A thought occurred to Isaiah’s player, maybe this is what roleplay really is? Role Playing games on a computer or console were mostly just clicking or selecting fighter / cast / flee from a menu. Also this MUD wasn’t like a tabletop game either. Combat in a tabletop game could take the entire session. On the mud combat was 5 seconds per round. If someone couldn’t type the command they needed to cast their magic missile at an attacker then they would just not do any damage that round. The real draw of this game was the social interaction.
Apparently the pause in the conversation was Isaiah’s fault. Light appeared to be waiting for him to say something.
Isaiah says: “Yes Light! I’ll help someone else get their corpse back if they come to me for help in the future.”
Light smiles brightly.
Light says: “You are a good elf Isaiah.”
Isaiah smiles.
Isaiah says: “And you are a good half-elf Light. Your god is no doubt proud of his priestess.”
Isaiah’s player decided to check his title now that he is posing as a level 3 mage.
-Isaiah the lesser seer-
Hey he is no longer the expert-know-it-all. Well that is nice. One of these days he’ll have to strive to become a high mortal and make up his own unique title. That day will not be soon though. Level 20 is far away.
Light says: “Perhaps you would join me for some tea?”
Isaiah nods.
>You have been invited to follow light
Isaiah followed light a couple rooms to the west and into an inn. The inn was called the three coins inn. It had an outside courtyard and an inside area where a waitress NPC stood to take orders. Her name was ‘Catherinea, Waitress of three coins’.
Light sits down at a table and motions for you to join her.
Isaiah sits at a table across from light.
Light fishes through her pockets and hands Catherinea some coins.
Catherinea gives Light a tea.
Catherinea gives Light a tea.
Light gives you tea.
Isaiah’s player brought up the inventory screen.
Longsword (wielded)
Leather armor (worn)
Spellbook
Tea
Isaiah ponders.
Isaiah says: “Light, earlier I asked on the OOC line and a person with the name of Someone answered. What was that?”
Light whispers to you: “OOC, those people are wizards. They are the people who code the game. It annoys them if we go in and out of characters though that is why I whisper to you.”
Isaiah whispers to light: “OOC Okay I was just asking about weapon proficiencies I don’t know why they snapped at me.”
Light whispers to you: “OOC, They see talking about certain in game stuff as giving away quest info. There are people who have gotten jailed or rid for that. “
Isaiah sighs.
Light whispers to you :OOC, there is a board under the MAH that the admins post who was rid and why.”
Isaiah whisper to light: “ooc, what is rid?”
Light whispers to isaiah: “OOC it is when they delete your character from the game.”
Isaiah shudders.
***
Gabrielle enters
Isaiah nods at Gabrielle
Isaiah looks over Gabrielle.
Gabrielle is a svelte female elf. She has black hair and green eyes. She dresses in loose fitting priestly robes. She wears a bodice that shows up her bountiful chest and tight leather pants that show off her shapely hips. A holy symbol hangs from a silver chain around her neck. She has a black whip attached to her her belt.
Stolen story; please report.
Another gamer girl was detected! And Isaiah is also an elf. Maybe this is a meeting destined by fate!
Isaiah says: “Hello Gabrielle! I’m Isaiah. Nice to meet you.”
Gabrielle looks over Isaiah.
Gabrielle hmms and smiles.
Gabrielle says: “Nice to meet you as well Isaiah.”
Isaiah says: “The pleasure is all mine.”
Gabrielle says: “What are you doing here with the half-human?”
Isaiah’s player is kinda surprised at this. Half-human? What is a half-human?
Gabrielle gestures at Light.
Gabrielle says: “She is half of what we are.”
Isaiah says: “Light and I were just having some tea.”
Light whispers to you: “Isaiah, we should leave.”
Isaiah whispers to Light: “Why should we go? She seems nice.”
Gabrielle says: “What are you two whispering about.”
Gabrielle raises an eyebrow.
Light leaves south. And because Isaiah is following light he also leaves just like that. Light shows impressive typist skills as she bee-lines it to the west to the temple of Lathander.
Isaiah says: “What was that about?”
Light says: “She is dangerous.”
Isaiah says: “Why is Gabrielle dangerous? She seems like a priestess just like you.”
Light sighs.
Light says: “She’s the high priestess of Loviatar. You should stay away from her.”
Isaiah says: “Loviatar what’s that?”
Light whispers to you: “OOC type help loviatar.”
Doing that brings up the help file. Apparently Loviatar is a goddess of torture. Holy objects to them include whips, ice and lightning. This game has a goddess of torture? Well that is unexpected.
Isaiah says: “Oh… I thought that elves were good. Elves are fey creatures that frolic in the wilds.”
Light whispers to you : “OOC normally you can’t roll an evil elf but there is a chance.”
Isaiah’s player shudders as he gets flashbacks to character creations. Such trauma. Imagine trying to roll a good Drow. Possible, but now imagine how many rerolls would be required to get a good drow with an 18(00) strength. Is masochism considered an official mental illness? Maybe rolling a good drow or evil elf might be the definition of that.
Isaiah gasps in astonishment.
Isaiah says: “Maybe I should stick with trying to get revenge for dying to that goblin king and his royal guards.”
Light smiles.
Light says: “Just be careful. You can hit him with a magic missile and leave before you take too much damage.”
Isaiah’s player lets out a big sigh behind his computer. He hadn’t been using his spells at all. Well spell--right now he only had one spell. Hopefully he could find some scrolls for his character and get a more respectable collection of spells soon. The reality was that he’d advanced his mage class without really using any mage abilities. It felt a bit like cheating.
After a bit more chatting Isaiah bid farewell to take the fight back to the goblin king. He killed the gate guards and made his way back to the throne room. He sat in the room adjacent to the throne room and equipped his sword and memorized all the magic missiles he could for his mage level.
His mud client would let him stack commands together if separated by a semicolon. He decided to see how this would work out. The command he wrote was ‘north ; cast magic missile on goblin; south’. Much to his surprise he was able to enter the room start casting the spell and leave before they got their attacks in.
Goblin king attacks you!
Goblin Royal guard attacks you!
Goblin Royal guard attacks you!
You begin casting a spell.
You leave south.
You raise your hands and 1 bolt of magic streams out of it and zaps goblin.
Wait… did that actually work? And the spell didn’t fail from not being in the room? Isaiah wondered if the devs knew about this but there was something better to do right now. He could kill the goblin king and guards without taking any damage.
However, it was not fun. He had to type ‘memorize magic missile’. Wait a few seconds to get the spell back. It was a little cumbersome. However with a little bit of time he had three dead goblin corpses which he promptly buried. The loot the goblin king dropped was a goblin crown and goblin scepter. The goblin royal guards had some chainmail and a goblin longsword each.
He tried to equip the crown.
‘Goblin crown is too small for you’
He tried to equip the chainmail.
‘Goblin chainmail is too small for you’
He decided to use the scepter. He could sell the thing at the store and get some coins. Isaiah headed out. However some of the rooms reset while he was slowly and painstakingly blasting the goblin royal court away one magic missile at a time. He’d killed the lesser goblins without too much trouble before so it wouldn’t be much of a problem.
You hit goblin ineffectually.
HP:24/25
Goblin misses you.
Mutter grumble---right you have to go to the trainer and train with a weapon. A scepter is not a bladed weapon is it? Isaiah just left and headed back to town not really wanting to do anymore fighting for a little bit and see how many coins he could get for the goblin’s gear. It wasn’t much, just a few hundred gold.
Next stop, trainer!
Isaiah was repeating his earlier grind trying to level up his blunt weapons with the trainer in shadow. Get 20 or so attacks in, take 20 damage, leave the room for the road and heal up. This continued until he was at 100% proficiency. He had finished up and decided to switch back to his longsword. Longswords are cooler anyway. In stories what does the hero always wield--a sword right? Well, equipping the scepter seemed to be a problem.
‘You cannot unequip mace it is cursed.’
Cursed? What?
Time to ask over the lines.
Isaiah (ooc): I try to unequip a scepter and it says it is cursed. What do I do?”
Whitefalcon (ooc): you have to go to a church and pay for them to remove the curse. It says what to do on the sign.
Isaiah (ooc): Thanks!
And so Isaiah’s next stop was the church on the west end of shadow. He head back in there and read the sign. Apparently one could pay for healing, forsake a deity, check for curses and break a curse for a fee. Isaiah’s player typed out the command to break the curse. The text scrolls back at him.
‘You do not have enough money to break this curse, it requires 1000 gold.’
1000 gold?! That is so expensive. The first magical item he got and it was cursed. Getting a magic item should be a cause for celebration. This is crap. How was he going to get rid of this curse?
He stormed out and tried several times to unequip the scepter. It didn’t work. He also was worried about something else. He tried to cast his magic missile spell. It also didn’t work. Great, so if someone gets a cursed weapon they are basically screwed. This game is so punishing it is hard to see it any other way.
Isaiah walked around a few more parts of the city he hadn’t been at. There was an abandoned warehouse in part of the town. He sat there a few minutes to collect his thoughts.
Sometimes someone just from being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Someone stabs you in the back!
HP -98/25
You are on death's door, your body is slipping from you.
The grim reaper cackles happily as he receives Isaiah’s soul.
Your world spins and you find yourself standing on an outcropping in a barren hellscape. In the distance there is a red and black wall with many faces on it wailing in pain.
A black male figure appears from nowhere.
Bane says: “Ah another soul for the wall.”
A female figure with a divine radiance surrounding her appears next to him.
Ventri says: “No so fast, this one is new. We should give him another chance.”
Vetri says: “You have died 3 time.”
. . . Great this cutscene again.
After getting back to the shadow church completely empty handed no money, Isaiah’s player checks this death log for what he suspects is his first PK(player killing).
Deaths
You have been brought low by:
Goblin King
Goblin Gate Guard
Nightfall