I'd like to respectfully disagree with this. Though I can understand why you would want to reduce the "griefage" in the forums, I don't believe your taking this action will solve anything. Some people will still have problems with others, and if you don't have spot for people to release said problems, it will just spill over into other areas of the forums.

Am I the only one who is actually going to praise this decision?

Come on, people. Is the prospect of having to actually consider other peoples' feelings in your posts, exercising tact and diplomacy, and actually having intelligent arguments really such a horrifying prospect? All of you have got to consider something else here.

The toxic atmosphere of the forums was driving players away. Players like myself, who found the forums and all the cross-talk, attacks, and wanton badmouthing of people actually detracting from the enjoyment of the game. Is that what you really want? Do you really want new and old players alike to leave the game en masse and limit the MUD genre to just be a niche with barely enough people to support itself, all merely so you can exercise what you consider to be "freedom of speech?"

So internet-savvy players will make their own forums to complain on where the rules enforced here won't apply. How is that a bad thing? Those who have need to complain about others or bring up issues all the time should have their own place to do it. This much I agree with, which is why I say to those people, make your own forums. Then you have a venue to complain, and the rest of us who just want to enjoy playing have a nice, stable place where we can actually talk to each other without fear of toxic talk.

I know my opinion's going to be unpopular. I don't care. For once I'm standing up for myself and voicing my own opinion.

I'm not sure I understand this at all. Was there seriously an issue here? Were people like leaving cause the rants thread got one page longer than they'd like?

That said, I'm glad the forums are back. I've had the worst two weeks ever and the forums being down was just like that one more thing that made everything else that much more irritating.

May I suggest a "Constructive Criticism" subsection?

Yeah, I just skip the things I don't want to read. You can tell within a few words usually, especially if you notice who is doing the posting. So I'm not sure what the real problem is either.

I don't personally think Lusternia was as bad as it certainly could have been, however I'm taking the personal viewpoint of this being a good pre-emptive action to prevent it from becoming acidic to the point that we begin losing people from the game - both players and administrators. Constructive criticism is one thing, but I think we can all come up with at least one instance when threads have gotten to the point where it simply became nasty and vindictive. Horribly so.

I'm certain in time we'll all adapt happily and the forums will be the better for it.

What about if I want to share the goings on of my crummy couple of weeks? I notice the RL rants thread is gone too.... am I allowed to start a thread complaining about the bad luck I've been having? (asking before doing so I don't get in trouble. )

These forums will, and it may be a lesser burden on the Administration... but it does open up the potential for much more vitriol amongst the playerbase. Remember Verithrax's forum? And that was only for "overbearing moderation," not for "a complete halt."

The things going up there were sickening.

It died out mainly because he gave up, and people were really able to do the discussions / mini rants they wanted to here. I really don't want to see people moving back towards unmoderated rant-discussions. :/

Some people are unable to do that, and by the time they realize they don't want to read something, their feelings are hurt, they get angry or defensive and respond. It's very strange but true phenomenon.




Sure, you can post a thread in the real life section of the forums, asking for some empathy, and perhaps even telling people something you learned from the experience!

I'm going to miss the forum angst.

Can we have a Thread of Dissatisfaction in the Real World forum? I just honestly hate the idea of making a whole thread just to complain about my crummy couple of weeks. It'd get one or two replies and that's it, it seems wasteful. I wanna share my bad times, but not fill the forum up with a hundred tiny threads.


eta: It could be titled: Thread of Dissatisfaction and subtitled: For when life gives you lemons and you don't feel like lemonade.

In my own opinion, forums like that will undoubtedly kill themselves, or be small cess-pools of unmitigated filth eternally. You don't need to look at them, and I certainly won't. The official forums are a fair bit different, and perhaps it's simply a psychological effect, but. It's definitely there. One of its biggest problems, from memory, was that its posters were so acidic and hostile, it kept people from going there - without doing a whole lot else. I don't think it will be problematic. Not a challenge to prove me wrong, though!

In a slightly more serious vein, I honestly don't think this change is such a bad idea. Some threads and posters could get very defensive and consume an otherwise potentially constructive discussion in bickering and personal attacks. I predict that rant-like threads will pop up in Common Ground and Ideas anyway, though I'm presuming with more moderation to keep things from spiralling out of control too much.

I actually never did look at them, but the posts / threads there were seeping out into everywhere else. I heard complaints in-game (well, OOC "in-game"), via IMs. Including various snippets being pasted. It does find its way back, for some reason, as long as there are readers / posters.

Also, the official aspect is a very good point-- having these official forums, where everything could be discussed (but with moderation to keep it from getting out of hand), puts a pretty hefty damper on a forum that is just for a small sub-section of posts. When there is no other outlet, it is going to seep out somewhere. Humanity doesn't really change personality all that quickly or well, on the whole.

What about my question?

I'm of the opinion that Lusternia did just fine before we had forums, and that far too much that should be handled in-game is being carried out on the forums. So many interesting opportunities for roleplay are lost on acidic bickering matches on the forums, in my opinion, anyways.

Honestly, I'm of the opinion that "if it makes your butt hurt, don't read it"

So how about this. Remove the offending sections, and... get rid of that thing about waiting periods between forum PM's.

Wait, if there are no more rants, does that mean we are free of the trolls?

You wish.

Eventru, I see you thre! Answer my question, please? If it's no, that's fine, I'll make individual threads each time I want to complain about something sucky that happens IRL (and everyone else will too) and there'll be hundreds of such tiny threads. But I'm waiting on your response so I can either do that or make a general 'my life sucks right now' thread. I don't wanna break the rules or get warned or cause some catastrophe that shuts the forums down (I'm already going to be worried that every post I make is going to do that now).

Please answer my question.