Gylin Allinsk. Your Good Neighbor.

[CondorHero]

Well, I'm really sad that I wont see the cool things that was set in motion last week. But I hope the players involve will enjoy it as the bring it to conclusions. :)

I gotta admit, I made Gylin for all the wrong reasons. A friend was feeling bummed about something that happened to his PC. So I jokingly said "I'll make a paladin to help you out." If anyone look at my account vault you'd know I'm an alt-aholic. I have so many alts in my vault. Haha. Didn't really gave her much thought. Just a few words about her background story to carry a short conversation.

[hide=Back Ground]Before the Sun goes out, Gylin serves as a devotee of Chauntea in a small abbey in Mistledale. Gylin was inspired by Nelyssa Shendean, leader of the Riders of Mistledale, and trained to be just like her hero. Her duties was actually quite mundane: standing guard, tending to chores, accompany priest/priestesses as they travel about Mistledale. But it allowed her time to pursue her dreams and education.

After the Sun went out, she survived through mostly through luck. She found decent folks to help her. Despite her best efforts to keep everyone she met alive, her companions fell prey to the Dread, which she often feel guilty that she survived. Still, she strives to live on to honor those who died.[/hide]

I was really tempted to make her life as grim-dark as possible. But then I decided that she had a happy childhood, and the things that's gonna happen to her is going to be enough to turn anyone grim-dark. So Chauntea as a Diety was a natural fit. The church is pretty laid back, and since it has some druidic influences I drew some ideas from the time period when Britain was transitioning from Druidism to Christianity, basically Gylin was an Arthurian Knight.

I think my only regret was that I didn't give her a proper oath. I only went with the default paladin oaths prescribed in the EFU class description. But I did took a line from Joe Abercrombie "... Good Neighbors are the surest shelter from the storm."  I had Gylin say that quite a few times and those are the words she lived by.

It's such a fitting line for a Chauntean as well, being farmers your neighbor next door neighbor is not exactly a short walk from your door. But they could be a couple of miles down the dirt road. If you can't depend on them you got noone.  So I have Gylin tries to foster and build good relationships with people she deem trustworthy. So in the end, she made a bunch of good friends, some die, some lived on. She made a lot of enemies as well, and some died, some lived on.

Paladin concepts are pretty difficult but it was so rewarding as well. Thanks to all evil people that makes it difficult to play a paladin, it wouldn't be fun without them: Director Falconer, and the evil scheming Spellguard Agents makes it interesting.  I'll definitely revisit the paladin class again, but probably wont be in the near future.

Anywho, enough ramblings. Here is my short story submitted for the contest.

[hide=Short Story]The Silver Amulet.

It came in a fancy zurkwood box, the silver amulet lay neatly on a soft velvet cushion fitted inside the box. I just stared at it: a small silver disk on a silver chain, with strange arcane runes etched upon it. A reward from the Spellguard, for services rendered. Likely made from the same silver extracted from under the Argent Deeps, a prison labor camp sitting on a silver mine.

I recalled the reaction of the others when they were told of the mission: Get in, enlist the prisoner's aid, get out with the silver. The Wayfinders exchanged uneasy glances. All of us knew this will have repercussion later, these people were locked away for crimes committed against their fellows. But orders were orders. Mother of All, forgive me.

We found the prisoner holding out against the Dread inside the silver mine. As soon as I stepped into the mine I immediately sensed it. Dismay washed over me. I knew it would be a mistake to free most of these men.

Let me explain.

It is difficult to describe a sixth sense to those who've only known five all their lives. If I tell you that these men exudes an evil aura, you may think they must glow red or black wispy smoke flows forth from their bodies. In demons, devils and perhaps wizards with some flare for the dramatic perhaps. If I were to say I hear the screeching sound of a nail dragging across a chalkboard, a roar of rage or a wail of despair you would get the wrong idea. But these were just ordinary men who made poor life choices. No, paladins do not "see" the evils etched upon a fellow's soul. Nor do we “smell”, or “taste” it. We do not “feel” it, like skins getting goosebumps. We- Ah, I should have never tried. It is foolish for a mortal to speak upon the divine with our limited tongue.

It sounded better in my mind than on paper. Rather than saying too much and confused matters, I suppose it is best to say too little. To put it simply, it is an amalgamation of all the five mortal senses and more.

There. In the midst of the prisoner's susurrus murmuring, as we were negotiating with their leaders, I felt wave upon wave of their vices and sins: lust, envy and rage being the most prominent in their eyes. By then it was too late for any objections. We struck a deal with these villains for the success of our mission and for their own survival. I had hoped then that some would see this as a second chance for redemption. How wrong I was.

In the end, the Spellguard took the silver, and exiled the survivors of Argent Deeps. Only a few days later, we begin to see the price they would extract from us. The grueling details described in Watchers' reports. I dared to recall them at the risk of my own sanity.

I once had a notion. That somewhere on the surface, virtuous men and women still yet survived. That by joining the Wayfinders, I would help gather them to this Sanctuary and together we would nurture Sanctuary into an ideal civilization to cast down the Dread Empire. It were to be a seed of hope within the Earthmother’s bosoms that would blossom and bloom onto the surface once the Dread Empire defeated.

The Watchers were tasked to protect, but they cared little for the business beyond Dunwaren. Their eyes turned inward. The Society cared only for the destruction of the Dread and aberrants, and they only sought means to support their end. The Spellguard and its Auxiliary cared only for the going on of the Machine, and all their efforts bent toward understanding its mysteries. Only the Wayfinder could make this vision a reality.

Mine was a foolish notion, I realized. The survivors we found were thugs, brutes and opportunists. They exploited the good will of the virtuous around them and betrayed those noble men and women to Dread enthrallment. Such was the case in the village of Orlimmin, I fought and slew noble men and women, enthralled by the Dread, and protected the villains that sacrificed them to survive. We learned of this after the fact and executed the most heinous of the lot. But the whole business had me rethink of my place in the Wayfinders.

How can I go before the Mother of All, who knows All and sees All in her love, and say I've committed these sins against my Oath, because I was ordered to do thus? I was given to know the darkness inside my fellows and swore to never lend them aid for surely they would turn against their fellows given the chance. Were there anyone up there worth saving?

I supposed, my hopes were cast too high. I had thought world-ending crisis would bring out the best in the last of us. But as in all things, the world was once made of all-sorts of people, and all-sorts managed to survive, by luck, by kindness, by treachery or villainy.

The silver amulet sat cooly on its velvet cushion as I closed the zurkbood box. I smiled and bid the courier to convey my gratitude to the Spellguard. It would served to be my reminder, that even something so pure, so beautifully wrought, was purchased by sins. The price we must all pay, heroes and villains, all.[/hide]


Screen shots. Unfortunately, half of the screen shots were lost when my old computer died.

[hide=Gylin slew a demon (other people helped too, a little bit...okay, a lot)]
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[hide=Wayfinder Missions]
A Successful First Mission



A Surface Mission for the Spellguard (this was the one I wrote my short story on)


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[hide=A short exchange with Flint][/hide]

[hide=Gylin had a squire][/hide]

[hide=Braving the Lowerdark with the Society][/hide]

[hide=Hanging out with the big movers and shakers (literally)][/hide]

[hide=A Demon Slaying Adventure with some Shady Characters from Lower]




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[hide=Gylin and the Gnomish Elemental Collider (it did not end well)]

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[hide=Gylin reflecting on her actions to Aden]

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[hide=Melanie's Funeral]




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[hide=Red's asked Bob about the Ruby Shard Animatron]


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[hide=Gylin's First Arrest as a Watcher]




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[hide=In The End]




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Gylin had a steady alignment shift, instead of suddenly fall as a paladin. Death of friends and in game events have slowly change her little by little as she began to opt for pragmatic choices instead of keeping to her ideals when she first started. The long term plan would be to have her slowly change, for better or worse. Thanks to the EFU DM staff for making such a cool setting and set the bar high for such a wonderful class.


[hide=Loots]

The cool thing about this helm is the typo "amazomg." It's like the mark of imperfection that makes it beautiful and cool.


[hide=stats][/hide]

This was the result of the Demonic Adventure with Lowersman.


[hide=stats][/hide]

Gylin's trusty shield. The first item I got. It serves as her holy symbol. And have seen her through many difficult trials.


[hide=stats][/hide]

Gylin's Flaggon of Beer. Won from the short story competition.


[hide=stats][/hide]

Gylin's trusty sword. Given to her by the Society as a reward for helping them.


[hide=stats][/hide]

Gylin's Armor, given to her by the legendary Zsigmond Kadar Who won it from a drow commander he fought near Trnaesyr. It was a reward for the first successful Wayfinder's surface mission.


[hide=stats][/hide]

And I got this from a BoM event.



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Thanks everybody. See ya later.

[TheSpooky]

Gylin was a great pal to more than one of my characters, and it's weird knowing I won't see that name on the player list any more. She and Baelian and Gareth can detect peace together, now.

[Killian]

I really enjoying scenes with Gylin. She made Killian want to do good.

[efuincarnate]

NOLlIVEMBER continues to claim it's tithe of blood.  Liked Gylin quite alot, looking forward to your next.

[tspawn35]

Man, I really liked Gylin, such a shame.. I had a blast interacting with her!! She is another char I am going to miss.

[goate]

I really only interacted with Gylin during the last three weeks or so, but it was nice to have her around on the Watch.  When I needed sensibility courage, and good book-keeping, she was always there.

[Hhean]

While I don't think Flint ever really got that close to her, she was always a steady hand when needed. Her later days were certainly interesting, and her time in the watchers was clearly hard on her.

[Gentlemen of the Empire]

Gylin was one of those fantastic, humble, paladin characters who never really aspired to heroism but constantly worked towards the common good. I particularly enjoyed the friendship between her and Tacitus and am sad to see her disappear!

[Colin609]

Great pc to play with peredo is going to miss his friend

[PanamaLane]

Awesome job Condor, from my interactions with Gylin playing Radma and Weston, Gylin was a rock solid paladin fighting the good fight in a mixed up world. Sad to see her go!

[Kiroy]

I was convinced Gylin would save the world.  She's a great character and I'm sad to see her go.

[Lascer]

When I first started here, I gravitated towards the Wayfinders as a way to learn about the server a bit. Gylin specifically showed my character (Grem) around, showed me some of the basic mechanics of EfU, and got my character infected with lycanthropy my first week. Great way/character to introduce a new player to the server :)

[The Samophlange]

Gylin was fantastic. Paladins are often such larger than life figures, but she was very humble in her devotion to hope and justice. She wasn't really a leader in the traditional sense, but the way she stood for those around her inspired people to be better. I always thought it was fitting that a paladin of Chauntea was a more reserved figure in the force of goodness.

I am going to really miss her!

[Reylathi]

Awwww ...

I really liked Gylin. She was such a balancing vibe against the huge slew of crazies and weirdos that arise so frequently on the server. It was always a real warm-fuzzy pleasure to me when she walked up to me IG and asked how everything was going, quite apart from when even my character's other friends would ask. She just had such a quiet warmth, I'll really miss that. I'm looking forward to seeing how my PC handles it IG, he was pretty fond of her too.

Thanks for playing her, it was a real pleasure.

[CondorHero]

updated with screenshoots and loots.