Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 16, 2014 22:29:22 GMT -5
Okay, so, I want to tell a story about the first time I ever played a psionicist, but first, I want to give some background.
I earned psionicist and sorcerer karma for, well, I can't even remember, and I am so scared of PTSD from reading what Nyr has been putting in my account notes these past few years that I'm not even going to bother to look.
It it must have been granted to me before 2007, because that is when it was removed. I never had a chance to play a psionicist and did not even make a sorcerer using that karma; the only sorcerers I have ever played were special apps when I first started playing, all who died almost immediately, a gith sorcerer, and two gypsy witches. I never had a chance to actually use neither the sorcerer or psionicist karma I had earned outside of a non-strictly-controlled setting before they were taken away from me for entering Tuluki with Nilazi magick, never mind the fact that I both ICly and OOCly believed that certain anti psionic Nilazi measures would shield my character, but I digress.
In 2012, while I was working three jobs in education, with a normal, calm life, I decided I would take a stab at Armageddon and try to play a psionicist. In my entire Arm career, I had spent most of my time playing merchants, and I had been saving playing a mind bender as something special that I would get to do one day. It was 2012 and I had been playing since 99, so hey, why not finally try that class I always wanted?
I believe I asked for my karma back at that time and was told no, so I special apped the psionicist, and he was approved.
In less than a week, I had received my first staff complaint about the play of the psionicist. They had issues with me trying to contact demons and other things with the way. I believe this was entirely IC. If you were well versed in psionics, wouldn't you want to see if you could make contact with otherworldly things?
Not another week had passed when I received another complaint for contacting "raiders" and "muls" and using locate on them. My character, being a criminal, was psionically scouting out potential bandit camps, but the imms interpreted this as abuse.
This is when Morgenes told me that if he heard of one more problem with my psionicist, I would be stored and lose karma.
Heh, I was really busy with work, and when I saw how I was being messed with for what, to me, were IC things, I was really just heartbroken. I had turned back to an old hobby that arguably led to be me working in English education in the first place, and within two weeks of returning, I was ripped to shreds.
Morgenes apologized, but I still stored the character and did not play for nine months. I'm pretty sure Nyr had something to do with that, which disgusts me after reading jcarter write about the shit Rissa got away with.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 16, 2014 22:50:29 GMT -5
It should also be noted that there are not guidelines for psionicists. It's not like there is this rule saying not to contact random NPCs. In fact, that seemed like a neat thing to do, and to me it made sense ICly.
Having your balls mercilessly busted and being threatened to be stored for "breaking" rules that aren't even written just seemed unnecessarily mean. It was purely critical and no suggestions or alternatives were offered. Just accusations of OOC exploitation and abuse out of genuine curiosity and exploring a new class. Really did not seem fair, especially when looking at the big picture, that I had played for so long and this was my first time unwrapping a new class... And what could have been hugely fun was just nitpicked and criticized to death from the very effing beginning. I doubt the character had more than 3 says played on him.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 16, 2014 23:03:47 GMT -5
Can't have psionicists contacting NPCs. That'd be the beginning of the end. Before you know it pickpockets would be stealing from NPCs, warriors would be killing NPCs, merchants would be trading with NPCs.... I think you see where I'm going with this.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 16, 2014 23:05:43 GMT -5
Hahaha. Yeah.
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Post by BitterFlashback on Dec 17, 2014 10:22:53 GMT -5
In less than a week, I had received my first staff complaint about the play of the psionicist. They had issues with me trying to contact demons and other things with the way. I believe this was entirely IC. If you were well versed in psionics, wouldn't you want to see if you could make contact with otherworldly things? CURIOSITY IS AGANST THE RULES. HOW DARE YOU. NOW SHUT UP AND MAKE YOUR OWN FUN! HAPPINESS IS MANDATORY. Not another week had passed when I received another complaint for contacting "raiders" and "muls" and using locate on them. My character, being a criminal, was psionically scouting out potential bandit camps, but the imms interpreted this as abuse. PRACTICING SKILLS OUTSIDE OF A CLAN WITHOUT SOCIALIZNG IS AGAINST THE RULES. HOW DARE YOU. NOW GO EXPOSE YOURSELF TO A PLAYERBASE WHO SHOULD KLL YOU UPON DISCOVERY! HAPPINESS IS MANDATORY. Morgenes apologized, but I still stored the character and did not play for nine months. I'm pretty sure Nyr had something to do with that, which disgusts me after reading jcarter write about the shit Rissa got away with. REFUSING TO PLAY A GAME WHERE YOURE ABUSED IS GROUNDS FOR BANNING. HOW DARE YOU. NOW GO TRY TO MAKE YOUR OWN FUN WHILE WE INTERFERE WITH YOU DOING BASC THINGS YOU CAN DO ON YOUR OWN WHILE TELLING YOU NOT TO DEPEND ON US! HAPPINESS IS MANDATORY. Having your balls mercilessly busted and being threatened to be stored for "breaking" rules that aren't even written just seemed unnecessarily mean. Preachng to the quior, man. You've mentioned you read our board for a while before coming here. You reminded me of something I ranted about in the ALA leak about Arms "rules". Because Arm doesnt really have rules. it has arbitration. |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 17, 2014 11:02:19 GMT -5
Damn BitterFlashback, that makes so much fucking sense and is applicable to a lot of what has pissed me off. Really, it seems like arbitration has increased on Armageddon, and that probably what makes it so much less enjoyable for me now. The fact that the arbitration is unequally dispersed seems even more fucked up. I simply don't talk to people on AIM, messaging, with some very recent exceptions, or anything, about Armageddon, unless I've decided to play again and tell the couple of people who I think might give a shit. So, someone like me is an easy target for arbitration by those who don't like me because I have zero "friends" that I actively play Armageddon with. I have friends who I know through Arm, but not anyone at all who I make characters with, which has been the case with few exceptions for years. So really no resistance if an imm just wants to privately shit all over me because of a disagreement we had seven years ago, or whatever. |
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Post by BitterFlashback on Dec 17, 2014 11:17:28 GMT -5
Yeah, exactly.
And i personally think a psionicist is exactly the type of person to start contacting anyone and everything they can to fuck with them. Their skillset is built around fucking with people over the Way. i don't recall seeing Improve Confidence and Boost Felicity on the skill list. But i definitly recall a variety of skills for silently gettng a person's secrets before commanding them to drink poison.
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Post by jcarter on Dec 17, 2014 11:51:34 GMT -5
I get not wanting 8 karma characters to have safe targets for practicing skills, as a game balance concept. But throwing players into the mix without giving them a list of guidelines (we get suspicious when you go after NPCs please report who you locate and why) or just straight up not coding successful psion stuff on NPCs as eligible for skill-up is dumb. There's an overarching attitude I think players feel but can't quite put their fingers on and it's the attitude that if a player is viewed under the constant assumption that they're trying to twink out or abuse things. I mentioned to a staff friend of mine in early 2000s about wanting to retire a merchant character of mine because I just wasn't enjoying it and thought the pbase was shitty overall because I only logged a few hours a week. They mentioned it to Sanvean or on immchat offhandedly and I got an e-mail from her accusing me of trying to store my character to avoid an assassination plot against me that I had no idea about. Now keep in mind I never put in a request or anything, it was just idle thoughts I mused about. After I told her I had no idea what she was talking about I got back an e-mail apologizing but mentioning how uncool it would be for me to store without wrapping things up. Again, I never put in an e-mail for storage so it was more shocking over how accusatory it had been. Do I think every situation has people put under the thumb for abuse by all staff they interact with? No, but when it happens out of the blue like that it takes away in my trust of staff. To actually add onto that and preemptively counterpoint 'well that happened so long ago things are different', here's a recent Nyrism: gdb.armageddon.org/index.php/topic,31255.msg859202.html#msg859202 that applies both ways. not accusing me out of the blue for twinking or abusing isn't "evidence of showing a great deal of growth". |
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my2sids
Displaced Tuluki
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Post by my2sids on Dec 17, 2014 11:57:15 GMT -5
Have you had a history of similar events besides the email, jcarter?
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Post by jcarter on Dec 17, 2014 12:16:16 GMT -5
Have you had a history of similar events besides the email, jcarter? Yes. Here was from my last account notes request that was done in 2010- the relevant part being the last note added for some reason 8 months after the character's death on Christmas day. The tl;dr of the situation was that I had a cocky, martial Tor templar that got even cockier when he got his hands on magick rings, which was supported by e-mailed in reports. Tor templar was supervising CAM for a bit and took them off a mage he executed for repeatedly showing off his magick skills). We went on a RPT to a tomb, Samos was 'interrogating' a zombie by asking it questions nicely and it responded in snarky ways, Lord Naremis Tor doesn't kowtow down to pieces of filth like that so he got more forceful, it puked on him and his fine raiments of silk and armor so he killed it which opened up a floodgate of zombies and Nilazi elementals. They escaped but he went back for one of his soldiers that didn't and got insta-gibbed by 5+ baddies in a room. Pretty shitty to hold a grudge for nearly a year secretly add notes to someone's account accusing them of that. I had no OOC contact with other players at the time and specifically wanted to avoid it by using a clan-alt account. The notes were expunged by Morgenes who apologized after I complained about it. |
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malkeninthemiddle
Displaced Tuluki
Black woman lawyer on a television morning show
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Post by malkeninthemiddle on Dec 17, 2014 12:17:44 GMT -5
The only time I ever app'ed a psionicist, it was such an epic disaster that I never app'ed for one again.
I started him in Red Storm, being super crazy careful on who I would 'practice' my mad skillz.. I would try to find people that were just passing by in Red Storm then I'd get their names from locals and start randomly picking them to better myself as the master mindfucker I knew I'd someday become. I messed up once in a while, I mean, who wouldn't, those skills are almost meant to out yourself at the early stage of the game just to make sure that they have a minimal amount of people going around and trying to mind-convince others to commit suicide. So anyway, weeks, if not months pass by, my skills are pretty well developed (or so I think) and no one seems to have any idea of what I really am (they probably all think I'm just your random rogue 'giker/tailor minding his own business) but I still don't seem to get all the cool toys that I expected from being a mindbender, you know, like catching people's thoughts and feelings. Who knows, maybe the PCs (like myself) don't ever use think or feel.
So I'm bored to death after weeks of doing nothing interesting in Red Storm and finally decide to take a chance and move to 'Nak, just hanging out and still assuming that the worse that'll happen is that someone will know me from Red Storm and be suspicious as my PC being a rogue 'giker. Hey, that's cool, I'll just pretend I'm a merchant - being a tailor in Red Storm did make me 1000000000 'sids, after all, so I might as well use them.
So I walk into Red's, there's this one PC chick sitting casually at the bar, so I'll play it cool, put out the good ol' Malken charm that got me the 8 karma my2sids keeps praising me for, yaddi, yadda.
So the first thing that happens is that suddenly all these psi toys that I was hoping for suddenly pops in, I'm now hearing the chick's thoughts and sensing her feelings, only trouble is, her thoughts go something like, "Oh shit, it's that rogue psionicist, I better play it extra cool and wait for a Templar to show up!" and her feels are something like, "The so-and-so chick feels super threatened and afraid for her life".
So I go into full retard-panic-6 weeks of boredom- mode and smile casually at her, leave the tavern, run for my inix and make a dash for nowhere city, as far north as I can manage. At this point, though, I was so bored to death with my role and just didn't feel like hiding for another 6 months that I just rammed myself into the nearest beast and ended the most boring role I had played on Arm in forever.
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my2sids
Displaced Tuluki
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Post by my2sids on Dec 17, 2014 12:20:33 GMT -5
Jcarter: Yeah some dumb shit like that happened to me a couple times in my notes. I had to complain about it for anything to happen.
I'm curious if it was a noobie storyteller or someone that had been around the block. Acct notes for the most part are a small part of the picture. Request tool history is a better system.
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Post by jcarter on Dec 17, 2014 12:26:56 GMT -5
My unprovable conspiracy theory is that it was someone involved player-side in the RPT that held onto a grudge, came onto staff, maybe glanced at my account for whatever reason, saw I had played the character and decided they were going to get me back or something by adding the account notes. But I'll never know because no one cared enough to look into it, or if they did then it wasn't important enough for me to know.
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Post by lulz on Dec 17, 2014 12:27:13 GMT -5
Tor templar was supervising CAM for a bit and took them off a mage he executed for repeatedly showing off his magick skills). Kolt.  Fuck that character. |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 17, 2014 12:30:41 GMT -5
Hahahaha... That is fucking hilarious malkeninthemiddleI'm glad you decided to join me in this epic quest to have all of our karma removed... |
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