After reading through a lot of these posts, I started digging through my old Dragonrealms box and came across this:

DRAGONREALMS USER DOCUMENTATION
Version 1.3
January 26, 1996
Revised May 1, 1996
Revised October 2, 1996

This was the documentation that was available to players at that time.

Up until the time I found DR, the writer's group I belonged to used to do their RP on the AOL message boards found at the Red Dragon Inn. Imagine how excited we were when we stumbled across this magical place called Dragonrealms, that greatly enhanced our RP efforts. We all joined instantly and some remain to this day.

I thought it might be fun to post the PROFESSIONS & GUILDS section so those not around at that time can see: what the early descriptions of each were, and how close we stayed or strayed from those original paths.

PROFESSIONS & GUILDS

Each profession has a guild house in or around The Crossing. Here you can ask the guild leader about the class, join, and train. If your statistics are not up to the guild's standards, you will be give the option to let the guild handle your training up to the minimum requirement, or to go train yourself to the requirement. Generally it costs a little more to have the guild train up your stats for you.

There are several professions to choose from in Dragonrealms, each with their own abilities and limitations. Each profession has as set of primary and secondary skills that the guild leader will teach you and urge you to continue pursuing. Guild members will learn these skills at a much faster rate than others. Each guild will teach its members a special ability that is not available to any other profession. But each of these abilities comes a special class-specific limitation. [NOTE: Many of these abilities and limitations are being added and tweaked during beta testing.]

Barbarian -- Strong and stalwart, barbarians are fighters first and foremost. They are also distrustful of magic.
--Primary skill - Weapons
--Secondary skill - Survival, Armor
--Ability - Masters of combat, barbarians have the ability to berserk. A berserking barbarian is able to push through physical pain and increase his or her strength and stamina. In this state a barbarian could go negative on health points and literally die on his feet when the effect wears off.
--Limitation - Barbarians disdain magic - in fact they are sworn against it. Magic and magical effects of any type other than Inner will disrupt the barbarian's ability to berserk.

Paladins -- Noble and brave, the paladin is both a warrior of the Gods and a leader of Men.
--Primary skill - Armor
--Secondary skill - Weapons, Lore
--Ability - Paladins are pure of heart, and gain advantages from leading people into battle. Those who follow will gain a bonus based on the paladin's leadership abilities [Charisma based]
--Limitation - If paladins should lose touch with their gods by committing unlawful or evil acts, they will temporarily lose their ability to lead.

Thief -- Thieves walk on the shady side of Elanthia. They are experts at ambush, hiding, stalking, and lockpicking.
--Primary Skill - Survival
--Secondary Skill - Lore, Weapons
--Ability - The thief is most comfortable as an anonymous face in the heavily populated streets of the city. Able to slip through crowds unseen, their survival skills are enhanced. Thieves can control their inner abilities to help them blend into the world around them or enhance their normal abilities.
--Limitation - The thief who engages in conspicuous or flamboyant behavior will temporarily lose the bonus to survival skills. Also thieves are uncomfortable outside the city, and lose their skulking abilities when out in the wilds for too long.

Cleric -- The spiritual guides of the people of Elanthia, clerics are wise men or women who are the most in touch with the Gods.
--Primary Skill - Magic
--Secondary Skill - Lore, Weapons
--Ability - Direct communication with one's god or goddess allows the cleric to receive everything from divination to protection. Clerics are the only ones who can resurrect.
--Limitation - Constant rituals are required to prove the clerics' faithfulness to their gods. Lack of faithfulness or touching something that may be deemed fouling to their spiritual purity will cause them to lose communication with their god.

Empaths -- Healers of broken bodies, empaths are the only people who can assuage the terrible damage that peoples of the land may incur from combat with the monsters that plague the Realms.
--Primary Skill - Lore
--Secondary Skill - Magic, Survival
--Ability - Empaths are gifted with the ability to transfer actual physical damage from an injured person through an empathic link established by touch. Empaths also have the ability to "heal" some undead so that they are returned to a living state and allowed to continue their walk on the Starry Road of the afterlife. IE, they can destroy certain undead.
--Limitation - Because of their empathic nature, inflicting damage on any living creature is crippling to them, causing them to lose their abilities temporarily. Causing the death of another living creature will likely destroy the empath's ability forever unless other empaths should intervene on their behalf at great sacrifice to themselves.

Moon Mages -- Special mages of the Realms, Moon Mages are in touch with the power of Foresight. Though at times unpredictable, Foresight is the ability to see beyond the present into the future and can be quite valuable in seeing the fortunes of combat or what the fates may bring the Realms.
--Primary Skill - Magic
--Secondary Skill - Lore, Survival
--Ability - The Moon Mage, can predict the weather and future events {both positive and negative} by observing the moon and constellations.
--Limitation - In order to use their foresee ability, Moon Mages must research the current astrological conditions. After going through this multi-step process, they gain the foresee ability for a limited time.

Warrior Mages -- Mighty spell-slingers, Warrior Mages command both the fighting and mystical aspect of the wizard's craft. As Warrior Mages progress, they begin to specialize in a particular style of magic.
--Primary Skill - Magic
--Secondary Skill - Weapons, Lore
--Ability - Warrior Mages have the ability to summon a familiar. Familiars are special animals who are attuned to a mage's mind, allowing the mage to see through the familiar's eyes and hear through its ears, as well as other special abilities.
--Limitation - The bond between the Warrior Mage and the familiar requires the creation and maintenance of a magical talisman. The talisman must be created before a familiar can be summoned. If the familiar ever dies, the talisman is destroyed, and the mage must create another.

Rangers -- The heart of the woods and forests, Rangers are silent folk who feel most at home amongst the sylvan shade.
--Primary Skill - Survival
--Secondary Skill - Weapons, Armor
--Ability - The ranger is most at home under the sky and away from the crowded city. Out in the wilderness they will get a bonus to survival skills.
-Limitation - Spending time within heavily populated areas will confuse their natural instincts, and the ranger will temporarily lose the bonus.

Traders -- The lifeblood of the Realms' commerce, Traders spend time going from city to city, exchanging goods and striking deals. Traders can potentially become the richest of all the professions in the land.
--Primary Skill - Lore
--Secondary Skill - Survival, Armor
--Ability - A trader's ability comes from the contacts he/she makes during their journeys. These contacts will help the trader to appraise the value of an item, including its going price in any particular province.
--Limitation - The information a trader needs changes constantly, and thus if a trader is not well-traveled, this information is quickly outdated and worthless. The trader must regularly visit the various provinces to retain this ability.

Bards -- Storytellers and warriors, bards are competent fighters and have the ability to sing spells.
--Primary Skill - Lore
--Secondary Skill - Weapons, Magic
--Ability - The bard's performance ability allows for some "magical" effects based on the type of song being played.
--Limitation - The bard's ability, while not requiring an instrument, is greatly reduced without one. This instrument requires constant maintenance and upkeep or it will lose its tone, go out of tune or otherwise lose its ability to enhance the bard's ability.

(Note: At this time, Bards are still in development and are not available as a character classes. Bards should be available by November '96)
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As one who has played DR off and on since the AOL days, it's really fun to see all the changes and advancements that each guild has made.

Hats off to all the GM's and players (heroes and villains alike) who have made and continue to make Dragonrealms a very special place where one can adventure, make friends and life long memories.

Player of - Lailokken/Halfstaff/Zabadoo

heh, and thieves who stay outside of town too much losing their abilities - which is where the concept of "urban ranger" comes from.

I'm glad the guilds have evolved. i'd hate for the bonus to work like a reverse ranger.


The undead hordes would like to take this moment to remind you that they are quite happy to eat your brains so that you may test new depart.Please consider it.Hugs and kisses, Team Necro.

sorry Annwyl... thanks for the heads up on the other folder though.