Runeblade Removal!

Anedhel

No reason people should have to mill around waiting for empowerment to fade so they can sell/gift weapons to others.

Therefore!

Why not introduce some kind of procedure for removing empowerment? You could have it require the runewarden to have contact with the ground (like empowerment) and make him/her stay still for longer than runeblading takes, and even increase the cost, willpower-wise, if that seems reasonable, though I can't imagine any argument against the removing of the empowerment status. To help make things cleaner, the runeblade should probably be required to be smudged of its enhancing-rune (pithakhan, eihwaz, nairat, hugalaz), just so there aren't extra runes on weapons floating around.

Strata

I thought this thread was about removal of runeblades from the game. Totally wasted a click.

Daklore

Mechanical side, I can see a point. RP side, don't. When you runebind something, you're filling it with the energy of the earth and attuning it to your own person. It becomes an extension of yourself, more or less. If you're that impatient, well, don't runebind something and then switch class two weeks later >P

Otherwise, letting it set in a stockroom will keep it nice and fresh and wait out the runebinding. Mechanical side, yes, I can see a desire... but I don't see a need to do this. Just like when you songbless a weapon, you're making it your own. Wait it out, or don't do it in the first place. *shrug*

Anedhel

You could, for instance, have made a new weapon you'd prefer to take into battle. Rather than allow a weapon to sit, unused, in storage, you might want to hand it to someone you care about, so they can bear it into battle themselves. That's not breaking RP.

Similarly, you may suddenly fall on hard times, forcing you to sell a weapon you otherwise cherish. Also not breaking RP.

As with anything else tied to mechanics, it's the way you deal with it in-game that makes the difference as to whether it breaks RP or not, not the availability of the ability itself.

Shunsui

I see no real reason. I've sold/given empowered weapons to people in the past, just make sure they know ahead of time that it's empowered. They can toss it in a stockroom for 1-30 days until the empowerment fades. Everybody wins!

Anedhel

Having to sit on something for 1-30 days kinda seems like a lose to me. Not to mention, not everyone has access to a stock room

Penwize

I don't really see why anyone would oppose this, since it can only improve quality of life in a video game.  If you want it to maintain RP value, just make unbinding a sword take a very long process.  30 seconds of lost EQ/Balance while you go through the ritual motions of it maybe?

Anedhel

Sure. You can make it as long as you want, and the more flavor text, the better :O

Athrax

I think it should take 3 times longer to unbind than it does to uproot a totem.

Sena

I'd prefer something more questish that would take 1-2 RL days and a decent amount of work to complete, at the very least.

There should be more semi-permanent choices in the game, not less.

Anedhel

Why?

I don't mean to be a troll or anything, but it seems like an arbitrary measure for something that makes a tiny impact, in-game. Kind of feels like it's opposition for the sake of opposition, rather than anything meaningful.

Anedhel

Athrax said:

I think it should take 3 times longer to unbind than it does to uproot a totem.

You're looking at an hour not doing -anything-. That just seems kind of arbitrary, and nonsensical, to me.

Kyrra

I frequently spend an hour not doing "anything" when I stand in a forge watching my screen fill with lines of balance recovery.

I frequently spend less than an hour playing with totems which is a process 98% of the playerbase seems to loathe but I quite enjoy.

People don't have to make runeblades. The extra runes only matter in a pvp scenario and there is nothing to prevent someone just burning through lots of purple inks instead. I did it while waiting for one of my blades to fade so I could empower my swords at the same time.

Runeblades are a big deal and it shouldn't be some option to toggle like mastery. You don't see the equivilent for bard's songblades and even enchanters can't remove enchantments which are so minor in comparison. Imagine if they could instead of needing to craft an entirely new item because they didn't realise they ran out of some commodity and their enchantment script trolled them?

I am not disagreeing for the sake of it or to troll. I don't agree with removing runeblades until the empowerment fades on its own. I don't think it's necessary. They don't last forever.

Nim

Sena said:

There should be more semi-permanent choices in the game, not less.

I totally agree with this statement out of context, but runeblades are already not very permanent, apparently - and even if they were permanent, it'd kind of be the kind of permanent that staying has in blackjack. It turns out you stayed at a 17 and the next card was a 4, and the dealer got it and stayed at 18 and beat you. And, oh no, it turns out you bet a ton of gold on that hand. Oh no!

But at the end of the day, as long as you've got the requisite gold, you can always play more blackjack!

Jules

Honestly, with the thievery buff, I'd like the runeblade empowerment to only tick down while OUT of the stockroom.  

Athrax

Anedhel said:

Athrax said:

I think it should take 3 times longer to unbind than it does to uproot a totem.

You're looking at an hour not doing -anything-. That just seems kind of arbitrary, and nonsensical, to me.

It may to you, but to me being able to remove runeblades at all seems a bit nonsensical.   And if there were a way to remove them, I would want the penalty for doing so to be high, as others have said.

Anedhel

Regarding Kyrra's statement, pvp is actually a big part of a lot of players' lives, and to say that someone should simply not use one of the strongest and most disctinctive aspects of a class is kind of mind-boggling, when the trade off is so minor that it could never add up to it.  It's a pretty odd line of reasoning, as justification for keeping the time restraint on empowerment.

It's also not an hour of not 'doing' anything, it's an hour of not moving, not emoting, not using skills, etc. etc., if you're thinking it should work like uprooting a totem. I don't see how this is justifiable in any way.

Regarding empowerment fading in stockrooms- it seems to me an oversight that runeblading ticks down while an item's months does not. That's strange to me.

I don't -get- the argument that runeblades shouldn't be removable. You can smudge runes off anything else, it affects a minute section of the Achaean population, and not being able to remove empowerment doesn't -add- anything. You're talking about denying people an easier time of things over a non-issue. What, objectively, does not being able to remove runeblading give? 'Suck it, you found something nicer and now you can't give your old thing so someone else can use it' seems a bit childish, as far as rationale goes. As for the previous argument of more decisions having to be semi-permanent, I'm not sure whether you mean it in terms of RP or in terms of making mechanics more muddled and unnecessarily clumsy. If it's for RP, I don't buy it- like I said, it should be up to players to make the mechanical aspects of Achaea make sense, regardless of what a skill actually does. If it's for the purpose of keeping mechanics the way they are... well, let's just say I'm not sure why that counts as a logical choice, really.

Eld

Daklore said:

Mechanical side, I can see a point. RP side, don't. When you runebind something, you're filling it with the energy of the earth and attuning it to your own person. It becomes an extension of yourself, more or less. If you're that impatient, well, don't runebind something and then switch class two weeks later >P

Otherwise, letting it set in a stockroom will keep it nice and fresh and wait out the runebinding. Mechanical side, yes, I can see a desire... but I don't see a need to do this. Just like when you songbless a weapon, you're making it your own. Wait it out, or don't do it in the first place. *shrug*

Even if the whole "attuning it to yourself" bit is how people actually see it (is it? I've never thought of it that way, but never played a housed runie), what makes it irreversible? You're the one doing the infusing. You know that the binding is going to wear off, and the sword is going to decay. It's an inherently temporary infusion of an inherently temporary medium; why shouldn't you be able to defuse it, rather than waiting for it to wear off gradually?

Kresslack

If you want to sell/gift swords, don't make them runeblades. Or, wait for the empowerment to wear off, which is 30 hrs. Not really that much of a hassle imo. I've never given away or sold a sword with an empowerment, nor thought to, because if I'm using it and it's empowered, it's my main set. Otherwise, I wouldn't bother.

Seftin

30 days not hours. Rl days.

Kresslack

Regardless the time, you know prior to empowering it. That's like forging fullplate to give to someone else.

Seftin

No it isn't. You should be able to disempower a rapier, just make it that you smudge the three runes from the blade and it takes an achaean month from that point to fade. There is no argument that can be made against this other than 'but its been that way for ages!'. I say yes, add it, give it an ingame month to fade to keep naysayers happy.

Athrax

Seftin said:

No it isn't. You should be able to disempower a rapier, just make it that you smudge the three runes from the blade and it takes an achaean month from that point to fade. There is no argument that can be made against this other than 'but its been that way for ages!'. I say yes, add it, give it an ingame month to fade to keep naysayers happy.

Actually there is a really good argument for making it take about the same amount of time as uprooting/implanting totems.  When you create a runeblade/runic armour you are BINDING the runes to the blade.  When you implant a totem you are BINDING the runes to the earth.  You can smudge regular runes off the ground/yourse/blades/etc...but those have not been BOUND to the item.   In my opnion runeblades are meant to be just as permanent as implanted totems, so removing them should be just as laborous.

Anedhel

Except for how creating a runeblade takes all of ten seconds to create and a totem takes fifteen minutes to implant?

Look, I really don't mean to sound contrarian, but at this point, it just sounds like you have this idea of a runeblade that has nothing to do with the way they work.

Stop making equivalencies between skills that are not equal.

Jovolo

It's not really arbitrary to make it take a decent length of time to unbind a weapon from its empowerment. It seems like a more difficult thing to do than empowering in the first place, and making it a quick easy fix to a somewhat significant in game decision appears metagamey. Should take an achaean month  to unbind itself from the point of UNBIND <weapon> FROM EMPOWERMENT. Through which you can still use it normally but the process cannot be reversed (simply empower it again if you want to when the empowerment wears off early).

Anedhel

I'm not sure why it is that the time seems to matter so much. If you're going to allow removal, what's the difference between it taking two minutes, an hour, or twenty-four hours?

But, whatever, I guess. 24 hours during which you can use the runeblade is fine, I just don't really see the point of that measure of time.

I wouldn't be opposed, either, to only allowing two weapons (one pair) to be runebladed at any given time, and runeblading a new one removes the empowerment of the one with the least months left on its empowerment. This seems to address the 'runeblades are a personal thing' issue which so many people seem to find a big deal (which I don't really agree with- Achaean warriors rarely display an attachment to their weapons in any field other than their quality, but eh).

Athrax

It sounds like you really just want what you want.  What exactly is your reason for wanting to only allow two weapons to be runebladed?

Jovolo

It's the same problem as ANYTHING that takes any amount of significant time. It's the issue the admin have between convenience for their players and creating a real-world, natural and harsh environment with consequences that mean something. Most people in this thread have unnecessarily and kind of elitistly tried to push for heavy consequences (a real life month - which is crazy) and I disagree with that, but a real life day is a fair compromise.

Still an in-game month!

( @Anedhel Your next suggestion is random. Just implement a method of manually decreasing the empowerment time. You COULD make it a ritual that can only be performed every in game year, preventing you from doing it a lot, but come on.)

Anedhel

People seem to think it's a deeply personal thing, or something. If that's the case, allowing more than two is silly.

It fixes the problem of waiting around on empowerment to fade, and it also reinforces the roleplay implications of runeblading.

For the record, your arguments also kind of sound like you just want what you want, except that what you want seems arbitrary and indefensible.

ETA: It just seems weird to impose a wait period on something that takes 10 seconds that's thousands of times in excess of the time and effort it takes to create. Even 24 hours is egregious when you think of the benefit you could present players with, and the rationale for not allowing for the removal of runeblades. It's something that'll have zero impact on the game, most likely, except perhaps more weapons of quality will shift hands more frequently, I suppose, but it's a minute number. In a world where if you die, you don't die, the measure just seems arbitrary and silly to me. You want to fix Achaea and make it more gritty, fine. Start with something that makes sense, I guess?

Jovolo

Jovolo said:

It's the same problem as ANYTHING that takes any amount of significant time. It's the issue the admin have between convenience for their players and creating a real-world, natural and harsh environment with consequences that mean something.

No one is suggesting a fix but you, btw. A real life day is hardly a serious, detrimental waiting period to you or anybody. A real life month IS.

Be a pragmatist.

Athrax

I'll happily admit that in my case.  Runeblades/Runic armor are pretty much the only unique things to the class, I don't think removing them easily serves any real purpose.  Nor do I think that limiting them to two weapons does (cuz that would be a nerf, and I don't want a nerf, I like my hugalaz axes for finishing off certain monks that like to numb through dsb).

And unlike you, I actually did provide a defense to wanting it to take as long as uprooting.  In a game mechanic sense, you're right, there really is no reason for it to take a super long time since the empowering itself is pretty fast.  I'm personally not against it taking a lot longer to make runeblades either though.

The whole idea of your change though, is... what?   To gift/sell a blade that you runebladed...   please tell me how that isn't arbitrary.