DrZeus

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I hope... for the sake of the development team, that most of them stuck with Cryptic - In 3 years CoH will be almost seven, which is a long time for any MMO, and while Cryptic would probably just move the people to a new project, I have a feeling NCSoft would just give them the axe.

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Well, since (according to Ex) only one stayed with Cryptic, I'm guessing they don't share your pessimism.

And for the record, Lineage will be 10 years old next year, and NCSoft certainly hasn't given up on that.

Think about it like this: as others have pointed out, CoX was Cryptic's only money maker. That means NCSoft must have made them quite a pretty offer for them to give it up. In addition to that, NCSoft is creating a new studio for them, and expanding their team. Businesses don't put that kind of investment into things they don't think will be around for much longer.

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Oh, I'm not implying that NCSoft will give up on COH any faster than Cryptic would have. But the fact is that once a game gets old, it gets less popular, and it needs less people to tend it. By the time an MMO is 7 or 8, well, that's ancient. It's still going to have it's fans, but not as many, and it isn't as feasable to keep as many people on staff for it.

No matter who owns it.

I think the cries that NCSoft will shut down CoH faster than Cryptic are largely false. That's not to say that the game is going to last forever. And this indeed COULD be read as a sign that the servers will be shut down soon (although I personally wouldn't read it that way). But if that's the case, they'd have been shut down no matter who was owning it. When a game's time is done, pretty much anyone running it could see the writing on the wall.

My point was only that NCSoft and Cryptic have two vastly different styles of dealing with problems and dealing with customers. I happen to prefer Cryptic's methods over NCSoft's - at least what I've seen in this game. Other people obviously prefer NCSoft... that's their perogative. That's why I said.. it all depends on what you dig.

Zeus - god of reiteration

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I am worried becuz I have no idea if this is a good thing or bad thing.

Someone please explain the good and bad of this??

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There is no good and bad. There is only possibility and probability. And really, it all depends on what you like and what you beleive.

Many people dislike Cryptic. People like Statesman have been scapegoats for all their complaints for many years. Valid or not, that is the direction they cast their blame for everything from travel power suppression to the regen nerf. So, if you like to complain about how your powers got nerfed by "the man", and think statesman is the devil, then this is definately a positive move.

On the other hand....

Many people dislike NCSoft. At first they weren't too bad, but they've progressively gotten more and more apathetic towards the game. They laid off most of their texas branch a couple years ago (often a sign that numbers are more important than people). They replaced Cuppajo with someone who sounds like a salesman - a PR mouthpeice for NCSoft. (although hey, maybe that's loosened up in the last year) They used to have tons of contests for the community - 5 or 6 a year I think... they're down to one now, and the prizes have gone from a couple thousand to a couple hundred. In addition to this, it doesn't look like Cryptic really liked NCSoft either - after working with them for a while, they decided to launch their next MMO's without the use of NCSoft as a money-man. Now with this sale, they're distancing themselves further.

So it depends on what you care about. Do you want fast loot now? NCSoft will give that to you long before Cryptic would. If something would make them money, they're all for it. Do you care about community support and sincerity in actions and words? Cryptic would give that to you long before NCSoft. If something would make a better game, they're all for it.

So is this good news or bad news? Depends on what you dig. To me, it's bad news. I stopped using the CoH community about a year ago simply due to NCSoft's horrendous handling of the community. Then again, for all I know, my blaming NCSoft for the dreadful handling of the community is as valid as people blaming Statesman for every development choice they don't like. I hope... for the sake of the development team, that most of them stuck with Cryptic - In 3 years CoH will be almost seven, which is a long time for any MMO, and while Cryptic would probably just move the people to a new project, I have a feeling NCSoft would just give them the axe.

Zeus - god of public speaking

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I participated in an audience judged costume contest once and it was a disaster. It was held at a halloween party attended by the Pagan and [censored] communities. The previous year, the judges had awarded prizes based on good work, creativity, and merit. I thought I would do pretty well- I had a completely handmade jedi costume, that looked pretty damn close to movie accurate, together with a lightsaber that I had built myself- it lit up and all.

But this was not to be- the contest's format had been changed to audience judging, the event planners mistakenly believing that it was more fair that way. The audience almost without exception voted for sexy and revealing costumes. The only exception to this were the categories where there wasn't something slutty to pick. One guy got best overall costume for wearing...a pair of jeans with a thong hanging out, a shirt and vest, and a cheap pair of angel wings. Why did this second rate costume do so well? Because the guy wearing it yanked his pants down and showed his umm..assets to the crowd, causing most of them to yell. In an applause based contest, that got him the prize. Never mind that alot of people in awesome costumes got nothing.
Fair, my butt.

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Heh.. a great example of one of these things going "worst case scenario". I'm trying to think of an example of audience applause EVER being a good gauge, and it's failing me.


Although it does make me wonder... why pagan organizations and homosexual organizations always seem to get together. We had the same thing in my undergraduate university.

I have seen audience voting go VERY well. But again.. I've seen as you describe as well.

Zeus - god of diametric opposition

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Yes, it would always be preferable to have this run by NCSoft (don't mistake them for devs... they're just the publishers).

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Pardon. I used the term "Devs" because when I was corresponding with Cricket about the contest, and what I had to do to claim winner-ship, she mentioned a comment that the Devs made about one of the pics I submitted. Several Devs, if I take her statement literally. I wasn't aware that the Devs weren't actually judging.

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Actually you very well may be right now that I think about it. NCSoft are not devs.... but then again, I don't know if they're the ones doing the actual judging or not. They RUN the contests, but I shouldn't jump to the conclusion that they do the judging as well. For all I know, they run the contest, let Cryptic see the pics, and Cryptic has a corkboard with a bunch of pictures on it that everyone puts a vote in for. I really have no idea.


Although colloqually, I can see calling them all 'devs' simply for lack of a better word. I can now see calling them rednames and orange names, but that just seems a bit cumbersome.



Other than that.. I even agree with the intent behind your post, if not the point specifically. I also would like to see that the judges are those who actually follow the guidelines/rules of the contest. It just seems you and I disagree on whether or not that's being done in it's current state. I'm not lobbying for "give votes to players" or anything... I'm just saying it's an interesting idea in lieu of the current problems. But by all means... there could be an entirely different solution as well, one with less negative side effects.

Although in experience I find that when you leave things in the hands of the audience, things either turn out GREAT, or AWFUL. There seems to be no middle ground whatsoever.

Zeus - god of agreements, and disagreements

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http://kat.mossgreen.net/temp/titanis.jpg
http://kat.mossgreen.net/temp/titanis01.jpg
http://kat.mossgreen.net/temp/titanis02.jpg

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This costume is really good. I'd like to know why it wasn't shown with the others?

The only thing I can think of was that it didn't say "coh" or "city of heroes" in the pics.

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That was not a requirement this year... or last year for that matter. That was only a requirement in the first year.

Although I too would like an explanation... then again, I think an explantion to a lot of things is in order. Not a canned, form letter style, empty corporate PR statement, but rather a real live person trying to explain what happened kind of thing. I don't expect it, but it would be nice.

Zeus - god of excuses

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The fact that this thread is STILL going in my opinion makes an absolute mockery of the Rules , specifically this part, which has already been quoted earlier I believe.

"6. Censorship Posts.

All posts referring to message board censorship will be removed."

This thread is directly violating the forum rules and the reds are not only letting it slide, they have posted in it.

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I think you’d have to misinterpret both this thread, and that particular rule, to think it applies to this thread in particular. This isn’t a thread about censorship. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if this is the first time the word “censorship” was used at all in the entire thread. It’s a thread about many things… styles of moderation, what people prefer and don’t prefer, whether or not people are happy with current personalities and whether or not people are disgruntled about the new trends that seem to be hitting the board. Censorship? Not even in discussion.

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Learn to adapt. Thats all there is. Everyone was so happy because they could post nearly what they want and it wouldn't matter even though it may not have followed the rules. Now that the rules are more heavily enforced, people lash out that they can't have their "fun" anymore.

[/ QUOTE ] Oh come on.. clearly you know better than to say something this obtuse. No one is saying anything close to that and we all know it. No one is saying “I used to be able to post anything”. First of all, no one ever WAS able to post just about everything. Even in its most lax days, (right after cuppa left) this board was still the most heavily moderated board I’ve ever seen. Things like “I quit” posts and flaming insults were never tolerated, at all. This board has always been kept to a very high standard. Secondly, no one is even saying they WANT to go back to how it was after cuppa left, and when the boards were at their most lax. From what I can tell, people want to go back to how it was when cuppa was here, when rules were enforced, the boards were kept civil, and yet at the same time you could actually guess as to whether or not a post would be deleted long before you hit the “submit” button.

I give this particular argument an F.

Zeus – god of correction

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And for the record, respect is earned never given.

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Personally, I'm of the belief that basic respect should be given as a matter of course.

"Basic respect" in this case meaning respecting the other person enough to discuss matters with them calmly and rationally, without resorting to personal attacks, and recognizing that the other viewpoint may well be valid, even more valid than one's own. That kind of "basic respect".

But then that's just me.

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Interesting tangent.

Under this premise however, we have an entire thread based around the fact that most of the people here are unhappy with how lighthouse is doing being in charge of forum moderation. It could be said that the respect you refer to here is not being given to him. People... may not respect him. After all, most of this thread is quibbling about HOW things are screwing up, not WHETHER they're screwing up or not. Most people seem to agree... something rotten is in denmark.

So if indeed you do see this thread as a matter of respect, and people either should or should not respect authorities, then I think it's pretty easy to say that this particular authority is not getting the respect that an authority usually relies upon to do his job correctly.

Of course, I don't happen to think it's about respect of an authority, I think it's a matter of methodology, but that's just me.

Zeus - god of respect

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if you read all my posts, you would see I was using the lampooning of his moniker as a method to prove a point.

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Your point failed. And pretty badly. You see, there are several ways to make a point. Some of them are better than others, and some have more side effects than others. You compare posts to important topics, such as nuremburg trials. I compare your posts to farting loudly in a classroom. That kid who farts loudly in a classroom may be trying to prove a point - he may think that the teacher's monotone lecture is poorly spoken and boring the classroom. But meanwhile the methodology he's using to express himself is immature, and no one is going to even CARE to get the actual intent of his actions.. the only effect his action will elicit is a trip to the principal's office and a lack of respect from every intelligent person in the classroom.

Your posts have a similar effect. People aren't getting your point because you're using the logic of a 9 year old to express yourself. You could be an intelligent and respectable person - but no one is going to care to find out if this is how you speak. The entire POINT of an online community like this is to express ideas and communicate to each other, and if you use methods that only make yourself ostricized from the rest of the community, you're only wasting your own time. You're not even wasting other people's time, because I'm sure at this point you've hit the ignore list of a decent chunk of the posters around here who are worthy of respect and capable of holding an intelligent conversation.

Zeus - god of not wasting any more of my time either

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<QR>

The reason some replies are deleted along with ones that don't look to be harmful is because any reply "chained" from that deleted one is deleted also unless you reply differently. Thats why harmless posts are sometimes wiped when a forum breaking post gets wiped.

I figured everyone knew that by now...

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While this is true, it doesn't really change anything. Because this is how the moderating software has ALWAYS worked, and the problems we're talking about in here are recent.

Clearly, something different is going on. You can't blame the software in this case. Instead, people are blaming the person who is supposed to be in charge of this (there could be someone else in charge, but we don't know of that person), since the changes have only happened since he stepped up to bat.

I'm not going to say "lighthouse sucks". I don't know that. I don't pretend to know what's going on behind the scenes. I know that several excuses have been made, from various people... I've heard about the forum software being blamed. That doesn't fly because the problem is recent. I've heard "outsourced moderators" blamed. That excuse would only be legitimate if they started outsourcing moderators at about the same time that cuppajo left or lighthouse stepped up. I've heard people blame the forum members themselves - saying the posts deserved to be deleted or didn't... but that would also imply that as a whole, the forum community changed at approxamately the same time cuppa left or lighthouse stepped in. (both times moderation changed a little, became more lax when cuppa left, and became too hard and random when lighthouse came in)

I don't assume I know what's going on - but I think we can at least figure out some of the things that AREN'T going on.

Zeus - god of excuses

I never followed the love boat. But... could julie have been able to do her job if it were "strictly business"? Or did she have to have a bit of personality? Put a bit of herself into her work? And is that avatar really a picture of you? I like to imagine that all forum avatars are of the people that post. Did you know miss kitty was really a manga character? It's true!

Zeus - god of a point, with some silliness added.

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Lighthouse is here to do a job. Being your friend is optional.

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This is important. What is his job? People seem to think his job is "forum moderator". Is it? I was to the understanding that his job was more than just the cheif moderator.

I was to the understanding that his job was to organize and hold together the City of Heroes community. There is more to this than just forum moderation. In game activities are part of this. Contests are part of this. People stay with a game in many cases because of the community and social environment that it brings, and his job is to keep that community together.

Can he do THAT without being friendly?

Zeus - god of differences

One more thing I wanted to add... because I've kind of tried to explore the manner of this thread in PM's for several months now.

In my opinion....

Cuppa did a good job.. although I didn't know it at the time. I never understood the cuppaclones, I always thought it was a branch of human "joiner" mentality. I'm just not a joiner, I don't care to join groups so I never understood the cuppa clones. Then cuppa left.

The forums were... undermoderated. I started looking at the DDO forums, and their intense lack of moderation really made me appreciate these forums. They have half their threads as ones that would simply be eliminated by ANY mod around here. "I quit" posts, that sort of thing. But even here, things were undermoderated. We started getting into off topic conversations where some people were really getting bent out of shape and the thread should have been locked pages before... and it wasn't. I kind of attributed this to the fact that moderation was a job for two (cricket and cuppa) and now there was only one (cricket). I PMed cricket about this... and after a few days, got a reply, which that in and of itself showed me "I'm really really busy" if nothing else. (although as usual her reply was quite helpful in addition).

Then lighthouse came in... and we got a HUGE overabundance of moderating. The dartboard method of post deletion was used. Not only was it WAY too much moderation, but since we were in a time of too LITTLE moderation, it came as a real shock and quite honestly, pissed a whole lot of people off to no end. Hence... a lot of people don't dig on lighthouse, and probably never will. First impressions and all.

Since then, moderation still seems a bit random at times. I can't say whether it's getting better or worse, as I've stopped following a lot of threads like I used to. I don't spend much time on the boards anymore. He does at least say why sometimes, so that's a bonus.


I'm not saying moderation is bad... the undermoderation was bad. the overmoderation is bad. There IS a middle ground somewhere. That middle ground seemed to come naturally to cuppa. Apparantly to lighthouse, it's something he needs to find, not have fall into his lap like it did with cuppa. Hopefully.. he WANTS to find it.

Zeus - god of history

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Well that is what I decided to do. I am PM'ing Statesman about Lightbright and hopefully he will either lay off the delete button a little, or hopefully actually apply it fairly and with some reasons given. I know this post will likely be deleted by morning. He has a personal hate-on for me so I think his beeper goes off everytime I post so he can delete them. Think CuppaJo will come back and replace him?

And if you really are nice, you will quote this so it will live on after his perfecttommy purge in the morning!

Bitter? nah, just figure why should I be polite to someone that won't even give me the courtesy of telling me what I did wrong

[/ QUOTE ] A couple of tips here. First of all, when you have to stoop to using a derogitory name for someone, ESPECIALLY a modification of his current name, then you're just reaching in a desperate manner for any and all reasons to hate the person. It really demeans your statements. I remember listening to talk radio... rush was on, talking about clinton, as he often did, then after his show a different person came on, and throughout his show he would only refer to clinton as "slick willy". It made the guy sound like a boob. Rush may have some idiotic points occasionally, but at least he was capable of saying the name "clinton". He didn't have to boost his ego by derrogating others.


And I really doubt lighthouse hates you. Come on. I don't think he's particularly great at his job right now either, but I don't fool myself into thinking this is some sort of conspiracy. Why? Because you're just not important enough. Neither am I for that matter. Was I irritated when the costume contest was botched up beyond all human recognition? Absolutely. Did I think to myself "wow, NCSoft must really hate me for screwing up in a way that I'd care about!" Absolutely not.



I'll agree that it's annoying as hell to have posts seemingly randomly deleted. As livinghellfire put it, meaningless tangents are kept up while refrences to underwear are deleted forever. But this isn't anarchy. Probably not anyway. There ARE other options than anarchy. This whole thing doesn't have to be about legal theory you know. He COULD just be incompetent. I'm not saying he is.. I'm saying it's a possibility. He COULD be under totally different orders than cuppa and cricket were, and his boss may just not have a clue how to hold a community together. We don't know WHY he's doing what he's doing... or whether the decisions are even his.

One person said that comments about his personality were uncalled for... to me, that is the ONLY part that is called for, because that's all we actually know about. We can't assume we know his motivations for things, because we don't. We don't even begin to.


Can't we just start blaming statesman for everything again? After all, he's the man.. so we can change his name to The States-man! Yeah, that will make us sound clever!

Zeus - god of derogotory statements

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There's a tendancy to vote for the sluttiest/most revealing costume because the voters are thinking with....something other than their heads. ... I would sooner have it judged on merit, creativity, and workmanship, as well as resemblance to the character.

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I whole-heartedly agree. At least we know the Devs are jusging on a fair set of criteria, which are strictly defined in the contest guidelines:

All contestants will be judged on costume creativity, difficulty (intricacy of outfit), and best re-creation of costume.



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I'm trying to determine if you're being sarcastic or not. Because when I read the same thing.. I thought.. "yeah, of course, it would absolutely be best if the costume was run right and rewarded based on merit, but since that's obviously not happening, let's try option B".



Yes, it would always be preferable to have this run by NCSoft (don't mistake them for devs... they're just the publishers). and not subject to things like voting for the hottest. But since we've already run into SO many problems (at this point we're up to four, including them simply not bothering to post at least one great entry that we know of) then maybe it would be best if we took the responsibility OFF the people who clearly haven't done well with the responsibility so far. Being voted on by the players is indeed not the optimal choice. I'm just thinking it's better than how things are going now. It would help NCSoft do things on time a bit more, hold up their end, and while we'd have DIFFERENT problems, I think we'd have LESS.

Zeus - god of the lesser of two evils

Mr BB has brought up some interesting points... and I think there's some merit.

Personally, I'm a big fan of well written rules. Why? Because I hate limitations. I see all laws as suggestions. Things you're supposed to do most of the time. Fortunately, our legal system is such that intelligent people can do anything they please most of the time. This makes it so that well written rules don't NEED excuses to be broken. If you want to.. and you're capable enough, you can break them all you want.

You don't need to stoop to excuses like freedom fighting or civil disobedience. Of course, this is all in theory, and doesn't really apply to a forum.

Zeus - god of stuff

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One thing I'ma say though; I rather like how Lighthouse doesn't just delete or lock threads without *saying* something first.

I know some people might not understand >< but for me - Knowing *why* a thread was shutdown is invaluable. It feels... well more respectful. I know technically we as posters aren't entitled to a whole lot of that if we break the rules - but it feels better to not just have your post vanish into the void. A locked thread is still dead - and it lets you see what you need to avoid.


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I wanted to comment on this, because a few people are saying this.

First of all, I agree, it's great to actually say WHY some things are being shut down. It's quite respectful and it really helps.


On the other hand, this also illustrates my point... that lighthouse is in need of finding a bit of board personality. You see, this whole thing is rather new. When lighthouse first came on board, threads got shut down really fast, and there was no reason why. I, and a few others, complained about it and reccomended that we at least know WHY things are being shut down, since some of them were pretty random.

So... it's nice to see that he is responding to suggestions, either from others or from forum members. That's a great sign. It also shows however, that he was even more "all business" than he is now. I don't think he really treats people as humans now, but it used to be worse.. after all, he was kind of treating us like machines. If I were moderating a forum that was just a game, no actual humans on the other end, I wouldn't bother to tell people why I'm doing things after all. It would be just an emotionless job. Lighthouse DID act like that at one point, but he doesn't so much now.

So.. he IS loosening up. He's still not showing much personality, but at least he's improving.

Zeus - god of zero point scales

I actually wanted to reply.. mainly to the OP here. I think she has some interesting points, and are very cogently stated, at that.

However, I think it's a matter of finding personality. You see, lighthouse is essentially an "instant celebrity, just add red". Now some people are going to assume that this means he's the new kid on the block, and people are going to be resistant to his ideas and what not, especially in lieu of the fact that we all really liked cuppa. But I don't think that's the case. Why? Because no one had a problem with cricket. She was the new kid on the block too, and yet was well received and there were not the same level of problems.


So what is the problem, if not the "new kid on the block" thing? Well, there are two ways to look at the "instant celebrity, just add red" problem. The first is that of the effect this has on the viewers... that they'll be resentful and not take him well, the thing I already mentioned. The other thing is the effect it has on lighthouse himself. You see... lighthouse is a person. So he is affected as much as anyone when weird things happen. What happens to a person when they're given instant celebrity status? Well, we all handle it differently. Some people handle it really well. Lighthouse... I don't think did.

He turned cold. This is a job. He treats it as such. However, we don't want to be treated that way. I sent him a PM at one point, with much the same concerns the OP has. I will never make the mistake of sending him another PM again. His reply was cold, pointless, VERY politically correct, and quite honestly, I got the impression that he had taken classes on how to write form letters, or instructions on how to assemble furniture. For all I know this isn't how he actually FEELS, just how he came across, but the reply had no personality. Because it had no personality, it had no weight. No merit. I might as well have been talking to a machine.

Some people may like this. Some people, like myself, clearly don't. I don't want to talk to a PR robot. I want to talk to a person. With personality, spirit, incentive, drive, dreams and goals. Someone with emotion. When I send a PM now, I send it to cricket. I don't think we need a dalek running the boards. We need an individual with personality.

The good news is that this isn't an insurmountable problem. It is a possiblity that lighthouse is just reacting badly to being thrown in head first into the pool. He may indeed be a great guy, a lively individual capable of human emotion, compassion, and expression of these things. He just needs to learn how to do this.. how to deal with being THE MAN, and yet still being a person.

The bad news.. is that a lot of damage is already done. I can only speak for myself, but I'm not really reading a lot of the boards anymore. By the time I PMed cricket about this (and received a well worded response) I had already become so jaded and daunted that I am just finding myself not really caring much anymore. I don't want to make a post just to find that it gets deleted later for some unknown and obviously uncared about reason. Then, to add to that, the recent debacle with the costume contest being bungled up in apparantly four different seperate ways really just gave me a feeling of no confidence in NCSoft at this point. The future may be brighter, but the damage is done. The community, in many regards has been partially destroyed for me, and I'll be the first to admit that I probably won't hold my account much longer because of it. Some damage can't be undone.

Zeus - god of damage control

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for the costume contests they should let everyone vote, lol

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I wonder how this would work. Quite frankly, I've seen nothing but disaster in this sort of thing in the past... once people feel they can "campaign"... then things go to hell pretty quickly. On other other hand, it still might be something to try. Put a little note on the launcher that you can cast your vote for the best entry, so people other than just forumites would want to look at the entrants, and give everyone a chance to check it out.

It might be bad... but it might not. When current methods seem lackluster, maybe switching to something a little risky may be timely.

Oh, and yes.... lol.

Zeus - god of provoking thought

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http://kat.mossgreen.net/temp/titanis.jpg
http://kat.mossgreen.net/temp/titanis01.jpg
http://kat.mossgreen.net/temp/titanis02.jpg

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I also think she looks great. A very nice job, and it seems a shame that it wasn't included. Did she submit late or some other reason to disclude her? About the only legitimate reason I can think of for not including a picture is if it's too racy or just inappropriate, but hers definately doesn't fall into that category.. just a well done costume, and even some decent photography.

The background is also really well done. A great match.

Zeus - god of compliments

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my friend made an entry, and her costume wasn't even posted

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This is quite surprizing... and unfortunate. Surprizing because I just assumed they had posted ALL The entries, since some of the pictures they posted were just... well, I can't say the costumes were awful, but the pictures themselves were bad enough so you couldn't even tell if the person WAS wearing a costume! I recall one picture of a closeup of a guy's face, and he probably was wearing a wig of some sort.

I'm not saying he shouldn't have submitted something... I'm just saying that the picture made it obvious that the posted entries weren't just the "honorable mentions" or anything. It seemed like "all of them".



Is it possible for you to post a picture of your friend's entry? I know I'd like to see it.

Zeus - god of communion

I agree, but I think it's spread out a bit more than that.

Obviously you're right on the mark as far as anyone attempting to enter a future NCSoft competition. Why put effort into something when you might as well just submit a peice of crap and hope the dart lands on your entry.

But... I think it should apply to people who aren't even interested in entering the contests. Because the contests are amusement to more than just the people who enter them. Have you ever sat down to check out a costume contest under atlas park... not enter, just check it out, and find that the judge picked the hottest chick instead of the best costume? It makes you feel like you've wasted your time. Like the judge was a complete boob. It makes you feel bad things about the judges, even though you weren't even in the contest. You were just watching.


These contests effect the community as a whole, not just the entrants. It's a show of camradarie, like a company putting together a company softball team. What if your company put together a softball team and then for no apparant reason after the game already started the company decided that you should use water noodles instead of baseball bats to hit the ball with? Wouldn't you think it was a bad idea, whether you were actually IN the game or not? Obviously it would matter more if you were playing the game instead of just watching it, but even the observers have a right to feel cheated.

Someone mentioned the word "cheated' was not appropriate for this case. I think it is... not for the entrant, however. The entrant didn't "cheat". I'm not really sure what she was doing truth be told, but it wasn't cheating. As far as I'm concerned she might as well have submitted a cool costume of a world of warcraft character. The cheat... was the other entrants and the observers. They were cheated.

I wonder if they're going to bother run other contests at this point. My theory is that they probably want to (I've spoken to cricket about the contests, and I think she genuinely has an interest in them), but just don't have the time or priority to do so. If they do, I expect more of the same.

Zeus - god of expectations

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I think if anything is done it should be to declare another Runner up within the scope of the rules and award a similar prize.


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I don't think you're giving NCSoft enough credit. They're not mindless boobs wandering through life just randomly doing things they hope no one will mind. The judges here weren't idiots, at least I'd rather think not, although... it would be more comforting to say that.

We have to assume that the judges... as there has to be more than one, talked about the ramifications of awarding a monetary prize to someone who did not follow the rules, and KNEW they weren't following the rules, and EVERYONE else would know they weren't following the rules. I mean... we all know what a carnie looks like. There are numerous threads about the fact that you can't make one, because many want to. It's not like the judges just didn't notice. This wasn't just a mistake. I'd love to think it was... but it's just not realistic. One of the entry requirements was to put down the name and server of your hero or villian. I can only assume the entrant put down "all of them" under server. And it's not like the rules were subjective.. or up in the air or misunderstood. One of the few things you needed to submit was "One full frontal body shot (digital photo) of contestant, out in public, dressed as their hero or villain. ", and they even added the bold in the contest rules... not "any hero or villian" or "an in game hero or villian"... but "THEIR hero or villian".

It would simply be unrealistic to think that people being bothered by this.. and rightly so, was not predicted ahead of time. The only conclusion we can come to is that they simply didn't CARE. Is there any other possibility that I'm missing? I'd love to be wrong about this.

And if they actually don't care.. then it doesn't really matter what they do in subsequent contests. They can add an NPC category, but they're not actually obligated to stick to people who dressed up as NPCs to win that category, just as they weren't obligated to pick someone with an ingame location in this year's contest, or someone who dressed up as their character to win anything at all. I'm not a huge rulehound... as a matter of fact, I generally hate restrictions and structure. But there are times when it's needed, and even I, someone who generally hates rulesets and structure, think it's pretty obvious that these sorts of contests are among those times when it's needed. Judging is subjective enough. You can't get subjective with which rules you care about.

Zeus - god of randomness

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Can someone explain this to me?

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You're not this dumb Zeus ... You're playin aren't you ...

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No.. I'm actually serious. Perhaps I give people the benefit of the doubt that they're not actually going to bother make a post that says (essentially) "I like boobies". I mean, that just seems pretty stupid to me. I take it you think I'm overestimating people.

It wouldn't be a first time I suppose.

Zeus - god of overestimation

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[...]I'm kind of giving the posters the benefit of the doubt that they're not just talking about physical attractiveness[...]

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Hehe, well not to cast aspersions on anyone, but I think you miiiight be giving a skosh more credit than is due.

/em Edna Mode voice
Do you remember..... DIVA 7?!?


At the time, much was made about her costume (or lack thereof), and I think we can agree the fascination there had nothing to do with regards to her leet costume-making skills.

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Ok, true. But Diva7 was a totally different issue. There was a girl who was hot, who made a hot character, for the purposes of being hot, entered the contest for hotness, and got replies saying "you're hot". That one seemed to fit.


But cookie girl looked like she actually put some effort into her costume. She has a theme, so it's most likely a character she plays and enjoys, not just made up for sheer hotness. That skirt? Looks homemade, although it's a good job of a homemade skirt. She actually had a decent costume in ADDITION to being hot, where diva7... just dug out some fetish gear from her closet and wore underwear.


I can see Diva7 getting all the "you're hot" messages and thinking "well, that was kind of the point!". I can see cookie girl getting the "you're hot" messages and thinking "gee, thanks, but I already knew that - this was a COSTUME contest, and I did actually spend time making a costume that apparantly you didn't notice"

Zeus - god of differences

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Debate on the carnie costume aside, my jaw hit the keyboard when I saw Cookie Girl. I didn't much care who won what or when after that. I would like to say gratz to all the contestants for entering, I don't think I would have the guts to do it so I would never criticize anyone that did. As for Cookie Girl, thanks for playing.

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This may be overly simple... but can someone explain this to me? This is like the 4th or 5th comment on cookie girl I've seen and I honetsly don't undertand. She had a decent costume, to be sure, although a simple one, but then again... more complicated than some of the winners.

She had a decent costume and all, but the only thing I can see where she's really above anyone else is in physical attractiveness, but then again, she's probably be more physically attractive than the other entrants no matter what she wore. I'm kind of giving the posters the benefit of the doubt that they're not just talking about physical attractiveness, because that would be pretty insulting to the person dressed up as cookie girl, and such baseless insults just aren't called for in this sort of forum.

Can someone explain this to me? Am I missing something or are several people just posting to say "look, cookie girl, don't bother ever enter any contest again, because no matter what you do or how well you do it no one is ever going to be interested in anything but your attractiveness". Because that just seems kind of crude.


Zeus - god of not understanding