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anyone know what build this guy was? It's evident that he was a hero class, but what AT?
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He was a DM/Regen Fearbot.
He went out of his way to not get kills himself, but instead, he would TP Foe/Fear people into mobs to intentionally give them debt. If he came across someone with the ability to overcome his tactic (he really only had one), he would Teleport away.
I read his story when he first released it, and while he's apparently an educated individual, his story was not very interesting to me because it felt like a dumb proof. Similar to a researcher releasing statistical proof that teenage boys think about bewbies a whole lot, his entire story was predictable. Of course people got angry, this individual was wasting their time, more than anything. Debt can be specifically tracked as a required time sink in order to get rid of it, so anytime he gave an individual debt (which occurred thousands of times), he was actually stealing some of that person's time. How shocking that people would be angry about such a thing.
He would go on to attack, insult, or dismiss peoples' criticisms of this approach to gameplay, which, in turn, made people angrier about the fact that this individual not only went out of his way to rob people of their available time, but he then seemingly embraced and prided himself on this fact.
I won't be paying any money, at any time, to support someone's proof that being a [censored] makes other people angry.
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Don't buy into it. This guy pulled off the big one. He's been telling his wife for years that all the gaming he does is "research" and when she finally called him on it... you got this.
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I won't be paying any money, at any time, to support someone's proof that being a [censored] makes other people angry.
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While I used to find it humerous how easily he could spark people into verbal pvp with him in zone and on the forums, the fact that he could only proved that people are predictably emotional creatures. No great discovery IMHO.
I read his paper a while back, and while I found it interesting, I would label it an experiement of entrapment, nothing more, nothing less.
Even in real life, there are social rules that go beyond what the law binds us to, and those that violate them are outcast and often threatened. When doing a purposefully unpopular action repeatedly, you can't claim you're sad or astonished that people don't care for it.
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Even in real life, there are social rules that go beyond what the law binds us to, and those that violate them are outcast and often threatened. When doing a purposefully unpopular action repeatedly, you can't claim you're sad or astonished that people don't care for it.
[/ QUOTE ]Instead you express your astonishment in interviews and publish a book about it.
Dr. Todt's theme.
i make stuff...
He's sort of the Borat, or perhaps the Michael Myers (fat one, not serial killer one), in the community.
His goal wasn't to join and coexist within community norms-- his aim wasn't peace, he came to push buttons. I kind of agree that it's sad buttons could be pushed, but if your agenda is to press the stress levels of players (including children, which I doubt the good professor could distinguish before the damage was done), you will accomplish mayhem.
Meh-- pass. 'Sides, I think Dirty would be an infinitely more interesting persona than Twixt, and much more honest about his intentions in the end.
funny My name was not in there.
I would send comments to Twixt when he would tp/kill me about how well he used the tactic, of course the whole time I would be hunting him down to kill him ( and did on many occasions, a few well placed inspirations go a long way)
the paper is subjective and one sided, it does not show any of the good aspects of the social activity of MMOs, it just paints a pretty nasty picture if you ask me.
Meltdown Rad/Rad/Mu Corrupter
Badges Earned
This is also being discussed in a thread in Virtue's forums.
Also, very well-written response at the paper's site, Ping.
i've also found the other responses to the article interesting and occasionally amusing.
Dr. Todt's theme.
i make stuff...
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Was this you?
[ QUOTE ]
Posted by StarkFist on 07/06/09 at 3:27PM
I am a COH player and veteran of other online games. I'm not a huge fan of PVP, but even though I rarely go into the PVP zones, I had heard of Twixt through the grapevine. However, contrary to this article, Twixt was never the most reviled person in the game or even on his server, just a minor annoyance to the small PVP community with delusions of grandeur.
In my experience, in game or real life, you get back a lot of what you put out there. If you treat people with kindness and respect, they tend to treat you with respect in return. On the other hand, if you treat everyone you meet with contempt, you should not be surprised when people start to dislike you. Or to put it even more simply, what goes around, comes around.
This rule of "social groups," to do unto others as you would have them do unto you, did not originate with video games.
The article makes it sound like "magically transporting other players to a robot firing squad" takes some kind of skill. It does not- even a non-PVP player like me could sit around and do that all day if I wanted to be as scorned as Twixt. In the game it is generally considered cowardly since there is not any actual fight or skill involved. Yes, it is technically within the "rules" but is not considered sportsmanlike or honorable. If what this article claims is true, it wasn't Twixt's "skill" that kept him alive, it was his ability to hide behind the robotic skirts of the zone drones.
His "experiment" seems to be to test the hypothesis that if you behave like a jerk in a video game, people will treat you like a jerk. Shocking, groundbreaking work there. GG Prof. Myers.
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Actual post here.
Very well said. Quite honestly i feel the tone of the article and the Professor's own words show him to be very lacking in even a pretense of objectivity or awareness of how many others actually viewed him in regards to his own behavior.
i also recall him being a topic of humor and mild annoyance for most, not "the most hated player in the game". True, some of the PvP types might have felt that way, but even most of them just thought he was annoying or amusing IIRC.
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I confess, it was me. I thought I'd confuse people by using the same handle I've used for 5 years, but you saw through my little ruse. 
"Don't unravel them-- your ears were meant to be that way."
-Steve Aylett
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Was this you?
[ QUOTE ]
Posted by StarkFist on 07/06/09 at 3:27PM
I am a COH player and veteran of other online games. I'm not a huge fan of PVP, but even though I rarely go into the PVP zones, I had heard of Twixt through the grapevine. However, contrary to this article, Twixt was never the most reviled person in the game or even on his server, just a minor annoyance to the small PVP community with delusions of grandeur.
In my experience, in game or real life, you get back a lot of what you put out there. If you treat people with kindness and respect, they tend to treat you with respect in return. On the other hand, if you treat everyone you meet with contempt, you should not be surprised when people start to dislike you. Or to put it even more simply, what goes around, comes around.
This rule of "social groups," to do unto others as you would have them do unto you, did not originate with video games.
The article makes it sound like "magically transporting other players to a robot firing squad" takes some kind of skill. It does not- even a non-PVP player like me could sit around and do that all day if I wanted to be as scorned as Twixt. In the game it is generally considered cowardly since there is not any actual fight or skill involved. Yes, it is technically within the "rules" but is not considered sportsmanlike or honorable. If what this article claims is true, it wasn't Twixt's "skill" that kept him alive, it was his ability to hide behind the robotic skirts of the zone drones.
His "experiment" seems to be to test the hypothesis that if you behave like a jerk in a video game, people will treat you like a jerk. Shocking, groundbreaking work there. GG Prof. Myers.
[/ QUOTE ]
Actual post here.
Very well said. Quite honestly i feel the tone of the article and the Professor's own words show him to be very lacking in even a pretense of objectivity or awareness of how many others actually viewed him in regards to his own behavior.
i also recall him being a topic of humor and mild annoyance for most, not "the most hated player in the game". True, some of the PvP types might have felt that way, but even most of them just thought he was annoying or amusing IIRC.
[/ QUOTE ]
I confess, it was me. I thought I'd confuse people by using the same handle I've used for 5 years, but you saw through my little ruse.
[/ QUOTE ]Yes, yes. i'm (not) clever like that. 
Dr. Todt's theme.
i make stuff...
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Also, very well-written response at the paper's site, Ping.
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Thanks.
I also emailed the author of the article to ask him to look into doing a piece that actually looks at the community instead of taking Twixt's word as truth. We'll see if he gets back to me.
- Ping (@iltat, @Pinghole)
Don't take it personally if you think I was mean to you. I'm an ******* to everyone.
It's a penguin thing. Pingu FTW.
He wouldn't have lasted 2 minutes in age of conan....that's a (or WAS, I have no idea these days) a freaking gank-fest.
oh, what's a fear bot anyway? You'll notice by my number of posts that I'm a newb, lol
Dark Melee/Regeneration Scrapper.
Basically, DM has a Fear power that is fast recharging and debuffs accuracy. When combined with the inherent uber-survivability of Regen, it makes the character extremely hard to kill. It also doesn't have very good PvP damage output, so it basically makes its living as a pain in the [censored].
- Ping (@iltat, @Pinghole)
Don't take it personally if you think I was mean to you. I'm an ******* to everyone.
It's a penguin thing. Pingu FTW.
I don't care if he was also LS. If you act like a jerk, then people will treat you like one. 
Being a jerk isn't against the law, but that doesn't make it right either. 
Edit: Mind NOT blown.
Reporter just got back to me, and he encouraged I write a letter to the editor. I'll be fleshing one out and sending it in tomorrow. I'll post it here too.
- Ping (@iltat, @Pinghole)
Don't take it personally if you think I was mean to you. I'm an ******* to everyone.
It's a penguin thing. Pingu FTW.
*checks paragon wiki* ahhhh, I see. Never tried DM yet but now it's tempting. lol
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Research shows the average gamer is 24 years old. Three out of 10 are women. Most are college students or work in information technology departments. Only 2 percent are unemployed
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Thats [censored]. Im willing to bet its a ton higher than that.
I don't think there's any validity in his "it's legal" argument. Those drones are there for player protection. What he's doing is one step away from an exploit as far as i'm concerned. Not to mention, being a jerk just isn't cool.
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oh, what's a fear bot anyway? You'll notice by my number of posts that I'm a newb, lol
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Under the old PvP rules, mezzes (fears included) lasted for roughly the same length of time as they do in PvE. Fear was one of the mezzes very few melee sets had protection against, so it was trivial to hit someone with a fear power and have them end up completely helpless for 30-40 seconds (of course, smarter melee characters would've always had at least a few Break Frees with them just in case, but hey, that's life). He'd use Teleport Foe to TP an enemy player right into a group of Longbow, hit them with Touch of Fear, and then run off as the Longbow killed the player, who was unable to do anything (again, assuming they had no Break Frees or in-set fear protection).
@macskull, @Not Mac | XBL: macskull | Steam: macskull | Skype: macskull
"One day we all may see each other elsewhere. In Tyria, in Azeroth. We may pass each other and never know it. And that's sad. But if nothing else, we'll still have Rhode Island."
"One day we all may see each other elsewhere. In Tyria, in Azeroth. We may pass each other and never know it. And that's sad. But if nothing else, we'll still have Rhode Island."
Kind of funny that for the majority of my time playing CoH was in Slidell where twixt resides........
Im rich because you trust the previous 5 bids!!
My market signature is the highest bid!!!!
Someone was askin' 'bout you a few weeks ago...
"Champion (the Community Server... or GTFO) is like a small town where everyone knows each other's names, for better or worse." -kojirodensetsu.
"If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail." - Maslow's Hammer
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I don't think there's any validity in his "it's legal" argument. Those drones are there for player protection. What he's doing is one step away from an exploit as far as i'm concerned. Not to mention, being a jerk just isn't cool.
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Even with all the positive descriptions from the author of the article, what the dear professor did was isolate and underline the fact that any sociopath, even a functioning one, tends to be abhorred by the community around them. And that's pretty much what he was/is, at least as Twixt. What's the difference between an armed robber shooting a housewife and a police officer who's had to kill in the line of duty? At the instant of the taboo action, one is justified by social acceptance - the other is in every violation of it. Both take a life, both violate the social abhorrance of intentional murder. One, however, does so for the protection of the community around them, while the other does so for personal gain. One is approved of as a guardian of his family, friends, and neighbors; the other is reviled for being a criminal.
Two families just lost someone though. And there's plenty of evidence that shows that those families often don't care if one of those people was following the rules or not - it still hurts. Point here is that following the rules, like Professor Myers, and claiming to not understand why people hated his actions despite "not doing anything wrong" is a failure on his part to understand humanity as a whole. The response to Twixt is nothing to despair over - I'd actually say it indicates something to be hopeful about, that even in a digital medium, we as people still insist on custom and "the Golden Rule" even when it's not enforced by authorities. That's a good sign, I'd say. I'd instead despair for his kids growing experience... I don't know that Dad's going to prepare them so well for team sports, to say the least... Anyway, just my $.02
Oh, and hi again
-M
Marut, 50 FF/Rad/Power Defender - Champion
Leader of The Earthguard
Leader of The Galactic Empire
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Reporter just got back to me, and he encouraged I write a letter to the editor. I'll be fleshing one out and sending it in tomorrow. I'll post it here too.
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I cannot wait to read your response, fair and reasonable it shall be I'm sure -- you go Pingster!!
The article itself was pretty lopsided and a really unfair overall view of the MMO world...especially to those that have never been a part of it therefore not knowing anything at all about it to base their own opinion on...almost makes it like something the religious extremists would begin to push on banning when they have nothing left to battle.
Perhaps I'm being a little over the top...but that article was just silly in the fact that it only represented like 10 to 15% MAX of the CoX population as if it were commonplace...bleh...
So anyway, I stole this kid's lollipop the other day and threw it in a gutter...was surprised she cried, you know? Grow up kid, these here are important lessons now kiss off!
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While its kind of entertaining that some "professor" was playing CoH, the whole project of his was kind of dumb. Doesn't this apply to ALL of the internet?
Lets look at xbox live. Play some game (halo, call of duty, w/e) kill your own team, and some spaz tells you to go kill yourself, that you are gay, etc.
When people can't be seen IRL, they say what they want. No biggie.
Quite true. He proved 1 + 1 = 2. I'll bet the Nobel committee is knocking down is door right now.
Tanker Tuesday #72 Oct 5 @Champion
"I am not sure if my portrayal of being insane is accurate, but damn its fun all the same."