Exarius, you only need 15 lessons in planar to get to ethereal. You have no ground here whatsoever.

Asara?

Yeah, her. Thought she'd like it here with all the interesting quests, but nope

I'm trying to get Asara to teach me to be a Master of Microsoft Paint so I can draw pretty maps like her!

I'm sure this is obvious, but it isn't for my Wake-up-at-4-AM-in-the-morning mind. It was mentioned about lesson gain from teaching- if I was teaching a novice Nature, would those lessons change over to Wicca/Druidry?

I've had billions of alts, billions. And personally, if I'm ignored I don't keep that character. I prefer having to go through novice training. Sometimes, I find it really fun, even tho I'm silent with most of them. :\\ But...in all honesty, I think teaching shouldn't be done in a sort of "automatic" way. Be yourself!! Role play your character. A novice, just because they're an alt, should be taught like they are new. If a person doesn't want to go through it then they can go TELL "Hey, I know how to learn, thank anyway." I think that's one of the few things that makes teaching a bore. Is you find it to be a job when it could be a lot more fun, if you so choose.

I agree with this statement. You can tell how good a guild is by how well they treat their novices. This is true of any of the games, but is especially true of a place like Lusternia where so much is stressed to deal with said guild.

To take an example from Achaea, as I've yet to make an alt here, I once joined a certain house. I try to have my alts always in houses, as I think autoclass is silly. I've joined a house, and sat there for about an hour trying to get someone to help me. I did not stay in this guild. Similarly, I had one where a novice aide took the time to teach me, and helped me, even gave me tattoos (which wouldn't happen here) and I stayed in said house for quite awhile.

One thing I was reminded of by another thread, was that the newbie intro says very little about the history of the basin, of the taint/wyrd/etc.

In fact, I once did a 2 hour orientation for an extremely inquisitive novice, who asked about all those things, because a lot of people don't read the histories as they are on the website.

I think that is a very good point.

I think many of us read the histories slowly, as they were released, and the history is one of the biggest draws to lusternia.

They should incoperate the historical charachters into the intro better perhaps.

I have no idea who to suggest this to IG cause our Secretary system confuses the hell out of me in Hartstone. (When asked if I wanted Undersec it had nothing to do with novices) This is also a reply almost to what Shorlen said about the 3 types. Perhaps when were they first get to our Nexus we should ask them whether they would like to have an training session, or whether theyd like to try it on their own? Most newer players will ask for help, the IRE-oriented players will be half-in-half, and the alts will just do their own thing mostly.

Or is this too harsh?

I know this has been said, but it would really help if any specific problems with certain guilds were found, so that we know just what needs to be changed (example: Geomancers don't help novices, this would be good information to know so we can know more what to focus on.) I think everyone realizes how difficult novice teaching is, there are so many things that go into it, like teacher availability, the level of help a novice needs, that novice's attitude, etc. etc. I know we've been approached about some things we could change which was really nice, and we're still working on it, but more specific feedback for the guilds would be great.

I agree. It's really useless and frustrating being told there is a problem without being told what the problem is, exactly, where the problem is, how serious the problem is, and even whether we are the problem.

Risking the fact that this will make little to no sense, I'm going to try this any how. I'll be adding things from previose suggestions and will also be throwing in random names off the top of my head.

Personally, I like the idea of a newbie village and guild. A Newton Guild run by a NPC Guild master named Issac along with four Tutors.

The idea behind this might be that, instead of forcing a new player into a particular society or be abandoned as a rouge, let them into a seventh, neutral, society where they can choose one of the four main guild skills...

*Nature
*Knighthood
*Cosmic, or
*Elementalism

This way, they can try out each basic skill before deciding which archtype they wish to play as. (Since they'll be novices they'll be able to forget and learn another without any lessons penalty.) Without having to explain why they're leaving their guild and try finding somebody to induct them into a new guild.

As for the four tutor's role, Each tutor could teach a specific archtype skill as well as randomly spouting out help full information. (I. E: Nature tutor says: remember that BARKSKIN will help protect you) Things that seen obviose to advanced players but often over looked by those just starting.

As for Issac, I imagine him as administrating a graduation task. Like the guild quests mentioned ealier, he could offer 12 slightly different quests that would allow a novice, graduating from this rouge guild, into a commune or city guild without having to find a player able to induct them. I would also imagine them responding to different key words like the nexus care takers do, but instead of a reaction like Meleris' on Mag, they would offer a quote or small revision from the help file for that city, commune, skill, or guild.

Also, while being within this rogue guild, they'll be able to travel to each of the for societies and actually look around and talk to people without the pre-determined prejudice of being a novice in a rival commune/city. Along with being able to freely walk around, I suggest each civilization put up a public reading area kind of like the Hartsone guild hall has. But instead of having to touch an object to read, leave permantly flame-sigiled books around quoting more of the help files or history. This way it'll be easier for newbies to find it and they won't have to sit around scrounging through the huge HELP files to find things they don't want to ask about.

Touching on the time and level requirements to be within this guild, I would believe it to be the same as entering Newton Caverns. From levels 1-20, you will be allowed to freely study and swap between each archtype's primary skill. Once you reach 21; however, Issac will summon you and, depending on your choice, offer a guild quest, or send you on your way to wander the basin as a rouge. Those choosing a guild, upon induction, would have only 12 hours to devote to novicehood instead of the normal 24. This way, not only do they have time to determin how much they like the guild, but also allow them a little time to forget comman skills they no longer nead and learn their secondary guild skill before they start having lessons penalties placed upon them. And if they choose to go rogue, they'll at least have an attack skill available to them.

Speaking of Rogues, they can play apart in the teaching. Those rogues who are allowed, through Divine intervention, while not holding any real posistions of power, could be allowed to speak over this guild GNT to answer questions, but also so that the newbies will have people they can interact.

Now for my biased list of Pros and Cons.

Pros
-Newbies can try and swap between primary guild skills
-Newbies can interact with each commune/city without fear of being rejected
-Those who spend 20 levels have reduced time when joining other guilds

Cons
- Rouge GNT kinda overlaps with the NEWBIE channel
- Those who quite and join a guild by induction still have to spend 24 hours as a novice
- Not able to play around with Guild Second and Third skill sets.
- NPCs don't do to well at teaching.
- Warriors will still have trouble since they depend on physiclly made weapons
---------------

Come to think of it, The Tosha monastary already has five NPCs that could fill Issac and the four tutor's roles.

As for the Tutorial, as previosly suggested, instead of kicking and punching the shadow, why not give them a small dagger or wooden club and teach them to SWING and JAB as well?

While it -is- a nice idea in theory, some things wont work because of the way the game is made out to be. We dont like Rogues too much and we dont really encourage them. Our guildskills, minus Knighthood, come from study of the Cosmic and Elemental planes we protect or are gifts to us from the Fae whom we protect.

Also, some places just want -nothing-, read nothing, to do with Rogues (not rouges, much as we all like red, theyre not ). Glomdoring just wants nothing to do with anything but themselves for example, they dont like people in their forest. If you read Gwyneveres post of selling her shop there, it was because they didnt want rogues. (Sorry Glomdoring, youre just the best example here! Some things may or may not be true with the Gwyne stuff, but thats all most people would know.)

In response to us not liking rogues, I only used that word because it was the first thing to come to mind. They wouldn't exactly be Rogues since they'd belong to a sorta... preview guild. Kinda like a school formed by the three civilizations (excluding glomdoring as you pointed out) so that those new to the basin can make an educated choice as to were to go.

As for those 'protected' skills, maybe this school could only teach them up... Apprentice? Just enough to give them an idea of what the skill is like, but not enough to actually revail potential secrets of the art?

Its not really that theyre protected, its just that the only reason we know them is because we have a connection to the Elemental/Cosmic/Ethereal planes where each of their abilities comes from. I used Glom as an example because of the way their roleplay goes they just dont like too many people outside of their forest.

I strongly disagree with this point of your idea, since the basic skills say NOTHING about the archetypes they are linked to, except perhaps knighthood. They don't get into the real aspects of Lusternian combat, nor touch upon the underlying concepts (afflictions and curing, demesnes, ents, deepwound afflicts, etc). The only impression I would gain from that is that every guild has a single skill to kill things, all of which are essentially the same, and then some support that doesn't help much at all.

If it hasn't already been done, the histories on the website should be transcribed as books and appear in all the nation's libraries, so you can send players to them without making an OOC reference. (Naturally this shouldn't count towards anyone's culture score or whatever that is.)

They're in the World Library. I'm not sure if they're in our org libraries, but they do exist ICly now. The World Library allowed them to introduce the books without counting towards anybody.

yes, I know I'm still getting to reading the histories. If nothing else, at least sort of explaining what the taint/wyrd/etc is. I feel sort of sillly saying "It's suggested not to use this skill because it's tainted" when most don't know what hat is.

I really like this idea... However, I would argue that you should pick a real org/guild by level 11 not level 20. When you start losing your portals.

Ok, let me explain.

I think it would be a wonderfull idea to have a "newbie school" in newton that allows people to learn the basic during thier first 11 levels. The RP behind it can be just about anything and it can work. After the 11 levels they join a guild and then have 24 hours to learn the guild and all its stuff.

The first 11 levels would be there to teach them the culture of the game, and to have people learn about the different guilds without having to go through the awefull roleplay of "why do you want to join us?" are you a spy?