Greetings,

As Ethians Crossing has come and gone, the war over the landmarks is in
full swing again. Paladins, Priests, Infernals, and Occultists lead the
charge to work on landmarks.

In a perfect world, that would be the case. In ours? -laugh- Yeah right.
Of course the four concerned guilds have a hefty hand in the workings of
the landmarks, but the entire world somehow gets thrown into the mix.
Some of which, don't even want to be involved in such a mess.

To clear some things up for all the critics and complainers of the
world, Shallam is extremely interesting when compared to the two other
city states. Paladins and Priests are gifted with the abilities of
devotion. Specific powers such as Prayer, Preaching, and Deliverence are
widely used throughout the City-State to extend ones life and escape
death by those who seek to kill them endlessly.These life giving
abilities tend to cost devotion energies and are replaced every dawn, if
of course the Landmarks are in Good alignment. Or by a rite of prayer,
which one church member and eight others can gather in a very noisy
room, kneel for ten minutes and raise the level of that sole devotion
user. But of course, this can only occur once per person per month�so,
if you didn't lead the rite, Ha! You're out of luck.

The righteous endeavor to sway the landmarks into good alignment for the
church is painstakingly frustrating and hard for the leadership of the
Church. Unlike Ashtan, the Church cannot field many mediocre fighters
(or a vast army of newbie weblings) nor can they field people vehement
enough to keep on pushing long after they have lost numerous levels of
experience(A.K.A The church is smarter than that and Shallam also
doesn't subscribe to when in doubt, use a graced newbie stratagem) With
the churches lack of numbers along with the lack of viable help, the
Church uses its widespread influence and aide to Shallam to draft
Shallamites into aiding them. Which -almost- balances the fight. (This
not counting the the distrubution of credits on both sides)

Ashtan on the other hand, is gifted with necromancy. We all know how
soulcage, blackwind, and deathaura go to help the well being of the
entire city-state. Given, Asthan fields necromantic fighters who enjoy
using soulcage in excess of three times per fight, and everyone in the
Sapience knows that there's no fleeing like blackwinded fleeing. But
really, all this soulcaging and blackwinding uses a lot of essence!
Unlike the Church, Necromancers just need to go find the local skirmish
and steal hearts for roughly 10% per heart. (Note, this doesn't count
over pking idiots who poach the forests for not selling herbs) So,
Necromancers, even though they're slightly linked to landmarks, in the
long run, they don't really need landmarks to exist to half their
potential

Now to the fun part. What in any gods (pick a patron) name does an
Ashuran monk, or a Warlock need with necromancy? It sure can't be the
soulcaging uses or the blackwinding abilities, because when soulcage or
blackwind occur, the monk or the warlock is screwed (because seriously
how many necromancers stay to fight after soulcaging/blackwinding?)
because that's one less person taking assaults. It can't be out of
comoraderie because with those heavy fisted solo combat, Ashurans don't
need anyone. And as Jack put it, warlocks only need relctions and webs
anyways. And Evil people, well, you can't have friends its weak (refer
to Seven Truths)
The Common Ashuran/Warlock response is the "I'm working landmarks" Yah
well, whoopy, the shrine of ascension doesn't count. Everyone who's been
there has heard the "great" ashtanite fighters say they only sit there
so someone can attack them, and they'll gain experience by ruthlessly
teaming the poor bastard hoping they'll get the last hit for a little
experience. (gotta love Rajamala race penalties eh?). So in essence, 1
in 10 non-necromancers can really explain the workings of landmarks and
even where they are located let alone actually get there.

--Hashanites are not mentioned because no one really knows what they do
or think-


As we can see from the histories of the land to present actions,
Shallam's citizenry is committed to the landmark war to pay back their
debts to the Churches benevolent actions. Even then, Shallam is
outnumbered 3 to 1 when it comes to war. Ashtan, well, 20% of their
population has a personal stake in the Landmarks, but the other 80% just
like killing people for experience. I doubt this post will even strike a
chord in anyones mind except those who live it on the shorter end of the
stick, but its worth a try to eliminate the ashtan pk reason of the
century "Duh, he was near a landmark *wipes some drool of the corner of
his mouth"

Calhoun

-Note- If you wish to argue your point of how the Shrine is a Landmark
and you pray, go talk to the the local humgii, he may care.

Penned by my hand on the 15th of Daedalan, in the year 287 AF.