I have to agree with Miriana and Sylly. If someone wants to twink, they
should go ahead and twink. The idea of twinking my own characters
bothered me at first, because I prefer to "do it myself", but there are
several reasons why I got over it.

Unless you are a powergamer, and are generally at the crest of the
high-level wave moving up on a server, the following happens way too
often:

At roughly level 20, I am in Highpass with a group of five other
like-levelled players, none of which is a direct-dealing magic user. On
four occasions, the named Orc spawned. The six of us pile on, we whack
away. Who gets the kill? One of the level 16 soloing Wizards sitting on
the rocks on the edge. Four times.

Or: I am in Oasis with three other players of a level appropriate to
take out Lockjaw. He spawns. Some idiot shouts "Lockjaw at second
pillar", four players in the 30 range come over to take him out. They
are not together, they are each hoping to take out Lockjaw for
themselves. What does a level 30 player need with a Lockjaw vest?

Or: I am in Highkeep. The first time there (level 10) there were a
total of six players there in the middle of a Saturday. My party,
killing prisoners. Recently, I am in Highkeep with a group of six
low-20s, trying to hold the upper room, (25 to 35 people there) and what
keeps happening? Soloing level 34s come in and announce that they are
taking spawn points. Or: soloing level 34s come in invisible, sit on
the doorjamb, and blast anything we're fighting as soon as it has taken
roughly half damage.

I currently have eight entirely full backpacks sitting in the bank, with
full equipment on my character, and NOT ONE of the items in the bank or
on my person (with the exception of some that are not usable by Bards,
and are for sale if I ever have the patience) is an item I earned during
a fight. Why? Because when *I* get to any area in the game that is a
reasonable challenge for players of my level, and that area has nice
loot, it is ALWAYS camped by KSing wizards, high-level loot gatherers, or
even, simply, players who really should have moved on to something
tougher but have just not bothered to do so.

I have been detailed to NYC for the last three months for five days a
week, so I get to play only on (crowded) weekends. My former fighting
partners are ten to sixteen levels above me. As far as I am concerned,
anything they want to hand down to me is fair game.

They have provided me with: silver-plated leggings and a silver-plated
bracer, thulian claws, a water crystal staff, and some pauldron and belt
whose names I forget, but are pretty useful. I did not "earn" any of
these in the conventional sense, but the way things work on an aging
server, I never will, so tough.

I also have a level 10 warrior that I started a few weekends ago (so I
could solo something relatively mindless for those times when I could no
longer stand grouping - why is it always me that gets to: lure, announce
the presence of spawns, direct who should med and when, announce who to
assist, instruct who to heal, and keep track of loot order?) Part of the
fun of playing this warrior has been the surprise acts of kindness from
total strangers. I received (free) an FS rapier, three derv rings, a
ringmail tunic, and countless unasked for buffs, heals and cures. Not to
mention the three marriage proposals (oh, I'm a female human warrior,
hehe, blond). I do not feel that this detracted from my game-playing
experience one bit. In fact, it made it a lot more fun.

One more place where twinking helped me out: I managed to get my
Smithing up to the point where banded armor is cost-effective to make
just about the time when prices collapsed. The only thing that let me
walk away from the experience with a profit (and without bitterness) was
the four twinked players each of whom bought complete sets of banded from
me for 125pp, no questions asked.

More twinking!

Kenross Cantoforjado, 27 songs, Innoruuk