Iron Knights selection process

[Ben]

This post is going to be very vague, but will hopefully clear up the questions people have, generally.

Not every warrior is going to be an Iron Knight. In fact, I'd say about half are and half aren't, and that is only for the warriors that attain a certain amount of power AND have been around for a certain amount of time. So not very many.

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Creating quests and goals in a MMORPG is a difficult process. You basically have two choices, both of which come with positives and negatives.... so neither is perfect.

1) You create something that everybody can, with work, attain. An example of this... or examples... would be every "boss" item in the game, such as the Amulet of Evilsbane. The postive with these is that people can each feel that special feeling when they get it. The negative is... how big is that special feeling, if every single person in the game besides you has it already? You complete the quest to get the "special" amulet, but everybody in the game of a certain level... thousands by now... have the amulet as well.

2) You create something that not everybody can attain. This is the Iron Knights process... another example would be titles or special reward weapons and items. The positive of these is that they actually ARE special and unique. The negative is that anybody who doesn't get them feels left out. This is a far more realistic approach, but can be bad in a game where the goal is for everybody to have fun.

**So what we have here is a choice between: either we can make EVERYBODY special, in which case nobody is actually special, or we can make only SOME people special, in which case they actually are special, but we also have to keep some people "un-special" to make the special people feel special. Kinda stinks either way. Which is why we have BOTH in-game.**

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Becoming an Iron Knight is in the #2 category. Not all warriors are going to be Knights. All the people who are eligible based purely on stats are listed by me, and then they are discussed by the Iron Knights Council (in-character these are the senior knights, OOC this is a group of admins and anonymous players) and people are chosen based on their character's profile, their past acts, and their amount of activity in Valorn. The people who survive the list after discussion are then invited when the time is right.

This means some people are going to be left out. That is the negative of quest style #2: just like some people don't get titles and some people don't get uber weapons, some people won't be Knights. That is just the nature of the style of quest... it would make no sense for a person who did not fit the "mold" of an Iron Knight to be made an Iron Knight. This is not a comment about you as a PERSON, this is a comment about your character... and it is not neccessarily a bad comment. Each character is different. The Iron Knights organization has its own goals and personality, and they will only pick people who fit within that mold.

I hope this helps explain. I'm certain it won't make anybody feel better, but questions had started coming up regarding, "why have I not been chosen?" I've asked that question myself about many things in the real-world where I thought I should have been rewarded, promoted, or aknoweldged, but somebody else was instead... that is human nature when we feel we have accomplished something. I'm sure all of you have had that happen at work or elsewhere as well.

Its just not meant for your particular character, that is all. That is not neccessarily a bad thing... there are many powerful, interesting, well-played warriors which are just not right for the Iron Knights organization. You have been not-chosen for purely in-character reasons. I hope everybody is cool with that. =)

IMPORTANT PS: The council (of anonymous players) that chooses who the new Knights are going to be DOES NOT INCLUDE the new knights themselves. People who are chosen off the list (such as Islander, Topaz, Fondour, and Raffe) have NO INPUT into who else joins, so don't go getting mad at them.

[Ben]

Oh, and to discuss another thing that has come up as of late: switching your profession to take advantage and become a Knight is frowned upon, and weighed into the selection process. Changes are ALWAYS occurring to the different professions, and I think it is kind of dumb to constantly be switching professions to take advantage of whichever one happens to be "hip" at the time... not to mention it is often very out-of-character for some powerful mage to suddenly decide he would rather swing a battleaxe around.

Warriors that have been warriors for a very long time are definately given preference.

[Ben]

And last but not least, the Iron Knights are going to be a very important part of future storylines and stuff, so interaction with them is important. Unless they accidentally killed your mom or something (which they haven't =)), most citizens of Valorn would view the Knights as heroes.... it is my hope that out-of-character jealousy and rage do not spur people to treat Iron Knights with less honor and respect than they might otherwise, just because they themselves were not chosen.