Rigorous

Alistair quietly lamented his most prized accomplice and ally, the lumbering creature eying an old keepsake within his hoard. A prized ruby which reminded him of somebody. "There was so much that I wished to tell her if only I had the time. Yet, despite my life never ending, hers is certainly over." The Titan paused in his deliberation, remembering something. "Bend down low to the lily of the Valley," he sang now without elegance, nor with emotion. It was an inhuman voice accompanied by the creature's grating, monstrous voice which sounded like metal scraping against pavement. Oddly melodious, but not at all the voice of a man. No, he was not human, and had not been for a thousand years. "Enjoy here the chyme of a million little bells. The unsung words in the echo of the music, and the secret that those lilies never tell. Isn't it a wonder what you hear? Once you listen to the smallest things of the world we're living in. Bend down low to the Lilly of the Valley, for the music's there and waiting to begin. Again, and again. The Elfin bells of the Lily of the Valley, which fill the moonlit glens of the Garden and Beyond." Yes, the Azdrazi decided. He was no longer human after all.

Though we're not well-acquainted out of staff circles, wanted to let you know that I appreciate you giving me a chance on the team, and that were it not for you many of some of the server's most prolific weirdos and pests would still be on here. Running anything on this server is a zero sum game. It requires a lot of resilience to hang in tight on this particular game. I know at times I was very frustrating to work with, but either way I really appreciated you tossing my name in the hat for Admin several times even though I never really desired to pursue that position. Having the feud with you that I did have and then managing to humanize you by working with you to ban people who tried (and failed) to groom young people I know on the server is easily one of the things online that reminded me that I can have faith in certain people to remain true to their word. Although in some respects you have stumbled, you were the best Admin I've worked under, probably even better than Pandann if it were not for your stance on Defender Default. I know it must be disappointing in some sense to watch me return to my old ways so soon after leaving the team a few months ago to hyper-fixate on real life commitments (trolling, not caring, etc), but I don't want it to go unsaid that I really appreciated all your help and your willingness to help me clear out many of the server's bad actors.

"I owe everything to my people and their enduring spirit. To the Heroes of the Petra, without which my reign would have come to an abrupt and humiliating end during the Petran Civil War." Sir Paul Montalt rests fortunately for Queen Renilde, for if she were to have betrayed the virtues of the Republic further in his life-time, it may have very well culminated in a blood bath that far surpassed the Petran Civil War. Alas, fortunately for her, the dead do not speak. After all, it is only the wicked and truly heartless who would reap the rewards of others' blood and toil, and for them the only joy that's owed to them is being subjected to the fruits of their own listless wickedness. Justice comes for all who abuse the trust of others eventually, whether they be man or wan or woman, human or elf, noble or peasant. At least, that is what one would hope. And so another chapter closes in the omnibus of human betrayals. A republic destroyed by conniving gentry, Balianite insurrectionists and a return to despotism. A gift of cowardice that keeps on giving until eventually it crumbles down beneath the weight of its own lies.

**** that. I got no place in this argument because I don't really care anymore because combat in general on here just falls down to who is the most annoying grinder (whether it's netherite gear or gate-kept carbarum ST items). When anybody becomes an adult and they have a combination of things such as school and work and other life factors weighing in, it is completely reprehensible to tell them to open up their schedule more. (BTW most people on LoTC are adults, it just happens that many of them happen to be mal-adjusted ones). The truth is that as an adult I have less time to play either way and that if it weren't for having a group that's willing to gear me, there'd be little place for me in the "competitive arena" segment of this server, CRP or Mechanical wise. Which is OK if people are fine with that environment, but personally that's why I invest my time RPing in private servers with friends who care about story/DnD game-play because you're not gonna find impartial rulings here. Truth is that the current system is very hostile to people who have to come and go and have a normal (non-gamer) schedule. Many people are not willing to invest 10+ hours a week into the server when they have bills to pay, a degree to earn, or other hobbies (guitar/judo or something). Server should be designed so that it's friendly to RP, not so that people need to invest large amounts of time into progression. In some areas (LC), this is respected. In other areas (Combat) it is not. Events are a good exception since when run well, an event is a good thing to set time aside for like DnD. But for random one-off encounters with people who don't know decency or etiquette? Why should anybody have to sit through that and then potentially have to spend hours negotiating or discussing intervention with Moderation? Maybe there's no perfect fix; but the server needs to move in the direction of alleviating time constraints and enabling friendlier ways for players to interact peer-to-peer, rather than exacerbating pre-existing tensions between groups with rule-sets that are often biased or informal.

The Petra Cathedral has been ransacked by cultists, leaving it in awful shape. A dead, orange-haired Wood Elf hangs outside of the building, his body drained of blood. The blood was smeared into Eyes of Iblees all over the compound to send a message. Renilde, the True Petrans are coming. Signed, Those Who Know HAIL IBLEES!

"I hope two beautiful souls I know get married," said Sailor Grisha.

too long i didn't read but i hope you're doing well kaiser

A curious symbol is displayed at Horen Road 3, Aaun Capital, belonging to Vukosav Radomavic. The house would be on fire, its structure in peril, the dilapidated common housing now reduced to nothing but singed timbers, ashes, and piles of stone and collapsed beams. A notice would be found throughout the city, notably penned by the ostensible arsonists. Will I will kill all who spurn the living. I shall dismantle all of that which goes against our Prime Mover; the True Creator, the Vindicator and Adjudicator of all that which is Right or Wrong, God. And so it is that we came here with hell's breath in our vary maws, laying waste to the cursed grounds inhabited by Vampyres, Strigoi of ill repute, Men and Mistresses of the Night. You shall find no respite from us. Fight us and perish nobly, or perish once we burn you out of every sinkhole your wretched kind subsists in, for none shall find respite from the Agents of God, wherever they might be, doing service in His name.

60th has invested constant hours in code and moderation to the server for at least the duration of November 2022 - Present. In that time, he has provided solid critiques of server systems, had a huge hand in just about every project the team has worked on, and helped train and work with new members. Every bit of major code has passed through his hands, every framework has been worked on by him and multiple others (who often he'd keep in line, including myself, due to our immensely difficult personalities). On the surface, he may seem very distant; but he has been there the whole time. It is an injustice for people to sit here criticizing the decision. He is the only person apart from Urge who has the time and necessary experience to expand his role. He is the only diplomatic GM who addresses things from a point of logic rather than ideology. If you don't like him, simply speak to him and bring up your ideas for how you'd like to change the server - for instance, with the combat rules people detest so much. Hate CRP Lock? 60th is your best hope of getting rid of it. Frankly, he was very skeptical of CRP Lock during the conversation. Don't like him? Talk to him. Think it should have been somebody else? There was nobody else!

Welcome to the Retirement Club.

To those who desire to start anew, seek Alistair the Red, and see yourself re-shaped into something better. With time you shall discover your motive power, latent within your descendant-born blood, from which you might hail the stairs and skies once more. Man has struggled in the absence of God. God shall retake Man, and Man shall retake God. The ceaseless blight shall end.

It gladdens me that another person in this community has left it with a positive impression. Despite my Boomerism and neuroticism, I also value storytelling coop game-play from platforms like LoTC and other RP communities. Best of luck!

Something stirs amongst the treeline, the nation from which Galar claimed descent may be long since dead, but the son of Camlannen had evidently found his calling. Claiming descent from Kairn the Conqueror, a fabled Elven mortal-king who joined forces with Emperor Aurelius Horen to subjugate the entire world centuries before. Galar had grown now into a man of over two-centuries of age with a honed mind, astute senses, and a sense of honor that compelled him to help his kin. Galar could recall next the words of his long gone father, who had long since entered self-imposed exile after burning Camlannen to the ground himself and leaving for reasons unknown to him. His father, he thought, the one they called Usurper. A memory of his childhood replayed itself over and over in Galar's mind, a reminder of the philosophy instilled within him through years of hardship. Advice that his father had given him long ago when he was being bullied by another younger boy. A boy Galar had conceived to be his friend, but in reality was jealous over a girl they were both friends with. "The world is cruel and people are even crueler. All men you meet are your enemies. Even your allies shall desire your power, and in the possession of power you must always be covetous. The first man to compromise on terms that aren't his own shall never rule for long. Remember this, my son, and you will be a wise chief. But being a wise chief and being a good man are two goals that cannot exist together. To be a chief, you must be willing to kill even those you love. Learn from my mistakes." The old and grizzled elf's mechanical arm whirled as he laid his bronze-tinted hand upon his raven-haired son's head, ruffling the boy's hair in a simple gesture of affection. However, the boy could not make sense of any emotion on the old chief's marred features, his tan face horrifically burned and scarred from centuries of combat. Centuries spent as a warrior. "If I had displayed the same cruelty I showed my enemies to those who betrayed me, fewer people would have suffered. After all, what is a couple more dead elves really, especially if they do not contribute to the society they live in anyways. No, my son, there are those who have the strength of will to make the hard choices so that the pack survives, and then there are those who shall hide from their responsibilities and allow their subjects to suffer. Power is about dominance. If you cannot dominate somebody, how do you ever expect to be treated with seriousness? So, the next time that boy comes for you, hit him until he does not move, and allow Nature to dictate his course. There is no place for the weak in this world." Somehow, Galar could still sense his father watching him. As the waylaid Alder Elf looked into the distance, he was met with the distant image of a coyote shrouded in darkness that possessed a single eye which glinted in the moonlight. Upon blinking, the beast was gone, and he found himself unsure of what to make of that ephemeral illusion that had come and gone so quick. I need a drink. @Nectorist

Rigorous Alistair of Johannesburg #83475

I'd love a toggleable option for both in the Persona Menu GUI!

I have met some of my closest friends on here. Overall, I prefer the community we have now to the one we had in 2016. But I feel as though this inability to let dead dogs lie has created a stagnant role-play environment. Though the server's map is beautiful and there's a lot of mechanical game-play options now, I feel as though there is a distinct lack of environmental events and story driven narratives on this map so far. The inability of Event Actors to be given easy leeway to create their own material is a contributing factor to this. Policies are far more stringent as it pertains to who is allowed to make what events and for whom. The consequence is that there's not frequently event lines that are bad. However, the flip side to that is that very few events seem to be happening. This is boring for me and I feel like most of the role-play I see could be considered slice-of-life, which I find personally to be fun in small amounts, but overall very boring. The world should feel more alive and I feel like it can be done with a few policy changes and some new training. The Player Events Handbook by Sorcerio was helpful in returning narrative power to the players, but it is often forgotten about and slept on. It'd be nice to see a myriad of new event lines happen that define a history for this map outside of nation politics and the egos of supposed high-brow elitist players seeking their next thrill and allowing their own players to suffer in the crossfire. There is divisiveness over game-play options. PvP or CRP. Nation or Magic Clique. There is derisiveness over every possible thing where people radically attempt to tear one another down. Player affiliation. A notion of misguided absolute loyalty to region PROs and ROs to the detriment of other players. Cooperative role-play is the sum of its participants. It is about people forming meaningful bonds between characters, proper out-of-character friendships, and by participating radical honesty with others. You cannot do this when all it takes for you to be supplanted from the place you're role-playing is out-of-characterly disobeying trends you do not agree with or being gate-kept from role-play you wish to do by ominous shadow figures of some dominant player groups that act in a manner that is consistent with political parties. You toe the party line or GTFO. This makes staff particularly troublesome and nebulous to sift through, as there is no unified vision for how to make LoTC a better place -- we claim we will remove problem players, we recurrently unban them. We claim we will create nicer magic systems and balance things out, it becomes an endless stamping game of passing the next piece of lore that eventually gets rewritten by a new person who lacks creative vision, and then supplanted by the next fleeper who wishes to usurp it's attractiveness as a novelty which they can possess to attract followers and teach people en masse rather than to ensure that there is continuous and free flowing role-play that comes naturally with moving about in-game and having in role-play ambitions. The art of creating characters seems to be pretty lost. Everybody has a dozen of them, a dime a dozen for every elf and human you see. People attempt to find over complicated solutions to a problem that is not at all complex. If you want more role-play on the server, role-play with more people. If you do not like those people, find new people to role-play with. Forgo the idol worship of the attractive nations and their driven personality cults, as there is no permanent nation on the Lord of the Craft, and the attempt to create one has led countless people to ruin due to the relentless sum of their own personal ambitions. Many people have adopted leaving these things behind to role-play with friends instead. Some of my friends are very new players who came to LoTC from other servers on D&D. I see this often from some people and it gives me hope that there can eventually be a shift from nation role-play back to the good old days that revolved around settlements and role-play rather than an abundance of out-of-character gatekeeping and power creep. Alas, until we have newer people take up the mantle of making these changes happen, we're going to be stuck with jaded old timers (myself included). Encourage people to be honorable and kind as opposed to the everyday snakery and devolved double-crossing nature that so many players have possessed and will continue to possess. The clout chasing, bizarre out-of-character decrees and nation blacklists, and magic clique factionalism is a waste of time so long as people can go #RP "Hello world."

The examples, again, do not pertain to this particular instance, and more so to the ways I've seen people try to weaponize similar rhetoric. At the end of the day, the important thing to me is that he does not say this towards you guys again, and if he does he would face more punitive measures. When people do those things to me, I criticize them or do not interact with them, as my philosophy is along the lines of just not interacting with those sorts of people any longer than I have to. However, if they are constantly walking up to you and doing this and you have it on credit with spectators and maybe some hard evidence or a date which you could give us to fetch logs, I am sure itdontmatta would be happy to re-examine his verdict on that particular instance if you were being harassed. Either way, sorry things did not work out the way you liked, and hopefully in the future we can act in a manner that better assuages your worries.

Do you believe then that it was the wrong decision not to issue a ban to a few players who apologized for the inconvenience? Perhaps there's additional context I might be missing. I participated in the discussion on the report, but I was not there in-game. Eager to hear some more of your thoughts.

Cut the topmost stuff out because some unsavory people I disagree with repped my comment, and as a consequence I feel my words have been misconstrued from their intended meaning. I'll leave it at the following. When people harass others, they are to be banned. When people spam racist language of modernity, they are to be banned - the accidental use of archaic terms can simply have warnings meted out if it's used disparagingly to another player or in a manner that violates our rules, such as if the player describes being uncomfortable and there is no resolution to that dispute, then a Moderator could obviously make a verdict that the situation calls for. That is the system that I abide by. That people who are harassed have a voice and that people who make others uncomfortable are consigned to having no access to our services.

Sigismund Bartholomew Derfey, self-proclaimed Emperor of the Orenians, places an orchid beside an empty grave. "Sometimes," the Emperor of Providence said. "I can still hear his voice. God willing, we might go drinking again in the Seven Skies, and condemn those damn Petran assassins to the High Hells!" The alcoholic was long since destitute and without a meager fortune he had in his youth. Once, he claimed descent from a true scion of the House of Horen he was told. Alas, in a world where every human family had grey eyes, his claim had long been forgotten - and so he pined in secret for the throne of the Aaunites, and impressed upon James Leopold his insistence in being named the heir to all of Aaun. After all, Sigismund's father (or his father's father!?) had fought in the War of Two Emperors scant a century and a half or longer before. Derfey's jaw dropped upon seeing that Alstion had named his grandson Edmund heir. After all, he claimed it would go to him, or so believed Sigismund upon having the vision come to him in a dream. "Creator," Sigismund Bartholomew Derfey begged, "Take me quick." And so he perished of a heart attack knowing that his work would go on forever unfinished. Not only was his supposed best friend dead, but he had lost the kingdom that had been promised to him - no, sworn to him! Shawn Melbrooke Derfey found his father dead in the waning hours of the night, and then took him to the coroner's office for inspection. An autopsy would reveal that he had died from an illness of his arteries due to years of horrible eating, sustaining himself off of Minitz dairy and beef alone. Before burning his corpse, they had to strip Sigismund's body of all the lard-like substance so that the whole office would not catch fire. Rest in Peace, Sigismund Bartholomew Derfey, Supposed Emperor of the Orenians, self-proclaimed Prince Heir of Aaun, and resolute Statesman (unelected) on Fourth Boulevard, Providence. He died at 104 years old.

Little bit tired, will revise these tomorrow, and if I got anything wrong about any of this Spurf will amend it once he sees it.

It's not "pretending". It is an instance of combat that has already occurred in role-play, but is still being acted out between the players in-game. You're free to spectate if you would like. It is a matter of fairness if anything that those involved are not interrupted, much less ganked after the scene transpires due to loot goblins. If you had suggestions to make, what would they be?

If you emote being involved and the fifteen minutes haven't passed, and you follow the pertinent rules for aviaries and/or ringing bells before the 15 minute timer has passed, then you can rally to come by for that instance of combat before it is locked. Rather clear-cut!

Exactly!