1. Favorite moments:
-After being hit by a river curse, Solrex could not shut up about the river. Everyone had to be reminded every five minutes to go to the river. Calan (Derrick) even told him that if he didn’t shut up, he would be hit by a (40) flame bolt, big enough to kill him. Unable to speak about the river, Solrex translated his cursed thoughts into verbal form, except, it came out as “I don’t want to be hit by a flame bolt, I don’t want to be hit by a flame bolt,” instead of trying to tell people to go to the river. However, for Solvieg’s wedding, he kept his mouth shut by following some advice by bargaining with the mental thoughts that he would tell them later about the river. Yet, his mind would not shut up about the river. Except, when he focused on the wedding, and focused on his partner’s death from his backstory, and how he could have had this, and the heartbreak of those thoughts briefly overcame the curse, until his thoughts wandered back to the river after the wedding, which in turn became, “I don’t want to get hit by a flame bolt.”
Note: Calan would have only made Solrex unconscious with a weaker spell, not kill him. But, he did not know that. Just for those wondering why a sylvanborn would act that way.
-See #4.
-Solrex, with the other Earth Weavers, fought to destroy a necromancy crypt, right before the beholder fight. Every time they attacked the summoning object, it summoned more zombies. They tried a healing spell. No effect, zombies fade in one, fade in two, fade in three. A life spell, which certainly wouldn’t have been in excess of, which also failed. Solrex wondered if elemental healing would harm the relic. Having only 20 channeling left, he tried a 5, and a crack appeared. Next chance he got, he summoned a 10, then seeing the zombies phasing in on 2, he went for a 5 to channel the rest of his pool, finishing off the relic but being torn to pieces. His spirit watched and counted, and realized that he had bled out. He needed a life spell, and it was already extended on the relic summoning the zombies. So, his spirit started the count for his dying 5 minute count. But, he was going to die this time, the life spell was already extended and exhausted. He knew this. He was a martyr.
“I call upon Earth to grant you life!”
Solrex’s body coughed awake, confused. They had used an artificial life spell stored to bring their hero back. Considering at this point that Solrex was afraid of his spirit longing for his partner (Maybe Cattail), he wasn’t even sure if he would come back (which is a bunch of bull crap planted in Solrex’s mind to make him not just be fearless of his first two deaths, of course his first 2 deaths are free), so he was blessed to not have to face death today.
Unfortunately, for the beholder fight, he had a potion and a bandage, everything else was consumed and so he gave the potion to someone else and hid. Having spent no time on honing his skills with a weapon, he had no offensive options.
2. Least Favorite Moments
-Having to fight a Beholder with no channeling left. Due to this, Solrex basically hid behind houses and trails until the beholder was dealt with, not even risking a glance longer than a moment due to the rumors he had heard about how looking at them could just hurt you. This was awful timing for this fight, and it could have been more entertaining if our resources weren’t all gone. While yes, I should have a weapon, I haven’t made a foam one yet, I don’t know which one to make yet, and swinging 2 normal seems REALLY effective against a giant eyeball you can’t look at. All in all, this seemed like an epic battle placed at an epicly WRONG time. Some people might enjoy fighting with their cantrip abilities, but I certainly don’t. What am I going to do, ask the beholder how many hit points he has lost so I can heal him with- oh wait, nothing!!!! And I doubt it was even undead.
Another moment for #1, it would be up higher, but copy and paste isn’t working for the forums.
-Solrex saw an undead. Late at night. He threw a “10 elemental healing” at it, and it harmed it. The fact that he was damaging instead of healing wasn’t the reason he enjoyed taking his first blood, his first attack, no, it was the fact that he was wiping the scourge of the undead off the land, and he was doing his job as an Earth Weaver. This brought new found hatred towards necromancy, moreso than before, and awakened something in him that wasn’t there before.
3. What I want to see more of
-More Roleplaying opportunities, if you had NPCs specifically for roleplaying, and one of them got into a conversation with Solrex about his partner, it would almost immediately make me want to give my NPC of the month to that person for helping me achieve tears and trembling (bones vibrating).
-Giving me space to write on my battleboard to write my channeling pool spent total. This is how my brain thinks:
“Right, he is down 30, and I’ve spent 20, so when I’m done, it will be 50 spent out of 275.”
Rather than:
“Huh, how many of these dots mean what? Am I out of channeling yet? This is not math, this is baby tally marks, which my mind doesn’t comprehend quickly.”
Just having space to write down my current total in like a box or something would be greatly appreciated.
4. A moment from the perspective of your character:
Aside from 1 and 2, there’s this:
-Solrex was in the Conclave, late at night, next to the Earth Circle, whispering to his beloved (Working name, but it might be Cattail) parter, who he believed if she could hear him from anywhere, it would be from the Earth Circle. Cameron approaches Solrex, and asks him what he is doing. Solrex explains that he believes that, although he is very likely just talking to dust and air, he thinks that speaking near the Earth Circle may allow his fallen partner to hear him. Cameron reassured Solrex that she does hear him. This caused Solrex to cry a little. Solrex asked if there was even an afterlife, or if spirits not caught by the Earth Circle would just fade to dust. Because the Spirit Farewell ritual exists, there must be an afterlife, of which we are unaware. Solrex argued back that what if spirits were destroyed after the ritual, and that’s why they couldn’t come back? Cameron reassures Solrex, and by now, the tear gates have flooded, and both Solrex and Anson, (myself, the player of Solrex) are crying due to the immersion, and his bones were described as “Vibrating from stress.” He also was clearly stressed out at the odds of meeting another reeds dryad that could love that could also live near the Lux. Cameron continued to give him hope.
With this conversation about what could have happened to his partner, I got to play with my body’s emotions, and have a lot of fun. Anyways, the story continues.
Much later, Phalanopsis offers Solrex a hallucinate potion, when he could produce one, and Solrex took the offer. This was to have an intentional hallucination of his partner (Cattail, maybe her name). However, after speaking to Tengu about maybe pausing his memory of her death, which he was unable to do at that point, he decided that if things went sour, it would only corrupt his memory of her, and thus, Tengu convinced Solrex to not be so violent in his emotions. Solrex couldn’t believe that he was speaking to a Biata and not a stone elf, with how stoic and reasonable Tengu was. He decided against this, and, (with OOC permission), gave Tengu a hug, probably in tears if I remember correctly.
This level of immersion where I physically trembled and had my bones vibrate, and could actually cry and feel my characters emotions, was amazing, and I wonder if the long weekend helped with getting deep enough into the character that I could achieve such a thing.
5. Not sure, cause I started playing after 2.0 released. Maybe a kind of shield with a maximum size that can be used as a channeling focus? I would love to use a shield as a way to deter attacks, but that’s kinda awkward when I have to put it down to heal someone. It would also be nice to have somewhere to put my spirit/battleboard that is in easy access.
You could also mark the circles ahead of time with numbers to make it easier to fill them in as you go, if that would be better for you.