Shattered Kingdoms

Without thieves stealing eq at master the entire reason people gm is going to be gone. Other than eq all you get between master and gm is some hp and damage on spells. If you take away the equipment diffrence nobody is going to gm because there is no need.

I would still GM...

I dont like the idea of master though, perhaps half the chance at master and half it again at champion then at GM theres nothing you lose(well except certain skins and other special items)

The only way I would agree with this is if there were some sort of time restrictions on getting to Master. ie you must of played at least 100hrs before you are allowed to reach master status. Then I would agree with it. I agree that at Master chars are suppose to be complete but because of the damn thieves and pk, Master is definately not it. If there is never the possibility of having time restrictions on reaching Master status then I would actually say Champion. Many chars are just stuck at Champion or really don't care to make GM. It is still way to easy to reach Master. Champion does require a little more work.

P.S. I really haven't thought about how many hows it should take for someone to reach master and I just pulled that number out of my arse.

That's kind of the point.

And you're still going to want to GM for your 5 trains and GM level skills and spells. Ask anyone who knows that those things DO matter and you'll see that too many things right now are pretty level dependant to NOT want to. GM spirit aura is a big difference from Master or Champion spirit aura.

Not true. Even if it were just for the prestige of being able to see that Grand Master label in "score", there will always be some folks who will want those last 9 levels. And there's a lot more that's affected by GMing than just eq loss. We discussed it some on a topic I posted a few months ago.

That said, I'm absolutely in favor of getting rid of thieves at 40 or 41. Here are some reasons why:

* Levelling usually slows down for me somewhere around Master, depending on what I'm playing. That means that not only am I spending more time around Master, since it takes longer to level past it, but with more levelling to do, I need to spend more time doing other things so I don't get too frustrated. That means that not only am I spending more time at Master than at any level up to Master, but I'm probably also starting to gather some gear. It's super annoying to lose that gear, while I'm mired down a bit with the levelling, and looking to gear-hunting for a diversion. A little perverse, even.

* Another diversion to beat the levelling blues is to start getting involved in politics or religion, which inevitably makes enemies and usually leads to PK. Master chars can start to be effective in PK (I've heard). To be effective in PK, sometimes you need gear. You certainly don't want your gear to be disappearing every login, except possibly through a proper junk-loot.

* I have Mentor and Master level buddies who can enchant gear. But if they enchant my gear at Master, the gear goes away. That delays the natural assumption of their enchant-bitch duties, which isn't right at all. I'd like my Master to have some enchants. That'd be great.

* A group of Masters can easily and organically obtain outstanding and near-godlike quality gear. They should be able to keep what they can obtain without help from higher lev chars. This applies double to gear my Master can obtain solo.

* If "thieves" were masterful enough to take my gear when my char is a Master, then that implies that these "thieves" are Champions at least -- and they should be well-known around the Realms. I'd maintain that "thieves" are mentor-level at best, and shouldn't be skilled enough to take my Master's stuff.

* This is a positive first step toward making Masters "complete" chars. They still won't be, of course, but it would be interesting to see if the ratio of numbers of GMs to Masters changes at all.

Peace,
Bux

Make it so. I know this has been discussed in the past month or two. I like it.

The argument that oldbies - newbies who find levelling a pain are simply lazy, is a flawed one. I, for one, haven't had TIME to go levelling. Hell, I haven't even had time to loot-hunt with the pk-happy state of the mud. Once I hit Master, you're either immersed in pk, or you're hiding yourself in a cave somewhere. Those players who might assist you in levelling are either in pk themselves, dead, or LOOKING for pk. I know I've gotten one level since I hit Master FROM CASTING RIFT ALONE. If you don't think this is tedious, you have another thing coming. But for me, I've found a definite pain, a hard point in looking to level past master on my own - and this isn't a gripe against levelling, so I'll get to the point. If Masters are complete characters, good pk targets, and under the risk to be junk-looted without remorse (Damn it, at least leave the barrel of water), then why should they not at least be able to carry lewt for a while? It's like going off to join the army at 18, but not being able to drink beer. WTF?

At master I can request a tanso weapon, place enchants on it and loose it because of log out thieves. I would like to be able to enchant my tanso and still keep it.

I've changed my opinion on it I believe, I think maste is a good time. Since I know priests can enchant at Expert, but they have little reason to because if they take time to make a suit, they still have 19 levels before they can keep anything good they could make.

All pets, herbs, skins, locks, etc should be completed at master too. Just to chime in.