Other Guild Issues

[Eonwë]

Some things I thought should be looked at and addressed.

Allignment:
I think it will be tough to allow "evil" characters within our Guild. It will certainly be hard to meet in cities if we do. I am not 100% sure how the system will work, but I would say it's safe to say we shouldn't base this on a RP server if we allow evil guys :} Our other options (again I'm not exactly sure how this works) are "good or neutral." Or at least I think Neutral is an option, but it may carry other connotations we do not want. Something that will have to be looked into.


The other thing is introducing ourselves. Varda has put forth(not on their board yet I don't believe) that we are a group of people who believe in the existence of the Valar. Does anyone have anything else to add to that?

Also, I think if anyone did choke on our name "the Valar Guild" we could also explain that in "real life" we are a group of Tolkien fans that has existed for 6 years and are planning to expand into MEO. Of course, we can point them to our web page etc.

And of course we need to let them know we do require a test. Hehe thinking about it, our Tolkien entry test will be current events :}

Take care :}
Eonwë

[Varda]

The Valar Guild could be those beings in Middle-earth who believe the Valar do or should be influencing events in Middle-earth, and honor them, which we hope invites their presence, by our deeds. We could even set up quests or crafts of our own specially to attract them.

This might include elements of the religion of the Faithful of the Numenoreans, for some. Perhaps "Eruhantale" for a celebration day, picking some handy mountain for celebrating Eru. Weathertop would be available in Eriador, but others less well-traveled by outsiders might be also, perhaps one not yet named or in the mountain ranges.

An iffy thought. We might include a shadow group of those who really are hoping for Makar, Meassa, or even Morgoth to aid them. They may be hoping for strength in battle, rather than evil. Morgoth is tricksy, so he might influence their minds as well without their realizing. Should we drop this idea like a hot potato at the start? It could allow more classes, but could cause problems.
Also iffy. We could try out a secondary Morgothian offshoot for less savory characters to get together, like a bandit group, but we might wind up in a position of having to slaughter ourselves.

[Elatan]

I think we will have to allow evil characters, I would like to try playing evil ;D but we may look into how we can coop with it. You can be playing evil and still have some honor allowing others to agree on duels ? or have nice funny battles between ourselves ? We might even setup one of the real battles and play it out

many players in Valar has expressed the wish to duel eachother but we have always said no but this were in D1 and 2 where the world were kinda different.
Games have come way further with other options and fraktions/difference between characters.
I bet we can handle it as the players we are looking for are honorble players even they play evil chars.

I am reluctent to use a RP server. It can be funny but also a tight annoying shirt. On a normal server we can RP as we find it suiting.

The idear with making RP-situations as Varda suggest I find quite funny Let us try some of those, might stimulate people to investigate how some of those ceremonies were performed.

[Varda]

The one thing most important to retain in any guild branch is trustworthiness. We've worked very hard to build this up in all facets, whether our references to original work in articles or our game play style. We need to be careful not to let the Melkor Influence harm this in any way.

[Varda]

I agree we should consider how to handle evil characters, without compromising their trustworthiness, asking a bit much. Sauron offered that he could consider the other evil characters in the game to be competition to be destroyed, and that he is using the "good guys" to help him unknowingly. Melkor was a Vala once, perhaps he would have a semi-secret following? And then we could have the "honor one Vala, honor them all" types who might choke on the idea but still do it.

[Varda]

Good point, Elatan, about going with a normal server. More freedom.

[Eonwë]

I agree, let's hit normal servers and see what we get.

Eonwë

[Varda]

According to MEO, we won't be able to play evil characters at first anyway. We can play good or neutral hobbits, men, or elves in a region including Eriador and nearby.
Fainan will be a good/ elf. (Hey! I was human in EQ!)

[Varda]

On the role-playing thread, do we go with one on this board under this one, or one on the MeO board? Why? hehe. You knew I'd ask why!

[Varda]

And dwarves! Can't forget them!

Although we can't play an evil character like an orc, we can make evil choices. For instance, an elf who listens to the advice of the Elven-wise (we get to meet Elrond!), can be an Elven Scout. One who ignores the Elven-wise and seeks vengeance instead of protecting the people, is an Elven Avenger. Avengers can use different weapons, but at a price...

[Eonwë]

Yeah, that's kind of what I meant by "evil." Not literally evil in that they're not serving the Dark Lord (at least not officially like an orc) perhaps, but certainly not making nice-guy choices. Guess that sort of makes our group neutral as we will allow both?

I really want to be an elf wielding a sword (too many bow Elves in games,.. was hoping for a Sword weilding Elf without a helmet in WC3 and I ended up with a Demon Hunter :}), but if I have to mess up my nice-guy stuff for it,.. :} Well, guess I'll make what choices I make and if I get to wield a sword all the better... they just better not take my sword away later on for being a nice guy :}

Glorfindel had a sword and he listened to Elrond so maybe I'll get lucky :}

Take care :}
Eonwë, friend to sword-wielding Elves everywhere :}

P.S.
Roleplay:
We could do it both here and on the MEO board, but to be honest I never really understood text RP past the point of making up a background story :} It seems too easy to go "my char has a bazillion mana with 18 bazillion HP, so your kingly deathstrike did nothing to him while my superzap killed you 20 times over" :}

[Varda]

That helps a lot. I have to list the guild under good, neutral, or evil.

Is it kind of weird for a group trying to increase the attention of the Valar to the normal folk to include baddies.? hmm.
Churches with large numbers of people can expect to have some members who are there for reasons other than religious; could be so with ours as well. Figuring out their motivations for helping could be intriguing story stuff.
Maybe they feel a kind of desperation, hoping in the back of the mind that the good guys' silly notions of finding help are correct, straw-grasping.
Or they at least want to protect nutcase friends before they are slaughtered as others they knew, meanwhile saying "I told you they wouldn't listen, it wouldn't work." Trying to talk "sense" into them. They might have nightmares about their earlier losses.

[Varda]

Eonwe, remember your attempt earlier at a guild-wide story? Maybe this text rp could be a workable way. I wasn't sure if it would be a good idea to hand a lot of strangers access to our board, but I guess we could ban them and delete posts if needed.

We could leave off most battle magic in our stories, unless we learn how it works in the MeO world. I understand there will be limited healing magic. Maybe we have to haul guys in to Rivendell for magical healing in our rp story (another adventure), but otherwise use mundane healing - splints, willow bark for aspirin, teas, alcohol, boiling water, clean bandages.

If we have to have fights, duh, we can gloss over it with "we came, we saw, we conquered"...or ran because we were grossly outnumbered, or ran to report to the regular army if we're elven scouts (I am). We could even turn some into poetic form, not necessarily great. He cried out to Orome and leaped into the fray.

When someone pulls that nonsense about his superzap beating your king's sword of haste, we can call that post "the cheeping of birds or frogs or neeker-breekers" and ignore it.

We should know about how many arrows it takes to bring down a whatever, fewer as we gain experience, or if we can take it out with swords. Helps to have a bow of Galadriel to take down a fell beast, for instance. Swords alone will not avail against a balrog, nor bows.

Auros, in rp at least, could be a big elf with a sword, backed up by one or more bow shooters, a la tank with casters. You're an elf who wants to get up close and personal with those vicious orcs, so that could suggest a bit of vengeance going on. It shouldn't have to over-ride all your choices, something like Elrohir and Elladan. Calling on the name of Makar isn't like calling on Melkor. If they let you be a good guy with a sword, Tulkas Astaldo could make a good battle-cry.

If the game won't support a sword-using elf, which it hasn't shown yet, then you might want to try a human ranger to give the greatest mobility and excuse to hang out with other races. Might lest us hook up sooner. I think games try to make the different races different by giving them different expertises, rather than using up memory with different styles. *sigh*

In rp fights, we could use a little *gasp* logic, when we don't know the numbers. Fifty orcs on one tank will mean a dead tank. Running can be sensible! Luring to the bowfolk is good. Also, luring over a cliff or into the regular army that we're scouting for, or help out a ranger ambush.

Since we don't have death in MeO, but wake up at a bind point with lowered experience and stats, we could call the guy unconscious and dragged to a safe place by buddies. He'd be considered injured for a while, buddies patch him up or he patches himself, and he regains health naturally. We can make time merely by typing, lucky us! "Six weeks later, after his broken arm had re-knit and he had heard every hobbit geneology known to Bree at least twice...".

If we're going to be detailed, we'll have to come up with hit points etc, maybe hunting down the latest D&D books to keep it uniform. I haven't seen MeO hit points etc listed, but may have missed them.

If we go too much for fights rather than our mission, we will turn into a D&D group very suddenly with constant dice rolls, rather than a story. Or we could combine it.

Anyone have the latest D&D books?

Want me to make shorter posts? Maybe we should get on AIM?

[Varda]

MeO News: Nov 14, 2003

"Every character, no matter what his class, can learn to pick up a sword and wade into heroic combat. But some classes gain skills that allow them to make especially accurate attacks, deal critical blows, or debilitate an enemy with a single attack."

"Axes, swords, and hammers, aren't just pretty things to hold in your hands; weapons behave differently, and monsters may react to them differently."

[Eonwë]

Well, from reading the Development Diaries, it's sort of a balance of personal philosophies. I'm not sure how this will balance into virtue/corruption though, unless it will be the ultimate "virtue" will be in helping others, while the ultimate "corruption" will be in seeking power or treasure for one's personal use. So someone could technically serve the side of good in a way not-so-good.

Still looking for whether good means we are all virtuous completely or whether we simply don't serve Sauron and "purposely" do evil things. Semantics, what joy :}

Take care :}
Eonwë