“Hey R u on?” my fingers flicked across the keyboard as I contacted a few of my friends, though my attention snapped elsewhere at an unexpected response. That was fast, were they like, not in the middle of doing anything? I didn’t expect to be responded ttttttttttttooooooooooooh that’s not a response, that’s a fresh DM.
But from whom? Who could it have be-oh come on obviously it’s Onesy who else?
“Are you online?”
“No”
“Haha, very funny.”
“I mean, u ask me if im online when it very clearly says im online and dont expect me to give u shit?”
“It’s more a courtesy than anything.”
“Yeah yeah courtesy smhertesy. i was gonna ask some friends if they wanted to play a game with me while i waited for Omniscient to drop. But now that youre here i guess ill ask you instead. wanna hop on untitled battlegrounds?”
“Untitled what now?”
“O yeah it is kind of underground. Only a few hundred thousand players n stuff. Its free wann check it out?”
“...Sure, why not? Don’t see why I can’t talk to you on there instead.”
“Great its basically a hangout game anyways.”
“...Uh huh.”
—
“Where is he… he said lobby sixty four didn’t he?”
“Boo.”
I stood with a smug grin on my face, watching as Onesy slowly turned around, with an entirely unamused stare.
“Well, that’s certainly a different look.” He noted offhandedly.
I shrug innocently and give my leather armor a few raps. “Hey man I can’t be a berserker in every game I play. Not even a class in this one.”
“So I noticed. What the hell’s this game even about?”
“Well, I think it’s pretty obvious.” I mumble as I ignore the crystalline lobby built in the tree on the center of the map and instead gesture to the giant pit in the center of the map. “You pick a class, and you go in. It’s a battleground. A pretty fun one, in my opinion. Shame the developers never did some heavy duty advertising. They even update it from time to time.”
“Right.” He nodded, before quickly pivoting to whatever he’d wanted to ask me. “So, now that I’ve got your attention-”
“My what now? Oh no I appear to be being drawn to the field by some kind of magical compulsion.” I uttered in the most deadpan voice I could possibly muster as I proceeded to backpedal towards the arena.
He frowned as he brought two fingers to the bridge of his nose. Pinching at it for a moment, before looking back up at me with that same miffed expression he’d been wearing this entire time. “Would it kill you to just listen to what I have to say for five seconds?”
“That’s lame bro.” I wave at him from a distance, now hanging just over the edge. “Catch me on the field instead! I’ll hear you out when you manage that. There’s only a few hundred players on the server, and you’ve got all day anyways! Have some fun!”
Shooting two finger guns at him, I fall right on down with a wink.
Alert!
HIGH BOUNTY TARGET: KOTH, HAS ARRIVED ON THE FIELD! (#32)
Right down into the middle. Just the way I like it.
—
The rules of UB are simple. Simply put, it’s a free for all. The only rule, being that there are no rules, besides explicit bug abuse being not allowed. I’ve seen a few Homepage accounts get banned over that one. Though it was pretty damn difficult to break the game with the current day Immersion Engine.
Now that might make up all of the rules, but in my opinion, this game really appealed to a… certain subset of people. Unlike most other battlegrounds games, where you’d just pick a class and go right into doing whatever… this one had a… sort of, leveling system. Oh, one second.
+21 exp!
What was that freshie even thinking? I kill like thirty different people as I blaze a trail from the center of the map to the wetlands and you think you’re gonna be the one to put me down?
…. Anyways, you stole experience from each kill scaling on how much experience your target had. And you could push that experience into upgrading class skills and your base stats. And for that, there was a leaderboard. That being the bounty leaderboard. Of which I was VERY, MUCH, a fan of.
The top #100 players at any given moment will always reset to zero exp once they die. Additionally, they’re marked as “High bounty targets” by the game. Notifying the entire server when one is in the field. But that’s not to say it’s all downs-oop!
Side step, pivot back in, parry-and that’s totally an ambush! Yeesh, this far out from spawn? They want this kill, huh?
My left and right blades cascade a storm of sparks as I deflect at least half a dozen attacks all aimed for my neck, two Warriors repelled and a few arrows deflected, I meet the greatsword of a Bulwark and easily shift its weight to the side. And so I count… one, two, three, four, five, no sorry, six goobers in my vicinity at once! Man, they must REALLY want this kill.
Unfortunately… people always tend to underestimate the top #50 range. It’s like they don’t understand that in order to actually get past the initial first few rankings, that you kind of need to… not die? Ever? If they wanted a fighting chance at beating me, they should’ve brought at least two dozen. It’s not like any other leaderboard players are in their group. At least not anybody past the first few dozen ranks.
That same greatsword comes crashing towards me in a vertical line, but without the element of surprise it’s an easy dodge, hitting a flicker of my afterimage as I sidestep the attack. My agility is way higher than any of these bozos, so I literally backflip onto the massive hunk of metal in the same fluid motion, leaping forwards and twisting in the air as I plant a solid kick into the Bulwarks right cheek. Disorienting him for a moment and using him as a platform to launch myself towards the archer in the backlines.
Works like a charm, most people usually aren’t expecting that trick, and these six clearly haven’t done their homework. Must’ve been a spur of the moment hunt. I can respect that, but I won’t be letting them win either way. Cutting through the air in a blur of movement, I [Cleave] the archer into four, planting my boot into the dirt just shy of the creek after I fly through their rapidly vanishing body. Launching my way back to the frontliners whom had previously been within arms reach, who are, understandably, a little shook at the course of events that had proceeded in under a fifth of a second.
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+2512 exp!
…Oh? Are these guys on the cusp of the leaderboard? Hm, they should thank me for dropping their experience right here then, cause they’d get wiped and lose everything with this level of skill.
All it takes is two blows for each Warrior. One to offset their guard, and another to cut them in two. Health is a thing, yeah, but when you get slashed clean through the middle you’re taking a lot of damage no matter what. When somebody has an attack stat equal to your max health, it’s not gonna go well for you. Buuut… they should be able to defend themselves though. They’re not dual wielding, so they really shouldn’t get pushed around like that, but hey I guess they’re just not used to playing with high stats? Maybe this is the first time they’ve gone up against a leaderboard player? Or perhaps they just weren’t expecting such an aggressive response from somebody THEY ambushed?
+1812 exp!
+1645 exp!
Or maybe it was just the archer who was high level? What, did he just pick off people all day long with his friends to guard him? That’s kinda lame. But, I suppose I can’t tell people how to have fun.
Only the Bulwark and two mages are standing-two mages? How long have they been casting? Is that [Concealment]? Heh, those little shits! They must have a Support around here or something. Explains how they got the drop on me.
[Riposte]!
Holy shit, just in time on that one! Taking a familiar stance, I catch the incoming blasts of fire on each blade respectively, whirling around and redirecting them right towards the Bulwark. Usually, Riposte can’t quite do that, but once the skills level gets high enough the amount of attacks you can reflect with it is kind of ludicrous. I’d say it’s broken, but I’d literally lose everything if I died once, so, fair enough in my opinion!
+1011 exp!
…Huh, he must die often. Welp, the mages are running now, but they’re pretty much free pickings. They certainly tried to get to the waterfall, but to be honest these guys kind of… I don’t wanna say they suck, cause they don’t, but they didn’t even try to cover their escape with magic. It’s not like fire mage is a bad class even with just other fire mages on your team, pretty sure #2 #5 #7 #11 and #15 are fire mages right now…
+2075 exp!
+2164 exp!
Glancing around, I can’t see or sense the Support player anywhere nearby. So, they know their place. Not gonna be able to find them without hunting them down properly, and I’m not really interested right now. I’ve already got plenty from this fight.
But uh, yeah, that’s a… ton of experience from one fight. Did these guys hop on after I got on or something? This doesn’t really feel like the kind of party you’d see in only a group of six. Feels like a half baked hunting party that I’d usually get accosted by. Anyways, that was a whole heap of experience. Like, jeeze, did I go up a spot with that?
Sheathing my blades, I leap backwards and onto a foothold, taking a route I’d labbed out time and time again. I flick open my menu as I jump from foothold to foothold, scrolling through the options as I make my way up. Eventually, I stop on the top of the waterfall and check my character page.
Koth, The Fury.
Ooo, I DID go up a few spots! Titles are only top #30, what’re my numbers looking like?
Bounty ranking #28
Acquired Experience 14,184
Nice, nice. Right, where was I before I was so rudely interrupted? Being on the bounty board not being all downsides? Right. Leaderboard players get a 50% increase to all experience gained, as well as a 25% stat buff and a 20% cooldown reduction to all skills. Basically, super duper buffed players. It’s awesome to be one of them.
And that, is why I love this game. It’s not afraid to challenge, or reward its players. Other games would be afraid to penalize death too much, or to let anybody get TOO strong. Like, Ragnarok for an example, only 5% exp lost on death, really? And if I were to grind weeks for extra levels I’d have maybe thirty extra points to show for it? Like, a 1% increase to my total strength? Really?
Here if I die, that’s EVERYTHING gone. Like, a dozen hours of this character! It’s an adrenaline rush is what it is, and I can’t help but love it. For casuals, you don’t lose that much on death and you can hunt people down with friends and have a good time. For true gamers, everything is on the line and you get to have a power trip. It’s great!
I mean… you don’t lose everything everything, you get bonuses if you wipe on leaderboard, and the game resets every season anyways… but that’s besides the point.
Welp, I should probably head back up, I got a crazy amount of experience to spend, and I’m kind of curious to see how much wackier I can make [Co-
“Koth! I finally found you!”
I pause mid thought, before tilting my head to the side. “...Wha? Who are you?”
“Are you serious? Come on! You literally told me to find you!”
Tapping my foot for a moment, I match a face to a name and snap. “Ohhhh, yeah what’s up Onesy? How the hell’d you make it up here? Aren’t you a freshie?” I tilt my head curiously as I unsheathe a blade. There’s definitely a good chance of an ambush. If he asked for help from somebody to get him up here, then it’s likely that they’re a high level player trying to get close to me with some kind of front. So an ambush from… a skilled assassin? It takes a pretty good amount of technical skill to actually make the climb-actually, wait a minute.
“Did… did you pick Support?”
His armor was leather like my class, swordsman, but the coloration was different. More tan, as opposed to dark like my own. It made sense, it had levitation and teleportation spells, and it wasn’t like anything was level locked in this game. You had all your tools from day one, you could just make them stronger. He could totally make it up. It’s just…
“Yeah, what about it?”
“I mean, not to tell you how to play the game… but Support’s kind of a shitty class on its own. Unless you’re playing with like, at least half a dozen other people. I’d just wipe and restart.”
“About that.” He grinned and raised a hand.
My other arm flashed to the handle of my sword, my feet pattering against the uneven stone floor as I covered the distance in almost an instant.
“HEY-WAITWAITWA-”