Ultimately getting rid of the trainers after 10 would likely lead to the conclusion of: "oh i've pwnd 3800 orcs and I have kept a tally of such (as danny did but for different reasons), this to me seams like a good reason to gain a lfl.", which in turn would mean people would become the tits of the tits weapon masters, or pale masters, or whatever, and start ranking up next to Tammy and Keldrin with regards to epicness after a couple of months. The idea with epic is that it's epic, hard to achieve, stands alone. LoTR books for example. As well as the tower series by that other bloke. There are loads of books which are as thick as your arm, and as numerous as a goblin tribe. At one point these people would have learned how to write, and after that they would have written but unlike u doods, they were constrained to time. Some people have died writing their epics.
I'm all for letting people level past 10 WM or whatever else if they can show maturity in their levelling and / or don't abuse their levels in PvP. The types of items that are given out are roughly governed by how likely people are to abuse them from my personal view, which is why it took pelgrin so long to get a holy sword of wtfpwn. Difference is, I can take those items away relatively easily and explain why. If I did that with levels people would be all: "AMAGUDS can i has dem back and put dem in rogue?" or try to manipulate me into giving them something else, cause you're all terrible people and what not. Though it's pretty funny what some people do. U guise! *Elbow nudge*
So yeah, if we did remove the necessity of tokens, how would we be sure that there wouldn't be countless epic weapon masters running around? And what fun would that be if there were? If you visit any dojo in the world there are probably a couple of blacks, some reds, and a vast majority of greens blues yellows and whites (or the equivalent thereof in whatever fighting doctrine you choose), so having 8 grand masters run about in solinar with no students doesnt seem realistic to me. But then my claims for realism have been shattered before so I should probably stay out of it
With regards to players who can't come on, we do rewards stories written on the forums which fit the bill and are interesting =)
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Never under estimate the power that language imparts. Sticks and stones may break your bones, but words can break hearts.