You know, one of the most irritating thing I see thrown around on the forums is this idea of "forum RP".
There is acceptable behavior and there is unacceptable behavior. Metagaming to gain mechanical advantages or exploit loopholes in rules (like vote rigging, bug abuse) is unacceptable behavior.
Everything else is acceptable.
This includes bringing up something I don't agree with in the game, in an OOC forum, to get discussion going.
Labelling something as "forum RP" and essentially shutting down a discussion and argument is the one of the most counter-productive things to do. Anyone can bring a complaint to the forums. For any reason. Even for an ongoing IC event. The only actual exception is in the case of open issues or unresolved bugs. Bringing any other topic to the forums to spur both discussion and maybe even change, is perfectly fine. This is what everyone has been doing before this, and none of this is "forum RP" or "forum drama".
Now, the complaint itself may or may not get enough agreement to actually effect change. It may even be argued and eventually concluded as invalid. However, pointing to it and labelling it "forum RP" to shut it down is not an argument.
Those who want Mag RP to be all about warlordish killing their enslaved villages are not neccesarily wrong just because there are people saying it is wrong. Neither are those who want Mag RP to be something 'deeper' or 'played out well' (whatever that might entail) wrong just because there are people who disagree with them. There is an argument to be made here, and discussed, and the people who should be the most interested in keeping the argument going so that a constructive answer, or at least progress, can be made should be Magnagorans. Yet, I see Mags turning up to say, "What's your motivation for posting this log, huh? You're trying to incite *gasp* forum RP, aren't you? This is drama that doesn't belong in my pristine, clean, everything-agrees-with-me forums! This shouldn't even get a reply! Shove off!"
And unfortunately, the great responses I see from people who genuinely participated and gave their thoughts on the archetype and role that Mag plays in the Lusternian landscape get ignored. Well, I don't have a Mag alt, so whatever way the dice falls on this topic is not immediately important to me. Continue with your pitchforks or whatever. Just wanted to throw the rant out.
I would personally prefer this sort of discussion in character. I think when it comes to the forums it ends up a debate of 'right rp' vs 'wrong rp'. When it's IC, it can be character building, it can be conflict, it can be different views clashing, it can be propaganda, it can have resolution. It can be great rp. Why roleplay outside the game when you can do it in the game? I don't get it. Not when the fallout is still ongoing.
You know, in cases like this, it becomes immediately obvious that the tempting nature of the response flags has a tendency to actually muddy discourse in some situations. For instance, @Lerad, you had a post with which I, in general, agree. Attacking someone's character and motivations for making an argument is not itself an argument; that's the definition of ad hominem. I also agree with Lavinya that it would probably have been best to wait a few days to raise this specific incident on the forums, because it's always a good idea to give IG events a certain amount of breathing room before exposing them to the cold, merciless light of people on the internet who don't quite grasp what empathy is. So the question is, are those disagree flags you've gotten meant to disagree with your entire point regarding the obfuscating tactic of accusing people of forum RP? Or your perceived support of OP? Or just principle? The world may never know.
Jadice, the Frost Queen says to you, "Constant vigilance."
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Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
edited May 2014
The in game discussion and the out of game discussion are not mutually exclusive. Both can happen at the same time.
There is an assumed conclusion that anything said on forums will ruin what happens in game. Which, obviously, is not the universal truth some people are implying it is.
There has been -far more- OOC discussion than IC discussion on this topic.
The IC discussion is two posts that most people asked what the "tl/dr" version of it is.
This thread killed all IC responses, more argument about it has happened on the forums than ICly.
So... yeah, you can claim all you want about how this isn't Forum RP or it's stupid to be shot down for that reason.. but I shot it down because I would prefer all this discussion ICly which none has.
2014/04/19 01:38:01 - Leolamins drained 2000000 power to raise Silvanus as a Vernal Ascendant.
2014/07/23 05:01:29 - Silvanus drained 2000000 power to raise Munsia as a Vernal Ascendant.
2015/05/24 06:03:07 - Silvanus drained 2000000 power to raise Arimisia as a Vernal Ascendant.
2015/05/24 06:03:58 - Silvanus drained 2000000 power to raise Lavinya as a Vernal Ascendant.
There is an IC debate, and many of those who are complaining about this thread are not participating in it.
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Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
I think it's funny that Shikha posting on forums means Lavinya, Leolamins, Shikha, and everyone else involved are so unable to distinguish between the two mediums that this thread has squashed all interaction ICly that you are just absolutely sure would have occurred otherwise (within a day, I might add).
That's kind of the problem with these sorts of claims. It implies 1) you can predict the future, and 2) the lack of something happening ICly on the terms you set means everyone involved is letting the forums ruin game interaction. It's, essentially, extremely condescending. Coincidentally, that's also why it's a stupid stance to take.
People play this game without allowing their actions to be dictated by the forums ALL the time. I know it's easy for posters to assume superiority on this subject, and that they are the only ones that don't, and it is their duty to shut down conversations that others shall fall victim to. But I shall share this with you: you're wrong, chill out.
No one said anything about forums dictating responses ICly, nor did I actually imply that "i can predict the future" or "lack of anything happening IC means forums ruin interaction". I said that there are more arguments going on OOCly than ICly, some of this discussion that should've happened ICly, hasn't. Actions speak louder than words, I can claim I am the Queen of England, but we know that's not true.
People can claim all they want that they are separated, but I'll just point out to you that this is game, is meant to be fun, and we are all people. So when someone hears about a thread on the Forums that has had far more discussion on it than what has happened ICly, and asks me about it, well, I'll just leave what Turnus said here:
"It might not be against forum rules, but I think it's bad form to post a
log of an event/something while at the same time going after IC
resolution of some sort. Let the IG stuff happen first, then post all
about it once it's done."
People often decide OOCly not to pursue things ICly because it's considered 'bad form.' It is not completely out of question that OOC feelings and agendas can ruin IC responses, this is something we have seen often around here.
So if such a thing can happen, why do we assume it won't happen here?
2014/04/19 01:38:01 - Leolamins drained 2000000 power to raise Silvanus as a Vernal Ascendant.
2014/07/23 05:01:29 - Silvanus drained 2000000 power to raise Munsia as a Vernal Ascendant.
2015/05/24 06:03:07 - Silvanus drained 2000000 power to raise Arimisia as a Vernal Ascendant.
2015/05/24 06:03:58 - Silvanus drained 2000000 power to raise Lavinya as a Vernal Ascendant.
It's been a bunch of people posting TlDR posts about the most ridiculous crap I've ever seen IG. no real 'debate' has occured. Just a bunch of propaganda on the news boards.
remember how I said a few times that Leo and I are out of town? We can't log in, though in my spare bored moments i trawl through here on my phone. Be patient, @Daevos (because what is there to debate without the Warlord's decision and the explanation of the councillor who gave permission for it and now apparently needs something done to her)
@Brona..that kind of response says it all. Wait for Leo to do something to Lavy? Obviously in some minds the outcome is now decided. Will Leo look at that and be unconsciously promptedto act in a certain manner now? Will there be the niggling concern of forum outcry if he did something different? That is why a thread lie this is contraversial and would have been best debated AFTER all the IC decisions had been made.
We actually reached a very interesting conclusion with this, with a negotiation with Leo and concessions made by both sides.
I do hate the precedent that a single council member can waive the law at their discretion, though. In some extenuating circumstances I can see it being needed, but the 'because I said it was cool' approach would imply that everything @Revan (<3) did when he was in power was okay, because a council member gave himself the thumbs up. There's a lot of room for conflict of interest and imbalanced application of the law.
I don't really know why you two hated each other so much, and perhaps those feelings color your viewpoint on the matter, but he did a fair bit more than antagonize people. You could argue that a lot of what he did was self-serving, but that same argument could be made for quite a few of the council members that have "served" mag. I genuinely enjoyed his RP and felt like the way he conducted himself in political arena was pretty exemplary of how mag politics should be played, if the lore and history from game areas are to be believed. A lot of people complain about how he would throw his weight around in matters where he shouldn't have been sticking his nose, but I think they would find a better understanding of those affairs if they stopped to wonder, for a moment, how he was able to influence those situations when he often had nothing to bring to the bargaining table, aside from a sharp tongue and a wink, that is.
Most of Revan's manipulations were done ooc via guilting and pressuring people to act. That's not good roleplay. He did roleplay well however when he wasn't blindly pursuing a vendetta, like trying to get his friends on council to boot munsia from the city.
I'm actually disappointed with this 'conflict' because not a single person spoke to me directly or indirectly. Other than very vague mentions in the newsposts, I wasn't included at all, and before I got home, the deal was settled and no more conversation on it allowed. Very disappointed. No one even knows why I approved, what I was thinking, nothing!
I don't really know why you two hated each other so much, and perhaps those feelings color your viewpoint on the matter, but he did a fair bit more than antagonize people. You could argue that a lot of what he did was self-serving, but that same argument could be made for quite a few of the council members that have "served" mag. I genuinely enjoyed his RP and felt like the way he conducted himself in political arena was pretty exemplary of how mag politics should be played, if the lore and history from game areas are to be believed. A lot of people complain about how he would throw his weight around in matters where he shouldn't have been sticking his nose, but I think they would find a better understanding of those affairs if they stopped to wonder, for a moment, how he was able to influence those situations when he often had nothing to bring to the bargaining table, aside from a sharp tongue and a wink, that is.
You didn't actually list anything he did. Many of us are having problems finding anything he's actively done since Open Beta besides ruin Ninjakari. Vendetta asside, he's well known for doing nothing and just claiming he did something in Open Beta and riding that. If 'Rp' is doing something to you, then sure...he does that. But that won't cut it with the rest of the playerbase.
Why are we offtopicing to discuss the merits of someone who spends their time bashing this game and the playerbase on Facebook?
Lavinya brings up an awesome point a couple of posts ago, too often people see others doing something and aren't sure why. Rather than talk to the person and potentially get some awesome conversational roleplay and plots going, they assume, judge, make up their minds and close the door on the topic.
There needs to be more IC talking, on all the things, well maybe not everything.
The divine voice
of Avechna, the Avenger reverberates powerfully, "Congratulations,
Morkarion, you are the Bringer of Death indeed."
You see Estarra the Eternal shout, "Morkarion is no more! Mourn the mortal! But welcome True Ascendant Karlach, of the Realm of Death!
I'm sorry you didn't feel like you got enough interaction @Lavinya. When I attempted to discuss this matter in game when the event occurred you shut it down with a 'Take it to the warlord' response. That basically sent me the message that you either didn't want to talk about it or didn't care about Shikha's opinion on the matter, so I took it up the chain, as requested.
Lavi's choice to validate her actions as a matter of rank rather than any sort of logic or philosophy (at least, how I interpret it when a council member makes a point of pointing towards a person's rank in the case of a disagreement) didn't do much to foster an expectation of rational discourse.
Edit: As for the reason for allowing it, that was extrapolated from the city logs.
Lavinya is big on decorum. She doesn't believe in such discussions on the city aether. I was more expecting a letter perhaps or someone approaching me personally. I guess it will be forever a mystery and left to presumption!
Edit: That sounds snarkier than I intended. I would have enjoyed explaining myself properly, but she never would have done it on CT, and Leolamins' post put an end to further posts. It was just some rp I missed out on (due to being away) that I would have happily dived into is all.
I also dislike arguing over CT and generally try to discourage others from doing so. However, everyone was subjected to the calls for help from the villagers over that aether so I didn't particularly feel like it was a terrible place to bring it up.
Now, for closing the matter out, that was all up to Leo. He made his decision and told everyone to drop it before even speaking to me about it. I was also hoping for more of a dialogue and a chance to explain my position and concerns more thoroughly, ideally with you there.
Comments
There is acceptable behavior and there is unacceptable behavior. Metagaming to gain mechanical advantages or exploit loopholes in rules (like vote rigging, bug abuse) is unacceptable behavior.
Everything else is acceptable.
This includes bringing up something I don't agree with in the game, in an OOC forum, to get discussion going.
Labelling something as "forum RP" and essentially shutting down a discussion and argument is the one of the most counter-productive things to do. Anyone can bring a complaint to the forums. For any reason. Even for an ongoing IC event. The only actual exception is in the case of open issues or unresolved bugs. Bringing any other topic to the forums to spur both discussion and maybe even change, is perfectly fine. This is what everyone has been doing before this, and none of this is "forum RP" or "forum drama".
Now, the complaint itself may or may not get enough agreement to actually effect change. It may even be argued and eventually concluded as invalid. However, pointing to it and labelling it "forum RP" to shut it down is not an argument.
Those who want Mag RP to be all about warlordish killing their enslaved villages are not neccesarily wrong just because there are people saying it is wrong. Neither are those who want Mag RP to be something 'deeper' or 'played out well' (whatever that might entail) wrong just because there are people who disagree with them. There is an argument to be made here, and discussed, and the people who should be the most interested in keeping the argument going so that a constructive answer, or at least progress, can be made should be Magnagorans. Yet, I see Mags turning up to say, "What's your motivation for posting this log, huh? You're trying to incite *gasp* forum RP, aren't you? This is drama that doesn't belong in my pristine, clean, everything-agrees-with-me forums! This shouldn't even get a reply! Shove off!"
And unfortunately, the great responses I see from people who genuinely participated and gave their thoughts on the archetype and role that Mag plays in the Lusternian landscape get ignored. Well, I don't have a Mag alt, so whatever way the dice falls on this topic is not immediately important to me. Continue with your pitchforks or whatever. Just wanted to throw the rant out.
The divine voice of Avechna, the Avenger reverberates powerfully, "Congratulations, Morkarion, you are the Bringer of Death indeed."
You see Estarra the Eternal shout, "Morkarion is no more! Mourn the mortal! But welcome True Ascendant Karlach, of the Realm of Death!
The IC discussion is two posts that most people asked what the "tl/dr" version of it is.
This thread killed all IC responses, more argument about it has happened on the forums than ICly.
So... yeah, you can claim all you want about how this isn't Forum RP or it's stupid to be shot down for that reason.. but I shot it down because I would prefer all this discussion ICly which none has.
People can claim all they want that they are separated, but I'll just point out to you that this is game, is meant to be fun, and we are all people. So when someone hears about a thread on the Forums that has had far more discussion on it than what has happened ICly, and asks me about it, well, I'll just leave what Turnus said here:
"It might not be against forum rules, but I think it's bad form to post a log of an event/something while at the same time going after IC resolution of some sort. Let the IG stuff happen first, then post all about it once it's done."
People often decide OOCly not to pursue things ICly because it's considered 'bad form.' It is not completely out of question that OOC feelings and agendas can ruin IC responses, this is something we have seen often around here.
So if such a thing can happen, why do we assume it won't happen here?
I do hate the precedent that a single council member can waive the law at their discretion, though. In some extenuating circumstances I can see it being needed, but the 'because I said it was cool' approach would imply that everything @Revan (<3) did when he was in power was okay, because a council member gave himself the thumbs up. There's a lot of room for conflict of interest and imbalanced application of the law.
I'm actually disappointed with this 'conflict' because not a single person spoke to me directly or indirectly. Other than very vague mentions in the newsposts, I wasn't included at all, and before I got home, the deal was settled and no more conversation on it allowed. Very disappointed. No one even knows why I approved, what I was thinking, nothing!
Lavinya brings up an awesome point a couple of posts ago, too often people see others doing something and aren't sure why. Rather than talk to the person and potentially get some awesome conversational roleplay and plots going, they assume, judge, make up their minds and close the door on the topic.
There needs to be more IC talking, on all the things, well maybe not everything.
The divine voice of Avechna, the Avenger reverberates powerfully, "Congratulations, Morkarion, you are the Bringer of Death indeed."
You see Estarra the Eternal shout, "Morkarion is no more! Mourn the mortal! But welcome True Ascendant Karlach, of the Realm of Death!
Lavi's choice to validate her actions as a matter of rank rather than any sort of logic or philosophy (at least, how I interpret it when a council member makes a point of pointing towards a person's rank in the case of a disagreement) didn't do much to foster an expectation of rational discourse.
Edit: As for the reason for allowing it, that was extrapolated from the city logs.
Edit: That sounds snarkier than I intended. I would have enjoyed explaining myself properly, but she never would have done it on CT, and Leolamins' post put an end to further posts. It was just some rp I missed out on (due to being away) that I would have happily dived into is all.
Now, for closing the matter out, that was all up to Leo. He made his decision and told everyone to drop it before even speaking to me about it. I was also hoping for more of a dialogue and a chance to explain my position and concerns more thoroughly, ideally with you there.