Begin Anew

It’s been two long years since a post has been made here, and it’s with great excitement that I break the silence today to announce that Cryptic Tide will be returning not as a guild, but as a warcraft community. The Tide will not be as intense as it once was as a guild, but it will still focus on creating a comfortable OOC community for everyone while providing relic hunting adventures. As a community, the Tide will also be far more open to helping members create and run personal story lines. Anyone will be allowed to run plot lines both via planned events and spontaneous roleplay. The basic IC premise of Cryptic Tide, however, will be shifting to the following:

With the war brewing and both sides of military power growing, Kaylir has decided it’s time for her to dust off her armor and her maps to ensure that neither faction gathers and uses artifacts of other cultures against each other. The introduction of Azerite into the world weighs heavy on the mind, and she hopes to do what she can to keep it from getting too far out of hand. Sometimes this may mean going outside the bounds of Alliance law to do what needs to be done. No longer operating as a ranked organization, the Cryptic Tide will become a collaborative where any may point out possible points of interest and recruit help for expeditions of their own. Each find will be held onto for safekeeping until the war subsides, then returned to their cultures if able when the violence has tempered. Anyone who wishes to join her on jobs will also, of course, be paid a reasonable sum.

The community has already been set up in game, and in character events will start within the next few weeks after a few more logistics are sorted out. Any ex Tidelings looking for some extra roleplay and getting together with old friends are more than welcome to give me a poke in game for an invite, but there’s no pressure nor expectations either. Anyone new and interested are also welcome!

I hope everyone has had an amazing time in BFA, and I wish you all happy RPing.

- Kaylir

End of an Era

Hey everyone. This is another big announcement, so please read this carefully. Cryptic Tide has been a wonderful guild that I’ve had the honor of running for almost a decade. It’s been the birth of many amazing friendships, partnerships, and stories. But all great things do come to an end. As 2016 comes to a close, it’s with a lump in my throat that I announce that Cryptic Tide will be retiring indefinitely as a guild. Why? Because ten years is a long, long time to run a guild. Not just me, but all of the guild’s leadership is tired. We had to put up a small wall from everyone to make unbiased decisions and to lead the guild effectively. We’ve decided that we simply do not want to do that anymore. We want to return to roleplaying freely, having fun, and being friends with all of you who we worked so hard for. @everyone But this isn’t the end for all of us, if you don’t want it to be! Recently, several members of ours left to create their own community on WRA. Kaliendra now leads Runeweaver Legacy, a guild that strives for the good of Azeroth rather than for profit. Runeweaver Legacy has opened their doors to all Tide members who still wish to play, rp, and enjoy the game together. Relics and all that good stuff are still involved and worked into the story, but under a new goal as a force for good. Don’t worry, your characters still get paid! You can read more about Runeweaver at their website: http://runeweaver.shivtr.com/. This guild is more family oriented so they prefer to foster a mature and respectful atmosphere. Excessive 18+ jokes/comments would like to be kept to a minimum. You can contact Kaliendra, Wiltheia, or Chkalla if you have interest in moving over to their guild. It is up to you if you would like to join fellow Tide members to this new direction. It certainly won’t be held against you if you decide this isn’t for you. However the guild will be transfered to Seara, the original character that lead the Tide back on Moonguard, and allowed to grow inactive indefinitely. The discord will remain open for everyone to keep contact should they want. I know I personally will be moving to Runeweaver Legacy, and getting back to the basics of enjoying character building RP with everyone I can. It has been an honor to run this guild for you, and I say from the bottom of my heart that I love you all. Happy RPing, Tidelings. - Kaylir

Guild Meeting: Friday, September 23rd, 2016 Location: Guild Hall <A notice is posted around at the base & shop.> To all those have ventured into the Broken Isles, this will be your opportunity to present your findings and discoveries to the rest of the guild. Expect conversation and debates. Will be a casual meeting. Bring any rumors of interest to the table.

I figured some OOC instruction would be required for the upcoming meeting. This is a chance for you all to flex your creativity muscles and bring stories to the table for us to work with! If your character has heard or picked up on rumors of artifacts or research of interest, please present it! We’ll be structuring future events for the guild based off of what others potentially give us.

Please note that presenting a potential job:

If you have any other questions, please bring them to one of the officers! And keep an eye out, Event Talents are going to be getting an update soon!

Kelthos and Talion working the selfie!

<Copies of a notice are pinned up all around both the Cryptic Tide’s base and the Stormwind shop.> To those in the Tide, The sails are ready to be deployed. Ships are prepared to take soldiers to where they hope to finish this war, and in turn as part of our joining the Alliance, we have been issued a task.  As of now for the next few weeks to come, our primary goal is to scour these new lands for leads on powerful artifacts. Secondary to that, those willing to take to the dangerous lands are urged to create maps, mark off locations of interest, study potentially new flora and fauna, as well as keep an eye on any possible locals in the area. No rumor is too small, and no detail unworthy of notice. We urge you to not go out on your own into this unexplored territory, but teams will not be assigned. We trust that you are all capable of knowing who you may work best with. We are not to engage in legion or hostile activities unless completely unable to avoid confrontation. The world is dangerous right now, do not take unnecessary risks. Spots will be available on departing ships, whether you are soldier or not. Keep in contact via your runestones, and we will gather to discuss any findings or rumors in time. Be safe, Tide Leadership

Hi everyone! Let me take a moment to explain how we’ll be handling the Legion release. Some people want to RP right at the start, and that’s great! But others prefer to simply enjoy the new content, which is completely understandable. So we’ve decided to take a more passive route for the launch that will allow people to enjoy the new content however they see fit, while also giving an opening to enjoy it with the guild in character. So for the next 2-3 weeks, there will be no regularly scheduled events. We encourage you all to RP as you see fit, and to flex your imagination muscles. Feel like making up a rumor about an artifact or something else of interest in the area? Please do! We’ll be meeting after the few weeks are up to discuss everything characters who have decided to RP these things out find, and planning our future events around those. So whatever we do next as a storyline is dependent on all of you, as the officers will create based off of your character’s input. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to ask any of the officers for clarification. Thank you, and happy RPing! - Kaylir

Alliances and Altercations!

At the very beginning of the month of August, the Cryptic Tide was forced into swearing fealty to the Alliance, thus surrendering most of the advantages of their neutrality in exchange for the superior protections of the Alliance.

One benefit of this arrangement was a garrison of forty-odd men for the Tide’s base, allowing them to keep it guarded and staffed as an outpost of the Alliance at all times. However, this garrison was to prove its use to the Tide on the very eve of their arrival, as a force of demon cultists attempted a suicidal attack on the Tide’s base of operations. With the aid of the freshly-emplaced garrison troops, the Cryptic Tide easily routed the cultists, killing nearly all of them and capturing their leader for interrogation.

This proved to be a good move, as their leader soon revealed that the cultists’ base had been situated in the ruined town that sat just outside the base proper. Setting out immediately, the Cryptic Tide scoured the ruined town to find out where the base was and make certain that it was neutralized. They found two cultists cowering in the remains of their base, a ruined lumber mill, and quickly executed them. But as they did so, they were ambushed by a large band of demons led by a Shivarra. The Tide was trapped, and things were looking very grim until a patrol of Illidari, dispatched to the area to hunt that very band of demons, broke the demons’ lines. With their help, the Tide rallied and defeated the demons. After that, the two groups retreated to the Tide’s base with lighter hearts. The Illidari were allowed to stay on the premises for the time being, allowing them a base of operations in the area.

With the expertise of the Illidari on hand, the leadership of the Cryptic Tide decided that it would be prudent to meet as a whole to discuss updates to the base’s security and defenses. Many ideas were posed, and members were encouraged to enact as many of them as they were able.

Tide Raiding in Legion

Hey everyone! There’s been some interest in doing some casual raiding as a guild in the new expansion, so to start the prep we’ve made a little form for everyone interested to fill out.  If you like the idea of raiding together for fun, please go >> HERE << And fill out the answers to the best of your ability. Thanks! - Kaylir

Recruitment is open!

A long overdue announcement, but Cryptic Tide’s doors to recruitment are open for the new expansion as we get ready for it. If you’re interested in applying, please go >> HERE << and send in your application! We’ll be sure to respond to you as soon as possible. If you’re someone who sent their application in while our recruitment was closed and heard no response, it would be wise for you to send it in again if you are still interested in the guild. Happy RP everyone and enjoy fighting the Legion! For any other questions, feel free to whisper the officers or myself in game or contact us with an in game mail. -Kaylir

Recruitment Closing!

Hi everyone, as was announced at our meeting last night, Cryptic Tide will be closing it’s recruitment doors on May 10th, 2016. We want to let the guild settle in after our recruitment spree, so if you are planning on sending in an application make sure you send it in soon! The Tide will be opening it’s doors again somewhere around June 7th, depending on how well everyone has settled in. Thank you and happy RPing!

-Kaylir

Announcements & F.A.Q.

Hi everyone. This announcement post will cover a few things. So let’s jump right into it. To start, we want to announce a few changes to the officer core. Riverthorn, who has done amazing work for the guild and was the visionary for the new event system, is going to be stepping down as an officer to focus more on their IRL situation. This means that Wiltheia will be stepping up to being the research lead. This will be repeated at our next meeting and plans on promoting an assistant for Wiltheia will be revealed at next week’s meeting on Wednesday, May 4th.

Survey

We’ve recruited a lot lately so we would like to adjust our events times and other guild aspects to better suit the people in our wonderful guild. If you could take the time out of your busy days to complete this quick survey for us to get a better idea of what everyone desires, we would be eternally grateful.

The survey will reward 1 XP upon completion, so it’s an easy way to get a free XP. The survey will only be open for 10 days though, so please make sure you fill it out before May 6th. You can take the survey >>HERE<<.

 F.A.Q.

We’ve been getting a lot of questions regarding the talent system that we think are pretty common among the guild, so we’re going to answer ‘em all here and let you guys know.

I messed up my character’s stats. Can I change them? As of right now, no you cannot change them because we’d like to avoid having everyone change their stats on a whim to better suit certain situations. That being said we have a respect system in the works that will allow you to re-stat your character.

What events qualify for xp? Events that qualify for xp are defined as events that officers have a direct hand in helping run. This is to prevent people from simply throwing up events without actually planning them out to gather up more xp. Since I can’t come to events often, I can’t get talent points. Doesn’t that make the system really unfair to people? It can be unfair in a way, but this is a point we’ve been wanting to address for a while now. The talents are not the main benefit in this system. They’re simply something fun on the side. Icing on the cake. Etc, etc. They have cooldowns and they can also be situational. The main factor in events is your stats, which everyone gets. The stats are what makes you pass rolls and succeed and events!

I can’t come to events often. Does that mean I’m out of luck for talents? Right now, yes. But we promise we’re working on drumming up ways for people who can’t always attend events to earn xp as well.

There are skills in the talent system that my character already has, like divine protection. Does this mean I’m not allowed to use them? Not at all! The talent system is not intended to take away any in character skills. Not having the talent simply means that skill doesn’t have the mechanics in our system. For example, using Divine Protection, if you pass a defense roll and decide you want your character to use their paladin shield for that passed roll that’s completely okay! Your divine shield simply can’t save you from a failed roll until you purchase that talent.

There are some talents in other class trees that would work for my character. Can I take them? Yep! Cross classing is completely okay as long as it makes logical sense to your character. If you can explain it to an officer there’s no reason not to. For example, if your character is a warrior but is a rather sneaky type, they’re free to take the Pickpocket talent from the rogue tree. But if they’re a warrior with no healing skills at all IC, then it wouldn’t make sense for them to take Lay on Hands from the paladin tree.

These talents are really restrictive on character creativity. My character’s spells would look a little different! What’s the deal? These talents aren’t intended to lessen the creativity of your character. If you want to change the visual aesthetic of the talent to better match your character, you’re free to! For example, if you’re a shaman and you’ve taken Lightning Shield, feel free to describe that Lightning Shield as wild and erratic electricity skipping quickly over your character’s entire body instead of simply having the little orb of lightning circle you.

The talent Block is worded in a confusing way. Do you block the person no matter what or is your roll with a -1 penalty to determine if you get to block? Because we’ve adjusted the system to not allow people to simply save each other back and forth all the time, we want to make Block a strong talent. So yes, if you use your Block talent you save the person you were blocking from the damage they were going to take no matter what. Your -1 roll is to determine if your character gets hurt in the process. Some talents say you lose defense to gain the bonus. Does this mean you lose the HP you get from that defense? Nope. If you take a talent like Battle Fury that makes you lose defense temporarily, you don’t lose the HP with it. This applies to all talents that you exchange defense for a benefit for. Do finishing attacks (e.g. “Highest roll takes out target”) take our bonuses into account? They do not. We’ve decided for finishing rolls to finish off a boss target, these will be flat 20 rolls that bonuses don’t apply. It’s not fair to those who put their points into utility or defense to never get to be the hero.

I have suggestions or criticism about the talent system and other guild matters. What should I do? Great! We can’t make things better or improve systems without feedback. If you have some comments or criticisms, send them to Kaylir, Asterlan, Lydea, Wiltheia, or Christiara. We will put it on the docket to discuss in our meetings so we can get answers to you.

Reintroducing Criticals

As a preview to some of the changes we’re making in the event system we’ve decided that it’s time to reintroduce natural 1’s and natural 20’s into the system, because those were simply fun when you saw the numbers pop up. Let us explain how we’re doing these now. Basically stats will not apply to naturals.

For attack rounds, if you roll a natural 1 you automatically fail the roll no matter and your attack doesn’t land. If you roll a natural 20, however, you get to deal an additional 2 damage on targets atop of the damage thresholds you already pass with your stats. And you get to make it extra flashy if you wish.

For defense rolls, if you roll a natural 1 you fail, and thresholds apply without your defense bonus. For example, if Ast has 4 defense and he rolls a natural 1 on a defense roll of 15, that means he takes 3 points of damage instead of the 2 he would take if he still had the 4 defense added to is natural 1. For natural 20’s, you can counter attack once more for 1 damage.

Keep in mind with these, natural 1’s and 20’s are defined as landing on exactly 1 or 20 before your bonus stats. None of this applies if your roll equals 20 after adding your stats in.

Tide Scouting Parties

The base has been attacked and pillaged! Astrelan has assigned the Tide’s scouts with the task of tracking down the guilty party. So this is how it’s going to work: Everyday you can have one utility roll. Mail that utility roll and the actions/scouting your character did to Kaylir. You should recieve a reply to that mail with what you may have found. Make sure you title it something like Day 1 Scouting so you and Kaylir can both keep track of it. These scouting rolls will be available from April 8th to the 15th. A meeting will be done the following week to present what you all find and draw on next course of action then. Happy RPing everyone!

Brief Reminder!

Hey everyone, Kaylir here. The officers will be meeting again soon to talk about the talent system and do possible reworks, additions, and modifications. So if you have any suggestions, please send Kaylir an in game mail with it, so I can keep them all in order.