Your View: Villainy

[osumanduas 1442]

https://www.lordofthecraft.net/topic/125642-the-final-definitive-poll-on-mas-and-vas/

 

Statistics again seem to be proving the communities point. We should likewise have a poll from the GM team on the issues and solutions being discussed here if thats fair.

[osumanduas 1442]

 

To sum up on how most of the community feels

  You made a bad call on VA's, it's very obvious no one wants them but for some reason you keep trying to defend something no one wants. Why?

 

 

That seems to be the main concern yes.

[River 555]

 

VAs didn't work well in Aegis at all. People waited at least weeks and often months to get accepted. The VA system was restrictive and annoying. The only reason Aegis needed VAs was because the quality of RP was a lot lower in early Aegis(June-end of August) because the vast majority of us were new to RP'ing and the app was easy to get past. We now have a far higher standard of RP than early Aegis and that was one of the reasons for the VA being removed in the first place.

You think we have a higher standard of roleplay now? It'd argue it's at the same level of roleplay at aegis, or worse. Because they have the ability to roleplay much better, but people are driven by their OOC intentions of grabbing pixils from others for no other reason than there's nothing better to do on the server. Yes, the server should actually think of a way to make the server function as a roleplay server instead of the mess we have now, but it's also due to the fact that players have been given a freedom to do whatever they want.

 

The better roleplayers you speak of have long since left, don't involve themselves in these petty bandit actions so it doesn't affect them anyways, or have degraded themselves to being nothing more than a "Ooo, he haz armur, I kill him for shineez" The VA System "DID" work. People didn't comit banditry actions as much as they did now, it was far, FAR more moderated. People who were bandits were few, and played a villain to be a villain. Not play a random city guard, who is a bandit part time when he has a mask he can put on.

 

LotC /IS/  business module, but it's a business module for a ROLE PLAYING SERVER. not a "we do what our people want". This decision was made in the best interest for players who devote themselves to being roleplayers. If our PVP hungry players aren't satisfied with this, can't learn to play a bandit to play a bandit or write another application, then I wouldn't mind them leaving.

 

The server just has to return to it's roots of being a "Fun", "Centralized" and "Cooperative"(cooperative between all the races/factions against a greater evil) server, not the "Factions" "PvP" server.

[ski_king3 0]

It was during this time we looked back to the tried and tested system in our minds; Villain Applications. These applications in the past have succeeded in fixing those problems and were removed as a test to see if the playerbase was capable of handling a server without them. After discussion and review of roleplay we came to the conclusion that it was not.

 

Platypus.

 

I think the problem with the whole thought process that went into the addition of these teams is this thought process. The initial premise that Villain Applications solved problems in the past is a false one. By the time VA's were being removed, all the bad, problematic villainous roleplayers could get VA's with ease. Sure, there was the threat of blacklist, but typically the people who were "good" at bad villainous roleplay were also "good" at getting away with it. The VA's were a paper trail that served no purpose or benefit. It became overwhelmingly apparent, so they were removed.

 

Regardless, I don't think we'll find agreement on that point, so I'll go on to my thoughts about the options.

 

 

 

1. Removal of Villain Applications all together; This will result in harsh blacklisting. The moderation team will be using this method almost instantly upon seeing poor roleplay and many existing villain roleplayers might find themselves subject to severe scrutiny. This is the existing system only with added emphasis on fixing the analyzed problem.

 

 

I think this is the best option, as do most folks. Villainy doesn't need a special team to handle it; it should be the job of the GM's to do this. That being said, I have a huge problem with the way you're framing this. Whether or not blacklisting would increase, you've worded this option in a way to make it less appealing, emphasizing how tough the staff would be.

 

If this is really true, which I'm skeptical about just given how the blacklist was used in the past, I don't think it's reasonable. The only reason you guys should be cracking down is if there's a problem. While it's apparent that the staff perceives a problem that definitely needs addressing, it looks like an overwhelming majority of the playerbase (far too many to be a vocal minority) disagree. Their strong negative reaction and absolute shock at such an addition definitively implies disbelief in any sort of problem, and that in and of itself is very important.

 

The GM's are made up of largely good roleplayers with preferences and standards that cannot accurately represent the playerbase's simply because it's too small of a sample. This is a situation in which I believe the staff needs to recognize that their experience does not represent the collective experience even if they personally would prefer an improvement to villainous roleplay and remove the VAT entirely. You guys may perceive a problem, but it seems fairly apparent that you're an empowered minority.

 

 

 

1. Leave the system as it is with minor tweaks up to the existing team. This would mean I'd be working with all of you to make sure the rules would be as non-invasive and non-restrictive as possible. I intended to make heavy changes regardless such as potentially removing the need for lesser evils to be applied for but this option is the globally 'disliked' one even though my system has not even begin to fly. I wished to at least be given the chance to prove that the system I had was better but I don't believe such an opportunity will exist.

 

This, conversely, would be by far the worst option. Let's be realistic for a second and recognize that the way that the VAT and VA system is set up now, all the substantive properties are a carbon copy of the old VAT. The VAT that failed, was widely disliked, and which pretty much everyone is sad to see returning (even if you disagree with my previous absolute statements, the **** storm of yesterday is pretty much indisputable evidence).

 

While you want to make the rules non-invasive and non-restrictive, that's functionally impossible because of the nature of the VA. When logical character progression becomes tied to an lengthy OOC application, the VA system becomes inherently restrictive. The only way for it to be non-invasive is if it isn't strictly enforced, which defeats the purpose of the VA anyways. I could go on and on about the various other problems that VA's resulted in in the past, but if you go to the bottom of the forums and click on the most repped threads, there is one by Dalek which covers all the bases far better than I will.

 

 

1. We introduce a team for Villainy Moderation, small 5-7 team that handles blacklisting and monitoring poor villainy roleplay. This solution is one that would be interesting and remove the need for applications from the start.

    

2. We, instead of having a complex application needed to gain villainy, instead have a simple waver that declares you as someone who does villainy roleplay. This waver states that you understand the rules, understand what happens should you violate them, and would not need acceptance. These wavers would not need review and would only be required to be posted to do villainy roleplay, just a set of pledges similar to the raid pass system. Blacklisting still exists and the small team above would handle blacklisting villains.

 

 

I'll just put these two together because they're essentially equally objectionable, with the former marginally better than the latter. Sure, these probably wouldn't be that harmful, but having this small team really isn't a good use of resources. With this small team of villainous moderators, what will end up happening is you'll hear a lot of talk about people roleplaying villainy poorly but a lack of evidence. Getting this evidence usually takes a ton of time and energy, and yields relatively little reward. Likewise, it encourages nitpicking in order to justify the team's existence, because people want their position to be meaningful and nitpicking villainy is relatively little work. I say this from experience on various staff teams, in particular the MAT because the same thing happened when we heard about all the supposed powergaming of magic roleplayers that never yielded evidence.

 

Anything substantial will be sent to the GM's anyways, leaving the VAT either searching for evidence they're never going to find, or tearing apart minor stuff that really shouldn't warrant punishment. And then the latter option adds an unnecessary restriction on development which, while easy to pass, doesn't provide any tangible benefit.

 

 

Unrelated to all of this, I think one reason the staff believes that villainous roleplay has declined is because certain types of villains aren't common anymore. However, I think that's less a result of the "state of villainy" and rather that people realized certain types of villains just aren't very fun to play. If you think that this is something that ought to change, I think the VAT is a lazy solution; the framework for it already existed, so it seems like an easy way to "improve" the quality of villainous roleplay. Unfortunately, this is just inconsistent with what the VAT has done in the past. If you want to change villainy, lead by example and have some GM's try to create groups demonstrating the villainy you'd like to see on the server. You're players too, and IC solutions are much better than inefficient OOC ones that we've seen fail miserably in the past.

 

 

 

Also, I hope this isn't perceived as a personal attack. I'm obviously a fan of you Kalen, don't have any ill will toward the staff (hell, I'd like to be among you guys), and believe this was done with the best intentions. That being said, I think it's a really horrible idea that should be rectified as soon as possible.

 

EDIT: I also think folks aren't reading this because they already know how they feel about the moderation of villainy. That's pretty reasonable in my opinion.

[osumanduas 1442]

People never stopped being driven by OOC loot greed. I've been around for all of it including when it happened during the times VAs when a thing. The issues your bringing up would continue to happen. 

 

The server just has to return to it's roots of being a "Fun", "Centralized" and "Cooperative"(cooperative between all the races/factions against a greater evil) server, not the "Factions" "PvP" server.

 

All of those things don't need a VA system in order to happen. "Fun," can and is infact still happening.

 

Centralized efforts need less Nexus Regions which has been a debate that had been going on until this VA system was pulled upon us.

 

And cooperation between races couldn't be stronger because now because none of us want VAs back.

[River 555]

1. It doesn't matter what the players want, what the players want (because this is most of the players nowadays) is to be PVP hungry scrubs, who want to commit random evils for NO REASON.

 

2. This decision was for the betterment of the server, and to "create" a tier of higher level roleplay, since being a bandit means nothing besides being a PVP hungry scrub, and being a mage just means you're edgy. Magic is non-existant because people who worked hard for it can't use it now. Same goes for VA's.

 

Their characters had an actual reason to commit those evils, while the evils people are comiting are largly based off of OOC interests, and not taken from their characters mind. 

 

THE COMMUNITY HAS NO SAY IN THIS MATTER, IT'S FOR THE BETTERMENT OF THE SERVER, AND CURRENTLY THE SERVER POPULATION IS SICK.

 

I used to advocate for the staff listening to the players, because at that time the players "did" know what was best for the server, and it was the staff who were in the wrong. But In this matter the staff are experienced, and want the same thing, which is to return to our roots of being a high quality roleplaying server, and am happy they're not listening to the general consensus of "we don't like it, boo hoo"

[argonian 14254]

You think we have a higher standard of roleplay now? It'd argue it's at the same level of roleplay at aegis, or worse. Because they have the ability to roleplay much better, but people are driven by their OOC intentions of grabbing pixils from others for no other reason than there's nothing better to do on the server. Yes, the server should actually think of a way to make the server function as a roleplay server instead of the mess we have now, but it's also due to the fact that players have been given a freedom to do whatever they want.

 

The better roleplayers you speak of have long since left, don't involve themselves in these petty bandit actions so it doesn't affect them anyways, or have degraded themselves to being nothing more than a "Ooo, he haz armur, I kill him for shineez" The VA System "DID" work. People didn't comit banditry actions as much as they did now, it was far, FAR more moderated. People who were bandits were few, and played a villain to be a villain. Not play a random city guard, who is a bandit part time when he has a mask he can put on.

 

LotC /IS/  business module, but it's a business module for a ROLE PLAYING SERVER. not a "we do what our people want". This decision was made in the best interest for players who devote themselves to being roleplayers. If our PVP hungry players aren't satisfied with this, can't learn to play a bandit to play a bandit or write another application, then I wouldn't mind them leaving.

 

The server just has to return to it's roots of being a "Fun", "Centralized" and "Cooperative"(cooperative between all the races/factions against a greater evil) server, not the "Factions" "PvP" server.

You have terrible memory. In early Aegis everyone was either a white knight with no flaws or a glowy eyed villain. There was a lot more powergaming and metagaming than now. Bandit RP was 80% "minas or die!" where you'd PVP them unless they stopped and handed over minas. There was a lot more no-RP'ing than now. And most villains were either edgy orphans with a dark past or moustache twirling psychopaths who used insanity as an excuse to randomly kill you. A few new people would said stuff like "lmao" and used smiley faces in RP. Early Aegis was really fun but the standard of roleplay was much worse. There was a lot less trolling than now but the standard of RP was worse.

[Cyndikate 2303]

1. It doesn't matter what the players want, what the players want (because this is most of the players nowadays) is to be PVP hungry scrubs, who want to commit random evils for NO REASON.

 

2. This decision was for the betterment of the server, and to "create" a tier of higher level roleplay, since being a bandit means nothing besides being a PVP hungry scrub, and being a mage just means you're edgy. Magic is non-existant because people who worked hard for it can't use it now. Same goes for VA's.

 

Their characters had an actual reason to commit those evils, while the evils people are comiting are largly based off of OOC interests, and not taken from their characters mind. 

 

THE COMMUNITY HAS NO SAY IN THIS MATTER, IT'S FOR THE BETTERMENT OF THE SERVER, AND CURRENTLY THE SERVER POPULATION IS SICK.

 

I used to advocate for the staff listening to the players, because at that time the players "did" know what was best for the server, and it was the staff who were in the wrong. But In this matter the staff are experienced, and want the same thing, which is to return to our roots of being a high quality roleplaying server, and am happy they're not listening to the general consensus of "we don't like it, boo hoo"

Or more like, let's implement VAs to bandage the problem because we're too lazy to regulate the playerbase ourselves.

[zaezae 1098]

1. It doesn't matter what the players want, what the players want (because this is most of the players nowadays) is to be PVP hungry scrubs, who want to commit random evils for NO REASON.

 

2. This decision was for the betterment of the server, and to "create" a tier of higher level roleplay, since being a bandit means nothing besides being a PVP hungry scrub, and being a mage just means you're edgy. Magic is non-existant because people who worked hard for it can't use it now. Same goes for VA's.

 

Their characters had an actual reason to commit those evils, while the evils people are comiting are largly based off of OOC interests, and not taken from their characters mind. 

 

THE COMMUNITY HAS NO SAY IN THIS MATTER, IT'S FOR THE BETTERMENT OF THE SERVER, AND CURRENTLY THE SERVER POPULATION IS SICK.

 

I used to advocate for the staff listening to the players, because at that time the players "did" know what was best for the server, and it was the staff who were in the wrong. But In this matter the staff are experienced, and want the same thing, which is to return to our roots of being a high quality roleplaying server, and am happy they're not listening to the general consensus of "we don't like it, boo hoo"

 

Most players? How could you be so out of touch?

[Jistuma 1996]

There are two underlying problems you state in your thread:

• Villains are uninteresting or bad.
• Magic is not roleplayed much.

You state that uninteresting villains are due to the removal of the VAs, I can kind of agree with it, but not fully. Interesting villains don't exist much because of, in my opinion, the combination of the following factors:

• No Va - Players no longer think in more detail on their character.
• No lockpicking - Believe it or not, many of the interesting villains used lockpicking as well.
• PVP default - Simply be, the interesting villains were mostly rp orientated and never really PVP'ed. There are a few exceptions of course, but those are normally bandits, and there have been very few interesting bandits.
• 'Edgy' - This stupid notion that 'edgy' rp is bad rp threw most villains to the gutter and they got insulted so much that they stopped playing the character that way.
• Smaller map - This is actually very important. In a smaller map, you can be found out far more easily when you're doing villain things. It also means you can't create road blocks, have secret lairs, kill someone on the road, without being found out by many other people. Please don't compare with Aegis, Aegis was a small map BUT you couldn't sprint in those times (only at the end of it).

Fixing one of the problems won't fix the rest. And crappy VAs like the ones implemented won't either. By crappy VAs I mean the ones you just explain the reasons, you don't even think much on it, it's 2 questions and 2 open end questions. It's not enough to make a player think on their character, and they can quickly BS it. Now adding VAs just hurt the players that play villains right, or the not villains that will need a VA. The anti-heros, the ones that just get mad and do things when really mad, those that lose control when some things happen, and those that only do stuff when certain stuff happens. I've seen new roleplayers roleplay cliche and I have seen new roleplayers play amazing villain activities. No more will someone get killed in a tavern and another be forced to drink their blood as a platypus watches from the boiling cauldron.

[argonian 14254]

1. It doesn't matter what the players want, what the players want (because this is most of the players nowadays) is to be PVP hungry scrubs, who want to commit random evils for NO REASON.

 

2. This decision was for the betterment of the server, and to "create" a tier of higher level roleplay, since being a bandit means nothing besides being a PVP hungry scrub, and being a mage just means you're edgy. Magic is non-existant because people who worked hard for it can't use it now. Same goes for VA's.

 

Their characters had an actual reason to commit those evils, while the evils people are comiting are largly based off of OOC interests, and not taken from their characters mind. 

 

THE COMMUNITY HAS NO SAY IN THIS MATTER, IT'S FOR THE BETTERMENT OF THE SERVER, AND CURRENTLY THE SERVER POPULATION IS SICK.

I used to advocate for the staff listening to the players, because at that time the players "did" know what was best for the server, and it was the staff who were in the wrong. But In this matter the staff are experienced, and want the same thing, which is to return to our roots of being a high quality roleplaying server, and am happy they're not listening to the general consensus of "we don't like it, boo hoo"

The fact that you call us sick and not capable of making our own opinions is extremely patronising. What makes you capable of having opinions that we don't posses? Or do you just think that everyone that disagrees with you is wrong?

[osumanduas 1442]

1. It doesn't matter what the players want, what the players want (because this is most of the players nowadays) is to be PVP hungry scrubs, who want to commit random evils for NO REASON.

 

2. This decision was for the betterment of the server, and to "create" a tier of higher level roleplay, since being a bandit means nothing besides being a PVP hungry scrub, and being a mage just means you're edgy. Magic is non-existant because people who worked hard for it can't use it now. Same goes for VA's.

 

Their characters had an actual reason to commit those evils, while the evils people are comiting are largly based off of OOC interests, and not taken from their characters mind. 

 

THE COMMUNITY HAS NO SAY IN THIS MATTER, IT'S FOR THE BETTERMENT OF THE SERVER, AND CURRENTLY THE SERVER POPULATION IS SICK.

 

I used to advocate for the staff listening to the players, because at that time the players "did" know what was best for the server, and it was the staff who were in the wrong. But In this matter the staff are experienced, and want the same thing, which is to return to our roots of being a high quality roleplaying server, and am happy they're not listening to the general consensus of "we don't like it, boo hoo"

 

Kind of insulting to the community to be honest. We're not children.

 

 

CURRENTLY THE SERVER POPULATION IS SICK.

 

 

 

 

Its not in fact "sick" and calling it sick is in fact childish and extremely insulting to the legions of people who play on this server everyday. 

 

 

is to be PVP hungry scrubs, who want to commit random evils for NO REASON.

 

 

I'm sorry this simply isn't the case

[Devland99 180]

1. It doesn't matter what the players want, what the players want (because this is most of the players nowadays) is to be PVP hungry scrubs, who want to commit random evils for NO REASON.

 

2. This decision was for the betterment of the server, and to "create" a tier of higher level roleplay, since being a bandit means nothing besides being a PVP hungry scrub, and being a mage just means you're edgy. Magic is non-existant because people who worked hard for it can't use it now. Same goes for VA's.

 

Their characters had an actual reason to commit those evils, while the evils people are comiting are largly based off of OOC interests, and not taken from their characters mind. 

 

THE COMMUNITY HAS NO SAY IN THIS MATTER, IT'S FOR THE BETTERMENT OF THE SERVER, AND CURRENTLY THE SERVER POPULATION IS SICK.

 

I used to advocate for the staff listening to the players, because at that time the players "did" know what was best for the server, and it was the staff who were in the wrong. But In this matter the staff are experienced, and want the same thing, which is to return to our roots of being a high quality roleplaying server, and am happy they're not listening to the general consensus of "we don't like it, boo hoo"

Are you daft? This isn't betterment its another disgusting call by our staff team

[ski_king3 0]

So you were doing trialing it for 1.5 years? Ok yeah.

 

Also to the recent screenshot I recieved... you're very approachable, kind and cooperative.

 

This, I forgot to mention this in my super long post. The trial period ended a few months after VA's were removed when the staff took a stance that the removal of VA's had been a resounding success. I'm certain that given an hour or so of effort, I could find posts from folks like Viper, shiftnative and various GM's asserting the removal of VA's as a success that would not be undone, but our forums search function isn't exactly functional and I don't want to spend that kind of time. However, I hope it can be agreed that that was a stance the staff had, so saying it was "still in trial" is a little odd.

[Jonificus 2741]

 

THE COMMUNITY HAS NO SAY IN THIS MATTER, IT'S FOR THE BETTERMENT OF THE SERVER, AND CURRENTLY THE SERVER POPULATION IS SICK.

 

 

And implementing VAs is like giving the sick server population laxatives in the hopes of curing a headache.