The History of the Refugees
I am going to be as brief as I can in this description, though I must ask that you bear with an old dwarf, as the tale of the Refugees' beginnings - like that of most guilds it seems - has many perspectives. I can only provide you my own in hopes that it might enlighten you as to the why's, what's, who's and how many's which go into a tale like this.
My name is Michael and I'm a game-aholic. Ok, ok so maybe it isn't as dramatic as all that, but the reality is, I love MMORPG's. I'm a middle-aged guy who falls into the heading 'computer geek' as I make both my living and my free-time slip away engaged in some facet of reality relating to one of these silly boxes. I'm very happily married with a wife and two sons who are all beautiful and whom I love very, very much. But I am also a gamer. No if's, and's, or but's about it, I love the role-playing genre as a whole. You can tell by my age that I grew up in the age of 'Dungeons and Dragons' and all the FASA games which ensued, no denying that. From Forgotten Realms to Castle Lords I pretty much played em all as a kid. Even got into the whole sci-fi craze and went into Battletech for quite awhile.
So why am I telling you all of this? Simply put, I think that you should know what you're getting yourself into here. You see, I helped found the Refugees guild, although it wasn't supposed to be this way.
(Cue the cheezy flashback music)
It all started a couple years ago...
I had spent the better part of 4 years in EverQuest. Or should I say 'Evercrack' as it has become so affectionately known. And I had burnt out. Betrayed by people I once thought to be friends in the first guild I helped create some years ago, I left the Tribunal server in EQ for Vazaelle after having built a half-elf Paladin all the way to level 58. Stripped him clean of the equipment it had taken me nearly 3 years to gather up and shouted my discontent to the lands of Norrath for all to hear. And then I promptly deleted him and moved to Vazaelle and started a brand new Shadowknight and a new guild. Back then, that was a big deal, believe me.
You see, the guild I ran on Tribunal had become quite large and basically defined the term 'Uber'. Yup, there's that word. You're going to hear it alot from us here in Refugees. Because it stands for everything we strive to stand against. Anyways, back to the story.
After nearly a year and half on Vaz, I finally realized EverQuest was literally eating its way into every facet of my life. You see, being a guild leader is a LOT of WORK. Don't ever let anyone tell you any different and to be honest, to anyone who ever reads this and thinks 'geez being a gl is a cakewalk' all I can say is 'bite me'. Walk a mile in my shoes. Try it for yourself. Then come talk to me, ok?
Ok. And so I left EQ. Walked away from the game entirely, and from gaming in general for about a year. Then my wife finally told me she knew how much I loved to game - it's basically my only hobby besides playing basketball and hanging out with my kids - and that I should find something else to play. So I looked around for a bit and stumbled onto Earth and Beyond still in very early beta. Jumped right in and started shooting stuff in space. Wooohoo! I thought, 'man this is cool'.
But, then the inevitable happened, I went and screwed up and made a friend. There I was, out shooting some stuff down near Mars station one night, and low and behold here comes this gung-ho space jockey named MacKlodder. To say Mac and I hit it off from the word go is probably putting it mildly. You know how sometimes you just feel like you're supposed to be friends with someone? That's Mac and I to a 'T'. He's an idijit, but he'll always be my idjit! Mac introduced me to Eeyore and for a long time the 3 of us were basically the 3 amigos hanging out in EnB. So, eventually we hooked up with a bunch of other good people and ended up in a guild named Sol Confederacy, which basically was dying at the time. The GL had bailed and left a bunch of people lost and hanging and Mac, being Mac, kind of 'suggested' to the other members of SC that I would be a good guy to get us going in the right direction. The bastige. I still owe him for that one lemme tell ya.
Ever heard of being nominated for a job simply because you were the person who missed the meeting? Yup, that was me. And that's how I ended up the GL of SolCon. But I ran the guild for nearly 6 months and took us into the Gold release of the game and things were going really well actually. Unfortunately, I had a real life tragedy happen with a death in my family and so I again walked away from the gaming world. I'll save you the sordid details and just say, I was gone long enough that I handed the reigns of SC over to Mac and said my goodbyes.
A year passed and my family has mourned and moved on with our loss and I am back to a full time job and have some free time on my hands again when wouldn't ya know it, but who shows up on my MSN messenger but Mac? "Imaj ya gotta come try Horizons with me man. It's in beta and it's pretty cool." he says. "Come on bro, I promise I won't even nominate ya for GL this time, you can just play bro." So, I look at the wife and say "Honey, what do you think?" And she smiles and says "Michael, it's Mac. Come on. You're going and you know it."
(sigh). God, I hate being predicatable.
So off into the lands of Istaria we went. Headlong into adventures. Killing the bad guys. Clearing the lands of the undead. But we agreeed from the word go that if we were going to build a guild, this time we were doing it totally from scratch and we were going to do it totally differently than anything else out there. We weren't going to be 'uber'.
'Uber' sucks.
'Uber' destroys lives.
'Uber' generally means you have absolutely no life outside of the game you're currently in because you're so totally consumed by it.
'Uber', my friends, doesn't work too well with a new baby in the house and a 9 year old, and a full time job, and a mortgage, and two cats, and two cars and...You get the point.
And thus, ladies and gents, the idea for Refugees was born.
The 'anti-uber' guild.
A place where people who just want to play, hang out and enjoy whatever game we're in can do so and they don't have to always worry about becoming all-powerful and all-knowing.
Now, don't get me wrong, this doesn't mean we immediately say 'Hey, we're anti-uber, we suck come kick our butts'. On the contrary. You would be really surprised at how many of us there are. Grandparents. Brothers and sisters. Professionals. Full-time college students. Moms and Dads. People with busy, full, engaging lives outside of our computers.
Ever heard the term 'An idea whose time has come is true power'? Well ladies and gents I am here to tell you, heh, this idea is one whose time has come. And my goodness, the people we have been able to attract to Refugees simply by being who and what we are is totally amazing. It really has been a labor of love getting this guild going and watching it turn into something which truly has a life of its own during the past five years. (My god has it been that long already?!?). From Dreamz and Breagan to Chara and Nef to Fernmug and Nittering and Navarra and all the others who have joined us since we expanded out of Horizons in 2003, Refugees has grown into a true cyber 'family'.
Sadly, Mac has since left us. He's off galavanting the backwoods of Minnesota these days. And where's that leave me? Heh...running a guild again. There's a really big difference this time though. With Refugees things are much different than they ever have been before it seems. I don't have to play every night, and everyone is cool with that. I don't have to be in on all the latest, coolest goings on in whatever game we are in, and no one minds.
It is my honor, and my privilege to hang out and game with such awesome people, let me tell you. And frankly, my question to you is, why be 'uber' and lose everything else when you can simply be a Refugee and have more fun than you ever dreamed of?
"For what doth a man gain that he should inherit all the gold in the world yet lose his own soul?"
Refugees isn't for everyone, this I know. But ya know what? That's just fine by me!
If all of this makes sense to you, if the history sounds similar to the path you yourself have walked, or even if you're just looking for a guild that truly defines the term 'family' on the web... then welcome. If not, then sorry we're probably not the guild for you.
You can read even more about our history in the chapter histories we have posted as well.
Best Regards,
Imajicaan Mae'Stro
Guild Founder/Sovereign
Refugees
I am going to be as brief as I can in this description, though I must ask that you bear with an old dwarf, as the tale of the Refugees' beginnings - like that of most guilds it seems - has many perspectives. I can only provide you my own in hopes that it might enlighten you as to the why's, what's, who's and how many's which go into a tale like this.
My name is Michael and I'm a game-aholic. Ok, ok so maybe it isn't as dramatic as all that, but the reality is, I love MMORPG's. I'm a middle-aged guy who falls into the heading 'computer geek' as I make both my living and my free-time slip away engaged in some facet of reality relating to one of these silly boxes. I'm very happily married with a wife and two sons who are all beautiful and whom I love very, very much. But I am also a gamer. No if's, and's, or but's about it, I love the role-playing genre as a whole. You can tell by my age that I grew up in the age of 'Dungeons and Dragons' and all the FASA games which ensued, no denying that. From Forgotten Realms to Castle Lords I pretty much played em all as a kid. Even got into the whole sci-fi craze and went into Battletech for quite awhile.
So why am I telling you all of this? Simply put, I think that you should know what you're getting yourself into here. You see, I helped found the Refugees guild, although it wasn't supposed to be this way.
(Cue the cheezy flashback music)
It all started a couple years ago...
I had spent the better part of 4 years in EverQuest. Or should I say 'Evercrack' as it has become so affectionately known. And I had burnt out. Betrayed by people I once thought to be friends in the first guild I helped create some years ago, I left the Tribunal server in EQ for Vazaelle after having built a half-elf Paladin all the way to level 58. Stripped him clean of the equipment it had taken me nearly 3 years to gather up and shouted my discontent to the lands of Norrath for all to hear. And then I promptly deleted him and moved to Vazaelle and started a brand new Shadowknight and a new guild. Back then, that was a big deal, believe me.
You see, the guild I ran on Tribunal had become quite large and basically defined the term 'Uber'. Yup, there's that word. You're going to hear it alot from us here in Refugees. Because it stands for everything we strive to stand against. Anyways, back to the story.
After nearly a year and half on Vaz, I finally realized EverQuest was literally eating its way into every facet of my life. You see, being a guild leader is a LOT of WORK. Don't ever let anyone tell you any different and to be honest, to anyone who ever reads this and thinks 'geez being a gl is a cakewalk' all I can say is 'bite me'. Walk a mile in my shoes. Try it for yourself. Then come talk to me, ok?
Ok. And so I left EQ. Walked away from the game entirely, and from gaming in general for about a year. Then my wife finally told me she knew how much I loved to game - it's basically my only hobby besides playing basketball and hanging out with my kids - and that I should find something else to play. So I looked around for a bit and stumbled onto Earth and Beyond still in very early beta. Jumped right in and started shooting stuff in space. Wooohoo! I thought, 'man this is cool'.
But, then the inevitable happened, I went and screwed up and made a friend. There I was, out shooting some stuff down near Mars station one night, and low and behold here comes this gung-ho space jockey named MacKlodder. To say Mac and I hit it off from the word go is probably putting it mildly. You know how sometimes you just feel like you're supposed to be friends with someone? That's Mac and I to a 'T'. He's an idijit, but he'll always be my idjit! Mac introduced me to Eeyore and for a long time the 3 of us were basically the 3 amigos hanging out in EnB. So, eventually we hooked up with a bunch of other good people and ended up in a guild named Sol Confederacy, which basically was dying at the time. The GL had bailed and left a bunch of people lost and hanging and Mac, being Mac, kind of 'suggested' to the other members of SC that I would be a good guy to get us going in the right direction. The bastige. I still owe him for that one lemme tell ya.
Ever heard of being nominated for a job simply because you were the person who missed the meeting? Yup, that was me. And that's how I ended up the GL of SolCon. But I ran the guild for nearly 6 months and took us into the Gold release of the game and things were going really well actually. Unfortunately, I had a real life tragedy happen with a death in my family and so I again walked away from the gaming world. I'll save you the sordid details and just say, I was gone long enough that I handed the reigns of SC over to Mac and said my goodbyes.
A year passed and my family has mourned and moved on with our loss and I am back to a full time job and have some free time on my hands again when wouldn't ya know it, but who shows up on my MSN messenger but Mac? "Imaj ya gotta come try Horizons with me man. It's in beta and it's pretty cool." he says. "Come on bro, I promise I won't even nominate ya for GL this time, you can just play bro." So, I look at the wife and say "Honey, what do you think?" And she smiles and says "Michael, it's Mac. Come on. You're going and you know it."
(sigh). God, I hate being predicatable.
So off into the lands of Istaria we went. Headlong into adventures. Killing the bad guys. Clearing the lands of the undead. But we agreeed from the word go that if we were going to build a guild, this time we were doing it totally from scratch and we were going to do it totally differently than anything else out there. We weren't going to be 'uber'.
'Uber' sucks.
'Uber' destroys lives.
'Uber' generally means you have absolutely no life outside of the game you're currently in because you're so totally consumed by it.
'Uber', my friends, doesn't work too well with a new baby in the house and a 9 year old, and a full time job, and a mortgage, and two cats, and two cars and...You get the point.
And thus, ladies and gents, the idea for Refugees was born.
The 'anti-uber' guild.
A place where people who just want to play, hang out and enjoy whatever game we're in can do so and they don't have to always worry about becoming all-powerful and all-knowing.
Now, don't get me wrong, this doesn't mean we immediately say 'Hey, we're anti-uber, we suck come kick our butts'. On the contrary. You would be really surprised at how many of us there are. Grandparents. Brothers and sisters. Professionals. Full-time college students. Moms and Dads. People with busy, full, engaging lives outside of our computers.
Ever heard the term 'An idea whose time has come is true power'? Well ladies and gents I am here to tell you, heh, this idea is one whose time has come. And my goodness, the people we have been able to attract to Refugees simply by being who and what we are is totally amazing. It really has been a labor of love getting this guild going and watching it turn into something which truly has a life of its own during the past five years. (My god has it been that long already?!?). From Dreamz and Breagan to Chara and Nef to Fernmug and Nittering and Navarra and all the others who have joined us since we expanded out of Horizons in 2003, Refugees has grown into a true cyber 'family'.
Sadly, Mac has since left us. He's off galavanting the backwoods of Minnesota these days. And where's that leave me? Heh...running a guild again. There's a really big difference this time though. With Refugees things are much different than they ever have been before it seems. I don't have to play every night, and everyone is cool with that. I don't have to be in on all the latest, coolest goings on in whatever game we are in, and no one minds.
It is my honor, and my privilege to hang out and game with such awesome people, let me tell you. And frankly, my question to you is, why be 'uber' and lose everything else when you can simply be a Refugee and have more fun than you ever dreamed of?
"For what doth a man gain that he should inherit all the gold in the world yet lose his own soul?"
Refugees isn't for everyone, this I know. But ya know what? That's just fine by me!
If all of this makes sense to you, if the history sounds similar to the path you yourself have walked, or even if you're just looking for a guild that truly defines the term 'family' on the web... then welcome. If not, then sorry we're probably not the guild for you.
You can read even more about our history in the chapter histories we have posted as well.
Best Regards,
Imajicaan Mae'Stro
Guild Founder/Sovereign
Refugees
I'm not great at SC but love it anyway 
