Reactions to the Witch Subguilds

[Harmless]

Akaramu, I'm with you 100% in terms of what I'd prefer to happen. What Lizzie above is touching on is what would have to happen to make the current playable choices reflect the IC world better; there is a mismatch.

Feco: The notion that "magick hate is cool" is all well and good if that's a form of interaction and roleplay. When magick hate/fear turns into an immediate shut-down of interaction then it's not really cool, it's just quiet. Then, when on top of all that, the magicker doesn't have nearly as much magickal ability to create that fear... it now also doesn't even make sense.

I'm not really happy that the subguild versions of magickers are so restricted either. But rather than continue to mope about what I can't do anymore, I'm trying to be optimistic and look towards the possibility that people will learn how to deal with magickers differently now. Maybe rather than be feared, they will be more aggressively subjugated, since their abilities are predictable and counterable and limited. That'd be a cool possibility also.. but it'd have to be a natural process of revealing the new nature of magick through IC interactions and not based on OOC knowledge, which takes time.

And I'm still with Akaramu in that I'd rather just have mainguild magickers be a special app option so we continue to have the magick users that inspired the original fear of them in the first place.

[manipura]

Feco: The notion that "magick hate is cool" is all well and good if that's a form of interaction and roleplay. When magick hate/fear turns into an immediate shut-down of interaction then it's not really cool, it's just quiet. Then, when on top of all that, the magicker doesn't have nearly as much magickal ability to create that fear... it now also doesn't even make sense.

I think Feco was just saying that there didn't need to be any change in magicker lore, because whether they are full mages or subguild mages, the fear and hate shouldn't be based on how much damage they are capable of doing, but the simple fact that they are unnatural beings doing unnatural things. 
It shouldn't matter to your average Zalanthan whether Amos blasts a swirling ball of fire the size of a wagon from his hand, or he makes tiny little flickers of flame dance on his fingertips.  Either way it isn't a natural thing so there should be the same amount of fear/distrust/wariness/etc, not a case of a PC going "Hmm...well Amos is a mage who does this and that with fire...but it's not -so- bad, because it isn't like he can burn down a whole building or set trees on fire."

[Raptor_Dan]

I'm not even sure if there was a change, IC. No one reacted differently when they could suddenly use #1 and #2 instead of 'arrow' when crafting. Is this purely a coded change? I know people have been roleplaying differently in some cases, but is there a change in the setting, that would require a different lore, or an explanation?

[manipura]

I'm not even sure if there was a change, IC. No one reacted differently when they could suddenly use #1 and #2 instead of 'arrow' when crafting. Is this purely a coded change? I know people have been roleplaying differently in some cases, but is there a change in the setting, that would require a different lore, or an explanation?

I'm of the belief that there's been nothing IC about the change, so I don't think there should be any difference in how mages are seen in game. 
I don't think PCs should have any inkling of "Hey, this mage doesn't seem so bad compared to that guy years and years ago."  If your PC openly hated mages in the past, they should treat subguild mages the same.  If your PCs way of dealing with mages was to avoid them at all costs, then keep on avoiding them. 

[boog]

yepyepyep, what she said ^

[Harmless]

No, there is neither any change in the lore, nor am I saying that the old lore should be changed. I am referring more to the subculture of gemmed and Templars, the ongoing plots that magickers would be getting into.  I can't really expound on this in too much detail, because a lot of what magickers actually do, are expected to do, and feared for doing, is find-out-IC information. I also still just have hope, and more hope that more options will open to the players who show a pretty reliable understanding of how proper magicker roleplay should look. I just hope that whatever happens, there are more storylines and activity surrounding this. The interaction of a dark fantasy world with subtle touches of supernatural is a cool aspect of the game, and I don't want to see it die off because of unintended consequences of some restrictions to our character creation choices.

[boog]

I don't think she was singling you out with her last post! Since it wasn't quoted. I think we were just meaning to reiterate that culturally, everyone should still be wary of 'gickers.

My post that approved of hers at least wasn't aimed your way, sweetness! <3

[nauta]

A related question: Would a commoner in Allanak know the different kinds of subguilds?  Right now, I believe a commoner in Allanak does know the difference between a sand witch and an air witch.  But would they know the difference between fire witch devastation and a fire witch guile (or whatever they are)?

I'm inclined to think they wouldn't, but I'm not sure.

[Reiloth]

A related question: Would a commoner in Allanak know the different kinds of subguilds?  Right now, I believe a commoner in Allanak does know the difference between a sand witch and an air witch.  But would they know the difference between fire witch devastation and a fire witch guile (or whatever they are)?

I'm inclined to think they wouldn't, but I'm not sure.

Definitely no.

[Raptor_Dan]

But would they know the difference between fire witch devastation and a fire witch guile (or whatever they are?

I like to think (and rp accordingly) that there isn't a category of fire witch, even IC. The fire witches that can throw fireballs, do so because their personality allows them to harness that aspect. The ones who can't simply don't have the personality traits to understand the ability or possibly just don't have the desire to do so.

[Harmless]

I don't think she was singling you out with her last post! Since it wasn't quoted. I think we were just meaning to reiterate that culturally, everyone should still be wary of 'gickers.

My post that approved of hers at least wasn't aimed your way, sweetness! <3

Eep. okay, thank you, I think I've made all the points I wanted to now anyways. 

[Lizzie]

I think that by this point, anyone who -would- know that there are differences in "types" of vivaduans, -do- know. When Oash says "Get me someone who can fill my waterskins" and you bring a vivaduan, and that vivaduan can't do it no matter how much they try and chant the right sounds to make water - then yeah - it's obvious there's a difference.

When the templar says "Find me a krathi, I need 20 fireballs ASAP" and you find a krathi and he can do all kinds of neat sparkly light-show stuff, but can't produce a single fireball, then you betcha - the templar and his commoner militia, and all their pals, lovers, boyfriends' bosses, and THEIR friends, family, and lovers and THEIR bosses - will eventually find out that there are different TYPES of krathis.

Will they know the OOC name of that type? No. But they'll eventually find out that "the guy who can shoot fireballs can't also make you glow all pretty like the sun" and "the gal who can make food, just like her mama used to back when they lived in that temple, can't also make a mekillot tip over, like her mother used to be able to do."

All the things that PCs who have existed since before the change, who exist currently, would have figured out by now that there is some kind of difference between then and now, and that mage PCs now have limits that not so long ago they didn't have. Sentient beings on Zalanthas, half-giants notwithstanding, are not stupid. They might attribute the differences to superstition, curses, Tek's power, or whatever else, but they absolutely positively without a doubt will know there's a difference.

***I refer to any sentient being who has had exposure to mages and magicks, OR who has pals who have exposure to mages and magicks, OR who has heard the latest gossip trickling down from people whose business it is to know about them, to their minions, and their pals, and their minions, etc. etc. etc. By now, these people would know that some kind of difference exists even if they don't understand what the difference is.

[wizturbo]

Lizzie's post should probably be true, but I don't think it is.  Intentionally so.  You have 20+ years of stories crafted with elementalists being a certain way, and the staff arbitrarily changed that without doing anything to make any sense of it in-game.  There is no event that caused all elementalists to suddenly have vastly diminished potential to use magick, there is no event that removed Drovians, Elkrosians or Nilazi from the world...  So they all exist, just virtually, with no representation in anyway to reflect their continued existence save whichever PC's happened to be around before these changes were put into effect.

I don't want this to come across as a complaint though, because it isn't.   The status quo makes it very easy for the staff to reverse these changes in the future.  I would rather they keep things they way there are, in this virtually hibernating form, than eliminating what I view to be some fundamentally cool things about this game entirely.  Eventually the pendulum will swing back the other way.

[Lizzie]

Actually there were hints IC to clue in a few people that changes were coming. Unfortunately, some of us didn't pick up on those hints, and of those who did, I'm pretty sure they're all dead, save one or two who ain't talkin.

So we're still stuck with what we see: that there *is* a difference IC between "what I've seen them thar vile critters do every fuckin day back when I was a wee lad of only thirteen, til I was older'n my bootstraps at the ripe ole age of twenny-seven" - and "what's going on now and over the past few years."

[nauta]

I get your position Lizzie, but I want to push back on it a little bit.  Here's the thought: a commoner trained in Oash, or an aide to a Templar, perhaps would notice that not all Krathis are the same in kind (for instance); but would the average commoner notice this?  The average uneducated commoner would, I think, hardly even know that there are differneces betwen Krathis and Vivaduans.  A more educated commoner might know that there are differences here, but I don't think they'd know that there are different kinds of Vivaduans.  On my reading of things, such an average commoner thinks that witches do all sorts of nasty things -- not just the subset of coded nasty things they can do: for instance, they can curse your babies, make you blind, put pimples on your penis, and so on.

That's my read of it, at least.  So I agree to an extent but disagree to an extent.

[Lizzie]

But Nauta, the average Oash aide and the average Templar's aide have friends, lovers, family. They are not isolated from the rest of the community and even have powers to converse through psionics to each other. Not all secrets are 100% secret 100% of the time. In addition, gemmed mages are not required to keep secret significant changes to their peers' powers. The fact that no new Elkrans or Drovians have come out into the public for the past few years, is something that would be noticed. It'd be noticed by anyone who is observant and some of THEM would tell other people what they've observed.

Person A notices something, tells person B and C. Each of people B and C tell two more people - and each of THOSE people tell 2 people...eventually the entire city knows that SOMETHING is different - even if they're not sure what that something is, or why, or when it first happened, or how it came about.

[Hauwke]

Staff have said there was no difference Icly from a main guild gick and a subguild gick.

And that all elkrosians, drovians and nilazi were removed from play but not from the game.

[Reiloth]

But Nauta, the average Oash aide and the average Templar's aide have friends, lovers, family. They are not isolated from the rest of the community and even have powers to converse through psionics to each other. Not all secrets are 100% secret 100% of the time. In addition, gemmed mages are not required to keep secret significant changes to their peers' powers. The fact that no new Elkrans or Drovians have come out into the public for the past few years, is something that would be noticed. It'd be noticed by anyone who is observant and some of THEM would tell other people what they've observed.

Person A notices something, tells person B and C. Each of people B and C tell two more people - and each of THOSE people tell 2 people...eventually the entire city knows that SOMETHING is different - even if they're not sure what that something is, or why, or when it first happened, or how it came about.

I don't think it's about it being secret, it's about understanding. Would a Commoner unfamiliar with magick even understand the differences explained by someone who is a Magicker, or familiar with Magick? I don't think so. They lump 'magick' together into being this amalgam, this scary hard to define lump of curses and misbegotten misfortune that can befall them if they cross a Gemmer the wrong way. If someone sat them down and tried to explain the difference between a Guile Krathi and a Destructive Magick Krathi, they might get the 'concept' of it, but I don't know if it would dispel their years of illusory suspicion, doubt, and superstition. You could tell them a million different ways that 'this' Krathi can't shoot fireballs out of their fingers, but I don't know if they would ultimately believe you. They probably will still, deep down, think that Krathi can roast your ass.

[Lizzie]

Staff have said there was no difference Icly from a main guild gick and a subguild gick.

And that all elkrosians, drovians and nilazi were removed from play but not from the game.

What staff might have said, and the reality of it, are not the same. Main guild mages were fundamentally different from what we know now as mage subguilds. Some characters were there during the change and are still in the game, and they know, ICly, that there exists a difference. SOMETHING is different, and they know it. There were even full-guild mages when those changes were made, who might still be in the game today, and would know without a doubt, that their contemporary peers are NOT the same as they are.

The staff can say otherwise, but it doesn't change the actuality of what IS, in the game.

[Reiloth]

Staff have said there was no difference Icly from a main guild gick and a subguild gick.

And that all elkrosians, drovians and nilazi were removed from play but not from the game.

What staff might have said, and the reality of it, are not the same. Main guild mages were fundamentally different from what we know now as mage subguilds. Some characters were there during the change and are still in the game, and they know, ICly, that there exists a difference. SOMETHING is different, and they know it. There were even full-guild mages when those changes were made, who might still be in the game today, and would know without a doubt, that their contemporary peers are NOT the same as they are.

The staff can say otherwise, but it doesn't change the actuality of what IS, in the game.

Maybe instead of hyperbole, those people should get in touch with Staff and figure out how they should react, or if they 'felt a disturbance in the Force'?

I'm unsure if you are playing one of those people, or just hypothetically speaking on their behalf. On the ground, in the game, I can say (from a Commoner perspective) there hasn't been a difference. People treat magick the same as they always have.

[Hauwke]

From an ooc perspective they are different. Icly it can be explained away as someone just being a little more powerful than your average gick if there are even any full guilders left.

[nauta]

Here's another related question:

Are the terms 'devastation', 'guile', and so on (from the help files on Krathi in this case, but etc. with the others) IC terms or OOC terms?  Setting aside the debate about who would even know or notice these terms, let's assume I'm playing a Templar who deals with the gemmed or an Oash Lord.  Would I know these terms?  Would the gemmed themselves know the terms?  Would rogue magickers know the terms?

[Reiloth]

Here's another related question:

Are the terms 'devastation', 'guile', and so on (from the help files on Krathi in this case, but etc. with the others) IC terms or OOC terms?  Setting aside the debate about who would even know or notice these terms, let's assume I'm playing a Templar who deals with the gemmed or an Oash Lord.  Would I know these terms?  Would the gemmed themselves know the terms?  Would rogue magickers know the terms?

I feel like it's an OOC term. Just like 'Enchantment Magick' isn't something a Sorcerer would call their magick, I feel like it's an OOC classification for the Guilds so there are distinctions between them. An "Enchantment Magick" sorcerer would just think of themselves as being a Sorcerer. If they met a Sorcerer of a different flavor, they would imagine them as being a Sorcerer of a different flavor, with a different set of spells.

[Lizzie]

Here's another related question:

Are the terms 'devastation', 'guile', and so on (from the help files on Krathi in this case, but etc. with the others) IC terms or OOC terms?  Setting aside the debate about who would even know or notice these terms, let's assume I'm playing a Templar who deals with the gemmed or an Oash Lord.  Would I know these terms?  Would the gemmed themselves know the terms?  Would rogue magickers know the terms?

I feel like it's an OOC term. Just like 'Enchantment Magick' isn't something a Sorcerer would call their magick, I feel like it's an OOC classification for the Guilds so there are distinctions between them. An "Enchantment Magick" sorcerer would just think of themselves as being a Sorcerer. If they met a Sorcerer of a different flavor, they would imagine them as being a Sorcerer of a different flavor, with a different set of spells.

Then why would a devastation krathi NOT think of a guile krathi as a krathi of a different flavor, with a different set of spells? Why would an Oash noble NOT think of a devastation krathi as a krathi of a different flavor, with a different set of spells, as a guile krathi?

They ARE different, they DO have different spells. This is true both OOC and IC. It is both the code, and the "reality" of the game world.

[Miradus]

They ARE different, they DO have different spells. This is true both OOC and IC. It is both the code, and the "reality" of the game world.

A master pianist I hear playing Mozart might not, in my mind, also be able to play jazz.

To me, he's still a pianist and I really don't know what he can or can't play until he's doing it.

Feels like guild-sniffing to me. "Oh, he cast X so I know he doesn't have Y."

When the reality is that I don't know that the guy I just saw fly away can't also nuke me with a fireball.