Hey Merky! Glad to see you're still about - thanks for leaving your contact details! It's good to keep in touch
What're you up to these days? Still gaming, I see, judging by the steam link
An update on my own life - I graduated from college last spring (B.A. in computer science), and am now hunting about for a job. Real life is kind of scary sometimes, haha... I don't play MMOs anymore, due to having gotten destructively addicted to them three years ago. Currently 25 months clean! I do, however, develop my own games - I've taught summer game programming camps for middle and high school students for the past four years, and I'm working on learning how to make a networked game at the moment. My main experience with CS is in computer graphics, so it's definitely going to be 3d! Good stuff (to keep me busy while I'm an unemployed bum, haha...)
In the interest of further updates, a very interesting email exchange that happened almost two years ago, which may not have been seen by some of you who visited Ardenia before it moved to the Great Compendium, is perhaps worth re-posting here:
==== April 25, 2012 ====
Zillyhoo here. I'm hoping you remember.
Lost friends, forgotten foes. It has been a very long time. Forgive the theatrics, but what a gap between then and now.
You'll remember me best by my pseudonym, Lucifer Zillyhoo. I'll remember you best by yours. Or your runescape usernames. Or your proboards usernames, or invisonfree usernames. Whatever you went by when we roleplayed in taverns or at the helms of empires, or in whatever story we were telling (quite frequently poorly).
I hope there is still a little nerd left in all of you, a little fondness for when we all imagined these things together. Because I am dying to catch up with you all. If you use these accounts, if you remember the times fondly even if you hated me, please reply. It's a colossal mailing list with some sure to be discontinued hosts (God look at these addresses, they're a flashback and an embarrassment in and of themselves), I can only hope to see a bounty of replies from the ones that go through.
After all, we have a reunion to arrange.
Mr. Zillyhoo
====
Salutations! I was wondering if someone was going to send out a mass email like this sometime. I see my wait was not in vain.
It has indeed been a very long time since the halcyon days of the Great Compendium and its tributary RP boards, punctuated by brief reminders now and then. And yet I still remember those days (and nights) with great fondness! It was on the Runescape Roleplaying forum of yore that I cut my teeth roleplaying for the first time, creating such threads as Mod Cafe and Ardenia Tavern. However, it was not until the Great Diaspora of 2006, caused by certain stupid rules on the part of Jagex ('taverns are not roleplaying, they're chat' - so much for Ardenia Tavern and Lucifer's Tavern), that I really found how much I enjoyed communal storytelling, as roleplaying really seems to be. Good times were had by myself and all who were good enough to join me at my Ardenia Tavern website. And then one day, out of the blue, one of my cohorts noted that several elements of the Diaspora were banding together on a single site, and that an invitation had been extended to Ardenia to join in. I only knew the main players in this new consortium, or Compendium as it came to be called, somewhat tangentially, but we came to know one another much better after I moved Ardenia to the Compendium. With new members for all of our roleplays, drawn from the participants in each contributing roleplay, I think the Compendium really did achieve its goal of being a great place for communal storytelling.
Even then, I noted that the drama quotient of the site was relatively high, but, considering we were all about 12-16, that was totally to be expected. Things held together well enough while I was still there, but then the great foe of all Internet-based endeavors reared its ugly head for me - Real Life! My high school classes were starting to get more challenging, in the eventual ramp up to college, so I found myself with much less time for roleplaying. And then the next year, in 2007, I began playing certain online games that did not begin with 'Rune' and end with 'scape', and my estrangement from the Compendium (and roleplaying in general) was complete. I dropped by my original Ardenia Tavern website occasionally, to post status updates on my life, but that was about it. My life continued, and while I remembered the glorious past fondly, I did not find myself drawn back to it. From what I can tell, I became one of the 'lost admins' on the Compendium, and the Ardenia subsection got hidden somewhere along the line so that the Compendium did not have dead roleplays all over the place. Fair enough, although too bad.
And then one day, idly following links into my own past, I returned to the Compendium, and found that that once-great empire had crumbled. The drama I had noted in its heyday had apparently become a resonant oscillation that shook the place apart. What a pity, I remember thinking to myself! And yet, like all empires in the past, its influence has extended far beyond its physical death, so that it cannot really be said to be dead. The memories live on in all of us, and perhaps the roleplaying and writing experience we gained as well. I know my writing skills certainly improved with regular exercise back then! And, indeed, I found that in the Zillyhoo's Tavern thread, which could perhaps be considered the grain of sand around which the Compendium's pearl first formed, there were still posts being added even now. I added one of my own, remarking upon the Warhammer of Zillyhoo's appearance on totally unrelated portions of the Interwebs. To this day, in fact, whenever I come across a picture of someone cosplaying a Homestuck troll, clutching their faithfully-recreated foam Warhammer, I cannot help but think back to the days of the Compendium, when Zillyhoo was just a name of a friend.
And what, indeed, am I up to these days? Well, I'll be going into my last year of college this fall, with a major in Computer Science and a minor in Astronomy. There is a good possibility that I'll end up as a scientist of one flavor or another, though whether in a lab doing simulations or in the field taking observations, I know not as yet. I have a secret passion for webcomics and associated art forms, and hope to perhaps become a decent artist someday (finding time to practice is always the challenge). I no longer play any MMOs, as I have discovered I have the tendency to become dangerously addicted to playing them, to the extreme detriment of my real life. I miss Runescape and Second Life and Wurm Online, but they must remain fond memories and nothing more. I am also into philosophy, especially as it pertains to society. Like almost everyone else of our generation, I am dissatisfied with the way almost all of the countries in the world are being run and controlled, and I hope to do something about it in the relatively near future - the world needs a new model of society, one based on common sense, tolerance for diversity, rational scientific thinking, enjoyment of the arts and the beauty of nature, and having long-term goals for humanity. That would probably be my life project, if one could be said to have such a thing.
I hope all of you have been doing well in your parallel existences in the (six!) years since I last talked to many of you! That much time can bring some pretty big changes in a person's life, especially when you're our age, so I hope all those changes have been good ones for y'all
Thank you, Mr. Zillyhoo, for getting back in touch with all of us!
Ack. It seems my memories have spawned an inspired bout of wall-of-text-itis! Sorry about that!
TL;DR version: Good times were had, and I wish I hadn't left before things fell apart. I'm doing well and I hope you all are too.
Cheers,
Random Tree
Aka Noah
====
I'm happy to see I'm not the only one who waxes eloquent when reflecting on that bygone era. The Diaspora... A good term for a dark time, haha. A mere sixteen and we felt personally attacked by a company the size of jagex. No wonder the drama stayed intense, we probably all felt like Napoleons in exile.
I didn't know you well, Random, but as a former fantasy innkeeper to another, I am glad to hear you are doing well. Your major is certainly interesting, and your life project a worthy one. Congratulations on staying away from MMOs, I too have an obsessive personality and become too focused on them. I haven't been as successful at freeing myself, but I blame the past we are so fondly recalling.
Much of my time has been spent trying to recreate the community we had in new places. Frequently failing. A few noteworthy successes. I think our common beginnings in roleplaying may have left a serious mark on my malleable teenage mind. Our taverns and the like, there's probably some underlying psychological desire that manifests in choosing to roleplay a meta lounge.
Anyways. On a different note, do you have any favorite webcomics? I'm an unashamed homestuck, and read a lot of comics in the same circle of authors. It's always fun to see my hammer everywhere. I thought about buying one from a cosplayer.
I'm glad you got in touch! I don't know if everyone will reply all; hopefully you set the standard so we can all be in the loop for who is still around!
Sincerely,
Ryan (Zillyhoo) Stevenson
====
Favorite webcomics, hmm. I find myself within the MSPA circle too, although a bit of the Dinosaur Comics / XKCD axis gets mixed in from time to time. Moe; Happle Tea; Two Guys and Guy; Questionable Content; Hark, a Vagrant - a pretty eclectic mix, now that I think about it. But I would definitely have to say that Homestuck, and its predecessor Problem Sleuth, have extremely fond spots in my heart. My one claim to webcomic fame was in Problem Sleuth, where it was my command back in 2008 that resulted in the creation of the Four Heroes... Most useless set of heroes ever, but hey, I ain't complaining!
I think the 'metalounge mentality' you mention is sort of related to the worldbuilding instinct in general. At times, the world feels like it is all just a stage, with sets and props guiding the human interactions, but overall less important than them. Creating a flexible space like our Taverns allows participants to socialize in a place where that setting, those props, can be created and interacted with totally on a whim - they still provide a context for the human interaction, but are also created as a byproduct of that interaction. In that way, the socialization that takes place can be much more agile and imaginative, while still being just as fully contextualized as real-world interactions taking place amongst real places and objects. To throw up a plane of reality apropos to a conversation takes very little more effort than engaging in the conversation itself, meaning that all participants can equally take a hand in shaping the imagined world the conversation takes place in. Such creative power really didn't exist before the advent of the Internet and web forums - if you were having a conversation in real life, it would come with a physical context, and you'd just have to deal with that context. With a lot of time and effort, you could modify the context to fit a certain set of ideas, but on the scale of days or years or lives, not seconds or minutes or conversations. So really, us roleplayers and our meta-taverns are really on the forefront of a whole new way of thinking of reality - it is a medium to be shaped to our needs, rather than a medium that shapes our needs. It's a cool frontier to be exploring
Noah
====
Not too far off from me! MSPA, Dinosaur Comics, Questionable Content, Girls with Slingshots are probably the four I keep up with best. I just keep a ton of them in my history and cycle through them all as I remember. As a medium, webcomics are pretty incredible. It's a flexible enough system that artists are pretty much unrestricted in what they can do to tell a story. And that is a real good command! Useless they were, but I use weaselKing as my chumhandle on the fanmade Pesterchum client and the four heroes will always be remembered, haha.
I think you are spot on with the worldbuilding theory. I really couldn't agree more! I find myself quite frequently dissatisfied with the circumstances of real life interactions. Sunny days for funerals and rain for your wedding kind of thing. Reality has no respect for a narrative! I think it's what will always attract me to the creative side of things. I'm still a storyteller at heart, and the forums provided us beautiful setting to exercise that.
It's amazing to me how fast and furious the replies are coming. What providence, that so many would still use these accounts. I had better get to replying!
-Ryan
====
Ha, it's funny how webcomics seem to sort of clump together, and how readers tend to pick up on all the comics in those clumps. And certainly another example of a powerful internet medium. The fact that webcomic artists don't have to bother finding a publisher, and can choose the degree to which their art makes them money, really opens the door for a huge variety of comics! Basically, hundreds of examples of worlds being built, all for the enjoyment of others. Pretty awesome. I'll have to check out Girls with Slingshots!
Haha, more replies as I write this. Best get replying! And I think planning the reunion is on you, too
Noah
====
They certainly do intermingle. If you would like recommendations, my two recent favorites are:
thepunchlineismachismo.com/ (Also known as manly men doing manly things)
and
oglaf.com (Ridiculously NSFW, but usually in good humor)
I've been meaning to catch up on Moe, you reminded me of that. I read it during problem sleuth, but when he stopped updating for a while it kind of fell out of my queue. But I follow the artist on tumblr and I really should have remembered before now!
God knows how I will arrange a reunion. As terrifying as it may seem to normal folk, I was and still am 100% serious about it! Someday, for sure. I think now that we are all adults we don't need to worry so much about predators and 30 year old adults pretending to be girls (perhaps because many of us are 20 year old boys pretending to be adults). I fully intend to bartend for everyone once.
-Ryan
====
Hello! Its Shado!
Of COURSE I remember the Tavern and the incredible memories I had on the RS forums and Proboards. I first got into "Forum Fights" and the Tavern when I was thirteen. THIRTEEN! I am nineteen now and I have spent almost a year out of high school. To think, I was roleplaying with you guys in the SIXTH grade and now im out of school. I will be heading back to school in the near future to major in 7-12 teaching. I still use creative writing from time to time and when I do I regularly flash back to my experiences at the tavern. I think that the forums were a great learning experience for all of us and greatly stretched our imaginations. I didnt just have "fun" at the tavern back in the days of RS, I was consumed by it. I quit playing the actual game just to be on the forums. I dreamed everyday at school of going home just to get on the forums. One of the best parts of my childhood, as aweful as that sounds.
For me personally since the forums I found other things to occupy my time with. I excelled at roleplaying anywhere I went. I kept playing video games(namely WoW). In high school I started doing all of the things I could never do in middle school because of the forums, like kiss a girl for the first time. No joke, in middle school I was more concerned with roleplaying on the forums with you all than the opposite sex. Needless to say I was picked on alot. I got into music heavily by the end of my high school life and spent the last year of my high school life in a band playing with friends. At one point I had actually considered writing a song called "Lucifers Tavern".
These days I have graduated high school and have not started college yet. I intend to go back to teach in public school. I work at Walmart to pass the time and save up money. I have been in a meaningful relationship for a year now and may soon be engaged(thats a scary word). This email made my whole day. My whole week even. I was glad I got to see what you guys where up to. I wish all of you only the very best in this world and what ever may come next for you.
Have fun, keep your head up, and please remember where you came from. Remember the tavern.
Love,
Shado
====
Well, this is quite a blast from the past. I haven't logged into this email for quite some time, since I've moved on to something a bit more professional sounding and less attached to a horribly mediocre, middle-of-the-road emo band that I'd rather not associate with myself anymore. Still, it was a rather pleasant surprise, mostly because it caught me unawares. I haven't faced this part of my past for quite some time, since I'd rather forget everything I used to be and accept who I am now. But I suppose this is a sort of therapeutic experience, yes? Take the proverbial bull by the horns and own up to the things I've done in the past.
I'm not quite sure how many of you remember me, but I can be sure that when you remember there will be negative feelings attached. It's Chelsea -- but I've long since started spelling it Chelseigh, for more personal reasons. If you need psuedonyms, I believe I used to go by Idrial or some other nonsense. Maybe some of you know me as Chels. Gods, what can I say about my life right now?
Well, I'm twenty. I'm attending university up here in Seattle and enjoying every second of it. As for major and the like, I'm in Criminal Justice, with aspirations to work in the FBI as a profiler. Hopefully these practicums will work out for me, yes? Other than that, I cannot rightfully attribute myself to doing anything else major. I work, I do my classes and I still goof around at times. I'm still a big gamer, though I've moved on to bigger and better (maybe that's not the right term?) MMOs. Just recently got invited to the Mists of Pandaria Beta for WoW! So that's fun. ;P Uhm, what else? I'm coming up on my fifth year of being in a wonderful relationship with the man of my dreams - hopefully marriage is in the works, but we'll see. I'm still very active with my creative writing. I RP constantly, but privately, with friends of mine. We have a blast and I can say that my writing has taken a turn for the better because of it. Though, mind you, that's an entirely subjective opinion.
I'm very different than the girl I used to be. Long gone are the high strung moments of drama and insecurity. I suppose this comes naturally with growing up... but I do notice the differences, most often, when Spinner or Aaron (who I still talk to on occasion) remind me of how much of a horrible ***** I was. Can't say I disagree, I was a horrible little whelp, wasn't I? Anyway, I suppose I'll take this time to cover my apologies to people I may have offended in the past. Whatever grudges were created are long gone, rest assured, and I hope that anything I've ever done in the past has not affected you too negatively.
Anyway, I have to get ready for work now. It was lovely hearing from you.
My email, if people are curious to know it in order to get back in touch, is thus:
chelseighselby@yahoo.com
Not that I expect some sort of response. Just throwing it out there. <3
Mucho love to all,
Chelseigh
====
Wow, this is such a pleasant surprise..
A little part of me always hoped that somebody would take initiative in checking up on everyone, and I'm especially glad to see that it was Mr. Zillyhoo/Ryan, since he does owe all of us drinks sometime in the future. Reading these email catch-ups has, without a doubt, been the highlight of my day, and probably of my week. You probably do not realize who this is at first, but you will...
I'm still not exactly sure about how it started. I was in the 6th grade, about 7 years ago in 2005, when I joined RuneScape. Almost immediately I grew a liking to the forums and took part in simple roleplays and conversations. I especially grew fond of one thread in particular: The Party Thread, a Mod Cafe-type casual chat. The only person from those days that I still keep in contact with is Chelseigh, who has already told you all that I like to remind her of our immaturity in those days. From that thread eventually spawned what I became known for: The Hogwarts threads. With over 100 threads all reaching the post limit, I made a lot of great acquaintances and friends, along with a few enemies. It's hard to believe that the entire lifespan of that thread occurred when I was 13 years old. While taking part in that roleplay among others, I frequented Lucifer's Tavern and met the majority of you. Skipping all the dramatics, we grew closer on half a dozen websites before all packing it in for our real lives.
With high school came a plethora of new experiences, and I stopped playing RuneScape, roleplaying, and virtually gave up on all MMORPGs while I lived life. In middle school, I was in a very small class and didn't get the opportunity to make very many friends, and I filled that gap by meeting all of you, something I would not change for the world. Once in high school, though, I did manage to keep up with a few people, namely Mr. Z, Chelseigh, Lord Greatak, and Aaron, with familiar faces and names occasionally glancing my screen. As of right now, I am finishing up my freshman year of college here in New Jersey. My declared major is Biological Sciences, and I intend to minor in Psychology. I have hopes of possibly going to medical school, but I am looking into doing something with body language.
It is great to hear from all of you, and I hope to read more emails from others. You can contact me with this email, or even feel free to add me on Facebook, where I'm sure we'll have a few mutual friends. I'll see all of you when this reunion finally does come to fruition.
Best wishes,
'Spinner'
====
This is a bit of a surprise, I hadn't expected to hear from any of you again. To say I preferred those days of yore is a bit inaccurate. I felt much less in those days, but what little I did, it was wonderful. I reckon a clarification of pronouns might be in order, however. I am Greatak, and that community was my entire life, I must admit. The death of our community was nearly synonymous with my own death, mentally at least. Some of you had this displeasure of watching that.
Unfortunately, that's the place I am now. In a university, though to list a major I havent considered might be a shorter list than those I have. Pardon the theatrics I find myself accustomed to, if you can spare the generosity. I am well by any objective measure. And pleased to hear many of you have moved on with your lives. I enjoyed a privelleged position within our little world and find myself stripped of rank and purpose, but it's good to hear from the lot of you. I best cut myself off before I stray even more over the top with my theatrics. I considered deleting all of it but I have nothing better to say, and I probably ought to pay a little but of attention to class
my Arabic isn't good enough to multitask.
Sincerely,
Michael
====
So yeah, interesting hearing from some of those folks. I hope everyone reading this is doing well! My email is now at noah.warnke@gmail.com, and I'm not playing online games, so that's pretty much the only way to get in touch. Feel free to email, anyone. Cheers!
As for me, I'm on a break year from college, doing crazy things like backpacking hundreds of miles along roads across parts of the country. Fun st00f.
Thank you, Mr. Zillyhoo, for getting back in touch with all of us!