So I'll give you a bit of my own experience then as an example. I do not consider myself elite or really even average anymore. My last PK character that was actually decent and held their own was in 2007. Since then I have had a stream of very blah characters and some that I really enjoyed the RP of. I started thinking outside of the box though a long time ago and my imagination is vast. Lets just say that I have had to apologize to some people for their significant other severely lacking in areas of the imagination because they'd never get what they wanted out of it by remaining with that person. Aside from that though, you can toss random race/class combos at me and I can think of an RP reason why you could join pretty much any Cabal with the one restriction being it doesn't result in an Outcast to gain it (so no Gnome Thief in Nexus as an example).
Out of all my characters, in 1.0 I never got approved for anything but was denied 4 different times and only upon my fifth application I was granted acceptance into Chaos. In 2.0 I was denied on several occasions by specific players to join Savant, and this was back when HUGE OOC rings were around in many ways. I was denied on several other characters as well for other Cabals. The few that I did manage to get into before the whole promotion thing was changed to be time oriented and more IMM controlled, I managed to get into two Cabals. Rheydin (Royal) and a Warmaster. I applied for around 10 different Quest Classes and Races and managed to get one of them to become an Undead. And that was an Undead Thief who I really sucked ass playing and was stomped by Totenkopf's Crusader who could at the time see hidden characters. Since he targeted people repeatedly though to level up his weapons, it was probably a contributing factor on making recent kills not count towards the level of both malforms and crusader weapons.
Then I decided that after talking to Messalantha for an extended time about Vampires that maybe I should try my hand at it sometime because they were interesting but I didn't know exactly what the RP should be. I as a player don't really much care for the religion of Cycle and since Vampires weren't limited to Cycle I looked at the other religions and based my own personal interests into the character making it crucial to put a piece of myself into them to make them more interesting. It was the first time that I have gotten a custom title from the very beginning because I sent out a few notes detailing the character and giving them life. By the time I finally hit 30, finished training, and sent in my app to become a Vamp I was given a quest quickly to kill someone waiting for Undead as a Cleric. I knew because of the things I mastered were only geared towards Vampires though that it would be a hard fight for me because I didn't bother training anything else except for one thing that played heavily in my favor. I really enjoyed that character and from the time of submitting my application and getting Vampire it was roughly 45 minutes. All because of RP and thinking outside of the box while at the same time implementing my own personal interests. You could always try this yourself, it could help.
Here's where I started to deviate though and it's why I don't go to things like Dischord server and I only talk to one other person who plays the game semi regularly. If it weren't for them though I'd probably only ever talk to very few people through PMs asking about PK tips and advice because my skills have severely dropped since I last was any good at it due to a few different breaks in the last 11 years that add up to roughly 50% of that time. My last Elder was in 2005 with Egui Aome my Elven Healer. Since then I had a couple of Trusted characters, though Chomba Charn was probably my most famous and since we had no Elders, myself and an Avatar Avian Ninja who I can't recall their name for the life of me was the Sigil Trusted who suggested people for induction. I never spoke to a single player of those characters either, at that point in time I was only speaking to two people regularly, and even then we often never played the same sides. Choosing to believe everyone is getting promoted or accepted for those things based on who they know though means you're choosing to completely blow off believing YOU can actually pull off the RP to gain those same things. You're screwing yourself by not growing in that way because you have this preconceived belief that you will be denied only because you do not fit into those molds yourself.
Facts: I came back in June 2016 after having not played since 2013, and then 2011 prior to that and again 2009 before even that. When I got back, I got Psi within the first few months of returning because I used what was available to me. My imagination and the fact that journals existed, as well as RP points that played into it further. I had nearly 200 before I dropped the character entirely and I only ever spent them as a Monk when I got locate object and identify prior to even realizing I wanted to see if I could do it as Soristipa and then again a year later as Legshey. Different RP perspectives, but both Monks gone Psi because I actually enjoy Monks, but the RP was more fun than the actual Psi Class to me. I was approved for a Vamp as well, and even a Demon DK which I utterly failed at before asking to be deleted. Then there was the Undead app I did get approved ultimately but asked to have sidelined so I could try for Crusader which I got after finally asking about what was going on since it was taking some time to hear back on it and I had to reapply because of it. It doesn't hurt to ask about things like that, you just have to take the initiative to do it. When I was accepted and finally passed the quest for it, I was thrilled and I spent a LOT of time trying to figure out the class. I had some people try to tell me the best path for them would be including Panek who turned out to not really know squat because his advice was completely wrong. Then I was getting bored after a few months and decided to play my old monk again to see if I'd gain favor once more. I didn't have a PK either mind you, but I was approved in the time span because there are sometimes periods of time where there is no one at 30 and everyone is playing their 50's. I started doing the quest, had a few hiccups along the way, and asked for advice where only one person was actually willing to help guide me through while another blatantly told me that they had to create several characters just to pass the quest so they wouldn't tell me to make it easier on me and this was AFTER I had already failed it. I asked the one person I talk to what they themselves had thought it would be and they said the exact same thing I had done. Shit happens though, I deleted and moved on. I deleted because I lost the RP of the character ultimately and I couldn't find an interesting view of them afterwards.
Since then though, I have played 0 quest class/race characters. I've even tried. The fact of the matter is though that it's painful how much RP goes into me wanting to play those classes/races. I would love to go for a Lich despite the fact that I know I hate the class overall after trying them out at Madness in 2016. But how bad ass would it be to play as a Human who's basically a restring Spirit seeking out their body to return to it so they can finally experience how death truly is? The belief being that the separation of spirit from the body prior to actual death is what left them in such a state to begin with and finally returning to it would give a sense of absolution so that they may pass on. Instead finding themselves trapped in a body that has been dead for some time and wishing to seek an end to such a life by either being slaughtered or by finding enough spirits to appease Anume to release their own from the coil presented to them and ultimately kept for all eternity and as punishment they don't really die, they just merely live as a tortured soul in her own personal collection for the rest of her own existence.
How about an Illithid Psi who is an actual space alien? In their own realm they were thrown to the Universe and that after several failed attempts and realms they were thrown to, each one presented an additional problem. Each place they were sent to trying to find their way home stripped them of different powers resulting in them becoming an Adventurer and finding themselves here in Aabahran. All the while trying to devise a plan to ensure they regain their strength and powers so they can continue on their path to finding home. What home may that be? Perhaps one of the moons of Aabahran? The possibilities are literally endless in this situation.
Perhaps Santa Claus is real and the myths were wrong about using Elves to help build toys. Instead he enslaves millions of Gnomes and Halflings to his own bidding resulting in their severe hatred to others and as such they have been traumatized and sometimes even believe someone else is Santa after all. This results in people dying for various reasons, but due to the hallucination not ever being 100% complete, their realization of just murdering someone crushes their worldly views making them quite distraught and remorseful. This can be played out in many ways even and can suit just about every Cabal combination they can join with the exception of maybe Herald and Merchant if they do so to kill people at least.
My point being though, is that it isn't going to be the OOC ring you seem to always state as being there that prevents specific people from being able to do what they want. It is literally your own limitations and beliefs of them that hold you back from achieving what others have and can do. You have to be willing to take a step out of that box of yours yourself though in order to achieve it. Do you truly want to play those things though, or are you using it as an excuse to point blame where it doesn't exist? How many times have you actually gone through with those things even to see if you could achieve them? I know the post is incredibly long, but I do hope you read through it entirely because I believe you have the tools available to you in order to achieve just as much, if not more than most people all without the need to try and say it's because of someone else you cannot. Watch some Sci Fi and think of a few things you believe is possible. Add a bit of yourself to your characters. Make them live, make them breathe, but more importantly, make everyone else believe that they're real as well and could easily be seen as their best friend they spent their childhood with, the ruler of a nation hell bent on destroying entire portions of civilization, or even just like their father who passed away because a conversation they had with them while fishing as a kid related to a story you were telling them.
I don't want to hear how you sniffed the flowers in a glade in the Ford, or how you helped everyone on a step by step basis, I want to IMAGINE exactly how a memory of you happened in my own mind by giving me the free will to also add to it making it interesting to me. I don't need every detail, just the stepping stones for such. I want to feel the anger you had when someone wronged you. I want to feel the sense of pride you had when you ACTUALLY accomplished something you never thought possible. Most of all, I want to see YOU as a player grow beyond what you have managed to believe has become your corner. You can be more than that if you want to. But it is up to you whether or not you will get out of it and you can't say it's because of another player or an Imm or even OOC rings. Your brother has pulled off some amazing things in short periods of time. I wouldn't be surprised if you could do the same as long as you can change your mindset.
