tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-63355806549894627062024-03-07T22:39:46.330-08:00Spectre's MusingsMy thoughts on video games and other forms of entertainment, whether cards, miniatures, or the aforementioned variant!Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-4466798349347791732017-07-02T01:00:00.000-07:002017-07-02T01:36:04.286-07:00When the Bully Comes Out<div class="MsoNormal">
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">I did a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmSqgC9-sGA">video</a> on the recent VidCon drama between Anita Sarkeesian, a noted third-wave
feminist and executive director of Feminist Frequency and Carl “Sargon of Akkad”
Benjamin, as well as her later confrontation with boogie2988. I also stated that I prefer to keep politics
out of my alter-ego here, but the truth is that this deals with entertainment
as well, and unfortunately politics will sometimes overlap with my hobbies and
ideals. So I’m going to get this out of
the way: politically, I’m more moderate, though I find myself more
right-of-center. That does not mean I’m
a Republican or die-hard conservative in American politics. Far from it.
While I don’t subscribe to identity politics in the slightest, I
recognize that in some instances it <i>can</i>
have an effect necessary to change wrongs, and I fully support equality of the
races and sexes, as well as orientations.
To that end, I support religious freedom, but also items such as gay
marriage. I am on record with my most
recent college as having penned an article supporting gay marriage from a
conservative standpoint (the conservative tag added mainly by the paper), and
the like. With that said, I am against
third-wave feminism as well as ‘intersectionality’. They are both toxic to the discussions at
hand, but that is neither here, nor there.<br />
<br />
I find that often, I can get my point across easier through writing rather than
speaking. I also find that even with a
long post, people are more apt to pay attention to it rather than when I talk,
because let’s face it my voice can be rather annoying. That, and I’m not photogenic in the
slightest. Oh well! With that being said, I want to expound upon
the video, and give what I hope is a more focused and well-thought-out view on
what happened, as well as what to expect.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Players: A Dispassionate
Explanation<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Anita
Sarkeesian</span></b><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> is a noted third-wave feminist, whose webseries “Tropes
vs. Women” deals mainly with several issues that she feels are damaging to
women in the entertainment industry: objectification and oversexualization of
women, especially in video games; a lack of “strong women” in video games; and
the “damsel in distress” common to some games (Princess Peach, for example). She made headlines in August 2014 when she
claimed significant harassment and death threats, especially as the Gamergate
controversy began to take hold and ramp up.
This allegedly peaked in October 2014, when Ms. Sarkeesian was scheduled
to speak at Utah State University: several threats were made, and while
university officials scoffed at it as ‘similar harassment she normally recieves’,
Anita ended up cancelling the speech, citing security concerns because of the
possibility of concealed weapons on campus.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Carl
“Sargon of Akkad” Benjamin</span></b><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> is a British YouTuber known for his
videos focusing on third-wave feminism and ‘social justice issues’ as well as
his ‘skeptic’ nature, namely in that he criticizes social justice ‘warriors’. He primarily rose to fame during the
Gamergate controversy, and has since been highly critical not only of Anita
Sarkeesian, but many others as well (including Shaun King and Deray Mackesson
of Black Lives Matter fame, among others).
Beyond that, he has other channels dedicated to gaming (as he is a game
developer), and “Ancient Recitations”, in which numerous audiobooks of various historical
texts from Greek antiquity and ancient Near East are featured. He has taken criticism for his positions, as
well as his 2017 position in support of PewDiePie, a YouTuber who was targeted
in a Wall Street Journal piece for alleged anti-Semitic and Nazi videos, which
were widely regarded as ‘jokes’, even by some of his detractors. He regularly hosts livestreams with other
well-known skeptics and personalities critical of third-wave feminism and
social justice ‘warriors’.<br />
<br />
<b>Steven “Boogie2988” Williams </b>is a
YouTuber known for his rants on video games, as well as ‘unboxings’ of trading
cards including Magic: the Gathering and Pokemon. His focus, while on entertainment, is also on
health (both mental and physical). His
created persona, “Francis”, pardodies what is referred to as “nerd culture” is
quite popular. Videos, as stated, range
from discussion on recent video game and entertainment news, to serious topics
such as his health.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">It should be noted that there are also ancillary
people who should be mentioned, as well as what VidCon is.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">VidCon</span></b><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">
is an annual convention held in Southern California and previously hosted at
the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza, and now at the Anaheim Convention Center. It’s focus is on ‘content creators’,
personalities who have cultivated a following, usually on the website YouTube.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Hank
and John Green</span></b><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> are the founders of VidCon, and YouTube
personalities in their own right via the channel Vlogbrothers.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The Incidents<b><u><o:p></o:p></u></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The first incident
occurred on 22 June, when Anita Sarkeesian and several other women were part of
a panel titled “Women Online Discussion”.
Carl Benjamin as well as several other known YouTube personalities
critical of what they refer to as the ‘victim complex’ of third-wave feminists
attended. Towards the beginning of the
panel, Anita Sarkeesian is quoted as saying the following:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">*
* * * *</span><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="color: #5b9bd5; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">“If you Google my name on YouTube you get
shitheads like this dude who are making these dumbass videos that just say the
same shit over and over again; and like I hate to give you attention because
you’re a garbage human being. Whatever
dude.”<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">*
* * * *</span><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Anita was specifically
motioning and speaking about Carl. She
went on to say:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">*
* * * *<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="color: #5b9bd5; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">“But the fact that these dudes are making
endless videos going after every feminist over and over and over again I think
is a part of the issue. Why do we have
these conversations? We don’t just get
to be online. We don’t just get to participate
like everyone else.”<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">* * * * *<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">It should be noted that
Carl and the others who attended with him were paying members of the audience,
and had been quiet the entire time.
Video evidence shows this to be the case. From a logical, dispassionate viewpoint,
there seems to be no reason for Anita, using her position on the stage, to call
out and insult members of the audience, critics or not. They had done nothing to warrant such
treatment. In fact, those who were with
Carl say that he said nothing until targeted, in which he responded that he
just ‘wanted to talk’. This was a
violation of VidCon’s harassment policy (more on that in a bit).</span><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">It could be argued that
more incidents occurred during the “question and answer” portion of the panel,
where several audience members (none of which were Carl) asked questions
specifically of Anita, including one asking her if she truly believed what she
said/wrote. Anita was hostile and
demanded security remove anyone from the line who asked similar questions, or
questions that were deemed ‘confrontational’.<br />
<br />
The second incident occurred on 24 June after a panel titled “End Cyberbullying”. During the closing remarks of the panel, Steven
Williams said that cyberbullying wasn’t a “womens’ rights issue, it’s a human
rights issue”, apparently angering Anita Sarkeesian, a co-panelist. Afterwards, Anita allegedly cornered him, and
said something along the lines of, “I think it was very fucking uncool what you
said there at the end, knowing no one else would have time to respond.” This incident hasn’t received as much press
as the Anita/Carl incident, mainly because it was captured on video, while
Anita’s alleged attack on Williams was not.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Critical Responses and The Fallout</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Here’s where I drop the wholly informational explanations
and start juxtaposing my own thoughts.
Following the videos surfacing of Anita attacking Sargon and his friends
(I’m referring to them as the “Sargontourage” from now on, sorry Carl!),
opinion was mixed. Many who were
critical of Anita doubled down and said she was the bully she always claimed to
be fighting and they knew her to be, and that her position of power (the stage
and microphone) turned her into the privileged individual, while Sargon was
powerless in this instance to halt or prevent the attacks that occurred. Others who supported Anita claimed that the
Sargontourage’s presence in the first three rows of what was widely viewed as
an empty auditorium was harassment enough and her response was understandable. In fact, Hank Green penned a response to the
drama which I will get to in a moment. I’m
firmly on the side of the former and not the latter, not because I view Sargon
as incapable of defending himself from such attacks, but because the evidence
shows it to have been purely unprovoked, and that her actions were detrimental
to the causes she claims to fight for.
Her outburst and her language were not in keeping with what was expected
of a panelist, let alone what should have been a professional appearance. She allowed emotion to cloud her judgment,
and whether it’s because she wanted to say what she did and not give him a
chance to respond, hoping for a “mic drop” moment or because she legitimately
was “triggered” by his presence and had an uncontrollable urge to defend
herself from what she viewed as harassment is anyone’s guess. Going by her past actions and words, and her
attempts to play the victim for years I am strongly erring towards her trying
to have that moment, and not because of any actual perceived threat from their
presence. I will admit, however, there
is <i>also</i> the possibility that Anita
and others like her have allowed this victim complex to so take hold of their
lives for years that it has become a significant part of their psyche, and that
they are incapable without professional help of losing this mindset. That is also a theory I would subscribe
to. In general, I don’t believe she felt
she was threatened by their presence, she didn’t feel harassed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">On the Boogie2988 incident, my opinion (assuming this
entire thing has been offered without embellishment from the multiple sources
who provide it) is that this was her acting a bully, which is ironic
considering she had just finished a panel on ending cyberbullying. However, lacking evidence, I can only assume
this to have happened. Many took to
Reddit and YouTube to support Boogie, with many (myself included) referring to
the attack on him as the “moral equivalent of kicking puppies in front of
kindergartners”. Boogie is a gentle
giant, he seems like a genuinely caring man.
He hasn’t been confrontational, and says that he intentionally crafted
his talking points in a way so that he wouldn’t offend or upset anyone,
especially Anita. He spent days doing
this, ran it by several people (including a co-panelist) to see if there was
any way someone could be offended.
Because he suffers from severe anxiety and he has had issues with Anita
in the past (or, at the very least has not supported her viewpoints), he was
especially nervous about dealing with her.
Again, she was in the wrong, and attacking someone for his opinion in
such a way is unacceptable, no matter who it is.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">VidCon ended up posting a response to the entire
incident. In part, it read:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">*
* * * *<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="color: #5b9bd5; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">“</span></b><b><span style="color: #5b9bd5; font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">This year, we had a contingent of attendees (some who paid, some who snuck
in with fake passes) who had been either perpetrators of this harassment, or
had, for years, watched as the outrage they cultivated resulted in followers
doxxing, harassing, intimidating, and even threatening the lives of the
creators on these panels.<br />
<br />
"It is difficult to imagine that this group of people (who are aware that
their channels have been base-camps for years of harassment of some of our
panelists) did not realize that their arriving early to fill up the three front
rows of a panel was going to be intimidating. In any case, it looked like
intentional intimidation to most people in attendance, and the panelists were
understandably on edge throughout the discussion.<br />
<br />
During the panel, a panelist called out one of the audience members for being
someone who has made her life very difficult, and wished she didn’t have to
give him attention because he was a “garbage human.” Look, we don’t want our
panelists to insult our audience members, even when we completely understand
that the comment exists in a much broader (and pretty messed up) context. Even
when people have said hateful things that everyone in our office disagrees
with, we have a policy, and it exists not just to protect people at the show,
but to protect our ability to have these conversations.</span></b><b><span style="color: #5b9bd5; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">”<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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* * * *</span><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">It goes on to say that
Hank Green informed her that her comments had violated VidCon’s policy on
harassing attendees or panelists, but that looking at it from a broader contect
he was understanding. He also apologized
for not being aware of the situation before the event, “which resulted in her
being subjected to a hostile environment that she had not signed up for.”<br />
<br />
So, Hank chastised her, but it didn’t mean a damn thing because he apologized
after. This brings up the question:
why? Why would he apologize, when the
evidence shows her to be in the wrong? I
think their response actually gives us an insight into why. The beginning of the post states the
following when talking about people who are invited: “They just aren’t on our
radar because we were looking in the wrong place, or they got very popular very
recently.”<br />
<br />
Speaking to that, I believe that they are intentionally ignoring members of
what is dubbed the “skeptic community”, and those critical of third-wave
feminism and social justice/intersectionality.
This is shown by their <a href="http://vidcon.com/featured-creators/">list of creators invited,</a>
among them noted social justice ‘warriors’ such as Anita Sarkeesian, as well as
Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasperian from The Young Turks. Notably, aside from Philip DeFranco there
seems to be no one of significance that has been skeptical of feminism in
particular as part of the featured creators (note: I did a cursory glance of
the invited people, and no one struck me as being part of that clique). This has me asking why that is, of
course. If it’s an ideological issue,
then that’s understandable why they wouldn’t be asked to attend as featured
creators. I mean, it’s not like Sargon’s
channel popped up overnight and became popular this past week or something, he’s
been known about for five or six years now.
His channel has 655,516 subscribers, a number that I can only dream
about (then again, if I was more consistent in putting out quality products…maybe
one day!). MundaneMatt wasn’t invited,
hell even someone like Thunderf00t wasn’t invited! A lot of skeptics simply don’t appear in that
roster. Maybe they all declined? I doubt it, to be honest. And keep in mind, <i>this is conjecture</i>. Short of
them admitting this is the reason, I can only go by what it looks like.<br />
<br />
So, is Anita likely to be disinvited from attending VidCon next year? Unlikely, because she has a <a href="https://archive.is/kGpm0#selection-4010.0-4024.2">personal connection with the Green Brothers</a> (Anita and John Green pictured). In fact, Hank
Green says that <a href="http://archive.is/9psNe">people who violated VidCon policy are given second chances on acase-by-case basis</a>. Does this mean that Anita will be disinvited
next year, or will she be given another chance, assuming her attack on
Boogie2988 is true?<br />
<br />
My firm belief is that had the roles been reversed, we would find Sargon having
been kicked out almost immediately. In
western culture, we tend to protect women more-so than men when it comes to
harassment. We tend to assume men can
take it, but that women are delicate flowers, and thus need extra
protection. In some instances on both
sides, they do. But equality being what
it is, what you hypothetically would do to Sargon you should also do to Anita.<br />
<br />
Some people have pointed out that extra security was requested in the
auditorium, possibly by Anita (she’s seen using her phone when she realizes who
is there, then security shows up). They
also wonder why security didn’t remove the audience members to begin with if
they were such a problem. Two reasons:
first, the audience was almost empty save those three rows, and two the PR
would have been absolute shit had they done so.
Removing paying members when they have done nothing to warrant it would
be a huge public fuckup.<br />
<br />
Oh, and Patreon ended up doing an “investigation” into Sargon’s account, and two
hours later was <a href="https://mic.com/articles/181083/patreon-is-investigating-youtuber-sargon-of-akkad-over-anita-sarkeesian-vidcon-harassment#.7RLHqQ88K">cleared of any wrongdoing</a>.<br />
<br />
My final point is purely conjecture, and on Sargon’s likely attendance next year. The VidCon post states that creators can be
kicked out if “they have previously been told not to attend after intentionally
endangering our attendees or being violent with our staff.” To date, Sargon has not had such a warning
foisted upon him. However, I expect that
when he shows up next year (after he’s paid for his ticket, airfare, room and
board, etc.) assuming he does, he will be told he’s not welcome because of what
happened. They will cite Anita’s
outburst as proof positive of his “intentional harassment” and will decline him
entry. As a private affair, they are
more than able and legally allowed to do so.
They will refund his money for the ticket (they can’t rightly keep his
money after denying him entry), but he’ll still be out thousands on the other
things. The PR will be in overdrive,
because I expect a significant shitstorm brewing if and when it happens.<br />
<br />
And a message to the Sargontourage: if you can be spotted as being with him,
you’ll likely face the same punishment.<br />
<br />
Speaking of legal, does Sargon have a defamation case? This is the United States, you can sue for
damn near anything. I think, however,
any defamation case would be farfetched, as he has no actual damages right now:
his brand hasn’t been hurt. Perceived
damages are a possibility, but it’s hard to defend them in court. At the moment, I don’t see much of anything,
and he’d have to take a “wait and see” approach before engaging in this.<br />
<br />
Additional Material:<br />
<br />
1.) <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Vyvv7P6Ldo">Sargon’s take on the matter</a><br />
2.) <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nxb2s2Mv6Pw">Phil DeFranco’s take</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">3.) <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Wr9EuivCds">MundaneMatt’s take</a><br />
4.) <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qEwRZ0PziA">Boogie2988’s take on his own encounter with Anita</a><br />
5.) <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgbRxtKySr8">Liana K’s take</a></span></div>
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Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-31155941530601177042017-04-04T14:39:00.001-07:002017-07-02T08:46:53.189-07:00Early Access and The Liberties Taken by Studio Wildcard<div class="MsoNormal">
<h4>
<span style="color: #f1c232;">It’s been close to a year since I’ve written here, and while
I’ve been doing some streaming and working on a video or two for YouTube, I’ve
really let this slide. With a bit more
time available, I’m going to be working on this, as writing is one of my favorite
past-times.</span></h4>
<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For years, early access has become more and more common
amongst indie developers in the gaming world, who take money up-front, often
for the purpose of fulfilling their dream of creating an engaging game. This isn’t necessarily relegated, mind you,
to Steam, but there are game companies out there that use GoFundMe and
Kickstarter to get the cash infusion they need.
Valve, to its credit, has attempted to get more and more small game
companies into the business with their early access program, which debuted
officially in 2013 (though there had been a pilot program in 2012, and only
nine titles were made available in this manner). Game companies view the early access concept
as a win-win scenario, though the truth is that the concept heavily favors the
developer and not the player, who essentially becomes an unpaid tester, and in
many instances will not see games come to fruition. In 2014, <a href="http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2014-11-13-early-access-popularity-growing-but-only-25-percent-have-released-as-a-full-game">Patrick Walker wrote an article</a> on the phenomenon of the early access craze, which had picked up significantly
in 2014 compared to 2013. In the
article, he stated that only 25% of the games in early access have released a
finished product, which is a pitiful percentage all things considered. In many instances, players are paying the
full price of a game (upwards of $60.00 USD) for an early access title. When games are not finished—timely manner or
not—it casts a shadow on <i>all</i> early titles, not just that one. Also of note, Steam makes it very clear that
they take a more hands-off approach concerning early access, to quote:</div>
<h3>
</h3>
<h3>
<span style="color: #6fa8dc;"><br /></span></h3>
<h3 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #6fa8dc;">"You should be aware that some teams will be unable to ‘finish’ their
game. So you should only buy an Early
Access game if you are excited about playing it in its current state.”</span></h3>
<o:p></o:p><br />
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<br /></div>
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As such, if a company cannot finish their product, Valve
won’t necessarily punish them directly.
More than likely, Valve will be hesitant to offer them the ability to
put other games up for early access in the future.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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All this aside, there have been some great early access
titles that have gone on to be solid finished products. My personal favorite to this day is Path of Exile, and there
are certainly others that have made it through this gauntlet. That being said, yes, to this
day most games do not make it to a finished product.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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<i>Ark</i> is an interesting case of a developer failing to meet
the expectations of many of the people who have bought into early access. Going for $30.00 on the Steam store when it
first debuted, it has had several sales on Steam, dropping to $10.00 this past
weekend before going back to it’s original price. It has been one of the top early access
titles Steam has ever had, and I’m sure it has made a lot of money for both Studio Wildcard and Valve. Players seem to be
very interested in the game, as shown on <a href="http://steamcharts.com/app/346110">this Steam Chart</a>,
but it’s a matter of time before people become fed up with it, as the game
continues to slog on in early release—referred to as <a href="https://twitter.com/arkjesse/status/690340531482836992">“Pre-Alpha” in a January2016 Tweet by Jesse Rapzcak</a>, co-founder of Studio Wildcard–and that self-imposed due date for a finished product has passed: the game was
supposed to ship the finished version in June 2016. It has been, to date, ten months since that
went by, and there is no end in sight for the move from “pre-Alpha” to even
Beta.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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In essence, <i>Ark</i>’s problems lie with the developers, who have
pushed off deadlines more often than they’ve met them.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Now of course, no plan survives first contact. You can’t plan for every eventuality, and
even I accept that as a cost of doing business in this area. I’ve made promises I had to back out of,
sometimes because of legitimate issues, sometimes because *I* screw up. In each case, I am honest about the
reasons. Studio Wildcard is an
interesting case of honesty and obfuscation.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Let’s start with the biggest issue at hand: the
deadlines. Patches are routinely days
after their initial announcement. A
patch that might be announced for, say 04 April might likely be pushed back to
07 April, because of bugs in the programming, or for “more QA testing”. Routinely, these patches will also break
something that requires an immediate patch in order to fix something that
became broken. Technologically, it’s
difficult to tell what will work and what won’t on a live server compared to
the test server: CCP Games has this problem every now and again, for
example. To date, over 50% of the
patches have not met the initial “ETA”, and Studio Wildcard’s response (and often
parroted by strident defenders) is that it’s simply an estimate, and that they
have no requirement to deliver it to us at that time and date. Not completely true, though, as these are
self-imposed deadlines, and they have often failed to meet them. If a company can’t meet its own deadlines on
small things like this, it bodes ill for large deadlines…like the finished
product release date.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Hand-in-hand with this is the fact that many of the patches
do not have complete patch notes. As
shown in the stickied patch notes on their <a href="https://steamcommunity.com/app/346110/discussions/0/594820656447032287/">Steam discussion thread</a> as well as the <a href="https://survivetheark.com/index.php?/forums/topic/166421-pc-patch-notes-current-v25623-upcoming/">official forums</a>, you can clearly see “More Notes To Come” in both. Ubisoft took a huge hit in ratings for
incomplete patch notes for The Division being far more common, because it
seemed like stealth nerfs were intentionally being hidden from players (and
routinely on The Division’s livestream with Hamish, players would be the ones
asking about these nerfs with Hamish being unable to confirm their presence),
and it seems that Studio Wildcard has decided to follow in this same “lazy” tactic. For a company that routinely puts out
minute-cinematic trailers for new biome and dinosaur updates (individual
updates, mind you), it seems rather silly that they would take this route, when
it would take minutes by comparison to simply type up all the intended changes.<o:p></o:p></div>
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</div>
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Obviously, they are going to have issues crop up. So long as those issues are taken care of
quickly, I don’t think it’s fair to chastise them if this wasn’t in the patch
notes. However, more and more Studio Wildcard has opted to warn people of impending changes, and then not tell people or engage in a discussion about those changes until they drop. This seems an odd thing to do, considering the players are supposed to be the ones acting as your quality assurance team. An unpaid quality assurance team. Scratch that, we <i>paid</i> to be that quality assurance team. That's even worse than being unpaid!<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This has happened in the past, but recently the players have entered into an uproar over changes to the 'flyer' nerf. Studio Wildcard said last week that a nerf was incoming to flyers, but not what it would be. Of course, this led to speculation, but it all came to a head when the patch dropped, and players were left wondering what in the hell had happened. There were no details on the nerfs until <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/playark/comments/62um8r/greater_than_50_flyer_stamina_nerf_and_other_stat/">a player took to Reddit</a> to note his findings. Studio Wildcard eventually <a href="https://survivetheark.com/index.php?/forums/topic/170311-re-balancing-the-fliers-mk-2/">came out</a> to tell players what they had done, but this was too little, too late in many instances.</div>
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This was on the heels of several recent creature additions, including the Troodon (a small dinosaur that has an attack that drains stamina to zero before disappearing), eels and jellyfish (capable of "stunlocking" players and dismounting them from all mounts except the basilosaurus), microraptor (capable of dismounting players out of nowhere), and others.</div>
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As stated previously, it would seem odd that Wildcard would willingly ignore the playerbase when putting in such large changes until <i>after</i> they were implemented, and <i>after</i> the players have begun, essentially, an open revolt. If you're going to use the players to test your product, it seems reasonable that you would keep them apprised of changes in the pipe, not unload them without warning.</div>
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Studio Wildcard, however, has a habit of keeping important information out of the eye of players as long as they can. In December 2015, Trendy Entertainment filed a lawsuit against Studio Wildcard. Trendy alleged that Jeremy Stieglitz, who had previously<a href="http://kotaku.com/investigation-a-video-game-studio-from-hell-511872642"> left Trendy</a> after allegations of sexism, fear of retaliation, overworking, and a general feeling of a hostile work environment was actually working on <i>Ark: Survival Evolved</i> as well as attempting to "poach" developers from Trendy, in violation of his contract's non-compete clause. It wasn't reported on until March 2016, and Studio Wildcard said that the claims held no merit and asked the suit be dropped. They claimed Jeremy Steiglitz was only <i>consulted</i> on the product, not actively working on it. His wife is a co-founder of Studio Wildcard, so it's very clear why Trendy would have looked into this. In April 2016, it was confirmed that Studio Wildcard had settled the suit to the tune of $40,000,000. Susan Steiglitz claims she and the lawyers did not want to settle, but others in the company felt "intimidated". It should be noted that routinely, lawsuits are settled in such a manner so that the accused doesn't have to admit wrongdoing. Had Stieglitz waited until August 2016 (when that portion of his contract was up, which <i>he</i> had negotiated), the lawsuit wouldn't have had any merit. He didn't, the company had to pay for it.</div>
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Move forward to September 2016. Studio Wildcard is now down $40,000,000 that should have been spent on the game. They are now three months past when they had originally promised to release the finished <i>Ark</i>. They haven't even left Alpha status. Studio Wildcard decides to release a much more polished <i>paid</i> DLC, called <i>Scorched Earth</i>. Understandably, players were angry that an early access game had a paid DLC released. As the blowback from this decision continued to build and reviews on Steam and elsewhere began to turn negative, Studio Wildcard <a href="https://survivetheark.com/index.php?/articles.html/introducing-the-kentrosaurus-a-message-to-the-ark-community-r305/">released a statement</a> to the media, in which they claimed they were simply following through on their plans for additional Arks (meaning DLCs). This didn't really help anything, as it was touted as "finished" and "polished", where-as the base game was...well, quite the opposite of that. In fact, they had fully intended to release this paid expansion that month in the expectation that the finished game would have launched in June, so they decided to carry through with it!<br />
<br />
Going back to a previous point, it seems odd that they were able to stay true to this timeline, but almost any other the company seems to fail at maintaining. To an objective observer, you might almost think that Studio Wildcard decided to bank on some extra money, no matter the excuses, now that <i>Ark</i> likely was not going to make them too much additional currency. And similar to this decision that had a negative impact on the playerbase, Studio Wildcard was able to have a sale for <i>Ark</i>. In this most recent development, a similar thing happened: the price dropped temporarily.<br />
<br />
In short, the problem is that Studio Wildcard seems more interested in keeping the players in the dark concerning negative impacts to the game, rather than being honest and engaging the community in a discussion until the negative feedback is too much to ignore. This seems particularly true when the Steam reviews suddenly go from "mostly positive" to "mixed", as was the case with <i>Scorched Earth</i> and this recent creature nerf. If the players are supposed to be the ones playtesting the game, they should be included in these decisions. Yes, Studio Wildcard <a href="https://survivetheark.com/index.php?/forums/topic/170311-re-balancing-the-fliers-mk-2/">has said they are going to be re-tweaking numbers</a>, but that doesn't undo the damage done, especially concerning the loss of faith players have had after being kept in the dark.<br />
<br />
I admit to having played 1,881 hours on <i>Ark, </i>but the decisions have caused me to re-evaluate how highly I rate the game. Did I get my money's worth? Sure I did. I spent $50.00 between <i>Ark</i> and <i>Scorched Earth</i>, but that doesn't mean I should stop pushing for a finished product, and neither should you. </div>
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Studio Wildcard’s continued delay in releasing a finished product—whether
because of feature creep or what-have-you—points to a company seemingly more
interested in maintaining the “free” quality assurance they get from the
playerbase eager to engage in their product.
The release of a more polished paid DLC before doing the bare minimum of
releasing the base game points to a company that might be making a decent
product, but appears to be more interested in making money. That’s fine if they choose to do this. But considering the negativity regarding the
constant delays in <i>Star Citizen—</i>to include
lawsuits in the pipes for lack of accountability in finances and refusing the give
refunds in contravention of their terms of service—and the lack of honesty and
forthrightness from Trendy, the implications will be far larger for indie
companies in the future, as possible investors consider the negativity
associated with early access from two widely-anticipated games, and make their
choices accordingly.<o:p></o:p></div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-53254796385607544482016-06-01T23:04:00.003-07:002016-06-01T23:15:27.800-07:00The War in the North<div class="MsoNormal">
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">The war has been lost.
Try as we might to console ourselves that there is still time—and I
admit there <i>is</i> still time, albeit
shrinking daily—the truth of the matter is that the war is lost in all but name
only. The attempts by The Mittani to
spin the war as a success-in-the-making, that the Fabian Strategy is the most
successful option available, and that given time the “Goonhammer” will win is,
at this point, nothing but attempts to save face before a declining population. Before I begin with this TL;DR piece, I’ll
provide my statistics for claiming “declining population”, using the current
seven-day population statistics for the remaining six members of the Imperium
on 28 May 2016, and then again on 01 June 2016, and provide an actual adjustment
after each to show statistics between those two dates:<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u><span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">28 May<o:p></o:p></span></span></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Goonswarm Federation: -250 (15,656)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">The Bastion: -317 (1,748)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Razor Alliance: -11 (1,400)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Tactical Narcotics Team: -25 (1,149)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Get Off My Lawn: -131 (1,137)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Executive Outcomes: -10 (964)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;"><u><span style="line-height: 107%;">01 June</span></u><span style="line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Goonswarm Federation: -260 (15,546) [Net Movement:
-110]<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">The Bastion: -348 (1,645) [Net Movement: -103]<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Razor Alliance: 0 (1,404) [Net Movement: +4]<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Tactical Narcotics Team: -24 (1,141) [Net Movement:
+1]<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Get Off My Lawn: -236 (1,022) [Net Movement: -115]<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Executive Outcomes: -2 (965) [Net Movement: +1]<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;"><br />
As shown, the populations of these alliances <i>have</i> been declining (exceptions being miniscule gains for RAZOR,
TNT, and EXE); this is not speculation, this is fact that can be seen when
using an unbiased third-party site (in this case, evewho.com). Even looking at Dotlan and the metrics used
there, it’s easy to see the constantly declining numbers available for all six
alliances. So while the Imperium members
might harp on about “declining numbers” in enemy groups like <b>Pandemic Horde</b>, Horde has been gaining
members (+270 over the past seven days for a member count of 9,304) while no
alliance in the Imperium has seen similar numbers. One <i>can</i>
make the argument that general activity <i>per
capita</i> is higher than Horde, but numbers right now do not lie.<br />
<br />
Yes, this is a basic explanation, but I like keeping things basic. If you want a more intimate explanation, I am
not your man for that (right now).<br />
<br />
<b><u>Alright, the Disclaimer</u></b>.<br />
<br />
At the moment, I am a member of <b>Tactical
Narcotics Team</b> and have been for a few months, now. I have been a loyal member of the alliance,
and have tried to remain positive and upbeat over this war, even writing
several pieces for our alliance forums in which I explained the similarities
between the current war and battles/wars of the past on Earth.<br />
<br />
I say “at the moment” because I have already become disenfranchised with the
alliance, and at this point am still in it because I <i>do</i> like many of the people in it.
I firmly believe, however, that TNT as an entity has lost its identity
because of the close relationship with Goonswarm. Coalitions are fine, but you’d expect that
there would be attempts to maintain individualism and identity while working
towards a common goal. TNT is regarded
as “Goonswarm Lite”, and to quote one director of Goonswarm Federation on
Mumble:<br />
<br />
“FCON and SMA leaving are expected. If
TNT leaves, then I’ll be worried because we are so fucking similar.”<br />
<br />
When The Mittani talked about folding the alliances of the Imperium into
Goonswarm to force the best chance of fighting in FozzieSov, TNT was on the
fence. While CEOs in the alliance were
hesitant to do so, there were attempts by Goonswarm directors to point out this
“special relationship” between the two alliances, <i>a la</i> the “special relationship” between the United States and Great
Britain. This didn’t fully sway the
CEOs, thankfully, and I think that was part of the reason the idea fell
behind. The Mittani and his directors
couldn’t even convince “Goonswarm Lite” to go with his plan, so how could they <i>possibly</i> convince the rest of the
Imperium to do so without significant failcascades?<br />
<br />
But while I am annoyed by this, I can’t overlook the fact that I <i>am</i> a loyal member of the alliance, even
with these misgivings. I wouldn’t betray
them, I wouldn’t spy on them. I’ve never
done it, and I <i>have</i> wanted to for
previous groups. Normally I just leave
at that point. TNT has been fun, and I
want this to be more of a wake-up call piece than a “fuck you bitches” piece. However, this is a point in the war where
morale <i>is</i> low for the Imperium, and
being objective and bringing facts to the table that contradict the narrative
is routinely seen as treason. As such,
having already been banned from Goonswarm Mumble and the site because I am
taking things more neutral than they want, I hold no doubts that this may be
the final nail in the coffin and I might see myself removed because of
pressure.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;"><b><u><span style="line-height: 107%;">The
Fabian Strategy</span></u></b><span style="line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">When the war began, The Mittani called on the Imperium
to take up the “Fabian Strategy” in order to win the war. The Fabian Strategy revolves around denying
decisive large-scale engagements in favor of small skirmishes at best, but
normally it involves rapid harrying of logistics, stragglers, and forces that can
be encircled, cut off, and removed. This
strategy works best against an invading force, where their logistics train is
strewn out, reinforcements can’t necessarily be deployed rapidly, and you have
a solid “GTFO” strategy and plan. More
commonly, this is seen today as “guerilla tactics”, and we saw in Afghanistan
and Iraq that this <i>can</i> be highly
effective.<br />
<br />
The Fabian Strategy assumes that the force employing it has time on their
side. Alternatively, it is employed if
no other viable strategy presents itself.
Once again, the Muj in Afghanistan used it, because they <i>don’t</i> have a viable alternative, and
because Western memories tend to be very short: we know about 9/11, but after
fifteen years of war we simply stopped caring, and became tired of the mire we
were in.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">However, the main problem is that we did not cut off
the MBC’s logistics. Their jump
freighters continue to move unhindered and unmolested, bringing in the
necessary ships for doctrines, modules, and other sundry necessities. As such, while the Imperium likes to say
eventually our enemies will get bored and tired of no SRP, PL, TEST, and other
larger conglomerates can easily replace what has been lost, even
supercapitals. That is part of the
reason they aren’t afraid to engage in supercapital fights, and The Mittani
knows it: we can no longer easily replace lost supercapitals; replacing basic
capitals is a chore as-is. We have no
industry capability anymore. We risk
scams by buying from outside sources.
Meanwhile, I Want ISK is funding the war effort, and easily replaced the
supercapitals destroyed by SNUFF in the infamous “backstab” not too long
ago. So while the Imperium may have the
largest supercapital fleet available (up for debate), it is not easily
replaced, which makes it more dangerous to utilize. Our assets are locked for the most part; our
enemies’ are not.<br />
<br />
But our own logistics are harried. The
recent move of pretty much every swinging dick into Saranen has pretty much
shut off our ability to bring in jump freighters. Cynos will be removed post haste, as we have
seen over the past few days. It is safer
to light the cyno on another station in-system and warp to our home base at 0
than to jump directly to a cyno on said station.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">There are also two key components to the Fabian
Strategy that are not being utilized, thus actually making it the <i>worst</i> alternative presented to, and by,
The Mittani. The first is that the force
utilizing the strategy is not centralized, and that instead of a large force,
you have multiple smaller forces camping out.
This is to prevent <i>that decisive,
large-scale battle</i> that the strategy seeks to avoid from happening. While low-sec might be unconquerable, by consolidating
the forces into Saranen—and into one station when three are available, at that!—it
serves to weaken the overall objectives stated by The Mittani. Having hundreds, if not thousands, of players
in one system, it actually eases up the enemy’s intelligence services: you can
now view that one system as your center of focus, and send a very small amount
of scouts out to the systems important to the Imperium: Daras (the system
important to Imperium Black Ops), Aunenen (the mid-point between Jita and
Saranen for jump bridges), and Tamo (the midpoint between Aunenen and Saranen
for other capitals). The stated goal of
this consolidation was to make fleets easier to manage, but what it does is
allow the enemy to know when a fleet undocks.
And considering The Mittani and directors of Imperium alliances like to
harp on about the MBC not having unified communications, wouldn’t it be smarter
to take full advantage of that, and spread the forces out in order to minimize
the chance PL, TEST, and TISHU might see <i>the
same damn fleet</i> undocking? If the
communication lines for the enemy are truly disgruntled (read: fucked), then it
makes sense to force greater hardships on it, not make it so one TISHU, one
TEST, and one PL scout can each be in the same system and allow for all three
to form up. The purpose of this strategy
is to introduce Mr. Murphy far more readily to the enemy, while also increasing
the chance he visits himself upon you as well (Murphy’s Law: Anything that can
go wrong, will go wrong, and at the worst possible time). Compounding problems on the enemy is crucial
to the power of the Fabian Strategy, but The Mittani ignores this, because of
the following component he ignores.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">The Fabian Strategy makes use of small-unit commanders. Normally, a military would entrust a captain
or lieutenant with a company or platoon, but the big decisions would be left up
to the major or lieutenant colonel in charge of the battalion, at the
lowest. While the United States military
offers the ability for those lieutenants to make command decisions based on a
changing tactical situation, overall it’s frowned upon to change entire
sections of a plan. The Fabian Strategy
removes such limitations, oftentimes letting the junior officers or senior
noncommissioned officers make decisions not normally at their paygrade. You actually <i>encourage</i> those people to think, make informed judgments, and run
things, which can put a lot of pressure on them, but it helps to shape
them. The idea is to turn your forces
into makeshift SEALs, Special Air Services, Force Recon, Delta, etc. They become specialized small-gang fighters,
looking to make the enemy bleed in the most efficient way possible.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Unfortunately, the Imperium has kept things to the “coalition-level
FCs”. Sure, there are individual
alliance-based FCs, but if you don’t have the FC tag attached to your name you
actually miss out on many of the perks associated with FCing. You don’t get to do pings unless someone
higher-up is willing to do so. In many
instances, your fleet <i>will not be
eligible for SRP</i>, and there have been several FCs who have said their
fleets have been denied SRP because they aren’t “valid”, despite the fleet
running the literal fits and compositions found on Goonfleet. So the enemy knows DBRB, Asher Elias, Amyclas
Amatin and the like are FCs, and to headshot them. There’s little chance of that happening when
other people who have proven leadership traits taking fleets out, because it
messes, once again, with the enemy’s ability to gather intelligence! <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">The more pressing matter is that the Fabian Strategy
is pretty much a solid “win” card.
Barring the entire coalition falling apart overnight, eventually the MBC
will grow bored, either because of no more fights, or just general apathy. At that point, The Mittani can claim victory,
as he “knew” it would happen. In
essence, there is <i>no</i> way to lose with
the Fabian Strategy.<br />
<br />
What it boils down to is leaders who have no other options, or who can’t
actually strategize and plan, turn to this tactic to save face. Nothing more.
It offers no actual chance for lower-level commanders and leaders to
take initiative and do their own thing.
It is rather like the Soviet doctrines, in which everything was decided
by the military leaders in Moscow, and it was expected there would be no
deviation at the sub-unit level. That is
that antithesis to the Fabian strategy.<br />
<br />
<b><u>Saranen “Standing Fleet”</u></b><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">24 April 2016: “<b><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial;">Firstly</span></b><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial;">, the Saranen Standing fleet which is keeping Saranen
clean. The enemy that used to be sitting on the undock having fun is no longer
having fun, either because the Standing Fleet docks up and advises nobody else
to undock, denying content until hostile forces leave, or increasingly because
the Standing Fleet kills the hostiles and fewer of them return. The enemy does
not deserve content, they deserve misery, and right now Saranen is a rather
discouraging place for them to be.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">15 May 2016: “The standing fleet
doesn't work because the enemy is always ready to drop overwhelming force, and
because Caracals can't take on carriers. If they're going to camp Saranen, let
them camp a station where nothing is happening. Use you own insta-undocks and be
smart when undocking. We will deal with their campers by boring them to death
and then flash forming occasionally.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">In less than a month, the concept of
the “standing fleet” went the way of the dodo.
This concept is routinely used in high sec war decs, where overwhelming
force isn’t expected. One alliance can
keep people outside the home station, going suspect or other shenanigans while
people do real life stuff. Once hostiles
show up, everyone prepares to fight.
This is effective because high sec prevents neutrals from opening fire
unless one side goes suspect. The real
strength is that neutral logistics will go suspect, allowing free fire on
them. Mittani tried to take a high sec tactic
and turn it into something in low sec.
It does not work.<br />
<br />
The reason for this is simple: the Imperium has preferred staying with cheap
fits and doctrines, limiting the power of the fleet itself. Since it’s so easy to prepare for, and you
know exactly where they are, you can camp it all day. The standing fleet’s purpose was to either
pop enemies, or deny them content. It
was easily countered, and people only joined to whore PAP links. A fleet of 90 would only have about 45
undocked, if they were that lucky.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">In short, Mittani expected
overwhelming numbers on his side.
However, as he’s constantly said the entirety of EVE is arrayed against
us. While he flaunts a “lack of
communication” amongst our enemies, he ignores the fact that you don’t need
impressive communication lines in order to stay outside a station and blap
anything from the Imperium that undocks.
It was folly to think we’d have the numbers to maintain a
round-the-clock standing fleet and maintain numerical superiority, when we
simply do not have it.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;"><b><u><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;">Once Allies, Now Falling By The Wayside</span></u></b><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">When SMA and FCON broke ties with the
Imperium, I was one of the few saying they should not maintain blue
status. The truth is while this war has
been on the minds of many for years, the actions of SMA were the catalyst that
caused everything to begin. As such, it
seemed only fair that they should have a part in the defense. The truth is, SMA was never prepared for
this, and hubris on the part of their leadership, and a general belief that the
Imperium as a whole would save them, led to their eventual destruction. It was difficult—nigh on impossible—to fully
fight this war on one front, let alone multiple. As such, bailing means that they had nothing
to gain, and their rapidly declining memberbase showed it.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">FCON has engaged the Imperium.<br />
<br />
The Bastion no longer sees itself as part of the Imperium.<br />
<br />
Only TNT, EXE., and RAZOR remain at this point.
And to be frank, given talks lately that I have been privy to, at least
two of those alliances are talking about evac’ing the war zone. Maybe not cutting ties, but moving on to “rebuild”.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;"><b><u><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;">So, Is The War Lost?</span></u></b><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">Right now, the war is lost for the
Imperium in everything but name only. I
want to make that clear: there <i>is</i> a
chance to pull victory out of this, but it would require a complete
restructuring of leadership, and an openness to new tactics and
strategies. It would require humility,
which The Mittani lacks. In fact, I
would argue the entire Goonswarm Federation leadership lacks it. They simply believe that what they are doing
now is the only right way to achieve success.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="background-color: #444444; color: white;"><span style="background-color: #444444;"><br /></span>
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; line-height: 107%;"><span style="background-color: #444444; color: white; font-family: inherit;">The Mittani’s many claims have never
been validated by evidence he claims to have.
In fact, each and every time he’s asked for evidence, it’s never
provided. He’s always said, “we’ve seen”,
but the average member hasn’t seen these cracks forming in the MBC. The average member hasn’t seen Pandemic Horde
being decimated and farmed by other MBC groups.
The average member can only see massaged numbers claiming proof of Horde
inactivity, and they have to take the promises of this war being “won” by the
Goonswarm leadership as gospel. In fact,
on the Fireside Chats, he readily admitted he doesn’t have a “ready list”. Okay, The Mittani might not have a list right
now, but why hasn’t be provided one since?
Why don’t we have video of all these amazing things happening to help us
win the war?<br />
<br />
It took less than two months to make Goonswarm Federation and the rest of the
Imperium a non-sov-holding entity. This
isn’t the first time anyone in the Imperium has lost their sov, but it <i>is</i> the first time it’s happened since
the new sov changes came to pass. In
time, yes the MBC will lose interest in the war, and they will go to do their
own things. At that time, the Imperium
may rise again and reclaim sov. But for
the foreseeable future, without a severe change in tactics, strategies, and in
general a change in thinking, the Imperium will likely continue to be camped
into Saranen station, until such time as it falls apart.</span></span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
</div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-24592649486057765972016-06-01T02:09:00.000-07:002016-06-01T05:53:42.720-07:00Assault on Free Speech...again!<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;">I’m currently in the process of writing up a piece about “World
War Bee”, the massive, multi-faceted war taking place in EVE Online, and it’s
taking a bit longer than expected, because quite frankly there’s more involved
than I intended. However, this came to
my attention on my newsfeed. Please keep
in mind, this is not necessarily game related, but it’s something we all use in
our everyday lives, so it’s relevant. I’ll
also come out fully in this, I am anti-SJW (Social Justice ‘Warrior’). I don’t subscribe to the millennial views on ‘safe
spaces’, ‘hate speech’, ‘third-wave feminism’, ‘Black Lives Matter’, and the
like. I’m a libertarian, albeit one that
subscribes to having a military that can beat the shit out of people who need
it. After all, we’ve seen what happens
when the US doesn’t have a well-funded and well-established military, though
eventually we became BACK TO BACK WORLD WAR CHAMPIONS AW YISS!</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">According to Bloomberg Technology, Google, Twitter, Microsoft, and Facebook
want to go beyond the criminal laws established for freedom of speech and
freedom of expression and clamp down on “hate speech” in less than 24-hours of
being notified.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;">Now, this is being said to the European Commission, and it’s
not hard to expect them to try to push for this in the United States. And if it makes it to the States, the history
of the government trying to pass SOPA and PIPPA will come to the fore
again. After all, the government will
try sleight of hand: “Facebook now does it, why not make everything safer and
let the government do it?” Believe me, any
censorship on the internet is bad, and it opens a whole bunch of doors that
should stay shut. However, over on the
Continent (and in England) it is far easier to curtail speech of others,
labeling something hate speech just because you disagree with someone. In fact, in Canada a man by the name of
Gregory Alan Elliott was arrested by Toronto police in November 2012 amid
allegation he harassed two third-wave feminists over the course of several
months through Twitter. He was acquitted
after two years, but during that time he couldn’t use a computer, among other
stupid limitations placed on him.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">In the United States we take freedom of speech for granted. However, such things are not the same in
Europe. Facebook has been working with
Germany to censor posts critical of Islamic immigration, labeling it as ‘hate
speech’ even if the person isn’t saying anything particularly hateful. Voicing concerns in Germany is now hate
speech? Of course, it’s understandable
about that. Germans, after all, are
still <i>really</i> sore about killing over
six-million people just because of their birth status.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;">They’re blaming the terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels
(and conveniently leave out San Bernadino) for the need to curb this type of
speech. However, this won’t stop
it. Terrorism experts (and military
experts) agree that radicalization is only made easier via social media, but it’s
been happening for decades before Facebook and MySpace. In a joint statement made by the
conglomerates, they stated that activity needs to be “expeditiously reviewed by
online intermediaries and social media platforms, upon receipt of a valid notification,
in an appropriate time-frame”.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">That, by the way, means 24-hours or less.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">This comes on the heels of several well-known anti-SJW pages being taken down
because of bot reporting (a lone person using hundreds of bots to report posts
on a page, leading to it being removed).
This isn’t a hard thing to do.
Several military-themed pages I follow are on their 27<sup>th</sup>
incarnation, or more! Some page
organizers just became tired of dealing with having to constantly remake the
page.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;">And please keep in mind, there <i>are</i> legitimate pages out there calling for attacks on people. There’s a whole multitude of pages calling
for attacks on Donald Trump, just as there were pages calling for attacks on George
Zimmerman, Officer Darren Wilson, and many others on the “wrong” side of the “social
justice debate”. Many of them aren’t
found to be in violation of Facebook’s Terms of Service until the national
media gets involved. But the minute you
question mass Islamic immigration, enjoy a 24-hour post ban!</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">This all comes on the heels of Twitter removing the “verified” status of Milo
Yiannopolous, a prominent Conservative speaker, and on the heels of the
revelation that Facebook censors the news stories you see and the pages that
appear in your feed. Don’t get me wrong,
as a private entity Facebook has that right, but to tell people, “No, we don’t
do that” is the problem.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">They want to be labeled Social Justice <i>Warriors</i>. But can you be a warrior when you cry for
safe spaces so your feelings aren’t hurt, and shout down prominent feminists
who disagree with your brand of feminism, like spoiled children? Looking at you, Trigglypuff.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">And yes, this is chilling to free speech on the whole, ladies and gents.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">I've asked for comment from several pages I follow that have been on the receiving end of Facebook's bullshittery, and will update when they get back to me.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.facebook.com/WOOK-Nation-004-1542944236019315/">Wook Nation</a>: <span style="line-height: 15.36px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Honestly I think many Americans have become weak and too damn sensitive. If someone makes a statement that doesn't agree [with] their opinion, immediately it becomes an issue. [Facebook] is the worst at trying to suppress freedom of speech. They won't take down liberals, Black Lives Matter or Muslims hatred but you say anything derogatory about any of these groups and you're [<i>sic</i>] post is removed and you're banned. Anything anyone says can be defined as "hate speech" if the person hearing or reading is opposed or offended.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="line-height: 15.36px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;">
America is breeding spineless children. It's like the 60s again. Peace, love and happiness. They have the freedom feel that way and act foolish spreading their brand of freedom. They fail to realize freedom is not free. There's a price that brave men and women have paid with their lives. Children don't learn about [w]ars past. They learn nothing of The Holocaust. They couldn't even tell you about Pearl Harbor or DDay. Why? Because our education systems are failing [our] youth and parents do nothing. Everyone wants to paint a pretty picture of everyone living peacefully. That is the biggest crock of shit out there. It's never going to happen. Our children can't say the Pledge of Allegiance in school because it offends some people. I guess that's "hate speech" in some peoples bubble. They can't have a moment of silence but Muslims can pray so they aren't offended. My own daughter and her friends in Middle School were called an Infidel by a young Muslim boy who's father was from the Middle East. That was 7 years ago. Where did an 11 year old kid get that knowledge. Yet I was called radical for going to school and discussing it with the principal. The Father wouldn't even attend the meeting because I had spoke at a Veteran's Day assembly and he knew who I was and that I was prior military. I was told that my bringing light to the situation was being a bigot and showed intolerance. I will not go into to what I told the principal to do with his intolerance, but you know me well enough to figure it out.
In short, Americans have become soft. We are no longer allowed to be Americans. We can't be proud of our heritage and we are supposed to forget the past that made us a Nation. If you're not with those people you're against them. As far as the page, we have toned it down because redoing the page over and over is exhausting. We have no reach because FB has stifled that. What happened to if you don't like something simply don't read it and move on? Aren't these folks that attack us just as guilty of posting "hate speech" in their comments to us? In the end its perception of the individual. Do we push the edge? Sure we do. It's just words, but these days words will get you locked up for verbal assault. What have we allowed to happen?
</span></span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="line-height: 15.36px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit; line-height: 15.36px;">+++++</span></span></span></div>
<span style="line-height: 15.36px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit;">
</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #444444; font-family: inherit; line-height: 15.36px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 15.36px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/United-States-Meme-Corps-1505124846426289/">United States Meme Corps</a>: </span></span><span style="line-height: 15.36px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">And that's where political correctness has ruined society. People are so scared of hurting someone's feelings that they aren't even telling the truth anymore. It is leading to the destruction of society.
When you silence the masses for fear of hurting the few you will eventually lose all creativity and honesty.</span></span><span style="line-height: 15.36px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">
</span></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Source: <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-31/tech-giants-vow-to-tackle-online-hate-speech-within-24-hours">http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-31/tech-giants-vow-to-tackle-online-hate-speech-within-24-hours</a></span></span><o:p></o:p></div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-76667090562792235432016-02-22T21:45:00.001-08:002016-02-22T21:48:48.522-08:00Goblin's Fairy Tales<div class="MsoNormal">
So I ended up reading <a href="http://greedygoblin.blogspot.com/2016/02/the-2016-peace-terms-to-imperium.html">Gevlon's blog post</a>, with his “very lenient peace terms”. It’s almost sad, how self-deluded he is, that
he’s some amazing EVE Online player, and yet he doesn’t seem to engage in
PvP. He pays others to do it for
him. His killboard is a joke: 12 kills,
4 losses. He’s been in an NPC
corporation since he started the game in 2012.
He’s made ISK in-game, sure, but where does it all go? Well, into the pockets of people he has do
all his work for him! There’s no risk to
him while he stays docked in station, though I’m fairly confident he has a PvP
character elsewhere, cleverly disguised so as to not be traceable. Plausible deniability. Hell, he’s probably in Goonswarm itself!<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The verbiage leads one to believe he has a severely narcissistic
personality, much as many self-important.
The constant reminder that he is paying people to kill Goon ships in
high sec, to fight them in null, to do X and Y, but never actually giving a
neutral viewpoint. Oftentimes this is a
good indication that the opposite side of the coin is something that frightens
him. But we’re not going back years to
explain killboards, ISK efficiency, shifting battle lines because of gameplay
changes, or the like. What we are
looking at is the claims made.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
First, we look at Sov changes. When “Fozzie Sov” was introduced, almost
every null-sec group agreed that this would change the outlook of sov-holding
alliances, and that it would be better to foxus on smaller groups holding areas
of sov, all under the protective umbrella of the larger alliances. This changed the names on some areas, but
overall didn’t change much, because even though several groups hold areas in
Tribute, Pure Blind, etc., they’re also falling into the sphere of influence of
Goonswarm, and other groups. More alliances
also means it allows those groups to take care of their own sov issues: they
can hunt down and defend their IHubs, TCUs, and command nodes, and request
reinforcements from other groups rather than force those groups to do so all
over the area. For example, even though
Goonswarm today was looking to defend their sov space, Tactical Narcotics Team
did the same, and it allowed for multiple groups to do the same thing, work
together, and keep their sphere intact.
This is similar to how combat operations after an invasion happens:
decisions and operations are planned out and carried out at the regimental or
battalion level, which is how one should look at alliances. The larger division or corps might decide the
objectives, but how those objectives are achieved can be left at the smaller
group levels. This allows for a rapid
change in a fluid combat environment, which Imperium is capable of doing.<br />
<br />
Goonswarm wasn’t alone in this outlook: as stated previously, almost every
other null-sec entity said that this would be the better way to run sov after
the changes, so it’s no surprise that much of the space around Deklein is held
by other entities: Circle-of-Two, Tactical Narcotics Team, SpaceMonkey’s
Alliance, and Fidelas Constans all own space around them, offering not just a
buffer, but allies if required.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
More to the point, the attacks going on right now don’t hit Goonswarm-held
space. The attacks are focused on the
other alliances with-in the Imperium, in the hopes of fracturing and destroying
the coalition brick by brick. Mordus
Angels continue to attacks SMA and TNT holdings, and even attempt to damage the
IHubs of CONDI systems, but the bulk of the fighting is aimed at the other
alliances in the Imperium. It would be
impossible right now to try to take sov from Goonswarm, and the hope is that
enough small chips will force Goons to pick and choose who to help, and thus
cause the ones who aren’t aided to view it as a betrayal and splinter off. This hasn’t worked, though, and the Imperium
(to include Goons proper) have come to the aid of each other. While people tout successes at hitting SMA,
for example, they ignore the utter failings of engaging and dismantling of
their fleets when the rest of the Imperium shows up. It could be argued that SMA’s loss of numbers
is a direct consequence of this focused effect, but the truth is no one has
bothered to ask the CEOs of those corporations why they left. Not even me. And I’ll admit that I have feelers out to get
the reasons why they left, which may be between “we can’t rat and make money”
to “we are tired of losing our damn Jackdaws”.<br />
<br />
Is it possible that this is a direct result of attacks on Goonswarm? Absolutely.
The more poignant and relevant question is, is this likely? Not by a long shot. Changes in game mechanics require changes in
how the players play and act; and while Gevlon will gladly tell you how much
MoA and TISHU have destroyed, he conveniently leaves out how much they have
lost. He makes no distinction between
kills of GSF members that have only those members on it: as long as one person
is on the kill—whoring or otherwise—it counts.
If the same metric were used, there’s a good chance the opposite would
be true. But we’re not here to debate
years of killboard statistics, because that would require time to go through
individual killmails since 2014. It
simply shows the lack of specificity in his claims (this is a trend of Gevlon’s).<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Second, Sion being banned from the CSM: no, that hasn’t
happened. At worst, he’s been
ostracized, but that isn’t the same as being banned. More to the point, it call into question CCP’s
commitment to the players, because it seems anyone who has a disagreement with
CCP’s decisions is similarly ostracized, with CCP even blatantly saying the CSM
was not the “normal channels” for communication with developers, despite that
being one of the core reasons for having the CSM, especially in lieu of the
Incarna debacle.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Okay, now on to the loveable claims made by Gevlon, about
TMC losing views. What metric does he
use for that? What site does he base
this on? Well, his post on 18 November
2015 linked to Alexa, which showed a decline in visits, absolutely. However, checking that site 23 February 2016
shows that they haven’t kept track of the site’s traffic <i>at all</i> since
October! (<a href="https://www.blogger.com/url=http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/themittani.com">Source</a>). However, a different source shows only a
slight downtrend beginning 01 August 2015 and ending 01 January 2016, 640,000
hits to 630,000 hits, for those respective dates. (<a href="https://www.blogger.com/url=http://www.similarweb.com/website/themittani.com">Source</a>). So while a general viewership loss of 10,000
might be a loss, it’s really nothing in the scheme of things, especially when
you consider that the numbers seem to fluctuate depending on the month. 01 November 2015, for example, saw 520,000
visits, so obviously those numbers continue to go up.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So the claims are either fabrications, untruths, or
impossible to quantify and qualify because of missing information. In any of the three possibilities, it shows
the bias and the blinders being worn by Gevlon.
Is he getting his money’s worth?
The return seems to be saying he is.
But is the end game being achieved?
Not likely. What is being lost is
a pittance in the grand scheme of things, and the facts Goons continue to run
strong two years after this began speaks volumes towards this point.<br />
<br />
Now, let’s look at his demands, which are laughable, at the very least.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
First, he demands a complete stoppage of suicide ganking by
Imperium members. That isn’t going to
happen, and he knows it. There’s a lot
of ISK made with Burn Jita, a lot of tears generated. It actually helps the economy. Also, what’s to stop those people who engage
in it from dropping to NPC corporations, or dropping to CODE. and continuing
the fun and games? He knows there’s ways
around it. What’s he going to do,
complain some more? Blow more ISK to
kill a bunch of -10 pilots? He essentially
wants high sec to become safer, when it is already incredibly safe. If anything, right now high sec space is
safer today than when it was when I started playing in 2009! People don’t want to watch their monitors
when hauling through Niarja and Uedama, let them pay the price for
complacency. Suicide ganking has a
plethora of punishments already attached.
Just because you don’t like them doesn’t mean that it isn’t something
that is valid, and CCP has said this multiple times.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Second, he demands that Goonswarm make the Imperium five
alliances instead of the current 11. He
demands Mittani pick and choose who to keep in the coalition, which means if
you’re not chosen, there will be hurt feelings.
When Gevlon expects is that if a group is kicked, they’ll be required to
hand their sov to other Imperium members, and then Gevlon can go to those
alliances and say, “You were slighted, you should totally join me in disbanding
Goons!” It’s a clever metagame, but it’s
easy to spot. More to the point, earlier
in this post he said that Goons already tell people what to do, that autonomy in
the coalition is impossible to gain. He
claims Goons run the show, and he doesn’t like it. But he’s okay just this once if Mittens
flexes his muscle and tells people what to do here. It falls into his metagame.<br />
<br />
Finally, he demands an apology to Mordus Angels, among others. That’s not gonna’ happen, again. He claims they are the “best PvPers” around,
but the truth is that in an engagement of similar numbers and similar ship
types, Imperium forces usually come out on top.
Mordus Angels and Psychotic Tendancies. tend to run from fights in which
they do not control the field via numbers or larger, more expensive, and/or
better ships. That’s fine, no one wants
to risk their ship and pod if they aren’t going to get some kills. But what comes out at the end of the day is
the self-delusion of Gevlon. If
anything, the fact people are upset over words said on forums, on Reddit, and
over propaganda and have seen fit to generate content over it should be
commended, because that is what null sec needs: more fights, whether good or
not.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gevlon reminds me of those people in World of Warcraft, who
talk a big game, but when push comes to shove there’s no real
consequences. You can be an ass all you
want, but there’s safety in those games, there’s no fear of losing what you
have earned. As I said, maybe he has a
PvP character outside of his character that is in no way affiliated, but who
knows? He is no different than the people
he tries to vilify, and is guilty of projecting his own shortcomings on others.<o:p></o:p></div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-2183444748280541492015-12-30T22:21:00.001-08:002015-12-31T07:52:13.042-08:00Diary of a Sad Man (not me, I'm mad)<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
If there is
one thing I have always been good at, it’s putting rumors to bed. This requires having the facts, and I think I
do that well-enough. You don’t get to
work at Massively by being a fear-mongering rumor whore, and I routinely critiqued
games and communities based on the facts at hand. Sure, there’s always some tinting in your
position, because an opinion is always there, but overall I do a good job of
being rather objective, even if I color my pieces with some profanity. That’s why I do what I do: I want people to
learn, be it from games, or drama.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
This drama
is not of my own design, and in fact I have found myself engulfed because I
hate people who lie. I do. Part of it is also my own silly belief in
loyalty to friends, even those you don’t know.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Ark has many
servers, and like EVE Online Ark admins can do what they want to meet their
goals. Most of these people want a
highly popular server, which is all well and good. No one wants to play as king of nothing,
right? But you have some that go too
far, and this is the story of one of them.<br />
<br />
Meet <b>Novahaze</b>. He’s a rambunctious, angsty pre-teen whose
sole solace in life is maintaining an Ark server. That’s fine, it’s okay to run a server, and I
encourage good people to do so. However,
Novahaze is a classiv example of “absolute power corrupts absolutely”. He was known to the admin of the server I
play on since the game came out, when said admin played on Novahaze’s server,
and since leaving said server, Novahaze has been upset. Angry.
Pissed.<br />
<br />
You see, Novahaze was caught doing something that a good admin will never do,
even in the toughest of circumstances: cheating. Because Novahaze is a terrible player, he
relies on admin commands to bolster his chances of winning, and even with such
an advantage he can’t seem to do it.
This was discovered early in the game’s life, when he raided a tribe on
his server, that recorded him using commands to escape their highly-successful
defense.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The admin of<b> Skull Island</b> is <b>Unk</b>, or Ertosi on Steam. His
friends Denium and DayMan played with him on the server, alongside another
player named Keith. During the attack on
their base, Keith recorded the adventure, complete with teleporting and
no-clipping on the part of Novahaze. Of
course, Novahaze claims it is doctored, but that’s a pretty incredible
doctoring, I have to say. The video can
be found <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmE33TuR5MQ">here</a>. As you can see, Novahaze falls from the bird,
taking no damage and the rider is killed by the fall. The discrepancy could be HP, but it’s
doubtful. You’ll then watch him run to a
wall with Plant Species X shooting at him, then disappear. Keith is able to crouch and get a look
through the ground to see Nova on the other side of their wall, running
away. This is referred to as “no
clipping”. Later, you’ll see him running
along a mountain edge to escape a pursuer and “fall”, looking as if he’s fallen
off a cliff. However, Keith quickly
shows he’s actually teleported, not fallen.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The defense
wasn’t successful. There’s no real way
to defend against an admin who is abusing admin commands to get an advantage
during an attack he instigates. Unk and
friends left the server, and Unk started Skull Island. I will say that this has been the best server
I have been on: Unk prefers to build, and while Skull Island is a PvPvE server,
he does not get involved in PvP. There’s
no worries about the possibility of admin abuse. Unk runs his tribe, The Wild Hunt. Denium created his own tribe, The
Starks. DayMan created The Forgotten
Tribe. That leaves me, joining several
months later, and creating the tribe Happy Pappy Puppy Pals after several
forays on official servers, and one on a non-official EU server.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
The
harassment from Novahaze has been extensive, mainly located on the forums for
Steam and Reddit. It usually consists of
a copy-pasted message, detailing how Denium tried to extort him for real money
when he played on Skull Island, and used admin commands to spawn dinosaurs into
the middle of his base to wipe him when he didn’t pay. The problem is, the only admin is Unk. He refuses to allow people to have server
admin rights to prevent specifically that type of activity.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Novahaze has
also had a habit of harassing other people on Reddit, to the point that no
fewer than five accounts have been banned, and he continues to make new ones to
continue the harassment. In classic
sociopathic fashion, he regales you with tales of harassment from Unk, of
cheating on Unk’s part, and how his time spent on Skull Island was
terrible. The problem being, all of that
should be reversed: all of that has been Novahaze’s actions, and he’s never
played on Skull Island. In fact, he’d be
allowed to, even after all of that, because Unk is that kind of a guy.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
In November
of 2015, Novahaze began spamming the Skull Island forums with a copy-pasted
message. That is when I found out about him, and was made aware of the video. Unk and I were then made aware 08 December
that Novahaze had created a Steam thread with the exact same message, and we
refuted it, providing evidence. At that
point, I created a character on his server, and intended to view his server
settings, as well as how long it took him to ban me. Arkservers.net said Novahaze was on the
entire time I was, and for over 90 minutes I played the game, bullshitting with
Unk and DayMan on Teamspeak while just observing. There wasn’t much chatter, I said nothing and
didn’t interact with anyone. After 90
minutes, while AFK to take care of the dog needing to go outside, I came back
to having been banned from his server.
Not for hacking, not for talking smack, not for breaking any rules. I was simply booted without any reason,
though I assume it’s because I stood up for Unk as a neutral party.<br />
<br />
That video can be found <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_76ZZl_bWxA&feature=youtu.be">here</a>.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
So here we
are, with a deranged child running a server, creating drama to make himself
look more important than he is. Comments
were disabled on the arkservers.net board to stop him from continuing the
libel. You now need to be a certain rank
on the Skull Island forums to see many of our posts for the server. Novahaze continues to run his mouth on the
forums. No one on Skull Island has
attempted to be antagonistic, but we haven’t laid down to be kicked,
either. We refute him every chance we
can, because that is what we do: you don’t allow someone to lie and get away
with it. And being a Marine, I don’t
allow some no-name scrub to dictate such libelous claims without a vigorous
defense being put up.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
You see
those videos. Those videos alone are far
more proof than Novahaze has ever given to substantiate his claims. He won’t both to do so, because he has
none. He has no recordings of Unk
hacking, or breaking any rules. All he
has is a hurt ego, and the need to be validated. That’s why he changes his name on Steam,
often enough to the names of women. He
even took the name Ertosi once to try to fuck with people and claimed he was
Unk.<br />
<br />
But he wasn’t done. As the harassment
continued, Unk and I continued to report his posts until, last week he received
a nice suspension from the Steam forums.
While it wasn’t permanent, we hoped it would shut him up. After getting off of it on Sunday, he
immediately added me to his friends list, and started a nice little
conversation, the text of which can be found <a href="http://pastebin.com/SJGjQ7AM">here</a>,
unedited.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
And it
continues. The spam on advertisement and
recruitment threads, the claims of hacking where none existed on our part. Outright lies about admin abuse, and not even
knowing who the admins are or, more than likely, embellishing the admins.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;">
Novahaze’s
threads for his server are even full of lies.
There’s no admin logging to keep him honest. He’s never had it on. His coliseum is a direct rip-off of Unk’s
coliseum, complete with a skull in the middle as a blatant “fuck you”. His “legendary server events” are
non-existant, the “most recent” being three months ago. His community is nothing. Skull Island may have fewer players on it
than his server, but the chatter in global and on Teamspeak is constant. We love chatting with one another.<br />
<br />
But Novahaze is a small man, not sure if he’ll be remembered. And he won’t.
He knows he won’t. And no one
will care that he’s absolutely nothing after all is said and done.<br />
<br />
This is being put up, because every time he starts his bullshit I want to link
to this instead of typing out new posts to counter his claims. I will always provide evidence, even when the
enemy refuses to do so. The truth is an
absolute defense, and when it is on your side you’ll eventually win.<br />
<br />
Novahaze is more than welcome to show the proof he constantly claims to have,
but it’s been over four months and he hasn’t shown a thing. I’ll let you figure out why.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br />
<u style="font-weight: bold;">Edit</u>: I guess it was inevitable, but 31 December saw me get a suspension from the Steam forums over the issue. This isn't so bad, I barely use it to begin with, but it looks like Novahaze receieved a similar penalty for his shenanigans. While I hope he does learn, history says he probably won't, and more to the point Ertosi gets a one-week reprieve from dealing with this narcissistic personality and compulsive liar. His server advertisement thread can continue unhurt, and not an issue any longer is Novahaze.</div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-8189008139933736432015-04-08T01:38:00.000-07:002015-04-08T01:38:12.135-07:00Commander's Intent<div class="MsoNormal">
Recently, the Rules Committee for the Magic: The Gathering
format “Commander”, more commonly referred to as “EDH” (Elder Dragon
Highlander) made a controversial change to the rules, one that upset a lot of
the more avid players. This ruling
completely nullified a way in which players could prevent problematic
commanders from going stupid very quickly; at the same time, it made people
wonder where the hell the logic for such a change existed, if it did.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For reference, The Rules Committee is run by the original
creators of the format, non-Wizards of the Coast employees, and the official
page on Wizards’s site states that they make the rules. This means individuals who may decide they
don’t like something one week might ban it, and vice versa, unaware of the
larger implications in individual playgroups.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The ruling affected sending a Commander (or General in EDH)
into the library or hand. These cards
(called “tuck” cards colloquially) are solid answers to Commanders that pose a
very real danger to a board state becoming something other than fair. Many of these Commanders offer a lot early-,
mid-, and late-game, and the longer the more they can be played with little
fuss the more problematic they can become.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u>First off, though,
we need to look at the rules of Commander.</u></b><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Commander is a singleton format, with a 99-card deck and one
card called the Commander. In the
format, the Commander’s color identity (this is, mana symbols in the casting
cost, mana symbols in the cost of activated abilities, and mana symbols in activated
or triggered abilities) determine the cards that can be played in the deck. For example, if you have Rafiq of the Many as
your Commander, you may only run lands that provide Green, White, or Blue
mana. Artifacts and permanents you
control must cost either colorless mana to play or only those three colors, and
effects they generate muct require only those colors or colorless mana. Spells you play can only have those colors as
well, and things such as “Kicker” must follow the same rules. You can only spend your mana on those colors
unless a card effect states otherwise.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Aside from basic lands, you may only have one of any other
card in the deck. In theory this tends
to whittle down on the consistency that a deck has. Under normal circumstances, a Magic deck will
consist of sixty cards with a fifteen card sideboard, of which aside from basic
lands you can’t have more than four of each card between the two “decks”. Because you have exactly 99 cards in your
library and can have only one of each card available, this cuts down on the
deck’s ability to be consistent without outside help. There’s loopholes to this rule, such as if a
card states you can have “any number” in the deck you can run up to 99 of them
in the deck, but it’s pretty much a hard-and-fast rule. Alongside this, the format has a banned list
which represents cards considered too powerful, and thus unplayable in the
format.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The format adds a new “zone” to the game, known as the
“Commander Zone”. This is where your
Commander sits when he isn’t in play, in your library, or in your hand. You play your Commander from this zone as if
it was in your hand. Each time that your
Commander is killed or exiled, you have the option to immediately put him in
the Command Zone as a replacement effect.
However, each time you do this, the Commander costs 2 more colorless
mana to play.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Overall, the format is the most fun you can play (in my
honest opinion), mixing the longevity of the eternal formats with the
shenanigans available in the standard and modern formats. It makes for interesting interactions, and as
it was created to be a multiplayer format, it really pushes diplomacy over
brute force. There’s variants of the
basic Commander format (such as “French” or “Duel”, “Pauper”, and a new variant
referred to as “Tiny Leaders”), but overall they follow the same general
outline.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now in general, there are loopholes to the rules, just as
there are in the other formats. But
these loopholes have larger consequences, especially when concerning
Commanders. To give you an idea, my
previous decks involved Commanders such as Glissa, the Traitor; The Mimeoplasm;
Karador, Ghost Chieftain; and Brago, King Eternal. Brago and Karador lent themselves to
combo-tastic shenanigans that I freely admit required little to no interaction
on the parts of my opponents, and while I enjoyed them I took them apart
because they really pushed the limits on the fun of the format in the
playgroup. However, not everyone is
going to view the format as something other than serious, and I certainly have
my competitive decks. My Commanders tend
to be competitive, especially my Erebos deck, which is my longest-standing deck
right now (given, it began as Drana, but it changed into the monstrosity it is
today).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u>So what changed?</u></b><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Previously, there was only one real way to handle commanders
in any way that was considered remotely permanent, and that was by using the
tactic called “tucking”. To put it in laymen’s terms, “tucking” is the act of
using a card whose main objective is to put a permanent into a library, and
normally they had a downside because of how strong the tactic was: Oblation
allowed the player who owned the permanent to draw two cards, Chaos Warp
allowed them to reveal the top card of their library and place it into play if
it was a permanent, and so on, and so on.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The change that occurred was that “tucking” the commander,
placing it anywhere in the library or into the hand, was changed so the
commander could be placed back in the command zone, much like if it was sent to
the graveyard or exiled. This
replacement effect essentially negated a large way to interact with problematic
commanders, such as Derevi and Skithryx.
Using it on a commander, in most cases, will result in the commander
returning to the command zone. The
caveat is that even if this happens, any other effects of the card still
happen, because it still successfully resolved.
This means the negative interaction still ends in a win-win for your
opponent, because that nearly permanent solution no longer applies.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Previously, white had the strongest amount of tuck effects,
with blue coming up next, followed by red.
Red got a boon in the form of Chaos Warp, which many people felt was <i>too</i> powerful given its drawback normally
hit a land. This was an important card—a
staple, in fact, in any deck running red.
Red is considered the weakest color in the entire format by far for many
reasons: starting with a higher life total makes red’s cheap direct damage
spells weak, and the format is slow enough to allow creatures with high
toughness playable, even if under normal circumstances (read: modern and
standard formats) they wouldn’t be viable.
Green is similarly placed as a weak standalone color, however it makes
up for lack of control by posing a lot of questions (playing large creatures
faster than other decks <i>under normal
circumstances</i>). Generally, green has
a lot of creatures that are hard to get rid of (green makes use of a <i>lot</i> of creatures with shroud or
hexproof, requiring board wipes to deal with more potent threats. Or more frightening in nature is that
creatures like Vorinclex and Omnath allow for large beaters that simultaneously
control the board, and also giving you access to large amounts of mana. Green also has a wide variety of cards that
can tutor up creatures and put them directly onto the battlefield, which can
cause havoc if the spell itself isn’t stopped in some way. Green’s main control is via destroying
non-creature permanents, which it can excel at.
Black’s variant of tuck is to either kill the creature, or to kill the
player.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So that leaves us with white and blue. Blue isn’t necessarily affected by the
change, since it does a lot of countering.
White, however, took the brunt of this decision, and it sucks for the
color because a lot of its control tends to revolve around tucking or
exiling. In fact, many of white’s exile
effects (such as Oblivion Ring and Journey to Nowhere) are essentially a free
trip to the command zone, unless they have a way to handle the enchantment/spell/creature. With such exile effects having returns that
can make a commander more expensive, in general people played these cards to
handle other threats as well.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That’s not to say that the tuck cards are now <i>bad</i> in the format, it just removes a lot
of their power for dubious reasons, at best.
Cards like Terminus are still highly effective for removing board states
revolving around overextension, and sending multiple commanders to the command
zone is certainly a big boon; however, in a situation where only one commander
is on the board and/or opponents aren’t overextending, its power wanes
significantly.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But we’re here to discuss the reasoning behind the decision,
so let’s get into it, shall we? And keep
in mind, this is going to come directly from the original EDH/Commander page.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: none; border-top: solid windowtext 1.0pt; margin-left: .25in; margin-right: 0in; mso-border-bottom-alt: solid windowtext .75pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .75pt; mso-element: para-border-div; padding: 1.0pt 0in 1.0pt 0in;">
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<!--[if !supportLists]-->1.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;">
</span><!--[endif]-->We want to engender as positive an experience as
we can for players. Nothing runs the
feel-bads worse than having your commander unavailable to you the whole game.<o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The format itself is supposed to be open and
interesting. Like the legacy and vintage
formats, very few things are actually prevented from being used, and because of
this is has made the Commander scene rather vibrant. New cards routinely come out to make new
commanders viable: it wasn’t long ago that mono-black was nearly unheard of, but
the addition of Skithryx, Drana, Sheoldred and Erebos made the color
valid. Black had a lot of power, but it
had little interaction with combos, especially those that involved artifacts
and enchantments: it had to go outside the color for this to happen, usually in
the form of artifacts and artifact creatures.
Additional spells like Sadistic Sacrament made black a powerhouse, and
in many instances black has the capability to ramp mana as fast—if not <i>faster</i> in many cases—as green can.<br />
<br />
Before I enter into my second point, however, I need to mention the second
“reason” they give for the rule change.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: none; border-top: solid windowtext 1.0pt; margin-left: .25in; margin-right: 0in; mso-border-bottom-alt: solid windowtext .75pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .75pt; mso-element: para-border-div; padding: 1.0pt 0in 1.0pt 0in;">
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<!--[if !supportLists]-->2.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;">
</span><!--[endif]-->The presence of tuck encourages people to play
more tutors so that in case their commander gets sent to the library, they can
get it back—exactly the opposite of what we want (namely, discouraging the
over-representation of tutors).<o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Black has always had an overabundance of universal tutoring,
from Vampiric Tutor to Diabolic Revelations.
Black’s ability to mana ramp has allowed various power changes in the tutors
over the years, and while in Standard and Modern such cards might not be run, a
format in which Cabal Coffers can be copied by no less than two other lands and
several black and artifact mana expounders being present, these tutors are only
seeing <i>more</i> play. Anecdotally, I have had 23 mana on turn 6,
which is a severe outlier for the deck itself, and many times I find myself not
getting close to that amount. Black is
never going to give up many of the cost-efficient tutors, ever. Tuck made it so that a tutor was required to
search up the commander if it was so integral, rather than looking for a win
condition, unless said win condition ended the game then and there. If anything, tuck allowed for a bit more in terms
of control with regards to <i>any</i> black
deck. With commanders such as Skithryx
and Erebos being present, removing such blatant threats and forcing them to
spend mana and a card to get them back meant that players might be safe for at
least one more turn.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Green was probably second in being better off, in that the
more cost-effective tutors put the card in the hand, and green’s tutors
specifically target creatures. This made
it possible to have cheaper tutors for the same objective—namely, finding a tucked
commander—because of the restrictions, which black had nothing of. More to the point, many of green’s creature
tutors had the ability to place the creature from the library directly into
play, meaning they had more versatility: what’s more, some of those cheats are
at instant speed, so there’s even less time to interact with them! So green’s not lacking in its ability to
recover a tucked commander.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Blue? Blue has oodles
of card draw, which restricts how much time the commander may be in the
deck. Cards like Blue Sun’s Zenith are
even instant speed, so you don’t really lose out on much. Sure, of the five colors blue tends to be
more combo-centric, but they have ways to control the board state until they
can recover. So, while blue might lack
tutors, the card draw can and often does make up for this shortcoming.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
White? While lacking
tutors and card draw, white had control to maintain a very powerful board
state. Some commanders even fall into
the artifact category, so they have <i>some</i>
tutors to get them but not many. What’s
really powerful is enchantment searching in white, but there are very few
commanders in mono-white that are enchantments: Heliod is the only one I can
think of off the top of my head, currently.
White also has <i>some</i> card draw,
generally with a drawback (the addition of Armistice certainly helps mono-white
players). Their main defence was and is
to send things back into the deck, or exile them, so white can maintain a very
powerful presence while waiting to find their commander again.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In truth, the weakest has always been red, but that is
because on the whole, red is the weakest standalone color in the format. Usually, red’s very cost efficient burn
spells will wreak havoc throughout the game.
But in other formats, the starting life total is 20, and so a 3-point
Lightning Bolt will be felt all the time, unless their opponent has gained an
insurmountable amount of life. Because
EDH begins at 40 life, that Lightning Bolt loses a lot of potency, and with
only one copy in the deck, it’s not like you can back-to-back chain those burn
spells for a huge advantage. Commander
is also intended to be a multiplayer format, thus reducing the effectiveness
further, and really putting them to creature removal spells. Red, however, has a solid tutor in the form
of Gamble: tutor up your commander, but discard a card. Oh well if it’s your commander, you can play
him next turn—or this turn if you have the mana. Chaos Warp provided a lot of power for red,
and yes, it became a staple in any deck that splashed it, much like Oblation
was.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So was tuck increasing the amount of tutors being run? In general, no. Green and black ran them because of their
strength, and the other colors ran them for utility.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: none; border-top: solid windowtext 1.0pt; margin-left: .25in; margin-right: 0in; mso-border-bottom-alt: solid windowtext .75pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .75pt; mso-element: para-border-div; padding: 1.0pt 0in 1.0pt 0in;">
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<!--[if !supportLists]-->3.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;">
</span><!--[endif]-->While we are keenly aware that tuck is a great
weapon against problematic commanders, the tools to do so are available only in
blue and white, potentially forcing players into feeling like they need to play
those colors in order to survive. We prefer
as diverse a field as possible.<o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In a debate, this would be referred to as a “slippery slope”
argument, among other things. It is
taking one thing, and making a judgment without reason because the cause is
true. In this case, the Rules Committee
assumes that because tuck is admittedly a strong mechanic, more and more
players would feel forced into blue or white to deal with commanders that are
problematic.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The problem with this is that there is no proof that it is
the case, and that there are a <i>lot</i> of
powerful commanders outside those colors being run in a competitive sense:
Omnath, Locus of Mana, Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief, Erebos, Ulasht, and a
multitude of others outside those colors see a lot of play because of their
strength. There is no proof that people
feel forced to run blue or white because of tuck being so strong.<br />
<br />
Skithryx, Derevi, Shaarum….there are a lot of commanders out there requiring a
more permanent answer before they become a problem. Simply sending them to the Command Zone is
not going to work to stop them: it becomes more and more useless as time goes
on, especially with Derevi. Commander is
a multiplayer format, is it not? That’s
what the Rules Committee has said previously.
So there will usually be a blue or white player sitting at the table to
deal with that problematic commander while the rest of the table plays
around. The format is supposed to
develop more diplomacy than anything, so why is the rules committee making
decisions that affect the power of diplomacy in the format based on weak
analytical reasoning? Blue and white
have routinely been the most diplomatic of the colors—until, that is, it’s time
for them to win. You can always expect
decks to do what’s best for them first, and blue and white have always been
more diplomatic than the other colors. In
the case of white, you’ve told them to run more boardwipes, and for blue to run
more bounce. In either case it’s going
to piss off the players, isn’t it?<br />
<br />
Or better yet, white will now run Armageddon effects more and more, to make
sure those problematic commanders are dealt with in a more permanent
fashion. How long until we see
Armageddon banned because of “how powerful” it is? And will the reasoning above be used as justification
for that ban as well? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
MMOs routinely understand that power creep is an issue. That’s why they look to balance rather<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
than remove. You can
always make a justification that the new flavor of the month is too strong and
demand it be nerfed. That just makes
something else too powerful by comparison, and overall it will lead to constant
complaining until everyone can only play with sticks, or in this case basic
lands.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Commander has been a healthy format with the tuck rules for
years. Only now it is being seen as
unhealthy? That brings to question if
it’s the effects, or the new legendary creatures in those colors that are the
problem.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: none; border-top: solid windowtext 1.0pt; margin-left: .25in; margin-right: 0in; mso-border-bottom-alt: solid windowtext .75pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .75pt; mso-element: para-border-div; padding: 1.0pt 0in 1.0pt 0in;">
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<!--[if !supportLists]-->4.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;">
</span><!--[endif]-->It clears up some corner case awkwardness,
mostly dealing with knowing the commander’s location in the library (since
highly unlikely to actually end up there).<o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This is the oddest one of the lot. They use the fact that Fate Reforged brought
about the Manifest mechanic, and if your commander is manifested, even
face-down attacks by the commander still count as commander damage. The only corner case I can recall was with
Praetor’s Grasp, in which if you pulled the commander with it, you had to
reveal it to your opponent despite it being exiled face-down (because they had
the “right” to send it to the command zone).
I can understand, for a bit, the issues that would come from
manifest. After all, if you were
attacking, you had to let them know commander damage was incoming, and they had
the right to block it. But if it’s such
open knowledge, than the commander being manifested doesn’t really create much of
a corner case in the classical sense: you still know which one to block, though
it tells people what creature not to waste a kill spell on.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sheldon Menery goes on to claim in an article on Starcity
Games that this affects very few commonly-played cards, and that overall it
shouldn’t have a deleterious effect on the format. So, if the numbers are truly so few—or rather
if this fact needed to be mentioned at all—why did it need to be changed? This isn’t a case of a format being dominated
by one or two colors, or one or two commanders.
Almost every color combination has a solid, healthy representation via a
number of viable commanders—mono-red being the sole exception as it is very
weak overall. There are other cards and
rules that have been a source of contention for years, and the Rules Committee
has either ignored them or given similarly bad excuses as to why they haven’t
modified anything. Examples include:<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo2; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->-<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;">
</span><!--[endif]-->Several years ago, the Rules Committee said they
would be looking into “split mana” cards, and if the color identity issue
should be modified to allow them to be played in decks running only one of the
colors (for example, Shattering Blow could be run in <i>either</i> red or white). Some
players said this would break the color pie, others said it was necessary to
bring colors up to snuff. The Rules
Committee said they’d be looking into this, but to date has not made a ruling
one way or the other.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo2; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->-<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;">
</span><!--[endif]-->Players have <i>begged</i>
for years for Infect and Poison Counters to be increased in Commander, because
it was felt 10 Poison was too few in the format. Defenders of the current rules point out that
they card pool for Infect is pretty subpar: there’s only one commander for a
true Infect deck, and beyond that not many cards that are very powerful for it. The Rules Committee stated they wouldn’t change
this rule for a variety of reasons: they didn’t want to change the base rules
(despite the format beginning at 40 life), the further we move from seeing a
new Infect card, the better they feel about the decision, and that Commander is
a multiplayer format, and infect tends to be bad in it. Which leads to the obvious question of, “If
it’s a multiplayer format and there are so few cards and you’re unwilling to
change the rules, why are you banning a mechanic and using those reasons to do
so?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u>So what is the general
conclusion?<o:p></o:p></u></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is quite hard to say whether the entire playerbase
actively agrees or disagrees with the changes.
You have several camps, ranging from the “Fuck yeah, this decision rocks
and it’s about time!” camp to the “What in the fuck are you idiots smoking?”
camp, and everything in between. I
generally fall into the “WTF” camp, I’ll admit.
I don’t agree with this rule, I think the excuses for changing it are
spurious at best, and overall I feel like there were other rules they should
have been looking at because they are more important than this.<br />
<br />
More importantly, potentially problematic commanders just became even <i>harder</i> to deal with in any form of
permanency. Who became even worse? Let’s list them!<br />
<br />
-
Derevi, Empyrial Tactician<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
-
Skullbriar, the Walking Grave<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
-
Shaarum, the Hegemon<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
-
Any God card<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
-
Brago, King Eternal<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Let’s just say it: any commander who had a negative effect
when put in the library or hand is no longer weakened. Skullbriar, especially, has become stronger,
so expect more decks with him as the commander showing up. Derevi completely nullifies two rules, one of
which is specific to Commander itself.
The God cards are indestructible, and sometimes not even creatures, thus
making them that much harder to deal with.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Combo decks are now able to worry less about losing a combo
piece so easily many times.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Heavy agro decks have lost a substantial weakness, since now
the commander—many times the win condition in and of itself—can’t be tucked.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Control and tempo are slowly being weakened in this format,
which is sad because of how healthy it was.
In time, people will grow annoyed, and I can see the prevalence of land
destruction decks showing up. Boros
Charm on Isochron Scepter, and get ready to start the board wipes with Kamahl,
Fist of Krosa and Day of Judgement, or just simple Armageddon. As something becomes more prevalent, we risk
the likelihood it will be banned because people are tired of playing against
it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And then it truly will be, “You can only play Grizzly Bears
as your commander and 99 Forests” in the interest of being “fair”.<o:p></o:p></div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-78796769085317393462015-01-21T23:32:00.001-08:002015-01-21T23:51:48.762-08:00Elder Scrolls Online Dropping Subscription Model. Called it!<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">I’ve been busy the past few months with a legal battle
with a former landlord, as well as finding a place to live, finding work, and signing
up for classes for this semester. Thus,
my posting has fallen to the wayside while the stress bleeds off, but this
single event is bringing me back.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">So now it’s come out that <b>The Elder Scrolls Online</b> is going buy to play. They’re dropping the subscription model
altogether for whatever reason, and there are many reasons. So, this does a few things, all of which are
amusing to me. But we’ll go over why
this is a big deal first.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Back when the game launched, it had a decent and solid
launch day. There was no constant lag
issues, no servers dropping because of overcrowding or bandwidth issues. People who preordered the game were allowed
five days of early access, so the servers could be tweaked and hardware changed
to allow for increasing numbers in incremental stages. Honestly, it had one of the strongest game
launches in memory. That was a good
thing, but it died very quick afterwards.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">From Day 1, the game was buggy. Nodes of gatherable resources would respawn
almost immediately, and you’d see piles of people around them, trying to grab
it before other people could do so.
What’s more, the vast majority of these people were bots, accounts that
had been compromised through many ways.
There was little account security involved, and pointing this out
usually entailed the defense of, “Well, Rift and World of Warcraft had botting
issues in the beginning!”<br />
<br />
And it’s true: they did. The difference
was that as far as anyone is concerned, World of Warcraft came out at the
beginning of the MMO craze, and so it wasn’t like they could foresee everything
that would happen concerning compromised accounts and the ways that the gold
farmers gain access to them. But
Blizzard took it seriously, and they made great strides with-in the first few
months to minimize them. Even when the
“play to level 20 for free!” event began, they severely curtailed the ability
for compromised accounts to pass on the information that could cause more
accounts to be compromised. But Zenimax
had ten years of trial-and-error to draw upon, to look at the security
precautions many MMOs have taken in order to prevent compromised accounts and
hacking. They didn’t do that, and so
they ended up reaping what they sowed.
There was a lot of anger launched at Zenimax and the developers of the
game, from Beta to when I stopped playing, which was about two weeks into the
launch. I actually ended up being
permanently banned form the “official” forums for stating why I believed the
game would stop requiring a subscription with-in a year at the outset, and on
the Tamriel Foundry forums I was decried as a troll by the ardent defenders of
the game and company. But then again, so
was <i>everyone</i> who said something
negative about the game.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">But now it’s come out that we were right: the game is
no longer a subscription-based game, or at least won’t be beginning 17 March
2015. The game didn’t even hit a year
before this happened, so you should think about that for a second. It’s no different than <b>Star Wars: The Old Republic</b> or <b>Warhammer
40k Online</b>, or probably the most infamous to do this, <b>Guild Wars 2</b>. They all went
free-to-play or buy-to-play with-in the first year, and they had all been hyped
because they were triple-A names getting MMO franchises! But the companies banked on the IP being the
saving grace, and so they half-assed the actual games, and that’s when shit
went down. To this day, SWTOR bleeds
people playing, and they are actively nickel-and-diming the people who have
stayed. The people at <b>Electronic Arts</b>, who published the
game, have admitted as much, and have no intentions of shutting down the
servers because they fully believe (read: hope) that the release of Episode VII
will lead to a resurgence in the interest towards the entire franchise, and
thus SWTOR will be saved by the people joining the game.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Zenimax is taking a similar look: the game is coming
out to Xbox One and Playstation 4, and since you have to pay to use the
multiplayer feature for both systems Zenimax can’t charge a subscription for
the console people, and that’s part of the reason the game for PC is going
buy-to-play. I have no problems
admitting that I believe this is part of the reason, but it’s a small part of
the overall reason. They made mistakes
that they allowed to compound and grow.
They ignored the players and focused on recouping the losses that have
happened since launching the game, and gave up on actual quality. Because of that, they’re hoping a rename to <b>Tamriel Unlimited</b> will somehow unfuck
the massive clusterfuck they have allowed to grow. To use a medical metaphor, they allowed
several small abscesses to grow and coalesce, and now they have a much, <i>much</i> larger problem to fix. Elder Scrolls Online has consistently bled
account subscriptions: what the exact number is we really can’t say. Blizzard admitted in a few press releases
that they were losing subscriptions during <b>Mists
of Panderia</b>, but Blizzard is also a much larger corporation with a much
larger amount of materials and manpower dedicated to each game. As such, they had to admit this shortcoming
to the public, also in part because they are a publicly-traded game.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Even the defenders of ESO admit that anyone who has
eyes can see the declining activity overall in the game.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">This is part of the reason I’m ecstatic about this
news: those of us who stated that the game would no longer charge a
subscription have been vindicated. Those
of us who attempted to tell the company that they needed to fix basic things
and were rebuffed have been vindicated.
The defenders of ESO are now in an uproar, being told that everything
that has been said that is negative is true, and what we predicated has come to
pass. To quote one former defender on
Zenimax’s forums:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: red;">“OMG! NO! WHY! I thought you Listened to your
community! Day 1 in beta, 1550+ hrs live, PTS hrs. Was patient through all the
bugs and growing pains from early access. Defended this game with all my heart
to all the haters and trolls. Now you invite them? So disappointing!!! And I
just re-subbed for 4 mo to fight the F2P "rumors". This hit me in the
gut. I can't even log in right now. May stop playing today. This is a sad day
for Nirn...... So sad...:(“<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%;">Others are simply stating that they are
jumping ship, end of discussion. Still
others admit they are not surprised, and are trying to play it off as a “welcome
change”. In the end, what matters is how
Zenimax will recover from this decision.
Recently, the other titles that have made this same decision—or gone
full free-to-play—have completely failed.
Zenimax’s track record is not looking positive.<span style="color: #413723;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-50542146687070329182014-11-12T09:14:00.000-08:002014-11-12T09:14:00.653-08:00PR Nightmares (and they're not Rifts)<div class="MsoNormal">
For the past few weeks I’ve been silent, and what I have
posted has been about Trion Worlds’s inaction on the part of the customer
support, community management, and in general public relations teams to try to
keep the customerbase of <b>Rift</b>
updated on the issue that occurred three weeks ago. Now it may seem like a long time to hold a
grudge, but truth be told it’s no longer a grudge about the rollback, but
rather the lack of Trion to actually take the complaints seriously, and to
treat the paying players (really, all the players) as something of a money
faucet. Generally speaking, the anger at
this point that is still simmering amongst the Faeblight denizens is that the
company does not care, and looking back on many of the posts and what-not, I
have to echo this sentiment.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Before I go into the actual posting, I’d like to take a
moment to congratulate <b>Turbine</b> for
their quick response today when the <b>Dungeons
and Dragons Online</b> authentication server issue happened. In under an hour the server was restarted, and
the players were kept updated as to the cause, the status, and the final
resolution in a timely manner. Not once
did anyone feel like there was an issue that they were being ignored or kept in
the dark, and Turbine’s Twitter, Facebook, and forums kept the players in the
loop. Dungeons and Dragons Online
doesn’t look as pretty as Rift, it doesn’t play as well as Rift, and in general
feels like a lower-quality game than Rift; however, Turbine has continuously
shown a good customer support team when it comes to PR (their in-game support
is a bit lacking).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now, I’m going to go into the root cause of the issue, but
I’m going to touch on some secondary issues as well. Let’s get those secondary issues out of the
way first.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u>Rollbacks happen<o:p></o:p></u></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yes, they do. Unfortunately,
sometimes servers shit the bed and hardware problems occur. There is very little that companies can do to
prevent this: it comes with age and the like.
Server maintenance and downtime generally focuses on the software side,
and that can help mitigate the problems that can appear when hardware problems
happen. I don’t think anyone is ever
going to complain about scheduled downtime, because it’s a necessity in MMOs (<b>CCP Games</b> has recently begun doing
minor updates and patchwork without bringing the Tranquility server offline for
daily maintenance, but this is not the norm).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I ended up asking around and doing some research to find out
what could have theoretically happened to the servers that would cause the need
for a 25-hour-plus rollback of the servers, and the people I talked to were
dumbfounded. After all, it is simply
something that doesn’t happen unless you have a huge clusterfuck happen, the
starts align, and a virgin has been sacrificed by a competitor to Aule. Properly maintained, software and databases
don’t implode like they did, especially if you have multiple redundancies in
effect to do so. What happened to the
databases for Rift (specifically, the Faeblight server) appears to show the redundancies
and multiple “save points” on different servers does not exist. And since we are told Faeblight is not on any
type of architecture different than the rest of the game, that can only lead
one to believe that safeguard is not being used for <i>any</i> shard in Rift. That is a
dangerous gamble, as we saw with the rollback: you risk hours—if not <i>days</i>—of information when something goes
wrong.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So, how often do rollbacks happen? Minor ones are actually more common than
people think: usually it’s only minutes or hours at a time (more the former than
the latter), and while specific amounts are unknown, it’s safe to say that each
game has rollbacks of different servers at least every month because of
:reasons:. Major ones—rather, ones that
require 6+ hours of rolling back—are nigh unheard of. Not once that I can think of has there been a
need for a game company to rollback servers for more than three hours,
otherwise there would have been a <i>huge</i>
uproar on the internet about incompetence when it was picked up on.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now given, there were rumors of a five-hour rollback in 2013
when it came to <b>Star Wars: The Old
Republic</b>. In truth, I haven’t found
any actual corroboration from EA/Bioware concerning it, but given that SWTOR is
a half-assed game thanks to the efforts of EA, and how shifty the company is, I
wouldn’t be surprised.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Just to make sure I was correct in not knowing of any major
rollbacks with regards to WoW, I asked a friend of mine who works with their
customer service department. She can’t
recall any, and as she put it, “If that ever happened to Blizzard, it would be
everywhere.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We can all agree.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u>Reimbursement Not
Required</u></b><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of the more common claims by apologists is that the
company does not have to <i>give</i> you
anything. By a strict reading of the
EULA/ToS, you’re correct: the company is not bound legally or otherwise to
provide you with any type of reimbursement for a failure of the game. In fact, should the game die a day after you
pay for a year-long subscription, the company doesn’t even have to give you a
refund, pro-rated or otherwise (though good business practice is to do so, <i>especially</i> if your company has more than
one game. It gives the consumer a sense
of honesty, and customers like being able to trust a company).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The problem is that in the past, Trion has done admirably
with regards to reimbursing people for mistakes. When the chat server issue was prevalent
earlier this year, every player received three bundles of +160% vials, and they
got these if they made new characters for a specific frame of time. Likewise, when Patron-status players found
their “patron buffs” not working for a handful of days (three, I think) each
one got a stack of seven bundles, and once again new characters made during a
specific timeframe on those accounts <i>also</i>
received the same number of bundles. So
it truly is no wonder that the players not only of Faeblight, but the other
affected servers as well as the playerbase-at-large expected better than what
we got.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
What the players got was a temporary 48-hour buff to
non-quest experience gain, and 750 credits if you either (a) spent credits
during the affected time, or (b) were a “paying customer”. That, unfortunately, didn’t stack, so you
didn’t get 1,500 credits if you filled out both parts of the criteria, and many
Patrons pointed out that the buff didn’t affect them. More to the point, this buff was during a set
time, meaning many players couldn’t take advantage of it. Also, since the credits were given unequally,
it was impossible to determine what a “paying customer” was, as some Patrons
received the credits and others didn’t; some people who bought Collectors
Editions of Nightmare Tide received the credits, and some didn’t. it made for unequal treatment, and the
question of “What constitutes a paying customer’?” was never answered by a
Trion employee.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now you can imagine why after this was announced a week
after the rollback had occurred, and the playerbase had been kept in the dark
about what was allegedly going on, that said playerbase would rightly be
angry. It may seem like entitlement, but
the playerbase had become accustomed to being given a very good reimbursement
when something went wrong. To many of
us, this seemed like a slap in the face.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u>So then, what <i>is</i> the problem?</u></b><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This is one of those questions that everyone will have a
multitude of answers for. The two chief
concerns are Trion’s lack of communication during the entire ordeal, and
Trion’s lack of giving a shit when the players say something. This has not exactly been something new, as
it has been happening for some time prior to this event. For example, on 09 August Daglar responded to
criticism of the proposed auction house changes with the following:<br />
<br />
“I never want to see someone leave the game over a change, however the nature
of the game is change. We will make
changes, sometimes ones that seem moronic to specific players (or even most
players) that have the potential to make people stop playing. We will make changes none the less.”<br />
<br />
This was widely touted as Daglar saying that even if the majority of players
disagreed with the changes, if he would want to continue on even at the expense
of lost revenue he would push on. I can
see where people get that, but I also see that, while poorly worded, Daglar is
saying that they cannot allow a vocal group to dictate the direction of the
game.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The problem being that Daglar admitted <i>in that very post</i> that even if a majority of players found the
change to be counterintuitive or “moronic”, he’d still go along with it. Because fuck you, it’s <i>his</i> game to be the executive producer of, not yours you unwashed
heathen.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now, this is the beginning, as far as I’m concerned, of a
very frightening trend. But even going
back further, my own experience with Trion’s customer service/GM group has been
lackluster. As I posted to my YouTube
account, I had a ticket in on people who had been harassing me consistently for
over a month. Even after getting in
touch with <b>Ocho</b>, the Community
Manager most frequently seen, nothing happened.
As Ocho told me that he would talk to Daglar <i>et al.</i> about my problem, I thought things would be fine. Two weeks after I finished my chat with Ocho
(and a full four weeks after my ticket was initially submitted), I eventually
updated the thread I had created, explaining my frustration with Trion’s lack
of customer service or taking harassment complaints seriously (my ticket had
had a GM copy-paste a form response to my ticket about a week prior with no
response after I responded to it). I had
been in the process of editing a YouTube video I had done on Trion’s failure to
take such things seriously when a GM magically contacted me in-game to talk
about what had been happening. In true
form, they hadn’t read a thing from my ticket, despite it being stupid amounts
of specific (listing dates, times, locations, and chat channels that the
harassment had taken place in; specifically, the constant use of the term
“pedophile” to describe me was mentioned).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That has, however, been a problem with free-to-play games:
they put public relations on the back burner a lot of the time, and instead
focus on the here-and-now. Only when
things explode and they need damage control do you see how competent your
PR/community teams are.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I keep harping back to 2012, when the EvE online
“Monoclegate” scandal broke. This is for
a specific set of reasons. Chief among
them is that it’s very simple for me to recall accurately, because I was at the
forefront of the protests. But it also
served as a terrific primer on what <i>not</i>
to do when it comes to PR, and how a gaming company—even one as big as Blizzard
Entertainment—can make huge mistakes, and mistakes snowball, they don’t add up.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The initial thread started pretty much told us that <b>CCP Pann</b>, the CM they sent in to play
early damage control, was simply biding time until the company could come up with
a response they thought we wanted to hear.
At this point, the players were not happy, and CCP Pann disappeared,
ostensibly because her daughter had gotten sick and she needed to be rushed to
the hospital (I can neither confirm nor deny this is the actual excuse, and if
it is not true it is a poor excuse when you realize someone is out of their
depth. More to the point, a few months
later CCP Pann was among the people from the community team fired after
Monoclegate happened, and the CEO blamed the players in interviews for “having”
to fire them).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<a name='more'></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Courier New, Courier, monospace;"><span style="color: cyan;">History lesson: “Monoclegate” coincided with the release of
the NEX Store in EvE Online, similar in nature to the RMT shops found in
free-to-play games. The primary issue
was the leaking of a CCP internal newsletter called “Fearless”, whose cover
prominently featured Michael Douglas’s character from the movie <b><u>Wall Street</u></b> and the title “Greed
is Good?”. Reading the issue, the
players were able to see internal discussions about adding special forms of
ammunition and ships that could be purchased with real-life money, effectively
turning EvE Online—a game with a subscription model—into a “pay to win” game at
the same time, thus causing the backlash.
The phrase “Monoclegate” was coined because CCP Games attempted to play
it off as people being upset about the prices of in-game clothing items costing
more than real life clothing items, rather than the fact that they refused to
actually respond to the primary question: Was CCP going to make EvE Online a
pay to win game while still mandating a subscription? This came to a head when an EvE Online
developer posted a developer blog posting equating purchasing a $90.00 (they
claimed $70.00, but the math was wrong on their end) monocle in-game with
purchasing a $1,000 pair of “designer jeanes” from a “Japanese boutique”. In the end, with thousands of accounts being
cancelled every week, CCP had to take the issue seriously; the fact that many
gaming publications were making a big hoopla about it also aided in making CCP
take notice finally, but it was weeks after the start, and the hate and
discontent had been allowed to fester.
To this day, hugely disastrous PR decisions are equated to “Monoclegate”
when it comes to CCP, and I draw that distinction when it comes to other gaming
companies doing the same thing.</span></span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Either way, the entire debacle was a PR clusterfuck, and
even CCP admitted as such. They didn’t
listen, they made mountains of out of molehills, etc. In the end, some cosmetic changes were made
to the game to acknowledge how widespread the protests had been, but there was
nothing else major that was done. In the
end, the players got what they wanted: answers to their questions, and a sense
that <i>now</i> CCP would listen to
them. To this day, it’s been pretty
decent, and even though they’ve started to slip a bit lately, they haven’t
completely gone over the edge yet; but just in case, our pitchforks and torches
are prepared.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To sum it all up, Trion has screwed the pooch, and screwed
it royally. They took things for granted
that they shouldn’t have, and they’re trying to bury their heads in the sand,
playing the old “if I ignore it it will go away” game. Unfortunately, customers are <i>not</i> that quick to forget—or
forgive—slights like this. This means
that money is going to stop flowing, and Trion is going to have to show the
players that they care again. Trion
allowed this to snowball exponentially and they still haven’t fixed the
problem: they’ve locked the thread they created, they’ve ignored our requests,
and they’ve been slow to respond. I’ve
been trying to have a discussion with Ocho, and understanding he is probably
busy I’m still not going to wait for weeks between replies. When he replies, I’ll update, because I don’t
want to throw them under the bus without giving them a chance to respond; but I
have to go by what they have said and their actions and base my suppositions
and determinations off of that.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As for myself: my monthly subscription was cancelled and
went to Dungeons and Dragons Online.
Quite frankly, I’m probably going to start playing World of Warcraft
again when Warlords comes out this Thursday (though I may be a week or two late
to the party).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
Finally, Happy 239<sup>th</sup> birthday to the United
States Marine Corps, who celebrated it this past Monday! Here’s to 239 more years of spreading hate
and discontent to enemies all over the world!<o:p></o:p></div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-56896435429790793882014-10-31T14:29:00.001-07:002014-10-31T14:54:06.443-07:00Trion to do Damage Control<div class="MsoNormal">
As I said previously, I would update my initial posting
concerning the Rift server rollbacks a week ago. However, there has been nothing to update
with until today. The biggest thing is that
there was no response or dialogue, no communication between Trion and the
players. As such, everyone was left in
the dark as to what was going on.
Previously, I posted Daglar’s initial posting, which said that they were
in talks about additional compensation for Faeblight in particular. However, all the players received were any
credits they may have spent during the time between the rollback start location
and the unexpected downtime, and an additional 750 credits for paying subscribers. Let me quote Daglar:<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; color: red; font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial;">We've awarded back credits to users who spent
credits, and additional credits to paying users for the downtime. I've unstuck
the thread at this point in time. We also applied global benefits to the
affects servers - a particularly large bonus to Faeblight as well.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background-color: white; line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: red;"><br />
<span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial;">This is not a monocle gate situation - this
was an unfortunate hardware failure, and we could have kept the servers down
for another 24+ hours attempting to recover the data. I made the call to get
the servers back up so people could actually play as opposed to avoiding a
rollback, but not allowing folks to play for at a minimum, another 24 hours.</span><br />
<br />
</span><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial;"><span style="color: red;">~Daglar</span><span style="color: #b2b2b2;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now, let me explain what this means. It means that if you were a paying subscriber—I
specifically say <i>were</i> because I know
a lot of people have cancelled their subscriptions since the rollback and
before this blog posting—you should have received 750 credits. If you didn’t, you’re SOL. If you’re not a subscriber, you’re SOL.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But you got that nifty 50% bonus to make up for the hours
upon hours of playtime you lost. Oh, and
it only applied to kills, not quests.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You didn’t get enough to purchase even <i>one</i> +160% EXP potion. You
didn’t get anything worth mentioning, not even the loyalty associated with purchasing
the credits. Faeblight lost 56 hours of
time—24 hours from the rollback, 12 from the downtime, and the additional 24
hours having to re-grind what we had already lost. This puts us, as a server, out of contention
for the majority of firsts associated with leveling and the like.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’m going to be honest, it’s bullshit. This is the type of customer service that has
caused companies to fold before. I’ll go
into that later.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
I will be keeping this post short because I’m livid and I
want to make the post covering this bullshit a proper one, complete with facts
and the like. That requires me to take
the time to do that. But I will leave
you with <a href="http://i.imgur.com/aHfn2KN.png">this picture</a> validating that Daglar has sent it to me.<br />
<br />
<u style="font-weight: bold;">EDIT</u> Some people have said that Daglar didn't confirm that is all we'd be getting. However, several minutes ago Daglar posted to the thread itself.<br />
<br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: red;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">The official compensation was 750 credits for paying players, in addition to massive exp and token boosts for the entirety of the server. If you were a paying user during this time period that appears to have been erroneously missed, please contact customer support.</span><br style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /><br style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /><span style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">As stated in the original post, it was most certainly my decision to get the servers back up in the most timely fashion possible. We could have continued data recovery processes for Faeblight for multiple additional days - which would be multiple additional days of downtime. It was completely my call to return servers to a playable state and apply a rollback to Faeblight.</span><br style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /><br style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" /><span style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">~Daglar</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: red;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">Congratulations everyone, you'll see nothing more.</span></span></div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-33232518826427307952014-10-27T09:14:00.001-07:002014-10-27T09:14:35.794-07:00Mists of Panderia 2: Electric Boogaloo<div class="MsoNormal">
Has Rift’s new expansion died before it lived?<br />
<br />Sit back kids, and grab something to eat or drink. This bitchfest is going to be long.<br /><br />
It feels like the expansion, <b>Nightmare
Tide</b>, is an attempt to recreate the <b>Mists
of Panderia</b> expansion for World of Warcraft, complete with a shitton of
farming. Trion appears to have pushed a “quantity
over quality” mentality, thinking to overload the players at the beginning of
the experience with the sheer amount of “stuff to do”, and to give them
something to push for. But if they had
paid attention to Mists of Panderia itself, they’d have realized that the
players—both hardcore and casual, and everyone in between—do not like that
mentality. It’s nice to know that we don’t
have to push ourselves to get into things, and to burn out before we even begin
raiding.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
First, a few facts about the first seven months after Mists
came out.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->-<span style="font-stretch: normal;"><span style="font-size: 7pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: inherit;"> 1.) </span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: inherit;">W</span>orld of Warcraft saw a 54% reduction in overall
revenue between September 2012 and April 2013.
Now given, Mists sold millions of copies in September and that would
certainly cause inflated numbers, but it is still not an insignificant drop in
subscription numbers.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->-<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"></span><!--[endif]--> 2.) Coupled with this fact, World of Warcraft lost
1.3-million subscribers during this time period, or a loss of 14% of the
playerbasev. By September 2013 it had
lost 25% of the playerbase, and Blizzard-Activision admitted they did not see
it stalling anytime soon (to date, it has been staunched slightly). It was also around this time that Blizzard
did a huge mass banning of the bot farms located primarily in Europe and
southeast Asia.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The next part is speculative, really supported by the
threads that appeared on the forums for World of Warcraft, but also what many
commentators in the gaming community mentioned about Mists of Panderia, but
also <b>Cataclysm</b>’s end.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mists of Panderia pushed the quantity-over-quality aspect of
gaming hard. Dailies were so abundant
and damn-near mandatory that raiders had no choice: it was far worse than even <b>Wrath of the Lich King</b> and Cataclysm
for enchanting and the like. It was
long, boring, and tedious, and players felt disenfranchised. The leveling was absolute crap, and many progression
raiders simply stopped raiding, myself among them. It really began to feel like a grind every
time you logged in, and when you feel like there’s no end in sight for two or
three weeks in a row, you start to simply lose the will to log in. I logged in because I had to: there were
responsibilities inherent to my position, and I couldn’t simply ignore
them. After about two months of
playtime, I had trained up the assistant raid leader to do my job, then told
the guild I was leaving, and I didn’t know if, or when, I’d be returning. I haven’t regretted this decision since,
because it was simply <i>not fun</i>. No one, not even the raid leader for a
progression guild, should feel like they <i>have</i>
to log in and view it as a chore instead of a hobby. And if you honestly believe that there is a
minority of people who feel that way, going simply be the data that can be
extrapolated it is not the case: in 2013 even Blizzard admitted that the loss
of paying subscriptions did not appear to be abating, and probably would not
for the foreseeable future.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It should be noted that about this time, Ghostcrawler left
the company (and thus the WoW Development Team) and the <b>Warlords of Draenor </b>expansion was announced. Many more cynical players have said that it
simply appears to be an attempt to placate the playerbase and bring them back
in because of the failings of Cataclysm and Mists of Panderia, and I’ll admit
to falling into that category. Time will
tell, but for now I have not preordered the expansion (the first one I have not
done so) and I do not plan to buy it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now, Rift is a themepark MMO, referred to often as a “WoW
clone” even though that isn’t fair: it brought quite a few nifty gameplay
changes to the genre, but it still feels rather like a WoW clone at times,
sure. And to keep up with the feel, it
appears Trion decided that the Mists of Panderia mindset was a good thing to
emulate, thinking imitation truly is the sincerest form of flattery. It isn’t the case, and it’s not just because
Mists was so critically panned and negative.
To begin with, let’s look at the monetary costs associated with
purchasing and getting into the game itself:<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->-<span style="font-stretch: normal;"><span style="font-size: 7pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: inherit;"> 1.) N</span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">ew </span>Souls (the talents) cost 4,500 credits in
the store, which means you’re probably going ot drop $50.00 on credits because
of sheer value. To get something similar
in terms of what you need to purchase it, you would have to buy four REX (the
RMT version, much like a PLEX in EvE Online), or credits in some form to get to
that point. Either way, you’re hitting
$40.00 with that, so you might as well just spend the extra ten if you can
handle it. This price, also, is assuming
you’ve spent $15.00 on a subscription for the month, meaning you’re <i>actually</i> spending a minimum of $55.00 to
do this; I am not, however, factoring in the subscription price for this.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->-<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[endif]--> 2.) The “physical” expansion costs $25.00 at a
minimum, and I’ll go into this in a bit.
However, most people will purchase the $50.00 expansion simply to get
the “Instant Level 60” boost that can be sold for in-game currency. At this current time, it is selling for 3,200
platinum on my shard (Faeblight). More
to the point, purchasing this version (or the next tier, which is $149,99) does
not give you those souls, meaning you have to pay <i>an extra </i>$40.00 to purchase that.
In essence, to obtain <i>everything</i>
from what would normally come from purchasing such things you would be paying
the equivalent to two expansion packs.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now let’s keep in mind, Trion opens the entire leveling and
gaming experience to <i>everyone</i>, even
the players who don’t spend a nickel on the game the entire time they
play. As a free-to-play game, that’s how
it should be done (Star Wars: The Old Republic should freaking take note here,
considering how badly it has done since Day 1): you should give the players
that much and put special things into purchases made with money. No one is faulting them for launching “collector’s
edition” versions of the game, and more power to you if you decide to help keep
the game going, ladies and gents. In all
honesty, had I had the disposable income I probably would have dropped the
$50.00 on the second tier version just to show my support. Now, I’m not so sure I would, but that’s just
me.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
The most important thing right now, however, is the massive
amounts of lack-of-clear-planning that appears to go on. Itemization, for example, is complete
crap. Let’s give you <a href="http://i.imgur.com/lGbVB1j.png">an example of what I mean</a> (sorry for the quality, you'll need to zoom in by clicking on the picture itself). Now ,the stats on the item aren't bad at all, probably where they want epics to be to begin with. Until, that is, you hit the Hit Rating: +53 hit. That is the same amount of Hit found on epic-quality gear <i>prior</i> to entering raids in the <i>previous</i> expansion, and hit requirements did <i>not</i> remain the same with this expansion: to get into experts in the <b>Storm Legion</b> expansion it required 300 Hit, which one could easily do simply with crafted gear; for Nightmare Tide it requires 800 Hit, and the gear you will get will put you <i>just</i> at that base minimum, meaning this epic will not be used. In short this epic will not see any type of play, relegating it to "less-than-trash" status. No epic should ever be at that level.<br />
<br />
Also on the topic of gear, several items that have been labeled "Bind on Equip" have simply become bound as soon as they are retrieved from a cache or box. I'm not sure if that's a coding error or what, but it certainly seemed a bit iffy.<br />
<br />
Next, on to questing. There are no quest hubs, but that has generally been true throughout Rift's gameplay so I can't fault them for staying on-point with this. Running form Point A to Point B can be tedious, but their liberal use of Porticulums for fast travel between destinations you've previously visited certainly helps to take a bite out of the strain generated by that. but running from Point to to Point B, then to Point C and on to Point D only to return to a spot halfway between A and B is annoying, especially when it happens constantly. You still have large expanses between those waypoints generally, and so you spend a lot of time getting to positions and less time doing the quests.<br />
<br />
But that's okay, there's a lot of shit asking for your sword in their throat, and I'll be damned if I don't oblige!<br />
<br />
The classes received "masteries" which are a set of four different "talents" that you can select between at each level. Now, between fights you can switch from one mastery talent to the next without having to buy something like in WoW, but they don't really appear to be anything <i>new</i>. Each class has it's own set of masteries, so there's no real variety for them: some are goign to be used, and others are just too broken that you don't look at it. I can't fault them for doing this, though: World of Warcraft decided with Mists to nuke talent trees altogether, roll the spells and abilities into leveling itself and at certain levels (multiplications of level 15) you could put a point into a set of "talents" that would theoretically have benefits and drawbacks associated with them, allowing for you to be better in some instances and worse in others. For Rift there are a <i>lot</i> of talent tress to work on, and adding five points into each would be tedious work, I will give them that. But this game has been touted as one in which there is a lot more customizeability (spell check says that's not a word, but it can bite me) even when compared to <b>Elder Scrolls Online</b>, and in order to keep that they will have to work on the trees. if it's a stopgap in order to allow them more time to work on refining the trees, I'd prefer they told us that. As it stands, this is silly at best and downright lazy at worst.<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
The new capital city—Margle Palace—just seems like they threw together random schemes and backgrounds. It is not aesthetically-pleasing, and it's not something that appears to be well-planned. I mean, it seriously looks like an architect was not involved. It isn't centralized like the other cities (Meridian is a fringe case, I'll grant you that). It is too much like old Orgrimmar or Stormwind: not localized. That drove people insane by the thousands, if not millions. There's going to need to be a huge revamp of that city, otherwise people are going ot keep Tempest Bay as their destination when they hearth.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now, with the exception of the itemization issue I can get over that, It's simply stuff that can be fixed, as can what I'm about to write about that has <i>really</i> upset me. The newest currency is called <b>Void Stones</b>. Now, they're being used for <i>everything</i> in this expansion: buying Nightmare Rift lures costs Planarite <i>and</i> Void Stones, for example. That is, of course, assuming you don't want to spend credits to do so (and yes, 9 credits is <i>nothing</i>, but that is not the point. I simply have one question:<br /><br />Who the <i>fuck</i> was in charge of this?</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you want to purchase gear upgrades like with <b>Infinity Stones</b>, you have to use Void Stones. Fine, you're keeping with tradition. But who thought it would be a good idea for dailies not to offer them, and more importantly <i>to fucking cap them</i> at a weekly amount? Now given, not many people are going to take the days-on-end to farm up 35,000 stones (the weekly cap); however, I <i>am</i> assuming you intend to add ways to get a shitton of them in short amounts of time, meaning that people will go over cap very quickly. I can only pray for this, because otherwise I will not give a damn about them, and neither will anyone else.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Two new slots (earrings) require 100,000 Void Stones each. Much of the gear now requires a new "attunement", also requiring 100,000 Void Stones.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Per character, mind you. Keep that in mind.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So with a 35,000 stone weekly cap, that is going to require <i>a grand total</i> of eight weeks (or two months for those of you who can do the maths in your head) to get those items. Per character. Hardcore progression raiders will be <i>forced</i> to get those slots and what-not in order to not gimp themselves and push for their server- and world-firsts. This means they aren't purchasing Nightmare Lures. They aren't going to spend 10,500 Void Stones to purchase the WoW equivalent of "dungeon gear" (oh, and that's for the cheapest items). Sure, you're pushing them to purchase from the players and hoping to drive the economy, but you're also forcing them to do <i>one</i> thing to get geared. you should have multiple avenues to do that, but there simply isn't.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now, all of this can be bypassed by paying $25.00 for the expansion. Well-played: it puts money into the hands of the company for "future development", which I am honestly assuming is simply being put on <b>Trove</b> and <b>ArcheAge</b> at this point, and that's not even working. <b>CCP Games</b> learned the hard way that you can't focus on new ordeals and sacrifice on the old ones: their two new games have all but died in the case of one, and the second is done, with the team who had been working on it being laid off.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I'll admit, that cap is high, because <i>no one</i> is going to spend the time to farm that many stones when it doesn't even appear in dailies! So I guess in a way the cap is arbitrary, but that also means that <i>the two months</i> I talked about earlier is similarly arbitrary because <i>no one</i> will get to it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And <b>Daglar</b> has been hesitant to actually <i>talk</i> about it, at all!</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now, I'll admit that I relatively enjoyed the leveling experiences (until level 64, which was a bitch in itself; now, imagine having to do it <i>twice</i> because Trion can't remember to back up your server's data on redundant drives!). And I'm thoroughly enjoying the Minion idea (which seriously, you <i>need</i> to find a way to add that to the mobile app). I think the stamina needs to regenerate faster, but I can live with it. I'm also enjoying the streamlined profession leveling, as it's simply easier to farm mats now, and I can live with that, seriously.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Trion <i>can</i> fix this stuff that people have been complaining about. It is early-enough in the expansion to get players to enjoy the game again, because right now players are annoyed. First impressions are important, but if you work on fixing some of the stuff that people have mentioned (and not just myself, mind you: hundreds of people have developed threads on these topics) it will go a long way towards helping to repair whatever hit your reputation took.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But what do I know? I've just been playing MMOs for over a decade, beta tested many of them, and have been writing for Joystiq for over five years.</div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-9359664433767589262014-10-24T23:18:00.000-07:002014-10-26T09:44:04.317-07:00Trion To Make Sense<div class="MsoNormal">
You ever played a game in which there was a massive hardware
failure, and the only way to make sure everyone’s account was safe was to roll
the entire shard back over 24 hours?
This happened to the Tranquility server in 2012. CCP Games’s response was a full rollback of
about 24 hours, but as compensation to the players they immediately gave
everyone who logged in a pretty sizeable amount of skill points. Now given, in EvE Online, “character level”
is measured in skill points, and characters can generally be given skill points
equal to a specific formula to help balance out what may have been lost in the
rollback. Of course, this also means
that ships lost are replaced, and anything you may have bought or found during
the time between the rollback start and when it was rolled back to is
lost. That can be both good and bad,
depending on how much Bob and RNGesus love you.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now, let’s assume that a game’s expansion launched during
the week. Let’s pretend it was on a
Wednesday that it launched. The launch was
pretty good: no massive issues except a slightly longer-than-anticipated
downtime, and a couple of per-usual hotfixes.
No massive server lag spikes, no issues with questing. It’s pretty good, and you’re thinking it’s
doing really well.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Thursday rolls around.
People have taken these two days off to enjoy the new expansion and
explore/level, as gamers are wont to do when a new expansion drops. Once again, plenty of issues that were
expected don’t show up, and you’re feeling really great.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Okay, now let’s put a name to this game: Rift. The expansion that came out is called <b>Nightmare Tide</b>.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At 0400 Pacific Standard Time on Friday, three servers went
down. The official reason for this was
some key databases for the Laethys, Wolfsbane, and Faeblight servers had become
corrupted, and so the servers were taken down to facilitate the transfer of
data to new databases. No ETA for when
it would be fixed, but we didn’t’ find out the reasoning until four hours <i>after</i> the problems began and the servers
went down, and we were told they didn’t know what was causing the issue
(rather, they were vague on the cause).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At 1200 PST, Laethys came back online, a full eight hours
after it went down. Wolfsbane followed
25 minutes later. Faeblight remained
offline. During this time, a hotfix was
announced. However, Laethys and
Wolfsbane found themselves rolled back after they came back up, but only to an
hour at maximum from when they went down (so at most they were rolled back to
0300 PST on Friday, so people lost nine hours of playtime, though only one of
it was actually played). Faeblight was
not so well off: the server was rolled back to 0300 <i>Thursday</i> morning.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That’s a 25 hour rollback, for those keeping track.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now some people will point out that players on Faeblight
didn’t actually <i>lose</i> 25 hours’ worth
of gameplay. After all, no one at that
point is going to play that much on a single day. We need time to rest and what-not. And you’re correct, we did not. But I want to explain it like this.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Three servers lost a total of nine hours <i>minimum</i> compared to the rest of the
shards out there. They were down, and so
that is time at the beginning of an expansion in which those players are not
playing, and getting ready to raid. For
progression raiding guilds—even in games outside World of Warcraft—that’s a big
thing. Sure, the individual <i>server</i> may be at an equal footing for
server firsts, but can you imagine if <Ensidia>’s server dropped like
that? Could you <i>imagine</i> the shitstorm that would be caused, and Blizzard’s responses
to get them back into contention (we’ve seen Blizzard previously coddle their
favorite guild, allowing them to bypass mechanics and exploit for world
firsts)? Trion may not have the same
issue in that guilds aren’t vying for world firsts for real-world money, but it
still causes headaches for them in that it shows ineptitude on the part of the
technicians.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Quite literally, the left hand does not know what the right
hand is doing. Technicians do not talk
to GMs (Game Masters, the in-game fixers of problems) do not talk to CMs
(Community Managers, who handle social media and forums). I did a video a few months back in which I
had reported some players to Trion about harassment that went beyond any type
of trolling. I had gotten in touch with
Ocho, a member of the CM team who promised he would talk to the GMs. A month later, the head GM (Daglar) contacted
me literally <i>five minutes</i> after I had
finished the initial video to talk to me about the problem. It took a month to get on that, and that was
after I had talked to a CM, whom Daglar said he never heard from. So someone was lying, or just dropped the
ball. I would have been willing to give
them the benefit of the doubt, but I had been a royal pain the ass with the
issue: forum thread that I had updated two weeks and four weeks after the
initial ticket-and-canned-answer fiasco, so it was a sign, to me, that they
didn’t actually care. But that is a
topic for another posting.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The point is, here the GMs hadn’t talked to the technicians,
and it took six hours to find out what the fuck had happened. Just fucking think about that: the players
didn’t know <i>why</i> it had happened, and
given most of us probably didn’t care about the <i>why</i> as much as we cared about the <i>how</i>, as in “How do you plan to fix this?” And we probably don’t care about <i>how</i> they plan to prevent this from
happening in the future, because those of us on Faeblight feel completely
cheated.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So let’s go back to the problem right now. The server as a whole is a <i>minimum</i> of forty-eight hours behind
every other server. I say “minimum”
because I’m really not taking into account the nine hours we had offlined
alongside Laethys and Wolfsbane. That
really affects the morale of the players, who have routinely felt that Trion
does not care as long as they are making money.
Now given, I’ve had <i>far</i> more
positive experiences in this game than negative, but that doesn’t absolve them
of blame when <i>they</i> fuck up big time. A hardware failure may not be completely
their fault, but the corruption of a database so severely that it requires you
to go back <i>twenty-five hours</i> in order
to restart everything screams negligence (and that’s according to some database
analysts, who have said this to Daglar <i>et
al.</i> on the forums).<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Faeblight was called “venerable” by Daglar, which means two different
things: highly respected, or old and antiquated. Faeblight, being one of the few original
launch servers remaining, is probably on the old architecture for the game, so
it wasn’t ungraded with the other servers.
It also means that it isn’t backed up like the others (which appear to be
once every hour). That says that those
of us playing on Faeblight can probably expect to have this happen again, and
the same results will happen.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Players have lost credits they spent, which the company
claims they will reimburse (and after the fiasco with Guild Wars II, I believe
it will be). They’ve lost currency, and
they’ve lost items that were expensive, or powerful (we’re talking relic-level
treasure boxes, epic-level BoE gear, etc.).
They’ve lost experience they gained.
But that can all be retrieved in short order, once people (including
myself) get over the shock of what appears to be such a monumental failure in
thinking. More importantly, however, the
people on Faeblight (and to a lesser extent Wolfsbane and Laethys) lost
time. Time is a precious commodity, and
is the most expensive thing each and every one of us has. Time is money is a common saying, and it’s
true: the server is two days behind as a collective, which hurts us for
progression raiding and the like.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But the most important thing Faeblight denizens have lost is
trust: we’ve lost trust in the capabilities of Trion to successfully keep the
server going. It may not seem like much,
but something as simple as properly backing up the database would have done far
more to calm us. As-is, the players feel
slighted, and it’s going to take far more than a title, cosmetic pet, mount, or
packaging of +160% EXP packages to alleviate that feeling.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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As of this writing, Trion’s head GM Daglar has said that for
reimbursement they are putting up an experience boosting event on
Faeblight. However, Patrons (that is,
paying subscribers) are not seeing this bonus applied to them, thus alienating
the people giving a consistent income further.
Try as the free-to-play crowd might to say that we aren’t special, we
are a far more consistent income than the people who spend money to buy
credits, because that is a one-time thing normally. You simply can’t count on that every month,
where-as we are generally paying for months upon months in a row. Many of us have also received 750 free
credits to spend in the store as we see fit, which is the equivalent to buying
$5.00 worth of credits. It’s not much,
but it’s a start. You may not be able to
buy us completely, but you can definitely make us feel better with
reimbursement that is commensurate with the level of fuck-up presented. I’m not saying that we should all get a
million credits, but something as simple as some special vials that might last
four hours and over +400% EXP gain, as well as everyone on Faeblight affected
by this server issue receiving a free 3-day Patron pass to make up for the time
we are missing out on because we have to redo what we already did would go a
logn way to showing us we care. And that’s
just for starters.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The EULA might say we can’t expect anything from Trion, and
in fact Trion doesn’t have to give us anything as compensation, but companies
have tried that before, and the negative publicity alone has caused them
endless amounts of headaches. I fully
expect Trion will try to repair the damage, but the repairing needs to happen
sooner rather than later, and it needs to be seen as something serious. If Trion does that and restores the faith of
the playerbase—because players on other shards are certainly watching this,
understanding it could happen to <i>them</i>—they
will have a lot more loyal customers, and the media <i>will</i> pick up on it.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I will update as more information becomes available.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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<a href="http://forums.riftgame.com/general-discussions/general-discussion/443077-shard-downtime-faeblight-laethys-wolfsbane.html">Head GM Daglar's Public Response</a><br />
<br />
<b>Edit</b> At the beginning of the post I mentioned that CCP Games rolled the Tranquility server back 24 hours. This was incorrect. At the time, the Tranquility server was under a concentrated DDoS attack that kept the server down for a period of 18+ hours, which meant that during this time skills were not training. As such, CCP reimbursed players a specified formula of skill points in order to apologize for this issue and worked to resolve the problem. CCP did not roll the server back.</div>
<o:p></o:p>Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-81140408968874712092014-10-24T06:33:00.002-07:002014-10-24T06:34:20.978-07:00Gamergate: Why Movements are Bullshit Now<div class="MsoNormal">
No greater friend, no worse enemy.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
That is one of the sayings when it comes to United States
Marines: we are so loyal to those we care about that we will bend over
backwards and then some in order to help them out; at the same time, we’ll do
everything in our power (legally and otherwise) to “destroy” a perceived
enemy. It’s been a saying that I
remember hearing for over a decade, and General James “Maddog” Mattis, possibly
the greatest general the Marine Corps has had since Lieutenant General Lewis “Chesty”
Puller, both of whom take a larger-than-life presence in Marine Corps
history/lore, quoted it when speaking to Marines and sailors in Iraq. We are truly the most steadfast and true
friends you can ever have, and many times that goes for our sister services as
well.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As a gamer, I obviously have female guildmates and the like
that I play with, and am thus also protective of. As I stated in my last posting, I recognize
and understand the hardships that female gamers go through. It’s simply part of the fact that over 80% of
the playerbase in almost every game is male, and also socially-awkward. When a being with tits shows up on Ventrilo,
you can hear the collective boners popping up, and you pray to whatever deity
you worship that nothing else pops into your head. My guild master in Rift is a woman, and she’s
someone every person in the guild would <i>kill</i>
a motherfucker to protect her. It’s not
because she’s a woman, it’s because she’s someone who gives a shit about all of
us. Sure, being viewed as a sister and
thus everyone wanting to be a big brother certainly helps her as well, but she’s
got a husband so no one is under any impression they have a chance. Simply put, we’re protective and that’s that.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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The problem now is that you have those same subsects of
humanity that are using someone’s gender against them. I only became aware of this today when I saw
an article on “gamers” who dox’d Felicia Day (“DOX”ing” someone means you
release their personal details—such as address and telephone number—on the
internet for anyone to find), and was only marginally aware of what is being
dubbed “Gamergate” prior to this.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For those who don’t know, “Gamergate” revolves around two
camps of the gaming community and is largely based around perceptions of
misogyny and sexism in the gaming community, as well (and to a lesser extent
now) as journalistic integrity and ethics when it comes to people who review
video games as a whole. It started in
August 2014 when an ex-boyfriend of Zoe Quinn, an “indie game designer” posted
that she had had romantic relations with a Kotaku journalist, and the
perception was that because of this it had an influence that was easily a
conflict of interest. Now, it came out that
the allegations were unfounded, but the damage was done and Ms. Quinn found
herself inundated with a deluge of harassing e-mails and the like, threatening
violence and rape against her.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once again, this is not a political piece, and I don’t want
people to view it as such. But this is
what has been happening with a social media network generation that knows “everything”
and can help propagate the lies without doing any fact-checking. And while many of us may not be willing to
(or even expected to) actually check the facts, it is still preferential to the
alternative, such as rioting in the streets because a white officer shot a
black man and everyone’s claiming it was an execution, only to have the
evidence of the case come out over months that that narrative was unfounded and
patently untrue.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The rampant misogyny and sexism would be fine if it was just
words and jokes. But the problem is this
vociferous fringe group has gone beyond that, issuing threats of rape and
murder against female journalists and gamers who they believe are stepping “out
of line” with their viewpoints. Felicia
Day was one such person to be subjected to this type of vitriol, and it runs
counter to everything that the majority of gamers actually believe. We are not here to denigrate women—the game
companies do that well enough with the female avatars running around in plate
string bikinis. Sure, we <i>all</i> say sexist and misogynistic jokes
and what-not, and we might say stupid shit but the vast majority of us do not
mean it. This subsect, while they may <i>think</i> what they write, will never act on
it. Here’s why.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ll go back to my opening statement. Marines (and most servicemembers) are the
best friends you can have. If you’re in
a pickle, we’ll do our best to help you.
More to the point, we’re stupidly protective of our female friends and
relatives. I have been present when my
friend Erica wanted to move out of her abusive boyfriend’s house. She was afraid he’d beat the everloving
manshit out of her, and probably hurt her daughter as well. She asked me to come along to help her move
her shit out, and I did. I didn’t say
anything. I simply followed her, helped
her move, and that was it. Sure, he said
shit, but he wasn’t actually going to follow through while someone was
there. One, it’s a witness. Two, he’s never had to actually fight for his
life (and yes, he would have been doing that had he acted). And my friends know that if shit happens and
it can be validated, I have a network of servicemembers through the United
States and Canada, as well as friends in Israel, England, and Ireland whom I
can turn to in order to make a point. If
you fuck with me or mine, I fuck with you.
And while we may bend the rules a bit, it will never be to the point
that they won’t find your body, and if you press charges, you’d be surprised
how many juries clear us on all charges because we’re veterans, and because you’re
a fucking cunt and we have evidence of it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But this vitriol is aimed at women, and has been. Feminist Anita Sarkeesian canceled a speech
at the University of Utah after receiving death threats from the fringe group
of gamers, and Utah’s concealed carry laws meant that the campus couldn’t
guarantee her safety. Felicia Day had
threats of rape and murder launched against her. Yet when former NFL star Chris Kluwe called
these same people “basement-dwelling, cheetos-huffing [sic], poopsock-smelling
douchepistols” nothing happened to him, despite him being a much softer target
in terms of publicity and the like. It is
stupidly easy to find his information, after all.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Women are simply seen as much safer targets to take out
criticism and anger on. They’re not as
likely to actually find out where you live, come to your home and murder you in
your sleep. As such, these people (and I
am using that term very loosely here) feel that they are in a much safer place
with regards to being able to act like badasses. Making a bunch of threats you will never be
expected to carry out makes one a man on the internet, and the community
understands that even if they also ridicule you.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sure, you have instances of gamers being dox’d, along with
the name, work location, and school locations of children. You have the threats of violence against your
family if you don’t do what they want.
This happened a few years ago in EvE Online, when a group of Russian
players decided to release that information to the public, with the very real
and clear threat against the families of the players part of <b>Goonswarm Federation</b>, the player-run
alliance made up of Something Awful forums denizens after there had been talks of
invading and capturing space owned by said Russians. But this is by-and-large not the norm,
because people understand this is a game, and even the most sane, hardcore
gamer will tell you that much. It is
legitimately not worth going to prison because you don’t like what someone
says.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have plenty of disagreements with gamers and game
companies. I’ve voiced them, and been
quite vociferous. I have submitted a
letter of no confidence that was signed by players against the CEO of CCP
Games, even if it was several years ago.
I have not, however, threatened to hunt down someone I have had problems
with and threaten to kill him and his family.
I’ve seen those threats made in-game, and the companies tend to react
accordingly (enjoy your ban).<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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And what’s more, this fringe group has received more
publicity from other media outlets simply because of how outrageous they have
acted, and because of that its cast a net of complete and utter inability for
people to differentiate between the “good guys” in the movement and the “bad
guys”. Now given, this stems more from
the media enjoying sensationalized stories of people acting like cunts, because
it sells papers. But what started out as
a decent movement—fighting against the corruption or biased “reporting” of
media outlets is something we should all want, whether we care about the news
or not—has become synonymous with a rape culture and the stereotypical gamer:
the type that hides in mommy’s basement, unwilling to leave and run their own
lives (as Mr. Kluwe pointed out).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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Is it important to distinguish between the two camps? Absolutely.
But it’s really not going to happen in the media because it does sell
copies. Period. Ratings go up. Sold copies go up. In either situation the bottom line is
affected positively, and that means that Gamergate has a negative stigma
associated with it. The group of
journalists that want to demonize something like this will just lump the fringe
group in with the main one; the group that wants to protect and point out their
grievances will not be heard, and so it’s now important to belittle and shame
that fringe group.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Unfortunately, I don’t think it’ll work: you have to have a
sense of shame in order to feel it.
These are the people you bring behind a bar and put a bullet in their
head, because they offer nothing of value to the movement, and really nothing of
value to humanity as a whole.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
Am I afraid of being DOX’d and having someone show up in my
house to kill me? No. I know they’re cowards, but more to the point
I have on me at all times a FN57 pistol, which has a notch in the
handgrip. It’s killed before and it’ll
do so again if I need it to. But as I
said, they’re cowards, and it won’t come to that point. Plus I have a penis, so that automatically
protects me from them.<o:p></o:p></div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6335580654989462706.post-62562863497265995432014-10-21T13:26:00.000-07:002014-10-21T13:26:55.917-07:00"Gaymer" culture<h4>
I want to preface this blog posting with the following:<br /><br />I do not want this blog to be viewed as some sort of political tool. Realizing this is my first blog posting, it is also going to touch on something that is by-and-large political in nature and I respect this fact. I am not advocating one way or another concerning gay marriage, equality, or the like. I fully support and endorse equality in all things, regardless of ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, or what-have-you. I'm an EEO kinda' guy anyways, and I treat everyone alike: just like shit (thank you, Commander Richard Marcinko!). My opinions will be stated on some topics, but please do not read into them as anything more than a stated opinion.<br /><br />In all seriousness, this is just me rambling about something I have started to see crop up lately in terms of people expecting certain things, at the same time being ready to denigrate other players who ask a question or don't fall in-line with the thought process.</h4>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Maybe it’s because I’m a heterosexual, and that has limited
my ability to actually view things in a different light. I consider myself an actually “enlightened”
person, and while many times on the political scale I may be more conservative
than liberal, I do support gay marriage, among other things. But it seems like there’s a continuing
presence in that there is a need to force the LGBT “agenda” on everyone, to the
point that it becomes almost more annoying and “preachy” than the
ultra-conservative, ignorant fuckers we see running around, spouting the
anti-gay-marriage crap. I have gay
friends: two gay, three “bisexual”, all female: two I can confirm are
legitimate and have been since high school; the third I am under no illusions
about that she does it for attention, as she has done so since high school, once
again. That doesn't mean I care any less
about them as I write this piece, and I even asked for their opinions on this
subject, since I do like the concept of being inclusive.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now, I don’t want this to be a political piece. This is more to do with the rationale behind
the need to draw attention to someone’s sexual orientation, especially in a
video game. I don’t know you, I will
probably never meet you. The same is
true for the hundred—if not thousands—of people that are similar in nature to
my outlook. We don’t know you, and
really all we are ever going to know about you nine-times-out-of-ten is if you’re
a good person or not. Sure, on a
roleplaying server more often than not the lesbian characters show up, because
it’s men playing female ‘toons and wanting to be able to ERP, but having a
straight female ‘toon makes them feel gay.
Fine, whatever. I’m not going to
judge you, and the majority of people aren’t going to judge you, either, unless
you pass yourself off as a lesbian in real life, or the person is just trolling
roleplayers to begin with. That’s just
how it is.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Back to the topic-at-hand: is it necessary to point out that
you are part of the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender—just in case
people needed that to be expounded upon) community? In my honest opinion, it shouldn't need to
be, and I’ll explain my reasoning in a bit.
Now, this all stems from a person on my server in Rift that has been
advertising their guild as a “gaymer” guild, and is LGBT-friendly. I have no problems with the community, but
the way it’s presented in many contexts is my issue. More often than not I have witnessed these
people who draw attention to this fact flaunt it, and not just a little bit of “I’m
gay”, because it is seriously no big fucking deal. These people ram it in your face, doing the
equivalent of “I’m here, I’m queer, get used to it”, and then demand you accept
them for who they are.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Seriously, wouldn’t you be a bit pissed if someone was in
your face, screaming about their sexual orientation or what-have-you, and then
demand you accept them for who they are?
At the very least, wouldn’t their constant need for validation and the
like annoy the hell out of you? I’m a
patient man, I’m not very tolerant in that I don’t tolerate bullshit from
people. When you push my buttons enough,
you’ll know it, and it will be quite blunt.
Tact and diplomacy only seem to work to a point, and with many of these
people it seems they want to force you to respond so they can start playing the
victim card. Now given, that is just
speculation and I’ll admit freely to that; but it certainly seems the common
act is just that tactic.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I’m not saying that we should run all the gays off the
server. As one person jokingly put it, “If
God wanted gays to play video games, he’d have put it in the Bible!” Facetious as it is, there are people who act
like that out there, and we generally ignore those people, don’t we? In the interest of keeping what little peace
we have in-game and not causing unnecessary drama, we keep such information out
of the game.<o:p></o:p></div>
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We know there’s a subset of female gamers out there who use
the fact they have tits in real life to get gear and the like. There’s stories out there of women in EvE
Online and World of Warcraft who have abused the fact they are in a minority to
get what they want: they play politics, turn people against one another and
destroy alliances or guilds. Or they use
their “feminine charms” to acquire gear in raids they either haven’t worked
for, or it’s not their turn to get. They
make a mockery of loot systems and generally give female gamers a bad name; and
of course, many players rightly ridicule them, because it makes those players who are insecure feel even worse, and gives
the wider female gaming community more of a bad reputation. A great case-in-point: recently the alliance
(in EvE Online) <b>Easily Excited</b> fell
apart, because a female officer tried to use her gender to play politics. The alliance as a whole fell apart because
the drama got so bad that it caused a complete breakdown in communication and
trust in the senior leadership.<o:p></o:p></div>
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That’s not to say there <i>aren’t</i>
issues facing female gamers: recently, Finland banned females from competing in
the Hearthstone tournament because they wanted to promote e-sports as a valid
sports form. And while I believe that to
be a terrible idea—it <i>does</i> smack of
sexism—I also can’t stop it. I can draw
attention to this fact, but I can’t stop it from happening, simple as
that. As a journalist—even an internet
journalist—I can and do ask questions, and I simply want to make people aware
of these stories as they pop up. I am
not supporting the decision, I am not supporting the thought process. With that being said, I am not a politically
correct person in the slightest, and I am very much a misogynist when it comes
to joking. One of my favorite jokes is,<br />
<br />
“If a man and a woman get into a car accident, who’s at fault? The man, because he shouldn’t be driving in
the kitchen to begin with!”<br />
<br />
Yeah, it’s fucking misogynistic as hell, and it’ll piss off the feminazis no
problem. But I’m not pandering to them,
just like I don’t pander or cater to any other group. I prefer to keep shit like I see it, and be
honest with my opinions. It won’t always
be something you agree with. It won’t
always be worded in the best way, but it’s an <i>opinion</i>, and as much as I try to validate it and back it up with
fact, it is simply my thoughts, nothing more.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Enough on that, though.<o:p></o:p></div>
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As I said, this came up because we have a guild master on my
server (Faeblight) advertising his guild as “LGBT friendly”. And so I decided I’d ask a simple question:
why is it that something that is out-of-game is necessary to be noted in-game
for your guild?<o:p></o:p></div>
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I understand almost every guild tries to fill a niche: PvP
and raiding guilds, leveling guilds, roleplaying guilds, etc. But it seems like there’s a growing group out
there that is specifically looking to capitalize on an out-of-game group of
people for the guild. In World of
Warcrat on the Sentinels server, we had the guild <Sisters of Passion>,
which was supposed to be an all-female guild.
In truth, while it had some females it also had many males playing
female ‘toons, simply there to roleplay lesbian sex scenes. We all knew it, even though they denied
it. No one gave two shits about it being
a female guild, it was the fact that they kept telling everyone that they were
an all-female guild when it wasn’t true caused a lot of friction, especially
when they began raiding. We’d hear about
how the “girls” were beating everyone—despite the fact <Acies> was always
ahead of them in progression—and how we should be ashamed, counting on
political correctness and fears of being referred to as a misogynist from
calling out the bullshit. And they were
wrong. I’ll be honest, I don’t know what
happened to them after I left the server, but I know they weren’t there a year
later when I showed up to say hi to my old server.<o:p></o:p></div>
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That’s the thing, though: when you push something such as an
“all-female guild” or the like, and you cause drama via this fact, you are also
a person who is probably going to play the victim card when you find yourself
in a hole you’ve dug.<o:p></o:p></div>
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That sort of happened here.
I asked this question and the GM ignored me. Fine, that’s okay. But then a player named Arawulf jumped
in. He began with the usual tactic of
being defensive, demanding to know why it should matter. Even as I explained that it was a question
intended to elicit information for my own ability to understand the mindset, he
continued to deride it as “hostile” and “homophobic”.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Let me get this straight: asking a question to understand
someone’s mentality is now <i>homophobic</i>? This is no different than when people asked
why blacks were voting for Barack Obama and some replied with, “Because he’s
black.” When people wanted a further explanation
as to why that mattered, those same people screamed racism in order to shut the
conversation down. It isn’t a chance for
them to rationally explain themselves.
Many people who act like this are not used ot being asked to elaborate,
and so they panic and scream “racism”, “bigotry”, or the like simply to shut
down the conversation.<o:p></o:p></div>
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It normally works, too, because those labels have power
behind them in today’s culture.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Unfortunately, it doesn’t work on me. I’m not one to simply lay over and say, “Well
I don’t want to be seen as a racist!”. I
pride myself on journalistic integrity, even if it’s not exactly working for <i>The New York Times</i>. I do hold myself to a standard and etiquette,
and as such I continue to ask for facts.
I want to know what makes you think something like that when all I asked
was a simple question. Of course, he
continued on the same line of attack until two others chipped in, one claiming
to be gay and wanting an answer to the question. At this point, Arawulf logged for whatever
reason. Fine , don’t answer the
question. He followed the same style as
those before him who try to shut down a debate or conversation by screaming “bigot”.<o:p></o:p></div>
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There are two types of people who will shit on you for being
anything but heterosexual: the people who hide behind the anonymity of the
internet to be little shits, and the people who legitimately don’t like
homosexuals for whatever reason. When
they pop up, the players seem to rally to defend them when it’s deserved. Two guilds were run off servers in World of
Warcraft for being horribly anti-homosexual, to the point they almost caused a
gay player in their guild to commit suicide.
Gamers tend to be protective of other gamers despite the bullshit that
you hear about on the news. EvE Online
is a place of terrible people, but the gamers come together to protect people who
are unjustly accused of being whatever. The
same is true in every other MMO. We tend
to drive those ignorant fucks off servers/shards, and we defend people who
deserve it. But the truth is, the people
most affected are the ones who are incredibly sensitive to begin with. The people who feel the need to proclaim
their sexual orientation, or their gender in a game where it shouldn’t fucking
matter are the same ones that cry when an off-color joke is made. They don’t laugh along with everyone else,
they don’t try to turn the tables and tell their own joke. They simply cry, scream <insert
racism/bigotry/homophobia/Islamophobia here>, and then act like they are
completely in the right. And the sad
thing is that these people tend to blow things far out of proportion and exaggerate
what actually happened in order to either make the story more interesting, or
to garner <i>more</i> sympathy. Many times these people cause the drama that
offended them, and they play the victim card, expecting people will feel bad
and support them because they’re a “minority”.
Then, when people get all the facts and don’t support them, there will
inevitably be a locked thread on the forums about how the game fosters a
homophobic community, or racism runs rampant, or what-have-you.<o:p></o:p></div>
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There are legitimate concerns for those who aren’t straight males
in video games. But when you identify
yourself and cause drama over it, it’s no one else’s fault but your own. If you can’t take the heat, stay out of the
kitchen. Or better yet, don’t bring your
personal life into video games to begin with.
It only causes more problems for you, and many times for others around
you. You can’t fault people for wanting
to remove the drama, and many times the drama will be removed, and you won’t
like the collective agreement on the source of that drama.<o:p></o:p></div>
Spectre_06http://www.blogger.com/profile/14692982852563047749noreply@blogger.com0