The State of Good v Evil

[Panashea 3326]

 

 

 

 

The current state of Good and Evil is a view that I find somewhat upsetting. This extends to almost all other conflicts within the server, but I’d like to focus on the groups that include the “Good guys”(Paladins,keepers,Ascended, etc), and “Bad Guys”, (Spooks, Necromancers, Mystics,etc).

 

I don’t intend to rag on either group, or even wish for there to be conflict or ire between the two. I’d simply like there to be a discussion between the current issues and conflict that prevent an enjoyable experience for both sides of these playerbases.

 

To many players, the idea of playing an antagonist character seems like the perfect way to have their own tales of someone who slaughters many, or simply commits evil simply for the sake of evil.  However, much to their dismay, often leads them to fling themselves before paladins and the other playerbases, causing more OOC damage than good. We’ve seen this with random orcs or simply new players who wish to bandit, though the amount of ghouls,wraiths, and darkstalkers that appear before city gates has become shocking.  It’s gone to the point to which every city has a golden barrier before it preventing those from entering. This seems somewhat justified, but to those who wish to roleplay such a character, it is simply punishing everyone rather than the few who act up. I think that as a whole, the poor roleplay of the few should simply given a villainy blacklist and explained the actions they take are done incorrectly. The wards don’t even act as such according to the lore, and yet the consensus simply agrees with such, in part to the poor roleplay of some of the spook playerbase.  However, not only does the literal wall prevent the Spook roleplay from being an interesting force, lore does in the same regard.

 

The undead in Aegis was one of the most consistently exciting and tense moments that I experienced on LOTC, and though such a feat is nearly impossible to replicate again, to make a good antagonist/spook/chaotic neutral group, the community as a whole should take pages from their book. I recognize many players plan similar events and ideas(KBR, Ang, etc), though the ability they possess to actually go through with such ideas is laughable. Currently every race and nearly every form of magic can effectively take down every form of undead. Druids have blight-healing, which essentially world-edits a process that can take days, Shamanism has Farseeing and Shaman smithing, which not only enhances the effectiveness of weapons made to kill the undead, but can essentially bless weapons with purging to cut away, Elementalism which does away the only defenses against such as Paleknights or Dreadknights. Lutauman can remove most spectrals as well. It is understood that a knight,guard, or hunter would carry a gold weapon though dealing fatal blows in a swing or two seems a touch unreasonable.  And finally, the overpowered group that is the trifecta of War Clerics, Ascended, and Paladins.

 

This is completely personal, and something that sort of shifted my view permanently, and I will be very bias in my rant and anger. I remember back in Athera, I believe midway through the undead/harbingers/some spook group had corrupted the Grove Tree, and the druids, and a few random players including myself had an intense battle against the undead (before the server lagged to ****) in which characters were PKing, and it seemed rather close.  Then, out of the blue, a character I had never seen before stepped up the tree, and instant, wiped away all the blight and undead with a few emotes.

 

...What?

 

So many other people put in work into this struggle, both undead and good, and yet someone simply walked up and stopped all of it?  It killed any sense of tension, fear and power the undead had, or any threat of the world has. Holy Fire, the mists, and the amount of barriers possessed by these orders is ridiculous, when most Spooks can’t even wear armor.  It’s not the magic itself, simply the lack of protection the Undead are given when the Holy Magics are so strong.  A group that possesses all the ability of multiple magic groups, both with holy weapons, magic that kills the undead, and blighthealing is a touch ridiculous when it would require 3 groups to do the same. I think that for a good antagonist, multiple groups, or even the playerbase should have some agency in stopping the force, rather than leaving it to the paladins, shamans or druids.  

 

Despite my salt and vitriol, the paladins are a good group, both oocly and rply. Though lore currently tips them onto the stronger side of the two groups. I really enjoy the sort of fortress atop the mountain, defenders of the people. Often people complain about magic being secluded or simply passed around through groups, and I’ve almost seen the Holy Orders keeping a good tab on players who have magic. This is an aside, as the goal of this post is to improve both side of Good and Evil RP (despite the salt), would be to train commonfolk and guards how to handle these groups, which would explain everyone being armed with gold swords and the wisdom to battle such otherworldly and abyssal creatures.

 

However, the words of one salty and jaded man do not do enough. I would like to call a community discussion, both between the “Good” and “Evil” sides of the community, LT, and MT, in hopes to remedy the situation. After all, we are a community dedicated to the “premium roleplay  experience”. Regardless of how little those words mean now, we are a community, and we should do the most we can so that everyone can have a good time.

 

TLDR: There needs to be a better balance between good and evil, in terms of roleplay capability, lore, and the impact both sides have on the server as a whole, rather than specific cliques and groups.

[OzYmandi 647]

As an edgy, elf alchemist who kills for free or for money, I am insulted that edgy alchemists are not included on this list.

-1

As a counter part, it is really well written.

+2

[DISCOLIQUID 2729]

Everyone wants to be a hero. Paladins dedicate their entire 5 magic slots to being heroes. Silly that someone with a yellow sword does the same work they do.

 

Just my two cents.

 

Edit:

 

Let's talk about niche roles. If you want to give necromancers a buff so that they can take on paladins easily, that means the common folk are going to have to give ground, and get absolutely **** on left right and center by necromancers, and holy groups will 1v1 evil groups. As it stands, the 'commoners' (lmao) are able to 1v1 evil groups. Any **** with a sword that's tinged yellow can say he's strong enough to fight up against a lich or something idiotic like that. That means in order to fulfill their niche role of being good against the unholy, holy groups have to donkey **** down the unholy spooklords.

 

So either you (as a common person) can get absolutely gnard-dogged by necrominions and cry while a holy group/guardforce saves the day, or you can accept that in order for you to be able to toe to toe a wraith, a paladin reasonably can smite one.

 

[Abyssus 487]

As I said to you before when you brought up the idea of posting this, I believe the most effective way of solving both our problems is simply, get this..

 

Communication

 

Aswell as being cooperative and patient with one another to properly plan out ways we could both benefit from our RP, either that be through RP development or otherwise. The reason I state this insane idea is because it's exactly what me, and a few others have done with the Westerlands, and they were more then happy to work with us OOCly to make the best RP experience for BOTH sides. If its not obvious, this made me quite happy, to see some working cooperation between both evil doers and good guys. That being said, I'll illiterate that I believe communication is probably the best medicine, although, some lore changes would be preferable as well(wards, spook weaknesses, etc). But that can be discussed, civilly, mind you. A good example of this working is when the spook stronghold(at the time) was meta'd via deceit on only one persons part, who was both a spook and a holy cat. Instead of staying behide and talking **** behide the holy peoples back regarding this terrible situation, I simply went and spoke with their leader OOCly and discussed how we might rectify the situation. I was completely patient and cooperative as was he, and we ended up solving the situation with little trouble at all. 

 

Although, one of my only fears with this is the people who dislike spooks on an OOC level, and thus have clouds of judgement(and don't say you don't have any, cause we have the vice versa).  All in all, I think that a major portion of the stigma might be from these folks, which is an example I borrow from the orc playerbase, when all of them had the stigma of being awful, when only a small portion were actually the bandits. In which, all I have to say in regards to that is, for both sides, either educate them to stop that behavior or disconnect them so they don't make that image for the group.

 

 

I suppose all that is a little bit off topic though. I hope anybody reading will try to take example from what I've tried to rectify it on my end. Oh, and of course...

 

 

 

Let's discuss

[meg 1994]

Oh man. I talk about this a lot, and I just recently feel like I've summed up my thoughts in a recent conversation. This really ties into Disco's point but, the problem is the balance of things is REALLY thrown off for lots of reasons. I'll try to explain.

 

There are generally 2 laws that are constant on the server that aren't a problem on their own.

1. There will always naturally be more normal people/good guys/holy orders than spooks. Always. This is a given fact. 

2. For the most part Holy > Dark arts. A holy group will generally always beat an evil group, hands down. (Keyword GENERALLY, the Dark group can win if they play it smart or have aspects in their favor, etc, but my point is conceptually, holy > dark.)

 

So like I said, these two aren't a problem. They make sense. It's natural, no big deal. The problem then comes from a few other factors compounding with these factors.

3. Like Disco said, any normal dude with an aurum weapon (Which are VERY common) can fight off a spook. This is a problem. The widespread blanket weakness of aurum on dark creatures is seriously debilitating, especially considering fact #1. It's not a problem if only holy beats dark, but when EVERYONE can beat dark, you have a problem.

4. In the interest of fairness, dark magic is kept at a state of equal power level with voidal and holy. (Actually I'd argue voidal can do more but it's neutral so that's ok) This is a problem because not only are dark magics vindicated and hunted  for existing so it's harder for them to do things, they generally have MORE drawbacks to their magics than holy/voidal. Shades have the debilitating other mind that seeks their destruction, necromancers are degenerated heavily and have to drain lifeforce (same for liches/darkstalkers etc), fwitches have to consume flesh, on and on.

 

Also smaller issues like being difficult to go places and do things due to wards, etc. Lots of smaller issues have compounded to cause the big disparity now. There's also been a huge resurgence of holy groups since I played in Asulon. Ascended, Clerics, Paladins are all out in full force, and druids have taken a much more active anti-dark stance. Also things like lots of neutral lore being written (Which I think is just a lot better) like Azdrazi, Archons, etc. I'm not really sure how to fix things other than a cooperative effort or changes in power levels/the balance of things. *Shrug*

[Chthonian_ 100]

I think there should be no "good" or "evil" on the server, and that everyone should rp as they like without restrictions.

[_Jandy_ 3519]

Most evil rp is pretty crummy because people who do it never have long term goals and typically just do it for the fun of it and blame it on racism, metal illness or religion. If people wanna make to rp between characters who strive to exterminate evil and the evildoers more interesting the evil characters need to have better motives and long term plans that heroes would need to try to figure out what the villains objective is and maybe even why that is the villain's objective. Just my thoughts on the subject.

[Bvie 1754]

28 minutes ago, Ornias_Aquarius said:

I think there should be no "good" or "evil" on the server, and that everyone should rp as they like without restrictions.

 

Agreed. Pre-Dispositions imposed and forced on players creates cookie cutter characters.

 

Open the doors for the Necromancer that uses their powers for actual good.

Open the doors for the crazed and zealous Holy user that wishes to purge anything and everyone that doesn't follow their ideals.

 

Get rid of the emergency safety switches of disconnection. Make connecting someone a more serious decision that can't be taken back. Ensure you're making a wise decision. Will create additional RP and allow RP groups to be created that aren't forced to follow the majority norm at the time.

[Guest]

7 minutes ago, SquirtGun said:

 

Agreed. Pre-Dispositions imposed and forced on players creates cookie cutter characters.

 

Open the doors for the Necromancer that uses their powers for actual good.

Open the doors for the crazed and zealous Holy user that wishes to purge anything and everyone that doesn't follow their ideals.

 

Get rid of the emergency safety switches of disconnection. Make connecting someone a more serious decision that can't be taken back. Ensure you're making a wise decision. Will create additional RP and allow RP groups to be created that aren't forced to follow the majority norm at the time.

It's impossible to be a good Necromancer. You might have alright intentions, but ripping the life out of people for selfish aims is never justifiable. FYI, most holy magic users are arrogant/genocidal in the first place, they try to wack something instead of interact with it. Neither side has much of a moral high-ground.

[Bvie 1754]

1 minute ago, Silver Vandal said:

It's impossible to be a good Necromancer. You might have alright intentions, but ripping the life out of people for selfish aims is never justifiable. FYI, most holy magic users are arrogant/genocidal in the first place, they try to wack something instead of interact with it. Neither side has much of a moral high-ground.

 

I don't see how it isn't impossible to be a 'good' Necro.

 

Aren't they able to sap lifeforce from ghouls and the such to protect living beings?

[Guest]

Just now, SquirtGun said:

 

I don't see how it isn't impossible to be a 'good' Necro.

 

Aren't they able to sap lifeforce from ghouls and the such to protect living beings?

Yes. But that isn't enough to sustain yourself, it's not an addiction you can control. Every time you absorb life-force you hunger for more, undead don't have as much life-force as a fleshy being or plant typically so we create them as our servants and tools instead of feeding on them. Undead are very rarely able to occur as natural phenomena, they are arisen by Necromancers or other Black Magi. 

[Bvie 1754]

Just now, Silver Vandal said:

Yes. But that isn't enough to sustain yourself, it's not an addiction you can control. Every time you absorb life-force you hunger for more, undead don't have as much life-force as a fleshy being or plant typically so we create them as our servants and tools instead of feeding on them. Undead are very rarely able to occur as natural phenomena, they are arisen by Necromancers or other Black Magi. 

 

That seems a bit backwards to me, as a non-dark arts user. I feel like you'd have to pump a LOT more life force into something to reanimate it, to bring something that shouldn't exist in the first place into existence, meaning you should be able to drain said life force.

 

Wouldn't a Necro be able to be a recluse/hermit and drain animals of a forest? A bear, per say, is larger than a normal individual, would it not have more life force? Considering the large creature and animal index that exists, I could believe that it may be possible. 

 

Obviously, as you said, their hunger would overcome them and drive them into a crazed state (I'm assuming), but that doesn't mean they can't attempt to be 'good' and assist where they can.

 

Whether its justifiable is an entirely different conversation, and like you said a lot of the holy groups actions (in their entirety, not individuals) are questionable. However, I'm the one that would rather break the cliche's and norms and allow for variation and freedom to exist. 

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, SquirtGun said:

 

That seems a bit backwards to me, as a non-dark arts user. I feel like you'd have to pump a LOT more life force into something to reanimate it, to bring something that shouldn't exist in the first place into existence, meaning you should be able to drain said life force.

 

Wouldn't a Necro be able to be a recluse/hermit and drain animals of a forest? A bear, per say, is larger than a normal individual, would it not have more life force? Considering the large creature and animal index that exists, I could believe that it may be possible. 

 

Obviously, as you said, their hunger would overcome them and drive them into a crazed state (I'm assuming), but that doesn't mean they can't attempt to be 'good' and assist where they can.

 

Whether its justifiable is an entirely different conversation, and like you said a lot of the holy groups actions (in their entirety, not individuals) are questionable. However, I'm the one that would rather break the cliche's and norms and allow for variation and freedom to exist. 

Well that's not how the lore works. Yes, they could drain animals and other beings in a forest, that would still be a natural imbalance and it'd still be morally obtuse and figuratively wrong. Animals and forests are still life, and tampering with life-force is a grievous crime in its own right. As for the holy people, yeah, they're not much better. Cults are ignorant and dedicated entirely to the will of their patron god far more often than the true good.

[KBR 2046]

21 minutes ago, Silver Vandal said:

It's impossible to be a good Necromancer. You might have alright intentions, but ripping the life out of people for selfish aims is never justifiable. FYI, most holy magic users are arrogant/genocidal in the first place, they try to wack something instead of interact with it. Neither side has much of a moral high-ground.

You're joking right? That's literally what the whole Brasomthing branch of Xionism is about, you basically are a necro druid.

[Bvie 1754]

11 minutes ago, Silver Vandal said:

Well that's not how the lore works.

 

Can you link the lore? I've glanced at the lore pieces I've been able to find that talk about Necromancy and haven't seen anything about this hunger you speak of? Not saying you're wrong. Just interested in reading about it. 

 

But as I said, I'm fine for groups having ideologies, beliefs, etc. for how they view things in the 'name' of their patron or art. But I think it'd be a lot more interesting and creative to have the ability for Dark/Light users to make their own choices without the fear of losing what they were given. All those old time movies of they paladin that lost their way, the dark user that realizes helping the 'good guys' at that moment is more important than eating them, the crusading individual that kills everyone that isn't 100% pure and who is really?

 

All good because they let people be unique, gave them a chance to fall, to rise, and nothing 'magically' bound them to follow their scriptures or lose everything. They trained, they received their gift, they used their gift as they saw fit. Whether they did or didn't do the 'right' thing was entirely subjective and grey, and I'd like there to be more grey on the server personally. *shrug*