Hi Folks,
Well, I'm LochLinn. I've been playing UO since October 1, 2000 - that date I will NEVER forget. I came into the OSI/EA servers just after the UO:Rennaisannce release, and absolutely fell in love.
Unfortunately, EA then did everything that they could to reject my love. The (AOS) Age of S*** was the last stage - especially when one of the developers actually had the stones to come into the Stratics forums and state that he was changing a lot of stuff - "Just to stir things up". This was when EA was letting the 'oldtimers' from OSI go, and replacing them with the newer developers, and new ideas (most of which emulated a vacuum cleaner) - Can you say "From the Mind of Todd McFarlane"? - I knew you could - just wish EA couldn't.
Fortunately, by then (2002 sometime) the freeshards were getting into full swing. I discovered the World of Dreams shard - running on the old POL software, and fell in love all over again. It was good for a couple years, then the shard closed down - and multiple attempts to ressurect it by some of the players all failed.
I drifted over to the ShadowCove shard, but that didn't last too long. Me and the shard admins had a bit of differences, and I left there. They were too heavy into role-playing - to the extent that the admins would float around invisible, and if you got caught even TALKING to another player "Out of Character" - you got disciplined. A friend of mine got jailed for talking with his nephew wayyyy out in the middle of nowhere - discussing some family stuff. Too much Gestapo for me, so I left.
Searching again, I tried some of the bigger shards (Excelsior, etc), but they felt too much like EA - mainly in the large userbase. I had gotten used to a small shard, "Where everybody knows your name" lol.
Ended up on Paradise Found, but once again, some differences in opinion between me and the shard owner caused a departure - nothing abusive or violent (none of my departures were angry, just sad and regretful).
Currently happy on the shard I found a while ago in 2013, but had to stop playing for a couple years. When I recently went back to it - it was still there, and I am soooo happy.
That's about it - other minor changes in my life (jobs, moving, people dying, etc), but the important part (UO) is here in a nutshell
Thanks, LochLinn
