Changes to customisation policy re: Pariah knives.

Nhakra

I know of at least one individual who customised/preserved their ritual knives, but now I am told this is not considered acceptable. What quantifiable difference is there between this and a Magi's quarterstaff? If I were paranoid, which I'm not, whatever people are telling you, I would be inclined to think that the difference is that there is an artefact available for one, but not the other. (but then there're Grove quarterstaves, which have an arte version but can be customised)

Regardless, this definitely seems an inconsistent application of policy. While an update to the HELP file would work, I'd be lying if I said I didn't want my customisation, which I put a lot of effort into.

Amranu

Fairly sure you can customize the artie knife, I wouldn't expect to be able to customize the base knife.

Nhakra

You can customize the arte knife, correct.

I know @Shirszae (sorry to bring you into it) customized her non-arte knife, and preserved it, the only two things I'm trying to do.

Also, what makes it any different from the staves mentioned?

Quarterstaves        A quarterstaff with resetting will reset into your 
                     possession once per Achaean day. This will not be hastened
                     or modified in any way if you PLANT the quarterstaff. It
                     will return, but only on the schedule already noted.

                     Customising the description of a quarterstaff will not 
                     change the description of other quarterstaves that you 
                     summon, only the customised one.

Tahquil

They mean the rule ' if there is an arte version of a summonable weapon you can't customize the base weapon' is not uniform. See: staffs (I have a custom Grove staff but I can't recall if it is arte)

There might be something backend that's different from the base weapon that makes it difficult to make the customisation stick. This is/was part of a warning about class customizations for snakes and falcons that if they died you'd lose the customisation.

It could also be that one individual was able to sneak in the customisation of their base knife before a solid policy was established regarding this. But since it was already done they didn't revert and refund the customisation. (Like increased capacity of trader satchels snafu)

Nhakra

Tahquil's summarisation is spot-on.

However, I think that we can rule out point 2 because point 3 happened, and if point 3 happened, why is it no longer happening?

Also, ARTSEARCH STAFF to check splinter's stats, then compare to weaponlist.

Amranu

Shirszae probably got the customization before the artie version was available.

Nhakra

@Amranu I attempted to check in with her to determine whether this was true. It's been too long, and the message appears to have auto-deleted, so we can't know without intervention.

However, this does not explain away the discrepancy I've noted: In what tangible way are they different from magi staves or druid quaterstaves? The only thing I can think of is that the blade of a Pariah is bloodied from time to time, but that doesn't -feel- relevant (could be!)

I've also attempted to look further into it, and I've found this from 19.13.3:

NO: Angels, Baalzadeen, Daeggers, or any occultist or elemental entities may
not be customised. Class-specific non-creatures such as summoned maces are not
customisable.

Which, unfortunately, confuses me further. Staves, quarterstaves fall into this 'class-specific non-creature,' but are customisable.

Shirszae

I really don't remember the exact timeline with the knife. I suspect it was after the artie knife came out, because I would have wanted to know whether an artie version was worth it or not before commiting to the non artie one. I could be wrong though.

That being said, I also have a non-artie customised sylvan staff, so...

I wonder what is the point of this rule, and specially where it leaves magi staves, of which exist no artie versions but which by the text of these rules would be barred.

Draqoom

I think I've seen at least one customized magi stave. I forget who though but I'm pretty positive somebody does have one.

Shirszae

They are pretty common yeah. The point was more wondering if they'd still be allowed going forward, since if we go strictly by the wording of the rule, they fall on the same 'class-specific non-creatures' bit.

Aina

I am working on customising my Alchemist robes. Does this mean that is not allowed now?

[Deleted User]

Magi and druid/sylvan staves are specific exceptions to the blanket customisation rules. Per HELP CUSTOMISATION:

 - A quarterstaff may be customised (see below for details).

 - A mage's staff may be customised.

These are probably legacy decisions more than anything else, since these are pretty old classes and the decisions of that time aren't necessarily reflected in current design choices. Either way, they can be customised and I don't see why they'd change their minds at this point.

My assumption would be that knives are being treated similar to daeggers/maces, where you cannot customise or set them as permanent, because artefact versions exist that can be customised. Since we don't know the circumstances/timeline of Shirszae's approval it's hard to know what led to it, but the general rules are in line with the answer you received regarding your own attempt. You will probably need the artefact to customise it. I agree it should be clarified in the help file if these are the standards being used.

@Aina Also in the help file, "Alchemy robes may be customised."

Aina

@Issam thank you very much