BattleMaster > Magistrates Case Archive

Clan in Fontan and Aurvandil

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Tom:
Summary:Clan activity detrimental to the gameViolation:We expect you to play the game as you would play a board game with good friends, and to value fair play above any victory or power. World:East Island and DwilightComplainer:TomAbout:multiple people, see below
Full Complaint Text:

The source of two recent forum topics as well as a Titan investigation, I've decided to bring this case to the Magistrates as discussed here. While the anti-clan policy mentioned there does not yet exist and would not be applied retro-actively, the activities mentioned do violate the Social Contract, namely §3:


--- Quote ---§2 Fair Play You can not win BattleMaster. Therefore, playing together is more important to us than playing against each other. We expect you to play the game as you would play a board game with good friends, and to value fair play above any victory or power.

--- End quote ---

The activities in both Fontan and Aurvandil are considered by several players as unfair in this sense. A close-knit group of apparent friends is cooperating extremely close with the intent of victory and power over fun, especially that of others. Investigations in Aurvandil and, to a lesser extend in Fontan, revealed that the military as well as the economy of those realms is working like clockwork with almost no in-game communication. Just one example: There is a clear and (to the dev team with a direct view on in-game transactions) obvious system of gold distribution at work that is consistently and reliably employed by these players with almost no communication. Gold is constantly sent between characters without requests or orders. This makes no sense unless one assumes that the entire system is managed through out-of-game communication.

In the interest of full disclosure, we also found that the alleged clan is not acting aggressively exclusive. We have seen characters join the realm and be welcome. However, to the best of our knowledge, they are not integrated into the alledged clan and receive none of the suspected OOG communications.


I recently sent an announcement to the players of Fontan asking for their feedback on the clan "takeover" that was mentioned here on the forum. The feedback has been mixed, with some saying that everything is fine while others explained in detail what happens and why they are unhappy. As I promised these players confidentiality, their mails will be shared with the Magistrates, but not in public. I have not yet cross-referenced the e-mails with the list of players alledged to be members of the alledged clan.


My concern is that this activity, while not necessarily intended to do so, is causing players who face the clan as enemies, either within the realms they take control of or as war-enemies of those realms, so much frustration, that they are leaving the game. I believe we all agree that "playing a board game with friends" also includes keeping everyone at the gaming table. There is a difference between playing a game of chess at a competitive tournament and playing some board game with friends, and the mindset appropriate for one is not appropriate for the other.


I propose to break up the clan by deporting a randomly selected half of their members from both realms to randomly selected other islands, where they can then join realms of their own choice. I also propose to prohibit them from re-forming within the same realm at a size of more than one third of the number of characters in those realms for the period of one year.
If these players care about the game itself, this punishment would suck a bit, but it allows them to continue playing and lose only very little in stats. If they are still playing after the year, we can be sure of and point out to their haters, that they play even when they can't gang up on others. If, on the other hand, the haters are right and they care more about winning and power-gaming, we will see them leave and know it's a good riddance.

NoblesseChevaleresque:
I don't see what the problem is here.

As you yourself say, no one is excluded, everyone is welcomed to play the game, everyone is involved, perhaps more so in Aurvandil than most realms due to the way the government works, and the vast wealth of current potential titles at the moment. So what is the problem? Some might not be included to out of game communication? Count me into that, I never post on the forum, and I don't intend to play the game by the forum, or find my gameplay subject to the hearsay of a few players on the forum. Have you even identified who is in this clan? Or if there even is a Clan? I've pointed this out before, if there is a clan, I don't know about them, if there is a clan, they aren't running Aurvandil, if there is a clan, they they don't override any In character processes.

If the problem is "but some players are losing, blaming it on a clan and then leaving the game" well tough, losers are losers, but if you start randomly deporting and placing arbitrary restrictions on players for what is hearsay on the forum, well then you'll lose players who aren't just upset because they lost the war. Why should I play Battlemaster, if some moaning on the forum is sufficient to see my characters deported, the realm I built from scratch dissolved and permanent restrictions placed upon me, and to what, mollycoddle some one? I won't play Battlemaster as a forum game, I won't play Battlemaster as an Out of Character game, and I won't accept a trial by forum, I sent you a long email and thoroughly explained the Aurvandil situation, I invited other players of my realm to do the same, if you can't even substantiate claims that there is a clan, and the most you can say is some players are frustrated that a realm is winning, and declare it a clan, well then it should be pretty obvious how this game is devolving in thanks to the forum enabling this.

Aurvandil isn't a clan, never has been, never will be, if there is a clan in Aurvandil, good for them but I still rule Aurvandil on my own, and I still ensure that everything is run in character and through the necessary channels, and that everyone is included, everyone is given fair opportunity and the out of game takes no precedence, and if there is any breach of that, I have the Out of character ban, sadly you can't ban the forum for trying to circumvent all in character events, happenings and its attempt to override gameplay.

Geronus:
Because it may be relevant, this thread discusses Aurvandil's unusually efficient economy, with input from players in Aurvandil:

http://forum.battlemaster.org/index.php/topic,1938.0.html

This thread discusses recent happenings in Fontan, though beware, there is a significant amount of flaming, particularly at the end:

http://forum.battlemaster.org/index.php/topic,2228.0.html

Blint:
I too do not see what the issue is. It seems to me that Aurvandil has been deemed a clan because it is a fairly new realm to Dwilight and was declared an enemy of Madina, they went to war and Madina is losing badly.

It has been said that their military works like clock-work with almost no in game communication. That is untrue in my opinion, For weeks before we went to war those in the higher up positions of the military were asking those that reported to them for constant updates on unit sizes and strengths, training cohesion, Mobile CS numbers, the whole nine yards. That gave our military leaders an idea of how we were put together as an army so that when the time came to move out against our enemy (i.e Madina) they did not have to give direct and specific orders all the time. Not everyone can log in all the time at every turn change and that is just a fact of life, but the fact that Aurvandil was so well put together and communicated before going to war IN-GAME and IN-CHARACTER. Our leaders and military personal could give orders a turn or two in advance so that most people would be where they needed to be when they needed to be there.

I also think it is highly dishonest and frankly pathetic that players in Madina have grown so fussy and upset that their realm is being taken apart piece by piece by a stronger and more functional realm that they claim a completely untrue and inaccurate "OOC Cheating" claim and take an In game conflict to the forums. Not everyone is on the forums and so not everyone will be able to see and reply to these claims and accusations but I feel as though it is unfair to those that win a war that they should be deemed as cheaters simply for winning the war.

There has been some claims that we are hoarding gold from other continents, I have not partaken in that I earn an income as a knight of Candiels and it is more than enough to keep a rather large sized unit afloat for a few weeks before the next tax day comes in. We share our wealth if a player needs gold for their character they ask In character and we as a realm help them in character. We are brothers and sisters in character as friends should be when playing a game, you have allies and you help those allies. If someone needs gold and I have extra gold that I wont need to keep my unit alive then sure I will send them some bonds to help them out. Does that mean i sit on my other characters and hoard gold to send to my family so that my character in Aurvandil can hand out gold to other players? No. In fact my other characters are much poorer than my character in Aurvandil. I do not have a high family wealth as I have not been playing this game for more than a few years.

It seems to me that those that play this game well and with others have a more enjoyable time than those that sit back and claim those playing the game with friends are cheating. Why should we be forced to endure this trial by forum when all we have done is play the game in character as it is meant to be played, why should we be forced to suffer these punishments and consequences when nothing has been substantiated. It seems to me that as soon as someone claims a clan exists there is little to no investigation and immediately judgement and punishment are bestowed.

Lastly I would like to rebute the "these are the same guys that played in Thulsoma" I played in Thulsoma, I joined the realm because I had a friend in that realm that I met in a different realm on a different continent. I wanted to make a new character and he sent me an OOC message that said, "Hey we have fun roleplaying together and a good time playing together I am in Thulsoma on Dwilight if you want to join us, if not thats fine to. Just thought I would mention it."
So i decided to send my new character to Thusloma to play with a friend of mine. Was I given anything special? No. I had to work for everything I gained there. I wanted my character to be judge so I had to endure months of campaigning and trying to gather loyal supporters to vote for me. I had to spend months serving as a knight before I was even considered for a lordship. I was unaware of any cheating that went on in the hierarchy of that realm.

I joined Aurvanidl because my character in Thulsoma was executed for treason. I made a new character and sent him to Dwilight because I enjoyed the serious mid-evil atmosphere. I decided however to send him to the south of the continent because the north was overrun by the realms that destroyed Thulsoma. I wanted nothing to do with that and it seems that as soon as a realm starts winning on Dwilight they are claimed to be cheating in some way or another. Aurvandil is not cheating.

Aurvandil is not a clan, it has never been a clan and it never will be a clan.

Anaris:

--- Quote from: SilentWrath on April 09, 2012, 02:14:09 PM ---I too do not see what the issue is. It seems to me that Aurvandil has been deemed a clan because it is a fairly new realm to Dwilight and was declared an enemy of Madina, they went to war and Madina is losing badly.

--- End quote ---

No. It was deemed that there is a clan in Aurvandil because there was a large influx of players from Averoth and Thulsoma, and after that happened, their military and economic performance changed from pretty average to hyper-efficient.

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