The OOC History of a Bard
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I had just lost my level 6 ranger after logging in and finding the server hadn't reset. This wouldn't have been so bad if I hadn't lost my connection half an hour earlier in the the Rawlins. It was only just outside Norwick - but back then, 'just outside Norwick' was swarming with goblins.
So, I gave up on my ranger. He wasn't very well developed as a character anyway. He wasn't very powerful. And my connection at the time was only 56k dial-up, which rather hindered any plans of a strong build - lag would kill me long before monsters did.
I decided I would play something original. Something new. Something nobody else played. I scanned the player list, looking with interest. There must be something nobody plays. Rangers were in abundance. Clerics too. Fighters, rogues, wizards, sorcerors, barbarians… I decided I did not want to play a monk, and that left one choice: I rolled up a bard.
There weren't many bards back then. In fact, in the whole server, there were only two. One was Karli Goodfellow (whose reputation still lingers, I hope), and the other was Piggu (whom I only ever met once or twice).
Meril made a third bard, and the only one in Euro times. I was unique. I was special. I may only have had 6 hit points, one cantrip a day, +0 BAB and could only wear medium armour, but that didn't matter. I was cool.
I called him Meril, not really knowing what else to call him. I couldn't think of a god, so I left that blank (a mistake that took me years to finally ask a DM to correct).
Meril, I decided, would not join the mobs of adventurers. That seemed a good way to die (I knew this from personal experience). Instead, Meril told stories and did the town quests every reset. This seemed a good way of safely aquiring wealth and maybe hitting 'safe' levels without dying.
He was level 3 before I dared venture outside the gates. But I was at least outfitted with a sturdy crossbow, a solid longsword, a nice big heavy shield and a horrible ugly coppery coloured chainshirt. He also went with friends. Probably his first two friends were a rogue named Nico (not the one that rose to great fame) and a dwarf named something like 'Belfar'.
They ventured through the woods (those being the woods arond the lake),hacking and slaying and generally being heroic adventurers. Experience slowly added up. We searched every body for the lucky drops the Devs had not yet removed - sometimes you'd find magic scrolls, or potions, or elemental resist robes on goblin tossers. It was all going wonderfully.
But as every group always seems to, we got a bit carried away. The goblin elite that loitered outside the cave noticed us. The dwarf charged, as did Nico. The elite hit Nico. Nico ran for it, somehow avoiding the AoO. The dwarf stoicly stood his ground, and told us to run.
We decided now was no time to argue, so we bolted for it. It was a good ten minutes before we'd found some help and returned to the scene. There we found one dead dwarf, and a good number of dead goblins. He'd died a truly heroic death, saving their lives, and Meril decided this would make an excellent tale.
That tale probably netted me the most cash from other PCs. Back then it wasn't unusual to tip a bard. I'd frequently get hundreds of gold pieces for a story, more if it happened the person recognised the name of the hero or villian in the tale. One thing I always tried to do was keep my tales about real events, real people. This particular tale went down very well with dwarves. They always tipped well, come to think of it.
Once I got a +1 strength ring, 500 gold and a bunch of random scrolls from a PC, just for a tale. Ah, memories. Of course, I lost the +1 strength ring at the Build 7 to Build 8 transition. But that's another story.
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One of Meril's first friends (that actually survived for more than a month) was Lolita C Clearbrook. She was a halfling cleric, played by Riverthorn. Meril and her would spend lazy afternoons chatting by the well, lounging on the grass, sharing stories and jokes and gossip. Sometimes they would even get RP xp! This was a whole new thing that had just started up.
But even in town, they were not really safe. Norwick was horribly unsafe, in fact.
I distinctly remember Norwick having a slow steady trickle of drow. I'm not talking scary DM drow with ten fighter levels. I'm talking about level 1 min-maxed drow with names like 'Drizzle'. They'd log in, buy some kit, port to the Boar's Head and find a nice juicy target. Bards, for instance, were nice juicy targets. And there was only one bard online most of the time. And that would be me.
Min-maxed half-orcs were also a common theme. Even at level 5+ you had to watch out for these things. A crit from a scythe - even from a level 1 - could kill you if that level 1 had 20 strength.
If someone did this today, you wouldn't be too worried. They couldn't really do any more harm than subdue you. A DM would quickly teach them the rules or boot and ban them. But there was no subdual back then. So they were a real threat.
I confess, I did enjoy how they livened things up. One minute you'd be sat chatting with a halfling cleric, the next thing there would a drow shooting at you or a half-orc charging toward you, axe drawn. The number of these attacks was one of the reasons for the 'no weapons out' law in Norwick.
But these people were nothing compared to PC-villains. To be fair, they generally tried to avoid killing people unless it was needed. But there was no PK permission required back then, and things tended to get ugly quick.
There were only two real villains I frequently encountered. One was Navere. She was an elven vampire who lived in the crypts. She would sometimes come up to Norwick and make grand threats about how she'd destroy the place.
One time she did this, I was sat with Lolita, just generally chatting. The halfling decided she wouldn't stand for this, got out her holy symbol, and ran up to the big elven vampire cleric. She called down Avoreen to smite her foe, and turned undead!
It didn't work, of course. Navare laughed and cast Hammer of Gods. I don't think it killed Lolita, but had I not frantically clicked to get Meril out of the area effect, the damage would have more than finished off my bard.
It was a good tale, though, when spiced up a bit. A nice quick one, for when I wanted coin in a hurry.
The other major villain was Vinessa. She'd generally keep to herself, but sometimes she'd wander around Norwick invisible. Some low level who knew just enough to get in trouble, but not enough to avoid being stupid, would recognise the floaty name. "VINESSA IN TOWN!" would go out on the shout channel or (when that was removed) quickly spread around town. A mob would form, lacking only pitchforks and flaming torches.
Inevitably, Vinessa would retreat to the crypts. As if scripted, the mob would follow. A few fireballs later, about half the mob would walk out, burned, singed and carrying the other half. I'm proud to say I never chased Vinessa around and got fireballed for my trouble. In fact, the only time I did get fireballed by Vinessa, Raz had forgotten to turn subdual off and I clawed my way to safety! But thats's another story too.
Ah, yes. Ways to die.
There were a couple of other major ways to die. The first was the goblin elite. There was generally no way to avoid running into this bugger at some point in your career. When I realised sleep spells worked, I would generally be able to take him out 3/4 of the time without loss. But sometimes spells didn't work, and you'd be forced to scarper. Some poor sod (as often me as anyone else) would end up sprinting round and round and round that lake, elite hot on your heels. You'd just have to hope your friends were still alive and smart enough to get help. Or, if you wanted to be chancey, you could try and run into Norwick (it helped if the gates were open) and let the guards take it out. But that tended to be a bad idea; most of the NPCs in Norwick had area effect spells. The number of people that died because of Friar Fred being a bit too liberal with his Hammer of Gods when a goblin elite chased a poor sod into town…
The last major way to die was the bugbear archers. A single transition (accidentally, in my case) and you find yourself in a strange new screen. The forest is different. Prettier. What is not so pretty are the poisoned bugbear arrows, which deal Con damage. Thankfully, the high level that had offered to show me around (Mitsu, I think it was) dragged my sorry corpse back to the Friar and my gold covered by raise. That was Meril's first death.
Fun times!