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Library: Why has the world changed? Are we becoming less?

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Author: daerid
Date:May 3 2003

Once upon a time, perhaps thousand bat years ago, distant relative of mine,
supposedly, went to do battle with great evil. Doing battle with great evil
is nothing to write home about, as that's what heroes do all over the world
day in day out, but the practical and economical aspects have changed since
then, and not necessarily for the good..

Thus, first shall I recite the tale and then shall I consider the changes
since.

Back in those days, men were MEN. Hence, in the front of all fiendish
monsters, only one warrior stood. The name of this warrior has been lost
in fogs of time.

Even in those primeval times, it was neccessary to have companions along
for the journey; for the journey, Blitzer, the mighty magician and cleric
of Zonni, as well as my distant ancestor, both magician and conjurer,
joined.
In those times, people didn't happen to have stock market dealing in magic
items ('Ye Olde Magic Shoppe', or 'insanely active sales channel'), and
therefore the heroes were not at all best equipped. The mighty warrior,
especially, was carrying just a shield! 'This is all I need, and you travel
best when you travel light', he said.

Also, the heroes were at best veterans, far from elite of the
adventurers. But still, they intended to tackle one of the most fell beasts
inhabiting the game! With greed alighting their eyes, they set the
destruction of the frog-lord, Burglefloogah, as their goal!

The journey to the temple of the Burglefloogah was considerably shorter in
those days. None of this strange huge continent stuff was there in the old
days, but instead the temple was just few steps away, for those who knew
the path.

The dark temple did not faze our heroes. Instead, they were eager to do
battle with great evil, and rushed inside. Within the temple, the trio made
short work of slaads blocking their way and made their way to next to the
final pit containing the frog-lord himself.
After furious battle, lasting two or three hours, the frog-lord finally
fell, and as he did, the heroes rejoiced and looted their loot bags
full.

Little did they know that all their effort would be in vain as the items,
paid in blood, would mysteriously disappear in few Bat-years, as some
nefarious people figured how to tune reality to their liking (aka the great
Burgle EQ dupefest)...

Since then, the known world has grown considerably, at the same time both
stabilizing, as well as growing many, many experienced
adventurers. Strangely enough, at the same times monsters have grown even
more in power.

What our forefathers took out in hour or two with few seminaked people,
takes nowadays nine extremely experienced people decked out like Christmas
trees many, many hours of work, even if it's possible. Are we truly
becoming less? Will the Bat be ruled by monsters in the years to come?
Interestingly enough, in some parallel dimensions (Everquest), the
situation has grown even more radical, there, you literally need army of
people to take out a large monster.. and then, one or two happy heroes get
the loot.

The gods of Bat have taken to intervening to prevent abusing monsters
(killing same monster repeatedly by same players, aka rape prot). This
might, led to extremes (can kill once per year, about all >50k monsies with
cash-worthy eq covered) actually lead to smaller and smaller number of
people trying to kill a monster, to ensure their chances of maximizing loot
they get. This, in turn, might lead to allowing people to actually kill big
monsters.

I wonder if the powers that be ever read these tales, or are these musings
just whispers to the wind?

Be as it may, it seems that the power of heroes is waning and the power of
monsters growing; will we see the next dawn?


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