Honestly, if it's just quid-pro-quo bloc reorganization, fuckin' forget about it. That old structure is shot through with shit. It has to go if any kind of innovation is to reinvigorate roleplay in the game.
And hav, u so biased. Shoulda modded meee : /
I see no reason to fall back into old modes of agression in ooc-discussions about ic matters, actually it's rather tiresome.Well, that's good. I wasn't falling back on them, which I hope is clear by now. The tone here is conversational; I conform to it. I just do it my way.
Oh, and re: 'gloves off', you know where to find me, bring it :PI don't know if you got this, so.
I think, and you may correct me here if I'm wrong, that Ashars main problem with the 'bloc' is that it does not conform to some corrupted hippie idealism :pNot so. Consequence is just fine, if it is reasonable and consistent at an organizational level; individual-to-individual consequences are fine too, and useful if they're varied. However, what I have experienced repeatedly is that individuals were told to conform to the decisions of their leaders both in and out of character; this robbed players of the ability to enrich their roleplay without significant penalties to their playstyle. It was allowing or disallowing people to be members of your club if they put a toe past the line.
Meaning, we don't conform into one big apologetic group of people whose main goal is that 'everyone can express themselves the way they want, no matter the costs'.
What I do miss in your rant, if I may call it that, Ashar, is that you fail to see the ability of the bloc to work together if there is a real need to.You may not call it that, because the rant starts a bit below the text you're currently reading (it's clearly marked, you'll see it when you get there). You may call it a summary of grievances, if you like :P
Very much like the empire itself the greater amarr community (GAA, or amarr bloc if you want), is split up into various sub groups - the most active ranging from fairly traditionalist (in the modern sense) corps like PIE or 1pg up to other entities of an even more liberal/lax attitude like, for example, Aldriths/Shalee's corp (the AM of the not so recent past might be another good example for the "shockingly" liberals).The trouble is that a cursory political analysis will reveal that EXTREMELY FEW new ideas have really arisen over the course of the bloc's lifespan and been disseminated to the community to any degree of prominence. There have been reactionary responses, shifts in opinion, and little else.
I don't care particularly much for what you call 'your game'. I am playing eve the way I think it's most enjoyable to me and my corp mates, and that's really it - you most likely do the same.Except that you don't know what I consider my game.
It's the fracturedness of the bloc that makes it so much fun for me and many others.
Where would be the fun in a round table like the one proposed above (just to get us back on topic) if everyone was best friends and just after some tea and biscuits.
Applause
Lae-lae.
Let's play some quotefest!
QuoteI see no reason to fall back into old modes of agression in ooc-discussions about ic matters, actually it's rather tiresome.Well, that's good. I wasn't falling back on them, which I hope is clear by now. The tone here is conversational; I conform to it. I just do it my way.
Aw, c'mon, whose the one playing thin-skin now? :cry: Meanie!QuoteQuoteOh, and re: 'gloves off', you know where to find me, bring it :PI don't know if you got this, so.
Yep, I guess I did. *ahem* NO ONE HAS THE PROWESS TO FACE TANKRED IN BATTLEQuoteI meant I used strong language (like the word 'fuck') around you because I thought you could hear such things in a discussion and not flip out.
QuoteI think, and you may correct me here if I'm wrong, that Ashars main problem with the 'bloc' is that it does not conform to some corrupted hippie idealism :pNot so. Consequence is just fine, if it is reasonable and consistent at an organizational level; individual-to-individual consequences are fine too, and useful if they're varied. However, what I have experienced repeatedly is that individuals were told to conform to the decisions of their leaders both in and out of character; this robbed players of the ability to enrich their roleplay without significant penalties to their playstyle. It was allowing or disallowing people to be members of your club if they put a toe past the line.
Meaning, we don't conform into one big apologetic group of people whose main goal is that 'everyone can express themselves the way they want, no matter the costs'.
QuoteWhat I do miss in your rant, if I may call it that, Ashar, is that you fail to see the ability of the bloc to work together if there is a real need to.You may not call it that, because the rant starts a bit below the text you're currently reading (it's clearly marked, you'll see it when you get there). You may call it a summary of grievances, if you like :P
I don't fail to see the history of certain goals being completed, actually. I merely fail to see the merit of preserving a group that gets internet spaceship things done and utterly fails to bring in new kinds of storytelling. It's just a hodgepodge of paramilitary shit with a few backseat story-tellers sitting around, from where I'm standing - and I get the juicy bits related to me over the grapevine juuuust fine.
There has been no public discourse on the politics of the Empire in a venue not dominated by private interests. There has been no good engagement of the potential audience at a group level. There hasn't even been a Providence to point to lately as an excuse for the community resting on its collective laurels.
If you're satisfied with pure capacity for force-projection and a bunch of static modes of interaction, Lae, then there you go. I need more in my game, so I guess that's that.
QuoteVery much like the empire itself the greater amarr community (GAA, or amarr bloc if you want), is split up into various sub groups - the most active ranging from fairly traditionalist (in the modern sense) corps like PIE or 1pg up to other entities of an even more liberal/lax attitude like, for example, Aldriths/Shalee's corp (the AM of the not so recent past might be another good example for the "shockingly" liberals).The trouble is that a cursory political analysis will reveal that EXTREMELY FEW new ideas have really arisen over the course of the bloc's lifespan and been disseminated to the community to any degree of prominence. There have been reactionary responses, shifts in opinion, and little else.
It's institutions are cookie-cutter. There have been no successful Heir House corporations. There have definitely been no masterful constructions of new platforms from the wealthy foundation that has been gathered in terms of our sense of what Amarr capsuleers are like and the world they live in that are not pan-Imperial or Emperor-centric.
All the old Sarumites are dead or liberalized thoughtlessly; a lot of the old Liberals are now with the Sarumites. My favorite member of the old guard is Lallara for a reason.
This is some wicked bland factionalism.
The practical differences explored by the current range of corporations, when compared to the overall range of available paths to explore as offered in the fiction, is disappointingly small. If a list of tropes were made from the data-set these corps represent, it would be tiny. Their distinctions are well documented, but there is little difference of note between a racially liberal industrialist corp and a racially conservative one.
To put it another way, the procedurally generated content that resulted from an exercise of some five years and survived the crucible created by its own framers is of too little merit to preserve.
The last truly innovative liberal corp I can point to was Oberon Incorporated, and they did it because they had bleeding hearts.
I do it to enable a broader range of valid methods of in-character interaction.
QuoteI don't care particularly much for what you call 'your game'.marked bold
Except that you don't know what I consider my game.
And except part of how I find the game enjoyable - a large part - is in finding ways to work with others and get them to share in as many elements of it as possible, and you just invited me to a summit to discuss loyalist interests or issues. How different are we in our goals, then? You can't have your cake and eat it too, I'm afraid. I'm either someone to brush aside, or I'm a like-minded player saying, 'Are there more ways to have fun here? Let's find them.'
QuoteIt's the fracturedness of the bloc that makes it so much fun for me and many others.
Where would be the fun in a round table like the one proposed above (just to get us back on topic) if everyone was best friends and just after some tea and biscuits.
That's about the only place where there's a bit of hope, really. Except that where there used to be different mindsets on political or religious interests, right now there's just a focus on survival and the sound of the old iron curtain of 'What's Amarr is for Amarr only!' being drawn.
We can't have that anymore.
End /quotefest.
BEGIN RANT.
My core criticism of any and all Amarrian undertakings lately is summed up in a recent quote by Grae. It is as follows.
[ 2010.04.15 06:11:36 ] Ashar KorAzor > D'you know the kid from the threat we linked you the other night
[ 2010.04.15 06:11:46 ] Ashar KorAzor > about the politics and justification of slavery, the original poster
[ 2010.04.15 06:11:53 ] Graelyn > Nope.
[ 2010.04.15 06:11:55 ] Ashar KorAzor > is tryina do some clever, liberal things?
[ 2010.04.15 06:12:04 ] Graelyn > Godspeed then.
[ 2010.04.15 06:12:11 ] Graelyn > That's a dead-end.
[ 2010.04.15 06:12:24 ] Graelyn > Nuances within the PF are not appreciated.
...
[ 2010.04.15 06:12:43 ] Graelyn > It's LOLSLAVERS vs LOLDARKIES in space.
...
[ 2010.04.15 06:12:59 ] Graelyn > I got that bashed through my skull eventually.
[ 2010.04.15 06:13:26 ] Graelyn > I remember I sat Nubulai down once and outlined my liberal RP.
[ 2010.04.15 06:13:38 ] Graelyn > "Does this have a point? Is it worth persuing?"
...
[ 2010.04.15 06:14:04 ] Graelyn > "Um...well...hey, didi you know we're giving you the Sacred Cross of the Throne Order? Yay!"
...
[ 2010.04.15 06:14:44 ] Graelyn > And since he was running the plot department, and he found any liberal Amarr anything to be confusing and silly, now so do I.
---
This is the attitude that the bloc has, in large part, embraced. I'm not gonna roll with that, Lae. I'd rather try to build something better from the ground up.
The buck stops with me on that one.
Anyway. Specifics.
My main complaints about the old bloc as a whole are the same as my main complaints about the CCP plot department. They are as follows:
-The Amarr bloc is a collection of personality cults loosely held together by common ground and friendship.
-The most influential leaders of the Amarr bloc favored balkanization.
-The bloc has failed to leverage its assets in terms of visibility and access to the public to educate incoming roleplayers effectively about game information. Which endlessly fucks up recruitment.
In short, it is not primarily a group that seeks to engender fun for as many as possible; it seeks to sustain set avenues of roleplay and favors them over novelty and experimentation for the sake of its own continued existence, and at a great deal of cost to its members.
First, on personality cults. I'll give you a couple of examples - PIE and CVA.
There has always been a lack of capacity in the bloc to establish a strong institutional culture for the thousand-odd players affiliated with it; nobody has worked to build something that runs itself, which is perhaps the one real accomplishment of Star Fraction. CVA didn't, and none of the other alliances came close.
This is why the culture of CVA shifted by degrees away from roleplay and directly towards 0.0 management, and why by the time I had an office in an outpost and was dragging corpmates out to 0.0 I couldn't hardly get the core characters of CVA to respond to new and interesting stimuli in an in-character sense. These people were too busy playing a game that consisted of a load of treadmills and running petty industries at a fraction of the efficiency they could achieve by more clever means, and called themselves a roleplay alliance.
A recruit in CVA who was looking to roleplay within his corporation was doomed almost from the start because of all this. I have dozens of friends in the group who, over the years, felt more and more marginalized because the personalities running the show responded first to the pressures of local politics and second to their declared interest. So the recruits didn't get to roleplay the way you and I did very much, Laerise, without leaving their corp almost completely out of the bargain.
That's bullshit. I don't want to be around it in EVE.
PIE suffered from this sort of thing another way - there was an Admiralty, but it was just a collection of figureheads who were good at certain things. As such, the organization responded to their whims. When personal conflicts occurred, they were settled by the whims of the people in charge; when things went well in terms of co-operation with newer corporations struggling to build themselves up, it was also on the whims of leading members - and no, not just in my case.
The real trouble came for me when Konstantin Mort and I spoke of the changes in PIE under Rodj as opposed to Gaven. I'd just gone to the Praetoria's public channel and spoken to a few newer members of the organization who treated me differently than members had under other CEOs; I had thought of communication standards under Lallara for a moment, but it was the shift in policy behind the behaviors that got to me. Konstantin felt the same way; he maintained that the lack of a structure of policies the CEO of the year had to abide by had altered the membership of the organization when the new CEO could come in and wield a free hand, but the goals of PIE had not changed in step with these alterations and as such, the corp was a different beast trying to fit itself to the same yoke.
That sure didn't help bloc politics become any saner, and it wasn't Rodj's fault. But it would not have occurred with strong institutionalization.
As it is, the whole thing feels like it works by virtue of being an old boy network. When you say it can work when it needs to, this is simply an old boy network in action. I think we can do better.
Onto the second point.
Gaven Lok'ri's player was a bright guy, but he said to me one day that because of prior disagreements with the community at large, the leadership of the various segments of the community he felt were like-minded were knowingly contributing to the balkanization of the community to preserve their play-styles. That was two years ago.
Today, there IS no core bloc presence outside of FW on the Amarr side that anyone really recognizes, nothing that even piddlingly compares to the Matari group in terms of its degree of outreach, accessibility, and capacity to achieve objectives. I lay that at the feet of a pro-balkanization posture among the leadership of the Amarr bloc and little else - they were following along with their predecessors instead of responding to circumstance and deciding that no, it was time to build up the camaraderie and co-operation in new ways. It was always people like Evanda on the outside, it seems, who rebuilt the bridges.
That can go.
Finally, the lack of available and well-formatted summarial documentation on the Amarr at large and the bloc in particular, accessible to anyone who feels like taking a look, and accessible without first joining a corporation, has monumentally fucked everything.
There have been half-hearted attempts on many occasions to fix this; here, I share in the blame to a significant degree. However, while people HAVE people posted chunks of internal PIE threads to Chatsubo (and done other things like that from time to time), they'd still left the onus on a newcomer to find that thread, analyze it, and make from it a sound basis for satisfying play.
This is hilariously unfair.
The Amarr are the most complex faction in the game.
They had to be. The villian must be the most interesting player in a given story to be effective, and Talisman got at least that right with the Amarr.
It's not about how inherently evil or good they are; it's not about the people that want to play some sort of weeping peacenik and try to make amends with the enemy. It's about positively everyone who ever wanted a deeper plot arc, or more PF.
The understanding was that all you needed was soldiers and adoring fans of your play-style, so you went and got them without building a public structure to allow for some evolution. The expectation was, among bloc members and everyone else, that smart interpretations were something that organically came together after some new kid had read sixty-odd chronicles, news articles, stories and novellas.
That's fucking insane.
There was also all this stuff locked away on a private forum (PIE's internal boards, in several cases) that nobody ever dragged into the light because they couldn't be arsed to stop doing other things in the game. That's weak. It's a disservice to the community, and I simply won't associate with it. I can get critical OOC faction-related information out of a given member of Electus Matari and RE-AW easier and faster than I can out of one of the members of my own factional RP group, and I've asked repeatedly. What the fuck is that?
If the function of the group we refer to as the Amarr bloc is not to educate any interested party about an activity that only improves when more educated people and groups are involved in it, then that group is likely to wither on the vine. And the bitch of it is, I started talking about these things six weeks into my stay in the game. And I never stopped. And now the bloc's deader than a doornail, but I contend that it could have been twice the size it ever was with more able outreach.
We had this silver, and never did anything with it relating to casting a bullet. And this silver bullet could have destroyed allegiance drift in a group the size of CVA for a long time, or created a more robust political sphere, or generally been a drama-killer and a thing of value. We all collectively sat on our hands.
But the bloc had a lot more silver than the fringe.
Alright, dear reader, that's the end of it. You've beaten Backstage's first textwall. Be ye gratified.
...and generally act like grown-ups.
I would strongly suggest that one thing that the Amarr Bloc should be looking into doing is getting some push behind that fellow that just switched to EoM. Help him grow his corp. Help him become a more prevalent entity.
This is the sort of thinking you need to breathe some life into the otherwise stagnant Amarr Bloc.
Get some House warfare going on.
Get something going on other than "Slaves YAAARRR!!" and "Matari Terrorists! BOO!!" and the more recent "Slaves......please?" from the 'liberal' side.
From an IC standpoint this is virtually impossible to do, but from an OOC standpoint you all need to start working with these people splitting out to attempt other things to help get them some publicity and perhaps if you have people applying that don't fit PIE or 1PG or what-have-you that would be better fit with something like EoM or whatnot (they don't like the idea that they can't pirate with PIE, is that the core of what they want to do? EoM might be perfect for them) and get it going.
I would suggest that factionizing (I made up a word) the Amarr Bloc as a whole would be beneficial to you. Internal Strife should be growing within the Empire with the changes that have been going on. These have not been gradual. The Empire has shuddered with massive shifts in perspective recently. Why are the Amarr still so focussed on the Matari and specifically the Ushra'Khan when they've got paranoia and in-faction distrust growing?
Where are these aspects?
Might be a textwall, but I read through it all and found it very interesting. Applause is in order.
Never were a part of the Amarr block so I cannot provide any opinion on the topic my self. :|
While I see your reasoning Lilith I beg to disagree.
Just because it's internal and because we do not make a big igs drama fest out of it, does not make it less relevant.
Maybe you, and many others, will just have to accept that it's not 'our game' to provide the public with amusing annecdotes the same way others do.
Actually, if you pay close attention, you will soon see the ripples of the narrative created by our actions, be that on killboards, various fora or even the ingame news.
Yes, its not being put on a silver plater, but does that make it nonexistant?
I dare say it does not.
If a tree falls in the forest there is a noise, even if noone's there - the solution to see tree's falling is, you guessed it, to go to the forest, or talk to people who do.
Interesting post there Graelyn.Try again, Archbishop.
Regarding the amount of PF on the PIE forum, yes it was a valid point a couple of years ago, but pretty much all of the important stuff there is now on the Eve wiki.Only half of the point was related to the stuff on your internal forums. The other half was that the best that was done with it was a throwing up of hands and a dump into the EVE-wiki, or a chatsubo thread, or an EVE-library thread, and that this was weak tea.
A big part of the problem was that a lot of us bitter old vets never properly documented stuff with history in mind, even to our own people. As a result, a lot of the past is locked away in people's heads - and a lot of them don't even play the game any more.Precisely why I am suggesting you either start again now, or be careful about claiming your labors are worth preserving. If none of it's going anywhere, it's worthless. Might as well burn it.
A while ago I did make an effort to pull things together, and the result is the PIE timeline which can be found at http://www.pieinc.co.uk/community/board/index.php?showtopic=22073 (http://www.pieinc.co.uk/community/board/index.php?showtopic=22073). I'm reasonably certain that it's visible to the public. Whilst it's centred around PIE, I hope that others with an interest in Amarr will find it of use.Well done - looks to be an excellent job.
As for the balkanisation of the Amarr bloc: yes, you make some valid points. There have historically been some personality clashes that have lead to divisions between us and I hope that these can be healed in the future.Peachy-keen.
I reject, however, the claim that PIE is in any way a "cult of personality" - if nothing else we change CEO far often for that!
I reject, however, the claim that PIE is in any way a "cult of personality" - if nothing else we change CEO far often for that!
(http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/2772/terminatorfacepalm.jpg)
It's been over four years for me, and far longer for everyone else.
Trust me on this. I've run plenty of cults of personality, and seen plenty more. If personality cult status spoke to gender or liberality, PIE'd be more flamin' than lit napalm on thermite.
*snip* - Havo
QuoteJust because it's internal and because we do not make a big igs drama fest out of it, does not make it less relevant.
Well, see, that's the thing. It actually does. If you're hoping to expand your dynamics or ranks, then people need to see what's going on. It doesn't have to be a "big IGS Drama Fest" by any stretch. Anyone who thinks the IGS is the core of what the RP community involves in is blinding themselves, but the public needs to be able to see it. Even if they are just seeing it from an OOC perspective of after-the-fact storytelling, it needs to be visible. Otherwise it plain does not exist.
It is, in a nutshell, a private circle jerk with a bunch of people going on with each other about how great they are, and NO ONE ELSE GETS TO PLAY TOO!!
QuoteMaybe you, and many others, will just have to accept that it's not 'our game' to provide the public with amusing annecdotes the same way others do.
Actually, if you pay close attention, you will soon see the ripples of the narrative created by our actions, be that on killboards, various fora or even the ingame news.
And that's a problem. You're making people hunt for something that they might find interesting -- especially from an OOC perspective their character is unaware of -- that might make them want to get involved. You are effectively shooting yourselves in the proverbial foot and forcing stagnation by taking your ball and going home. You are effectively limiting yourselves and choosing to let your entire effort die under the weight of its own collective ego.
This is a problem. Links in peoples' sigs to storyboards that give after-action novella-style accounts of the goings on is more than sufficient. Giving people direction to find the information is necessary. If it is all happening behind closed doors you are destroying yourselves.Quote
No, I am merely making it a little bit harder to get to the prize they desire.
Requiring someone to put some effort into research is not bad at all, I have done more than enough research in my studies to know the warm feeling coursing through my veins whenever I finally tap my fingers into knowledge that was hidden from me before.
Also, not everything happens behind closed doors, there are a few open ooc character blogs of PIE members out there, you'll just have to either go look for them or ask.QuoteQuoteYes, its not being put on a silver plater, but does that make it nonexistant?
I dare say it does not.
I dare say that you are arguing semantics.
Agreed.QuoteQuoteIf a tree falls in the forest there is a noise, even if noone's there - the solution to see tree's falling is, you guessed it, to go to the forest, or talk to people who do.
If there is no one to hear it, then the noise was completely irrelevant. If you want to be anything other than a stagnant entity that many people view as a collective joke because they only see posturing between yourself and the Ushra'Khan, then you need to not make them hunt for the information. You need to bring it to them. Claiming that the IGS is the only source just makes it clearly evident how out of touch people can be with the way that it works.
Edit: Broken quote tags are for the lose.
I don't feel responsible if people choose to be willingly ignorant.
If they're not interrested enough into the amarr bloc and/or its conflicts to do at least the very basics of research, then I don't think anyone can help them really.
Just as a clarification, I never claimed that the IGS was the only source, there are various ways to spread knowledge, my personal favorite is personal convos - others preferr blogs, making movies or writing stories. Maybe I just preferr to tell our stories myself, in private, but I'm starting to ramble, so lets stop before everyone falls asleep :)
Yep, I guess I did. *ahem* NO ONE HAS THE PROWESS TO FACE TANKRED IN BATTLETANKRED DEMANDS A DUEL. TANKRED IS IN THIS WAR FOR THE BITCHES.
I suggest that we split this argument into a new thread.Fuck that. Been done.
There's just so much individuality that fits into a team Ashar.And so little that fits into gridlock.
I obviously won't comment on my predecessors, but I consider myself fair, sometimes even exceedingly and stupidly fair.The only people you're asked not to speak to in executing your job are parties you're precluded from sharing protected information with.
Being asked to conform to descisions of your leaders is nothing I see as particularly back breaking.
Actually it's something I do in my every-day-real-life quite a lot, its called having a job.
Respectively, if you don't like your employer, just look for another one that suits you better or go independant.For example, if I think my employer has a monopoly on a public good, I might independantly work to break it? If my employer, or a potential employer, has demonstrated less-than-satisfactory stewardship of a central resource, I might try to put the rights of ownership to said resource back in the hands of a larger variety of parties?
There are two roads you can go in this regard, in my eve-experience.
One is that you conform to anyones wishes and, over time, become dilluted into something else, I'll cite AM as a prime example here.
The other is to keep a hold to a strong central ideology and stick with it, even if it rubs some people the wrong way once every so often.
You can, of course, prove me wrong :) and I'd actually appreciate it to see a new, working, solution to this problem - so far I didn't see anything coming from you or OBSA for that matter though, again, if I'm wrong just give me an example.
Yeah, I can imagine internal stuff is hard to see from the wrong side of the walls of privacy, but I assure you, there are more story tellers in PIE than there are captains+admirals. ;)Here is your fiddle, Nero.
And quite a lot of them are carving out their little, personal experience as we speak
No, most of our RP does not bring about world changing moments, oh my.Well, that was disingenuous. Exploring new opportunities and concepts is something done by degrees; it is a studious methodology devoted to uncovering more of the topology of a place or an idea-structure, just like science is something used to achieve a greater degree of rightness by systematically eliminating faulty elements of a present model.
You sound more and more like Graelyn who wishes back the days when a single fart of a player woul make all five empires tremble :D
Then please do explain why my unconditional invitation to such a discourse throws you into such a proto-rant. (not saying it's not enjoyable, but...)You asked me what I thought of the idea; I laid down some things we needed to do and a structure we needed to get away from. You defended the structure, I defended my points. Here we are.
Before we go further down -this- particular road of "yeah it is / no isnt!!" calling, who says we only have a set bunch of static modes of interaction?Aside from people in this thread, who will make their points themselves (HAI LILLITH), and aside from former members of the bloc that left in a huff that you old boys convienently tend to ignore (HAI LALL), and aside from old opponents you could never make peace with?
Yes, of course, you do, but please give me some examples on this, because quite frankly, you are wrong.
Before we go further down -this- particular road of "yeah it is / no isnt!!" calling...This is a closed loop. The circuit it runs on is made of irony. Oops, Laerise, I think you accidentally the point.
First, let's take out all the mechanics and so forth. Roleplay through in-space and mechanical action, by its very nature, is more up to the developers to innovate than anyone else. Those who do manage are usually not bloc members - go ask Azia Burgi what she thinks of the Empire.QuoteThe trouble is that a cursory political analysis will reveal that EXTREMELY FEW new ideas have really arisen over the course of the bloc's lifespan and been disseminated to the community to any degree of prominence. There have been reactionary responses, shifts in opinion, and little else.This is not the case, and I think you should do some more research, especially on FW, if you think that everything is and has been just the same since '06.
Heck there even were people who actively opposed imperial decrees quite publically on the IGS!Heh.
The fact that it was solved peacefully and without a large news article does not mean that nothing happened at all.
Khanid-Provincial-Vanguard anyone?And what is the virtue and the novelty in yet another Kingdom corporation in a long chain of like-minded Kingdom corporations? Silas is pretty okay, but he's also pretty samey when it comes to the broad strokes. He breaks out of no rut, I am sad to say. Tablaren stood a better chance with the Kingdom of Kador bunch, whom you failed to mention, but they're flat on their backs.
Stuff about LallI'll let him speak for himself when it comes to addressing your points. I referred to his leaving the bloc because of jarring changes and looking for another way. It was more interesting than rolling over and following yet another empress to yet another center. More valid. Better done.
And this is the same for every other factional RP.Presenting the wealth of evidence to the contrary would be a staggering task fit for dozens of authors.
For the minmatar you have the big players U'K (of whom most are too busy to do 0.0 games to post more on the IGS than "bloodyhand.gif" - no offense) and EM, who are just happily sitting in minmatar highsec doing... not much more than come out every highnoon to help the mini militia to outblob the amarrian even more, I see that hasn't changed either :PMany of the supports for your counter-points are mechanical in nature; most of my position concerns itself with roleplay, whether free of mechanical elements or integrated with them.
Which I have never even heard of, qed :(Ignorance is never a defense, and it should never be held up as a shield when someone is trying to point out some new phenomena to you.
You mean, content that is more world changing than getting commendations by heirs/the emperor/empress him/herself , or that PF was changed towards more liberal waters, especially in regards to slavery?Why yes, I do mean content that's more world-changing than a line in a news-post or six, or a pat on the back from an AURORA NPC.
Yes, I know. I have had the pleasure to meet Ashar quite a few times already, and I think it'll stay at quite a few times, since the whole fed.-liberal schtik doesn't ring my bell (nor does it go well with laerise), so, sorry....Every time we interacted, I was doing my best to humor you and sate your tastes as related to me by others that knew you.
Absolutely not, it fucking doesn't.Quote...Except that where there used to be different mindsets on political or religious interests, right now there's just a focus on survival and the sound of the old iron curtain of 'What's Amarr is for Amarr only!' being drawn.
We can't have that anymore.
It is very fitting to the amarrian spirit, being xenophobic and all, but that comes down to personal preferrance, I'll give you that.
Oh for christs sake, leave Graelyn out of it, he's even more of an old grumpy man than Gaven... and that says quite a lot!I should abandon the experiential evidence presented by someone who's actually had far-reaching responsibility and seen into how things work to a rather significant extent? I should abandon the input of someone that knows more than you because they're crusty and rough around the edges?
QuoteIn short, it is not primarily a group that seeks to engender fun for as many as possible; it seeks to sustain set avenues of roleplay and favors them over novelty and experimentation for the sake of its own continued existence, and at a great deal of cost to its members.
I think especially Louella and Aldrith/Shalee will disagree with you here.
Hey, my character might not run up to them to give them an (in Shalee's case) unwanted hug and a kiss on the cheek out of happiness, but I sure appreciate what they're doing.
I do agree on some of your statements regarding CVA, but we're seeing the same changes in UK as well, so I'll just put it down to problems with exponential corp/aliance growth and 0.0 Realpolitik.
I don't think sitting in your highsec while the other side is down in the dirt and unable to reach you due to standings mechanics is reaching out, but then I guess you just don't have any idea of FW realities :sIgnored this statement for this round, because you need time to catch up regarding my points on faction warfare's place in roleplay-centric considerations.
In regards to PIE I'd like to ask you to stop thinking in the past and to learn to live in the present.Well, that was quite meaningless, then.
I'm not going to say much else because I'm already getting sick of the distinct possibility of seeing this conversation c/p'd to the IGS by a certain kind of people who do not inhabit this forum quite yet.
I agree with you wholeheartedly, to a degree.I really didn't think anyone could ever agree with anything wholeheartedly, to a degree.
There have been some attempts to write up accords of one kind or another, but not all information should ever be revealed - it simply takes out the novelty of RP to ooc'ly know everything in advance.Half the function of roleplay is to create new content. As such, one can never run out of novel content; a lack of such things is a problem with the roleplayer, not the setting.
I guess you'll get a big headache when I tell you that I expect our members to dig around our forums if they want to get some juicy ooc-tidbits, but to me thats another experience to enjoy - heck I did a lot of reading during my time as (back then) an ensign as well and it didn't hurt me in the slightest.First off, not everyone enjoys the experience of doing a chore for the sake of doing a chore.
Yes, it is more effort, but not everything should be avaiable at handsreach.
Also, where do I find a concise and complete history of Ashar's exploits?smells a bit like double standards to me hereHer bio. It has every public event she's involved in IC or OOC that made a real impact on anything ingame.
No, it's called hardening the ef up and putting some effort into something.Don't give me that stupid bandwagon shit, ever again, as justification for a reason to make roleplay harder to get into in this game.
In my time as a recruitment officer I have never sent someone away for lack of PF knowledge, apart, of course, from cases that went along the lines of "Long live the God emperor, lets slaughter the xenos, I FIGHT FOR THE BITCHES" :DAn impatient recruiter and disseminator of information hurts the community.
And if people got sent back to the drawing board the sole effort we required was for them to do maybe 15 minutes of reading. If you can't abide that you don't really belong into my corp, I have to deal with people who have ADS on a weekly basis and my patience doesn't extend far enough for me to care for ADS in internet spaceship games.
It is not sensible to hoard. Bloc corps have a communal sharing track record so bad, and so intricately linked to your getting-along-with-others record, that were they young children, they'd be thrown out of kindergarten.QuoteThere was also all this stuff locked away on a private forum (PIE's internal boards, in several cases) that nobody ever dragged into the light because they couldn't be arsed to stop doing other things in the game. That's weak. It's a disservice to the community, and I simply won't associate with it. I can get critical OOC faction-related information out of a given member of Electus Matari and RE-AW easier and faster than I can out of one of the members of my own factional RP group, and I've asked repeatedly. What the fuck is that?
It's sensible.
And it's also a slow development that happened over the years, mostly due to metagaming of emeies which made IC interaction, especially on the IGS, a very bland and annoying experience.
Unlike EM we have/had to deal with people like SF (especially Jade/Jasmine) and various lolrp merc groups hired by Revan over the years.Somehow, I don't think curling into a ball and telling everyone to go away unless you were trying to beat on them was the right solution.
We don't have the allencompassing fluffarmour of "oh, I was kidnapped and raped by an evil slaver" on our side, so we'll have to make up for that somehow :)
And, yet again, if you want to know something, why not just ask?Laerise, when I've talked to Amarr roleplayers in the last year or two, they've been...different than you, and different than a lot of bloc rank and file. Because I value going to the source, for one thing; because I value novelty, for another. And because I've already asked for the insight of a lot of bloc rank and file on a wide variety of topics and the answers have generally been less novel, varied, or well thought-out than asking more diverse groups, thanks to all the indoctrination.
You surely haven't asked me about anything like this in the last... year or two.
Just because a few corps have gone inactive doesn't mean that the bloc is dead.Again, your group's internal logic and your group's opinion of itself count for less than communal perception and opinion.
PIE has been on a recruitment surge for, well, actually ever since we joined FW, with sometimes more applications than we can handle immediately.Sadly, numbers do not equal clout. Telling me that you're turning into some new version of CVA after admitting CVA's inability to maintain itself as a roleplay organization is...troubling, if you fail to see the connection.
Again you fall down the tarpits of your uneducated POV, making assumptions and pointing fingers at things that either have no factual evidence or that you misunderstood.All this shit up there above this line? It weighs in at about second level on the ol' disagreement heirarchy.
...
Yes, we did, and mostly because noone I know of (except Kost and a few others) did think of it as a major problem.
In conclusion, why did you not just change things your own if you dislike them so much?
You had your own corp, OBSA, running for quite a while and the only thing OBSA ever did was create an ofspring corp that introduced me to half a dozen new characters.. and that's all, really.
Sure, its very simple and comfortable to just sit on your white horse, eat some BLT and point down the hill towards your imaginary fairy castle, but it doesn't change anything.
As much as I enjoy your discourse, only action can make changes to t he ingame reality, and the amarr bloc has brought quite a lot of changes about.
Your opinion on PIE is completely uneducated and more of an account of fraction of our past than anything else. Quite frankly, I find it a bit insulting when you point towards a past leadership that has been at odds with your ideals and then project this at the present situation.
I'll tell you whats the most mindboggling about your wall of text.
It's all I've ever seen from you except some random blurbs on chat screens and maybe the odd occurance in local back in 07.
Meanwhile the loyalist bloc has been uniting the bag of cats that is the amarr militia for two years now, been instrumental in the continuation of the timeline and in bringing about significant changes (Brother Joshua and the Kourmonen campaign being two prime examples here).Brother Joshua affected a figurehead and little more, Laerise. Unless you have access to the G-unit's files, you really cannot comment on storylines. And, for the last time: greater involvement in factional war does not equal clout in the roleplay community; accomplishments in faction war are no more accomplishments in roleplay than are accomplishments in holding 0.0, and many of the points you have presented suggest that every gain regarding the capacity to wage factional conflict is a loss in the capacity to innovate in roleplay.
1.) The simple fact is, the amarr bloc as you know it does no longer exist the way it did back in 06/07.Frankly, I would prefer it. The bloc I'm criticizing is less able by extremes than the bloc you evidently think I'm criticizing.
2.) There are significant changes on the horizon that may well bring about a massive change in our own little habitat and in extension in the whole of EVE.The future's the future, and mechanics are still mechanics. The ability to build something on a planet simply isn't going to affect my capacity to innovate in any real degree. Feature changes that allow walking in stations affects my character's appearance, not its substance.
It's probably a minor point in the greater scheme of things, but a cult of personality requires a personality to be a dictatorial subject of adoration. PIE is run more as an oligarchy where ultimate power is shared between an inner circle. You'd probably be quite surprised at how little power the PIE CEO actually has.
Basic information on the Houses, what they stood forWTB Thread just for this.
Speaking of killboards, Ashar's arguments seem to be focused on achievements in terms of new and interesting roleplay while some of Laerise's arguments seem to center around RP achievements in terms of mechanical/PvP objectives. Not every RPer is a PvPer; I don't think it's necessarily useful to require an RP entity have a proper K:D ratio on battleclinic or a certain number of FW Victory Points in order to legitimize their characters' roleplay. At the same time, I also don't think it's fair to disregard a group's RP because they choose to use those metrics to measure their "RP Achievements", especially when that group is a militant one like PIE Inc.
-We write a good primer for new Amarr players
-We engage people at an individual level rather than corporations
I think, Mitara, that what you're saying is part of Ashar's point. Ashar is expressing distaste for a 'structure' of behind-closed-doors RP that he asserts led to a great deal of uninteresting play and stagnation. I think it's somewhat supportive of his points that several corporations have gone inactive or mostly inactive over the last few years.Kinda, yeah.
1PG was mentioned - I planned on wardeccing them because I saw their roster number said 83 ingame, so I combed killboards and eve-search looking for names, then copying those names ingame, verifying that they were still IN 1PG and adding them to the addressbook in preparation. Out of 83, I found 65 or so that were still on the 1PG roster. Out of those 65 or so, I regularly see 4 or 5 online. And by regularly, I mean once or twice a week. It's not even worth the 2 million ISK to wardec a corporation that looks that inactive. The 20 names I didn't find might be plenty active, but if so, they didn't appear on any killboards on either kill or lossmails, so I dunno what they're doing :pMost likely, non-forum-using alts or rookie pilots they just didn't kick.
Speaking of killboards, Ashar's arguments seem to be focused on achievements in terms of new and interesting roleplay while some of Laerise's arguments seem to center around RP achievements in terms of mechanical/PvP objectives. Not every RPer is a PvPer; I don't think it's necessarily useful to require an RP entity have a proper K:D ratio on battleclinic or a certain number of FW Victory Points in order to legitimize their characters' roleplay. At the same time, I also don't think it's fair to disregard a group's RP because they choose to use those metrics to measure their "RP Achievements", especially when that group is a militant one like PIE Inc.Yeah, two things.
One small comment about the personality cult opinion; I saw one thing Ashar said in an earlier post that gave me the understanding that he didn't mean that the cult of personality (as he perceives it) was necessarily kowtowing to the one central figure who happened to be in the CEO spot at the time, but rather that regardless of who is technically the CEO, the main two or three influential people remain and their influence prevails. The PIE members that have posted attest that no such cult of personality exists, of course, and as it's all opinion/perception/speculation anyway there's no need to really drag on an argument over that. I only mention it at all because it seemed like an important brick of distinction that seemed to get lost in the great walls of text :)Not quite. The kowtowing you can leave out of the equation altogether. It was merely that, without changing policy, a new leader or set of leaders evidently coincided with a shift in what we might call the feeling evoked in interaction with the corporation at large, or the corporation's nature. And this happened more than once.
The one and only reason why I entered this little quote-exchange with you, Ashar, is because I have an exceedingly strong dislike towards people who approach me with a gridlocked opinion (ie. Amarr bloc is stagnant because it is).And I came to you with the opinion that the Amarr bloc was a net negative and a ragged corpse and gave reasons, so Christ only knows what you mean by a gridlocked opinion.
You made a pair of very reasonable arguments which I might just as well quote again:Good.Quote-We write a good primer for new Amarr players
-We engage people at an individual level rather than corporations
Now that is all fine and dandy with me, but being involved in some of our corp administration I also know that this is a whole metric ton of work.
However, as you have so kindly informed me in your last quote-wars post you have quite a long history of accomplishments in leadership and administrative skills.
I'd be delighted to see you put them to good use to bring the two things you outlined earlier to fruition.
Not only because it's more productive than hacking each others posts apart, but also because it enriches the greater community, which, as you have made abundently clear, is your main driving force.
I hope you won't mind if I stay an insignificant cog in the machine for now though, you know, defending the empire and all that.
If anybody minds a word from an outside observer:
In my memory, PIE were more distinctive in their RP and as a corporation, while these days I see little of what characterize being a member of PIE to any other corporation engaged in the horrible limited* Factional Warfare games.
The PIE timeline looks awesome, but most of the big achievements seems to be riding the waves generated by the CCP storytelling team. Rarely making the waves themselves, though I do remember the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Slaves and the Amarrian Loyalist of the Year Awards, and they are/were creative and distinct RP elements that opened up for other. These showed us what kind of Amarr organization PIE really is on their own merit, and not just a group that jumps on any and all CCP directed event.
P.S. I want to see more of SPCS, please.
*: My opinion entirely.
'my little pony'Speaking strictly as a roleplayer, this is one of our community's little memes that I'd dearly love to see die. I've never once seen it used in a manner that was not intended as derisive toward an entire playstyle of roleplay and the players who enjoy it (the way Ashar uses it here is an obvious exception). It feels like a "your RP is wrong" writ large.
what I don't know is how many people want a more complex faction.While I'm not an Amarr RPer, I want a more complex faction for the Minmatars. Just like how you lot used to have some rich and interesting Rival House/house supporter roleplay stuff going on, I wish we had Rival Tribe/Tribe Supporter stuff. The whole slavery thing is just such a strong point of common ground, there's no major/visible Minmatar RP group trying to push that sort of stuff. Partially off-topic for this thread, I know. Just trying to say that I'd love to see more complex factional RP across the board... the whole "We're all loyal to X so we all love each other" shit is stale - the highlight of EVE RP for me in the last six months was different corps in the Gallente RP sphere disagreeing and taking sides over Moira vs. ILF (until I-RED publicly supported ILF with this big thread and forced all "good, loyal Gallente" to join Moira in condemning the "traitorous Intaki terrorists". The diversity was interesting to see and fun to watch, and it was sad to see it end so quickly.
'my little pony'Speaking strictly as a roleplayer, this is one of our community's little memes that I'd dearly love to see die.
I want a more complex faction for the Minmatars. Just like how you lot used to have some rich and interesting Rival House/house supporter roleplay stuff going on, I wish we had Rival Tribe/Tribe Supporter stuff. The whole slavery thing is just such a strong point of common ground, there's no major/visible Minmatar RP group trying to push that sort of stuff. Partially off-topic for this thread, I know.
Through the penance of deeds, the sins of forefathers may eventually be washed away. [Slavery] is the Amarr way and it is the future, if the Empire is to thrive
The heir closed his speech thanking those for attending and promising that he would “never forget the sacrifices made by the true faithful in times of falsehood.”
As the CEO of a new Amarr-Rp corp, I feel like I should be paying attention to this thread.I think so. There's a lot of back-and-forth between a few old-timers about what's come before, but I think it lays a foundation for what should hopefully be a very productive topic in general :)
Should I really though!? I don't want my young mind to be tained! D:
I'm a noob, but noobs can write States of the Amarr RP, too (just no one has to read them):Your level of bitter is admirable for a newer player. I award you honorary vet status, so I can pull no punches.
I cannot see emergence or reemergence of heterodox or minority Amarr RP happening at this point.I sure hope you don't mean, say, liberalism, when you say 'heterodoxy.' And all Amarrian roleplay except world-level event roleplay has been minority roleplay.
— CCP's own writers have largely abandoned the theme.These two points are tied together.
— Since the end of the event system, there is really no in-game way to play such opinions. (Back in the old days, I gather, people were more naive or at least more willing to play things that didn't square with game mechanics; these days people are pretty realistic or cynical about what they can do).
— Noob-specific problem: anyone going into to this area is walking into a minefield of ancient chronicles, ancient in-game events, and bitter old vets who nonetheless have hundreds of millions of skillpoints and long memories. Why the hell would any noob commit EVE-suicide like that?If there was a real history of being unable to find allies in EVE, for anyone, especially anyone in the roleplay scene, this'd be a valid point. But there's simply too many people looking for a good fight to put on your own side if you have even a bone worth of charm in your body that frankly, the concerns of such groups are a bit of a joke unless they're just plain unlikable. And in that case, the school of hard knocks may be required.
Given all that, anyone going for alternative Amarr RP is facing a lonely road that is going to be mostly based in fiction writing, not events. That's fine for some people. But not for others, and especially not for those people — the noobs — who still have the energy to do some stuff.I can't stress this enough, but.
But even those in the mainline of Amarr RP face some of the same problems. While CCP continues to produce Amarr PF, most of it is essentially unusable in space, at least for today's cynical no-in-game-event-having generation of EVE player. The one exception was FW, but even there CCP's writers seem to have slacked off production. And we all know the problems with FW in general. (Perhaps because I've played many other MMOs I can recognize how strangely useless CCPs lore is. It is just out there, with little to no connection to what players actually do.)Look, a sandbox is a sandbox. In the end, if you don't seek to build yourself that sandcastle, you simply won't get one to play with.
And thus it is the unifying principle for Amarr RP has long been nothing to do with CCP's PF at all, but instead commitment to a certain style of NRDS, anti-pirate rules of engagement. And that's something that certainly can be fought in space. These brought Amarr RP a certain power and fame way, way out of proportion to its size. But it came at a cost: cut loose from lore and any kind of character-player separation, what you have are real people arguing about real life !@#$. And they came to hate each other. Really hate each other; not their characters — they themselves. Take a look at IGS and just try to step back; why the !@#$ would anyone want to be part of that?Community conflict isn't really my concern unless I can halt or end it. Certainly, I take preventative measures. But.
I don't know what the way out is. I know two things I like to see, though, although neither is particularly realistic:Why do I detect an undercurrent in your words that such things are to be settled for? Why do you strike me as feeling that it's second rate to stake your own money and ships, instead of asking the devs to stake some for you through volunteering the time and energy of an AURORA member?
— On the small corporation scale, maybe it would be possible to start doing something semi-cooperative or semi-arranged with some people on the "other side", using what few "props" we have available to us to get at some normally inaccessible lore. Of course, events of this sort are anathema to tons of people and there's game/metagame mechanics that make it hard, but....
— I wanna see some ex-Prov corp, somewhere, go north, join the NC, go NBSI, AND still retain some Amarr RP identity, however "light". I don't know that there are any candidates for this, but it would be cool.All I can do is repeat my refrain - look up Oberon. They were semi-faction-aligned until perhaps a few years to a good few months ago ago; they were in Esoteria; they fought BoB and lost, and went to Morsus Mihi in the north.
Just like how you lot used to have some rich and interesting Rival House/house supporter roleplay stuff going on, I wish we had Rival Tribe/Tribe Supporter stuff.
Just like how you lot used to have some rich and interesting Rival House/house supporter roleplay stuff going on, I wish we had Rival Tribe/Tribe Supporter stuff.
I'd like to clarify this misconception.
There was never such animal.
Just a short primer on the Houses and their virtues:
Kor-Azor, diplomatic cloak and dagger folk.
Tash-Murkon, Udorians, most merchantile of the Houses.
Kador, traditionalists.
Ardishapur, most religion focused.
Sarum, most militant.
While the average member of any of the involved corporations may not see the value in the 'bloc', I believe that the director/CEO levels would have a much greater appreciation of it
But lately your core group has been nowhere in sight.
Accomplishments mean little in terms of present day effects if they have no lasting impact except circumstance; faction warfare has little effect on roleplay. It's currently the first and only iteration of a flawed idea system, and CCP has a lot of history in terms of adopting such things and leaving them be at the fundamental level when they suck.
The 'true path' of Amarr roleplay? Sounds like bullshit to me. What's so exclusively right about your thinking if you can't present a concise argument to those around you about it?
Just so it's not missed, I've split off the FW significance topic to OOC Summit; you can find the new thread here: http://backstage.eve-inspiracy.com/index.php?topic=256.0Quote from: Ashar Kor-AzorAccomplishments mean little in terms of present day effects if they have no lasting impact except circumstance; faction warfare has little effect on roleplay. It's currently the first and only iteration of a flawed idea system, and CCP has a lot of history in terms of adopting such things and leaving them be at the fundamental level when they suck.
If you think FW means little, could you be so kind as to explain what actions would mean something significant in your view? If we have divergent views of what 'significance' is, then we'll be doing 'yes it is/no it isn't' arguments, which rarely get anywhere.