Oh please, there is a vast gulf between AFK hunting or influencing and AFK at the Nexus for 20 - 30 minutes. Even the Admins are smart enough to see that.
Just as a last remark, when your wife is giving you the "do it now" look and you say "just a second i just have to run to my manse" and that look turns from "do it now" to "I will smite you with all the fiery power of hell"... you make a quick decision on what rules are important to you. Anyone married for a long time knows this to be true.
I can reconnect to a game and get role points back. Sleeping on the couch or waking up with my testicles on fire (not that it has happened, but I married a ginger and who the F knows what they will do to you) is not something I really look forward to.
You guys are seriously making a big deal out of nothing.
You know what? No. It's this kind of cavalier attitude towards rulebreaking (not even the "It's an accident, I did it by mistake, sorry" but out-and-out "I just don't care what the rules are, I am going to ignore them") that leads to situations where an individual in this game felt it was a-okay to abuse something that gave him infinite power, health, mana, and ego during fights. Being so dismissive towards the very concept of rules is just... not a good thing.
Yes, me and everyone else who has AFK'd at the nexus on more than one occasion are destined to be massive powergaming bug abusers. Xenthos has spoken. So mote it be.
Yes, me and everyone else who has AFK'd at the nexus on more than one occasion are destined to be massive powergaming bug abusers. Xenthos has spoken. So mote it be.
No, but it does clearly indicate that an environment which encourages rulebreaking does not discourage rulebreaking.
Nobody is encouraging it. Not even myself. I said if you want to be a rules lawyer and have issue with it, which obviously you do given you not only had to point it out, you had to point it out in big bold letters, then stand by your words and rules and issue me for it when you think it is happening. I do not shy away from my mistakes, I own up to them and accept the consequences of my actions.
I get that your one tracked mind to prove yourself right at all costs using any little point you can wriggle out of a statement means you can't grasp the difference
Will I AFK at the Nexus again during my game time? Yes I will, for any of a number of reasons. Do I AFK Hunt or Influence, no I do not. Are they all wrong to do? Of course they are. Is there a vast difference in the wrongness? Yes there is.
edit:: Let's also add some perspective here. How many of you have sped in your car? How many of you have logged in from your phone while at work? How many of you have logged in from your work computer while at work? the list goes on and on. So please, do me the favour and spare us all your hypocrisy about "respecting the rules and rule makers", "rule breakers", and "slippery slopes"
I was really unsure why the person thought it was okay to cheat at the game-- through the course of this discussion, it is becoming much more clear. Permissive attitudes towards ignoring / blatantly dismissing rules have a snowballing effect. It's not about whether you yourself have set some arbitrary "line" so much as whether everyone you are interacting with and who is receiving that reinforcing message also sets the line at the same place, and hint: not everyone does.
However, as kids are fickle creatures, sometimes 10 - 20 minutes turns into an hour or longer and me ending up singing my favourite lullaby to my son "Go to sleep, go to sleep, go to sleep before daddy strangles you..." (Anyone with young children should understand this lullaby at times)
You guys are seriously making a big deal out of nothing.
You know what? No. It's this kind of cavalier attitude towards rulebreaking (not even the "It's an accident, I did it by mistake, sorry" but out-and-out "I just don't care what the rules are, I am going to ignore them") that leads to situations where an individual in this game felt it was a-okay to abuse something that gave him infinite power, health, mana, and ego during fights. Being so dismissive towards the very concept of rules is just... not a good thing.
My point is Demartel has already stated his stance. Agree or disagree, that is his position to take and it's clear that no amount of guilt-tripping will make him change his priorities. If the admins see a problem with it then they will deal with it. You can issue him if you want. This is not the place to discuss it though.
I don't like policing people myself, but there's a point in it. Namely, to uphold and maintain the spirit of the rules. There are multiple angles at work here, but self-policing and community-policing are integral and important aspects of maintaining a positive atmosphere in the game.
Of course, self-policing is not all rosy and good - there are costs and problems with doing so.
For one, there's a great deal of grey areas between what is the spirit of the rule and what are unintended loopholes, of course. And while debates about where the lines are, when they can be crossed or not, are helpful to clarifying said intentions of rules, taken too far, it can also lead to rule-lawyering, bogging down resources and wasting time. Where there are the rare clear-cut rules, like the AFK policy, however, it's simple (or should have been) to have it be pointed out and everyone making an effort to adhere to it when possible. End of story. The only thing that's preventing this from happening are people refusing to back down because apparently, they need a higher power to tell them to do so. Which is ridiculous.
Of all the arguments against self-policing, the "Who are you to police me?" argument is the worst and the least palatable. It doesn't matter if the person chiding you is an admin, a newbie, or Jesus Christ himself reborn. If your pride is in the way, feed it to the dogs - or the kids, as case may be. The rules are there - if you've run afoul of them, and get them pointed out to you, then just count it a new thing you've learned and adhere to them as much as is possible. End of story.
Do you know what this conversation sounds like? "Blah blah blah partisanship blah blah blah who do you think you are blah blah blah." Geez.
Eh, it's probably down to the person's personality. Some people don't shy away from confrontation, some people can't care less about others (or to put it more nicely, they prioritize their own experiences) etc.
So all I'm saying is that if Xenthos could learn to prioritize his own experience and not confront others (especially when he's been proven by logs to be wrong), I think there'd be a lot less friction. This is 100% a problem with myself, as well.
It's a police officer's job to arrest you if you break the law. Unless it is under extreme circumstances, the civilian should not engage the suspect.
Tl;dr let the admin do their jobs. Nobody needs a nagging know-it-all harrowing their every decision, especially when it reaches out to real world.
So all I'm saying is that if Xenthos could learn to prioritize his own experience and not confront others (especially when he's been proven by logs to be wrong), I think there'd be a lot less friction. This is 100% a problem with myself, as well.
It's a police officer's job to arrest you if you break the law. Unless it is under extreme circumstances, the civilian should not engage the suspect.
Tl;dr let the admin do their jobs. Nobody needs a nagging know-it-all harrowing their every decision, especially when it reaches out to real world.
You know that's not what he said, right?
You're also saying that if you're in a community with people who you know are about to commit a crime, you'd rather not try to convince them to not break the law? I mean, that's the entire point of neighbourhood outreach programs and everything like that, trying to get communities to help out and discourage bad behaviour before it even gets to be a problem.
Pretty sure that you know this is a huge stretch, and you're just desperately trying to make any point that you can. It's fairly obvious.
Edit: PS, I note that your "dropping it" didn't last very long.
Shh. No. That's not what I said, that's what you said.
While you may be a goodly neighbor and are so very kindly advising Demartel to not break the rules, I believe you're doing it just so you can be right about this and not because you think it'll improve Demartel and the community.
It really sucks when people inaccurately pin your intent, right?
Shh. No. That's not what I said, that's what you said.
While you may be a goodly neighbor and are so very kindly advising Demartel to not break the rules, I believe you're doing it just so you can be right about this and not because you think it'll improve Demartel and the community.
It really sucks when people inaccurately pin your intent, right?
Not really, I'm over here looking at your argument and thinking that it's about the worst one I have ever seen on these forums. It doesn't quite take the cake, but it's pretty darn up there. "Yeah, you should never tell people when they're doing something that is wrong, you should always just let them do whatever they want." That's just not how society even works; if we were still in that mode, we'd still be living in caves! If you're trying to make any other point, you've completely buried it under a pile of "Hahaha, did he really?"
Actually, if you read, I pointed out that there are social constructs (that we all agree upon) such as admins/police/government to do that thing for us. So that we don't squabble amongst ourselves. But yes, you can keep misrepresenting my argument, I know how much joy you get from that.
Actually, if you read, I pointed out that there are social constructs (that we all agree upon) such as admins/police/government to do that thing for us. So that we don't squabble amongst ourselves. But yes, you can keep misrepresenting my argument, I know how much joy you get from that.
And I countered that with the fact that those social constructs also rely on the community working in tandem with it. When the community does not, you get rifts between the two and things fall apart pretty badly. The government cannot fix all of society's problems by itself. The police cannot, either. Society is required to address society's problems, and those are some of the frameworks that we put in place to try to help guide and hold things together. Left unsupported, they crumble (or society does, leaving behind only an authoritarian state).
Edit: In short, nobody else is going to fix our problems for us if we can't be bothered to care about them ourselves.
Xenthos: You keep jaywalking, you know that is illegal right? Me: It's also a victimless crime. Random passerby: If the police catch him they will handle it. Xenthos: IF I LET HIM DO IT THEN A MURDERSPREE MIGHT HAPPEN!
Xenthos: You keep jaywalking, you know that is illegal right? Me: It's also a victimless crime. Random passerby: If the police catch him they will handle it. Xenthos: IF I LET HIM DO IT THEN A MURDERSPREE MIGHT HAPPEN!
Taking a molehill and making a mountain.
You know, the murderspree actually did happen. We're not talking a hypothetical here.
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SylandraJoin Queue for Mafia GamesThe Last Mafia Game
I think we can agree if you see someone afk and feel it is a problem, it's within your rights to issue it. Everything beyond that point is up to the admin.
Afk happens. Sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally. Whether or not you personally issue someone for it is your call. But you have the right to do it if you so choose.
I've issued in the past over things--never afkness--but if during one of the instances I've found myself afk I got issued, it would be valid. Not malicious on my end, or theirs, but valid.
There's already a protocol in place for this is what I'm getting at, and I don't think anyone is debating whether or not that protocol works. This is just an argument about how often people police, or should be obligated to police, people being afk. And as I find it hard to imagine a system where you can issue someone for not issuing another person for being afk, I don't think it will go in any productive direction. But it's good that people care about enforcing Lusternia's rules. That's something we should appreciate, the same way we appreciate people who do typo reports and bug quests.
"Oh yeah, you're a naughty mayor, aren't you? Misfile that Form MA631-D. Comptroller Shevat's got a nice gemstone disc for you, but yer gonna have to beg for it."
Edit: This post is mostly a reply at Maligorn's post after mine.
Yeah, I had a feeling that question was angled to bait and switch. Should've known better than to give the benefit of the doubt.
If you wanted to dispute my point that "Who are you to police me?" is a stupid position to take, you could've come right out to say it. You didn't need to veil it behind a patronizing, "so what do you think about this, huh?" question.
I'm loathe to even respond to that logically questionable comparison between self-policing game rules and real-life law and order, but let's pretend for a second that it has merit. Sure, it's a police officer's job to arrest you if you break the law, and a lay person is not empowered by the law to carry out arrest or even punitive measures, but it's also a person's social responsibility to question and point out something right or wrong about a situation. If you want to wash your hands off it, the way I prefer to at times, sure, that's your prerogative. But to take that idea and insist that only the police can question someone who is doing something wrong and everyone should just turn their eyes and walk away unless it is some kind of "extreme" case, is in itself an extreme position that is detrimental to society.
A game society is not like real life society, of course, which blows the original comparison full of holes anyway. If anything, when you compare the two, there is a compelling reason for the players to aggressively and actively police and punish rule-breakers in a game, far above and beyond what would have been acceptable in society. The stakes of personal liberty and freedom are smaller, and the potential for destructive behavior is larger, in a controlled environment like a game. People who would never imagine trying to break the law in real life, they may well be tempted to, and even actively participate in, destructive and anti-social behaviors in a game where they know the damage is limited. Couple this with the fact that punitive measures in a game do not actually (or would very rarely) inhibit a person's real life freedoms, there is little reason to be cautious in the application of rules from the "civilian" population, and a lot of reason to come down hard, as a collective, on rule breakers.
On hindsight, thanks for the comparison, it helped my argument a lot, Maligorn.
The only merit to the idea that the admin have a mandate above the "civilian" player in policing rule breaking lies in two points:
1) The admin have access to tools that can get to the truth of things.
2) The admin own the game.
3) The admin can hand out more advanced, or permanent, punitive measures.
The first point is relevant for cases of suspicious activity or unconfirmed infractions. Players who cannot prove definitively that a rule was broken will find it difficult to pin the suspect to punitive measures. The admin are far better left to such cases, and have a far more compelling mandate to say if someone is guilty or not guilty based on their access to logged player actions, ability to trace credit trails, access archived private correspondence etc etc.
The second point is self-explanatory - they own the game, so what they say, goes. If the admin one day says that AFK is no longer not-allowed, and everyone can AFK to get vote weight, then that goes, players have no say in it.
The third point is also self-explanatory. While players can punish other players for infractions, most of the time, what they can do is limited. Things like ostracizing, both the mechanical command to kick out of the city as well as the social activity of giving someone their collective displeasure, are effective to certain extents. But that's it. Players can't zap, shrub or ip-ban other players. In cases where such is needed, the admin are better suited, better equipped, to handle the infraction.
That's it. There is no other inherent mandate that an admin has over a player to police other people - in other words, beyond the three points above, there is no reason why a player should not be allowed to tell someone to stop doing something that they think is wrong. When that policing is backed by an iron-clad rule, then, there is also no reason to "leave it to the admin" when it can be handled on the ground. Players have every right, and every prerogative, to say, "hey, that's against the rules."
If there is any other reason that can mandate a player to never police another player, I'd like to hear it. In your words, Maligorn, "I think it would be enlightening for everyone to know why exactly this is."
Also being AFK at a nexus isn't a victim free crime. It sucks to show up at a nexus, see a large group to interact with and play with, and have it turn out that most of them are AFK. This really sucks if you're a new player showing up at your nexus for the first time. (Also, jaywalking isn't victimless. a lot of work is put into traffic patterns and when people can safely cross).
Despite the raw condescension, I pretty much agree with you. I don't really know how I got into the AFK argument as it stands now, but that's not my original beef. I think it was because Xenthos suddenly made a big deal about AFK to suit his argument when it has never, ever been a problem before (as far as AFKing at a nexus, not AFK hunting or influencing) (and everyone knows how much Tau AFKs at the Ravenwood. Why hasn't he ever chastised her publicly, or issued her?)
To get back on track, then, this is about Xenthos making assumptions about a person's real life. "You couldn't have been AFK taking care of your children because you were CLEARLY engaged in the game/forums". [Demartel shows logs] "Uh, nope, not gonna acknowledge that."
Comments
To be fair, issuing said person could never be claimed as partisan due to you never know where said person is residing next.
I can reconnect to a game and get role points back.
Sleeping on the couch or waking up with my testicles on fire (not that it has happened, but I married a ginger and who the F knows what they will do to you) is not something I really look forward to.
I get that your one tracked mind to prove yourself right at all costs using any little point you can wriggle out of a statement means you can't grasp the difference
Will I AFK at the Nexus again during my game time? Yes I will, for any of a number of reasons. Do I AFK Hunt or Influence, no I do not. Are they all wrong to do? Of course they are. Is there a vast difference in the wrongness? Yes there is.
edit:: Let's also add some perspective here. How many of you have sped in your car? How many of you have logged in from your phone while at work? How many of you have logged in from your work computer while at work? the list goes on and on. So please, do me the favour and spare us all your hypocrisy about "respecting the rules and rule makers", "rule breakers", and "slippery slopes"
Thank you for clarifying the matter for me.
Can you give us some insight as to why this is? Celina mentioned it too. I think it would be enlightening for everyone to know why exactly this is.
It's a police officer's job to arrest you if you break the law. Unless it is under extreme circumstances, the civilian should not engage the suspect.
Tl;dr let the admin do their jobs. Nobody needs a nagging know-it-all harrowing their every decision, especially when it reaches out to real world.
You know that's not what he said, right?
You're also saying that if you're in a community with people who you know are about to commit a crime, you'd rather not try to convince them to not break the law? I mean, that's the entire point of neighbourhood outreach programs and everything like that, trying to get communities to help out and discourage bad behaviour before it even gets to be a problem.
Pretty sure that you know this is a huge stretch, and you're just desperately trying to make any point that you can. It's fairly obvious.
Edit: PS, I note that your "dropping it" didn't last very long.
While you may be a goodly neighbor and are so very kindly advising Demartel to not break the rules, I believe you're doing it just so you can be right about this and not because you think it'll improve Demartel and the community.
It really sucks when people inaccurately pin your intent, right?
Edit: In short, nobody else is going to fix our problems for us if we can't be bothered to care about them ourselves.
Me: It's also a victimless crime.
Random passerby: If the police catch him they will handle it.
Xenthos: IF I LET HIM DO IT THEN A MURDERSPREE MIGHT HAPPEN!
Taking a molehill and making a mountain.
You know, the murderspree actually did happen. We're not talking a hypothetical here.
To get back on track, then, this is about Xenthos making assumptions about a person's real life. "You couldn't have been AFK taking care of your children because you were CLEARLY engaged in the game/forums". [Demartel shows logs] "Uh, nope, not gonna acknowledge that."