My view?.
Its not on.
Roleplay doesnt justify it.
Sorry, It was a very bad thing to do.
If they're not roleplayers, then yes, it's rather rude.
If they're RP'ers and don't know OOC, then it's also rather rude, but still not as rude as above.
If they're RP'ers and know and are fine with it OOC, knock yourselves out.
is that a Z?????????
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Depends on why you are doing it and how.
If its as part of a role-play SG/VG and all the players are aware of the rules of rp in their group...Then fine go for it.
Group takeovers are a staple of good IC politics, I was thinking of something similar in our villaing group. Maybe even having the end resolution(we can assume it would come to a confrontation) in warburg or arena (me and any allies I can get in the group Vs the loyalists).
It would be fun and the loyalists would have all the advantages (base teleporters/base med units), whereas the rebals would have no such support and risk possible character death on top of exile from the group (death would just be removing the char from RP).
[img]/uk/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]
As long as the rules of your group are observed, then fine.
Thing is that you're roleplaying the takeover, not the character; so what you're actually doing is roleplaying an OOC situation.
Now, if you all know this, fine. If you don't, you're treading very close to meta-gaming/griefing.
It doesn't really matter how well you did it if someone's getting hurt along the way. That's when RP turns into psychological bullying.
[/color]<blockquote><font class="small">En réponse à:[/color]<hr />
If you don't, you're treading very close to meta-gaming/griefing.
[/ QUOTE ]
I'm sorry but I don't understand (Pardon my French lack of vocabulary). It sure sounds like a really bad thing but what do you mean exactly?
Ok, Meta-gaming is where you play two or three levels of 'game' in one.
An example of which would be to try and seduce your friend's girlfriend in order to get him to lose a CoH battle. or as simple as throwing the dice at people who score a natural 20.
Both are wrong in that the other player don't know who you are being at any specific time. This leads onto griefing, which is the verbal equivalent of bullying, where you are subjecting a person to abuse in order to 'win'.
Now if people understand that this is happening, they can make valid judgements on behalf of their characters over who to promote; but with what you're doing, you're influencing the players to make judgements that they or their characters might not feel comfortable with.
Let's put it this way, if I started (as a character) to spread vicious rumours about your character with the 'game' of getting you to cancel your account, what would you think afterwards when I told you it was all a game.
For Reference: Watch Trading Places (film) sometime, two gents decide to ruin two men's lives for a dollar bet.
Hmm, I thought Meta-Gaming, when RPing, was when you use knowledge you aquired OOC (and couldn't know IC) as IC knowledge..
Or perhaps that's just a possible form of Meta-Gaming
@ShadowGhost & @Ghostie
The Grav Mistress, Mistress of Gravity
If you have nothing useful to say, you have two choices: Say something useless or stay quiet.
Similar thing SG, you're playing the OOC game at the same time as the IC game. The OP was using OOC tactics to win an IC game and then claiming he'd won the OOC game.
Whoaoh, I must thank you for such a deep insight on the subject. I don't even know why I bother asking this kind of question on French forums. You should see the level of the answers I get... [img]/fr/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]
Well, I started it, it's true.
If anyone is speaking French, I'd like to refer you to the following link: French Forum CoV
Let us know what you think.
Cheers
Hmmm...my french is a bit rusty so I babelfished it and there do seem to be a lot more emotional than rational responses there.
Perhaps it's just we English expect things to be broken, so we look on it in a more cynical way [img]/uk/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]
Oh, some of us Germans share your view... [img]/de/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]
@Digela:
But seriously, it is hard to tell if you have done anything wrong by taking over a SG. Would you care to elaborate a bit further?
If it was fun for you and nobody was griefed I would most certainly say that it is ok.
Concerning your mentioned points 1-3:
1. Why should you warn others of your intentions if you don´t mean them any harm? The leader(s) dictate(s) the SG´s politics and if these politics include the possibility of someone taking over (and thus having all power to change the SG´s politics if he wishes to), there is nothing to blame you for. You just took an opportunity presented by the rules.
2. The fact that someone has the possibility to harm others in the way you described does not make this person a griefer. Anybody has the chance to grief others at one point in the game or the other, but only those few who take those actions can be considered to be actually griefing. So, no wrongdoing here either.
3. It´s quite a philosophical question if CoX is geared more toward competition or cooperation. Both have it´s fair share, I guess. Otherwise there wouldn´t be much use for many badges, PvP or those terminals where you can compare statistics. In conclusion, I would not see this as a very strong argument against your actions.
And finally, regarding your remark about people being more concerned about what could have happened... Well, you know, the world is full of little carebears who have nothing better to do than to think of all possible perils and dangers. Of course, these guys often fail to realize what is really going on, because they are too trapped in their delusional fears...
Take their words for what they are: an opportunity to think about your actions, but don´t take them too serious when they engage full-carebear-mode.
If it has eyes, you can blind it, if it has blood, you can make it bleed, if it has a mouth, you can make it scream.
Now that's a good example to set here, sin... (your name says it all, doesn't it?)(j/k, I don't want to get personal)(though you'll note that the names sometimes really say a lot [img]/uk/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img])
I strongly disagree (as you may have babel-fished it from the french forums) with this kind of actions when they do not receive a global agreement from everyone involved. Not only do I disagree but I'm even coming here to share my opinion. I must be one of those über-carebears [img]/uk/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]
In my opinion, doing something wrong is never justified by the fact that no one complains about it. And "taking over" a sg was, again in my opinion (I would need some official info here), never intended by the developers. To me it would be considered as an exploit (I'm not sure about the technical term though). Thus, it is wrong. Plus, a sg is by definition the ultimate goal of the cooperation that is expected by everyone (devs & players) in a MMORPG, making it the last place where you want to have to watch your back for 'villains'.
Well, obviously I'm not the only one to think this way and to prefer building to destroying (or taking over). Unless it takes place in a global rp agreement where it becomes an official competition, based on, for example, the PVP victories, the prestige brought to the sg, the level... A "killer game" would be interesting enough, if everyone knows the rules of the game they're playing...
If someone creates a toon, and sets out with the specific goal of becomming a supergroup leader, is that immoral?
I'd call that ambition.
So is the problem that it was done for an RP reason, rather than a game reason?
If someone set out with the goal of infiltrating and *destroying* a supergroup, that's different, but it sounds like the OP wanted the SG intact and functioning, since they would have failed if it wasn't.
About the only moral quandry I can see here is if it's ok to boast about it on the forums afterwards, I don't actually see one in what happened.
I will however note that the fact that the membership as a whole cannot remove an unpopular leader means that if you do this right, no proplem, if you get it wrong, a lot of people are going to get hurt, at which point I would hope the person doing it would have the moral strength of character to put it right.
Lets also look at it from another point of view. IC != OOC
If you make it to the top of an SG IC, then at no stage should that (or in any SG worth the name would that) translate to any change at all in the OOC leadership levels. RP sg's tend to be more coperative by nature, so it's easier to do this way.
It all comes down to the fact that you should not demand or expect ooc power in an SG because you go after/have IC power. The reverse also applies.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
On the french board you said you took over a lazy SG and waited for an opportunity (like the leaders being on vacation) to model the SG to your tastes.
So, it's disconnected from any reference to a theme, roleplay or whatever.
It is presented as "I can use the game mechanics to do the takeover, so I did it".
No wonder why you got negative answers (but not that emotionnal).
Here you presented the same concept by linking it to a theme of world domination, which can be understood as a roleplay theme.
That said, taking-over a SG can lead to internal problems.
People who joined a SG may not agree about such change. They might be perfectly fine with remote leadership or whatever.
Even if the mechanics are transfering leadership to other members in time, they still belong to a community who was formed under certain circumstances and having certain goals.
Getting the leadership to force on the SG a change will be conflicting with what a certain number are waiting from it (most members, some, a few, depends of the SG and their dedication to it).
Your idea must then probably be used only in SG where such mindset (struggle for power) is already existing or in SG where you believe the idea would work (considering the latter option is probably very hard to guess unless you know well the SG).
Bases, SG leaderships, are most of the time considered as "common investment" and it will probably always negatively be seen that an "outsider" come to take control.
Because he probably didn't work "as hard" as others, for example or because he was "invited".
The SG mechanics are generally viewed as a separate thing from roeplay.
One possible damage such tactic would cause is not to stimulate people into engaging a struggle for power (as they didn't ask for it at first) but rather drop out of the SG in frustration, create another one and become more selective about recruiting.
Of course, a "guenine" take-over is not that damaging. Getting power, showing you got it, warning people and waiting for their reactions is less damaging.
Still, SG can react by telling you to bail out, maybe definitively, or disintegrate from frustration.
Like everything else in roleplay, acceptance and consensual game is the main rule.
A sneaky take-over (I mean, entering a SG with only that purpose in mind and not trying to know if others are fine with such concept) is just breaking that consensual gaming.
You just force on others your views about how you can play with SG mechanics.
So, triggering negative answers.
In theory, a roleplaying SG with roleplayed inner conflicts would fit for your idea.
Yet, such a SG is probably somewhat active as inner struggle is part of their fun.
So, it also probably reduces your chance to do the takeover by using game mechanics to nil.
And yes, there isn't really tools for managing power struggle in SG rather than just waiting for the leaders to be demoted.
Finally, either you're going to get negative reactions from people who don't want to see you just using a game mechanic to get power. Either you're going to see SG members who won't care at all.
But then, if they don't care, what's the purpose of the takeover ?
Hi Guys,
I am referring to having a character infiltrating a SG with the (secret) goal of taking over leadership.
Now, I'm not so concerned about the feasibility of such plan as I succeeded recently on Defiant and bragged about it on french forums (only to be flamed by most respondents)
Now I thought it would be controversial, but not that controversial.
Just to give you some background, my idea was to develop a new plan of world domination (actually more like a multi-server domination) where you would create characters on different servers and attempt to size power within SGs (I think I used the term hold up to qualify my deed which could also explain the amount of emotional reaction).
Now some of the many critics I got were that
1. I didn't warn other players about my intentions therefore this was unethical, mean, disgusting etc..
2. the possibility, once in power, to kick out previous leaders, destroy the base or freeze completely normal dynamics between members (I did none of those things but that's not the point) would damage other player's fun and therefore it should not be tolerated
3. CoV was more geared toward cooperation. The competitive aspects of the game (PvP, bases attacks) were carefully regulated and consensual. (I must say I found this critic the most valid, we would need to have some feedback from the devs or moderators)
Actually some respondents went imagining phantasmagorical scenarios where players emotions were shattered and the many months spent building a glorious base were thrown to oblivion but in fact few cared about what really took place (what could have happened seemed more appealing to them I guess)
So I'd really like to have your perspective on this. Thanks.