What happened to Diplomacy?

[Elijah]

We may be a player driven community, but we are a volunteer maintained gameing forum. Those volunteers who have long tenure and been apart of the continued maintaining of this forum are best to determine who among them should fill positions of authority. I have complete trust in the staff to do what is best for the forum without collective voting approval from the rest of us players.

[Jake]

...One thing that bothers me? I've heard tale that all private messages in ROH chat are logged and visible by some admins.

Where have you heard this particular rumor?

The mechanism that handles FlashChat's rooms also handles the IMs.

So, yes, it IS true that messages sent via IM are logged to a database. However, let me clarify a couple of points. The database is the backend that keeps track of rooms, people in rooms, etc. So, the database is where information is stored that will be used to update the room display and to keep track of who's conversing with whom. The purpose of the database is just to handle the flow of information (in other words, it wasn't added in order to harvest IMs).

Also, the chat/IM info that's recorded is not permanently saved. If it were, we'd be filling up the database at a prodigious rate, and that would cause problems of lag, in addition to costing the admins money to host a larger and larger database.

That's why the chatlogs are only available going back a couple of weeks. They get purged on a regular basis (or should be) to clear up space for more *temporary* data.

So, during that two week window, could an admin access that data, and puzzle out an IM between two people. Yeah. We could do it. But to be clear about that, there are "admins" and there are "admins". Only a scant handful of people have the logins necessary to reach the data, and only a smaller subset of us would know how to pull it out. Off the top of my head, I can think of only 5 people that could do it, and of those 5 I'm not even sure a couple of them are still actively involved in the forum (beyond supporting it).

If trust is an issue, and you don't feel you can trust the very small few of us (me, Xeno, Brig, Dave, Shell) that CAN access that data (before it gets automatically purged), then you can do what my wife does, and only use AIM for her private conversations.

For my own part, I'd never tried accessing this data until this afternoon. So, while I knew I'd be able to get to it, I'd never had any reason to do so until Rakeesh made the comment.

Does anyone have any specific knowledge/belief that this data has been inappropriately accessed? If so, please feel free to contact me (privately if you prefer not to do so on the boards).

Yes, the data is there. No, it's not there in order to track anyone, and it's purged on a regular basis. Hopefully there's no merit to this particular rumor. I can't think of any reason why any of us that *could* do it would have done so.

-Jake

[Napoleon Bonarat]

I'm pretty sure that AIM and any other instant/private messaging system also keeps some sort of log for some certain amount of time.

[Jake]

I'm pretty sure that AIM and any other instant/private messaging system also keeps some sort of log for some certain amount of time.

True, but if it's a trust issue with the RoH admin folks, AIM is an alternative.

No matter what path you go, someone, somewhere, probably has access to it. If they have the right privileges. What's key is whether you trust them to hold that info (even temporarily).

[Napoleon Bonarat]

No matter what path you go, someone, somewhere, probably has access to it. If they have the right privileges. What's key is whether you trust them to hold that info (even temporarily).

That's exactly what I was trying to get across. I prefer AIM. Mostly because of that unnerving function of the PM/Chat tool that if you send an flash chat IM to someone who logged out, your IM chat seems to be sent to the chat room at large. I've learned that it doesn't actually send it to the room, it only appears on my chat screen. I've checked logs and asked people if they saw certain lines of text and they didn't. But still... freaky.

[Amaltea]

That's exactly what I was trying to get across. I prefer AIM. Mostly because of that unnerving function of the PM/Chat tool that if you send an flash chat IM to someone who logged out, your IM chat seems to be sent to the chat room at large. I've learned that it doesn't actually send it to the room, it only appears on my chat screen. I've checked logs and asked people if they saw certain lines of text and they didn't. But still... freaky.

Right, the message goes to the screen because, and this is just a guess, the flash chat is "telling" you that the person you tried to IM is gone. Unlike AIM where you get the message that the other person is gone or when they logged off.

[Artemus Kurgen]

Additionally, despite not normally or always agreeing with Artemus - his post in this thread is the one that I believe to be the most important, and least assuming. Jake brings up many good points as well. And Sartan, being the veteran player that he is, shows us that it is not only the newer blood that believe that things here may not always be upheld with the greatest of communal thought.

I think I'm going to faint. Never thought I'd see this day....

[Rakeesh]

My computer blew up the other day, so I will attempt to keep this brief (for me).

In short reply to G'nort, I'm not attempting to judge your position - I truly am not. As far as the argument that people leave for many reasons? Yes, there are many multiple factors. Having been friends with the people on -that- list that left, I can say that even though there were multiple reasons (and in one case, in particular, destructive behavior on their part), the one primary reason people left was that they had been cold shouldered or acted against in a very passive aggressive way by the group of people who made/make up a lot of the "admin group". This ties in with my last sentence, and so I will clarify that as well.

The many, many people here? I am referring to people who have, throughout the years, spoken up against things that they believe to be unfair, passive aggressive acts from admins or popular players, or perceived bias. People like the author of this thread. The common response that I see is that they are being unappreciative, negative, and unfair themselves - this may or may not sometimes be the case. However, the fact that the same arguments have been brought up by many different players, for many years - to me - means that there is at least relevance in the attitude or status quo that causes players here to feel shafted or treated unfairly. I hope that clarifies exactly what I meant.

What am I calling for? Transparency. Fairness. And for more of an ear granted to players on "the outside", like the one who posted this thread. The latter I feel to be the most important - to make players who feel at odds with certain groups or certain perceived behaviors still feel welcome and wanted here. Zombie-ing in follow of heavy time-contributing volunteers is a kind way to avoid conflict, but it increases some players' experience of isolation here, and does affect the playerbase's ability to sustain and grow in the way we -all- would like it to.

-----

And Jake - thank you. I think it is fairly well known amongst at least a good number of players that the chats IMs can be logged. But since it hasn't been addressed before to my knowledge, it sort of was creepish to some people (including myself) - I do try to use AIM instead of the chat feature in flashchat, and I do not have any reason to believe that anyone's read over my own PM logs - but I do feel it is an example of one of those things that I wish I'd heard from the mouth of the staff first, instead of the mouth of a disgruntled player.

[Rix Favre]

I gotta be honest, being one of those "outsiders" I can't ever recall knowing about any sort of bias or passive aggressive acts from the admin or popular players to anyone else. To be fair, I haven't been an active duelist in years, but I still keep up with things regularly and get in the chat rooms enough.

Perhaps it might be the disgruntled players who need to make the first step toward reconciling any sort of bias, perceived or real?

What are you speaking of when you say people have been treated unfairly? Give us some examples. In my opinion, for wanting transparency, you're being awful vague yourself. Who's being shafted? Who's being treated unfairly or shunned?

Now this isn't to say there aren't any problems, otherwise people wouldn't feel the need to leave, but I'm just wondering if these problems are being blown out of proportion or are as bad as what you suggest.

[Sartan]

In short reply to G'nort, I'm not attempting to judge your position - I truly am not. As far as the argument that people leave for many reasons? Yes, there are many multiple factors. Having been friends with the people on -that- list that left, I can say that even though there were multiple reasons (and in one case, in particular, destructive behavior on their part), the one primary reason people left was that they had been cold shouldered or acted against in a very passive aggressive way by the group of people who made/make up a lot of the "admin group". This ties in with my last sentence, and so I will clarify that as well.

The many, many people here? I am referring to people who have, throughout the years, spoken up against things that they believe to be unfair, passive aggressive acts from admins or popular players, or perceived bias. People like the author of this thread. The common response that I see is that they are being unappreciative, negative, and unfair themselves - this may or may not sometimes be the case. However, the fact that the same arguments have been brought up by many different players, for many years - to me - means that there is at least relevance in the attitude or status quo that causes players here to feel shafted or treated unfairly. I hope that clarifies exactly what I meant.

What am I calling for? Transparency. Fairness. And for more of an ear granted to players on "the outside", like the one who posted this thread. The latter I feel to be the most important - to make players who feel at odds with certain groups or certain perceived behaviors still feel welcome and wanted here. Zombie-ing in follow of heavy time-contributing volunteers is a kind way to avoid conflict, but it increases some players' experience of isolation here, and does affect the playerbase's ability to sustain and grow in the way we -all- would like it to.

I'm neither a member of the admin team nor a particularly "popular" player (although I don't really know how that's judged?) but I wanted to respond to that post.

I think we can all agree that transparency and fairness are everyone's ideal. However, railing against the entire admin team and whoever your perception of popular players are, while at the same time asking for that transparency and fairness, is really uncalled for and completely counterproductive in my eyes. The point you're trying to make gets buried under jargon like "zombie-ing in" and the message ends up looking like an assault even if you preface it with your opening statement of "In short reply to G'nort, I'm not attempting to judge your position - I truly am not."

I almost gave up these games for good a while back because I was so completely disgusted by the actions of another player. To this day, I avoid interaction with that person as much as possible and it's only been relatively recently that I've had my characters start interacting more with characters and players who were new to me. What kept me coming back after that bad experience was the enjoyment I got from interacting with a few select people, one of whom recently announced she'd be leaving (which majorly sucks, by the by.)

What's the point of that story? I don't think there's anything wrong with having playgroups or a group of people you enjoy interacting with, and you shouldn't be described as being "elitist" or "cliquey" or any other word because of it. I almost always go out of my way to interact with people new to the forum and games, even if it means bending my character to do so.

The main point that story is meant to convey, though, is that the admins and the cool kids aren't the only people capable of driving away players. Everyone playing these games is a member of a community, and we should all try to remember that we're supposed to be doing this because it's fun. If you're the reason someone else stops having fun, you probably need to reevaluate what you're doing.

[Napoleon Bonarat]

I admire your champion attitude, Rakeesh, but we're all adults (or should at least be acting that way ), so these people that left because of other people/groups treating them poorly should defend themselves or explain in their own words why they left, without targeting specific people. Otherwise, yeah, I'm with Rix and think some of what you are saying is way too vague to make a judgment for myself about what happened to the absent players.

I agree that we need more transparency (where we've been, where we're at now, where we're going) from admin to patrons. More transparency makes it easier to see what's truly fair and what's truly not.

But at the same time, patrons need to be transparent too. They shouldn't rely on champions to speak for them. They need to speak for themselves. Or admit that their priorities have changed and they simply don't care about RPing here like they used to, and that includes being part of the IC *and* OOC drama at times. I wonder if you care more about why people leave than some of those people that left do?

I feel like an outsider a lot of times too and I've been around for 13 years!

[Rakeesh]

But at the same time, patrons need to be transparent too. They shouldn't rely on champions to speak for them. They need to speak for themselves. Or admit that their priorities have changed and they simply don't care about RPing here like they used to, and that includes being part of the IC *and* OOC drama at times. I wonder if you care more about why people leave than some of those people that left do?

I probably do care more about why they left than many of them do, and what Rix, Sartan, and Napoleon have said is right. I'm being too vague in my criticisms. I'll try to be as clear as I can without unwantingly injuring anyone's feelings or causing them to feel attacked. My vagueness stems from caution and not manipulation - I know how it feels to be in the hotseat, so to say.

The reason why I am avoiding specifics, is because a lot of the "drama" surrounding players that leave here is still a very sore subject for some players, and it is dangerous to "take sides". There was once a Baron that I challenged, who incorrectly assumed me to be siding with a friend of mine who had gotten himself into the anti-admin hotseat and was forced to leave the forum. This Baron wrote the head of DoS an email saying that they OOCly refused to accept my challenge because they believed me to be harrassing them - whereas the truth was that I challenged this particular Baron as a personal challenge to myself. They stated that they would resign their Barony before dueling me - and in order to avoid creating waves that would likely embitter me and cause me to quit playing entirely, I chose to rescind my own challenge for their players' sake.

This is a less aggressive action taken than others with my critical view of some (and I'll repeat, not nearly all) of the people who are in charge here would have taken. Never-the-less, it is just one of many incidents that make it hard for even me to enjoy playing here, despite my pro-active, never-ending optimistic attitude.

Things like this happen all the time. I could turn this thread into a list of greviences to make things "less vague", and it could be a long list if I put my mind to it. But my point instead is to encourage -everyone- to stop trashing threads and ideas that are critical of admins and rules. My point is to encourage everyone to consider why many players feel critically in the same way, even if most are too disillusioned to speak up about it themselves. My point is to encourage a change in the attitude(s) of the past - to allow for a more receptive, non-bias communication - and to do what Jake has done in this thread and try to offer insight into what exactly is going on behind the scenes.

I'm not trying to cause drama at all. I am close to having to make a decision, after several years of struggling with feeling fairly unwelcome here by many for one reason or another, of whether or not I will continue to play. In retrospect, I have looked at other people who have been in my position before and what the community's response to them was. My opinion is that there is little be done to fight this disillusion, which is as much or more a threat to our longterm playerbase than advertising and graphical MMORPGs are. These are the things that I am now wrestling with, and the things that many others have wrestled with before quitting. It is a bad status quo to exist in - hence my involvement in this thread.

[Napoleon Bonarat]

OK. So you shared your experience, which is really the important one because you are actually still here! I honestly don't care about anyone's experience who left and isn't here to talk about it themselves. Otherwise, it's just a dubious guessing game.

I understand your frustration and I get the sense you felt like you couldn't defend yourself against the accusation and be taken seriously at the same time because of bias some staff had in favor of the challenged.

I have ideas on how to get past that, but I'm gonna do it in PM.

[Karen Wilder]

There was a time when I almost quit the dueling community all-together...

I won't bother going into the details here... What happened, and why, aren't important to the general conversation.

In the end, it was because of good people like Matt, Spiffy and Al that I ended up finding new ways to contribute and stay around the forum.

Basically, the lesson here is that even if you do have problems with someone else... member of the staff or not... there are always plenty of others around, and plenty of other reasons to stay.

[The Amazing Nova]

This place hasn't changed much in fifteen years.

Sure the chat window is different, but it's still Rhydin. It's still a mishmash of everyones' imagination and talent. It's still a product of YOUR (general) abilities and failings.

Admins are great. They keep the ship running. Thank you admins.

But they have nothing to keep running without the people that frequent the place.

At the end of the day, the duels are a product of you. They're a product of some of the most creative minds on this planet (that no one seems to know about) and they're a product of the people that just prefer to shut up and send moves in as if this were a schoolyard game of rock-paper-scissors without the kid that can punch you in the stomach with the rock or slap you with the paper.

This is your entertainment. Should you have a say in how its run? Maybe.

Here's why I say maybe:

A few years ago, the decision was made to remove some of the rings from the baronial titles. Some people felt there were too many titles and too few duelists. I didn't. Would I love for things to always go my way and for people to bow to the concepts vomited up from the depths of my spectacular mind? Absolutely. Do things always go that way? No. The decision was made, I gave my opinion, and I left the duels for a while because they ceased to be fun for me.

Not because I couldn't stand people or decisions or the in game story, but because it wasn't fun for me. It's that simple. When it's not fun, stop doing it. The world is crappy enough without living a crappy life in a fictional setting. C'mon now.

So there's the 'maybe' of it. If you run it, someone else isn't going to agree with you and your carefully crafted Plan To Make Everyone Happy turns to dust. If they run it, the only person whose fun you have to worry about is you - and here's a trade secret: you can ignore whatever you don't like. Even the most slimy individual in the world cannot get to you here unless you let them.

Don't like the people that can't separate IC from OOC? Don't play with them. Easier said than done? No. Seriously. Don't play with them. Don't like people that don't RP? Don't duel them. But there's no one else to duel? Go read a book. Or play something else. I hear that Warcraft game is popular with the kids these days.

At the end of the day, this place is an extension of you. It's the fluffy pillow you can rest your head against or its the rusty razor you can cut yourself with (cheer up emo kid). This is a free form roleplaying environment. The people that run it can't do anything to change it. This place can either be a worthless blackhole of stifled creativity or the last place left on the planet to cooperatively write decent fiction.

Tell your story. Most of us are waiting to hear it. And the rest of them can go to hell.