This thread covers the explanation of Power Sources, the Story Team’s stance on them, and advice on how they can apply to your lore. 

For advanced or veteran lore writers working on shelved pieces of lore, Powersources can be a very difficult topic to come by. 

Power sources are effectively what fuels a piece of lore. Feat, Magic, CA, etc., powersources are what gives a lore it’s lore effects. On the server, we have a good few. You can find them HERE at The Canon Energies. Please reference this post for any information on power sources.

Typically, we dislike new powersources. While this can be disheartening, we’ve already got most of the thematic bases covered and more. To think that one could have all these different sources of mana, and a new one, it can be frustrating. Often new powersources do exactly what others do, or try and emulate some combination between them- something which is most of the time, not positive or beneficial to lore. 

Another powersource we tend to have problems with is Egregore type lore, or lore that is made given the thoughts of a collective. This is often hard to represent, and often is just used as a justification to get something since “NPCs” can believe anything, and there can be any amount of them. It’s downright impossible to make new lorepieces that seem well made through the power of thought.

We already have many types of powersources. Instead of trying to make new ones, maybe try sub-dividing ones based on what type of magic you’re using. Deific magics have an easy ticket with this, as they can have their souls deifically blessed or modified to have their mana give a different effect- such as with Azdrazi/Herald Draan, or Paladin Embers. 

Mundane magics are things which have been tried, and are things best avoided. These are things like your typical D&D Sorcerer or Wizard, or your WoW Mage and Warlock. While concepts from these are nice and often used on the server, given our give-and-take system and drawbacks, this is simply undoable. Many have tried in the past to take the void out of voidal magics, but it often leaves it flavourless and just a straight upgrade in comparison. While voidal weakness and the infinite-horror aesthetic has been largely made optional, we do get the occasional submission to try and write it out. 

The beautiful thing about lore is that lore itself points you into a direction of how it should be roleplayed. Unfortunately, many take that route and simply stick to it with no plan to deviate. This can lead to a very same-y feeling between roleplayers. A good lore, if not most lore, allows players to take aesthetic variance and do things without the writing of additional lore. Some lorepieces have additions or variants which allow for wildly different lore-enforced variants between types of magics. An example, being The Voidal Feats and voidmagic. While voidmagic itself allows a roleplayer to take a thousand and one personal aesthetics with the basis of following the lore’s redlines, voidal feats take them into a direction where they can experience massive flavor, aesthetic, and mechanical difference in counterpart to one another. Think of this when you’re both using, and writing, lore. Allow some aesthetic variance and interpretation that doesn’t change how the lore affects others. 

Overall, stick to the basics. Keep your power sources used between magics, and try and focus on subdivisions of current power sources rather than re-inventing the wheel for just a single, new, piece of lore. 

This thread covers the explanation on what “Bad Lore” is, it’s concepts, and why certain archetypes or submissions are closed off entirely.

Bad Lore is a harsh term, particularly when describing older lores of the server which people put a lot of effort into, some 10+ years ago. However, people evolve and things age, and often, some concepts do so poorly over time. Not only this, but their utilization or place on the server is questionable. They can offer nothing, and just exist as a piece of lore to read. While not a bad idea, this gets into bad territory somewhat quickly. Let’s explain.

There’s a lot of different types of bad lore, but it mostly boils down to why it’s bad rather than the specifics itself. Some lores can never work, no matter how much finagling, spite, or effort one puts in because fundamentally their concept doesn’t mesh well with the server in some aspect. Some lores aren’t even open for submission, which is questionable given they have been in the past.

An example of fundamentally-flawed concepts of the server could be Telekinesis. While formerly a very important magic to mali’aheral, Telekinesis is a concept which has dulled greatly and seen over a dozen writes, each lacking in some aspect no matter how many times patches get applied to correct the last mistakes. Fundamentally, size, scale, and weight are impossible to work with in minecraft. Practically, any magic which tries to utilize some form of hard-measurement other than temperature or distance is going to run into this problem. Minecraft is not a good representation for size. It’s an extremely poor representation for weight. Even then, most roleplayers are extremely unfamiliar with both of these things, given it’s hard to picture yourself in armour. With swords, with shields, how that feels and how you can move. People can speculate and watch all their youtube videos on people performing incredible movement in armour or with weaponry, but it often delves into people arguing over semantics and specifics. Even if you wrote some form of equation, equality, or measurement, you are forcing people who have never read, nor maybe even want to read, your lore to get an idea of what has been arbitrarily decided for them. It’s written-in powergaming. Relativity is the best measurement here, and relativity is extremely poor for minecraft and magics; hence why it’s used sparingly.

Another fundamentally flawed concept has been Mentalism. While formerly a very well-kept magic and somewhat niche, it explored a lot of issues regarding metagaming and good-taste roleplay. These issues often revolved around death roleplay and how to get around memory blocks, metagaming names, places, people, and taking control of other people’s characters in a manner which can be abused incredibly easily. Simply put, writing in clauses or redlines that state “Don’t do this, or you’ll be in trouble” are extremely poor. A lore should not enable or allow those behaviors within their writing, and should not rely on Story Team to constantly validate roleplay and handhold people through utilizing their day to day magic. 

Another fundamentally flawed concept is Bladedancing. While never really having a formal magic submission, this is the idea of using a form of telekinesis which allows the user to manipulate floating blades around them, or weapons of some other kind. While again, a super cool and thematic idea, all the submissions we’ve ever received for so have been shot down for time and time again the same issues which exist on a conceptual basis. A person with a lore like this will always be fundamentally stronger than someone without it. While that seems a no-brainer that someone with a magic should be stronger than one without, it becomes unfair when every situation is an unwinnable one against a lore like this. What stops the user from not only manipulating blades, but having one of their own? Can they move just fine? Are they still strong? What cost is there to their lore? How long can they keep it up? What stops them from just stabbing people in the back with undodgeable strikes constantly?

And lastly, going over just two more of a similar archetype, Izkuuthi and Contract Magic. An issue with both of these is often players just felt at the mercy of both these types of magics and that they couldn’t do anything. That an Izkuuthi was impossible to kill, could constantly use illusion or manipulate the senses to borderline powergaming, that the Izkuuthi was practically an unskippable cutscene when interacting with them. Contract was similar, where it pinned players and made them feel trapped, and almost lore-enforced to be entirely at the mercy of a contract mage. People used them for anything, to be able to rip apart somebodies character if they didn’t do what they say. Both of these make players feel like a passenger of their own character rather than players master of their own destiny. Being trapped in these types of unskippable cutscene interactions may be fun for the lore, but it’s just wasted time and frustration for those interacting with it. That isn’t fun, good faith, or roleplay- it’s power tripping.

Overall, the list of conceptually flawed lorepieces goes something like this.

-Telekinesis

-Mentalism

-”Blade Dancing”

-Ruibrium

-Shade

-Arcanism

-Electric Evocation

-Izkuuthi

-Contract Magic

-Soul Puppetry

-Cognatism

-Non-voidal Voidal Magic (Taking away Voidal Weakness)

-Fi’hiraan’tanya/Direct antimagic (A magic/ability which completely shuts down another magic)

While some of  these lore submissions aren’t wholly auto-denied, they just can’t be written without changing the core concept of the lorepiece. When rewrites were submitted for many of these pieces, the lore was so wholly disconnected from the original that it was just it’s own idea, with the same name. Even then, they shared the same conceptual issues which ended up having them denied. While spite is a great fuel and naivety is a blessing, we strongly, strongly suggest not writing these pieces else you wish for a swift denial. 

Plagiarism

Another thing to consider is plagiarism. While this server is built as a hobby and is defined by artistic expression in a shared narrative, we do value keeping a core integrity to our lore. While many concepts on the server and in future submissions may be heavily inspired by other sources, the ST will accept nothing short of a piece which values it’s place on the server, more than another piece of lore coming in just as a port-over from the original source material. No matter what you’re writing, please keep in mind you should adapt your ideas to the LOTC universe, and stray from taking concepts and ideas from other sources. Invent and adapt those ideas further, but please refrain from copying other sources of lore and worldbuilding.

The other hand of bad lore is in submissions. With this final rewrite of Lore Criteria, we’re throwing in some submissions which are on an auto-denial list of nonacceptance. We’ll go into the reasons for that below.

Open Race Submissions are no longer being accepted. Given this was never used, we want to move to a direction where CAs can be more of a direction for open races, given our lore is practically hard-coded to only have our core five and their subraces. Additional subraces, simply, don’t really have the legitimacy or playerbase to warrant becoming an open race, given none have ever sustained themselves for any degree of time outside of a couple months. With this update, Open Race Submissions are no longer accepted. If you wish to write something like a subrace or something along the lines of an open race, consider writing a Group-A Creature Submission more revolving around your subrace or open race. See General Criteria: CA Race Groupings for more details.

Aengudaemonic/Patron Submissions are no longer being accepted. In the past, accepted deities have always been really awkward and serve mostly as “OCs” which don’t fit in with the rest of the deities. This is lore written for people just to look at, and never quite interact with. While the ST over the years has been shifting towards having Aengudaemons and Pantheon being far more interactive and represented, these submissions dump someone’s writing and ideas for them to use. This makes it awkward, and in the past, just includes deities which are disconnected entirely from the pantheon and don’t quite fit in with the rest of the world.

The final submission type we’re removing is Non-Aengudaemonic Deity-Class Submissions. These are a mixed bag, and to be frank, were written by a previous admin with no real clue on what they would service or what they would do. Given we want to remove any mention of something like Primordials (another bad lore), and keep our lore simple at face and complex at back with Aengudaemons at the top of the chain. While Voidal Behemoths have their purpose, these are always used in large events in which they never show; since a voidal behemoth is effectively so powerful it’s outside of any ST’s perspective to play rightly outside of very distance proxy. With so, this submission type will close.

This short thread covers the Story Team’s stance on healing and how it should be handled within lore. 

Healing, by our definition, covers healing of other players in or outside of combat. While the two do have very different nuances and feelings, they do share some similarities. We’ll go into both, and describe why the Story Team holds some caution into what types of healing are being utilized.

In general, we found that theres pros and cons to each different archetype of healing.

Free Healing

Free healing is healing which is described as healing which often costs mild resources, if any. Energy (Mana, stamina), emotes, IRL time, reagents, faith of some kind, etc. These are your most traditional fantasy healers, like Dungeons and Dragons Clerics, or Priests in WoW.  This isn’t limited to just magic, but can be alchemical or mundane means of healing too.

Free healing, being the most traditional in fantasy, is often that which is coveted in lore. There’s nothing quite wrong with that, however, there comes the issue where this can easily eliminate impactful moments or character development, or stifle consequence and conflict. While it may take multiple emotes, perhaps even hours of combat, to wound someone or be in the process of wounding someone, a healer may have an ability prepared in that time which lessens, prevents, or undoes that damage quickly and without issue. This can be really detrimental, because it can completely skew a fight in the healers favour. Typically, free healing is reserved for very minor or small wounds, at a real cost which prevents a caster from using offensive capability. While fun for the healer, it can be incredibly unfun for the offending party. 

Not only this, but the target of healing can lack fun as well. A common issue players have is that they find themselves overwhelmed during medical RP, the healer often emote-dumping how quickly, efficiently, or effectively they can completely null wounds and effects and stabilize a wounded person. Free healing suffers from this as well, with the wounded party often simply sitting there while a free healer just cures them. This can be incredibly unengaging, and lead to nothing changing in plot, character development, consequence, and more. 

For in combat healing, consider how powerful an ability/potion may be in undoing a wound which is an outcome in give-and-take CRP, as a healing ability/potion that doesn’t have to. You don’t have to work with another (or yourself) narratively to heal them, only fixing what another has done to them, and what the wounded accepted as part of that give-and-take trade. Keep this type of healing costly, temporary, and unlike just fixing a wound completely.

For out of combat healing, consider the fact that in honesty, things do not have cost. In the term of a day, a mana cost is minimal as most often someone will get it back tomorrow. In the term of material components, most can be spawned out of thin air without difficulty, or without roleplay attached to gathering them. These are things that can’t really be changed. For out of combat free healing, consider that your resources are effectively unlimited, while in comparison, a wound is finite. Be fair, and allow narrative to develop further and characters to progress from something like this.

Ultimately, the resources used in free healing are inconsequential, and thus the efforts of any party involved in the conflict are made inconsequential as well. When writing your lore, or utilizing healing, please express caution into how much you feeling effective is trading others making narrative.

Trade Healing

Trade healing is healing which follows a sort of “eye for an eye” doctrine. Trade healing is healing in which one trades wounds, their severity, their emotion, their blood, their energy, all in some effort to lessen or remove the wound or affliction of the afflicted. This can be put upon other targets unwillingly, or taken on by the healer or allies willingly.

Trade healing can be significantly more interesting than free healing, and can offer a more interactive roleplay experience. However, one thing players may run into is the fact their RP is notably gray. In this sense, they do not always feel like the good guy, they feel there is too much work, too much cost, etc. - While potentially true depending on the lore, this is a personal issue, although this type of healing does enable it. This is generally the safest bet for healing, and the one granted the most leeway. This allows for good character development, roleplay, and decisionmaking. This can lead to deciding where one’s power is best spent, if wounds are worth healing, and if there are alternative routes to be taken. Rather than a one-ability-cure-all, trade healing allows for more options and interactions to be utilized to encourage an actual recovery process within healing, having lasting consequence and effect on the wounded party.

Time-based Healing

Time-based healing is healing which is very similar to free healing, but it may take multiple sessions or extended emote times for the therapeutic effect to take place on the healed target. Time-based healing often can involve more severe or traumatic wounds or wounding, such as psychological or even limb/organ damage. While this mostly works for extended, chronic effects a character has had like a lost limb or a long-time sickness, it can get really complex when one factors in short term wounding.

Time-based healing, given it’s similarities to free healing, can very much suffer from the same issues. Traditionally, this type of healing suffers from the issue where it can lead to the same emote dumping and unengaging roleplay that comes with free healing roleplay. Given the power often lended to this type healing, with the ability to undo great things, these abilities should be very rare, and heavily scrutinized. Consider how time-based healing can be constraining with multiple sessions, days, or people, and consider how much the effects should have on a user and how they should scale accordingly. 

Overall, consider carefully healing and it’s effects on the healer, healed, and the attacking party. Consider what limitations you want to implement and what type of healing is best for your lore, if applicable. Do not be afraid of making your healing too weak! The Story Team will always tell you and help to make sure your magic is as fun to use and balanced. Try to err on the side of underpowered, rather than overpowered, and The Story Team will scale accordingly in feedback.

This thread explains the Story Team stance on the techlock and magi-tech.

Techlock

“Techlock” is a term which fundamentally defines what technology we have on the server. Given we are a fantasy medium with the best interests in mind, we have created a Techlock https://www.lordofthecraft.net/forums/topic/192604-the-techlock-hub-page/ which supplements how we limit and define what we have on the server. Often, people will justify some sort of time period excuse. Such as, “We have cannons, and the chinese civilizations had made guns back in 800, so why can’t we have guns?”

Simply put, in all terms and arguments, no. Although we have some suspended disbelief on the server, there are bad actors out there. We do not allow obscure or extremely dated technologies which seek to loophole or break techlock. We have a strictly defined techlock which limits things such as Gunpowder and its applicability, and what real world elements are on the server. Please, do not overthink things. Do not try to “science” too hard on what we have, we are a fantasy medium with constraints on realism. The Techlock in general is meant to provide a reasonable, sustainable boundary for which we can maintain a unique fantasy setting without ebbing too close to reality. 

Furthering on “science”-ing too hard, this server is a wonderful foundation for creativity and artistic expression. While some may love the detail you might go into regarding some very in-depth smithing roleplay, keep in mind much of the server has little interest or knowledge in so. Following that, writing anything involved with inventions or techlock should be kept simple and understandable, easily digestible so that anyone on the server could read it comprehensively.

When making inventions, keep the techlock in mind and try to make unique items which don't exist simply to break the techlock, but introduce an interesting contraption on the server. Think outside the box, think like an inventor. 

Magi-Tech

Magi-Tech is essentially magical technology, which can bypass the techlock in some cases (dependent on what the magi-tech is emulating). However, this does not mean that the server should dive into science fiction territory or go too advanced. Things like AI have been on the server, which was rather out of place and has since been culled. New inventions with magic aiding in the process is fine, so long as it is creative and not just imitating real life technology. In the past this has meant computers, particle accelerators (seriously), sno-cone machines, etc. Try and keep it tasteful, and unique. You have an entire fantasy world where you can do and make whatever you want, to just copy real-life inventions is so dull. Try to put some pizazz into it, some fantasy, put some thought and creativity with the lore we have in our universe. You’re granted that leeway, that magic simply makes things work- take that and run with it. Don’t try and over-science something with magic, as that’s against the nature of magic itself. Alchemy is perfect for these types of things, and works, with things like Smoggers and Animii acting as slightly techlock breaking, but highly fascinating and well crafted lorepieces.

When writing magi-tech, consider what would happen if someone unfamiliar with the lore involved got their hands on it. An arcane cannon, are these just better than regular cannons? Do they require a mage to use, so that they don’t powercreep cannons? Think of how you would use enchantments, and think of how you could make your magi-tech useable, or unusable, to the majority. Avoid ‘gatekeeping’, for things that reasonably anyone could use, and define exactly what it is someone can’t use certain magi-tech. Keep it flavorful, keep it fun, and stick to a theme rather than an effect you are simply trying to justify writing a lore to make happen. 

This thread covers the stance Story Team has taken on Lore Variants. Lore Variants are defined as “Antithesis” magics, “Alt” magics, or “Variant” magics. These are lore pieces which take after another piece, offering a sort of subsect or branch of that original lore which has spun off into it’s own direction. Think of Dark Shamanism, as example.

Over the years a number of lore proposals have popped up that were “dark” variants of existing magics. “Dark” druidism, “dark” paladins, “dark” shamanism, et cetera. Conceptually, these dark alternatives are meant to be another route to take for the magic that is “dark” or “evil” and/or are meant to act as the antagonist towards the already existing version of the magic, such as dark shamanism’s relationship with shamanism.

However, a common issue with these pieces is that they don’t really offer anything that the other magic doesn’t and tend to just be aesthetically different variants of the existing piece made so that a person doesn’t have to deal with the current powersource or group. Another is that they ignore that a lot of these magics are morally ambiguous. Druidism is fully capable of being “dark” if the character using it wants it to be that way, there’s no reason to have a new lorepiece to justify just having evil druids. 

For magics that are not morally ambiguous, such as holy magics, an argument can be made to have a “dark” alternative for those that wish to RP as rogues or a darker variant of the magic. Currently if you attempt to do that, you essentially get targeted over by groups disconnecting your character. However keep in mind, that is creating good conflict roleplay, so creating an entirely new magic simply for that purpose is iffy. If you are attempting to create said “dark” variant, you should also make sure that it is providing some kind of roleplay for the other group that isn’t purely antagonistic, and goes into it’s own direction that allows the two groups to work together to make an interesting narrative and story between them.

These submissions can also be more subtle, going into directions of subtle additions, amendments, or simple variants which offer something else to the aesthetic of the lore. An example is how Azdrazi could become corrupted, granting them different mechanics, abilities, and so on; far from an “Upgrade”, it’s a vastly different direction in the lore’s way, and aims to accomplish something very different from originally intended. Submissions going into this variant direction are favourable, and often aim to provide something different from the original group, both functionally, aesthetically, and mechanically. While different, they certainly are not their own magic.

When working on a Lore Variant, consider deeply. “Is this something I can accomplish already?”

If you can say yes, then it’s likely a poor lore variant. Further, answering “Yes, but it could be better if I had these tools” - it becomes tricky. However, most likely, it is probably a frowned upon lore variant. This is because this is additive, and not transactional. You are not trading parts of your lore, but instead just giving yourself more tools to go into this different avenue of roleplay. This effectively leaves the original piece unfinished without this “DLC” variant piece.

However, if you can say no, then there may be some idea there. A variant should be a similar piece, certainly, you’re not writing a different lore! You’re trying to write a lore that may go into a different direction, or accomplish a different goal. 

Another example of a good lore variant is the Voidal Feats (Voidstalking, Arcane Scions, Voidal Artificery, Voidal Eminence). The voidal feats do not fundamentally change how one performs their magic mechanically, but each guides them to developing their characters and how they perform them. Adding flair and individuality to every user, encouraging them to do different types of roleplay with some new spells and abilities which focus specifically on their niche. While not significant, or even enough for their own magics, they are small pieces of lore that encourage players to develop their roleplay and define their characters with certain aesthetics and abilities without affecting, detrimenting, or downgrading from regular voidal mages.

Overall, think of how this may affect the original group, and how this may affect this lore’s roleplay and impact on the server. Ideally, a lore variant should go into a different direction, co-existing with the prior. While there may be some conflict between the two, it should not be the primary purpose of the lore variant. The lore variant should have goals elsewise which allow the two to, on a meta scale, coexist and be looked upon as similar, yet distinctly different. 

This thread discusses the concept of “The Lore Web” and how we can do our best to maintain it.

The Lore Web is a concept coined rather recently, but one which has been in effect for years. The Lore Web is the idea that all lore is like a web- it interacts with one another in an exchange. There are two states of the lore web that we can really be in. Out of the lore web, and in the lore web. 

To be in the lore web means you are tangled and lost- most lore does not add up to one another or it often contradicts, and reading one piece often leads to reading multiple others. 

To be out of the lore web means that you do not have to run in circles to find lore interactions, and that these actions are often presented to you easily. Oftentimes, writing broad statements such as the grounds for an effect to occur, rather than specific examples, gives one relief that they don’t have to bounce around from piece to piece.

Here’s an example of the two.

In The Lore Web

In the Druidism lorepiece, it states that Druids cannot learn Necromancy, Naztherak, and Mysticism. This sounds a lot like Druids can’t learn dark magics, or magics which alter the soul, but it doesn’t say that directly. But now there is a hypothetical new rewrite for a new soul-altering darkmagic. Druidism doesn’t say it isn’t compatible with this, even though it is trying to in the original lore. This leads to a discrepancy where it doesn’t make sense for druidism to be able to learn this new soul altering magic, when they now arbitrarily can’t learn those others. 

Out of The Lore Web

In the druidism lorepiece, it states Druids cannot learn soul altering magics. In a new submission for a soul altering magic, it does not need to specify it is incompatible with Druidism specifically. It could even counter and say that it is incompatible with deific magics, and still be fine- just that the magic is soul altering. This way, lore is effectively future-proofed, allowing for less headache when both reading and writing new lore.

“...Unless otherwise stated”

All lore and lore rules operate under a “...Unless otherwise stated” clause, in which that specific thing applies, until it doesn’t. An example, Aurum is capable of inflicting great pain upon any CA creature. However, some creatures may have reasons to not be weak to Aurum. In their lore, it should specify they are not weak to aurum. If it were not written, the “Unless otherwise stated” clause would kick in, and Aurum would be an effective weakness. 

Another potential lore interaction is “Magic Stacking”. A very old term but one with a lot of weight to it. Magic Stacking is a scenario in which a player gathers as many lores as possible (MAs, FAs, CAs) to increase their playerpower. Not quite minmaxing, but along those same lines of bad faith. Magic stacking is a potential when lores are under-costed in slots, or when compatibilities aren’t quite written in. When working on your lore, make sure to include compatibilities or incompatibilities with other lores. It is best if you remain specific on the reasons why, rather than the specifics themselves. For example, you shouldn’t say “My dark magic is incompatible with paladins, druids, shamans, etc etc…” but rather “My dark magic is incompatible with any deific magic EXCEPT xyz because it gives a tainted soul.”. This allows the piece to be future proofed, where say if a new deific magic comes out which allows for tainted souls to connect, you don’t need to write an amendment specifying compatibility. There’s a lot to account for, which makes it best that you focus on power sources and slotting, rather than trying to figure out how to tangle and untangle webs of compatibilities which can be fringe and niche. Overall, make sure your lore is appropriately slotted and with a good compatibilities list to assure a prevention of magic stacking.

Magic Targeting is another potential lore interaction. Magic Targeting is when one lore piece may target another lore, either written as a weakness in one piece or as a strength in another. An example of this could be is how Paladinism’s magic is highly effective against dark creatures, which include Azdrazi. While this magics thematic sense and the purpose of that magic, be careful with how you do so. Magic targeting can seem unfair when one group seems to have a massive advantage over another- and while advantages are okay, things should not be entirely one-sided. Rather than shutting down your opponent, focus on exploiting a weakness and a vulnerability to take them down with a fighting chance. We also advise speaking to members of that targeted lore, to make sure that you are fully aware of how to write that target to develop your lore and theirs in good faith and in the interest of good spirited roleplay. 

An example of magic targeting, put very shortly, can be something like this.

Paladinism has Xannic Mists which are incredibly effective against certain creatures, Azdrazi being one of them. How do you state in both lores the same thing, perhaps written or even amended at different times, while still maintaining accuracy and being outside the web? Here is how our lore currently tackles this issue.

In the Azdrazi lorepiece, it states Azdrazi are susceptible to Xannic mists, causing extreme pain and fear when wounded, and in touch anxiety and discomfort. This gets to the point, and directly describes what is important for the Azdrazi to know. Chiefly, how their character is affected and how they should roleplay it.

In the Paladinism lorepiece, the lore may not even state Azdrazi directly, outside of mentioning they are one of the creatures affected. It includes information pertinent for the Paladin to know, such as casting, emotes, limitations on their own spell or casting, etc… Only telling them how they apply the effect, and what it should do. 

This thread covers the stance currently taken on the leeway given with lore on it’s more passive “boons and banes”, which are benefits or detriments that your lore may have.

Boons

There is an unlimited plethora of benefits you can grant to your lore. Whether it be a CA that increases your strength, or a material which is stronger than steel. Genuinely, this feedback cannot cover every single facet of what you can do- but the ST can give as much good advice as possible.

More in tune with CAs or MAs, some bonuses are things which give a character passive benefits. This can be things like increases in strength, mental fortitude, natural armour, etc. When writing your bonuses, be sure to try and avoid mary-sue perfectionism with your writing. Such as perfect disguises for CAs, or orc (maybe even greater) strength on an otherwise unchanged character. These can make for rather uninteresting bonuses which only serve as an OOC convenience. Either to avoid any form of intrigue, or to try and have an auto-win in any form of battle. Generally, the ST will allow limited increase, change, or benefit in these circumstances. Limited polymorphs, minor (at best) passive strength increases, mental shielding only if it makes sense. Anything greater, should come as an ability, or with some active cost. When writing passive boons, always put priority to if something makes sense, then adding the boon afterward. Never make a boon and write the lore to justify it existing. 

Passive bonuses should avoid gimmicks. Gimmicky things can be like rolling benefits, interference with mechanics (such as seeing through blocks, invisibility, breathing underwater, etc…). While something like enhanced perception or nightvision is okay, something that justifies borderline metagaming would not be. Such as ‘detecting’ magics, cas, etc. on another person, or being able to detect some sort of attack, casting, or so on within a certain radius can be distasteful as well. Consider as well the limitation of minecraft mechanics. Currently, there is no way to mechanically represent underwater breathing, lack of food, invisibility, and so on. Please do not rely on this or try to incorporate this into your lore.

Some boons like ‘immortality’ can be thrown out willy-nilly, or even certain levels of strength. While yes, your ability could be justified because you can potentially perform it mundanely, it doesn’t justify doing it for someone who can’t. As an example of what that means precisely, just because someone is a CA, doesn’t entitle them to orc strength. While one could be an orc, and with the CA, that doesn’t mean the CA should have orc strength inherently. Often this excuse is piled onto lore, justifying abilities by saying “But what if I was under these certain conditions, then I could do it and my lore couldn’t?”. An example of this could be you have a spell which blocks an arrow for free. One could justify that spell as saying, oh, it’s the same thing as having a shield. The fact of the matter is, it’s not. Because you don’t have to make/acquire a shield, equip one, or be hindered by one in any manner. There’s no setup- it devalues those who actually incorporate that as part of their roleplay.

As before, the same goes for immortality. Yes, you can turn off aging with Midpoint Theorum. Yes, you can simply ignore aging as an elf or as a human, and be entirely unaffected. That doesn’t mean these things are worthless. For those who go that extra mile and do care about their roleplay, these are big, implicative things which can be major motivations for characters. Don’t take or use them lightly.

Overall, take into account as well with boons what other lorepieces may take to accomplish them. Carbarum is harder than steel, and is exceedingly rare and difficult to refine- is your stronger-than-steel metal justified in some way that it doesn't invalidate carbarum? Does your lore grant a free easy-access immortality that those of Frost Witches or Azdrazi have to earn with great difficulty? Does your lore just do what another lore does, but better? With less cost? We want to avoid powercreep and making sure that each lore is nuanced and interesting. This does not mean some lorepieces simply hold certain boons hostage as the only lore that can use them, it just means to take things in your own unique direction with lore rather than trying to improve upon others.

Banes

Banes with lore are things which scale back a lore’s power, or utility. While you’re practically unlimited with what drawbacks you can give to your lore, there are a lot of things to consider.

Direct Drawbacks 

Direct drawbacks are things which directly make a lore less favourable. Maybe your CA-submission is weak to a certain material, or that they are vulnerable to command and manipulation. Those two are very different things- things which can vastly change how a lorepiece functions, or where it’s real power comes from. When writing direct drawbacks, make sure to consider a few things. Make sure to consider that your drawbacks will try to be negated, meaning they can be prevented. Like with a sound sensitivity, just having a user wearing earmuffs. Or with a ‘too hot to touch’, just wearing gloves.  You want to make sure that your drawback is not available to be fully ignored, or in some circumstances, ignored at all. Make sure that people understand your lore has a definitive, non-negotiable drawback which balances its power out and keeps the game of give and take fair. When writing direct drawbacks, while you can include as many as you like, make sure to include at least some form of mundane counterplay. Not all players utilize lore to the same extent as one another, and should have some, at least mild, fairness when in combat with one another. Reward those who plan, prepare, and execute, and give something token to those who don’t. 

Indirect Drawbacks

Indirect Drawbacks are things which indirectly make a lore less favourable. An indirect drawback can be as example, a CA without a disguise. Or a magic which takes away more slots than usual, or makes people ineligible for certain other lores- even feeding mechanics where a lorepiece requires to feed on other players in some sense. More on a meta scale of events, an indirect drawback is something which can be alright if done correctly, and very bad if done poorly. Often indirect drawbacks go through a route which inhibits roleplay, and shuts off an entire avenue from some types of roleplay in whole. This leads to the “Sleeper Rally” effect we see from some lorepieces, where a CA or Magic is entirely unfavourable to be or utilize unless in combat. Thus, they only come around for combat. This in practicality, kills a character and any use they might have outside of combative or potentially-combative scenarios. This is what often leads to the infamous “spook CT rp” where dark mages who had no way to blend into society or rp with others would meet in Cloud Temple, because it was the only place they could. While there is argument for evil-guys staying in their evil-lair, these people are condemned to roleplaying with strictly their own coven, and worse, only being able to kidnap, kill, and hunt people for their roleplay. This locks a lorepiece into a horrible corner where it becomes less interesting to play, and dull to use. 

Trade Drawbacks

Trade drawbacks are things which can be both a boon, and a bane. They’re a toss up of something negative in some circumstances, positive in others. These can be extremely interesting to utilize in your lore if done correctly. Perhaps it gears your lore to use some form of ability or passive in combat, and makes them less favourable out of combat. Maybe the inverse, where an ability has very potent use in something like say, forging, but is a drawback otherwise and unfavourable to use in combat outside of very niche circumstances. These can be interesting, just be wary of the power you imbue into these types of banes. 

This thread explains the Story Team’s stance taken on glass cannons and the mentality it creates.

A glass cannon is a term used in MMOs and other game settings such as tabletops where someone has a character created that is very strong when it comes to dealing damage, but the downside is that they can’t take much damage themselves. “Glass cannon” as glass shatters easily while cannons have incredible damage potential. When it comes to LotC, we are not playing against NPCs like in most games nor do we have a well crafted game at our disposal meant for highly intensive text-based combat and it’s balance. Even in events, there is a balance to be achieved.

PvE or PvP, CRP is a game of give and take. That does not necessarily mean you give and take before the fight has already begun. What this means precisely, is you should not stack on a bunch of weaknesses to justify an extremely strong ability or creature. An achilles heel is fine in lore, but given that, that does not justify the fact one can have incredibly powerful or versatile spells to compensate.

These types of abilities are ones which utilize combinations of very short emote counts, very high damage outputs, large areas of effect, and multi-actioning (Performing two things in the same action, such as two separate attacks from abilities or mundane weaponry alongside abilities).

Thus, we disallow and forbid entirely abilities and lores which justify their immense strength given they have a weakness. Do not have it mistaken - weaknesses are expected in your lore. Absurdly powerful spells are not justified by these weaknesses. 

This thread covers the advice and ST’s thoughts on Lore Structures & Environment Warping abilities, spells, rituals, lore areas, and so on.

Environment Warping is a big set of words to describe a somewhat basic function. Some lore has the ability to, or does, “warp”, or otherwise change, environments from what they are. This can be small and localized, to large and gamechanging. An example of this could be Voidal Tears, which can be made of theoretically infinite size, and can later explode to cover an area three-times it’s own. Paladins have chanceries, druids have fae rings, mystics have menhirs and their deadbreath, etc.

Lore Structures are defined as the specific structure created by a lore, such as a voidal tear, chancery, menhir stone, and more.

Environment Warping is defined as the effects of that structure, either during or after it’s creation and-or destruction. 

When making lore structures and environment warping, consider a couple of things. 

Be sure to be mindful of region permissions, and how that may affect your lore structure. While you can place signs globally, you cannot place blocks globally. Consider how that may limit your lore, or interact. The ST operates on a policy that while we may sign a structure, we will not build or create it for you. This is up to you, and requires you to have some form of permissions on the tile from the lair/settlement/nation owner, or for you to own that area yourself. 

While there exists some exceptions with this, this is our standard. Be mindful also of how others may interact with the area. We will not tolerate lore structures which are deliberately unreachable or hidden to a point where it indicates bad faith In the past we saw this in the form of Soul Trees far underground with block-perfect sunlight exposure, menhirs hidden at bedrock, and chanceries behind dozens of locked doors and switches. While you shouldn’t write your lore around the possibility this may happen, as the ST are diligent in their upkeep, you should be mindful of how your lore structure could be abused in this manner.

Environment Warping is another thing to consider. You will always want to create roleplay, flavor, and intrigue with environments, rather than non-mechanical forced mechanics. Such as trying to lock players out of a region, or block their magic entirely, or to weaken and incapacitate players in the region. A region message is a region message, and tracking how ‘long’ someone is in there is difficult. You should avoid banning other lores from interacting with your warped environment unless it makes complete unavoidable sense to, as with Voidal Hollows and Thanhium. Instead of banning magics or incapacitating people in your area, try lowering tiers or mana pools, or instead inflict symptoms like dizziness, fatigue, weakness, and so on which are more freeform and suggestful rather than forced. While there is the frustrating truth that OOC curiosity will always best roleplay reasoning, and that characters will always be “fearless” in a scary zone, and that characters will “power through” the pain or symptoms they may acquire, you should simply flow with it and encourage things elsewise to best suit both parties. 

With lore structures and environments, consider how they can be removed, or broken. Can they be purged by holy magics? Cleansed with druidic or spiritual magics? Obliterated with mundane things like flame or tools? Consider these and always make sure the average player can by some means interact with your environment without ST guidance to do so. Make sure the lore is clear, concise, and friendly to people who may be unfamiliar to it. 

A suggestion or alternative one might take to both warping or cleansing land is incorporating a cost of some kind. More than mana or a couple of emotes, maybe think about incorporating material reagents, or more users, in your lore when warping or cleansing land. This gives the warp/cleanse a little more value, and makes it feel more impactful and friendly to roleplay than something that may simply appear, then disappear.

Another thing to consider is what lore structures and environments do for those who benefit from it. It is mostly fine to give your lore buffs and boons while within their region, but be sure that it is not too “gamey” to where players feel required to be within their zone, or that they are unstoppable within their zone. Make sure lore structures and environment warps are first and foremost, flavorful and interesting. They should be fun and unique, and not just an excuse to have stronger casting or greater stamina. Think outside the box on what you can do here, what opportunities are present that you can allow for creative roleplay, crafting, character changes, ability changes, that can make for something unique. 

This thread covers the full story team stance on Connection & Disconnection, and advice on how to fit it best within your lorepiece. 

Connection and Disconnection are two topics which have, in the past, been heavily controversial to both players and the ST. Thus, over the years we’ve been testing out different stances and systems, and ultimately, have come up with some interesting conclusions which now shape out standards and criteria. This thread will primarily focus on the nature of connection and disconnection, rather than the exact methods. If you came here concerned about how you are connected or your power source, please check Explanation: Power Sources for more details.

Connection

Connection is something which introduces you to a magic or ability. Something which spawns your journey with that lore, or even advances it. Sometimes, connection is something that is taught and not inherent. Many CAs take after this, and a couple of MAs as well. While it is nice to have a sort of ‘quality control’ when it comes to introducing new players into a lore, there is also the issues that come with it.

In the past there have been issues with gatekeeping and locking magics by having the connection be tightly guarded, or kept in a sort of council. This nature of the server has mostly been stopped and has been broken by Lore Injections (see Story Information: ST Oversight), and is no longer something you should quite worry about with your lore. Gated connections are no problem and are mostly at a player’s free will to write however they wish. Take into note how one can involve other people, with or without the lore, into inducting new members of a lore with their connection. Make connection a special thing, rather than a mandatory part of roleplay. Make it fun, and interesting, for a character to go through. 

Disconnection

Disconnection is a much more wary topic for The ST. Disconnection advocated by one’s self, meaning that one can disconnect at their own whim, is mostly fine. “Mostly?” you may ask, and yes, there is some small caveats. With disconnection of something more severe or tangible, such as a soul, mind, or body altering lore, try to include some form of downside with disconnection. Something temporary, and maybe even permanent effects from so- always allow for players to carry that weight of disconnection as long as they would like to. While some may only like to have an enforced week of weakness, some may live with that effect for a very long time. It can mean a lot for a player, and disconnection should always. In the case of something like a transformative magic, CA, feat, etc. where a character is severely altered physically, disconnection should be a very difficult thing to do, if not outright impossible. One should recognize the weight of decision with lore that changes a character, and keeping to that choice in perpetuity - being able to take a piece of lore which completely changes a character, and simply take it off and turn back to normal, or even in a slightly hindered state of normal, is something that kills a lot of narrative value and character development at an OOC whim. Choices made have no weight to them.

Disconnection can as well in some magics be brought on by other players. One player may forcefully disconnect another player from a CA, Magic, or Feat. Often times with CAs, this is paired with a Permanent Kill (PK) of a character. 

Be cautious in how you may use disconnection in lores. 

“Disconnection by Tenets”

Used to be a common way. Tenets are “Rules” or strictures set out by your lore (Typically, a deity setting their ground rules) which dictate if one can be disconnected or not. This lead to both “Automatic” and “Greenlight” disconnection. 

Automatic disconnection is disconnection in which breaking a tenet would instantly disconnect you from the magic- the issue being, this is impossible to track and is on an honor system for players to follow. 

Greenlight disconnection is disconnection in which one can do anything they wish and cannot be disconnected until they explicitly break tenets.

“Chaos Disconnection”

Is the last form of common disconnection, in which anyone for any reason could disconnect someone else. An issue with this disconnection is that obviously, one may have done nothing wrong- this often spawns a sort of mutually assured destruction when two opposing groups of the same lore have the ability to disconnect, and can cause a lot of tension both in and out of roleplay.

We highly recommend of all these chaos disconnection. Tenets, no matter how well worded, always lead to the Story Team having to validate if a disconnection was valid or not, and if the roleplay associated was valid. In every recorded instance of tenet based disconnection was the ST somehow called in, and is often still to this day contested and controversial. Automatic disconnection is impossible to enforce without constant upkeep and check of the lore, and thus, Chaos typically lends itself to be the best choice. 

Disconnection can be knowledge locked, meaning one has to be taught it in roleplay, or available to all. Disconnection which is forced can lead to consequences where it makes sense, such as a PK or other detrimental effects. Don’t be afraid to pull punches and be honest with how disconnection can effect a character temporarily or permanently. Just be cautious of how it is implemented and how easily it can get out of hand. When writing disconnection, try and prevent ways in which a single rogue actor can go out and disconnect people, unless that is within the wants of your lore’s nature. Try and make it ritual based, have a reversible period, require multiple individuals, have that person there in person, etc… 

If you believe you have a different system for connection and/or disconnection in your lore you want to try, feel free to write it in. Above are just the most common examples and in the past what has been performed. The ST recommend you consider scenarios in which the lore is strictly not within your hands- consider yourself out of the picture. Can the lore survive? Is there a reason for people to stick together? Whats stopping one bad actor from destroying all we worked for? Be honest with yourself, and consider what you should do with your lorepiece.