This post was a lot easier for me to write than I initially thought it would be. Although I never thought I would write anything like this, I've come to realize that anything is possible and that change is a necessary and beneficial part of life.

Before I start meandering, I will state up front that I will be stepping down from the position of Warrior Mage Advocate. Although I will not be relinquishing my tenure as a GM, I will become invisible to the public, focused on small fixes and changes to enhance the game as a whole.

Those of you who have been following my sporadic posts over the past year will understand that because of my other committments (multiple jobs and school) I haven't been able to dedicate the amount of time to development that this guild deserves. Additionally, because gamewide development has been rushing forward as such a great speed, I can't take the time to relearn the game every time a major update is made. It's impossible to successfully develop long-term or involved projects when the ground is constantly shifting and there is no time to regain balance--and the guild is at the point where it needs those long-term projects to bring fun and excitement back to being a warrior mage.

It's time to step back and let someone else take the reins, someone with more time to work and more passion to revitalize the guild.

I won't be leaving the next advocate empty-handed. I would not want to have the next GM who assumes that mantle to be put into the same position I was in five years ago. To that extent I've created documentation to clarify projects, development, and ideas that I was not able to complete. The long-term projects I can no longer maintain have been passed into very capable hands, along with enough information to ensure that they can be completed with minimal changeover issues. Until a new Advocate can be found, GM Zeyurn will be stepping in to fulfill those duties. It will be difficult to see the guild's development out of my control for the first time in many years, but I am confident that those who follow me will bring honor to the role.

Developing for this guild has been one of the high points in my life. Trials and tribulations aside, it's been a fun and eventful five plus years. I would like to believe that I offered a level of stability to the guild that suffered through a lot of absentee gurus over the years, and helped guide the guild through some of its darkest times. Not bad, I think, for a newbie GM who was thrust into the position of guild guru with zero preparation. :)

This may be my final post. If you hear from me again in the distant future, it will mean that I have regained the drive and excavated the time to make Big Changes to DragonRealms. If you don't hear from me, no worries--I've gone on to better things, but will carry memories of my time here in a special place. (Then again, I may just be lurking, waiting for the perfect moment to strike when you least expect it.)

As a parting gift, I intend to leave the guild with my most recent spell creation, Blufmor Garaen. (The mere fact that it took nearly a year to finish this rather simple spell goes a great deal of the way in explaining why I must scale back my participation in DragonRealms.) Look for this spell in the next couple of weeks as it passes its final clearance.


- GM Wythor

What goes up
is futile --
unless it goes out