So... after working for about a week on a ritual which I thought turned out super well (at least I was entertained and understood the point), things went really, really far from what I had hoped.

I don't really like being creatively stifled and looped into what has been done before in the first place, but I can understand where a guild would say "Hey... that's not really what we do here." Still, some part of me struggles against tradition. It really starts to feel stale at some point, and honestly, I like to use this kind of stuff as a creative outlet. I don't really get the chance to write creatively, as most of what I deal with on a daily basis has to do with existence or morals or ethics or judgment and blahblahblah.

Anyway, and more to the point at hand.

When Lusternia starts to blur the line between your character's feelings and your feelings as a player, how do you get over it? I'm sitting IRL with a hurt pride, and a slight worry that I've jeopardized all the hard work my character's done, and it's awesome that he's where he is. I've never ever had a character above cityrank 1 or guildrank 1 (lusternia)/houserank 3 (achaea, and for those who don't play achaea, HR 3 there is the same as GR 1 here), and somehow it feels like it doesn't matter now =/

Anywho, how do you do it peeps? How do you wind down from a bad, IRLhurtful Lusternia session?

I've had this issue before, and the best advice I can give (that I'm still learning to follow myself) is just to sit back, relax, and say the following to yourself as much as you need:

It's just a game.

I was scolded by my GM the other day for posting a bit of silliness on our guild logs (which was not quite as silly as what a former GM had posted just before me), and as much as I wanted to sit and fret about it, I stopped myself. I just sat and closed my eyes, calmed myself and went, "It's okay. You're not being tossed out of your position for this. It's a game, and nothing more. No one's going to come after you any more about this than they already have."

It also helps to have people to complain to. I'm available if you want to talk privately, because I've been in that position way more times than I care to think about.

Just remember, it is only a game. And the characters were talking to your character, not to you. Take whatever they said and either A. discard it as useless or B. learn from it.

But remember most of all, that it's a game and you're meant to have fun.

Hi there. I'm one of the pride wounders. Sorry! As you'll come to find out, Druken's sometimes unpleasant to work with.

He had a point, though, and it's one you just made. Lusternia's rife with roleplay opportunities. In Glomdoring alone, there are outlets for ALL KINDS of different lifestyles. The Harbingers have a flair for the dramatics, the Blacktalon are all about honour and the Shadowdancers give people who prefer a more regal bearing an opportunity to whip out all that nifty seventeenth-century vernacular they've stored up over the years.

We just don't do bloodshed or hardcore cultist mysticism. It's all pretty wiccanized-- nature-loving, shadow-beckoning and reverence for Mother Night. It's a load of nonsense from an IRL perspective, but the characters take it pretty seriously, so when you deviate from that tradition, it's natural for them to start wondering if you'd be better suited for one of the other guilds (the Blacktalon do a LOT with blood rites, and so do the Nekotai).

THAT DOES NOT MEAN WE DIDN'T THINK YOU WERE CREATIVE. I can assure you that it would have gone awry a lot sooner if we weren't entertained. It wouldn't be the first time I stepped in and halted a ritual in its tracks before it was finished, but you were going somewhere and had obviously worked at it for a while. Kudos!

Take our criticism for what it was. None of us are inherently mean (or we better not be), and all of us will be happy to give you a real master/protege experience if you ask for one. After all-- it's one thing to try your hand at something you're unfamiliar with, but it's an even BETTER hand when you know how to play the game. In this case, the game is ritualism and the Shadowdancers have a LOT of rules to follow. Which, if you're hoping to have a strong roleplay experience, is pretty cool. Not a whole lot of guilds will spend time teaching you their "secrets."

Either way, if you leave the coven or not, have heart! We like you just fine.

I have a hard time separating myself from Aeral these days, but better now. It's just I talk so much OOC on Aeral that I sorta become her 100%.

Heh, don't worry Druken. I totally understand where you guys were coming from, but still, this wasn't meant to be a discussion on "ZOMGIHATETHESHADOWDANCERSTHEY'REALLASSHOLES!" ...'cause it's anything far from it!

It seriously is a problem that I've always found myself having in IRE games. I suppose I just let myself get a but *too* immersed. It's awesome that coming home from work being tired and frazzled can all be washed away with a little bit of awesomeness, and I suppose it's also pretty awesome that it could hurt my pride IRL. Regardless... now that I've got you cornered...

I totally get all the "too much bloodshed" stuff. That's not what I was going for! The idea was that at the beginning, the forehead cut (which are totally superficial, but bleed a lot) was an offering. As it progressed, the blood was bleeding (weird diction choice here) just as a normal cut on the forehead would, not being conjured up in grievous amounts. The whole blahblahblahnotwhatIaskedfor bit with the "blood" was *supposed* to translate to a form of transubstantiation of blood to palpable shadow... I guess that's where it was a bit too fuzzy. Still yet, if every ritual has to be some kind of sacrifice/offering/respect to a spirit/divine/whatever... I'm gonna have to find some way to get Kio outta there. As a player, I'm not into all that kind of stuff. My flavor of rituals is more along the lines of "I have a problem, I'm gonna find some way to fix it." Regardless, the whole ordeal was supposed to be a character-development thing. Something to let everyone know "Hey... Kio has some deep, buried issues about abandoning the Serenwilde, and feels guilty for turning his back on it."

Anywho, my hurt pride comes more from the fact I was unable to get the picture in my head to translate to the picture in everyone else's head. Before I pelt everyone with more walls of text, I'mma sip some tea and go to bed!

Echoing what Ongaku and Noola said, it's just a game. If you're starting to get frustrated, just need to take a step back and take a break for awhile. Never really been much for rituals myself, but I get frustrated plenty by PvP and the 9-10 minutes it takes me to come back from death as an ascendant is usually the breather I need to calm down.

Though other times I totally flip out and suicide run into prime glom for an hour, or a day, or a week. =p

Do not follow Lehki's example and suicide run. It's stressful for us and for him.

And please chat with Druken. He'll tell you all about what you CAN do with rituals and what you should avoid. It's really neat stuff, and I think you'll find that there's a lot of creativity to be had when your talents are forcefully refined. It's like a workshop in expository writing. If you've ever had a class like that, you know what I'm talking about. If you haven't, just trust me-- it can be mind numbing, but the fruits of your labors are always so much cooler than you had originally anticipated when you first read the assignment.

As for wounded pride-- I, too, echo Ongaku and Noola. It's easy to be crushed. A lot of us are crushed by someone we respect. It's also easy to be frustrated when something doesn't go your way, even though you spent hours--days, even--working out some puzzle or playing a role in some huge, game-altering event (ask anyone who somehow lost the ascension event! talk about frustration and wounded pride!). You have to either dust yourself and keep going or find some other way to make your character what you want it to be. That's that.

Well, it is the 'original' Shadowdancer who uses the corpse of a murdered infant to drench the Ebonglom Crown in order to call down Mother Night to possess her and be made manifest... I can't imagine blood-rites would be out of Mother Night's domain (look at Glumki Thorneye, redcaps, etc). There's a big blood theme there, definitely. Whether players choose to acknowledge it though is certainly up to them.

That's an issue I find myself often having, Kio, is what will people think of me (or what I'm doing) on an OOC level?

When I RP in WoW, there's a sort of unwritten code there that you can interact with the people you're RPing with OOCly and discuss what's being RPed so that things don't go too far and potentially upset someone (or just for clarification's sake with certain things). In Lusternia... well, I don't feel I have that luxury. I can't just start talking to people OOCly in TELLS, because unless I know them really well (like Zasha or Tynghall), I don't know how they'll react to it.

Plus, without that OOC interaction, I get way too involved in my character's life (especially with Ongaku). I can detach myself more from other characters for some reason, but I think this is because I know the people I play with on my other characters more on an OOC level, whereas on Ongaku, there is a lot more interaction with people I don't have OOC communication with.

If any of that makes any sense to anyone other than myself.

WTB Ongaku plushie!

When in doubt, screw those guys. You're here to have fun, not make their life complete.

I sort of love it, though. Only sort of. <3

Edit: Oops, forgot I was actually posting over something relevant.

You have to take everything with a grain of salt. Sometimes, I feel like people stomp on you just to stomp. Most of the time, however, no one is 'out to get you'. Take what criticisims are thrown your way and try to see how you can make them constructive for you. Don't live for pleasing others, IG or out of it, but do listen with an open mind and be sure you can sort out the hate from the well-meaning critiques.

I, personally, have absolutely no problem with blood being used in Shadowdancer rituals. There's a lot of history of it, and I've used blood in my rituals. It wasn't so much the use of blood as it was how much blood was being used. It was a little over the top, and I think that's just a result of you trying too hard to get a specific image across. You over emphasized that detail until it began to seem like I was watching a SAW movie instead of a ritual.

Also, the all cap screaming was a little over the top too and it was never very clear at any point just what it was you were fighting. Druken wasn't the only one who thought you were trying to manifest Mother Night there. And, I actually have no problem with Shadowdancers manifesting Mother Night in rituals either, to be honest. But not if they're gonna have her screaming like that.

It was very obvious that you worked hard on that ritual and that's great! It'd be nice if more people did. Some of your imagery was very nice too, I really liked the bits with the candles and your circle. I even like the concept that you were trying to pull off. Rituals don't always have to be just about how much we love Night and blah blah blah, they can certainly be about facing some inner demon or issue. I helped Talan with a ritual that had a similar purpose in fact. It was an execution thing more than a concept thing, IMO, and that can be fixed easily enough!

I'm happy to help, anytime you want.

I really hope that you don't decide to leave because you're great and the Shadowdancers need you!

You are so going in my sig.