Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

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gonz.0
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by gonz.0 »

Stormseeker wrote:lol my 2nd pc made it into your story. Loved that death and got me hooked on alfa that night.
Likewise, the tragic death of a character is what got me hooked on Alfa as well. My FIRST PC, Morro Longshadow. RIP 2/12/12

It all started with talking IRC, got to know a few people, was trying to come up with a character, and Nurran suggested a long lost cousin of his Hin, Liam.... that was the basis. Come to think of it, we never did figure that out in game. One night of tavern rp, getting geared up and meeting a bunch of folks ended with a romp through Sharp Teeth until like 4 in the morning, in which my 1st level character survived even though being surrounded by shady folk, and ended up hitting on a talkfolk G.I.R.L. and getting a kiss for luck. Vyvyka if I remember her name was. Now, understand, when I say shady folk, I mean a lot of people wearing back and keeping hoods up in the tavern and such. Forgive me if I forgot anyone or misspell names, but I remember Voric, Cassandra, Kara, Kori, Kenner, and Liam.

It was an extremely deadly adventure for a 1st level, multiple wyverns, undead, goblins and orcs oh my... and very much expecting to die, as I am told over and over, good luck with your second character... nearly 700 experience points later, and almost 9 hrs of gaming... back in the inn and enjoying the light rp before logging. I was extraordinarily happy, as I had rolled the dice and survived, even with first PC. However; we were all very tired and closed it up for the evening. The loot split was to happen the next night.

Morro arrived back at the blade & stars, only to be told that he needed to go down to the docks and see Voric at the Mermaid, ic. So off he goes... and we have a traditional IC/(mildly ooc) after adventure loot split conversation. Including more flirting with Vyvyka, with whom Morro is absolutely intending on seeing how far that might go(lol). He even saved out a gem from his share as a gift for the lass.

Now imagine this, being new to Baldur's Gate, and in the 'safety of an inn' it never occurs to poor Morro that armor might be needed, and only a short sword hangs at his hip as deterrent to muggers. That's when the orc and dwarf come to the table and start trouble that ends up in the most hilarious bar fight scene I've ever seen in D&D. It erupted into what seemed like a dozen heavily armed and armored brigands slaughtering every other npc in the room, and the orc & dwarf starting in on Voric et al. Being not at all prepared for this, Morro is shooing the damsel Vyvyka toward the door as best he can, as she was also unarmed/unarmored (but also appeared to be heavily lagged).

Morro, being the gentleman he was, and seeing as it was a bar fight had not considered actually killing anyone, was set to subdual and parry mode, and while bumping Vyvyka toward the door, blocked any of the brigands from getting to her. He even last about 10 rounds defending her before finally hit once, and dying. And as the lights went out, the last of the blood flowing from his little body and the rest bar fighting away, the only action from the damsel Vyvyka was appropriately... panicked screams and inaction.

Now some might see this as very tragic when in truth for me, it really was the kind of death I could have only hoped for the would be rogue swashbuckler type that Morro was... for not only did he risk his life to save the girl, but gave it in successful attempt.

What's more, was the incredible support from those on IRC to encourage the creation of the next character. That was what made me want to be here, that kind of spirit. The folks on IRC even helped me to literally roll up (every point/race/class random) my next character which I still play today, Horatio. Which in turn have let to MANY memorable moments, that I just can't share until Horatio is no more for meta reasons.
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Adanu
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by Adanu »

I have two current favorite moments in ALFA. One is too meta for this place... but the other is when Zyrus sparred with the goblin king in BG and got his ass handed to him. Then watched Bevan get the same treatment.

It was small, not very epic... but Zyrus rarely gets to spar with someone totally out of his league, and it was awesome.
First Character: Zyrus Meynolt, the serene Water Genasi berserker. "I am the embodiment of the oceans; serene until you summon the storm." Zyrus: http://tinyurl.com/9emdbnd

Second Character: Damien Collins, the atypical druid. "What? Being a stick in the mud is boring. No pun intended grins"

Western Heartlands HDM: On break. PM for emergencies
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indio
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by indio »

Part 1

To commemorate the birth of my daughter, 9 years after my son was born, here are my ALFA memoirs. FWIW. This is my way of saying thanks, of remembering, and of..other things.

My love affair with ALFA began when I first started posting to forums in 2001. I was at NWStratics where a group of mod developers were putting together a NWN1 campaign. It was apparent that ALFA was the place to be, but I was nervous about joining, especially with the calibre of RPer they possessed. I created this assumption based on Mother's entry of J'Kin Grixtolidar (help me out here Mother) into a BioWare created contest for the best character background for their forthcoming NWN. It had a 500 word limit. Mother's character was brilliant, but clearly over the limit. It was also very popular and it was made a finalist. At the time I was frequenting #baldursgate, a chat channel run by the great MageDragon who used to run BaldursGateChronicles (now PlanetBaldursgate), a place Bio staff would drop by to hang out. I happened to mention J'Kin at one such occasion and suddenly, J'Kin was out of the race.

ALFA was always the elite in my mind. It was to ALFA that I aspired, but considered myself unworthy. So to have brought down the ALFA finalist was a major victory for us at Stratics, in my own small mindedness, and I felt that the great and mighty ALFA would not bully its way to secure all pre-NWN attention. Oh how we at Stratics celebrated. Then we all went our several ways. This occurred mostly because of a rift between the Stratics chat community and the mod devs. I developed a suspicion of chat channels after this, and despite having had amazing experiences on #baldursgate, it coloured all future experiences on irc.

I remember my first post on ALFA sometime late in 2001, where I chipped in on a thread that Erran had started about competitors to ALFA. I explained what Stratics was, or had used to be, and what had gone wrong. I felt like I was walking amongst giants. Soon after I found Silmar, who had already been accepted as HDM of Loudwater, PM'd him and we joined forces. We spent perhaps a year or more developing that module, both conceptually, then in the toolset, which did not arrive until June 2002. Most of the work we did was on our microphones. He was probably my closest friend for that year. I made friends with some of the other DMs too, and I found that all I had hoped for in joining a group of D&Ders was realised.

I was spending many hours a day working on ALFA projects in those days. I couldn't script but had lots of ideas for them and I found I could write reasonable tutorials about the toolset, which I shared on the forums and chatted with DMs about. Area design, outfit design and dialogue I found myself in love with in the toolset. Id guess I was spending about 10 hours a day working on ALFA, for those first 6 months. With Beta well underway and Loudwater doing well, I PM'd the admin team if they wanted help. Erran graciously stepped aside and I joined the team.

Burt - give me some names of DMs from that time will you? I need help remembering. :wall:
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by Galadorn »

Traind.













((pbbt, heehee...maybe not, but just wanted to mention him for shits'n'giggles))
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by Rumple C »

Indio - for twas he that gave me my first taste of "personalised" dm'ing. Nothing noteworthy about the event itself - what was noteworthy was how it made me feel. Invested in the PC and his place in the story. It has colored and influenced my own dm'ing to this day.
12.August.2015: Never forget.
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indio
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by indio »

Part 2
The launch of ALFA was too hectic to remember clearly. I was teaching full time and was doing ridiculous hours for ALFA. But it was all working out, with the understanding of my wife who came to realise that it was my real calling. No money in it, of course. The names that dominate my mind in this period became known as the Loudwater crew. Most nights I would say goodbye to Silmar, log off, and be shaking with exhaustion and delirium. I don't think I'd had more excitement in my adult life to that point. The player's were the most responsive, perceptive and creative I'd been with, in my life, and I was struggling to keep up. Increasingly I took refuge in the toolset, perhaps to avoid letting people down if I didn't come up to scratch. But the support was amazing. I never once felt taken for granted and often felt more loved and respected than I had grown up to expect I had a right to.

Wy wife got a job interstate and we moved. I couldn't get ALFA, now a year into Live, out of my head. I quit.I'd watched Erran do it so gracefully, I thought I should too. I was 32 years old and was a burnout. After 6 months of other things I was ready to go again. In retrospect, I should have reinvented myself at this point outside the game and not returned. I built Waterdeep but fortunately it went to safer hands to get to Live. Then Baldur's Gate and the hex experiment. By that stage, haks were making more beautiful servers possible, and with the exception of a few uninspired areas, I was just so happy with this exterior. I redesigned Loudwater with Evro and I cannot for the life of me work out what I did after that. Perhaps helped Bool? I'd stopped DMing though and was just building.

Late 2003 and I was waiting to start my new job teaching film at a school near our property...the same job I've still got today. But we were short on money and I was drinking pretty heavily, a habit I'd picked up living up north. It was a little seedy and my decisions reflect that. I'd been invited to join a DM session on a popular server at the time, and I sat and listened. Perhaps because it was so different to the way Silmar and I had operated and our regard for the players, perhaps my mood, but I was worried about the way they talked about players. I stayed a while before logging off and by then I was so alarmed at what I was hearing that it didn't take me long from there to turn revolutionary. I would never want to discredit the others involved, for we all believed in it at the time, and I wasn't alone in my estimation of that attitude that I had been exposed to, but I regret currying disfavor on the forums and have done for years. My errors in this rate on my scale of all time RL errors. It affected my life deeply; my relationship, my confidence and my morality. It also impacted on many people I held dear online. It was safe to say that I had some serious problems at this point and I had no idea how to fix them. It felt like I was killing the thing I loved.
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by Heero »

Elorn.
Heero just pawn in game of life.

12.August.2013: Never forget.
15.December.2014: Never forget.

The Glorious 12.August.2015: Always Remember the Glorious 12th.
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by wvincenti »

Heero wrote:Elorn.
Vale of Lost Voices.
I only got to see a fraction of that server before it left the project, but what I saw was beautiful.
It rounded out a great collection of servers in the Dalelands: Daggerdale, Shadowdale, VoLV and nearby Northern Cormyr.

-Bill
  • Currently NWN1 ALFA: Ryld Ky'bler
    Currently NWN2: Gwindor Faelivrin, still not actually dead!

    Formerly: Timyin Tim, Glorfindel Inglorion and Beleg Thalionestel amongst others.
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by Mikayla »

Hey Indio - its great to see you post on the boards again, and I love reading your tale of ALFA's early days from your perspective, even though the tale itself is, well, kind of heartbreaking. It pains me to think you thought you did so much damage when in fact, ALFA would not be what it is today (and whats it has been for the last decade) without your efforts. As a builder, as a DM, as Lead Admin, you helped build this incredible project that not only spawned countless other projects, but outlasted them.

Some views from my perspective: The early days Loudwater campaign went down in ALFA legend as one of the best campaigns ever. I believe I recall Wynna saying it was her best role-playing experience ever, and I've heard the same from others as well (Burt maybe? I cannot recall who said it).

The hex-map on Baldur's Gate was also legendary - lethally so. In the early days there was probably no server that inspired so much respect and fear. Granted, I poked fun at it in the Lord of the ALFA, but I poked fun at everything.

Anyway, I can't speak to your life outside of ALFA, but in ALFA, you are certainly one of the people who made ALFA what it is and what it was. All of us who have enjoyed ALFA over the years owe you a debt of gratitude.

Mikayla

P.S. Especially me, because I needed a foil for my forum rants and library satires, .. ;)
ALFA1-NWN1: Sheyreiza Valakahsa
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by indio »

Part 3

Typing this on the ipad in the living room, my wife just asked what I was doing. ALFA, I said. For a while she just stared at me and we both smiled. I know she was glad when I finally gave it up. ALFA was my first thought each morning. I'd never belonged to anything where the things I was good at were more recognised and appreciated. I'd also never been more vulnerable to having my weaknesses exposed. My involvement to this point had garnered me many admirers, but the last episode garnered just as many enemies.

Some of the names in this thread, Elorn, for example, simply left. I started receiving lengthy PMs detailing their disappointment/anger. I decided to rejoin admin to assist the rebuild and soon found myself making a post about how I thought a lower level cap was a goof fit with ALFA. I was naive. Soon players who had invested serious time and effort to build their characters were concerned I was planning on dismantling them. I thought I was preaching to the choir. Who wouldn't want to make ALFA less about leveling, I reasoned?

Soon after a fellow admin at the time indicated they required help handling a particular player. After listening to the situation my teacher brain concluded it was a clear cut case of bullying. The DM felt powerless to stop the player from doing anything they pleased. Any time the DM attempted to intervene in-game, the player would immediately take it to the PMs and essentially meta their way out. The DM was afraid of consequences in the community, on the forums and in chat. We conceived a wrong-headed plan to reinstate the DM as in control on the game.

This became a notorious affair within ALFA and resulted in the loss of a friendship with that DM. Neither of us, certainly not me, ever doubted why we were doing it though. Not originally. The player was killing the game for the DM, who also ran the server and was putting in as many hours as I was, and more. At that stage, I wasn't even aware of who the player was. Not did it matter. So we acted. My incompetent handling of that resulted in a new era of mistrust between player and DM but also, ironically, saw the emergence of two of ALFA's most important long term contributors, Wynna and Mikayla. These two had been around since long before, and were already up to their eyeballs in reconceiving the community. But as the situation became an emergency, it was these two, I believe, who led us through.
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by Castano »

My favorite moments:

Pushing MS NWN1 through the politics back then to become ALFA1's last live server, even though I wasn't part of any particular clique at the time. I know I will forget someone who contributed to MS1 as I call it, so I'll just list Bartleby here as our lead scripter and leave it at that.

Getting MS NWN2 live as ALFA's 3rd NWN2 server with the help of a broad team from the community who built multiple areas, fixed bugs, tests and everything else. Thanks everyone!!!!!
On playing together: http://www.giantitp.com/articles/tll307 ... 6efFP.html
Useful resource: http://nwn2.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page

On bad governance: "I intend to bring democracy to this nation, and if anybody stands in my way I will crush him and his family."
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by Mikayla »

Yeah, that affair was really difficult Indio, and I feel for you. Although I spoofed it in the library, ultimately I had to threaten that player with removal of their character from the vault before that player would comply, and it was hard for me to do it because I had been friends with the person .. but .. they exhausted every avenue and appeal and would simply not comply. The details are still in the Player Admin thread, for those that really want to read it. I read it again just the other day and it reminded of me how serious and difficult things sometimes got in ALFA. There were so many people with so much passion here, and that led to so many conflicts.
ALFA1-NWN1: Sheyreiza Valakahsa
NWN2: Layla (aka Aliyah, Amira, Snake and others) and Vellya
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by Castano »

I don't call that stuff passion, I call it well never mind...

I don't think either side handled it well.
On playing together: http://www.giantitp.com/articles/tll307 ... 6efFP.html
Useful resource: http://nwn2.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page

On bad governance: "I intend to bring democracy to this nation, and if anybody stands in my way I will crush him and his family."
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by indio »

Part 4

Away from admin and with the NWN2 toolset at my disposal, I went back to building and got TSM up and running. Acadius Lost was instrumental technically, as was Donrath in hosting it. I had retreated into my cave and spent many days just designing. AL sent me a PM asking for my email and soon after I received a message from his partner thanking me for the attention to detail in TSM. For some reason it was this message that finally allowed me to consider moving away.

I tried to get Waterdeep going, but it was more an exercise in denial, or vanity. I tried to build Skullport and spent more time refusing to concede the truth. I'd worn out my welcome. Feeling more like a fifth wheel and with Wynna, then Curm propelling TSM into something worth playing, I slowly got used to the idea of not having ALFA.

There are many people who were kind to me throughout my time here. I've mentioned some, but Swift has always been very supportive, as was Rotku, Dorn, Thangorn, Fionn, Lemernis, White Warlock, Grey Pilgrim, Curmudgeon, Veilan, mick, fluffy, Joos, paazin, Coby, Mandos, Old Grey Rogue, and of course Burt. Often during the hard times I would receive an PM from so eone like OGR, telling me to keep my chin up.

I guess my memories of ALFA will always be tinged with regret that I made as many enemies as I did friends. My mistakes were often made publically and I was not a very good administrator or manager. This is true of RL as well. ALFA taught me more about myself in 7 years than Would have taken three times that without it. My mistakes needed to be reconciled because I couldn't be without ALFA. That meant dealing with things that I would rather have walked away from. In this respect, ALFA is and will always be part of who I am.

I'm often nervous before posting here, so thankyou to Mikayla and Rumple for making me welcome. I often look at the boards and enjoy seeing the community alive and well. I started this with mention of our baby girl, so attached is a photo of us from a few weeks ago. I feel that ALFA bought the best out in me and that the modules were evidence of that. Over time it perhaps bought out the worst in me too.

Yesterday I apologised to a student who I had given a hard time to in class about a year ago. She didn't really deserve it, but it took me a year to properly feel the injustice and do something about it. It could have been never, of course, so I'm glad I did eventually apologise. Molly, the girl, was as happy about the apology as I was giving it.

TSM was my apology to ALFA. The damage was done, but it helped find a new direction. It was my best work and the culmination of the support and inspiration ALFA gave me.

Thanks for this thread. It was cathartic. There. I've said what I wanted to say and wish you all a very pleasant day.
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Re: Favourite ALFA/Other moments?

Post by Mikayla »

Fair enough Castano, but lets not re-fight it. It was hard enough the first time around.

Anyway, despite the difficult subject of your posts Indio, its still great to hear from you, and thank you for the posts. Although it is kind of emotional reading, I am really glad I could read your perspective, and .. I don't know .. I am glad to hear from you and glad you told your story. ALFA would not be what it is or what has been without you.

M.
ALFA1-NWN1: Sheyreiza Valakahsa
NWN2: Layla (aka Aliyah, Amira, Snake and others) and Vellya
NWN1-WD: Shein'n Valakasha
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