Fun Arctic Trivia/History

[Heo]

I was thinking the other day it might be fun to have a thread on random Arctic trivia. Just fun random snippets from back in the day for me to read while I'm eating lunch or something.

Like, how did this game get started? 

- Which were the first clans to get formed?

- Who have the main overlords been?  When/why did they take over?

- Random zone trivia - why is the mystic queen Christine Cramer, seems strange for mob to have full name, did he have a teacher/crush/wife or something with that name?

- How many no bash items out there that nobody has discovered?

- What zones have the most deaths or playtime?

Always thought it was a bummer that Suf's old logs went down, would be fun to have some interesting stuff on here from time to time as Arctic enters her twilight years.

[Kuss]

I started about 20 years ago, Rafo would know even more than me since he led me to this game in high school.

First clans I knew of were Shriners, but the Dark Brotherhood was the dominant clan when I started. I think both Lucas and Kimmo were in it. 

Aristox gets a baptton of credit for taking the game this far.

Pretty sure every nobash has been discovered, there's such a coveted few.

As for zones with most deaths, i have no idea. I do remember when Gilean's spire and Pax  first went in. We had 20+ people in Gilean's and yank using a dragon orb to wall of force the trackers.

[Jorake]

bapt off joe. Message a motherbapter before I come find and pull you down a flight of stairs by your beard.

Also. My first clan was Renshai. I think Shadow(bsp)? Was the most dominant clan when I started.

I always thought Aristox created the game for whatever reason. Dudes just always been a fixture.

Memorable moments ..  the big 20vs10 battle of Brandon clan and others forming with bsp to take on wild. AND Outlaws vs a shaky staircase. Never have I seen 10 complete sets of eq change hands so efficiently.

[Kuss]

Miss you too, John. I'm back for the time being.

I think anyone who played pre-2000 would tell you Morgion was their favorite overlord.

Lots of imms had fun quirks back then. Morgion singing, and Morgion roulette. Flint was fun, but was dry in terms of humor since he was a geologist irl, I'm pretty sure. Not nearly as fun as Randy Marsh

Mahasamarahu, Gloove and Ned rank among my favorite imm's. Just for originality and fun characters.

[Jorake]

I sent you a message joe!

[Heo]

I joined in high school because a few of my buddies were playing.

We all got addicted pretty fast.  A few joined Renshai, so I did as well, played Aran (not corey), Demos, Lebo, Heo, Hernando, etc.  I wasn't quite as anti-pk as some of the others, so figured out some PK triggers and spread them around and started going after randomers who saw Renshai as the ideal clan to attack (not that I disagree, was kind of a juicy target).  I specifically remember Paradox and Paradocks, both of whom I appreciated.

Renshai started to grow in power/numbers a bit, which meant we were popping better eq and pissing off some of the other clans, most often BSP as Carnage.  Obviously we couldn't stand up to them too much, but allying with wild and helping their numbers as spacefillers was a win for both of us and kept BSP from demanding equipment at will.  Diplomacy with the dane brothers was always pretty respectful.  Started leading a bit more and a similar clan called RoT had formed, led by a guy named Fang.  They seemed to be pretty friendly with Carnage/BSP.  At some point they attacked one of us, leading to these two battles.  Renshai could not pop a ton of eq at will, and I was worried people would quit if we lost, so was extra careful.

Resulted in these two fights:

https://web.archive.org/web/20021215063840/http://www.arctic.elay.org:80/index.php?option=viewlog&logid=231

https://web.archive.org/web/20021215063840/http://www.arctic.elay.org:80/index.php?option=viewlog&logid=232


Syndicate, basically shriners and fury, then ambushed Renshai in Graknar:

https://web.archive.org/web/20021215063840/http://www.arctic.elay.org:80/index.php?option=viewlog&logid=241

After that we had to do skirmishing and ambush tactics just because we didn't have the eq or spells to go at them toe to toe. 

https://web.archive.org/web/20021215063840/http://www.arctic.elay.org:80/index.php?option=viewlog&logid=242

https://web.archive.org/web/20021215063840/http://www.arctic.elay.org:80/index.php?option=viewlog&logid=243

https://web.archive.org/web/20021215063840/http://www.arctic.elay.org:80/index.php?option=viewlog&logid=245


With Syndicate, odds were tough because one of their members was Yants, a loveable guy I'm sure, but also a rampant cheater with Overlord access.  The plan was this, have our allies RoT hit Syndicate in shadow and kill one, enough to really piss them off.  I had them wait at a no-recall room that autodegrouped (TOT) and lagged I think, with wild and renshai waiting in the menu to come in and attack.  Unfortunately, Fuhr looted himself with a wizinvis imm, then opened up some portal so they would be able to enter unlagged and grouped, plus Wild had forgotten to rent in Neraka.  Best laid plans...

It was a temporary win though, because I think Aristox then deleted Yants/Fuhr's imm, or at least admonished him for rampantly cheating.  At some point we snagged Gazer I think.


Later, we as we were warring Fury, Matt and I discovered an interesting zone feature where Lord Curston in Tant responded oddly to flags.  We honestly did not think of it as a zone bug, just an odd zone feature.  We were able to take advantage of it, but sadly did not get away with the Onyx Shield...

https://web.archive.org/web/20021215063840/http://www.arctic.elay.org:80/index.php?option=viewlog&logid=75


After that at some point Wild attacked us (actually, Ie/Will/Exupery, who I had initially recruited to Renshai, but then had left to Wild when we got him prism).  It was probably an "out of boredom" attack.  We tried to come at them by doing a two group mass log, but eventually we got owned.

https://web.archive.org/web/20071107063145/http://arctic.elay.org/index.php?option=viewlog&logid=251


Also, we killed Rudra for his Cyan chainmail nobash.  That was fun.  Sadly the link on wayback is dead :(.


After that, I forget why exactly, but a bunch of clanmates pissed me off so I said eff it, fight your own war, and quit for a while.  I think Renshai was then lead by Tikk and fought shining force for a bit.

Bounced around in BSP and Wild a little bit in years after that, but was in college and not playing quite as seriously. 

Recently came back to have a little fun and relive some nice nostalgia.

[Anthony]

...
With Syndicate, odds were tough because one of their members was Yants, a loveable guy I'm sure, but also a rampant cheater with Overlord access.  The plan was this, have our allies RoT hit Syndicate in shadow and kill one, enough to really piss them off.  I had them wait at a no-recall room that autodegrouped (TOT) and lagged I think, with wild and renshai waiting in the menu to come in and attack.  Unfortunately, Fuhr looted himself with a wizinvis imm, then opened up some portal so they would be able to enter unlagged and grouped, plus Wild had forgotten to rent in Neraka.  Best laid plans...
...

But you do know who Yants eventually became right!?

There were quite a few staff in Syndicate and most of them just wanted to be left alone at that point, but of course when you're popping gear and spells, people always take notice.

Earlier, before the days of rampant who bots, and other less scrupulous divinations, clans would bury moles in each other. I'm getting too old to remember the best ones. But I do recall Takhisis/Shayd had a 1x warrior in Ahma... Plus there was the always popular option of placing a character in KoS so that you could still play when the enemy mass-logged but the rest of your clan was sleeping.

Over the years, I think the game was really lucky to have such a diverse array of staff, creators and overlords alike. It seemed at the time, Morgion's antics were always a little more obvious than most (like Kobra)... really early on, there were always weird glitches you would encounter too. Characters casting out of class spells or using out of class skills, that seemed to get swept away in the later years for more non-obvious things. But again, as those things got abused, once again logging and policing of that stuff got increased as well. In any event, before the game itself became a different sort of meta-based timesink, I definitely didn't begrudge staff who wanted to mess around, but once the game got more and more gated through increased xp, skill training, etc. I did resent some of the tricks that basically negated the time commitment... for instance, like the 100000 HP autoblind mobs who bruised but had low ac so that you could practice weapon skills and backstab on them. But again, over time, those got cleaned up too.

In my early days, I played a mage and got basically nowhere. So then once my girlfriend/now wife lost interest, I took on her role and became a cleric. I spent time in lots of groups with lots of folks early on. Then in later years spent all my time with Wild and began a pattern of playing at wipe, getting geared up, and eventually, often drunkenly, donating the gear to some other clan/character who was probably more deserving of it anyways. I never was a great player but I can type fast and write a mean set of aliases/triggers/etc. especially back when I was still slinging code for a living. Maybe I was always a cleric at heart and that is why my adventures with mages and thieves always ended so terribly :)

Lots of great memories for sure with lots of awesome folks and it makes me sad to think this game is winding down...

[Heo]

Morgion was Kobra?  That figured I guess, I remember him tracking us into Shayds and stabbing us a bunch.  I remember him deleting a friend because my friend found some hidden chest at Volcano that was rottable that had +6 dam cloaks wearable in 3 locations...

Who did Yants become?

[Zozen]

Who did Yants become?

Weird how names are lost and changed.

[Heo]

History became legend. Legend became myth.  And some things that should not have been forgotten were lost...

[Kam]

That cheating bastard Yants became Dougan and that cheating bastard became Hoss.

[Heo]

Haha, seriously?  God dammit.

[Vasagh]

The Arctic chronicles I, a first trilogy of stories, logs and trivia by yours truly.

The three books in this highly anticipated series are Dragons of Shriner Dominion, Dragons of Brotherhood Night and Dragons of Wild Dawning.

Available for pre-order later this year through arctic.org. All proceeds will go toward the 3d Arctic Project.

[Anthony]

But who was Dilvish/Huma?!

[Hoodoo]

Wait, Dougan who got his imm status ripped for some imm cheating scandal, back when imm cheating wasn't a scandal?   Heard rumors about that.  So many rumors.  Another about how some Morgion scandal lead to an asteroid hitting old Tarsis, but that was likely just a rumor.