I love the “pay it forward” concept – someone does something nice for you, and instead of returning the favor to them, you do something nice for someone else who needs it. Even though I recently passed my third anniversary on DDO (and never got around to blogging it), I still remember when I was an incredibly newbish newb and all the people who helped me become – well, a newb who isn’t new any more.
Slvr sent Vic a robe with a fox’s cunning clicky so she wouldn’t have to lug pots around. Vikkus sent her an anarchic rapier after her party abandoned her without loot. Dek (who I don’t think plays any more) gave Even her first heavy fort item and vorpal weapon. Once, back when I was still F2P, Even had run the first part of the Lordsmarch chain with a really good PuG. They were continuing on with the second P2P part of the chain, so I told them I’d have to drop and bade them goodnight. Oneill insisted on sending me a ship invite “for the next time you log in,” and as I was standing at the tavern selling and repairing, he dropped a guest pass on me and told me I was doing the chain with them.
Sooo many people – I’ve lost track of all the stuff Slvr and Baz and Shin and Comic and Vey have given me. Not to mention Keava, and my friends in Emerald Dragons, the very first guild I joined. And Monty’s, and a few folks from Renowned and aLi and… I’m going to stop there so I don’t leave anyone out, because it’s almost 4 am and my memory’s not great at the best of times.
I never asked for anything, and I always ask if I can pay for anything offered to me. I was lucky enough to have found great people who were happy and willing (and sometimes very insistent) to give me things I needed. And no one ever asked for anything in return. I’ve tried to reciprocate as much as possible, but I still feel as though I’ve received far more than I’ve given.
So when I come across a reasonable, considerate person in need of something, I try to help out if I have what they’re looking for. (Note: Standing in the Harbor on your level 20 legend build and asking repeatedly in the trade channel for someone to *give* you a full set of +3 tomes because you’re “new to this server” and don’t have any plat yet is neither reasonable nor considerate. Nor is begging for free hearts of wood in your former guild’s chat channel because you’ve decided you want more monk levels. And yes, both of those are real examples.)
I was on Ivy tonight and saw an LFM up for eNorm Cabal. Now, that’s out of Ivy’s range, as she only just turned 17. But the LFM description said something like, “No BB, just need relics.” I have a pretty healthy stash of relics sitting in a green bag in my shared bank, and this guy was clearly trying to *earn* his relics by running quests rather than begging for them. So I sent him a tell to see how many he needed, and he told me he’d managed to farm almost enough, just needed four more restored giant relics to finish his robes. So I dug them out, mailed them off to him, and told him to enjoy his new robes.
It felt good, and from the sincere “thank you” he sent me, I’d bet that he’s the kind of player who’ll pay it forward. And then it felt REALLY good, because I did my nightly AH check for mana pots – those things are beyond outrageous lately. I refuse to pay more than 12K for a major pot. I used to be able to pick up at least a few a week at that price, and now the ordinary mnemonics, not even greaters, commonly go for 15K. (And I bet most of those are put on the AH by people who put up LFMS for “healers only.”) Anyway, I do my search, and there’s a set of five major pots with a 25K buyout. 5K per major pot? YES, please! With the timing, it kind of felt like that was my reward for giving away the relics.
Meanwhile our little guild hit 55 last night when Acanthia turned in a saga. Our new ship was already bought, so she headed right for the airship showroom to upgrade.
On our old Windspyre ship, we tried putting the mailbox on the top deck, but it never showed up even though the hookpoint clearly said there was time left on it. So we put it on a hookpoint on the bottom of the lowest level, in the front of the ship. But it didn’t seem to like that location, because we usually found it on the floor above near the tavern. It seemed to like hanging out on the ramps, but sometimes it hid behind Sully the bartender, or buried itself partway in the floor, or hung out in some mysterious ether where we could target it but not see it, or it would just disappear completely.
The disappearing was annoying, especially since it seemed to happen more often when I had something to mail or had mail to read. But the wandering – we liked that. It was like having our own little quest on the ship – “Find the mailbox!” No XP or loot, but definitely fun. So I had just a bit of mixed feelings in upgrading the ship… but lo and behold, the mailbox still wanders, *and* so far it hasn’t disappeared yet!
Even Now 