Best Of

I'm not commenting on the thread as a whole, but I'd like to remind people that this is a sensitive topic and to please be polite to each other, rather than dismissive and rude. Forum rules, #5. Everyone's feeling it a bit right now - everyone.

Carry on.

I'm actually going to take this into consideration and do something completely out of left field here.

@Callidora. The power is 100% in your hands. What happens is 100% up to you.

It is not up to Tiur. Tiur has already stated that he believes compromise is the solution, and it has been stated by multiple people on varying sides that the compromise is just a bandaid, liable to be ripped off down the road, or scraped off over time. Tiur's solution is a non-solution. Tiur probably feels his hands are tied, because no matter what choice he makes he will make some group of players mad. Tiur has decided that making everyone mad is the better solution so he can say 'no one is happy and we just have to deal with it'. I have no idea why Tiur is doing this, when it is incredibly obvious that the mechanical constraints are unwanted, unnecessary, and causing problems for the organization and the players in them, and that a bandaid is not going to help. The 'lore' argument has fallen flat, proven inadequate in this thread in a variety of ways. But for whatever reason, Tiur does not want to do the Obviously Correct Thing.

Those of us who view the system as wrong, or odd, or unnecessary, or as some constraint on how we get to play the game, or just opposed to it for whatever reason, clearly cannot do anything about it. We've pushed an IC option, there was a meeting about it in the pools, and the posts on this thread have proven their points quite well. But, it is a coded mechanic, and the only thing we can do is ask Tiur to remove it, and Tiur does not want to.

So, it is up to you. It is up to you to take a step back and understand the system that has been created from an objective view point. It is up to you to recognize that at least two people on this thread have stated they voted yes in the referendum for IC reasons, and are against it or ambivalent towards it on an OOC level, completely changing the results. It is up to you to realize that both IC and OOC resentment grows as a direct result of this constrained city leader position. It is up to you to realize that the structure holding you in power is actually also hurting you, by causing players in a city to dislike either you, or your character, or both, purely because of these power dynamics and how the game is being forced to be played within the organizations.

It is up to you to relinquish control. It is up to you to let go of the power that is given to you as a guarantee, instead of the power granted to you, through voting, by the characters and players in the organization you help lead. It is up to you to understand that you are not just the IC leader of the Dominion and Bloodloch, but an OOC leader as well. It is up to you to understand that this means part of your responsibility is to do the right thing, even if it isn't the thing you want to do. Even when you have dealt with sleights and unfair treatment by other players, or forced decisions by the admin, it is still up to you to make this difficult decision.

I do not want to bump heads with you. I feel like I have been talking at you without ever talking with you. I, as a player, have never harbored any ill-will towards you or your character. My past character and current character have had either amicable interactions or no interactions with your character. Any bad mouthing of the Dominion I've done on web, I've only done specifically because of this mechanic. I have also shit talked Bloodloch, the Teradrim, @Bulrok, and Spinesreach (fuck spinesreach). But mostly I shit talk myself because I love self-deprecating humor. And frankly, Tiur and the pools will tell you I am extremely critical when I have a critique or criticism, so if anything I've probably handled this with kids gloves compared to what I throw at them.

I guess, in the end, I'm asking you to be a leader of Bloodloch. Not a propped-up leader of Bloodloch.



P. S. Considering the post now above this one, I should mention that doing this isn't going to be some panacea for tension in BL. But if there is a desire for cohesion, then it has to be up to the players and their characters to push the city in that direction. A mechanic that constrains that possibility of cohesion is going to work directly against any chance for BL to works towards unity or mending wounds or seeing eye to eye or whatever else.

It's just. This ain't it, y'all.

Edit: To clarify, I'm not asking anyone to step down as OL, just that the lock on the OL spot be removed so anyone can contest and fill the position, not just Primus.

I've tried staying out of this, but I feel like calling out some facts in favor of why this needs to chill, and trying to defend the Admin a bit on this.


Bloodloch... is the city of CONSANGUINE. Up until about the time the Carnifex were leashed back to it and dragged back by -force-, Even being an UNDEAD in the city was not the same as being among the CONSANGUINE. You want to point and talk about mechanics.. but the LORE is the fulcrum of the city. And the LORE was compromised as it was when the Carnifex was dragged back to the city and Abhorash straight up went, "Okay. Despite -centuries- of the city being all about us Consanguine, no tolerance for living citizens who aren't Azudim, and us treating even the Undead non-consanguine like crap, we're tolerating living, we're treating them -and- undead as equals, and y'all can shut the fuck up and deal." The fact that they're in the Minority of leadership as a guaranteed position is a mechanical compromise in and of itself of the Lore of a city of dignified Consanguine. If it were still sticking as closely to the lore as it should've been, there shouldn't even -be- non-consanguine in leadership.

The correct action for the LORE would've been for Abhorash to say "Okay. We're dragging our wild, rabid mutts back to the city and we're going to demand they shape up and fall in line. Or end up as slaves themselves." And Abhorash smacking down dissenters and vocal noncompliance with the command because he was THE big bad bastard in charge of Bloodloch, the shadow leader behind the player run leadership. But I remind you: This is a -game-. Compromise was made in favor of the mechanics -because- they were already performing what was an unpopular action, leashing guilds to the cities because they were falling out of intended line of the lore as it were. It's why the Cabal got blown up, it's why the Carnifex were leashed back to the city they were originally bound to, it's why the Indorani got blown up too. The Admin moved to make something -feel- more fair to the players who were going to be suffering for this drag back into place. And now you're screaming "unfair" because they chose to compromise instead of falling unfalteringly to Carnifex demands.. when Carnifex shouldn't even have HALF the culture it currently has as "We're big badasses who don't answer to -nobody- but the Carnifex leadership. Guild above ALL OTHER TIES, this city can fuckin' -burn- for all we fuckin' care." and I say that as someone who -knows- Carnifex Culture, seeing as one of -my- old alts is cited as a source in one of the first books you hand to novices in the guild. The culture of "Guild first" shouldn't have been tolerated in the first place in the city. The Teradrim, and the Consanguine guilds don't have that culture. It's the Carnifex standing out in that regard.

Pull your head out of your unicorns, @Tiur, stop sticking to lore that is clearly disliked by sizeable chunk of the game's players, and get your unicorns house in order.

Title: (Closed) Dominion Overlord. Description: should the Dominion be guaranteed an Overlord on the Bloodloch Council while other organizations are not? Choices: 1. Yes (56) 2. No (53)

A compromise certainly seems the correct option here. I will say the referendum is not phrased fairly and likely created some defensive and adversarial opinions, so it's difficult to extract good information from it. A majority might prefer outright removal over a compromise, for instance, but regardless.

@Iazamat your inability to hold a civil conversation, adversarial tone, and general inability to add to the conversation without attempting to make it worse.. I'm just banning you from the forums.

Presented without comment.