I remember Twixt from Freedom.
Interesting read.
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I read the 21 page paper a while ago.
I think it's neat. Even on a small server like Liberty it doesn't take long at all to make someone crack in RV.
I'm not a fan of Pvp, but I suspect I would've hated this guy in game. The prof seems particularly clueless and sad himself, nevermind his claim that he was playing w/in the rules and game design.
The old tactic of confusing a player on the opposite side, allowing him to kill a member of his own faction, was technically w/in the rules, since game mechanics allowed it. But it was cowardly nonetheless. There was no risk involved since I couldn't attack back. Easy, cheap, insignificant kills.
That's essentially what the Prof was doing when he used TP foe to drone people. Yes, game mechanics allowed it, but there was no skill involved. The more I read of his paper, the more it seemed that he thought he was a great player and became aggrieved that others didn't recognize it.
His book could just be a typical small run university press publication. But if it catches hold, this may be another nail in the coffin of CoX Pvp.
Prof Meyers is correct in one respect. Pvp play became clannish or cliqueish. It wasn't as hardfought or freewheeling, anything goes as the cliques pretended. They agreed to their internal rules, shared by both factions, and perpetuated a rigid structure that others had to copy to be "successful."
Btw, if you wanna be entertained, dig up some videos of Whirligig matches. They were hardly ever the best, but amply demonstrate the hopscotch, leapfrog, catch me if you can, hit and run style that was so prevalent. No slugging it out toe to toe. Twixt just took that further, minimizing his risk by hiding behind drones. Then pronouces it "sad" that players got angry.
Hopefully the death threat he received in game was just someone anonymously blowing off steam.
After reading it, it does seem like he felt very superior in his game play.
Strikes me as rather pathetic tbh.
My problem with his dissertation is that he refers to Twixt's behavior in the third person, as if Twixt were a separate entity. It was his behavior and his choice of actions which caused his unpopularity in the community as a whole.
Whenever we see a singular entity ostracized by a community at large, it is not proper to assume that the actions of the majority are the actions of antagonists. Clearly, the antagonist in this situation is the man behind Twixt, and he is deserving of the behavior of the community. In the end, it is most likely quite irrelevant, as his social consciousness seems a bit callous, and I suspect, that he, like me, was a bit of an outcast when he was a teenager and this "self-centric" view of the world around him has cascaded into his adult life.
While his behavior was not against the "physics" of the game, it was against the social order defined by the populace, and any and all social actions taken against him that are within the rules, are just as acceptable as his own.
The practice of "droning" people was established by the community on every server individually to be socially unacceptable. There was no collusion involved. When the behavior of over nine different servers falls in line with each other over a particular tactic, it is safe to assume that following such a ground rule is a prudent choice.
He brought social leprosy upon himself. No one else is to blame. Unless you want to blame just about everyone else---
The thing about academia is that you can find evidence to support and theory you feel like purporting.
Liberty Server (@enderbean)
Arcs on Live
#1460 Hometown Rivalry
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The thing about academia is that you can find evidence to support and theory you feel like purporting.
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Especially when you omit contrary facts/opinions and present only those which reinforce your argument.
At any rate, people do take what is just a game to serious. Seems some forget it is just a game. That is all I will ever see it as. What someone thinks or believes doesnt affect my game play at all. That guy was on freedom. No wonder he had problems. 
for an actual interesting read about the psychology of online gaming communities, hit up nick yee's Project deadalus. not specific to any gmae, but it was a study of several different aspects of online gamer culture, quite a good read for both laymen and those who have a little more technical understanding.
All I can say is if he wanted to pay 15 bucks a month to p:$$ ppl off then let him. His paper from a psychology/social aspect can be respected, debated, and dicussed in academic setting with no problem. Now in game an [censored] is an [censored] no matter the reason. I mean anyone can become an [censored] no matter the reason. If he did it for purely experimental reasons that is fine, but it takes practice to be an [censored]. So I now have to wonder about the psychology/social aspects of human nature and if he was revealing his true uninhibited self by being an [censored] to provoke other [censored]. WOW we could sit on park benches on college campuses in our white toga debating this for decades and still not come to a conclusion. That is why these questions of [censored] are so difficult because all are opinions stated as conjecture in which both sides are truely convinced they are correct in their own conjectures.
Whoa! Hey, hey, there? Watch were your waving that Sapper Gun Thingamajig with the sparks and the zaps and the endurance drain... humm yeah
Liberty
Blue Stonefist Lvl 50 Stone/Stone/Stone Tanker
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My problem with his dissertation is that he refers to Twixt's behavior in the third person, as if Twixt were a separate entity. It was his behavior and his choice of actions which caused his unpopularity in the community as a whole.
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The best part is if u read his posts, or even his chat logs, u can see how he goes from his LOLpvp persona to 'the professor'. Its pretty schizophrenic and creepy.
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The old tactic of confusing a player on the opposite side, allowing him to kill a member of his own faction, was technically w/in the rules, since game mechanics allowed it. But it was cowardly nonetheless. There was no risk involved since I couldn't attack back. Easy, cheap, insignificant kills.
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pop a break free, get your support class buddy to remove mez, try to break line of sight quicker. or abuse the old confuse target bug that allowed you to focus on one opponent essentially making confuse merely annoying to be hit with.
professor twixt's study is unempirical and doesn't come to any particularly insightful conclusions. people will get pissed off with you and attempt to enact retribution when justice is meted out by the public exclusively.
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An interesting study of the COH community.
Link
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I do not pvp.
What this guy did was not PvP.
It is FORCED PvE.
He is using tp to force another player into a confrontation with an NPC drone. NPCs are envirnment which is PvE.
So what he was doing was in no way PvP. He never killed the guys, just set it up for an NPC to do so.
I could do the same thing in a PvE zone. I could take a lvl 50 hero in PI. Get on a team with some hapless lvl 1 and TP him above a lvl 50+ mob. Boomed, force PvE.
Not PvP. Forced PvE!
Doosh.
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A lot of lies on that paper anyway. One in the description...Twixt" became perhaps the game's most reviled, abused player because his playing methods were unpopular.
Not many knew this goofball. He played on one server. Mostly PvP. He wasnt the GAMES MOST REVILED ABUSED player. Peckerwood was on one server, in one zone most of the time.
Lier 
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A lot of lies on that paper anyway. One in the description...Twixt" became perhaps the game's most reviled, abused player because his playing methods were unpopular.
Not many knew this goofball. He played on one server. Mostly PvP. He wasnt the GAMES MOST REVILED ABUSED player. Peckerwood was on one server, in one zone most of the time.
Lier
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^^ This.
Also: Yea, he played like a jerk and disregarded social customs and polite requests and so people treated him like a jerk. Big surprise there. Brilliant research, shocking conclusions. /e sarcasm
Wavicle, Energy/Energy Blaster, dinged 50 in Issue 4, summer of 2005.
@Wavicle, mostly on the Justice server.
The joke is he was paid good money to do this. Nice gig if you can get it... Meaning persuade a gullible department chair ignorant of game culture to let you structure a course around this. Not only that but he subjected his classes to his so-called experiment. I would've felt ripped off if I took a communications course and I had to sit thru this guy's lame theories. Comments in the local paper show that some of his students felt he wasted their time.
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The old tactic of confusing a player on the opposite side, allowing him to kill a member of his own faction, was technically w/in the rules, since game mechanics allowed it. But it was cowardly nonetheless. There was no risk involved since I couldn't attack back. Easy, cheap, insignificant kills.
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pop a break free, get your support class buddy to remove mez, try to break line of sight quicker. or abuse the old confuse target bug that allowed you to focus on one opponent essentially making confuse merely annoying to be hit with.
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Uh, you miss the point dude. No amount of break-free popping will let me attack a confused toon of my own faction in RV.
Specific example. A confused stalker entered villain base and killed my gf. My brute could do nothing. We had no options to remove confuse condition. Said stalker would not fight in arena. An a** and a chicken, colluding w/ his hero friends.
I believe that's been changed since then. So its just an illustration of jerk behavior in PvP, like what the Prof did. Just cause it can be done, doesn't make it ok to do so.
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The old tactic of confusing a player on the opposite side, allowing him to kill a member of his own faction, was technically w/in the rules, since game mechanics allowed it. But it was cowardly nonetheless. There was no risk involved since I couldn't attack back. Easy, cheap, insignificant kills.
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pop a break free, get your support class buddy to remove mez, try to break line of sight quicker. or abuse the old confuse target bug that allowed you to focus on one opponent essentially making confuse merely annoying to be hit with.
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Uh, you miss the point dude. No amount of break-free popping will let me attack a confused toon of my own faction in RV.
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oh, I see now. yeah, that tactic almost never happened. not much you can do about it but it didn't happen much to begin with.
You COULD get a Thermal or Sonic or Pain and go remove the Confuse from the Stalker.
Wavicle, Energy/Energy Blaster, dinged 50 in Issue 4, summer of 2005.
@Wavicle, mostly on the Justice server.
Weirdly ,as interesting a read as it was, I just couldn't get past the fact that this was less like a "socializing" experiement and more like "game creation" experiement.
I mean...when it comes down to it the rules of PvP were and are still in flux. It s more like if when football was created the "rules" allowed one side to keep kicking fieldgoals so long they kept making it over the goalposts.
It would have been "legal" but not fun for most teams.
And the rules would have been changed to remove the practice. Same with this game...if the players aren't having "fun" eventually the rules get changed to match the "social norms"...course we can always find holes in a game like this but still...because its a game social behavior is DIFFERENT from society. People here are for the most part trying to play a game....not actually be a hero or villian.
Worse his playing didn't even let him score...
And such playing HAS changed the rules with the Devs slowly changing the safe zones and powers to discourage his tactics.
What really surprises me is you all seem to have read the article on his paper, and some may have read the paper. But what really surprises me is that none of you seem to have zoomed on one of the main points of the article and the paper:
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Contrary to some stereotypes, people that play online computer games like "City of Heroes" aren't adolescent misfits. They tend to be what most would consider mainstream adults.*
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In other words, he played by the rules. We may not like what he did, but he did it - he may have even relished in the frustration he created - but all in all, one of the the main points is:
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They tend to be what most would consider mainstream adults.*
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Because:
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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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Granted, he may have pulled the extreme cases to prove his point:
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Another player added, "I hope your mother gets cancer."*
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And:
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When Myers took a break from the virtual world and went on vacation for a couple of weeks with his wife and daughters, players noticed his absence. One player started a discussion thread that claimed Myers had been banned from the game because he had called a fellow player a "n----r."
Another posting claimed Twixt was a convicted pedophile.*
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But it all furthers the point.
So, long story longer, after someone started this thread, ya all seem to miss the point, and started to continue in the same manor. In other words, a person played by the rules, people did not like it, and the main stream adults used a high school mentality to deal with the person who is out of the norm.
Also, if you read the paper, he did this on more that one server, and always the same reaction:
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Throughout the duration of his breaching play, Twixt endured threats of computer sabotage, real-life violence, and a variety of less speculative (and more achievable) in-game harassments and abuses. This pattern of escalating feelings and emotions was repeated very similarly on each of the three servers Twixt visited.**
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*http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2...fessor_be.html
**Myers, David (2008), "Play and Punishment: The Sad and Curious Case of Twixt"
You're as bad as he is.
"I played by the rules" is NOT a defense of antisocial behavior.
This is Not like State Rights. The players do Not have the right to do anything and everything that the rules don't specifically ban.
The community decides what is and isn't socially acceptable. The devs decide what is and isn't 'legally' acceptable.
Just because it's not explicitly forbidden does not mean it's completely acceptable.
Wavicle, Energy/Energy Blaster, dinged 50 in Issue 4, summer of 2005.
@Wavicle, mostly on the Justice server.
Wow, what an [censored].
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You're as bad as he is.
"I played by the rules" is NOT a defense of antisocial behavior.
This is Not like State Rights. The players do Not have the right to do anything and everything that the rules don't specifically ban.
The community decides what is and isn't socially acceptable. The devs decide what is and isn't 'legally' acceptable.
Just because it's not explicitly forbidden does not mean it's completely acceptable.
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No, I am not as bad as him. I wait till the other says ready before I get pwned. Just because one can see the point does not mean one agree with the tactics. First, I point out the facts the author is talking about the mentality of the average adult. Second, "The community decides what is and isn't socially acceptable," is so false. If you decide to fit into the "norm" of things, then go right ahead. If you decide to scream foul, kick, and threaten the "antisocial" person, then feel free to fit into that "norm" as well. (Again, sounds very high-school to me.) Laws, rules and regulations are in place to protect the general public. If the community decides those laws are unacceptable, then it is mob mentality. What if the community decides it is ok to stone people in the public square for disagreeing with the general opinion? Or, to call someone "un-American" because they do not wear a flag icon on their suit? Or, if one drives a huge gas sucking SuV they support terrorist? Does that mean everyone needs to agree, wear a flag icon and drive an electric car? No, because it is legal to voice an opinion of descent - it's called opposition, as in an opposing party. (It works quite well in a democracy.) It is okay to not wear a flag icon. It is okay to drive a gas sucking SuV. Why? Not because the community feels it is wrong, but because the laws say one can. Or is that what you mean by community decides? It is okay to do what you want till it offends my opinion, and/or the majorities opinion?
But ultimately, if we talk about what he does in PvP/E, we are talking about what is fair, what "The devs decide what is and isn't 'legally' acceptable." And logically, since in this game, RV is a war zone, why would you wait for the other to say "go," when you can sneak attack. Like a stalker running past you getting a good hit, using hit and run tactics, as a couple have done to me. But that is not fair, maybe I should scream foul. And the last time I went to RV on Freedom, I took my MM to the entrance. Seen lots of heroes, think it was about 20 - 30, door sitting on the red side. I thought I was in a safe area by the Arachnos Drone. But I was not, a hero TP'ed me into the middle of the group and they pwned me. Guess that is foul, unfair, but I am wrong. Why am I wrong? Because "The community decides what is and isn't socially acceptable. The devs decide what is and isn't 'legally' acceptable." So, according to what everyone is screaming foul about is you can TP someone into the middle of a crowd of players, but not NPC's. It is okay to use hit and run tactics, but only if you do not lead them into a group of NPC's. Correct? I am trying very hard to figure out what the "norm" is since the "war zone" has laws and rules.
Now, if you don't mind, I'm off to make it socially acceptable to street race in crowded suburbs while smoking in public restaurants filled with children. Because all it takes is one determined person, and then a whole lot of sheeple who so want to fit into the "norm" to make it socially acceptable. Hence, when you disagree with me, but the majority of the community is on my side, because "The community decides what is and isn't socially acceptable," whether the laws support me or you, I win at all cost. Yeah, baby, The American WAY!
An interesting study of the COH community.
Link