Return Of The Undead & Ascended?

[Rilath 3719]

Ummm as for the High Elves, they are being removed because players simply don't like them. For some reason the vast player base see them as WRONG (god forbid elves act like elves!) and want them removed and will push their RP in such ways to remove them. The constant raids and warclaims on them is evidence of that.

I'm sorry Blundermore, but that arguement holds little weight. When you put in a villain application, you knew first hand that you were giving up regular RP and such to make sacrifices for everyone else. There's no way you didn't realize that playing Undead was going to be a permanent thing.

Cataris made a good point. After a while, people just ignored the undead. This was before the GMs had to take drastic actions. They had to force the player base to fear them by destroying Oren and Alras with godmodded events.

That didn't spark the 'great RP experience' that they thought it would. We simply ignored it in Laurelin. Basically saying, "why bother? If they are going to destroy us, it will happen, oh well... if not great." It loses the suspense when you have no control or effect on the situation.

And without god mode, how could they (undead or great evil) possibly threaten the nations? They'd need the best RPers and players to play them right? They are not going to get all of them since players are already established and wouldn't want to move. So their numbers will be very few. One warclaim that involves multiple nations ends the threat.

Have to figure out where they are coming from? That will be figured out in about a day from random explorers. Word spreads fast in LotC. Even when its not meta'gamed. 5 days later, a warclaim happens and poofs them. Yay we all go back home and go back to fighting each other again.

The only way this could work is if its more subtle and they get their hands around certain positions. And this doesn't need to be a GM sponsored group to do this. I've said that before, and no one wanted to take up my challenge on that.

No one in the playerbase has the stones to make an organization that could be ran by the players instead of undead/bloodmages. I've given that challenge before, no one accepted it. Well the gauntlet is thrown yet again. If the players can't take the challenge then the idea of a great evil shouldn't be done, since you just won't have the playerbase to fill it. The fact that the players are unwilling to even try should be a red flag.

Well prove me wrong players, lets see what you got?

Well I personally have wanted to start something like this and I've even tried writing down some lore and ideas on my own. The thing is, the players that are willing and capable of doing this are sometimes barred by limitations set in place, such as VA's.

I myself am known as probably one of the worst app writers ever. Unless I spend a week on an app, it won't get accepted or even taken seriously. Despite my reputation with villainous RP, there is nothing I can do about getting around the VA because it's set in stone.

I'm sure that nobody wants to spend time writing up a VA for a character they haven't even played yet. Or if they are using their current character, perhaps they don't want them to become evil? This is honestly the only barrier I have to forming such a group. I simply do not have the patience to complete one of these time consuming applications, only to have it most likely be denied. Does that make me selfish? Probably, yes. But it's a fact that isn't going to change.

[Blawharag 277]

One of the big issues I had with the Undead, and I hope this doesn't repeat with our Liches, was that they were untouchable. Even when they did something extreme and drastic, like blow up Oren and Alras, that was it. What were you going to do? Nothing. You couldn't do anything. You couldn't stop them during the event, they were pre-planned to win, you could retaliate and retake, you couldn't do anything. The Orcs never gave to craps about what happened to Ahkazar, we knew we just wouldn't be allowed to do anything, so why bother acknowledging it? You were never permitted to attack the undead (they had a mysterious flying fortress which teleported randomly and was RPwise could not be found or attacked. The one hidden base they had was collapsed before we could do anything with it) and you basically had to sit around and hope that when the Undead attacked you, they wouldn't just hole up in a tower, block off the entrance with obsidian, then drop a pool of lava over that so if you broke up into the tower to finally kill them you died anyways. Most of the time though, that's exactly what the undead did and you just had to sit around and let your city get bombed for a half hour until they ran out of ammo and teleported away.

Then we have those few events where the playerbase actually could fight back. Like the giant fortress that was put in Kramaroe. That was amazing. We had the ruins of a obliterated town apparently sitting over some ancient powerful artifact and the Undead were trying to get at it. We had a huge battle outside the fortress, dodging Undead fire while pushing our battle line through cover of trenches and ruins, all while staving off the Undead minions. Eventually besieging the fortress. Then, instead of simply saying "Ok guys, RPwise you are besieging this fort and tomorrow we will lift the barrier so you all can storm the fort. See ya then!" it was "OMFG guyz, we are trying to have a coolio event. Another preplanned one you cannot affect the outcome of. GTFO! The real battle is tomorrow, until then you are not allowed to sit out here and just have a fun time besieging! That is stupid. I don't care if there is no RP explanation for you Orcs leaving, make one up and leave!" yea, that was absolute nonsense. But the event still had a chance. As one of the Orcish commanders I actually went around to the other commanders in the area and we began setting up a strategy for the next day. We had found out about the Artifact IC, believed the Undead already had it in the fortress and had assumed it was the legendary Orc Axe (wrong assumptions, but ones made IC) and planned to storm the fort the next day with a very in-depth strategy where you finally saw co-op between the nations that everyone had been begging for. It was a lot of fun, and the operation would have been even more fun. Only problem is, when the day came the fort had just been turned to sandstone and some unexplained "K event over" was plastered on the seen. All that potential RP was just obliterated.

If "The Enemy" is this invincible god you are never allowed to touch and just have to bend over and let them do as they please, yea people are going to ignore it. When it make it a legitimate fight and give players incentive to fight as well as a possibility of success without it being one sided as hell (like when the Undead attack and hole up in a tower) you have people actually interacting and partaking in the RP. When you make them feel like they would be more productive trying to punch a cement wall with their fists, they are going to walk away.

[Miquill 188]

I liked them but not at the end. At first they were great fun. People had to actually fight them and the fate of cities hung in balance. Later though the Undead were given GodMode. This ruined the atmosphere due to the fact that players could no longer actually affect what happened. If the city was supposed to be destroyed it was. The Undead also never progressed past Al'Khazar which I thought was a shame until they were given GodMode. If they return I would also like it to be done differently. Instead of Undead raising new ones I say there can't be new ones. This could stop people trying to become them and at the same time force the Undead to rely more upon evil guilds. I say the same about the Ascended to a lesser amount. I say have them come back only as the ones who are actually alive right now and each can have two apprentices. Once those slots are filled that's it. Another thing is Perma killing of them. I say if an Ascended is killed by someone with Iblees in a good RP manner they CAN'T come back. So the two races would try to kill eachother. I would also like to see some artifacts scattered around. Maybe these artifacts can put up a spell shield stopping Undead attack? They can have may functions. Another thing is that they were given too much of a pominent role in Aegis. If they return I want them to provoke evil. So maybe a toned down Undead? This is just my two cents though.

I agree to this, I loved the undead battles and so on events because everyone wanted to be there, I mean I can honestly say the recent wars of Asulon, I just waited till most fighting was over, put on iron armor and went to do some crazy looting. In Aegis, I wanted to go to every battle even if I died, I loved fighting off the mobs and slowly advancing in a diagonal patterns and taking cover, making pools of water for people to dive into, and then I'd get close enough to attack and be like "W-T-FREKIN-F They have God Mode What the Hell!"

I had a problem with the ascended because a lot of them, almost sounded evil because they were soo corrupt, and I would talk to them and they would say they aren't even trying to, they were just naturally being cocky and greedy because they're human. I would love for them both to come back, but to be move evened out or equal and both focus or have different kinds of spells that counter act each others but still one not being over powered. I like how each of the 4? Ascended left would get two partners, that would make about 12 Ascended or whatever. I like having a main threat of two sides and a few people who were renegades and just caused trouble on both sides.

EDIT: I also would like to add something I forgot, I didn't like the events to already be decided, because that made me not really want to fight because we'd lose no matter what, and just go to loot crap. <_< You know?

[Hiebe 2493]

Everyone got mad when ascended took alras's side but then the normal races decided to fight without the help of the noble ascended. In my eye ascended lost their luster after the sages left :/

[Miquill 188]

A lot of what people are saying is stuff I've never heard about, my brother never heard about, my cousin never heard about, who cares though. I go by what I think, I know the Undead and Ascended would make some awesome rp if they were just fixed up. And to those who say rewrite the lore, how would you explain all the other stuff and the old lore? It would just not make since. I mean maybe the lore could use some tweaking, but not complete change.

[Blundermore 2741]

Reason why the ascended was somewhat corrupt was because there were quite a few who didn't follow the rules of the ascended and were deemed "rogue" by gold sect. Gold sect being the justicar, High priestess and the leader, the Preceptor.

I thought it brought quite a lot of indepth RP with some ascended having political infighting with themselves seeing how dwarf ascended would still have to deal with greed, orcs have to deal with bloodlust and elves are still infertile.

Only the human ascended really came out on top as their only curse was short life, which is not really a factor because the humans just got immortality like the rest of the races... (no normal race is immortal,elves still die of old age as do dwarves and orcs technically die quicker than humans due to genetic structure of "growing up" faster than any other race and high motabolism rates.

As for the heavily scripted battles near the end of Aegis, the GM's just made it so that the undead would win because they wanted the move to the new map. How exactly are they to move and attack other cities when some people just kept going back to take back other cities exactly? Sure it would of made sense but the GM's operates on what is the quickest and easiest way to get to their goals. Not what makes sense.

Technically also, a month before the end of Aegis, our plugin broke, meaning that no undead or ascended could even take part in these battles...as it was all GM ran. Blameith not us, for we weren't technically there.

The ascended moved to alras as we were cut off from everyone else due to al'khazar being taken. No one saw that thismade sense that we would put ourselves between the undead and the rest of the races though... they saw this as a political move, and didn't act IC'ly the way they should have, instead they whined saying that we sided with alras... Yes of course, we sided with alras... that's why we were trying to defend every other race as well even when they were killing us as well. It isn't just the undead and ascended's fualt here guys, it's yours as well yet none of you have yet to taken a single shred of blame for it. Acting IC'ly with OOC initiatives because youlost items, or homes etc... How is that fair then to go and blame two entire groups who couldn't even act in events anymore because no support staff was given into fixing the plugin so that we would be useful during events.Because let's face it... not one is going to bother reading RP magic emotes during those events.

Quite a lot of your gripes and issues are based apon things WE, as a group, not the GMs, were not there for. Your labelling us with blame that isn't just to give out to us.

[Hiebe 2493]

^this. I remembering being spat upon which is good rp but people usually did it cause they acted like it was my fault they lost their homes.... but we couldn't help everywhere and then no one wanted our help lol

The corruption deal was great rp and when selina threaten my clan I knew the old ascended ways were over.

If they do come.back I might rply kill them lol

[domainoft 191]

The problem with polls is "who" is voting. There are a lot of votes from people who were never there for the undead/ascended, and a lot of votes for people that were ascended/undead that would want "re-instated". Also all the votes for people who are friends of undead and will benefit. I think its a bad sign if we have to revert to our old RP instead of looking forward to creating a new conflict. I am not opposed to good/evil, or at least two sides pitted against each other where players could decide which side they were aligned with. The options are endless It would be a shame to not look for other ideas. Many people favor the bloodmages for example, I thought they were a terrific idea of your blunder.

[no longer active 734]

The bloodmages were good by didn't do anything. We Dwarves even destroyed one of their temples and none of them showed up to defend it.

[Miquill 188]

I liked the corruption slightly, but ICly I hated it of course and it was a bit annoying OOC sometimes. I was part of the F.O.A. But only the guys high up ever actually heard anything the Ascended had to talk about, if anyone. My character basically thought the end was near. Oh and now I actually understand the God Mode stuff thanks Blundermore, though the gms could have thought of a more creative Idea, like the undead finding a secret to rebuild themselves really fast or something. Like if they died they couldn't do damage or anything for like 5 minutes of something.

EDIT: Since I didn't see those last two above I want to say The Blood Mages sorta started to look evil then like suddenly POOF no more Blood Mages.

[Blundermore 2741]

You can thank the GM's for no more bloodmages, the entire group was GM ran, and it died out within three events.

And actually a lot of them are people from Aegis... I can count 14 that are not from Aegis. The others however are...

[Ivran 137]

I don't exactly want Undead and Ascended, but what about the Lich? Why can't the Ascended, (The few that are left), re-appear (The Ascended blood that is.) They could rally the people of Asulon to fight against the Lich? It might offer some good RP and events. As long as the Ascended decide to actually HELP in the fight.

I know from experience that some Ascended would be at an Undead attack. And wouldn't help, they'd just sit there while everyone came together to try and kill Undead who were incredibly powerful.

I think the Lich could actually be more interesting than the Undead, because they could easily use more corruption and planning to destroy Asulon. Maybe they could take over the small towns that are scattered, and if people wanted their town back, they would have to fight back against the Lich minions (These minions could actually be permanent or temporary players, this might negate the need to summon mobs for attacks, as these are ineffective.)

Just my two cents, and hopefully someone is able to understand what I just posted here, not too great at... um... making sense?

[Blundermore 2741]

Partly because mog himself told me that the liches are a one time thing that basically allowed him to shoot lightning and act like undead at the end of Aegis.

There is no real greater evil with the liches it seems. They were a one time bad undead event.

[Ivran 137]

Blundermore, you are extremely negative about the Liches. The Liches could become permanent? You just seem irritated that the Blood Mages were set aside. (Which I understand, you wrote the lore, which took a while.) But this negativity is incredibly irritating. You say it was a bad event? A LOT of others say it was good. I suggest you set your feelings aside.

[Miquill 188]

I actually liked the event, besides the fact I didn't get there until the end because I was being held by someone and ended up having to jab my mini knife dagger thing or w/e in the person slightly so they'd drop me, But I am glad I did because I saved peoples lives in game that is.

I was thinking some of the Undead could come back and form an alliance thing with the Lich so it be like half Lich/Half Undead force, which would still be an Undead force. Any thoughts?