"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power."
- Abraham Lincoln
This is the story of how I lost my apprentice to the Darkside.
One day abou 8 to 9 motin the hot Alkir sands I found 2 travelers. They sent me a xbox party invite and they had a ton of questions about the game so I began to train them. The names of these travelers are Picklez and Briz.
Briz was a healer so it was super simple to help him out.
Picklez however had a thirst for power and has a very competitive spirit.
Upon meeting me he adopted my play style and even made a new character that was the same class and race as my Main. I was Happy and willing to teach and so him the ways of The Fire Serpent.
As some time passed we would meet another Traveler that went by the name of Train. This man was only around 40cp when we meet him. Train was one of those people who would dual Anybody and just wanted to dual he loves it and still loves it. So when we ran into him he was smacking his head against Picklez and then Picklez decided to bring him my way so I could help him out.
At this time Picklez was about 160 to 170 cp, so I had crafted him 2 very powerful sets to help him.
We told Train about the gear cap (cp160) and suddenly nothing else mattered to him, I took him into Skyreach and ran it for hours to get him from cp40 to Cp160 (Without Charge) .
We crafted Train new 160 cp gear Forged in the fires of the Ashen Forge he Arised as a new champion. Harden by battle and forged through fire he would confront the Mighty Picklez once more to hopefully conquer him in Victory.
In a way at this time they were pretty equal and treated each other as such.
There fights became more and more interesting as the days would come, Interesting it seemed as healthy it would be like they would motivate each other through this Ritual they would preform every day to ever other day.
Little did I know this would soon change as Picklez Competitive nature started to stand out, he wanted more power, and the power he would seek would ultimately Consume him.
Train had to seek power to Adapt.
The 2 difference in between these 2 Appreciates was this
Picklez was very good at hearing Advice and actually applying it in Application.
Train however loved Advice but a bit more into discovering how to get things to work in his own way.
Train had specific ways he wanted to play the game, really great Ideas and alot of them to be smacked down over and over again by this new build that was Adviced to Picklez, that was simply some really good sets that seen a few changes with the patch.
We actually went out of our way to farm these sets together before the patch changed them. In this time we had just gotten access to the New Greymoor patch.
I went out of my way to collect all of the Mythicals once it drop as I could imagine most people did.
In time I would learn ways to use my ring and two 5p sets with a monster helm , with certain conditions.
In sharing this understanding with them, Picklez was the first to become Extremely motivated by this after seeing the power of this Ring first hand when I was wielding it, right there his adventure for the Brutality Band Began.
Up until this point Picklez would always have a very hard time killing me and I won basically every dual he would throw my way.
The patch dropped, Picklez got his Brutality Band, equipped the gear we farmed before the patch in the same two 5ps, monster helm, and ring formation he was now entering in his final Form.
This is just like when the Fire Nation Attacked, Everything changed.
Around this time Picklez was about 420cp and Train was a bit lower Cp still I can't remember exactly but let's say 350cp.
Basically Every dual Picklez had with train would result in a victory to the point from my Angle I could tell Picklez wasn't even really trying hard at all to beat him and this Infuriated Train.
Train would talk about how this game is broken he cant do this he cant do that, this doesn't work, that doesn't work, my buttons aren't going on. In reality Train is now feeling what it is like to be Literally DeSynced because the other player is doing so much damage and his damage mitigation wasn't high enough and he is play a Stam Sorc so Train can not Purge these Insane Fire Damage over time abilities so he try's to streak but Picklez uses a Staff and typically just leaps on him after he streaks.
A Health daily dualing section, became a Toxic daily mockery from Picklez to Train of how you still cant touch this build.
Train would cycle set after set ability after ability, weapons and even roles like Werewolf and Tank.
However how this build worked against the same build, (Basically when I fought Picklez literally wearing the same build) we discovered that it was actually ridiculous. Whoever got the first Fossilize off would win.
It wasn't very fun to fight a Fossilize roulette and in my Opinion wasn't very Interesting or Intelligent. Since I knew if I could remove the dots he wouldn't be as much of as threat. So I set up a Stam Necro build and it countered it perfectly. I did this to show Train it is possible to Counter it, you just need to purge.
However this upset Train because he really really likes to use his stam sorcerer and is just mad that he can't counter That build on his favorite class.
One day recently the Ritual began again, Picklez, Train and I stood in Glenumbra hanging out talking and I had mentioned my new Stam Dk build that I'm using and I fight train a couple times and then I fight Picklez. I can't remember the exact order of Duels but what happened was train and I beat him a few times he switched from his below lv 50 Dk to the Serpent Dk with "The Build".
When he gets back I win a few against him, then he swaps his monster set to Grothgarr after I tell him I'm timing my Shield Ulti to counter his incredible power Zaans proc. I lose 3 times and realize he's putting up to much pressure with Grothgarr for me to just stand still. He makes a Comment like "Alright after this one I'm about to get on some Netflix"
In my mind I'm already thinking about how I'm going to counter this now that he has Grothgarr, so I say "Okay"
The dual Starts and Suddenly right from the start he Fozziles going into a heavy damage dealing rotation as I break free the pressure on my is so much that I'm rapidly go to 75% I know I need to Kite him to stay Alive so I hit Race against time removing the snares he placed on my from his Dragonknight passive, Rotate around the build that was near us then he uses his talon to Immobilize me as I drop close to 50% then I sheild ulti buying me some time to recover now that I'm not stand in his Grothgarr, it takes me nothing but a second to recover as I run back around the corner to Delete his character in 3 or 4 hits Winning the dual.
After winning the Dual I tell him, "Alright, looks like it's time to get on Netflix." He responds "Wow, you need to relax" I laugh at the comment and respond "Your probably right."
-Picklez has Left the Chat
Train went to smoke when this happened so he came back about 15 to 20 mins later and I talked him about what happened. Told him I felt bad for talking to Picklez that way and later that Night I view Picklez profile to see him on hulu as I send him a message telling him, That I was sorry for talking to him that way.
The next day when we got a bunch of guild members in a party chat Picklez joined and I'm of course Ecstatic to see him join the party so That I can personally say sorry and talk to him about it, I find he can't hear me because one of my guild members says that he has muted me. I later find the had left Guild as well.
It saddens me to lose a apprentice, especially one that I have worked with for so long. He said in the chat after he muted me, So I can still hear him just cant speak with him something like "Well maybe he will learn to not talk to a friend like that." Maybe he's right but I would have thought if he was truly a friend he would be willing to Accept my Apology and move on.
I write this in memory of my lost Apprentice that maybe I can continue to learn from this and others may also learn from my mistakes.
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.
-Abraham Lincoln