Hi, i will attempt to expand upon my original post as that seems to be the right of passage here and something important to the community.
I am Dimitri.
I first got involved with this game as a little kid around that 1999-2000 period. At this time the technology was seen as mindblowing by my family. Especially as a male as the ability to remotely socialize with friends/family who are half a city/country/world away while computer gaming and getting real time responses/feedback was revolutionary as long catchups over phone calls were not in our culture especially when the landline disconnected the dialup. After mainly being reduced to a spectator for that first year, my real taste of the game was post tram. Since it was all i had experienced, it was the golden era for me. Being massacred at Brit cemetary while others watch to getting your hands on a silver weapon and watching the next batch of new players get massacred. Saving your best gear for PvM and only risking junk in PvP as gear inequality/powercreep wasn't there yet and your 4th choice outfit was competitive. Of course there was also the much enjoyable period of farming Ettins in group, grinding while dreaming of pooling gold together and getting that 300k Earth Elemental Slayer katana for sale on a vendor near brit gate. Not long after, real life took over and the downsides of AOS etc paled in comparison.
Over 15 Years later i returned in some capicity. If i can escape life then i will play but it's a revolving cycle of getting nostalgic and getting right back into it, getting bored or real life taking over after a few months and then repeating several times a year. I spend 90% of time on the smaller offical shards/10% on Atl, so an event is bumping into someone somewhere. Unfortunately any friends i played with are long gone and forgotten while spotting a name or two i remember in the community but didn't personally know at one of the shards memorial sites with date and backstory of their passing is always a devastating reminder of how time constantly moves on.
During this cycle i have been very interested in how game mechanics have been exploited in the past and exploring any ways they can be taken advantage of in the present. As opposed to things that kill the fun of playing like dupes, i am more interested in how people exploited to get to places they shouldn't/taking/bringin items to places they shouldn't/graphical bugs or creating unique situations or objects. It's often hard to find details about how some old exploits were done but i find it facisinating finding any clues about how players exploited the game in the past and the reasoning behind how such exploits were possible and how they were stumbled upon etc. Unfortunately it seems nearly impossible to find knowledgable active people who just enjoy messing around with game mechanics and seeing what's allowed just for the fun of it.
