Hello everyone, I'm quite new to the whole Ramath-lehi scene and I'm confused about something. From the FAQs I've been reading and the description, I get the impression of beasts living in a modern word with careers and clothes. Think a Bangaa living in Ivalice (preferably FFXII). Is the world similar to the world of Ivalice? If that example doesn't help illustrate my question, how about this: think of Earth, replace all animals into other strange, native fauna, including the Rapine, set technology back to around 500 years or so, replace all humans with Pendragons and pretend magic existed. Is this what the world looks like? Terribly sorry if this has been answered but I can't really make a deduction with the most subtle hints within the FAQ or maybe I'm just blind eyed and the answer is hidden somewhere. Also, it'll help greatly if you have any other helpful links besides the race description, FAQ and New player thread. EDIT: Oh and, what's the difference between a normal member and a pending member?
Hi Aiuret, and welcome to our home away from home! Firstly, thanks for thoroughly looking around the site ^_^ Ramath-lehi is open to some interpretation. Shriker has kept the overall design of Ramath-lehi (especially in the last couple of years) down to its players/members. As a result, such places like the Watering Hole (in Watani) and the Neurotech Research Facility (in Trilok) have been made, as well as many flora and fauna additions; so to tell you exactly what Ral is is a bit tricky. Ramath-lehi, in general, is largely forest/green with settlements, estates, cities, encampments, and other types of housing in groups or spread out. Of course, there's the City of Aurius, located under water. Like I said the whole thing is opened - somewhat - to interpretation. The way I see Watani is a large scale city, upper crust in its design and technology. All state of the art lighting, doors, vehicles (transportation is going to be beefed up in the near future, as we recognize that that area is very unspecific right now) etc etc. It's also based on a cave system, i.e. expensive, larger caves are renovated to become mansions in style and much in appearance. The major structure and support is the cave (as I see it) with massive bay windows, large balconies, pillars - ALMOST Greecian in style, I guess. Bhim, to me, is a dark, damp, humid, bustling trading area, with stalls and maaaany back roads with no lighting there :p But now, in fill with anthropomorphic creatures that resemble cats, dogs, lynx, servals, dragons, lizards... the list is nearly endless. Now make these anthros (and indeed quads!) capable of numerous things, such as manipulating nature, reading minds, sightless fighting, weaving or good old fashioned, bronze age story telling! The culture of Ramath-lehi is more shaped by how you want your character to be. There is no limit to what Ramath-lehi can become (provided you're not trying to overthrow the ones in charge! Then there's a limit to your char In Character =D) and so in some ways, the ball is back in your court. The thing about the Rapine that I need to emphasize is that most Pendragons do not know about the Rapine and it is very likely they'll not encounter one. We've had many a character profile come through which has - in itself - been very good, apart for a mention of the Rapine and how their char wants to go on some kind of rampage. A one liner about the Rapine CAN have a character rejected in some cases, depending on the line. In regards to how members are categorised, you're a pending member until a character profile you submit is accepted, at which point you become a full fledged member! Or Plebeian ^_^ We then have the "rank" or Harbinger for members who've been with us for ages and know quite a bit about the site and how things should be functioning. Content Editors do their things, the Character Application Team do their thing, I and Jodie (Shriker) do our things =) I'd like to point out that, although we do have a hierarchy, there's nothing stopping brand new members with only one char and no threads to their name, suggesting new content, plots, characters, places, flora and fauna, rituals, skills and trades, technology and transport - anything you can think of is immediately welcomed! Also, if you ever see something that isn't right (and this goes for everybody) such as a page isn't loading correctly, some content has been misspelled, or even you see someone out-right Power Playing or in some way breaking our rules, to (depending on the severity of the infringement) PM them to politely request they change what they're doing. This approach, however, does work better when you're RPing with them. Of course, if you have any more doubts, queries or uncertainties, any one of us will be more than happy to answer them. We have our own system of answering questions, but you are guaranteed an answer. Don't be worried if the answer you get back isn't what you were looking for, just ask another member or invite one of us into the Flash Chat (I'm nearly always on because I'm out of College). I can't speak for any of the others right now, because I know a lot's happening. Anyway! I do hope this all helps you, Aiuret (such an original username!).
Wow, thank you for your detailed answer, Dumu (An original name too!) It does get me thinking about other aspects of this site. In my own opinion it is too open for interpretation and I imagine awkward situation where roleplayers will have clashing alternating universes and causing an immense amount of confusion, e.g someone brings a knife to a gun fight. I doubt this has happened though since my imagination is quite linear and wild. Despite this however, I do recommend you add some more bits about the Ramath-lehi world or give vague descriptions for inspirational purposes (like you did with the race descriptions. I find myself typing down all the ideas that keeps exploding continuously and when I look at what I've created, I shout, "I've created a monster!"). I checked this site yesterday and thought it was quite interesting and then I was sorely disappointed when nothing inspired me, causing me to leave. But I had already started on this brilliant biography with wicked names and it was all just a waste so I came back and tried my best to milk every bit of creativity within me and work around these obstacles (which in writing, sometimes isn't great). What inspired me the most was the character trades page and suddenly, an influx of ideas came to mind, but different people are inspired by different things. For me, it certainly helps make an interesting and, hopefully, an original character to interact with that is limited to that world so it is believable. Think of it as an essay perhaps? Without your notes, you've got nothing to work with. With notes, it's just a walk from point A to point B. Though of course I may be blowing this out of proportion and I'm just a die-hard roleplayer with hardcore dedication and leet attention to details. At the moment, my history is stumped because there's not a lot of information on the place I'm revolving my character around (Which is Bhim and your description just gave me more ideas). I could continue to write, giving extremely vague and surreal descriptions but I'm afraid I'd write it completely wrong and it clashes with the current universe where something I write never happens. What is your opinion on an assassin guild that works to assassinate people with malicious intent and a threat to world peace? Does that happen? Edit: And should I send you my biography now? It's just to check that at this point, my character hasn't been rejected. It's written in .doc so I can easily copy+paste in a PM and show you. Everything is done except the history needs to be written properly (it's in point form)
Ramath-lehi is indeed very open-ended. :) That's a huge part of its appeal, at least that's what I believe. There are area descriptions for each place you can roleplay in, but yes, they are rather short. Since we're also a World Building project, anyone is allowed to suggest new ideas to further flesh things out. So if you feel like an area is lacking (like technology/transportation, as Dumu pointed out), you're more than welcome to contribute to the building of it. "If that example doesn't help illustrate my question, how about this: think of Earth, replace all animals into other strange, native fauna, <s>including the Rapine</s>, set technology forward <s>back to</s> around several thousand <s>500</s> years or so, replace all humans with Pendragons and pretend magic existed. Is this what the world looks like?" Sort of. ;) Add space travel and colonization capabilities to that as well. Ramath-lehi is a lot more technologically advanced than our Earth. As for creating your first character, you need not worry about it being very in depth. You can always add to it later on as you figure out things and details. It isn't even necessary to fill out the history field if you don't want to. Submitting the history in point form is also perfectly acceptable. As for an assassin guild, they would most certainly exist. I would not be surprised if there were a few that the government handed odd jobs off to as well. I don't think it'd be unheard of the government putting bounties on criminal's heads for those rogue vigilantes either.
Cool! I'll submit it as it is then because I'm still stumped on it. xD Hope it's good enough for you. Edit: And also, I get a lot of SQL errors and "failed to connect" errors on this website. Is it just me?
I know that the host was doing some SQL upgrades earlier and that they've been shuffling us around a bit (by the looks of it, we have a new file server =D). If you're still getting specific errors, could you copy and paste them for me?
