Time for a Vacation

[Valbrandr]

Aaaaa.. if thats true... /me thinks about my own name.  Valbrandr is actually an Old Norse name if I am not mistaken.  And my guild.. Sentinels of the Ragnarok... whoops.  Shhhh.. dont tell anyone.. pleasssssseeeeee.

[Robinmagus]

Look, their human. They misjudge and make mistakes just like you. I\'m sure you wouldn\'t turn out to be the perfect little GM either. And I think that Moogie will be doing the whole community good if she just closes this thread. Because beleive it or not, Your getting extremely close to flaming GMs. Thats unappropriate. And calls for locking a thread.

[Induane]

Robinmagus makes a good point which I wasn\'t too clear on myself.  First off I wasn\'t refering to all GM\'s/MODs,  Part of my post was lost as I accidentally hit a browser button and forgot to add it back in when I redid my post.  

One point I intended to make was that the Mods/GM\'s are human as well and thus prone to the same problems as all other humans.  When a person loses site of their real responsibility, then it is the job of the people to steer them back in the right direction.  Making fun isn\'t really a good way as it breeds defensiveness, but sometimes it takes a little coersion or a slap in the face to get someones attention.  

Sorry if I came across as against all Mods/GM\'s, its just a few people who may possibly be abusing their power in a way that isn\'t really in the best interests of PlaneShift.   That should be the primary concern of anyone in those authority positions, and they should try to be as impartial about it as possible, though no one can be completely as we all have our own biases.

[Keyaz]

got an opinion against what GM\'s are willingly to enforce in their own time?

talk to the creators, developers. making a useless thread is not getting anyone anywhere except giving a few people a reason to flame... and raise their post count so they feel superior.

y\'know, if you don\'t like how a GM tries to enforce what they are asked to, you can also approach them ingame about it, I\'m sure they will be happy to explain any reason behind their work, as it is all fair and clear, but i warn you this, don\'t approach them with the attitude you give out on the forum, you will be warned repeatedly muted and so forth for such discerning behaviour.

now, to those leaving, godspeed, or whatever suits you best.

to those staying but still complaining, make a decision, deal with it, form a complaint to someone who can do something about it, or leave, like others have.

to those staying that are trying to show the honesty and hard work put into making this game good, thank you, but in all, the more you try to persuade that we\'re not evil the more they will complain, its how they do their thing.

this has been an informal, too early in the morning post by Demarthl.

goodnight

[Kiern]

Originally posted by Demarthl
y\'know, if you don\'t like how a GM tries to enforce what they are asked to, you can also approach them ingame about it, I\'m sure they will be happy to explain any reason behind their work, as it is all fair and clear, but i warn you this, don\'t approach them with the attitude you give out on the forum, you will be warned repeatedly muted and so forth for such discerning behaviour.

Why can the forums not be used for this exact thing? (see: the Pking sub-forum, really cleared that stuff up..though I guess you wouldn\'t know)  I fail to see the horrible difference in someone posting on a forum (where, in fact, they do not have to hunt the GM down) what their problems are, why it is a problem, and the way they think it can be resolved.  

Great arguments have been made here, but they\'re completely ignored and the people are told to approach these people individually in places the person they\'re talking to practically have complete control over, which does nothing more but inconvenience everyone.

The arguments submitted by the person are the same, as would be the reply, except for some reason the forums can not be used.  The only difference being, people can then disagree with what the GM did...but shouldn\'t they want to know if the entire community disagrees with their actions, as they are supposedly working to better RPing for PLANESHIFT and not themselves?

This is an honest question, as you will note I did not flame nor insult anyone.  Also, I\'m aware that this post I have made will amount to nothing and that you are not the correct person to be asking, don\'t point this out because it is not the reason behind the post.  It sucks I have to say that, but eh.

[Induane]

y\'know, if you don\'t like how a GM tries to enforce what they are asked to, you can also approach them ingame about it, I\'m sure they will be happy to explain any reason behind their work, as it is all fair and clear, but i warn you this, don\'t approach them with the attitude you give out on the forum, you will be warned repeatedly muted and so forth for such discerning behaviour.

Actually I have tried this a number of occasions, attempting to be as polite as possible while simply asking questions.  For instance I was grouped with a friend who was considering joining our guild.  His name was completely normal sounding in that it wasn\'t anything that obviously violated the naming conventions.  A GM came to discuss a new name because it didn\'t \"fit\" the RP style of PS.  I asked \"What is wrong with the name that it doesn\'t fit?\"  The GM told me if I didn\'t stay out of it then I would get muted or banned.  This has happened several times.  My questions to that nature were brushed off in the same manner.  It was not only rude, but it didn\'t get anything done.  I didn\'t learn about why the name didn\'t fit,  I didn\'t learn what it takes to do a PS style name, thus making the whole encounter pointless.  

People need to feel like they can talk to GM\'s, and to not feel like they are going to be judged because of their opinion.

[Efflixi Aduro]

This all comes to one thing, devs, make it harder to be a gm. I doubt anyojne will disagree with that except a gm that may lose their power from the rule.

I was in the sewers once and saw a gm standing right next to somone name cheeseburgur or somthing and talking to him about some site or somthing like that. I asked the gm what he was doing bla bla bla we argued. Some gms are gms and dont even know the rules.

[Karyuu]

I think Phinehas so far made the best point - if the current choices for GMs are hard to agree to, more people should try to attain GM status who think they can do a better job. Personally I still think that occurances such as the rude behavior by GMs made in several posts here should be logged in some form (a screenshot at least) so that the player has some proof of abuse of power. If enough of these gather against a particular GM, then it becomes easier to point to something clearly wrong, and proper actions can be taken. I sincerely apologize for my \"throwing random complaints into the wind\" comment, I realize how it might\'ve sounded to someone already frustrated over the situation. However, being a bit more organized in collecting instances of rudeness or power abuse will ultimately help the players in the long-run.

I don\'t think that threads like these in the forums will achieve much, unfortunately. They will gather players of similar views and opposing views, but not too many people who actually have the powers to change the situation. I know people need a channel to just vent sometimes, and if this is the sole purpose of threads against GMs or naming policies, I could understand that. But if someone really wants change, then forum threads are not the best approach.

[Phinehas]

*looks up at thread and sniffs*

I\'m so proud.

Anyway, I was originally planning on posting my own comments about the posts that I find intriguing. I\'m not going to bother. However... I will mention that I think Induane has a good grasp of the situation, and Kiern\'s a great flamer. More power to them. Also, there are some serious mistakes in Demarthl\'s post, most of which were pointed out. And Robinmagus is... nevermind, I decided not to say it, although not a direct insult, it might have come across offensively. Karyuu is nice, but a little naive. That is all. You can now go back to your pitiful little lives.

Oh, and in the spirit of the thing... \"Phinehas\" is from the Bible, so the name should be erased. I was thinking of just going with some grunting, but that\'s probably copyrighted by cavemen. From now on, you will know me as Mooraloorah III.

[Keyaz]

Gm recruitement has already changed, as has naming policy and some other aspects of how we work.

it\'s just down to you now to pull off that shroud of stereotypical grudges, forgive, forget, start anew eh?

Karyuu has a good point of take screnshots, its only solid proof atm of power abuse, as itsa pita to edit for the players benefit, logs can be edited too easily, and word of mouth has no proof, but still its better then doing nothing, just, do it in the way its supposed to be done.

Ok now I\'m going to let this die, hope everyone else does too

[zabeal]

Just to back up what Dem and Karyuu said, if you have any proof of GMs abusing power, please contact other GMs or Devs. We want to stop any such abuses more then even players do, as it gives us more work, and contradicts everything we stand for.

As to comments that Gms are young or power abusive or picked at random... seriously, where are you getting this from? GMs are selected after a very grueling proces that many have not passed already. Every single GM we have now has been playing for atleast the 6 months of CB, if not much much longer. And what pwoers do you expect us to abuse? There is no thrill of combat when you don\'t suffer damage, no point to adventuring when you got there by using an OOC power. I don\'t see how anyone could get a thrill out of renaming somone.

Kiern: if you don\'t even know what Moogie is, you are in no postion to talk about anything. You are even in less of a postion to tell Dem he is doing a bad job when you have seen none of his work.

[Kiern]

Originally posted by zabeal
Kiern: if you don\'t even know what Moogie is, you are in no postion to talk about anything. You are even in less of a postion to tell Dem he is doing a bad job when you have seen none of his work.

What the hell is wrong with you people?  I have flamed absolutely NO ONE in this thread.  And never once have I accused Demarthl (or anyone else directly) of being a bad GM, simply because I do not play the game...I just happen to not like the guy on the forums.

My posts have all been related to the GM situation here on the board, because honestly that is all I care about.  How does it matter what Mogura is in-game if it is in no way related to that?  Though it is pretty apparent that these posts are ignored because no one with an opposing viewpoint can find real fault with them...I even asked a direct question and was completely ignored.

[Uyaem]

The arguments submitted by the person are the same, as would be the reply, except for some reason the forums can not be used. The only difference being, people can then disagree with what the GM did...but shouldn\'t they want to know if the entire community disagrees with their actions, as they are supposedly working to better RPing for PLANESHIFT and not themselves?

I think this is what you are referring to.
Note that Demarthl said that

you can also approach them ingame about it

(in my opinion) referring to the fact that there are more than just a few people who do not seek the dialogue directly.

The reason why in general the forums are considered a bad place for those discussions, because they easily lose focus with too many originally uninvolved participants, and tend to get way overstated.
By now I can\'t even remember the exact name of the person who started that thread, and if I have to read one more of Phinehas\' exaggerated \"examples\", I\'ll rip my own arm out just to have something to throw at him. (insert winking smiley here)

[Kiern]

Originally posted by Pogopuschel
The reason why in general the forums are considered a bad place for those discussions, because they easily lose focus with too many originally uninvolved participants, and tend to get way overstated.

I can understand that, but the main point I was trying to get across (and probably didn\'t do it so well) is that there needs to be some sort of neutral ground for people to talk to GMs.  

Approaching them in-game where they can simply ignore you (can there be logs of people not saying anything?), threaten to mute or ban you, etc. doesn\'t seem to me to be the best system for this.

Now, the other part of my post which I mixed in was my suggestion about the forums was that there was a sub-forum for these complaints.  This wouldn\'t exactly solve the problem, because I agree this is not the ideal place for these things.  But, face it, they\'re going to continue popping up whether it is allowed or not.  And as long as the complaint is made out in a reasonable manner it shouldn\'t be that hard to answer it. (the difference between a reasonable complaint and one that isn\'t is obviously very clear and the flames can be easily deleted).  For example, eiffel\'s post was very clear and reasonable, and he even consented in the end once he got an answer.  

Likewise, there are many good complaints about the way the naming system is, and on the forums others can build off of these complaints (no one will deny that it\'s not perfect) and that way you get a system instead of the same complaints over and over because no one knows what has been pointed out to the GMs (same with Moderators).

Once again, my posts have more to do with the forums then cleaning up the GM system, I don\'t know much about that so I try not to comment on it.  Having every other thread locked/deleted once a discussion starts just isn\'t good.  Like this thread, is it actually harming the forum community by having it here?

[Valbrandr]

Why do so many feel the needs to take the side of the mods and gms? For one, every gm or mod should not take offense because we are not outright accusing everyone.  Just a select few who we have left, for the most part, unnamed.  Are there really so many naive people around here that they can deny that some abuse has occured? Just count the number of people who have left this community because of it.  Too many in the ten months I have been here.  

And please, to anyone else who is going to post after me, dont say, \"Well you can just leave if you dont like it.\"  Why, because a few would like to complain about it?  Thats what Eiffell was told... If he didnt like the fact that his name was changed... he could just leave and find another community.  That is not fair.  He was just wondering why his name was changed.  Thats it.  He didnt come out and attack anyone, actually he was quite polite.    

By now I can\'t even remember the exact name of the person who started that thread

Well, I do.  It is a friend of mine, Aranis.  He has always been good to me,  never complained to me about anything, and is just an all around polite person to be around.  Its not just some person who unfairly made accusations.