Best Of

4/9/2021 at 3:19
Tiur, the Gnosis
Everyone
Artifacts!

Revenant and Warden artifacts have been released into the shop! Here's the details:

First of all, the existing 'weaponmaster' power which decreases mastery cooldown for Battlefury and Savagery to ten minutes has been expanded to also work for Riving and Warding mastery skills.

Warden artifacts
----------------
hunt_warden a carved serpent trinket 200/400/800cr
Provides a bonus of 5%, 10%, or 15% to the damage done by Warden attacks on mobiles.

renown_regen an Amulet of Segiae 400cr
Grants a small amount of renown every hour, and increases the amount of renown earned during Trials by 25%.

many_bones <none> 100cr
Increases the amount of simulacrums you can have by 10.
Increases the amount of instructor simulacrums you can have by 10.

renown_boon an ancestral bear skull 250cr
Halves the amount of renown used when performing Ancestry abilities.


Revenant artifacts
------------------
hunt_revenant a heavy rulebook 200/400/800cr
Provides a bonus of 5%, 10%, or 15% to the damage done by Revenant attacks on mobiles.

Penned by my hand on Gosday, the 24th of Midsummer, in the year 494 MA.

4/9/2021 at 14:34
Tiur, the Gnosis
Everyone
Aegis and PK

Formal rules, now enshrined in HELP AEGIS PK

The Aegis based skills provide a unique PK problem, due to them being tied to a location and capable of acting at nearly any time, regardless of the maker's presence.

1) If you are online and any aegis you own is being actively attacked you are allowed to defend it DURING the attack.

2) If your aegis is in a hotspot location, e.g. caravan routes, major hunting area, frequently used path, or Orrery area, you cannot take revenge for its destruction.

3) Anything else is open for revenge, such as a city, shop, personal residence, etc.

All of these rules are lesser than the greater PK rules and do not override them. So if it was (real life) weeks ago, move on. It needs to make narrative sense, and an Aegis isn't important enough to plot revenge for (in game) years.

Penned by my hand on Falsday, the 2nd of Lleian, in the year 494 MA.

4/9/2021 at 19:02
Tiur, the Gnosis
Everyone
2021 Celani Call!

Aetolia is once more accepting applications for new Celani in the Pools of Creation. This is a volunteer position where you can help shape the world of Aetolia, with the potential to eventually take on a roleplay position of one our of Gods. There are many tasks expected of you as a Celani. Some of these are building entire areas, constructing and running events, engaging in roleplay, creating scripts for NPCs and plenty more!

If you feel you have what it takes to make the cut, then read on and follow the instructions for applying! Please note that this is a VOLUNTEER position, and during your time as a Celani you will be expected to give up your other characters.

We are taking three kinds of applicant this time around, a little differently phrased:
* Those who are interested in creating story depth and engagement, especially through items, roleplay, and events.
* Those interested in quests and coding.
* Those that feel they can handle the behind the scenes tasks that are tedious and difficult, but important to theme and flavor (like writing AB files/Skill messages)

Successful applicants for both roles tend to have the following skills:
- A love for Aetolia and a desire to enrich its world.
- Self-motivated.
- Maturity.
- Consistency.
- Creativity.
- Improvisational skills.
- Dependability. (underlined four or five times)
- The ability to handle critique and rejection. Many of the ideas you will propose will be rejected, whereas ones you see to completion will suffer the critique of your fellow Celani/Gods and, perhaps more terrifying, players.

Successful applicants for a RP/CONTENT role tend to have the following skills:
- Strong roleplaying ability.
- Impeccable writing skills.
- Ability to disconnect and RP for the game, not for gain
- Phrasing skills to make the mundane into mystical

In order to apply, you must meet the following criteria:
- You must be 18 years or older IRL.
- You must have, at absolute minimum, at least 500 hours of playing time.
- Be willing to sign a NDA.

You must send your application to celani@aetolia.com and include the following:

1. Your real name.
2. Your real age.
3. What position you would apply for (yes, we're only asking for one..)
5. Your occupation (or course of study if a student)
6. Your character(s) in Aetolia.
7. Why should we make you a Celani, and perhaps eventually a God?
8. Why do you want to be a Celani?
9. Any special experience you have outside of Aetolia that you feel might be helpful in your position as a Celani.


Those applying for a RP/CONTENT role should also include:
10. Two room descriptions of at least 100+ words.
11. A brief outline for an RP event, roughly 100 to 200 words in length. This should be smaller in scope than an events post, more something that makes a single city have a fun few days and talk about inside their orgs.
12. A skill message in the game you find boring/terse, made interesting.

Those applying for a CODING role should also include:
10. A paragraph or two outlining your coding background, what your language proficiencies are, as well as any other skills you feel that you bring to the table (*nix admin / SQL etc.).

Applications will be open until the 14th of May. We have a limited number of positions to fill, so if you don't make it, don't be too disappointed! Hold onto your application and send it in next time we open applications.


TEMPERING EXPECTATIONS
- Please note that we take into account the game's environment as a whole. If you run multiple orgs we might not be able to afford losing you on the player side.
- We do not open God roles of the same tether as the person accepted, and if you play both tethers, then we take into account the tether that has had the most recent amount of playtime across your characters.
- Coders can expect it to take 3+ months to get actual Aetolia code access.
- Even RPLani have to code a little, to make quests. Don't be terrified by code, we'll teach you.
- The first task of a Celani to be promoted is to build an area in full, that includes quests and NPC content. Don't worry, we'll be there to help!
- The second task of a Celani to be promoted is to run an event, so be ready to roleplay!
- For both the volunteer's sanity, and bias protection, we require discord & skype groups to be left. Technically, you're representing Aetolia in some small degree and although we don't expect you to suddenly cut ties with your friends, we do need to remove the temptation of giving information that shouldn't be revealed. Once it's typed out to a whole group, you cannot take it back.
- There is a six month limit on getting promoted. By the end of sixth months, either your stuff is done and you are helping with a God role, or we'll have to free up the spot for someone else to try.

-T

Penned by my hand on Quensday, the 3rd of Lleian, in the year 494 MA.

They're meant to be sorta vague, because I hate enumerated PK rules. We have a small enough playerbase that we can take issues as they come and figure it out. We also expect players to be adults (I know, I know) and use basic common sense. I'm just not going to discuss hyperbolic attempts to drag 'hotspot' out to mean the whole world.

The word REVENGE is very specifically used here. Revenge is PK for something past tense. Showing up to defend the aegis you put down during someone's attempt to destroy it is not revenge, the act is still ongoing. If they use a group, and you bring a group, neat, it's a group fight. If you go find them hours after it's gone, no.

Essentially: The Aegis are not meant to passively sit there and generate you PK cause. The core to understand is that it's not you building something and it deserves to exist; it's that you are putting something like a preemptory attack out in the world and waiting. When it hits, YOU STARTED THE FIGHT.

If you weren't there to defend it, you don't get revenge for losing the fight you started. There is some leeway left for things like making trap rooms, or tricking people into them as active combat methods. Hence only really caring about hotspot locations. Essentially, I should approve every single issue where your Aegis hits someone you have no cause on.

Ask yourself "Do I have cause against X?" Because an aegis is like an attack on a loooooong timer.

In cases where no one is hit, or it's destroyed while you're gone, we're saying that to claim revenge (pk at a later date) it needs to either have been somewhere you have a reasonable reason to pk people over or somewhere you own and were protecting. Again, think of it like a delayed attack. It is unreasonable to think you deserve cause on someone later because you started a fight and they fought back. If it's at NoT, even if it doesn't hit the person who destroyed it, it's like you left an attack waiting to hit them at any time, it's silly to give you cause for them removing it.

The aegis is aggressive. Justify its aggression, not how people respond to it.

E:

I missed the bit about single deaths. That's meant to handle people putting up silly issues, death is not that big of a deal, whatever. But if someone treats it like "I get one free pk causeless kill on every player" I'll end up punishing you because the larger picture matters more than the time saving "don't waste our time" rules.

This feels like another nail into the coffin of any kind of world conflict outside aura-sanctioned encounters. Aegis are unique, I agree with that point, but they are property and, as it stands, labyrinths on aegis exist as the primary method of forcing an encounter or controlling an encounter that Shadow has currently.

Even more, shadow cannot remove traps that can be set at any time along these same hunting areas. Are we now allowed to attack someone for hitting a trap they left because reasons, especially as we can't see them unless we're specifically looking for them? Will there be an ability to remove them or possibly attempt to remove them? Will that be considered a reason enough to defend while I am trying to remove those from the pathways? What of glyphs?

I can understand the frustration that may come with having an area prepped for an upcoming conflict, but prep is not unique to Aegis, and is not unique to Shadow either. I also feel that if you engage in an aggressive action, you accept the consequences that come with that action. Shrine defiling gives you a hefty aura that lasts after and leaves you open to PK, and you're allowed to set those up in areas and are used aggressively - will there be a limiter on that next, too?

I think this is going in the wrong direction and setting a terrible precedent. World conflict is already non-existent outside sanctioned events (foci, orrery, sect, vortex/fracture/HG), and this only limits it more. And if anything, it just creates a situation where it is now encouraged to bring an entire group to defend an aegis or attack an aegis, as once the aegis is down, it doesn't matter anyhow - you're off scot free.

Add in some removal options of Traps, please, or else this feels like a double-standard aimed specifically at labyrinth @Tiur.

Edit: As an additional note, this feels like it goes against the spirit of a single death not being issuable for the most part. A single act of aggression is answered with a single act of revenge if it can be completed in a reasonable time. I try to avoid hyperbole, but feels like a bit of a slippery slope heading toward PK lawyering.