Shattered Kingdoms

I am rather disappointed in this. My time in SK will be up in the following week and I was really hoping to get some more interaction with Ciadel via, the loreseeking rp you were following.

I realize you're trying to be helpful, and I didn't see things play out. But I'd like to challenge the underlying assumption here. If factions are player-run and seperate, why can't the Peacekeepers be more interested in keeping the peace than suppporting the Hammer? It's far more in keeping with the faction framework than necromancers in the Druids, and somehow SK has survived. I can understand an immortal stepping in to stop a lightie-lightie war, as that's a cursable alignment violation (not that new players would necessarily know that). But that applies equally to the supposed case of lighties spam-killing in response to Peacekeeper policy.

I confess I got the clue that the Peacekeepers are intended to be the tail to the Hammer's dog when I first played one, but there was a prominent post in the tribunal's area to clearly establish that. If these IC means of persuasion aren't still being used, new players can't be expected to mesh with the Established Order.

(Of course, my response to that notice included never playing a Peacekeeper again. There may be players altruistic enough to play a character for another faction's convenience, but I'm not one of them.)

I absolutely agree that the Keepers (or any faction) was wrong for Ciadel. Ciadel joining was not an OOC decision but one originating from his RP. He was young (19, if I recall correctly), idealistic, confident in his abilities (a 19 year-old GM with mastered spells?), felt responsibility for something terrible happening, and was faced with the prospect of his home kingdom being defenseless. I remember OOCly debating whether or not I should allow him to join, thinking it was a bad idea relative to my desire to stay out of things and relative to my inexperience, but that is where his RP led him. There were a few elements of that role that really didn't come to light until much later that would have altered my decision to follow that RP.

That said, I got the memo about the Keepers supposed to be supporting the Hammer. Then I threw it out. As far as Ciadel was concerned, the Keepers are the ones with legal authority, displayed by the various tribunal commands, and it is the Hammer who should be deferring to them (and the RL history behind the title "Justiciar" is rather interesting as they were the precursors to Prime Ministers and held a lot of power) as the creators of national policy in accordance with royal decree and the book of law. He saw the Hammer occupying Castle Morea as an sentimental indulgence and if they weren't going to act in Taslamar's best interests, according to what Ciadel saw those interests as, and kept provoking wars, which got his people killed for what he saw as nothing but vain pride, he was going to deal with them by executing said legal authority. He was stern with the Hammer because they were stern and wouldn't even entertain the idea of peace (under Pilnor) so he wasn't going to entertain the idea of forgiveness.

I was disappointed when that RP ended. I felt that sort of conflict has a lot of potential for quality RP since same-alignment conflicts necessitate more nuance than light vs dark conflicts. Foreign invaders are at least foreign and don't sabotage the character of the kingdom. The Hammer, in his eyes, was a cancer that needed to be removed, peacefully if possible but violently if not, as something that ran contrary to Taslamar's promise as a kingdom (which is why he kept raging at them for violating specific laws) that offered sanctuary to all people regardless of race, nation of origin, or creed so long as they abided by the law. The Hammer was supposedly of the right races and creeds but refused to abide by the law (even when the Queen did say that while the Hammer could wage war with whoever they wanted outside of Taslamar that they couldn't attack people within Taslamar according to the Justiciar). The Hammer wasn't even fully comprised of citizens of Taslamar while the Keepers were.

I debated to the very end whether or not he should final strike a certain shiny rock. Or relic.

Also nooooez, I was interested in doing an RP with you.

By the way, I do intend to stop checking the forums after a few days. After that, if anyone wants to chat with me for some reason, they'll find me at this screen name and almost any of the big IM/email services.

Since you're obviously just going incognito to start up a new character, I'll go ahead and drop one more comment... the one thing I questioned about your character from an OOC perspective was your grasp on alignment. The conversation Paedrig and Ciadel had where my char totally failed to convince yours that deep-elves are inherently more evil than elves left me going "well, uhhh" for a while. You were playing scrupulous, I think, but if I hadn't known you were Zavijan I'd have guessed dogmatic.

Like I said I was impressed at the consistency and wish you luck with the next. Maybe try unprincipled or anarchist if you're looking for freedom to just go explore.

(╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻

I am sad, very very very sad. Loved rping with you and driving you crazy. I was hoping to see just how that was going to work in the end.

Ah well, I do hope the SK boomerang affect gets you and you come back. The pbase can be total ooc douches but icly the stories we weave do make it fun to see what mess we can stir up in imaginary land.

This is the best afterlife I've ever read. When you write your book, come back here and pm me and tell me what it's called so I can get a copy. I liked alot about Ciadel but I was not playing a lighty at the time. I really hope you come back after a break because it sounds to me like you have a lot to offer the game.

If you don't come back, I hope you enjoyed yourself while you were here.

The Peacekeepers aren't destined to be involved in constant PK because of the Hammer of Light, they're destined to be in constant PK because they're a lighty tribunal, and if the darkie factions are well-staffed they're bound to find one reason or another to go poking around in Taslamar looking for people to murder.


I never insinuated as Pilnor that the Peacekeepers were meant to be the Hammer's lapdog, but I -did- insinuate many times, as was also proven by history and lore, that they were meant to be allies, or barring that most certainly not at war with each other (This is also what Queen Serena's main point was). Ciadel disputed the Hammer's worthiness to be considered a part of Taslamar because the Hammer had wars that Pilnor couldn't comprehend ending: Namely Pilnor was at war with the Black Hand, a nation who had been, was and for all Pilnor could tell was forever going to be surrounded by necromancy and dark-auras. Given that no one in the Black Hand had approached him with any sorts of terms for any peace agreement and that he was most certainly not inclined to seek one out himself because beating the daylights out of evil was his job, Pilnor told Ciadel that he could not foresee coming to a peace with the Black Hand.

Ciadel took that single statement, twisted it around in his head a million different ways, and then eventually decided to deport every member of the Hammer of Light without question and threaten to declare war against the Hammer of Light. He wasn't threatening war and deporting every Hammer member because we broke the laws of Taslamar, because that happened extremely rarely unless of course you count the abundant times where Hammer members defended Exile. He wasn't doing it as a response of any aggressive action against the Peacekeepers either, or because I tried to order him around like a flunky (The very opposite is true. I offered my help to Ciadel at every turn). No, Ciadel decided to do those things because the Hammer of Light was warring with what was the most evil faction in the entire game and it would have been completely contrary to the Hammer's creed to stop unless presented with a reasonable truce agreement. At the same time, Ciadel was completely amicable and glad to pardon, unbanish and declare a truce with the Black Hand, whose members routinely entered Exile and killed everything in sight just so that they could either kill some PCs who were resting there or lure in some PCs to kill. I cannot accurately represent through words how much I felt like I was living in opposite world while Ciadel was in charge of the Peacekeepers. For a little while, part of me actually thought that Ciadel was Baldric just playing a twisted meta-game joke on me.



The Peacekeepers are not meant to be the Hammer's lapdog, but the Peacekeepers are also supposed to do their job. Ciadel decided that doing his job involved deporting people who went to extensive lengths to avoid breaking his laws except in the case of invasions, and pardoning and granting truces to the only people who actually broke his laws. I'm all for the Peacekeepers being on their own and separate from the Hammer of Light, I'm just not a fan of doing it with your head shoved squarely into your trousers. I think the main reason that Ciadel had so much trouble was that he seemed, like Marshall, to completely disregard the rules of the game as far as alignment is concerned, which is something that has no place in SK unless you're playing someone who's insane or deluded, which Ciadel definitely fit in my book.

Since he's deleted as well, I'm curious: Was there any sort of deep-elf marriage RP going on with Ciadel or was that just some PC blowing smoke?