One time Aspirant Monk (Part 1)

My name is Jon Calver. My parents died when I was about 5 years old, so I was sent to Empath Abbey as a child to become a monk. By my teens the alimony to support me ran out. I had anyway tired of this profession and felt the time had come to do something else. Vows of silence ceased to have any appeal to me. I longed to see the bright lights of a city, the taverns, girls, and to train my military skills as a way of earning some gold. Meditation still gave me enough inner peace to sharpen my ability to think. So it was not entirely for naught. When I came of age to leave I did so. I still practise meditation, but this is not my profession.

Leaving the abbey I found my way to the moon-gate that lies near the abbey, and decided to go to the city of Trinsic, at the other end of the known world.

It was not so simple to earn a living as I had hoped. The land round about outside Trinsic was rough, with many gullies that forced travellers to divert and easily get lost. But the city lights at night meant I could keep orientating myself and when I had gone astray I could find my way into the city. I also learned to hide and to use bandages.

I had no gold besides a few hundred in coins, some of which went on buying a scimitar. So I began to hunt monsters outside the city on the road north. To start with I found that I could kill mongbats quite easily, and also headless monsters. So I went out several times a day to hunt. By August I had made enough to equip myself with a longsword, iron round shield, a viking helmet and ring mail armour. I learned to run from orcs, giant spiders, and crocodiles, and staying near the city gate I could summon the guards to help if I got into trouble. But no doubt I would improve my skills as time passed.

*a note is left for Kishember outside city walls of Trinsic*

As a Trinsician I know the lands outside Trinsic as inside of my palm, if you want companions during your valiant efforts, feel free to let me know and I may be able to arrange something. I can persuade a patrol guard to assist you in your endeavours.

N

I've often wondered about the town guards in Trinsic and elsewhere. It is hard to tell who is a player and who is what.

I may take you up on your offer, but lately hunting has been meagre, as i will explain in Part 2.

One time Aspirant Monk (Part 2):

I have been keeping a tally of the various monsters I encounter (see Part 1 above). But one day there was suddenly a dearth of strange beasts. None at all! I made several sallies, probing further and further up the road from Trinsic, until I reached the large old battlement that stretches across the road, and nearby a signpost to Paws Village. But now it was late, so I returned to the tavern and bought some provisions, only a few in case I had no hunting luck also the next day.

At dawn I left again and returned the way I came. Again no hunting and so again no bounty! Silence except for the howl of a grey wolf, the sound of a bear snuffling, and of course different kinds of birds. This time I followed the signpost to Paws. It was none too far, and first I came across a shrine, where I silently offered up thanks, then village houses. This must be Paws. I turned back and returned to the gate.

The next day I repeated the journey, hiding off the track in the shadow of a tree, and making camp at night. I was hoping a villager would emerge from a house that I could ask, but no luck.

The last day I noticed a mongbat and took the opportunity to kill it. A couple of days later I saw more monsters, a headless and a giant spider. It seems they were returning, at last. I still have not done what I had intended to do in Paws, but that would have to wait.

I am taking a pause from this story to say something about how I operate in UO:renaissance (or indeed in UO). It is essentially how I work to create individual characters that each have a life of their own. New characters are, for me, a major source of enjoyment. Part of this is to create characters with something of their own individual background. The rest embodies the events the character is involved in, so a story is built up around these events. I hope that this thread will show that in due course as far as Jon Calver is concerned. I am not troubled by the fact that there is no trammel on the shard. Whatever happens will be part of each character's history and in-game development. So I don't expect I will have more than 2 or 3 characters at any one time.

I am aware that without trammel they will be exposed to being "pwned". That is attacked by a PK-er, killed, resurrected and killed again - and again, and again…I will just log out, then log in the next day (or perhaps a couple of days later) and go to a healer to be revived. It doesn't matter if he loses "fame". So please don't bother giving me any special equipment. If he loses all his equipment, it is no great loss. I never equip my characters with specially-crafted "uber" equipment. I have only once lost a character by his death while gating to another place, where he was instantly killed, and he was wearing a suite of hallmarked shadow armour gifted to me in-game. My mistake, I just abandoned him (he died).

Guilds I am interested in the character joining will be where role-playing is respected and valued. However, with age I have greater difficulty role-playing. I am in the process of creating a number of emotes and spoken expressions that will provide each character with a minimum of conversation but otherwise I will play it as it comes and not worry about my slowness of response. I will see how this works in practice...

Tis a man after my own heart.

Live, study, work and train to gain knowledge and improve skills.

A much fulfilling and rewarding experience in this realm.

Should you travel north and west of the settlement of Paws (west side of river),
you will find the realm of the True Knights of Britannia.

You are welcome to come.

Paws does seem to be something of a role-player's mecca. People of Britannia, True Knights of Britain, and perhaps also Paws Village. Can there be so many guilds based on the one village? I have already been in direct contact with PoB, and am awaiting a further response. I guess I will see.

That is correct Kishember. The People of Brittania are currently (and only recently) based in and/or around Paws. The True Knights lie just beyond our "borders" as well.

Come on down. Ragar is eager to meet the man who makes his patrols of the Trinsic road a simpler task. I keep expecting to find you on the road but as of yet it has not occurred.

This is cool Kishember. I'm going to try doing the same type of present running background story. I never thought of it before.

Role playing really is an art. Every time I see a new post I get ideas on what to do thanks dude.

Great, Maltman, the more the merrier!

The difficult comes when the description of what happens is diverted by computer problems. Luckily it doesn't happen often. On my mac keyboard there is a key to close a window without closing the whole computer. It is located at the end of the F1-F12 row, on the far right. I accidentally hit it while writing up my most recent encounter in-game, and got shot out, with the window being closed. I must have been tired as it was the end of the day and I was going to log out a anyway. I've not managed to complete the write up of that encounter. I thought of writing that "suddenly everything went black", but however I tried I could not do that in a simple way that made in-game sense. This is what I started to write:

Yeah right, in the middle of this…what? My computer crashed?

This was, hopefully, a rare occurrence, but gives me the opportunity to apologise for the resulting confusion.

LoL. This is why I started writing my stories up in Word/Notepad first. Then once i'm satisfied I'll copy and paste into a forum thread. I've had a whole story with pictures and everything up before and then .... kapoot.

Also, i found that if you use a PC (sorry this doesn't seem to workfor mac), but you can copy text into UO using ctrl + V. so I type my stories up in Notepad and then just copy paste into game books.

This might be another reason for me to buy a pc next time round.

I also need to sort out the techno stuff about getting onto IRC (Mac use the limechat app), and taking pics in-game: everything is different on a Mac. But $ for $ macs are far superior.

One time Aspirant Monk (Part 3)

My time in Trinsic was spent quite simply trying to find the Trinsic Moongate. To fend off attack by monsters, I bought a suite of chain mail armour and a longsword. But I never became proficient at defeating the tougher animals (alligators) nor the monsters like the giant spider and the biped with horny scales, so each sally - out of the West Gate that leads to a beach - ended in retreat into Trinsic, where I sometimes had to call the guards to save my worthless skin.

I eventually found the moongate and decided to return to Yew and spend some time meditating in the Abbey at the altar. The Abbey was, after all, my home for some 10 years. I checked in to the Abbey Inn, rested, removed my armour and donning my purple robe I spent time praying at the Altar. But my aim was still to join a company of companions, and make a second attempt to join the People of Britannia.

Meanwhile I had marginally improved my fighting skills, but still an apprentice tactician. Still a young man, I have many years to improve.

*a message bearing the seal of Paws*

Deliver to Jon Calver

"Esteemed youth, I send you this message to inform you that Nymeros of PoB is on a 10 day holiday to distant lands.

No doubt he is mediating on his new found ability to communicate with animals.

I urge you to continue your path and do not despair. While you may think your efforts are marginal, I assure you they are not. Already I have overheard the men of stature in Trinsic speaking of the wild youth. These men have taken notice.

While Nymeros is out seek out @Jittery Sauce or Airk to see if you can get more information on joining PoB

Jupiter

One time Aspirant Monk (Part 4)

Eventually I found the Trinsic Moongate. I decided to go first to Empath Abbey to visit old friends, and where I lived for 10 years from the age of 5. This time I came well equipped with ring mail armour, viking helm, shield and longsword. After a few days resting up and mute meetings with old friends, I began to explore along the coast. However, I soon came up with some rather large and hostile monsters, and fled back to Empath. I made a second trip a while later and this time I was attacked by an air elemental from behind and by a mongbat from the front. Hedged in between these two I couldn't escpe and everything went black. Luckily it was close to Empath Abbey and I went to the chapel where a healer helped me to recover.

But this time nearly all my belongings were looted. I still had some unlooted stuff, shoes, a purple gown and a weskit, plus 15 gold, two scimitars, and a knife.There was nothing in the bank either, so I had to think what I should do…I decided to go to the sheep fold and gather some wool, use a loom at the weavers to make some cloth, try to kill a mongbat or two and put together some gold. I would stay here until I had gradually rebuilt my fortunes. It might take a while, but I would manage, somehow...

One time Aspirant Monk (Part 5)

I've made a couple of visits to the sheep-fold that lies near the abbey, shearing sheep and collecting the wool. I will need now to find a weaver's shop and spin the wool, then use the loom to weave the wool into rolls of cloth. I also killed a couple of mongbats to marginally boost my meagre gold reserve. It is going to be a slow business to be in a position to equip myself as I had been before the elemental attack. But it was a useful lesson in (a) using the bank to save my gold in and (b) slowly re-equip myself.

One time Aspirant Monk (Part 6)

I was not able to find a tailor in Yew. Odd since there are two sheep-folds not far from the Abbey. So I went to Occlo to use the spinning wheel and the loom to make cloth. That was a useful trip. I could not sell the cloth to the tailor in Occlo, though, so I banked it and returned to the Abbey.

One time Aspirant Monk (Part 7)

Re-equipped, I had to re-think my role in People of Britannia. I have always hankered after a guard militia role as a Waywatcher. So I decided to work on my hiding, and eventually, stealth movement. But it is slow work, so will take some time. But then I've only been around for a month so its early days yet. I noticed that Trinsic had effectively been taken over by a red guild, the Guard Shadowlords, or at least there are always some of them there. But I have been able to come and go without hinder.

One time Aspirant Monk (Part 8)

On rune books: I will make an attempt to buy a runebook in Trinsic, and begin to mark much frequented places. But how to do this remains a puzzle. When I was in the guard militia for some 2 years magic's were frowned on at the guard militia's home town of Stonekeep. There was one member who was (I think) called a Templi, a sort of guardian of the pure religion, not the kind using corrupted magics like the elves. He was a great orator, would hold forth on following the pure way of the Church in Stonekeep. Very inspiring to listen to. Anyway, the Templi would summon a moongate to go to various destinations, dungeons and the like.

So I never used a runebook nor know how to use runes in a book to go instantly to places, like my shack ín the dense forests north of Trinsic, where I waste much time searching. Do I need to a basic level of mage skill to do this? I think I need some magic "charges". Though how they can be used remains a mystery. I have no idea.

One time Aspirant Monk (Part 9)

By chance I met the miner/blacksmith who made my suite of ring-mail armour. We came across each other in one of the empty streets of Sosaria's largest and most gracious cities - Trinsic. He was grimy and looked famished, so I invited him to one of the Inns for a drink and a meal. He told me that he was developing his skills well. Tinkering, in particular, meant he could make shovels and pickaxes. Tinkers tools are cheap to buy, just 2 gold each set. But the costs of all this physically demanding work are high, and needs three good meals a day. In the early years I guessed that he has had to go short of food.

But his mining skill has improved so much that he could mine enough iron ore from just two rock outcrops in Occlo. The next skill to work on was blacksmithing. But all this takes time, so the emerging blacksmith that is my young comrade is built on tinkering and mining. It will still be a long time before he masters the skills he needs, but all in good time and needing much patience. These things can't be rushed! Unless the person is a bot, some sort of slave, put to work for long periods. I decided to arrange for us to meet in a tavern and give him some gold to help him on his way. He needs to build his strength up!

I have often puzzled over why Trinsic is so forlorn. There seems to be no life in such a splendid and beautiful city! My friend and I chewed the rag over this and decided it must be because there is no bank in Trinsic. The city should recruit a good banker, it would make a big difference. I must find some way to contact a city councillor.