Post by Logo on Jun 14, 2006 20:14:32 GMT -5
As some of you know, late Saturday night, madness struck the HLR. In a moment of questionably questionable judgement, we allowed one of those crazy spammers that run from district to district like a beheaded chicken into our Vent server. My memories of the experience are hazy, and I would be more inclined to insist that it never happened at all, a side-effect of late-night delerium coupled with Leader Withdrawal, perhaps... were it not for these troublesome ventrillo recordings and screenshots on my hard drive. So for your entertainment... nay, as a warning to all who would try the same... I have done my best to reconstruct that fateful night.
____________________________________________________
The Seven Year Old Jamaican Gangsta
By Logonitur Karn
As citizens of the Half-Life Republic, we inhabit a world that is, by all sane accounts, not real. The internets provide us with a veil of anonymity unlike anything the world has ever seen. A veil... that can be both a blessing, and a curse. For as we hide behind the veil, unleashing the most dark and bizzare versions of ourselves upon an unsuspecting world, we must realize that those we claim to see may in fact be behind veils themselves. And when we peer from a veil into a veil, we enter a place of confusion, a place where truth is twisted and diffracted as easily as the light passing through two bent pieces of cloth, a place where the most obscure of metaphors seem to make sense, a place that can only be known in...
The twilight zone.
It began like any other day. A bout of rather extreme group flailing foreshadowed a thoroughly mediocre GvG outing, where the losses were harsh and the victories won through dumb luck and circumstance. A last attempt to salvage a slow night took us to Heroes' Ascent - we were all to make random builds and throw them blindly into the battlefield. Hilarity would surely ensue. But alas, when Monkey decided to bring EoE, the only hilarity came in the form of painful, painful death. Death so painful that Jupiter and Kaiser were driven away in despair.
Helplessness and rage were boiling behind the Republic's collective veil. Surely, SURELY, nothing bad could result from some harmless cathartic stalking - just like it had been in the old days, the days before the Exile of Triia and the Semi-Hiatus of Malae. Picking a target by the name of Packed Punch, we began to relentlessly follow him across a regretfully un-manly district 2. Our campaign of annoyance was bitter and relentless.
But young Packed Punch had a veil of his own… a veil that he was not afraid to use. F***ers we were called, and worse, Jews! Fearing greatly for our lives, we activated the Enter Mission button before it was too late. Imagine our horror when, upon returning, Packed Punch was STILL spamming his hateful spam upon a terrified and still testosterone-less d2. Lives were in danger, and we were to blame!
The Grand Republic witnesses the wrath of Packed Punch.
But something was wrong. Seeing the letters "HLR" shining on the horizon once again, like a beacon for all that is just and good in this world, Packed Punch was seized with joy. "My posse!" he cried. His... posse? Had the rage that WE had inadvertedly fed him made him stronger... more powerful? Powerful enough for... slaves? But then... could such power be harnessed for good? We could invite him on to our team, take the Halls by storm! The plan was too disturbingly hilarious to turn down. The invite was sent, the vent ip was relayed, and a nervous HLR shuddered at the prospect of hearing the hateful voice of the monster behind the veil.
A brave and, by all accounts, quite manly Khunlin was the first to offer his greetings. An astute observation was offered in return. An almost audible shiver pierced the now deathly-silent server. We were clearly dealing with a man whose powers of observation eclipsed the intellect of the entire guild put together.
This boy knew his stuff. An accomplished fame farmer he was – and he knew how to put together a dealage team too. The man just OOZED hardcore, but he was a people person. We were cool, he assured us… we were cool. A tear of wonder danced across my cheek.
But alas, things are not always as they seem, for in time, things began to sour between the HLR and the venerable Packed Punch, who had now shed his hateful persona in favor of the benevolent vent alias “life aid”. Our faithful pickup, Wanderer, was the first to experience his vicious verbal blows. Good man, Wanderer was having a bit of trouble connecting to our server, and Life Aid, in gloriously broken English, let him know just how much of an 00b he was. We didn’t know quite was he was talking about, but some things, as we now know, are simply beyond this Republic’s meager intellect.
And much to Jay’s horror, monks were the next on the agenda of hate. “You… hate… monks…?” the esteemed Warlord of Life Tri gasped. An explosion of panicked voices melted into a stormy silence. But darn that Jamaican, he always knew how to turn on the charm. His current guild, he said, be hatin’ on him , but we… we respected him. The uproarious LOLs flooding the guild channel were underscored by a sense of the utmost admiration and respect.
But alas, not even our young friend, in all his absolute power, could avoid the dreaded Error 7. He dropped out as we were entering the match, prompting heart-wrenching cries of confusion and finally… acceptance. He may have been left behind physically, but he was with us in spirit. His beautiful laugh kept us afloat in the dark match that was to come – and against all odds, with his moral support, we almost didn’t lose.
The Republic attracts the greatest people on the internets, no doubt, and this was no exception. He wanted to join us, of course. If only Malae had been there to see it… our liason officer would have been ecstatic at the prospect of our guild’s seven year old black jamaican gangsta quota finally being filled after all of these months.
Not just anyone can join the Republic. We laid out the entry requirements, one by one. Stunned at our standards, he backpedaled nervously, offering to pay us 100k each for entry into the Republic’s Hallowed Hall. But the Half-Life Republic isn’t one to be bribed – we prefer to do the bribing ourselves: “How about we pay you 100k?” Khunlin offered.
Our awesomeness had finally blown his mind. Such generosity… such selflessness… try as he might to express himself, the words would not come. And so he knew that his time amongst the great ones in the HLR had come to an end. Offering a heartwrenching “I love you guys!” he vanished forever. As Microsoft Sam mournfully documented his departure, the Half-Life Republic could only weep.
____________________________________________________
And should you dismiss my tale as a mere hallucination, I invite you to download these unedited Ventrillo Logs and zip file containing all of the clips in the story above.
[These files have since been taken down. I guess you'll just have to have faith.
]
____________________________________________________
The Seven Year Old Jamaican Gangsta
By Logonitur Karn
As citizens of the Half-Life Republic, we inhabit a world that is, by all sane accounts, not real. The internets provide us with a veil of anonymity unlike anything the world has ever seen. A veil... that can be both a blessing, and a curse. For as we hide behind the veil, unleashing the most dark and bizzare versions of ourselves upon an unsuspecting world, we must realize that those we claim to see may in fact be behind veils themselves. And when we peer from a veil into a veil, we enter a place of confusion, a place where truth is twisted and diffracted as easily as the light passing through two bent pieces of cloth, a place where the most obscure of metaphors seem to make sense, a place that can only be known in...
The twilight zone.
It began like any other day. A bout of rather extreme group flailing foreshadowed a thoroughly mediocre GvG outing, where the losses were harsh and the victories won through dumb luck and circumstance. A last attempt to salvage a slow night took us to Heroes' Ascent - we were all to make random builds and throw them blindly into the battlefield. Hilarity would surely ensue. But alas, when Monkey decided to bring EoE, the only hilarity came in the form of painful, painful death. Death so painful that Jupiter and Kaiser were driven away in despair.
Helplessness and rage were boiling behind the Republic's collective veil. Surely, SURELY, nothing bad could result from some harmless cathartic stalking - just like it had been in the old days, the days before the Exile of Triia and the Semi-Hiatus of Malae. Picking a target by the name of Packed Punch, we began to relentlessly follow him across a regretfully un-manly district 2. Our campaign of annoyance was bitter and relentless.
But young Packed Punch had a veil of his own… a veil that he was not afraid to use. F***ers we were called, and worse, Jews! Fearing greatly for our lives, we activated the Enter Mission button before it was too late. Imagine our horror when, upon returning, Packed Punch was STILL spamming his hateful spam upon a terrified and still testosterone-less d2. Lives were in danger, and we were to blame!
The Grand Republic witnesses the wrath of Packed Punch.
But something was wrong. Seeing the letters "HLR" shining on the horizon once again, like a beacon for all that is just and good in this world, Packed Punch was seized with joy. "My posse!" he cried. His... posse? Had the rage that WE had inadvertedly fed him made him stronger... more powerful? Powerful enough for... slaves? But then... could such power be harnessed for good? We could invite him on to our team, take the Halls by storm! The plan was too disturbingly hilarious to turn down. The invite was sent, the vent ip was relayed, and a nervous HLR shuddered at the prospect of hearing the hateful voice of the monster behind the veil.
A brave and, by all accounts, quite manly Khunlin was the first to offer his greetings. An astute observation was offered in return. An almost audible shiver pierced the now deathly-silent server. We were clearly dealing with a man whose powers of observation eclipsed the intellect of the entire guild put together.
This boy knew his stuff. An accomplished fame farmer he was – and he knew how to put together a dealage team too. The man just OOZED hardcore, but he was a people person. We were cool, he assured us… we were cool. A tear of wonder danced across my cheek.
But alas, things are not always as they seem, for in time, things began to sour between the HLR and the venerable Packed Punch, who had now shed his hateful persona in favor of the benevolent vent alias “life aid”. Our faithful pickup, Wanderer, was the first to experience his vicious verbal blows. Good man, Wanderer was having a bit of trouble connecting to our server, and Life Aid, in gloriously broken English, let him know just how much of an 00b he was. We didn’t know quite was he was talking about, but some things, as we now know, are simply beyond this Republic’s meager intellect.
And much to Jay’s horror, monks were the next on the agenda of hate. “You… hate… monks…?” the esteemed Warlord of Life Tri gasped. An explosion of panicked voices melted into a stormy silence. But darn that Jamaican, he always knew how to turn on the charm. His current guild, he said, be hatin’ on him , but we… we respected him. The uproarious LOLs flooding the guild channel were underscored by a sense of the utmost admiration and respect.
But alas, not even our young friend, in all his absolute power, could avoid the dreaded Error 7. He dropped out as we were entering the match, prompting heart-wrenching cries of confusion and finally… acceptance. He may have been left behind physically, but he was with us in spirit. His beautiful laugh kept us afloat in the dark match that was to come – and against all odds, with his moral support, we almost didn’t lose.
The Republic attracts the greatest people on the internets, no doubt, and this was no exception. He wanted to join us, of course. If only Malae had been there to see it… our liason officer would have been ecstatic at the prospect of our guild’s seven year old black jamaican gangsta quota finally being filled after all of these months.
Not just anyone can join the Republic. We laid out the entry requirements, one by one. Stunned at our standards, he backpedaled nervously, offering to pay us 100k each for entry into the Republic’s Hallowed Hall. But the Half-Life Republic isn’t one to be bribed – we prefer to do the bribing ourselves: “How about we pay you 100k?” Khunlin offered.
Our awesomeness had finally blown his mind. Such generosity… such selflessness… try as he might to express himself, the words would not come. And so he knew that his time amongst the great ones in the HLR had come to an end. Offering a heartwrenching “I love you guys!” he vanished forever. As Microsoft Sam mournfully documented his departure, the Half-Life Republic could only weep.
____________________________________________________
And should you dismiss my tale as a mere hallucination, I invite you to download these unedited Ventrillo Logs and zip file containing all of the clips in the story above.
[These files have since been taken down. I guess you'll just have to have faith.
]
