Well, yes-- give an honours line, a thing in your description. Some reward, plus the fun of the event and the challenge. There is a reward, without it becoming as much of a cutthroat "I hate you all, DIE" kind of competition. You can RP which challenges your character would actually attend (perhaps prioritizing the ones you think are fun) without trying all of them just for the permanent karma blessing.

Don't ban everyone from participating if they don't want to Ascend, just... reduce the reward so the playing field opens up a bit and the overall thing is more fun and interesting.

That may be true for normal gods, but is it for ascended ones? I mean, everyone would know that you ascended and would probably treat you the same except with maybe a little more reverence. If a spouse ascended, wouldn't you still consider that god to be your spouse even if you're no longer officially "married"?

I don't think the contests are that bad. There's no real violent ones. Making an exceptional trade item? A quiz? A scavenger hunt? A hamster hunt? I think the admin are trying to reward those who do everything as well, not just RP, since events shouldn't just focus on RP either.

Agreed, right now I get the feeling that everyone who would be a strong contestant will be trying for "second place". So there's the possibility currently that the final contest won't actually be like the wildnodes events, but more like the slippers events!

Estarra needs the veto. Pure and simple. Heck, as producer she makes the final call on all Lusternian Gods anyways.

So my idea is: Estarra decides. That's it. The other Gods can present their cases for the best choice, and it's a public forum: but that's about all. Mortals who enjoy being alive will make suggestions to a representative of a given Divine, who will then talk to their God. The option you go through to persuade a God to help you... anything. Indiscriminate slaughter, organizational political campaign, groundswell of guild support (especially from novices who feel more like a Paladin, Nihilist, etc. thanks to you) amazing literary entry, long history of service to your Divine. But keep in mind, that Immortal can only present the case. Can Estarra see through bias? Do you really doubt there's a problem there? About the only person I think can sway her with anything less than a stellar case is Roark, and he's another producer.

The blessing itself should carry a Mark. Whoever gets the blessing can appoint their representative in the quest for the Cup. This works GREAT for people who would want to bring glory to the city, but can't make the time committment to be a kickbutt God.

My two cents. This is a brilliant idea, and just one more reason Lusternia is a clearly superior IRE mud.

Sorry if I'm babbling too much, but a question occurred to me I was hoping someone could address. Does the finalist have to hold the Staff for an entire hour consecutively or can they just hold it for twenty minutes here, thirty minutes there, as long as it eventually equals one hour?

Let me play devil's advocate and pose a question to you regarding a person who became a god solely because they "had great running ability and a lot of thugs": Why would you support someone for the god who wasn't up to your standards of a good rper? If there are a considerable number of Lusternians concerned about the rp qualifications of the god, and presumably the god's thugs (it's beginning to sound like a hip-hop entourage now) are drawn from this pool of concerned Lusternians, then it seems to follow logically that the thugs in question would only support those candidates who had strong rp qualifications.



Ascension is a mind-altering/expanding process that changes a person forever. Their mortal relationships will undoubtedly become insignificant in the larger picture. A God is (rpishly) not just a beefed up mortal. Rather, a God is a creature of infinite power and equally infinite perspective and breadth of perception. Their realm of influence and interest will concurrently become one of divine aspirations, goals and interests.

The permanent karma blessing is meant to be a nice substantive reward to go along with the obligatory honours line. Given the competitive nature of people, I really don't think we will get a different class of players if the reward was there or not. (Yes, people would compete just for an honours line!)

An ascended god represents a new class of gods, one who is focused solely on roleplaying and perhaps running events. This is experimental (obviously) with the goal being to sculpt a role that is fun for a player yet with enough guidelines and oversight to curb abuse. If successful, perhaps we'd see more of this type of god!

One of the dangers of OOC interactions, whether it be participating in an OOC clan or otherwise, is that it is only too easy to let down your guard and tell players behind-the-scenes matters that have a really negative impact. I have seen this so many times that I cannot tell you. The other issue is simply that the more OOC you are with players, the less respect you'll have as a god. You really are more effective as a divine if you aren't "one of the guys".

As for the roleplay (and this is very different from Elder Gods), an Ascended God has evolved the divine spark found in all mortals to rise up beyond the boundaries that the Fates control to the immortality of a higher being. Sure, he or she would remember his or her mortal background and family, personal and professional history, etc., but these matters become but distant memories, mattering less and less as the time marches on.

I haven't read this thread apart from the first page since it's 6 am and I've been out the whole night, but let me tell you one thing...

Tzek for God!

errr...do gods just completely lose perspective on the game during their time as Ephs? Because that is so not the way it works.

Lets look at Marcalo and Kayde, for example.. the De'Unneros at one point had a huge, huge, huge family who would suppot either of those two should they have wanted it.. but both of them have broken numerous rules and are debately RPers.

Or, we have a little thing called OOC. There are people who have been friends for years while playing other games, they're all above average fighters, and one of them wants to be a god just for the sake of it. Now, because he has OOC friends, they're likely to support him whether or not they think he is a great Rper for the role. They'd know that they'd get in his Order and get to be quite highly favoured for helping. This is a definitely motivation for fighters.

You also have the situation where people go "you know, I reeeally don't like that one person because my mother told me they were bad. So, i'm going to do my damnedest to stop them.." and since there will be very few seal winners who will actually want godhood, you've severely unbalanced the situation.

Oh, and of course there are orgs/people using threats to force people to support them or risk punishment.

Yeah.. whose the best RPer is really going to matter.. not so much.

Maybe if it took RP to win the seals, then yes, but since it does't, the whole idea that the better RPers will get chosen is silly.. because its very likely that no one capable will even enter the finals, but hey, they caught a purple hamster.

Cool to see this happen actually, but not something I'm going to participate in I think. Really is cool though!

I find it intriguing that so many are questing after an "impartial" solution.

The simple fact is that this is an impartial solution. There's no easy way to do this. Every scenario has flaws. When coming up with this plan, the admins simply picked the one with the least number of flaws, and the highest level of objectivity.

I'll be frank: I'm usually the first in line to go "wow you guys screwed the pooch on this one" when the administration pulls a bad stunt (and even when they don't, since I'm sometimes a negative nancy).

But on this one I'm totally behind them, and completely psyched. I think this is a fantastic opportunity and I'm very much looking forward to competing.

I'll concede all those points about OOCness and why you should lose your family from an IC perspective (although I couldn't stand doing that so I'm still not up for it) but I really think this whole affair will be much better without permanent blessings. I disagree that you won't get a different class of people competing. It'll just be more stressful and less fun, as Xenthos said, if you offer those as well as just honour lines and the chance to get the staff. My strong recommendation is to remove those.

Count me in.

Somehow, I keep thinking of Kingdom of Loathing
Hrm, for an RP god, that seems to be a rather PK way to get there...

Players basically will be the major factor in deciding who gets this position, throwing their support behind those they think will make the best gods. One would imagine the majority of players wouldn't support someone who would obviously be a poor candidate. There is a reason for this, of course. We would like to see who players support and who gets the position almost entirely out of our hands, and how the position can be developed no matter who gets the position (assuming it isn't someone completely whacked out--you know what I mean). I'll say no more on the matter!

Of course I get the veto. A god who is "out of control" will lose immortality fairly quickly. We aren't going to put on blindfolds and let the new god run amok. However, whoever wins will be given a chance to prove him or herself.

I hate to say it.. but you're wrong. There are going to be Org lines drawn, and then inside of that you will have OOC lines based on friendship not qualification. You cannot leave something like this to "Who can rally the most pkers!" Cause you need to realize, a lot of fighters don't do the intense RP thing (note I said intense, all you fighters ) and so they are more likely (at least a bit) to pick their alignment based on OOC allegiences.

In other words:

The winner will be the one with the biggest posse.

Let's say you have a really good RPer from Glomdoring, and 3 others from other orgs who cannot RP anything worthwhile to save their lives. Players from Celest, Magnagora and Seren HAVE to support their candidates rather than support the really good RPer who is well liked from most people oocly. So you will end up with a sub-par god who probably will throw the system into chaos and thus the system will be removed. This denies people who would actually make good gods chances.

EDIT: To add on, also let's say I support the RPer from Glom using Clise. This would instantly label me as a traitor to Celest and be cast out. If we are doing this, it has to be done from an OOC perspective so we can support whomever we think is best. I say we should call for a vote on those who wish to attain the Staff of Ascension.

Pretty much. This method is going to pretty much insure that the system is a flop, I'm thinking. You won't get the best people for the job, because being a good RPer is not going to help you win any of the seal challenges.. not a single one.