Wow, great course. I wish you\'d have written this post when I was studying Shakespeare, and not understanding a single word of it...
English not being my native tongue, I can\'t really say if this kind of language is suitable for RP situations. However, on a more \"external\" point of view, I think this type of language is really beautiful and poetic, and I wouldn\'t mind seing it used on PS at all, moreover because this kind of language is unconsciously associated (at least for me) to works of fiction dealing with the fantastic (not only Shakespeare but also Tolkien for example). But as far as RP goes, it should be restricted to scholars anyway. Strangely enough I can\'t picture my dwarf character speaking like that...

(officially) translating guides having multi-language help channel will actually reduce the need for players to learn the language, and so they won\'t.

In every debate about languages here, I\'ve always found this idea very intriguing, that learning a language is a sort of natural process and only a matter of good will.
As I stated earlier, such things takes YEARS of HARD WORK and a lot of motivation (it requires more than just a game).
So let me put this straight :
 
NOONE will learn a whole language just for a game. EVER.

Therefore the whole \"if we allow language support no one will make the effort of learning english\" thing is totally absurd. When they come on PS, people already know english, or don\'t, and if they don\'t, it\'s more than likely that they never will.

So there are only 2 solutions :
- You accept this fact and make language support available.
- You don\'t accept it and forbid people who don\'t speak english to play.
Pretty simple, eh ?

Originally posted by buddha
6. \"Furthermore, english is a very easy language to learn, for the reasons that have been stated already.\"

I think most linguists would beg to differ with this one.  Any experts out there?

Well I\'m not an expert at all, but I\'ve been studying english linguistics for 2 years and that must be the most difficult subject I ever had to learn ! Phonetics/phonology, grammar, syntax, etc. are not the funniest subjects to study either...
I\'m totally amazed when I see such things as \"english is easy to learn\" or \"people are too lazy to learn it\" etc...
Hellooo, learning to speak a foreign language, even poorly, takes YEARS. It took me 10 years of studies, travelling half the world away to speak english like I do, and that\'s still not enough to be called fluent, and you come here and say anyone can learn english in, like, 2 weeks during their free time ?! Welcome to reality !
Sure it\'s not _the_ hardest language to learn (I\'m not even sure you can say that because it depends A LOT on how your native language is close to the one you\'re trying to learn - and I\'ve tried ancient greek, russian, polish and spanish), but I wish people would show a bit more respect to those who dedicated years of they life just to be able to talk with you here.
Which also proves that your reproaches to people posting here and whose native tongue is not english are absurd. If we took all that time to learn english, it\'s obviously because we think that being able to speak that language is very important to communicate with people all over the world. Well I didn\'t, I\'m sure I would have somehow found a use for those ~5600 hours.

As for the Zelphirien thing, it\'s nonsense. First, if anyone has problems with this guild here is not the place to discuss it, and then the french website has no connection whatsoever with the Zelphirien guild.
And I don\'t see how a \"hidden, separated community\" would have got its place on the official website (and why it would take time to interact with people here).
I saw that Seytra and buddah have been evoking the influence of cultural difference in wars. My opinion is that the difference in itself is not the root of conflict, it\'s this weird idea that we humans all have : everything or everyone that is different is an enemy.

First of all I think that inter-guild grudges don\'t belong here (bad fken ! ).

Then I think Willen\'s question is aimed at making us think about the everlasting debate of language : Does everyone who want to play a mmorpg have to speak english ? How can we help those who can\'t speak english without creating small language-based communities which will be isolated from the rest of the players ? To avoid this, must we reject all those who can\'t speak english ? Is it even worth it to help them if they can\'t be integrated in the game later because of that damn language barrier ?

But in the specific case of the help canal, imo we don\'t yet have to find answers to those questions. I think that most of the players could rp or just play in english but may have some difficulties finding the right words to explain their technical or gameplay problems. Having a French, German, Spanish or Slovenian GM wouldn\'t really alter the international/community spirit of the game but could help newbies getting familiar with the environment of PS - and therefore integrate - faster.

As for Willen in particular, he is a very VERY commited player and I think he\'d be a very dedicated GM.

PS : Cad isn\'t french ? Well he certainly does speak French very well then if he can fool french people...

Skizzik is right, it\'s just 3 colors and a lot of smudging.

As for the \"unfinishedness\", it\'s just that some of them are just sketches, and others are part of abandonned or \"on hiatus\" projects, like the wizard lady or the sketch of the guild\'s god. It\'s just that they\'re not detailed enough or incomplete (no background, etc... for example the wizard lady has no shadows on her shoulders or neck).
By \"unfinished\" I mean that they\'re not like some stuff you can find on art sites under the CG section where every drawing is polished, with a neat background, some effects, etc...
I\'m just too damn lazy

So here we go :



A book I \'oekakied\' which is part of the current Zelphirien coat of arms.



An avatar I made for a member of the Zelphirien forum (not so good this one, I may redo it sometime)



A sketch I made of another member\'s character.



An attemps to draw the guild\'s god.



This was supposed to be a part of the coat of arms at the beginning.



Dwarves just rock