The NS community is too easy on people who switch sides

unibot:
Bigameplayism is invading for fun and defending for fun, which is sweet and cuddedly but lacking in political depth and gritty ideology.
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Going back to an earlier statement, is it your intention to say that it is bad to lack political depth and gritty ideology? Because as much as I can manage to read the debate between you and Abbey (and Uni, I do agree with Abbey that your language is VERY difficult to read), it seems to boil down to whether or not you treat the idea of bigameplayism as a "valid" way to play the game.

And seriously... wtf is up with this word. bigameplayism. :duh:
 
Former English Colony:
And seriously... wtf is up with this word. bigameplayism. :duh:
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They came up with it themselves.

Furthermore, telling someone to make their argument stand on their own is a poor way to debate. Often times someone else has said what they wanted to say more eloquently, or it helps establish their argument with more credibility. Quotes from people who are known as credible add credibility to one's argument by association. "See! I'm no the only one with these views! Also others have said it better than I could say it myself." It strengthens one's argument to have others that can be referred to.
 
Former English Colony:
And seriously... wtf is up with this word. bigameplayism. :duh:
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It is Jargon. In Flemingovian tradition Satan invented Jargon to prevent humans from understanding each other and to promote the sin of pride.

It was Jargon that caused the first political scientist, Tobinu, to fall from grace when he coined a word that nobody else could understand, but which made him sound very very clever. His pride at this caused God to turn him into 46 cents in loose change* and he disappeared behind the sofa.






*do not question the ways of God.
 
First things first, bi-gameplay as a term was not invented as a serious term. At all. It was Bel coming up with the word because we wanted something silly in our sigs when we first started doing this - it really was just meant as a joke. It's been picked up by other people as a serious term.

There is only one thing which I want to say directly in response to your post, Uni. One, is that you really didn't get the point over terminology. When you start spouting latin and having to italicise it, an alarm bell in your head should go off that this isn't layman terms.

You put this post up, using what you try to claim is proper logic, and use varying levels of veiled insults in order to try and push the other person into submission. You treat everyone else like your playthings, as if they are things to be manipulated and pushed around to suit your own point of view. You suppress dissent within your own organisation, because you don't want an argument, and then criticise other people for walking away because they are sick and tired of dealing with you. Everything you do treats this game like an alternative reality, where you should be king, and silly things like rules shouldn't get in your way.

You claim to want to "do the right thing", to have founded an organisation which is focused solely around the idea of protecting natives, and then you try to push other defending groups around when they don't comply, and they don't make the UDL seem like the best defending group ever. You don't want to shatter that little alternative reality you've built for yourself where the UDL is doing the most for natives, all of the time.

I think you need a reality check. You have created an organisation which, quite frankly, scares me, and others (which is why I'm very soon no longer going to be a part of it). It does not act in the best interests of natives, rather, in order to get back at those who have "hurt" you in the past. What scares me the most is that you have created a culture where people then proceed to follow almost blindly, because if you say that it's the right thing to do, then it must be. Those that question initially are thrown something very similar to what you have said to me in this thread, and that again, gives them the point of you "well it must be right". You have created this organisation which has the capability to do great good - and has done - into something which is almost purely to fulfill your own twisted grasp on reality.

I've seen this happen, and I'm sure there will be surefire evidence of it once I've posted this. Of course, there are a few people left within the organisation who are there simply because they want to defend, and at present it is the largest organisation and without otherwise limiting your options, you're not going to be able to avoid working with it. I think that when any organisation gets to that size, it risks problems - but when it's head is a man who obsessively holds grudges and is not scared to issue ultimatums to people, despite those ultimatums going against everything you apparently believe in, you have a particularly bad recipe for disaster.

I've had enough of dealing with you, Uni. I'm not alone, just not everyone is quite willing to say it to your face, because the barrage of harassment and abuse that follows is enough to put anyone off. It's a culture of fear. I hope that other people will see this, and even if one or two question what they think about you and your actions, then I'll consider it a victory. You harass people in such a way that they are left in a position where they can report it to no authority, either through blackmail of some sort or by going across as many different platforms as possible. I am not the only person fed up with your harassment, of your hate campaigns against anything and everything you disagree with. You see no boundaries between different parts of the game, or even between the game and real life, and you don't care who you slander by crossing boundaries. You will stop at nothing and you don't care who you hurt in the process. And you know that I'm not lying about a single word of this, although I know damned well that you're going to shout "PROOF!". I don't have access to most of it, but there are people that do - and I'm fairly sure that some of them will be willing to help me prove it.

Wake up from your dreamland, or you're going to find that the fall from your pedestal when you're finally brought down is going to be a very, very painful one indeed.
 
King Durk the Awesome:
It seems there are next to no political consequences for switching back and forth from defender to invader, etc. Thoughts?
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I'm not entirely sure how we got to where we are in this thread, considering that the above is the topic of it. I'm not sure how we ended up bickering about bigameplayism at all, really, or why this thread just turned into a copy of the million on the NS Forum where players are all shouting at each other and saying shit behind each other behind their backs and cheering when those they disagree with get screwed over..

But I'm going to try to get this back onto the actual topic at hand, rather than a shouting contest in front of what seems to be a region that would prefer ear plugs to this nonsense.

This is, of course, me speaking from my own experiences and clearly an opinion piece--not fact.

Personally, I think that the NS Community as a whole has grown, making it easier to accept people who switched from one side to another, because there's the fact that once they switch--they will have a very, very hard time switching back. Yeah, maybe it creates a bit of an intelligence problem for both sides there, but I don't think that we're seeing as much random switching--at least amongst the more prominent players. I would assume that Tim and Cormac both put a lot of time and thought into their decisions to switch, and both have been rather ostracized from many raider communities because of it or called rude things by those that used to be their gamemates. I know I personally took it rather seriously when I switched because it was abandoning a loyalty to one side that I had had for three years.

A few things that I would say are contributing to people switching, though, is the general atmosphere of both sides of the game. We're getting more non-gameplayers into gameplay these days and some newer players coming to the front line. Older groups are still existing, but they're rather tight-knit and arguably harder to get involved within. Thus, it's harder to gain trust in groups that are locked up tight--so we have wild and rambunctious groups too for those that just want to jump right in no matter what their past is. We've got a rather big spectrum at the moment. Bah, this wasn't the point I was trying to get to with this paragraph, but I guess a decennt one all the same...

Anywho, what I've seen is a more personal hostility on both sides of the game, perhaps with "morals/ethics' coming back into play, or just because those are the kind of positions that the RL people behind the players need to fit into that day. They need to feel like the good guy or the bad guy, to fit into a role, and to put on a mask in game. And of course, everyone should recognize that that's part of the game--but that this is all a game, and everything done in game is taken by those characters. It's an odd mix that NS just -has- where people get to know each other on deeper, more personal levels than in-game..but also go after the jugular when arguing about the silly nuances of one small aspect of the game. And I think because of this weird cognitive dissonance when dealing with other players, we're leading to hostile environments shielding each side from each other, burning up those in the middle while creating safe-havens for those strongly on each side. (Crappy analogy, I know.) Perhaps I'm biased because I know of the community within defender organizations and remember the friendships with the boys that I raided with back in the day and the closeness there compared to the general 'gameplay' atmosphere. It's like..your friend is your friend that you will die for, but anyone that spites them is your worst enemy, and deserves terrible things to happen to them. Then, when people -do- get to know their "enemy", they hit a cognitive dissonance and begin to look badly on their old groups that disapprove of them "fraternizing with the enemy" and thus switch.

Or, maybe it really is just people playing the moral/ethics card again. I can't say I really get this one as I really do just play this game for the people, but if that's what floats your boat in-game and you ain't judging anyone IRL for their actions, then go, have fun, whatever.

So..I've rambled a lot and tried to address..sort of different parts of this thread and just things in general, but I think that there -are- consequences for switching "sides" because of how, in general, gameplayers cruelly treat each other based on alliances rather than the actual intensity of game activities. If you switch the people who were your friends are probably going to tell you to get fucked, even if you were RL close. And that's fucked up. Consequences for switching, or anything like that, should only be in-game. We shouldn't be treating each other so shittily over gameplay--and that means all of us.

I have a headache and have been feeling crappy all day, so leave me alone on shit writing. >.> Too many points to try to address while staying on topic, frak ya' all.
 
Most military gameplay occurs at an hour of the day when most of the people who play this game should be sleeping, studying, or trying to get laid. People who take the R/D game too seriously should accordingly be viewed with the utmost suspicion.

(Cormac)

When I switched from invader to defender, I was all but banned from the region I founded and put months of work into, banned without trial in another region in which I held office, and tried in yet another region with a permanent ban as my sentence no doubt pending. My chance at higher office in another region in which I was involved was also destroyed by my switch (not that this was the only impediment to higher office for me there), despite that region's claim of independence. It's my understanding that others who have switched sides have faced similar consequences.
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I presume that the bolded part refers to my home region of Europeia.

You have read Unibot's posts here. If we take him at his word, he considers anyone who disagrees with his ideology to be his enemy. I think you can understand why someone who is part of his organization would have difficulty being elected President of Europeia. Our history, however, shows that a defender stance is no impediment to attaining the presidency (Lexus and PhDre, for example). More recently, our most successful political figures (Vinage and me, among others) have been people who eschewed R/D ideology altogether.

Unibot

It's a social strategy to create a deterrence factor regarding switching. "Don't want to lose your friends? Don't switch" is the message the strategy tries to suggests to players. Then the other side uses the existence of this strategy to argue they're not true friends at all. The sad part, both sides are wrong. One side is wrong for trying to impose this deterrence on their friends and the other side is wrong for assuming they're not genuine friends because they commit these practices.
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You are overthinking this.

Just as a relationship between two addicts will last only until one of them gets sober, a relationship between two players that is based solely on game play will not survive one of those players switching sides. It's unrealistic to expect otherwise.

On the other hand, a relationship between two players that transcends game play should survive a switch just fine. My friendship with Earth is a good example -- perhaps I have been a crappy friend and don't keep in touch as I should now that we don't frequent the same forums, but her switch had no effect whatsoever on my feelings. Same goes for Abbey (and Cormac too, though we weren't as close). I hope they all know that.
 
Skizzy Grey:
You are overthinking this.

Just as a relationship between two addicts will last only until one of them gets sober, a relationship between two players that is based solely on game play will not survive one of those players switching sides. It's unrealistic to expect otherwise.

On the other hand, a relationship between two players that transcends game play should survive a switch just fine.
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:agree:
 
As far as friendship goes, my issue is not which side of the gameplay fence a player chooses to play. It is how they play that matters to me. You may be a defender, but if you lie to me, betray my trust or act like a shit - then you have lost my trust. You may be a raider, but if you act straight with me, then I will overlook your hangups about your tiny genitalia. When you hit puberty, we can hang out.


Another fair and even handed post from Flemingovia.
 
flemingovia:
As far as friendship goes, my issue is not which side of the gameplay fence a player chooses to play. It is how they play that matters to me. You may be a defender, but if you lie to me, betray my trust or act like a shit - then you have lost my trust. You may be a raider, but if you act straight with me, then I will overlook your hangups about your tiny genitalia. When you hit puberty, we can hang out.


Another fair and even handed post from Flemingovia.
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:rofl: :rofl:

:worship: :worship: :worship: :worship: :worship:
 
If we're laying down philosophies... I will modify Flem's. ^_^
flemingovia:
As far as friendship goes, my issue is not which side of the gameplay fence a player chooses to play. .... if you lie to me, betray my trust or act like a shit - then you have lost my trust.
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And I think that goes for most of the people that truly support TNP.
 
I'm slightly split on that thought. I've had to go against many people in-game, in order to do my chosen job. I've never betrayed someone IRL, however.

I think, if you can maintain an RL/IG split, you'll do okay.

~B

Edit: This is not to say that every ingame action should be forgiven, eh flem? :P
 
I like to be consistent. ;)

It should be noted that the time I went against you, I was going against -defenders- in general, anyone who was putting fingers into TEP. It wasn't personal.
 
Skizzy Grey:
On the other hand, a relationship between two players that transcends game play should survive a switch just fine. My friendship with Earth is a good example -- perhaps I have been a crappy friend and don't keep in touch as I should now that we don't frequent the same forums, but her switch had no effect whatsoever on my feelings. Same goes for Abbey (and Cormac too, though we weren't as close). I hope they all know that.
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^ Incredibly true. And you know I love ya, Skizzy. I actually meant to call you the other day, but my service is still being crappy and college apps have me super busy. >< Miss you. <3.

A NS friend of mine that I've known since I joined the game has been on the same side as me, different places on the same side, and then on the opposite side. He's been in and out of the game over the last few years and is currently stationed in Afghanistan fighting in the US Army. I still talk to him every day. Switches shouldn't mean shit if they're an actual RL friend--but it does really just depend on what the friendship is based on.
 
Biyah:
I like to be consistent. ;)

It should be noted that the time I went against you, I was going against -defenders- in general, anyone who was putting fingers into TEP. It wasn't personal.
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Why do people always say "It isn't personal" when what they really mean is that it isn't personal for them. Is that supposed to make it somehow less offensive?
 
Perhaps because it's true for me. If gameplay became personal to me, I'd leave. And by the flip side, this is a place where I (and anyone) can play out a persona and contemplate actions that we wouldn't necessary consider IRL.

I still speak with most of my 'enemies' through the years, most of the time we'd had a good laugh about what we were doing while we were actively fighting in-game. This is not always the case, of course. And if flem took my actions during the Empire personally, then I was never told about it.

Whereas I can see the point of (and have done) a cold shoulder to those who acted in certain ways in-game (such as switching allegiance) within the game, I don't see how this is a reason for RL fallout.

~B
 
Skizzy Grey:
More recently, our most successful political figures (Vinage and me, among others) have been people who eschewed R/D ideology altogether.
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Except you haven't. Your recent posts in Europeia show you explicitly support raiders.

That's not 'eschewing r/d ideology', that's being a cheerleader from the sidelines.
 
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