by Moorgard on 2001-08-23
Time sure flies. It has been almost two months since the Sleeper was freed from his tomb.In that time, Blood of the Spider, one of the guilds who unleashed the blight of Kerafyrm upon Norrath, has kept watch over the tomb, looking for signs of life.
The warders have not returned. The Sleeper is still MIA. The Rathe server has been quiet.
In a response on Lum the Mad, Abashi said, "This patch we added some more dialog [sic] and such" to the zone to show that events are happening as intended.
Blood of the Spider found what he was talking about:
[Ed: Graphic was too wide. It says: HEED THESE WORDS! This prison was made to hold the most dangerous being ever to walk the face of Norrath. The combined might of all Wurmkind was required to subdue Kerafyrm, and only long vigilance kept him imprisoned. He has since broken free of his bonds, thanks to interlopers such as yourself. His prison is kept in readiness, for Wurmkind prevailed once, it shall prevail again. Click on it to read it yourself.]
Okay, so the prison stands ready for wurmkind to triumph again.
But where is Kerafyrm right now? How can the dragons even try to beat him with no sign of the big baddie?
Maybe the Sleeper script is working as intended. Maybe. But in that case, the intention leaves a lot to be desired.
What should have happened when the Sleeper was freed? I'll give you my opinion.
Assuming the idea was that Kerafyrm would go to Skyshrine and Temple of Veeshan and clean house, I would have liked to have seen some automated scripts in which the rabble of the zone rose to defend Lord Yelinak and the ToV elite.
At the point where the battle seemed hopeless, the important dragons should have yelled something about having no chance, and how they were leaving immediately to have a meeting somewhere Veeshan could protect them, far away from the Sleeper's wrath.
Kerafyrm proceeds to wipe out the remaining population of both zones, and yells something about how he is going to scour all the planes of reality until he can find the dragons he so wants to destroy. The Sleeper disappears, but maybe makes an appearance or two in Fear, Hate, and Sky, killing some mobs but probably not clearing the zone, talking more about his insane plans to wipe out the dragons. Kerafyrm could have some really choice words for some of Veeshan's minions in Sky.
Meanwhile, the dragons return to Velious, but their dialogue has changed. Those players on Claws of Veeshan faction would find out that the dragons are very much on edge since the Sleeper was freed. In fact, they should offer some new quests that would allow them to obtain items that will be needed in the upcoming battle to subdue Kerafrym again.
Eventually, perhaps months down the road, Kerafyrm would have to return for an epic war with the dragons... to be subdued once again with some all-new, even more powerful warders. In fact, the last one should be so hard as to be almost unkillable. Almost.
Well, that's how I'd do it. But I don't write scripts for Verant, so we'll all have to see how the story unfolds in our reality.
If anyone from Verant has made it this far in my article, let me make a heartfelt plea once again that you should be letting players in on what's going on in your world. When big events happen, you should publicize them. Players shouldn't have to chance upon some nugget of information when they pass through a zone, nor should players (not even the Mobhunter staff!) be forced to search countless message boards trying to piece together some idea of what's happening in the game.
Give it to us. Not on a silver platter, but make it accessible. Let us, the players, immerse ourselves in the storyline.
A lot of us want to do that--desperately. But you're not making it easy on us.