Aug 30th 2010, 3:34:54
The issue with team server is finding a standard of conduct that is both enforceable and fair. I cannot think of any standard that satisfies both criteria.
An example of a standard that is enforceable but not fair would be deleting any two tags who both war the same tag. However, would this be fair? What if tag A instigated the aggression towards both tags B and C? What if tag A has 5 five members, tag B has 2 members, and tag C has 3 members?
An example of a standard is that fair but not enforceable would be to not allow groups of tags to enforce any policy that is harmful to the server. After all, why does it matter if two tags are named pang1 and pang2 if they aren't hurting anyone else? However, this policy is not enforceable. The game moderators for each server do not play on those servers because we want them to be as impartial as possible when dealing with deletions and player issues. How would someone who doesn't play be able to keep track of all of the teams, especially when many of them exist only for a set or have no presence on the boards at all? How would moderators decide what is good or bad for the server? What if someone claims to be a representative of a tag on the boards but doesn't actually play there? What do we do when one member of a tag violates the spirit of the rules, should we delete the whole tag or just him?
Besides practical concerns, there are also philosophical concerns. Team is a clan server. The admins would like to see mature clans that have meaningful (both positive and negative) relationships with other clans. We don't want to see one group of players teaming up to gain an unfair advantage, but it has to be up to the players to prevent that. When MKR, RAG, and BEER were teaming up and killing other countries, I Fsed them with half of their numbers and won. The next set they changed most of their policies. Why can't you guys do that?
As many RD members have pointed out, other clans were doing this long before they appeared on the server. Many posters on the boards have been warning the community about what would eventually happen if players continued to use numerical advantages to enforce bad policies, but for the most part no one listened. If I had deleted the clans who were teaming up to do bad things, I would have been roasted on these boards for being biased and tons of players would throw a fit. However, now that RD basically has control of the server and RD are the Bad Guys, a lot more people want to see the game moderators get involved and delete them. Is it really so hard to recruit people to fight RD?
It's also worth realizing that if a strict interpretation of the rules means that half of the players on the server would be subject to deletion, maybe the rules or the server itself need to be changed.
The primary server is different because diplomacy is not a major part of gameplay. Ideally, diplomacy is handled country to country. Players teaming up for the most part are easy to spot. The situation isn't ideal and some guilty players escape without being deleted, but it's easy for honest players to avoid getting deleted for spirit of the rules violations.
By the way, the reason I got so pissed off before was because I find it to be very rude to post someone's emails on the boards without permission. I apologize for letting my temper get the better of me.
An example of a standard that is enforceable but not fair would be deleting any two tags who both war the same tag. However, would this be fair? What if tag A instigated the aggression towards both tags B and C? What if tag A has 5 five members, tag B has 2 members, and tag C has 3 members?
An example of a standard is that fair but not enforceable would be to not allow groups of tags to enforce any policy that is harmful to the server. After all, why does it matter if two tags are named pang1 and pang2 if they aren't hurting anyone else? However, this policy is not enforceable. The game moderators for each server do not play on those servers because we want them to be as impartial as possible when dealing with deletions and player issues. How would someone who doesn't play be able to keep track of all of the teams, especially when many of them exist only for a set or have no presence on the boards at all? How would moderators decide what is good or bad for the server? What if someone claims to be a representative of a tag on the boards but doesn't actually play there? What do we do when one member of a tag violates the spirit of the rules, should we delete the whole tag or just him?
Besides practical concerns, there are also philosophical concerns. Team is a clan server. The admins would like to see mature clans that have meaningful (both positive and negative) relationships with other clans. We don't want to see one group of players teaming up to gain an unfair advantage, but it has to be up to the players to prevent that. When MKR, RAG, and BEER were teaming up and killing other countries, I Fsed them with half of their numbers and won. The next set they changed most of their policies. Why can't you guys do that?
As many RD members have pointed out, other clans were doing this long before they appeared on the server. Many posters on the boards have been warning the community about what would eventually happen if players continued to use numerical advantages to enforce bad policies, but for the most part no one listened. If I had deleted the clans who were teaming up to do bad things, I would have been roasted on these boards for being biased and tons of players would throw a fit. However, now that RD basically has control of the server and RD are the Bad Guys, a lot more people want to see the game moderators get involved and delete them. Is it really so hard to recruit people to fight RD?
It's also worth realizing that if a strict interpretation of the rules means that half of the players on the server would be subject to deletion, maybe the rules or the server itself need to be changed.
The primary server is different because diplomacy is not a major part of gameplay. Ideally, diplomacy is handled country to country. Players teaming up for the most part are easy to spot. The situation isn't ideal and some guilty players escape without being deleted, but it's easy for honest players to avoid getting deleted for spirit of the rules violations.
By the way, the reason I got so pissed off before was because I find it to be very rude to post someone's emails on the boards without permission. I apologize for letting my temper get the better of me.