grumble
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Post by grumble on Mar 15, 2017 12:34:30 GMT -5
But that only amounts for sparring, also, Harar was a beast, as Miydao I got to spar him... do you remember the epic Armali rescue? I was Chuckem, and I was looking at the screen and saying, OMG, I do NOT want to do this! But, I am playing a HG, so if Harar keeps up I'm probably going to jump suicidally into the big, dark hole... ok, jumping in the hole then, and flapping my arms really fast.
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grumble
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Destroyer of Worlds
Posts: 1,619
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Post by grumble on Mar 15, 2017 12:43:24 GMT -5
I think it was around christmass, and I was horribly drunk when Harar approached Chukem and said, you're our only hope, but not drunk enough to swan dive into a hole, and my OOC reaction was just like, oh HELL the fuck no, then settle back into character, where I allowed Chuckem to be gently coaxed to the hole, given a bit of extra rope, and by that point he just ran at the hole, flapping his arms and screaming, I am a big bird!
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 1:39:04 GMT -5
Starting to finally read through the GDB thread about all this shit.
Got to Bahliker's post and had to stop and take a deep breath.
Now, though his GDB handle isn't that old, he has been playing the game as long as I have. And we both started at roughly the same age.
I know the guy IRL. It's someone I first met when I was, well... still in fucking high school.
Anyway, it's interesting, considering one of the aspects of the original post, that this guy was probably, alongside myself, one of the pimary players in the Tan Muark alongside myself once upon a time. It's interesting because he's the one that's made the most compelling case for this board thusfar yet would be lumped, according to terms previously listed, under the cliquey regard category... when's he's not nor ever really has been. You can play the game a long fucking time and even be granted extra neat stuff, like playing in the Tan Muark, without being a cliquey retard in the Malkenesque sense of the word.
As far as what Noted Liar Nergal said, he's right. There's nothing stopping some of us from playing again. Making new accounts, etc.
But I am not one of the people who is still playing.
I got smashed and had a meltdown here sometime last spring, quit posting for a long while, and, not long after that, I found myself homeless living on Bureau of Land Management land in a mother fucking $100 tent and a busted ass sleeping bag in the middle of the Rocky Mountains in April. Miraculously, after a month of living like that, hungry and cold and with no plan, I got a gig with a guiding company and started getting my shit squared away again once the money started coming back in.
Reflecting on all of that, I realize on what a bad spot I had been in. Mental illness is a weird classification, and, even we we think we recognize it in ourselves, well, it's still a blanket term that ignores nuances of situations.
Like being in a very bad spot in your life while simultaneously feeling the brunt of the underhanded sentiments held by certain staff members. Bahliker is probably aware of the extent of those attitudes, having been a part of staff and having married a woman via ArmageddonMUD. Reading his post feels like a confirmation of things I was almost certain of previously, like the grudges held by people like Nyr towards certain players... like me.
If you are in a difficult spot in life and feeling as though you're being brickwalled by an OOC grudge held by Nyr dating back nearly a decade, well, you will probably be even more pissed off at the bullshit because you don't have much going on or much else to think about. It's easy to become extremely frustrated and angry when you feel you're being marginalized because some dick head who couldn't even play a successful leadership PC is continuing to fuck with you out of sheer spite.
Say what you will, but at a certain point, there's only so much a person can take. Especially when their back is already against the wall in very serious ways IRL. That doesn't have to deal so much as being clinically insane as much as it does having a lack of patience or even stability as a result of fighting through IRL bullshit. A hungry man is an angry man, and fucking with or stonewalling someone over petty, aged shit will make them angry. Noted Liar Nergal, breaking rules has nothing to do with dealing with the nastiness of someone like Nyr when you're already in a shitty place IRL and are just trying to enjoy something you've enjoyed for a long time *without being fucked with or feeling like you must walk on eggshells all the time*
Not trying to write to much about who Bahliker is, but, to me, context is extremely important when you're trying to discuss an issue. Especially when the roots are deep.
Anyway, I'll go back to reading that thread, but that one post in particular struck me as extremely meaningful... especially if you know the context.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 1:59:19 GMT -5
I feel like a community like ArmageddonMUD can be therapeutic when dealing with difficult situations... but not when you're having to deal with people who simultaneously hold longlasting and obvious grudges that unfortunately seem to spill over into the game world, such as with the case of Nyr. When that's the case, well, I feel like it exacerbates any problems a person might be fighting through.
Lol, anyway... I would love to try to play Armageddon again under a different account.
But hey, Nergal. Fucking banning people for posting here is god damn absurd. Come the fuck on dude. Go back and read what bahliker wrote about senseless moderation. Banning people for participating in a community that SOME PEOPLE have used to spread spoilers or shit like that is witch hunt bullshit that you should know better to fall prey to.
I personally don't agree with the spreading of IC information. Those kinda spoilers are just sorta disappointing to me. As for when some people deconstructed efforts like the goth thing, well, I feel that's unfortunate and don't agree with it.
But you cannot take what one person says and use it as an excuse to insinuate that the entirety of posters here feel the same way. About some things, I surely don't, and I really believe you'd have a hard time pigeonholing the people here. Like the population of ArmageddonMUD itself, the people who have posted and continued to post here is an eclectic one... and it is fucking dumb to try to characterize is as all of one thing or punish people that post here because of what other people did.
Just like the current staff shouldn't really, in my opinion, feel the brunt of Nyr's actions, I don't think that this board should be labeled as some blanket thing because of what a few people wrote.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 2:00:23 GMT -5
emote gags, heaving violently, his entire being convulsing in resistance to a triple post.
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Post by BitterFlashback on Mar 16, 2017 15:30:56 GMT -5
OT - Thanks for the history lesson. It makes this thread much more complete. I really wonder how people from the alt-shadowboard (AKA "the GDB") will react to seeing our version of their thread isn't a go-nowhere predictably-locked circlejerk of the same argument they've had a dozen times. 1) What do you mean when you say "plot" in this sentence? Like, what's the least important or least complicated thing you'd call a plot, and what if anything do you have to do bureaucratically to get it allowed/enabled by staff?
2) What actions staff are taking to enable leaders' plots? I don't need specifics; giving specifics might get you in trouble with the staff. A list of generalized actions would be appreciated. 1.) Plots as in, staff-supported NPCs being animated. PC leadership and otherwise at ends with each other--competing, trying to kill, politicking, building, exploring, etc. 2.) Allowing leaders to do what they want and pursue reasonable IC solutions to problems. Giving them tools to move forward instead of "silence". Interesting. Positive, definitely. How much latitude do you have to take action without advance approval? Particularly where other sponsored roles may be impacted? Leaders never, ever, ever like admitting when they're wrong. No leaders anywhere. It makes them, well, look like bad leaders. No one who is a leadership position... wants to look like a bad leader. Or a weak leader. It's a pretty simple concept, really. This is the behavior of poor leaders. Failing to acknowledge when you're wrong makes you look arrogant at best or oblivious/incompetent at worst. What you'll see good leaders do is acknowledge a mistake in a way that either shows it won't be repeated or that if it can't be prevented its averse affects can be mitigated. All of this is true of any skill-related profession, FYI. Starting to finally read through the GDB thread about all this shit. Having finished it, how would you compare it to our thread? Also, yes, if only to infuriate BfB could you explain in exrtutiating detail what happened to you? I swear BfB's gonna rip my head off.
The neck-bearded basement troll eyes the spice-oil-stained, spice-scented man morbidly.Do you have any comment on BFB's classification of players? I don't feel like it's quite as complete or cohesive, though I do feel like it underscores a significant truth. EDIT: Although I do salute the attempt and recognize it as something that would be beyond my ability to do... I simply feel there are many more groups that don't get mentioned, and that drawing the line at ass-kissing shit-birds doesn't quit do the job. Oh, as I've said in the OP and subsequent posts, there are lots of other subcultures and player classifications and so forth. Most people are a mix. I chose to focus on the individualist / entitled retard spectrum (which covers how all people approach the game itself regardless of what they play in it) because I believe the eventual triumph of the cliquey retard culture over the driven individualists is what has led to the collapse of Armageddon MUD. I was never good at playing combat roles, for example, because I was almost entirely disinterested in it. I hated the grind for combat more than any other grind. Because of that many of my characters were vulnerable to losing in combat. Yet, at the same time, I neither begrudged people who were good at combat nor did I try to eliminate the threat of combat from the game when I was a staffer. That's because I'm firmly in the individualist camp. Arm is a game where you can get killed by players; it's not my place to change that part of the game just because I'm far more likely to get killed IC than people who actually like Arm's combat grind. I shouldn't ruin the game for others to protect my PCs. the arm reborn fiasco was downright ridiculous. people knew it was bullshit from a mile away. a brief history, for those who don't know. arm reborn was announced in 2006. i can't find the original announcement post (please oh please someone find it) but i also recall them mentioning some absurdly small timeline that everyone knew wasn't feasible. but you still had people like morgenes that should have known better going nope just you wait and see! of course, they missed the date. but there were updates! discussions and great new ideas that every imm has which they spent time making sure to update the blog, which shifted locations a couple of times, to hype up their ideas. Yep. They made basically everyone into a project manager. I knew it was doomed from inception because when they announced 2.0 they said everyone could have input. You have to have one vision and as few people allowed to alter that vision during development as possible if you want development to end. It's a choice between disappointing some people during a programming iteration or disappointing everyone by failing to finish.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 16:00:39 GMT -5
I am still on page 4 of the alt-Shadowboard version of this thread but will try to finish it and give some thoughts.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 16:55:53 GMT -5
Lol, Malken:
Quote from: titansfan on March 08, 2017, 12:48:44 PM
"I personally do not think the game is in a
Just my two cents."
Malken:
"That's your opinion and unfortunately, your opinion alone that the game is doing well isn't going to get me back into the game. Before I even think about dedicating the amount of hours required to even start enjoying Armageddon on a daily/weekly basis, I need to 'feel' that my investment will be worth it. I gauge this kind of feeling from what I read on the GDB and from what my friends tell me (no, no big secrets, don't worry - beside, is there even any big secrets to talk about??). If the general 'feeling' of the GDB and that my friends are that nothing is happening in the game and that Arm has slowly turned into a giant and very well-described chatroom, then it certainly doesn't make me even want to try it out again. If all I see on the GDB are the usual parties/card games/auctions RPTs, then no, that doesn't want to make me want to log into the game either.
I need to 'feel' like something is happening, something grand or something super interesting that I just want to be part of it. I haven't felt that way in months and each time I give the game another shot, I just end up bored and as disappointed as I was before creating another character to give it yet another shot.
Storytellers should be made to tell a story, not to react to player's stories. They are storytellers, not story-reactors (man, this is beautiful, I'm totally trademarking this line)."
This is funny on a lot of different levels.
Hey, say what you will, but I have never bitched about the game being too boring.
Know what you need to do if you feel like ArmageddonMUD isn't interesting enough? Maybe try to actually do something to attempt to make the fun for others. I always enjoyed the clan building aspect of ArmageddonMUD and the only real gripe I have about that is when staff put population caps on clans in an effort to, presumably, funnel or force people to join other clans.
The times where I have felt the thing that Malken's talking about is when I sensed that my ability to build up a clan or group were impeded because staff feared that group accruing too many members.
I get that it's a little weird when a huge chunk of the player base is tied up in one clan, but if that's the case at a certain point in the game, *there's probably a reason for it.* people are likely, well... actually having fun. And there are likely steps staff could take to tip the balance and make another clan or clans more attractive to a greater number of people.
Anyway, idly bitching about how "arm is boring now and stuff" just kinda seems ridiculous. Especially if you're in a position when special apps are open to you and you aren't the brunt of some ridiculous grudge.
I've written way more about how I felt like my attempts at making the game fun for others felt thwarted way more than I have sat there and just said, man, the game just sucks now.
That's mighty weak, Malken.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 17:03:51 GMT -5
Armaddict:
"I'm completely not okay with calling the longstanding rules of the game dumb altogether, accusing staff of purposely fucking things up, people telling each other that the game is dying because they didn't get what they want, etc."
Some of the staff even at the higher levels have, while not maybe purposefully fucking things up, have definitely been purposefully assholish in significant (and unnecessary) ways, and I think that's more of an issue than what you're characterizing it as. When people are dicks unnecessarily or hold grudges while in a leadership position, that fucks things up.
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Post by sirra on Mar 16, 2017 17:11:40 GMT -5
I rarely ever saw staff serve as 'story reactors'. While it's unquestionable that they've been dropping the ball as storytellers for about ten years (in that decade of time, how many significant and interesting staff arcs have there been, that didn't involve a black robe or was limited to only a tiny clique of noble PCs?). They could barely even be bothered to animate a single gith to take a pot shot at a patrol, more than about once every 2-3 RL months.
Maybe Malken had better luck, but all my experience with staff, was them either animating NPCs to punish you somehow, because you did something they didn't like, or doing their extreme best to ignore you.
For example, Salarr spent about 2 RL years trying to build an outpost, and collected a stupid amount of materials for it, and staff constantly reassured us that it was possible, long after we surpassed the original milestones. Then they stopped responding to it. Barely paid attention to us. Salarr was so large when I was running the hunter ops, that it had nearly 20 active players, and I was disallowed from recruiting anymore. If staff cared about their game, it would seem that throwing some action our way, even a little bit of it, would've made a lot of fun for a lot of people.
It didn't need to be like Expansion Division 1.0 all over again (staff loves swinging to extremes depending on which friend of their's is playing in which clan). But just a tiny bit of interaction geared towards us having fun rather than fucking us.
The ONLY time Olgaris ever animated an NPC or interacted with us under his watch, was to bitch at my Salarri sergeant for letting his hunters wear Kuraci camos instead of the stupid shitty leafy tembo stuff. When I laughed it off, Olgaris wrote a very shitty, resentful 'hidden' character note on me, which I only saw accidentally when Adhira forgot to delete it while showing me something else, years later. The wording for it was so extreme, you'd think I was Hitler. It blew my mind to discover he'd taken my character's IC rejection of his fashion advice with such malevolent seriousness. He described me as a horrible leader at a time when Salarr was experiencing as much activity as during Expansion Division 1.0 without any of the goodies or staff support, thanks to my organization.
Then while fucking around the desert and exploring, I was attacked by some bandit gate NPCs, so we defended ourselves and killed them. This was no different from the countless desert elves who've killed untold numbers of braxat or locational gith/tribal guards in the Tablelands.
After that, suddenly, Nyr, Olgaris, Adhira (who btw, cannot pvp worth a damn) and one other staffer couldn't get enough of fucking with us. They animated the Miloka and announced this one shitty little near extinct tribal group who had some past connection to the gypsies, was responsible for halving Salarr's trade income across the map, and doubled all our prices. It didn't matter that whenever Miloka NPCs encountered Salarr PCs, we fuck-stomped them. It was all happening off screen. Because what? Their gate guards picked a fight?
In more than ten years, that was the most interaction I ever had with staff.
Then they cancelled the outpost project. Which had been done and waiting for staff response for the last 6-8 RL months. This was after Nyr/Adhira took over from Olgaris, who had taken over from the original guy who was alright. Some T-name guy. (Most of my worst experiences on Armageddon seemed to happen after Nyr/Adhira took over a clan I was having fun in).
The best support I ever had from a staffer, was probably shaloonsh.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 17:24:12 GMT -5
But I agree the staff when they say they aren't a monolith. I agree with that whole.
I would caution, though, that they be careful from falling prey to attitudes or patterns that might be carryovers from that period when lots and lots of mistakes were being made in the realm of player/staff relations.
I feel it's hard to shake something once it becomes the party platform, but that probably needs to happen more often.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 17:30:35 GMT -5
"...than having Nyr take over your clan."
Triggered.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 17:45:32 GMT -5
*made it to page 9 (edit: sorry, had written 8 first) another good post from Bahliker*
Noted Liar Noted Liar Nergal keeps talking a lot about breaking the rules.
Personally, I never really felt as though I ever had a problem following the rules of the game.
I didn't start posting here because I had some kinda huge hangup with repeatedly breaking the rules - even when I played *a fucking lot*, I was able to follow the rules of the game.
What I had a problem with was dealing with people (well, maybe just that one guy or two) who seemed to fucking relish and thrive on being an asshole to others.
Breaking the rules and tolerating an asshole who is producing the game... are two different things.
Noted Liar Noted Liar Nergal seems to be attempting to characterize what's happening as the growth of a "fairer" game... but i don't think that many of the things Nyr did were fair and were, in fact, pretty fucking biased/personal. That's a far cry from this emergent "fairness" that Noted Liar Noted Liar Nergal keeps referring to.
I see what he's doing, but no, you cannot sit there and tell me that a lot of the shit that's went down, especially if the past five years ago, was fair. It wasn't. Noted Liar Noted Liar Nergal even admitted that as much earlier in that damned alt-shadow board thread.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2017 17:57:53 GMT -5
Notice how Nergal only responded to one part of Bahliker's excellent post on page 9.
It must really suck when you're the boss on a job and are continually confronted with the absurdities perpetrated by your predecessor, but part of the deal with being the new boss is to try to make sense of and attempt to repair what can only be a huge fucking flaming catastrophe of a shitshow left by the one who came before you.
Not really an enviable position, but when someone puts the truth out on front street like bahliker did, well, you're falling short if you don't incorporate that sorta feedback into how you think about the game as an administrator.
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Post by BitterFlashback on Mar 16, 2017 17:59:48 GMT -5
I meant more when you're done reading both threads, I'd be curious to see how you'd compare them to each other.
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