I've actually offered a couple of times to be unascended, so that someone more willing and able to lead may step forward. I'm a much better follower than a leader, especially when most of the followers won't follow.

Eh, we can argue about this, but I'd rather do it on an OOC clan sometime than here I've never said I didn't walk the fudge away from ridiculous situations before. That's why I have some admiration for people who don't do that.

Withdraw in disgust is not the same as apathy, I belive the axiom goes.



My logic is, just move the main. Then they can't be mad at you for abandoning your character!

Obviously, not a super good option for everyone.

Under the impression I have been given by people who were/are in Serenwilde, you are in the position of having water in a very large, very hot desert.. and you seem like you so don't want to be that guy carrying it around . You are seriously admirable for sticking to doing it, I will say.

Okies. If it turns out I'm way off base, I'll say as much here, or in raves or something if this receives the probable lock.

Let it not be said I won't own up to my opinion being wrong, should the evidence demonstrate thus.

I think even the most experienced defenders will fall back if the situation is impossible. Walking into an enemy meld with no mage/druid would be silly not necessarily courageous. We do have a kamikaze division in the Brigade though. It's called Inagin!

You don't need to wait a year, just go back into the forum archives. The number of people whose story hasn't changed during Lusternia's life along with their fortunes is vanishingly small.

Even when I'm in a Seren defense that we're absolutely going to lose, and even when I'm still using my crappy patched non-functioning curing system and this is keeping me from working on the new shiny good one I'm working on, I still don't mind being raided by superior forces, and losing, and dying, provided:
1) If you started the fight, fight. If you run, run to leave, not to just buzz around kicking things but avoiding the defenders that you implicitly asked to come fight you.
2) If by some miracle you lose, suck it up, don't just go get all your buddies and come back five minutes later to steal the win with overwhelming numbers.
3) Leave the newbies and lowbies alone.
4) However the fight ends, don't start another one for a while.
5) When the raid is over, don't start spilling out its consequences into the rest of the game. Don't enemy or gank people for defending, for instance. They only came to the fight because you invited them.

But all those things are symptoms. The real issue is that the fight has no real goal or objective. So nothing actually determines when it starts and when it ends other than when people are satisfied -- and that's never going to happen on both sides simultaneously. If the raid had some goal and there was a moment it was either acheived or definitely not going to happen (like smob raids in Olden Days) then you'd raid, people would be obligated to respond, but when it was done it was done. The lack of this is why most of the above points happen at all (all but #3, at least).

Unfortunately, putting something into place to make raids have objectives probably wouldn't be enough now. There's too much reprisal-momentum at this point. You'd have to stop that by making it so kick-and-run raids were mechanically discouraged or prevented at least partially to break that momentum.

Monday - Friday I have to work so I have approx 3 hours after work in which I play those days.

This past week I have had to spend a significant portion of those three hours each day to defend. So why even bother to log in if you are telling me I should just QQ it up?


And you do know the only means to kill for those middle tierish Illuminati you are fighting is to damage kill right? Which means cosmicfire... the the instakills for Illuminati are near trans in tarot or paradigmatics....

The Smob raids were worse, because for the defender, it didn't end. They had to run around for RL days afterwards sometimes, attempting to raise their SMOBs, all while the other side, which obviously out guns them anyway, is beating the piss out of them for trying. They get them up, and after a short hiatus, they get to do it all again. I stand by the SMOBs being crazy tough as a very good decision- especially for a game that, one way or another, has had disgustingly lopsided active combatant population distribution since the day I started playing.

Worse still for the communes, as they're probably being chopped constantly over this whole period.

Worse than that should their shield be dropped, and their org territory made even more griefable.


No, I think I rather like SMOBS that don't fall down much.

Right, I have been keeping my hands away from this hot potato for a while now, but responses are getting increasingly acidic and non-contributive. I will give one warning to discuss in a normal and polite manner, if this is not adhered to I shall proceed to lock this thread. I do believe everyone's had their chance to blow of steam by now anyway.

What helped me deal with constant raiding was to take a step back and consider the numbers. I believe that someone has said this already, but every org has plenty of everything, so if you lose some of it, your org will be fine. So you lost 100 power because your cosmic plane got wiped out. OOCly, there is no good reason to care, thats a trip or two through a elemental plane. Even the Supernals (and equivalents) barely dent the power supplies. ICly your character can be pissed, but you're not your character. If you still don't have fun, you need to change your game so that you do have fun. At the end of the day, you are playing a game, and the whole point of games is to be a fun break from real life, not to drag down your real life by being a tedious obligation.

I've been through both plenty. I complained about smobs falling. And yet, I would rather have Luna fall and then Etherwilde left alone for a week, than the every-two-hours raid where neither side actually accomplishes anything or is trying to. The former precludes doing anything you'd like to be doing for a day each week; the latter precludes doing anything you'd like be doing almost all the time.

The problem here is that these are not alternative choices on a menu. The time has passed when giving back the smob raids would take the kick-and-run raids off the table. So it's not really a dichotomy.

I will definitely make the point that things seem to be better since I've been back again (for us, at least, I'm not Gaudi), and that I'm only really arguing when things are done to crazy excess. Raids are fine. Once a day would be fine. A dozen times a night, where even if you go do something else in between all you're doing is worrying about when they'll come back, or watching a distort timer, that's when it gets to be too much.

It's an old adage, but I think it holds true here... I think there is a huge difference between losing a battle and losing the war. In Lusternia - and every IRE game, really - you can't lose the war. Your faction is always going to be around, it's not going anywhere. Now, when it comes to battles, one battle is relatively insignificant. Like everyone has said, losing 100 power or a few Fire Lords here and there isn't going to remove your organization from the help files.

When an army is outnumbered, there are two appropriate responses that are realistic from and RP standpoint:

1) Bide your time, call in your allies and engage your enemy when reinforcements arrive.

2) Accept a loss in this battle, retreat and do your best to ready yourself for the next battle.

In regards to 1, this appears to be the common response; when we raid Vortex, we stick around until the odds against us are overwhelmingly bad. We'll stick around for 1.5:1, 2:1, even 3:1 sometimes. But, when the odds reach a point where our army is outnumbered, we choose option 2.

Option 2 is available to both sides of the engagement. Sure, maybe it is not a glamorous option. It doesn't get you any bragging rights or experience, but the beauty is that it is a realistic option. In the real world, if an army is outmatched, they don't choose option 3 (see below) because people are resources and resources are valuable. Just because we get rezzed on a death and there aren't any permanent consequences to dying in Lusternia doesn't mean it is good RP to push this concept out of our heads. Your soldiers, citizens, etc. are resources, protect them; if they are faced with a danger that they are incapable of dispatching, retreat and save them for another day.

The 3rd option is not nearly as compelling or realistic:

3) Charge the enemy anyway because, hey, what's it matter if we all die.

From an RP standpoint, this is not an option that I - personally - will ever endorse. It's not something I've ever understood in any IRE game that I have played. Death is not fun for our characters. I'm certain, from the death messages, that it is neither pleasant nor rewarding. It's painful, detrimental and ultimately unproductive; it's something that you should try to avoid.

Saying, "We're going to charge anyway, even though we will lose! We're not going to prepare any further. They may grind our bones to dust, sear our nerve endings and otherwise inflict upon us pains that no man should endure, but we'll conglute at the nexus anyway, so it's no big deal!" This isn't a logical or interesting response. It's not anything that anyone would consider if they actually had to live through what they are planning to put their character through.

One of my favorite moments in IRE history, that I remember to this day, is when the Anointed, in Achaea, took over Shallam. They were declaring wars against people they had no business declaring wars against. They had the RP clout to run the organization but lacked the military might to back those RP claims. Silas, at the time, didn't see what he was getting himself into. When Ashtan and Mhaldor came knocking on Shallam's door, killing guards, holding the city and generally wreaking havoc, they didn't say, "We can just replace those! You can kill us all you want, we'll just come back!" No, he posted, publicly, admitting defeat. He held himself accountable for the path he chose and told the world he should not have taken it.

He admitted a legitimate defeat, and it was some of the best RP I've ever seen in any IRE game. Why? Because it was the logical conclusion to the ordeal, it was a realistic resolution. It might not have been satisfying IC, but it was satisfying OOC because Shallam got out of the mess it was in and because I can, to this day, look back on that post and point to it as an example of how consequences and losing battles should be handled.

I guess the long and short of it is: IRE games tend to promote the idea that you can never lose. It's okay to lose sometimes. It's realistic to admit defeat when you are defeated. It's hardheaded, stubborn and ultimately a product of the "we can never really lose anything" mindset to repeatedly attempt to win battles that you've got no real chance of winning. Pull out, admit defeat in a battle, and better prepare yourselves for future battles, because the war isn't going away, it's hardcoded into the game.

This misses the entire point. I, at least, am not looking for glory or experience or anything, I just want a loss to be a loss, not something that drags out all night. If you raid, you either get some people to fight or you get to stomp all the NPCs. Take it and be done. Don't hang around because the fight wasn't exactly what you wanted, or because you didn't kill enough people, or because you're just bored and all you can think to do is harass (or try to harass) people. When your whole night turns into "When are they going to raid? Are they done yet? Can I turn loyalsays on yet? Should we have this ritual or play or other activity, knowing that it will be interrupted as soon as we try? Do we have enough time on distort to get it done?" that's when it needs to stop.

It's like having someone knocking on your door, asking you to come out and play. It's fun to go out and play, but if they just stand there and beat on your door all night it gets old really fast, especially in the middle of dinner or something.

I'm not sure if you're referring to the raids on Vortex or some other org. But Hallifax pulls out when the job is done and the defenders are clearly finished. Having said that, if your group is still sitting on fleshpots trying to summon us onto them (a known bug), of course we're going to stick around because it's clear that you intend to defend.

If you're talking about who I think you're talking about... no, he just thinks he can run his mouth whenever he wants because he's apparently proven himself by being able to raid Celest once a day and rush into fights with Glom in Faethorn that eventually turn into the whole zerg that we simply cannot win. But of course, since he's had a few kills and has the protection of a GM, he can do whatever he wants, including making sure everyone else on his side knows it.

God, I really hope he is who I think you are talking about. I'd really hate to find out there's another Seren with such an attitude.

@Prav: If only that happened with us. A general Etherseren raid would include the first few demigods killing a bunch of Serens before losing one of their numbers and the rest all fleeing. Then, just when we thought they'd be done, their group suddenly doubled in size and have built an unbreakable fortress/camp (springtrap into choke-pits ftl). Then for the next ten minutes they'd usually just sit there and pick off anyone else who was unaware of the fact that moving off the nexus meant death.

I have no clue what's going on between Hallifax and Gaudiguch, honestly. It sounds tame so far, which is good. I'm speaking in a much more general fashion about how sometimes chilling out and not defending isn't enough. It takes both sides to make things work, really.

Only takes three GMs to boot one of their own. I was working on having the CL booted at one point for being a stupid git, you just need a good reason and people who agree with you.

As of late it hasn't been "raids". It's him and about two or three others attacking both Water and Celestia at like 3 or 4 in the morning my time, during which there's no one to defend and I'm tired and the only Aquamancer around. And I can honestly say this, if you get him out, he'll probably just move back to Mag for the chance to "raid". And his main reason for raiding is his OOC problems with several people from a clan and he's a little kid throwing tantrums.

Waaatch it kids.