Witch Loving

[Desertman]

Random, but this reminds me of an encounter I had with an invisible magicker once in the desert.

It went something like:

"Hey, I'm a big scary magicker. Be scared."

"Well, there's nothing I can do to stop you from killing me if you want to. So sit down and have a bite to eat at my fire if you care to, because I'm too old to be scared for you today."

"I hear that sort of thing so much it's cliché."

"Well, maybe if I didn't have a new invisible magicker fucking with me at least once ever three or four weeks I would be more impressed."

We basically had an OOC argument in game. They were telling me I wasn't roleplaying proper fear. I was telling them it's hard to roleplay proper fear when you see dozens of magickers regularly. We were both right.

They left, I lived.

It's hard to roleplay proper fear/awe/hate for magickers when you see them every single day of your life sitting in the same taverns as you with everyone else.

It's hard to roleplay proper fear/awe/hate for magickers in the desert when you see two a RL week and all of them want you to do the same "old encounter' for them again and again and again.

If I roleplayed proper fear/awe/hate for magickers every time I saw a magicker, especially in Allanak, I would spend most of my logged in time doing that and only that.

If you want me to roleplay a magicker is scary and rare.....make it rare. Otherwise I'm mostly going to treat them like any other undesirable that is just as common as they are.

[BadSkeelz]

It's hard to ropleay proper fear/awe/hate when you find magick just a fundamentally uninteresting story-telling element that has the added "Bonus" of immediately trumping every other factor. So many good political/combat/adventure plots reduced to "lol magick!"

[Armaddict]

If you want a real IC reason not to beat up a Gemmed sitting in the Gaj, it's because they're a fucking witch who will curse you and your entire family line.  Your children will be born with mutations.  Your weener will rot off.  You don't beat them up because you fear them.

Incorrect.  The gem around their neck says that they serve the city.  Commoners hear drivel about the Highlord's protection day in and day out.  The gemmed are tolerated by the Highlord because of their acquiescence to serving His will.  The Highlord does not tolerate upstart mages, and so the moment one is threatening to use their 'gift' as an assertion of power of the common, I fully expect the templarate to say 'Wait what?  You're okay with the idea that you can use this for self-elevation?!  That's a dangerous thought!'

Every time a mage threatens something like this while wearing the gem is the moment I start informing the templarate that there is a very uppity mage who is forgetting their place and threatening citizens.  Sometimes something comes of it.  Sometimes something doesn't.  If they are Oashi, it pretty much gets passed on to Oash to deal with, which is why D-man's words on such are valid.

This is not unyielding.  This -is- my actual compromise of gemmed and commoners being in forced close contact over time.  Before, I said the documentation demanded hatred and fear.  Now this is the compromise made through years of dialogue on the subject...they have to be included in things, which requires that they also realize they cannot depend on said fears above.  That is not an option anymore.  No more demanding fear of magick while also demanding acceptance of it.

[hopeandsorrow]

Dman sounds like you meet one really un-creative player.  Might be harsh of me to judge but I would have the same reaction.

"Be scared of me."

"LOL get in line, dude behind the last magicker who tried this shtick."

I dunno... when I play magick I usually play a PC unfit for the world, just trying to find a place, remain hidden, maybe use his powers in secret to accomplish goals.   Of course when I have the opportunity for karma classes  I don't see has a way to wield power over other players or harass random hunter #1233.  Sounds... lame honestly, one can be much more creative then that.  I rather take on the challenge of being more then just a random blur harassing hunting parties.

I guess I've only had limited exposure to magickers messing with me.  Only one time was it kind of silly, but we both rolled with it, but I believe wasn't intended to be a deadly encounter. 

[Desertman]

He was actually well played.

He just wasn't any more well played than the dozens of other magickers I see regularly.

It is what it is.

Magickers are more common than dwarves when it comes to PC to PC interactions. Throw an unusual dwarf at me and I will find that more interesting than magicker #551.

At best magickers get treated on the same social level for me as breeds, but in this case, breeds that maybe Oash or a Templar might back. It makes how you treat them a little different, but not by much.

[BadSkeelz]

It is perfectly valid to have hatred and fear of mages. It's how those feelings are manifested and acted upon that's important.

Personally I think the best everyday attitude for southern mundanes to have (as a baseline) is fear-driven resentment and disassociation from the Gemmed as much as possible. These things are strange, deadly, and gross, but they're also protected. You want to limit your interaction with them as much as possible lest you catch something from them or, Highlord forbid, get involved in something that might draw a Templar's attention.

It's only during periods of complete law-and-order breakdown that public violence is directed at the Gemmed. And, as someone has previously said, sometimes that doesn't work out very well.

[LauraMars]

It's important to remember that it goes both ways.

If I play a mage, she's most likely more scared of "normals" than they are of her.  Even if they're gemmed and working for House Oash - they know the score.

Social power, superior numbers, and might of arms are nothing to sneeze at.

[Dresan]

Random, but this reminds me of an encounter I had with an invisible magicker once in the desert.

It went something like:

"Hey, I'm a big scary magicker. Be scared."

"Well, there's nothing I can do to stop you from killing me if you want to. So sit down and have a bite to eat at my fire if you care to, because I'm too old to be scared for you today."

"I hear that sort of thing so much it's cliché."

"Well, maybe if I didn't have a new invisible magicker fucking with me at least once ever three or four weeks I would be more impressed."

We basically had an OOC argument in game. They were telling me I wasn't roleplaying proper fear. I was telling them it's hard to roleplay proper fear when you see dozens of magickers regularly. We were both right.

They left, I lived.

We must have encountered the same magicker.  I had practically the same conversation with one magicker, came in whispering in the ear. The only difference was I was playing a gemmer at the time myself. My character, a magicker himself, surrounded by gemmed magickers all his life, wanted me to be afraid of him for being a magicker.

This was before whiran karma requirements got bumped, haven't encountered a similar situation since.

Anywyas my opinion is that publically all magickers are scorned and often met with digust...privately/discretely though, I've been happily surprised to find that the docs can be rather accurate depending on the PC. Kudos

[Delirium]

It's important to remember that it goes both ways.

If I play a mage, she's most likely more scared of "normals" than they are of her.  Even if they're gemmed and working for House Oash - they know the score.

Social power, superior numbers, and might of arms are nothing to sneeze at.

This, very much this.

[Vwest]

It's hard to roleplay proper fear/awe/hate for magickers when you see them every single day of your life sitting in the same taverns as you with everyone else.

It's hard to roleplay proper fear/awe/hate for magickers in the desert when you see two a RL week and all of them want you to do the same "old encounter' for them again and again and again.

If I roleplayed proper fear/awe/hate for magickers every time I saw a magicker, especially in Allanak, I would spend most of my logged in time doing that and only that.

If you want me to roleplay a magicker is scary and rare.....make it rare. Otherwise I'm mostly going to treat them like any other undesirable that is just as common as they are.

Exactly that.

Especially for citizens of Allanak, you are exposed to gemmed all over the place. There is an entire city quad' dedicated to housing and training them, it lets out onto the main thoroughfare and they're welcome to hang around in regular taverns, rent apartments in the commons, shop in the bazaar and behave like everyone else without consequence. Then you have the considerable career options with Oash, one of the most prestigious noble houses that afford them superior status to common citizens, as well as the option of being a Templars minion and serving as confidant and council, or even as a flirty love interest.

If a citizen is growing up surrounded by this all the time, they're going to end up conditioned to it. The response from the PCs towards magick (mild distrust, shrugging and avoidance, some situational embracing) is just about spot on as far as I'm concerned, given the gemmed behave and interact with the game world and the people in it in more or less the exact same manner as everyone else, except they're forced to wear non-optional jewelry.

The entire OOC slant towards 'interaction with magick = twink / bad RP / another GDB hate thread' has never made sense to me, either, considering player options are more supernatural, rather than mundane.

http://armageddon.org/help/view/Guilds

Normal Guilds:
Assassins    Burglars    Merchants
Pickpockets    Rangers    Warriors

Karma Required Guilds:
Drovians    Elkrosians    Krathis
Nilazi    Psionicists    Rukkians
Sorcerers    Vivaduans    Whirans

(Templars, too, since they include psionics or magick options)

Six mundane options, ten supernatural options. The game was pretty obviously built with magick and magick powers being a major and functional part of regular play.

I've never been able to maintain the facade of magick being mysterious, scary and rare -- every time I start up a character with those kinds of bias, they're erased by in-game interactions within a few game years. In most cases, they end up in love with someone, sleeping with them, living together, then they're let in on the secret that guess what, you've been banging a witch/psi/sorc/undead (seriously) all this time.

The same goes for making friends in-game, especially as an independent. You end up making friends and associates and so many of them turn out to be an elemental, a Nilazi, even a sorcerer or psi that it becomes impossible for it to even come as a surprise after a while, or for your character not to become conditioned to it.

Overall, ArmageddonMUD revolves around and is propped up on the pillars of magickal trope. It is pervasive, it is invasive.

It is fucking everywhere.

It's time to embrace the horror, folks.

[BadSkeelz]

The only horror I experience from magick anymore is that my PC might get hijacked into another laser light show RPT.

[Vwest]

What, you didn't enjoy being a part of that non-interactive fiction?

Pew, pew.

[BadSkeelz]

All I got to do was kill some gypsy NPC. Didn't even see the dwakon  

More seriously, I'm afraid I would just suicide a character rather than be coerced into a magickal plot. They just have no appeal for me.

It's important to remember that it goes both ways.

If I play a mage, she's most likely more scared of "normals" than they are of her.  Even if they're gemmed and working for House Oash - they know the score.

Social power, superior numbers, and might of arms are nothing to sneeze at.

I do very much agree with this post, and have tried to play like that on my magickers.

[wizturbo]

BadSkeelz, I get this sense that you've just been included in a lot of bad magickal plots.  Or do you hate supernaturally leaning plots in all fiction? 

[MeTekillot]

He doesn't like anything you can hit with three unspeakables and not kill.

[BadSkeelz]

BadSkeelz, I get this sense that you've just been included in a lot of bad magickal plots.  Or do you hate supernaturally leaning plots in all fiction? 

The latter. Most Arm magick plots aren't really offensive; my reaction is typically the same as Desertman's "Gonna kill me if they want, so whatever" attitude. I do resent how Magick cheapens the role of politics and mundane skills.

I'm also saddened whenever an interesting character manifests because they just become a gimmick.

[Vwest]

I'm also saddened whenever an interesting character manifests because they just become a gimmick.

That isn't really a fair statement.

Some of the best experiences I've had in the game came from someone turning out to be more than I realized. Some time ago, I had a character in a romantic relationship with someone she shouldn't have been and the entire taboo of sneaking around, covering our tracks and that type of thing was an absolute riot and I loved the entire experience.

Then they dropped the bomb they were a mindworm.

When I recovered from choking and completely botching the opening scene, I realized that aspect of her character being out there had immediately overshadowed all the cool stuff we had going on up until that point. To a degree, the worm angle became the new 'in' thing and all the sneaking around, the taboo of a secret love and related things became mundane and old hat in comparison.

That character didn't become a gimmick and 'the' gimmick of mind reading powers didn't diminish what a rockstar character she was, but it took some adjustment on my part when I realized my character went from the co-star in a show about forbidden love to a supporting character in a show about a the life of a mind worm. That's what happens when you're the mundane at the side of someone rare and powerful, though.

They become a big deal, but you're still playing some bitch with a sword.

I suppose what I'm getting at is, when a character manifests or otherwise develops some new and unexpected character arc, it doesn't reduce them to a gimmick or diminish how interesting they are as a character. It doesn't diminish the merit or value of your character, either, even if it might initially feel like they're stealing the show from you.

[BadSkeelz]

You missed a prime chance to add eight notches to your belt, there.

I actually respect psions and their plots, finding them inherently spookier and more engaging. Still find their powergaming aspect annoying, but so many get killed trying to level up on newbies I kind of pity them at this point.

Magick almost always follows the same, predictable trajectory on top of just being dull to watch.

The bitch with the sword remains the most interesting PC in the game for me to play. Anything else is threatening to get in the way of my sword-bitching.

[Vwest]

You missed a prime chance to add eight notches to your belt, there.

I've got a closet full of belts, all of them notched to fuck, so I'm not too worried about it.

[Erythil]

Remember that it's a game ultimately about character interaction.  Mage characters need interaction too to have fun or they might as well go play an MMO, or have their own separate city somewhere.

[MeTekillot]

Remember that it's a game ultimately about character interaction.  Mage characters need interaction too to have fun or they might as well go play an MMO, or have their own separate city somewhere.

[TheWanderer]

I figure when a player loses a number of characters to mages (like Badskeelz?), they'll develop such an animosity for the class and the magick system as a whole that it'll translate well into IC hate. huehue.

If characters not only ostracized the magickers, but also the people who openly work and converse with them, you'd see a big difference in 'witch loving' because of the social stigma it bears. A failure to enforce the stigma causes these casual interactions between mundanes and magickers to play out the way they do.

#witchesandfriendsgetstitches

Yet on the other hand, their current representation in the game world doesn't really line up with documentation. They're plentiful, have weird amounts of clout, and people generally give their character an excuse to befriend one and make use of their special talents: "I'll do whatever it takes to win, Chief!"

Desertman also touched on the point of it being difficult to be afraid of something you interact with -soooooooo- much.

---

watev, doe. ain't my prob, bitches.

[Jave]

Personally (read: having nothing to do with my being on staff) I'd prefer if mages had no ground to go to. No elementalist quarter. No gemmed. No tolerant tribes or settlements. If you go magick you put it in the closet, go rouge, or get murdered like sorcerers and psions.

ETA: And if you didn't hunt and kill other opposing elementalists your elementals killed you. Welcome to magick: no friends allowed.

[MeTekillot]

maybe consider posting with your non-staff account if you don't want your words to carry staff weight?

[Asmoth]

I enjoy his transparency and sorta think that would be a good change to mages.