With the influx of new players in the last couple of days, it has been my suspicion that many of you are transplants to Imperian from the unfortunate end of Midkemia Online. If you have joined us from there, welcome to Imperian! Having never dabbled in MKO myself, I cannot claim to understand the disappointment felt of the environment you are leaving, but as a seasoned IRE gamer I give my wholehearted endorsement of Imperian as the absolute best place to invest your time.

Imperian especially is blessed with an attentive administration team, who have done a lot of hard work to make Imperian's storyline progressive, and to encourage role-play and an environment more engaging than any I've encountered in IRE. This game is oozing unique quality of life mechanics (HELP AUTOCURING, for instance - and its functional!) and unique items and collectables. Fishing, jousting, taming, quest honors, boss mobs and of course a geography unique from the IRE template of Achaea/Aetolia worthy of exploring. This all in addition to the IRE staples of crafting, normal questing, hunting, events, etc.

And of course, Imperian was once dubbed the 'wild west' of IRE as far as PvP goes. Due to the general direction of a long-lived game, this has mellowed out. However, with shardfalls (HELP SHARDS) the emphasis for casual fighters has shifted to team fights in a way that allows non-artifacted mid-bies to also participate and find success in fighting. Those of you pushing mountains of credits looking for artifact-laden and/or exceptionally skilled opponents might come as a breath of fresh air to our own fighting base as well. With autocuring in place, which most of the population uses, the largest hurdle is learning to manipulate your own profession, rather than to build a system from scratch and try to code around stupidity emotes, the learning curve is very welcoming to newer fighters. Meanwhile, our best fighters have formed a clan for helping others get their toes wet (CLANHELP PVP).

Org-wise, our emphasis is on cities and councils well above guilds, and to that end our role-play is also primarily focussed there -- if you are looking for people to interact with, that is where I recommend looking for that enrichment. This game is much less polarized than others I've seen, with two cities (Kinsarmar and Antioch) now allowing anyone from any faction to patronize it. Some organizations are naturally stricter than others, but in general there will not be much resistance to you moving, speaking, and emoting to your heart's content to anyone you pass. Our circle-wide politics are surprisingly nuanced and complicated with the good and bad that comes with these lines. For our hardcore rpers, I do recommend shying away from circle rings, which are strictly OOC, unless you are interested in the chicanery of 'real people'.

I am personally thrilled at the idea of a few new players despite the sad news that might bring you here. I know that others feel the same. I'm confident to say that everyone has the opportunity to find Imperian an engaging place. Our small playerbase are loyal and engaging people, I can say certainly that the only thing Imperian has been lacking has been new players and the enthusiasm and change they bring along. Welcome, welcome from me and the others of us of us who are also glad to see you giving Imperian a try. I know I and the rest of us will be putting our best feetses forward to answer any questions, emote at you, and generally help you see the side of this game that has brought so many of us faithfully into this little fantasy.

Penned by my hand on the 20th of Halitus, in the year 112 AM.