Well, rubberbanding served its purpose and died a soldier. It gave me 15 kills, and now I can access the Warlock class.
Once a squire, and after like a few months of grinding, I would get Holy God Knight, and with that, I can move to seize command of the kingdom's army and call an official attack on the final boss.
If.
And only if, none of the other players have the same idea and influenced the king themselves, in a game where choice mattered and NPC can think like this, I fear the fact that it can reach like ten million player concurrent if things go bad.
I do want more players, more challenges.
But I also wanted to gatekeep from the tourists and to farm without getting cockblock… Oh the misery, the complications, the dilemma!
I made my way back through the forest, and soon reached the catacombs. And he waited there, cloaked in black so deep it could hide teeth.
Jimmy, his name was. Ridiculous, I know.
One of the few NPCs in the game who didn't appear on any maps, and whose dialogue had no quest markers.
"You return, blood-slicked one," he rasped, as if he had no lungs and too much time.
I crossed my arms. "I finished the quest, 15 player kills."
[QUEST COMPLETE: Sacrifice of Blood]
Reward: Unlock [Warlock] class
"Status…" I muttered, pressing a button on the floating UI that I opened up.
—
Username: CJS69Real
Level: 29
Class: Warlock
HP: 102/102
Attack: 30
Magic: 25
Defense: 22
Resistance: 16
Damage Reduction: 3%
Skills:
Self-Infliction (Fool's Knife [Weapon]) Not Equipped
- By activating this skill, the player deals a set amount of HP to themselves, gaining one-tenth the charisma stats.
Deep Cut (Twin Blades [Weapon]) Equipped
- When dealing damage that brings the target down to 50% of their HP or lower, inflict Bleed I, this effect does not stack but can be refreshes. Overwrite if a larger Bleed effect is in.
*Bleed I: -5 HP every time the effected makes a large movement.
*Read the player's handbook to know what counts as a large moment.
Chain of Agony (Warlock [Class])
- The user throws five chains consecutively, the Magic damage that the target(s) receives will be shared among every other target that got chained as long as the user stays within range.
—
I gained one new skill, and 20 points in my Magic stat. Plus, the items I collected from The Lion's Parade guild wipe gave me solid stats while I sold the rest. I could easily solo the entire game and stop everyone from even leaving spawn at this rate. But, that would probably get me in the scopes of the mods more than anything.
Also, Chain of Agony was neat and certainly nice to have, but useless for me, considering I didn't have any other Magic spells, that would need me to buy or find magic scrolls, which was doable, but not my goal.
Spellcasting and magic-oriented classes was just very dumb in my not-so-humble opinion, what's the point of using VR if you didn't want to jump around and swinging your body?
What, you already had enough exercise in real life, huh? You have a life outside of Darkmoon Adventure? I didn't think so.
Speaking of… They kept the Charisma stat from the PC version, as shown in the Fool's Knife description, yet, so was Speed, I think, but they kept it hidden… But why? Probably didn't matter, but it was unnerving to say the least.
I didn't gain much EXP from the kills, considering they were around level 5, but I did gain a bit after killing those skeletons and catacomb guards. They're grinded mostly for bones which I collected for future references.
"I want to be grant a small wish." I said.
"What do you wish for the most, fellow Warlock?" Jimmy said, his glowing eyes met mine.
"I want to change class. I want to be a Squire."
His voice lowered.
"Why?"
"So I can become a Holy God Knight and ruin people's lives with a glowing horse and an anti-evil greatsword," I answered, albeit sarcastically, "Are you familiar with a concept called… Antihero in fiction? Like, I don't know, The Punisher?"
A pause.
Then he chuckled. A dry, sandpaper chuckle.
"A wish like that will not be freely given. But a price… yes, a price may be paid."
His hand lifted and a small reddish window opened, carved into the air with ghostly script.
Do you know what was the worst part about this Warlock's request mechanic?
It randomized its request, and the amounts of possibilities was larger than the possible atoms in the universe. So I could not predict what I was going to get.
I am not shitting you.
Wish Granted:
To change your class to Squire, complete the following quest:
[The Holy Favor]
- Escort a player safely through the [Cleric] quest and protect them through the entire process, you may initiate your quest by shaking hand with a player after they've accepted the [Cleric] quest yet has not made any progress.
- You may not kill anything, you may only equip shield and armor
- The escorted player must attain the Cleric class for your own quest to be fulfilled.
- The escorted player must not harm anything, even unintentionally.
- The player will be Deaf until the quest ends.
- Upon completing the quest, the escorted player will need 150 gold coins as a one-time purchase access to the Cleric quest instead of unlocking it right away.
Think about it.
[Action] an [Class/NPC/Player] through [Quest/Path/Enemy] and [Main Goal], then [Obstacle 1], [Obstacle 2]...
I counted at least 15 possibilities in the Action category alone, at least in the PC version, but there were at least 500 possible thing in the next word alone. I'm fucking scared of RNG, man.
But, hell yeah, I got a very, very easy one!
Still, escort quests were the worst.
I turned to leave, preparing to, maybe, like, bribe a new player with 150 coins if they promise to be deaf and be pacisfistic? Blackmailing them by kidnapping their bestfriend or spout? Promise them big titties catgirl as a payment if they comply?
"Well, I'll think about it on the way."
But just as I reached the stairs out of the catacombs, a soft chime echoed in my ear.
[Friend Request: Hailie]
I froze in place.
The air in the catacombs seemed to shift.
I turned slowly toward the notification hovering in front of my face.
Did she…
No.
This was my first friend request after like, two days, since the server was open, and I had added "Real" to my CJS69 handle after the name got stolen. That would mean no one, absolutely no one in the world knew my new username, otherwise, my friend request notifications would be as high as the twin towers once were.
Which meant she figured out my username.
And it was apparent there could only be one person who helped her, Eirlys.
God damn admin abuse.
[Accept]
But then, an idea pop into my mind.
Not exactly illegal, but definitely didn't seem legal.