by Jason Cheek
In all honesty, I thought these Emergency Hot Fixes were pretty reasonable. While sieges would still favor the larger guilds, a smart guild could make an attacker pay through the nose in levels for anyone willing to attack them. That alone would make most players think twice about sieging a guild’s fortress for any length of time. A point even more important now that non-Nightmare start players could conquer their own land. It also took care of the whole NPC trooper issue for player-owned cities without causing any additional conflicts with player-starting and monster cities.
Additionally, I thought the “Changes made to NPC Purchases” that gave players their own private purchasing pools for people of The World was pretty awesome. While it wouldn’t stop the public pool from being owned by the highest bidder, it gave small guilds and solo players the chance to still take part in the world-building aspect of the game. Not only that, a smart player could easily focus on purchasing fewer people of The World and power leveling them up as crafters and/or fighters while keeping their land safe by building their settlements in out of the way locations.
Ignoring the sudden bark of laughter from Phoenix, Rayne, and Brenna on the other side of the room, I went over the final Emergency Hot Fix. The “Criminal and Exiles in Player-Starting Cities” looked to be another Band-Aid to stop the crimes being committed by players against the people of The World. I couldn’t imagine how difficult it must be to balance out the influx of millions of players that were immortal into a world where the people living in it couldn’t respawn when killed. While it brought a certain sense of realism to The World, it also created a large hole that could be abused by new players looking for power.
I had no idea how the punishments would actually work or what players would think of them, but creating a Bounty Hunter title and giving rewards to players for hunting down criminals was a pretty interesting twist. Also, someone was smart enough to keep the de-leveling option in which I was sure would cause a storm of outrage. It kind of made me wish I could pull up The Worlds forums to see what the community thought about being able to be de-leveled and jailed for being a murderhobo. No doubt there were a number of people already bitching up a storm. I could hear them now, “How dare you take away our fun of murdering NPCs whenever we want to.”
For myself, I thought it was a reasonable fix for keeping the player-starting cities intact. If more fell under the control of large guilds or were destroyed like Telrain, the game would lose much of its fun to play. Hopefully, between this new Emergency Hot Fix and the last Fix for NPC and Monster levels that increased NPCs’ health to Advance, Nightmare, and Elite Nightmare levels, the player-starting cities would remain neutral grounds as they should be for new players entering The World. I was just mentally flicking the message away, when a loud “CRACK” rang out across the room as the bed I was in jerked sharply.
“What the fuck?” I hollered in surprise, as I sprang into a sitting position only to see an angry Phoenix standing over me.
“Seriously,” the Barbarian demanded, “how long have you just been lying here in bed while I’ve been waiting on your slow ass to log in?”
“Chill the fuck out Phoenix,” I exclaimed, swinging my feet around to sit on the side of the bed. “I just logged in and was reading over the new Emergency Hot Fixes that our digital overlords have introduced.”
“Yeah, ain’t that some shit,” Phoenix began to say, only to come to an abrupt stop as her head jerked back in surprise. “Are you freaking naked?” Covering her eyes with a hand, she turned around and blindly waved a hand at me. “Dude, get some freaking pants on so I can look at you while we talk!”
“Really Matt,” I asked, using Phoenix’s in-real-life name, “and how many times have I’ve seen you naked?” I grumbled in annoyance, as I got up and headed over to the back of the chair where my clothing was lying.
“Dude, I already had to deal with one sausage fest last night,” Phoenix complained, while trying to keep her back to me. “I don’t need another first thing in the morning.” Peeking through her fingers, she glanced back in my direction only to see my naked ass. “Seriously, how long does it take to put on a freaking pair of pants?”
Rayne and Brenna glanced over at us to figure out what the Barbarian’s objections were all about. Seeing me naked and Phoenix looking away like a shy virgin, they rolled their eyes and went back to their discussion. Distractedly scratching my ass, I grabbed the coarse undershorts off the back of the chair that was The World’s version of underwear and began to get dressed. Why was it that the people who woke me up first thing in the mornings were always acting this way?
“Haven’t you ever changed in the gym before?” I asked, lifting my arm and giving myself the sniff test. If you didn’t want to see the one-eyed snake then don’t look at it. Seriously, didn’t every guy learn that in high school? Not detecting any stink from the night before, I decided Helgath must have washed me down sometime after I logged.
“Haven’t you gotten your pants on yet so I can turn around and talk to you face-to-face?” Phoenix loudly complained, perfectly imitating the tone of an annoyed woman. I swear, his ability to roleplay was uncannily realistic. Enough so, that I wondered at times if she was actually a woman in real life and not a man.
“Yeah, I’m dressed,” I confirmed, as I shrugged into my coarse shirt. While it wasn’t exactly comfortable, it helped the armor not to chafe in the wrong places.
“Seriously, who prefers to sleep naked anyway?” Phoenix muttered unhappily, as she sat down on the edge of my bed and looked up at me.
“Asks the busty chick in tight leathers that decided to walk into my bedroom unannounced to wake me up first thing in the morning?” I snappily said without looking back, as I started to strap on my armored pants. “It’s just like I tell Dom. If you wake me up first thing in the morning, you get what you get.”
“Stop there,” Phoenix grunted, shaking her head at the disturbing visuals that came to her mind. “I don’t even want to know.”
“So, I guess congratulations are in order,” I said, silently laughing at my own joke as I switched topics.
“For what?” Phoenix asked, obviously perplexed at my words.
“You’re the winner of the Naked Raid,” I announced in my best game announcer voice. “Though I have to admit,” I said eyeing her up and down, “you looked pretty kick ass last night.”
“I’d hope so with these puppies set free,” Phoenix mockingly said, sticking out her chest and cupping the bottom of her breast forms. Not that she could really grab anything through her Red Coral breastplate but it was the thought that counted. If anything, the armored chest piece just made her breasts look that much bigger. Seeing my rolling eyes, she turned serious once again. “How did that happen? I mean, it’s not like I joined any contest or anything.”
“Some fanboy named Snuffy uploaded the videos for you,” I said with a shrug, sitting down to strap on my boots.
“Oh yeah, him,” Phoenix mewed, as a frown came to her lips. “The dude is a total creeper and wouldn’t leave me alone. I don’t even want to talk about the stalkerish messages he kept sending me until I finally just blocked him.”
“Did you tell him you’re a dude in real life?” I asked, arching an eyebrow at the sexy Barbarian as she uncomfortably crossed her arms and nervously rubbed her upper arms.
“He didn’t seem to care,” Phoenix muttered, visibly gagging as she continued, “but just kept on begging me to let him touch my breasts saying it was just a game.”
“Yeah, that’s even worse,” I agreed, as a visible shudder ran down my spine.
It brought back bad memories of my own experiences playing as a female player. For the most part, I didn’t have any issues while playing with my female Warrior. Usually, people tended to be super nice to you. Hell, I couldn’t even tell you how many times I was offered free stuff for simply being a female character. Every once in a while, you’d get that one pervert that wouldn’t leave you alone. In my case, it was some twelve-year-old
that couldn’t control his hormones or his mouth. I couldn’t even imagine how bad that would’ve been if it had been an old pervert that knew what they were doing. Unfortunately, gaming shouldn’t be that way.
Like in most things, gaming was a microcosm of the real world. With living in South Florida and a college town, you had all kinds of women and men looking to hook up and not hesitate to ask if you were interested in having a one-night stand. While that was all well and good, I just asked that the person asking would accept “no” for an answer. That might come as a surprise to some people, but honestly, I just looked at it as a compliment. Well, once was a compliment. Twice was harassment.
With all of the problems that women went through with unwanted attention, you’d have thought the problems would’ve come from the guys that decided it was okay to hit on me. In truth, the men were always polite and I usually ended up with a free drink afterward. The problems typically popped up when women asked me out. It was like saying “no” wasn’t allowed for a man. I couldn’t even begin to tell you how many times I’d gotten bitched out, called a fag, or had a drink thrown in my face for saying no to a woman. Pushing that random thought away, I focused back on my friend.
“Well, either way, you have a nice sword waiting for you to pick up at the front gate,” I winningly said in my best announcer voice, while making a mental note to inform the Guard Leader on gate duty. “Thought, it might be best if you picked it up when we’re heading out of the city together. I haven’t had a chance to inform the guards of the winner.”
“Sounds good,” Phoenix said, as a smile came back to her lips. Free loot was always good for that. “Is it any good?”
“It’s not bad,” I said, nodding towards my equipment belt. “It’s on par with my Vicious Executioner's Axe of Cruelty.”
“Where in the hell did you get that from?” Phoenix asked, giving me a curious look. “I thought you were logging out after you talked to Princess Isolde?”
“It’s Queen Isolde now,” I automatically corrected the Barbarian, as she rolled her eyes at me, “and yeah, there was some excitement last night.” Seeing the questioning look in her eyes, I waved it away as a shudder went down my spine at the memory of Dil-Hilth Grimblood DeKhayed. “I’ll tell you the whole story once we’re on the road but, for now, I can tell you that the sword came from our old friend Milo Hawkin.”
“No shit?” Phoenix asked, giving me a surprised look. “I’d wondered where those Iron Falcon turds had gotten off to.”
“That’s another long story. The short of it is that they were sent here to cause havoc,” I briefly explained, before continuing. “My big questions for you are, how in the hell did you get stuck outside of the city and split off from the rest of us-”
“And why am I waiting for you in your bedroom to log back in?” Phoenix finished, cutting me off midsentence. My response was simply to point a finger at her to let her know that she’d guessed correctly. Leaning back on my mussed-up bed, she gently began combing out her naturally curly hair as she started her story.
“It all started when we reached the top of the cliff to Palnisdale and it was your team’s turn to hold back the Orc hordes. While we were reinforcing the ridge, I saw your Rani friend quietly heading away from the battle.” As she talked, Rayne and Brenna quietly walked over and joined the conversation. “Your companions tried to keep up with her, but once she left the battlefield, your people came back to join in on the fighting.”
“Neristhana made the call to let her go, Lord Ironwolf,” Rayne pensively said, stepping forward to give me a formal bow as Brenna followed suit a step behind her. “You ordered us to keep a careful watch on the Nordic Guardian so she didn’t betray us, not to restrict her movements or hold her as a prisoner. Ulia, Keela, Brenna, and I guarded her until she left the battlefield, only returning so we could fight by your side.”
“You did good,” I said, stepping forward to supportively grip Rayne’s upper arm to communicate the sincerity. While I was curious as to why Neristhana hadn’t brought the issue up during our conversation in the bathhouse, the most logical reason for the omission was that it had simply slipped her mind with everything else that had been going on. Knowing that Brenna didn’t particularly like being touched by men, I gave her a reassuring nod and continued. “Neristhana made the right call. Having the four of you split off from the rest of the group would’ve caused more problems than not, especially with the changing tactical situation.” As I turned back to Phoenix, she continued her story.
“With how odd you’ve been acting towards Rani, I decided it would be best to see what she was up to and followed her along the edge of the cliff.” Phoenix gave me an apologetic shrug. “I figured having me stay wouldn’t have changed the outcome of the fight all that much and,” she nodded to Rayne and Brenna, “from what your companions explained about the final battle, it sounds like I guessed right.”
“Yeah, you made the right call,” I agreed, strapping my armored belt around my waist. “The fight turned into a total shit storm, but Domenic dropping the cliff face with his Moonshine Elementals saved our asses.”
“Yeah, I saw that from further down the ridge,” Phoenix said, shaking her head. “That was some pretty crazy-ass shit. Your girlfriend Rani and her friends seemed pretty upset about it too.”
“She’s not my girlfriend,” I said, rolling my eyes at the smirk on the Barbarian’s face. “She’s a freaking V-MMORG Admin who has been assigned to watch over us to verify if we’re cheating or not in our gameplay.” Seeing the startled look on my friend’s face, I explained. “With the ruckus that Julie’s video caused on the forums, there are a lot of accusations flying around about us and our unusual luck.”
“That better explains what I saw then,” Phoenix said thoughtfully, before giving me a shit-eating grin. “Looks like that Moonshine Elemental move is going to be a one-time thing after the latest round of Emergency Hot Fixes that V-MMORG just put out. I take it your friend Domenic isn’t going to be a happy camper about that.”
“Not in the slightest,” I agreed, while securing my weapons and gear on my belt. “Dom is going to blame me for not warning him about Rani being an Admin, but it’s not like we had much of a choice. It was either that-”
“Or lose a bunch of people,” Phoenix agreed, understanding my point.
“Also, she doesn’t really want me telling everyone about her,” I made air quotes, “Admin status.” Crossing my arms over my chest, I jerked my chin at the Barbarian. “So where did Rani end up running off to and who are her new friends?”
“There was some sort of airship waiting to pick her up,” Phoenix said, getting back to her story. Seeing the surprised look on my face, she explained further. “It was like one of the pirate ships in the movie Pirates of the Caribbean, but it was a lot sleeker looking with only one mast in the center of the ship instead of three.”
“How big are we talking about,” I asked, trying to picture what she was describing. “Are we talking about sixty feet long or something more like a hundred and sixty feet long?”
“Probably more in the range of sixty feet,” Phoenix said, after considering the question for a moment.
“So basically, something like a Bermuda Sloop and not a Galleon like the infamous Black Pearl,” I thought out loud to myself, as the Barbarian nodded in agreement.
“Not that I’m an expert on pirate ships or anything, but that sounds about right,” Phoenix said, giving me a flustered look. “It was kind of hard to exactly see the ship with the masts sticking out of its sides.” Seeing my confused frown, she went into further detail using her hands. “The ship had a mast sticking out from either side of the ship about midway like wings and a hard fin almost as tall as the topmast on the bottom.”
“You mean like a keel?” I asked as the image began to firm in my mind.
“Dammit Jim,” Phoenix said, pitching her voice to sound like a grumpy old man, “I’m a Barbarian, not a sailor.” We both laughed at his Star Trek joke b
efore she turned serious. “How the hell do you know so much about boats? Do you sail in-real-life or something?”
“No,” I said with a laugh. I wouldn’t ever call the dinghies that I’d sailed at John Prince Park while growing up a sailboat. At least, not in comparison to something like that. Though, it did help me understand some of the basics. “I learned most of that from playing an old RPG called Risen Two. It was an old pirate game that I got from the used-game-box at my local GameStop that went into all kinds of details about the pirate ships you could build.”
“Woohoo, gaming for the win on useless information” Phoenix chortled, as we both laughed at the old joke.
“What I don’t get,” I said, as my face screwed up thoughtfully. “With the sailing ship being that big, I’m surprised we didn’t see it from where we were at on the edge of the cliff.”
From every pirate movie that I’d ever seen, I remember how big the sailing ship looked off of the coast of the island they would stop at. Even a small ship would show up on the horizon due to its tall mast and full sail. Sailing ships weren’t something you could easily hide.
“Oh, that’s because they had an illusion spell around the ship,” Phoenix explained, immediately understanding my point. “I didn’t see it myself until I reached the edge of the cliff. If anyone had turned around to see if they were being followed, I’d have been s. o. l.” She leaned back on both of her hands with her elbows locked. “About scared the bejesus out of me.”
I distractedly nodded while silently contemplating the ramifications of what a flying ship would mean in a game like The World. From what I understood so far about the V-MMORG Admins, their avatars didn’t get any special powers within The World like you’d expect a normal MMO Admin to have. That meant, if they had flying ships then there was a good chance that normal players could craft or acquire them too. Tucking that little tidbit away, I focused back on what my friend was saying.
“Once I broke through the illusion’s effect, I had no problem seeing the ship after that. The effect stopped at about twenty,” Phoenix cocked her head to the side, “or thirty feet out from the ship. I only got that close because I followed Rani to the spot where she disappeared from.” Her face took on an annoyed look. “I almost tripped over the boarding plank. Luckily, everyone on deck was watching your buddy’s Moonshine Elementals blow the shit out of everything or they would’ve seen me for sure.”