Closing up Shop

[LungTien Temeraire]

Well, since there are furred dragons, dragons who can turn into goo, smoke or light, demon dragons, and other more or less "out of lore" things, I personally tend to be ok with blighted dragons, too.

[BrightCat]

It is a completely orderless society that welcomes Aegis and Murderers alike into its folds as Heroes in a fashion that I cannot conceive of any sane person actually doing in that particular setting.

I've wondered that myself. I'm still trying to figure out why some characters even talk to Selarth. I'd expect everyone to try and chase him away/kill him by now. Recently the only one who's tried to do something about him is Lung. And Shink tried, but Sel ran. :P

And I'm aware that he breaks lore. :P

And there seems to be a whole lot more nonsensical-ness these days. All of my characters agree that the world has gone crazy and needs to be taken away by the men in white coats and be put into a padded room lol!

[Shinkuu]

Leaving Order is not the solution
(though I understand why you`ve mentioned that, Amon).

Is there nobody willing to accept the responsibility for that situation?

Or only willing to put things right?

I am not leaving Order. I am leaving the community.

I TRIED to put things right. However, it will not happen it seems so I decided to say "Lump it!" and just stick with the people who I can count on for good RP instead.

I do thank those of you who lend me your support and who see the same problems that I do and I must agree that it creates a rather bad atmosphere that undoubtedly does not help anyone who wants to get in on the RP or the game in Order... If it had been so heavily that way when I came here I would have probably not stayed past the trial to be honest.

And to you Lung, Azu and Selarth are a part of it but they are by no means all of the problem or some all powerful source of it.

[Shinkuu]

Still, without conflict or 'darker rpers' Roleplay gets pretty darn stale and stagnant. Everyone can't be all happy and cheerful ALLLLLL the time.

If they are, it just gets annoying. At the same time though, people can't be EEEVIL and RAAAWR all the time either, it just gets annoying as well.

What we need is just realistic reactions to things. If a big, blighted dragon waltzes into the clearing....since the blight is on the opposite side of the war that is going on....people should understandably try and kill/shoo the thing.

The problem comes in the form of an evil that cannot be resolved. If you can never stop the enemy or the evil one who you are in conflict with then why bother even trying? After awhile having Evil win by default is also extremely boring.

[Shinkuu]

Speaking from a "here's my thought as a player" if I may for a moment (in other words, please allow me to remove my developer hat and just post as someone who's played Istaria since day minus something or other )

What has always bothered me about player characters in Istaria that are "evil" or "Blighted" is that it goes completely against official lore. You can't be both "Gifted" and "Blighted". Much of the point of the overall storyline of the game is to keep the secret of "being Gifted" from those who are effected/influenced by/taken by the "the blight".

So if you want to RP a "evil blighted dragon", go right ahead... but in the course of that roleplay, if you are a lvl 20 (or 20, etc) hatchling and a lvl 100 ancient gets a bunch of friends together to stand up to you..... You're dead. And no, you aren't coming back to life. Delete that character and don't play it again.... cause you can't be both "Blighted" and "Gifted".

If those "rules" were played by, it also would do what I believe Sereamha is suggesting and making sure there's an ending to every roleplay story.

That part annoys me I think to the same level TBVH. I have always maintained that none of my characters are beyond being perma killed even my GIFTED characters can be permanently killed with the right efforts.

I also see the Gift as being DIRECTLY OPPOSED to the Blight from all I have seen in the Lore meaning that it would NEVER Coexist with the Blight one would have to completely overwhelm the other in any given body.

Hoooowever.... To allow for the fact the Aegis and Undead never seem to stay gone I DO have to assume that the Aegis and Blighted likewise can return form being destroyed unless they are killed in the same few ways a Gifted could be slain. Essentially if they still have a core essence to remake their body (a soul if you will) then they will come back eternally. It is my view that the Gift was designed to give the Living warriors with the same advantage and properties in order to fight the undying relentless hordes of the Aegis.

However, once the proper steps are taken it seems likely that those evil beings could be destroyed for good just like the Gifted may not be completely invincible.

[Xepher]

Still, without conflict or 'darker rpers' Roleplay gets pretty darn stale and stagnant. Everyone can't be all happy and cheerful ALLLLLL the time.

If they are, it just gets annoying. At the same time though, people can't be EEEVIL and RAAAWR all the time either, it just gets annoying as well.

What we need is just realistic reactions to things. If a big, blighted dragon waltzes into the clearing....since the blight is on the opposite side of the war that is going on....people should understandably try and kill/shoo the thing.

This point has been brought up again, and again, and again.

While I do agree with you Ser, entirely, this is not what's actually going on in Order. When I first started, people actually Roleplayed their characters as hatchlings growing up, families, goofy bipeds training and practicing their skills in melee or magic, there were occasional and entirely resolvable issues between characters or groups that didn't drag on for days, weeks or even months. There was one or two shady characters that added a bit of tensity, there were a handful of 'oddity' characters to keep things interesting. This is when the community was at its best.

Now? If they aren't unbelievable, they're evil. Or both. The ones that ARE normal as far as lore go, mostly hatchlings, are seemingly played by people who don't understand that a young dragon doesn't and shouldn't talk like a toddler and the like. Point is, there's too much of the crazy and the bad, and not enough of the lighthearted and simple. Those that ARE lighthearted and simple, are comprised of amateur RPers or people who don't even try, from what I have seen at least.

I'm ranting again. I know that if we had a larger population this issue might be resolved, but as everyone new tends to go the route of evil or out-of-the-ordinary anyway, more players might just make the problem worse.

In response to your last statement, again, I agree. We need realism in our RP community period. In terms of characters, how they're played, AND reactions to such things. Really, I think when it comes down to it, a lack of realism is one of the biggest issues here.

[ScaleIron]

... I'm not really sure if I should bother with a response to this.

At one point, my character(s) (Mostly just Kandrin, since Ly was always a bit of a pacifist) used to be aggressive towards "evil" and "blighted" characters. She would often check her aggression when there were draconic children around, but it nearly always came to blows with her.

You know what that got her? "Don't be so mean, Kandrin, they're trying to fit in! Just because they're blighted, doesn't mean they're EVIL. Quit trying to fight them!" So you know what she did? She left.

I left.

I try to come back every now and then, but the reason I don't stay has already been stated by people like Xeff, Ser, Sel's player, and even the OP. Kandrin's mind threatens to implode with all the crazy that has infected her world. Zeroun wants nothing to do with most people, especially since his brother no longer seems to be around. Ly? Well, she's not going to try to fix a world a full grown Dragon couldn't.

From the things I have read, and what little I've seen when I decide to risk coming back, the chances of me officially returning are slim. I don't even bother going into Dragon Chat when I log in. Roleplay is questionable at best. I'll stick with the games I enjoy playing, and only come to lurk from time to time to see if the mess has been cleaned up any. I would love to see Order back to the way it was, when Kandrin was still a hatchling (or newly flight worthy) and the Istarian reality wasn't in tatters. I would come back in a heartbeat if it all went back to that. But a few people made the game a chore to play, and I left because of those few people. Maybe I'll go back to Chaos or something, but... I dunno. It just doesn't have the same appeal to me, anymore.

[LungTien Temeraire]

Shinkuu, I haven't said Selarth and Azu were the only "evil" characters on the Order shard.

As far as I've seen since I have started to roleplay properly, not every new roleplayer has been playing an evil or out-of-lore character. If some do, they aren't the only ones to play out-of-lore characters, some elder/serious roleplayers do the same.

Amateur roleplayers can still be helped and learn to roleplay better, if they are nicely treated. After that, it depends of the roleplayer's reaction.
I'd like to know where it is stated that istarian dragon hatchlings should not speak nor act like young children, just after their hatch. Does it mean they learned things and/or are like my own character when he was born?

Still, if some new players are making their characters act in a childish way when they shouldn't, according to the lore if this is the case, they can still be greeted and asked softly and quietly.

Maybe, played blighted dragons or bipeds might have been living ones who were killed, then reanimated by the Aegis, in a way or another. If they are dead and have been raised to be undeads, it should be possible to raise them again.

About sealing the fate of the evil characters, it would just require to fix a date and an agreement with the player who plays the concerned character, and then roleplay it/write a story,...

[Frith-Rae]

I totally get ya'lls frustrations, I too felt it when I started playing less and less back in Aug/Sept.

It seemd like every other week we were having the same evil problems over and over again - hatchling killers and eaters, dragon eaters of every sort (blood, flesh, spirit, mind, whatever..), and it gets old.

If everytime I'm running into a dragon I'm suppose to be fighting/hating/killing in RP then my character just stops trying to hang out with other dragons. It seemed like every dragon I was coming into contact with was either evil or existance-impossible. Every other hatchling was feral, didn't understand common, couldn't communicate in some way, or was afraid of everyone else and so just hid under a bush (how people expect to have meaninful RP if they don't come out from under a bush I don't understand..).

My "normal" dragon had to have the same conversation with everythign that walked into the area. I might as well have put it on a macro.

But at the same time, if the more 'in-line with lore' or "regular" players don't stick around and stay active - then you just get more and more polarized play.

Its a downward spiral, and unless people like myself and others are willing to stick around and edumacate through example then we have noone to blame but ourselves for walking away and letting the RP go crazy.

And I include myself in there. I got tired of being only one of 2 or 3 who tried to remain "sane" and "normal".

And the reason why "a dying shard of a dying game" can create such conflict with a limited amount of players is BECAUSE there is a limited amount of players. If you come into contact with 10 RPers when you login and 5 of them are warped/impossible/evil then that's 50% of the RP you're having to figure out how to interact with.

If you come into contact with 50 RPers and 5 of them are warped/impossible/evil then its much more rare and novel occurance, and doesn't seem to be that "everyone has gone crazy."

This would NOT be the problem it is if we had the population out there Rping that was higher in numbers *shrugs*.

[LungTien Temeraire]

I haven't seen that many aggressive or out-of-lore characters, lately... unless it is just me.

[Eelime]

I haven't seen that many aggressive or out-of-lore characters, lately... unless it is just me.

I'm not sure if they're out of lore, but I saw some sort of Soul eater in the Role-Play channel yesterday, and a water/ice dragon. Not so sure about either, but that's because I don't role-play much and don't know much about the lore yet.

[Riaken]

I don't get it, are you trying to make sense of make believe things?

[Eelime]

I don't get it, are you trying to make sense of make believe things?

What do you mean?

[awdz]

I suspect he means that since the whole world is make believe, what difference does it make what folks include as part of the make believe?

Istaria was designed with a specific framework in mind - concepts about what exists in the world and why. The developers have modified it over time, but some things have not been included in the framework. Introducing things that do not fit with the game design can undo the game continuity for other players.

I use the game as a diversion from the real world. Interrupting the game continuity reminds me of things outside of the game - such as the real world again. Although I generally go with the flow of whatever folks present (but keeping my own character as consistent with game lore in the process as I can), I can definitely understand the annoyance some may feel at encountering things that do not fit with game lore.

[Tcei]

I agree so much with what has been said here. The whole reason why I moved Lantua to Chaos, was because I got tired of the evil/blighted/whatever characters. Every time Lantua tried to stand up to one (as he feels very strongly that he should protect the young from these sub-dragons) he was either told to more or less gtfo or would learn that the community had embraced that particular evil sub-dragon (I refuse to refer to them as actual dragons) and that said sub-dragon was viewed as a valued member of the community who's duty it was to eat and/or corrupt the young.

From what I could see the good dragons, who actually tried to stop this madness, where the ones that were ultimately cast out of dragon society. In the end Lantua felt the world deserved to be overrun by the blight and skipped town.

On reflection there is potential to have a very interesting rp story-line. Provided you could get all/most of these sub-dragons to agree. The Aegis has found a way to corrupt/blight dragon kind. The infection/corruption/whatever spread so fast that now there are very few good dragons left and they have been reduced to hiding in the far flung corners of the world. Now its up to them to band together (possibly with the help of their bi-ped allies) and save their race from utter destruction.

Its a nice idea at any rate. Getting it to work is next to impossible tho; the current set of players of these evil sub-dragons dont strike me as the kind who want to kill off their beloved pest.

[LungTien Temeraire]

Are ou saying the Order RP shard has now too few characters who aren't evil, to be able to get proper RP, even in private channels?

[Tcei]

The times I play tend to be sporadic, even going through private channels, I would spend long periods alone. One of the hallmarks of the Order shard back in its heyday was that you could almost always find proper rp nearly any time of the day (save for maybe the wee-hours U.S. time) in the public spaces and the public channels.

The evil sub-dragons were the ones that were forced into these private channels. The well played ones would make an appearance from time to time to keep things interesting, but they played with the knowledge that they could be killed/cured and that they couldnt just hang out in public spaces w/o consequences.Most would simply quit after a time and life would go on. As someone mentioned earlier the real world equivalent of the way it is now is like a serial killer casually hanging out in a police station.

For me I dont like having to be pushed out of public places for being a good dragon. Its understandable if you are evil, you're not supposed to be an acceptable member of normal society. I also didnt like the fact that my character was becoming a manic depressive and suffered from severe stress. It wasnt fun to play him that way, it wasnt how I intended him. My choices were to either let him get so depressed that he'd destroy the Gift within him and commit suicide or have him leave. I chose to have him leave.

The more I think about this the more I notice this seems to be the result of inexperienced players trying to be "unique" but not realizing that you can have a unique character and still fit all/mostly within the lore. You dont have to be supper evil, have supper powers that dont exist in game and/or lore, be of an impossible union of two historic figures/ another world/creature that doesnt exist, ect. Its the small personality quirks that really make a character stand out.

[LungTien Temeraire]

As I said earlier, I haven't seen that many evil characters, lately, and I have seen some good characters roleplayed by new players. I don't recall any time my good ancient dragon had to leave a public place for being good, even while trying to catch an evil haracter.
And as I said too, the new roleplayers aren't the only ones having characters who doesn't fit entirely with istarian lore.

[RuneDragoon]

All kittens and fluffy bunnies can get boring after a time (and I've been kittens and bunnies for years now). A story will always have some sort of conflict to keep it interesting, whether it be an outside source or a character struggling with inner demons.

So just to clarify (And thank you lung for making me feel utterly singled out here, I already feel bad enough like I'm a major cause for shinkuu leaving) yes, there is an end to the character... as an undefeatable darkness is well... not so nice. Its just not now or soon, or when someone feels it should be now. Some things will happen beforehand that have not gone forward. Things first, end of character later.

As stated before as well, a never changing, stagnant character gets old too. It HAS been changing over time. Perhaps it started as an over the top concept, but eventually I got tired of it and hacked it down to a more manageable size and through time perhaps it changes a bit with experiences. It does not stagnate.

I have been looking at it and notice some people have taken it personally in the past and forget that as a player, I'm just a big old teddybear. I'm getting exhausted with people telling me in whispers that they do not approve of it or think I should do something else (or log in and recieve tabs of loathing and moaning, not that I say this with any mal-intent, but rather as an observation) or just outright scream at me in one case. Heck, someone told me to go die once out of the blue, and that makes me feel... great. Not. It makes the experience of so much as logging into the character a royal pain and moreso when I've caused some extra feather ruffling that I never intended for.

[Starstilanxs]

Adding to the subject at hand, I understand your feelings on the problem, Shinkuu. These are recognizable things that are troublesome to the RP in the world. Very few people RP evil characters well, the ones that I know of and interact with have lead great character development without decimating the lore.

There are many, though, that RP evil characters who are completely off the wall, killing aimlessly in front of dragons such as Starstilanxs (whom, I will mention, will practically rip the head off of any character who harms innocent dragons/bipeds without reason) without any sort of thought to the fact that a giant ancient who is known to protect the society is sitting in front of their face and more often than not have these characters made in a way where they have some sort of rediculous power that does, in every way shape and form, break the worlds lore. These characters are the ones who are the problem, evil characters in general are not.

I will admit that my character is one of the very few who do take action, but he does without any sort of thought on the matter. He is often bothered by others about how he goes about his work when defending everyone but it doesn't mean he will ever stop protecting the society.

Try having your bipeds and dragons join up with Starstilanxs and Callihan, they need the support in defending the society and taking down those who do these evil things, even out the numbers a little with the evil vs. good if you could say.

Now.. light hearted RP.. thats one that is very hard to come by now. When I started back up earlier this year even there wasn't nearly as much seriousness in the atmosphere, sure there where times that it became pretty tension filled, but that didn't escalate to what it is now. I would love to see more of this and really, I am willing to contribute to it as much as I really can.

As to what Xepher mentioned, this is also agreeable entirely. Believability is difficult to come by, the server is covered with those who are generally unable to RP in a way that is understandable and believable, pointing these things out is most of the time met with anger towards those who try and help and tell them that they might end up getting into large amounts of issues in the future with other players.