It's been two years since I've began playing Achaea. I've stuck with the game quite well, unfortunately the same cannot be said for my characters. I have a particularly nasty habit of getting a fantastic RP idea in my head, becoming all inspired and excited to play the character, make it, get all set up, make a few friends, get to about HR3, then suicide him because I just thought up another exciting idea for play.

I realize that part of my problem lies with the fact that I think every side and every class is amazingly awesome and interesting. I've played every city long enough to know a bit more then then basics of each one. I can play any side and have an absolute blast. I have the same problem, only much much more severe then the previous one, with classes.
Every class beside monks intrigues me so much, sort of like a kid with a brand new video game. "Ooh, this one sounds so awesome, these powers are so freaking fun to have and use"

So I come to you in hopes of learning how to once and for all choose and side and a path and STICK WITH IT. I would like to actually make something of a character I play one day, but I cannot do so if I have four different characters to play at once.

How do I solve this path shifting addiction once and for all?

Phoenix Appearance and Abilities

A phoenix is a mythical bird with a colorful plumage and a tail of gold and scarlet (or purple, blue, and green according to some legends). It has a 500 to 1,000 year life-cycle (500-1000 achaean day?), near the end of which it builds itself a nest of myrrh twigs that then ignites; both nest and bird burn fiercely and are reduced to ashes, from which a new, young phoenix or phoenix egg arises, reborn anew to live again. The new phoenix is destined to live as long as its old self. In some stories, the new phoenix embalms the ashes of its old self in an egg made of myrrh and deposits it in the Egyptian city of Heliopolis (sun city in Greek).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_(mythology)

Play as a rogue and have absolute freedom.

All I can really tell you is to choose what a character is going to do and be before you create him, and don't change it because you come up with a new idea. If in the course of playing the role you find yourself altering the goals of your character, that's only natural, but don't do so simply because "hey, this would be cool, too."

Be sure you choose a path you, personally, will find fun. This doesn't apply only to the skills of the class, but the community of the city and House you choose. Mhaldor isn't for everyone, and neither are Shallam or Ashtan or Cyrene. You can find fun and interesting people and situations in all of these, however.

Finally, stick to your role and don't be afraid to do things which will cause people to dislike you if your role calls for it. ICly they may hate you, but OOCly they will probably respect you more for your dedication to your role. Unless they're bat- insane, in which case you don't need their respect anyway.

EDIT: And please, for the love of all that is holy, don't go with the above suggestion. Rogues contribute little to the game, and often in fact harm it, unless played well, and the vast majority are not.

I am, and have been, notoriously bad at this on Otha.

Picking one character and just sticking it out (if you want to change sides, don't make an alt -> convert that character) is probably the only advice. Houses and cities are dynamic, not constant. If their ideals change in a way you don't like, roleplay into leaving due to those reasons.

I was going to say something but Zoma's post made me lol so hard that I cannot take anything he says seriously anymore.

What Quoren said

I keep having to remind myself that Naifos has his own goals, but I've hit so many bumps that I couldn't do what he was set to do. He's my only character so I immediately put myself in his place and I think that's gotten him in a rut that I have trouble continuing with. My personality is dynamic and so I think that may be messing up my RP with Naifos.

Since he was my first, I considered him a throw away character then gave him RP once I knew what was happening...

Decisions Decisions Decisions...

I can be very bad at sticking to roles due to class changes.

I also get random ideas for a good character, and make an alt only to leave him dormant after about a week, but this is usually down to the mindset of some of the Achaeans I've dealt with on them. A lot of the time, you can get shot down as a "Lolalt", I'm guilty of thinking this as well. A lot of the novices aides seem to just ignore you because you know what you're doing, and most wont bother wasting their time because they think - "Blah. He'll just suicide after he's bored of this char"

Guilty, it's a bit backwards but it's hard to care about a character when you're training a newbie character who's found out about EMOTE and they think every sentence has to be reacted to with "EMOTE takes a horrified gasp, his fur standing on end" Unfortunately, sometimes those emotes take five minutes to write and they gasp at a really unneeded time slowing down the excitement and the "fun" of the lesson.

Buy credits. It'll make you think twice before abandoning your character.

Too true.

And now it's a meme



Seriously though, it all depends on where your character's going.

Yeah, you don't abandon, you just become the person who changes to every class possible without it getting you kicked out of your house, and then you piss someone off because of all the changes and get kicked out anyways, and then it takes you 30+ IC years to figure out what the hell you want to do, and finally it all makes sense. However in this process you spend $1985109475125461 on credits for class hopping ( I would know cause I did that )

funny thing is, right after I made my final (hopefully) switch back to Infernal, I won $1,000 of a $2 scratch off. That was a kick ass day

Staying consistent is the single thing that makes for great characters. The truly great characters either a) stick with one side their entire lives or b) switch -once- and make it stick.

Exceptions to this rule are pretty few and far between. I can think of maybe two during my entire time in Achaea. No, you aren't one of them.

God, this thread is making me laugh so hard.


So I guess basically what needs to be done is, I need to just suck it up and force myself to pick a class/house/rp/ and plot line and just stick to it?

Yes. But don't be so strict that you refuse to quit sides...if you pick Cyrene and a member of Cyrene kills you/you run in to conflict with Cyrene based on RP beliefs, switching sides is fine. Just don't lolquit every city, then act confused when people don't trust you. And for -s sake, don't pull a Z and act like you know it all.

Avoid leadership positions. Despite how 'cool' it may seem at times, it makes Achaea drastically less fun.

It's personally my one and only regret. The whole experience has made me incredibly bitter and I've started to hate pretty much every aspect about the game. I used to be consistently in-character and everything that would happen was fun and I loved every minute of it. I had a lot going for me, but I feel getting involved in leadership has completely -ed up my character.

I'm hoping that one day (hopefully soon) the enjoyment I initially got from Achaea returns, but somehow I don't think that's likely...

The above is true. However, the intensity of the effect varies upon the organization and the job. For example, City leader is quite literally the most ridiculously taxing position there is, while House leader (depending on the House) can be fun, as long as there isn't but so much busy work to do and the House is a good one with lots of roleplay.

Absolutely every leader goes through this, and if it helps at all, from an outside point-of-view you've made the CIJ actually respectable.

Part of the problem may be joint leadership positions between the House and your city. I can't imagine the combined level of stress, but Bonko's pulled it off pretty well.

I love being a House Leader. I can take or leave the city stuff, but the House stuff is great.

But any leader that expects insta-change is going to be sorely sorely disappointed/disillusioned.


And yeah, Azu, pick the concept, stay the course.

My big problem is making alts, falling in love with all of them, spending all the lessons I have, then wanting to buy enough credits to tri-trans them all, then getting bored with them.

I just realized how strong of an analogy for my hobbies/girlfriends/life that is.

My brick walls in Achaea now are;
1) I'm really bored with my Monk's class/bashing and need to get some credits to tri-trans a new class.
2) I enjoy playing a militant Good character, but could use some credits to trans some skills and start getting more into PvP, but then Shallam gets raided and I facepalm at the cluster- and want to play my Monk again.

I have the same problem. Thank you to everyone who posted in this thread so far. Now, how to go about keeping my rp to something I can stick with consistently...

*sigh*