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Tabula Rasa's shutdown salute schedule
Listen up, soldiers! We're going to post this once and only once, so I want all eyes and ears on this blog post! Do you get me!?*Waits to hear the chorus of "We get you, sir!" coming from the computer monitor.*We have gotten word from AFS High Command that the Bane are preparing for an all out attack against the Allied Free Sentients in Tabula Rasa. This will be the single largest troop movement that the battlefields have seen to date. This is why all soldiers are being asked to fortify all AFS bases in preparation of an attack on Saturday at 8 PM GMT for the Centarus (EU) server and again at 8 PM CST for the Hydra server.These attacks will be lead by the infamous Neph, cousin race to the benevolent Eloh. Neph are the most intelligent commanders that the Bane has to throw against us, but we will fight them back!The attacks are expected to last until midnight GMT and midnight CST. If we are unsuccessful with our defense, and should we be overrun, then we will make sure that their victory will cost them everything! The Penumbra Division has been ordered to ready the last resort weapon and only fire it should we still be under attack at midnight. If we're going down, we're taking them, and the server, with us!Hoo-rah, soldiers!
A long overdue Tabula Rasa loregasm
As rich as we've always found the Tabula Rasa universe, we've always felt like they've stopped precariously short of fully fleshing out the universe as inhabited by the AFS and those nasty Bane. The reason for this is likely practical; they don't want to write themselves into a corner and have to resort to strange retcons or deus ex machina to be able to shoe-horn in content for the expansions down the road.Perhaps in an effort to assuage our fears of floating lore-less through life, this week's Feedback Friday explores many of the questions players have had about Tabula Rasa's universe. Many of the items are easily to explain and hammer down, like the AFS chain of command and the reasoning behind the credit system for soldiers in a time of war. More ambiguous are questions about the size and nature of the larger Bane forces and their Neph overlords, which lead us to the logical conclusion that these are avenues that the game will explore further down the road.
Building the Bane
Over at GameZone, there's a lengthy article about the origins of the main villains of the whole Tabula Rasa saga: The Bane. It's also got some beautiful shots from Destination Games of a Thrax soldier and the Neph, and goes into a bit of detail of the Bane hierarchy -- standard story fluff, you'd think, but intriguing.The Thrax are quite well personalized as a race, actually -- in that they're immediately recognizeable as repulsive, and that you want to shoot them. It also makes a break from tradition in that they're the first foe you'll encounter in TR, and that they're not stupid; instead of the usual fighting of rats / bats / giant spiders / kobolds to introduce you to a standard MMO, dropping assorted body parts that you'll immediately sell for two shillings. Not that I'm a cynic, and not that other MMOs don't have their own memorable opponents -- be they Charr, Nazgûl, or other players.Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to kill some Trolls.
