*chuckle*

I think this thread is quite amusing, though probably not for The_Logos and the rest of Achaea's admin. Personally, I have very little experience of Achaea itself but far too much experience of the attitude displayed here.

What I find amusing is that the player shelled out $200 on a game without questioning her actions or experiences. Throwing money at something you don't like is only likely to make you more resentful.

There are TONS of muds out there, offering quite different environments and player-bases. Most of them are completely free and don't even accept donations. To my mind, a true newbie should take their time sampling what's on offer before committing any money to mudding.

I am now a regular donator to my chosen mud, having played there for several years and found the experience wholly enjoyable. I can understand why people do the same thing for Achaea.

I'm guessing English isn't your first language Enola - if it is, then my second guess is a serious deficiency in language skills, or maybe even an attention problem. Here's the answers to your question, which were already posted on this thread and easy to read on page 2.

1) In ordered to learn certain skills that are only offered by certain guilds, you must be a member of that guild. If you leave that guild, you lost those guild-specific skills.

2) What was clear in reading Matt's response, was that no credits were taken away from Kimberly. She spent her credits on things - and those things were taken away because she abused the privilege of getting those things. She chose to spend her credits unwisely, in other words.

3) The_logos IS Matthew Mihaly. He didn't have to change his name to be that.

Finally - that sentence - your closing "With no discontent" - did you mean "With no disrespect?" I'm just curious about that..heh.

Quick response here as I have a flight to catch:

Nobody -ever- takes credits away from a player unless it is a result of credit card fraud, and players, or even normal Gods, cannot take them away. On Achaea, only 4 of us (all paid, full-time employees) can do so. What Kimberly lost was lessons. You can spend credits on lessons, and also get lessons by rising in level through questing, hunting, etc. You can get credits by buying them from us or getting them as rewards or buying them from other players, in-game. You use lessons, incidentally, to raise skills.

Once you've spent credits, as the disclaimer says, the value of what you've spent them on may increase or decrease as a result of your actions or the actions of other players. Kimberly was unable to accept this, apparently feeling that anything another player did to her as part of the game system was, in fact, "us" (the administration) doing it to her.

Everything she lost (and I'll point out we completely refunded her money to get her to just go away, so she lost nothing in the end) she lost as a result of the game functioning normally and in accordance with help files on the subject. She just didn't like the way the game functions, which is kind of just tough luck. I was jokingly wondering if she thought she was playing a single-player game in which the other players were actually cleverly-scripted NPCs (as that would explain her apparent feeling that the game world should revolve around her view of how to play). Perhaps she thought the whole game experience was set up to screw her over. I have no idea, and am just glad she will not be playing our games anymore.

--matt

Uh, I don't know you. You're just text on a website. I've never had a conversation with you, I've never met you..I've never even exchanged instant messages with you via AIM or whatever.

I might think you're a bit obtuse at times, and seem to enjoy taking shots at Matt (who I also don't know), and I might state that on occasion, but no, I have no particular dislike - or like - for you.

I am a player on Achaea, and will try to answer these for you.

1> Guilds on Achaea are player-run. There ARE generally guild NPCs you can learn skills from if a guild member is unavailable to teach them. (Yes, you can use your lessons to learn from a fellow guild member). Generally speaking, you DO need to be accepted into a guild to learn guild skills.

2> Hmm. How to respond to this. Kimberly may have sworn that she had credits taken away, but this does not make it so. I can write the word "candy" on a box of matches and swear up and down the box contains candy, but that doesn't change the fact there are matches in there. She also, technically speaking, did not lose lessons either. She spent her credits on lessons, then spent her lessons on guild skills, then due to her own actions, was booted out of the guild. When leaving a guild, you lose your guild skills. She could just as well have spent the lessons on general skills and not have 'lost' anything.

3> She's an idiot. Each time she opens her mouth, she loses a little more credibility. Were she a tenth as educated as she claims to be, she would accept the fact the she is unwanted, has been given a full refund, and go on with her life. Instead she keeps trying desperate actions to win people over to her side, losing people who may have been sympathetic to her before with each post she makes, here and elsewhere.

I understand where you might say her rant couldn't be based entirely on nothing...but it is. You are right in that she feels she has something important to say, but that is as far as it goes. She may feel that way, fine...but I may feel the sky is purple with yellow clouds, and you're all morons for thinking it is blue. If I go around calling everyone a moron for thinking the sky is blue, how popular do you think I'm going to be? Everyone will rightly classify me as a moron myself, and crazy to boot.

Agreed with Brody. I don't think it reflects negatively on a game when someone posts Kimberly-esque rants about it, and the admins post a rebuttal.

If the_logos had replied by spamming every forum with two-page rants about how "OMG KIMBARLY TEH N00B SUXXORS!!11"... well, that would reflect negatively.

Any reasonable reader can tell the difference between this kind of review and the kind that should attract/repel you with respect to a particular game. If they can't.... well, I'm not sure you'd want a player who couldn't.

As an aside, nitpicking a poster's grammar/spelling is not a good use of forum space. We've had plenty of foreign players come through our game with poor English skills, and many are big contributors in terms of roleplaying, ideas, etc. Worry more about the quality of what they're saying, and less about how they're saying it.

For the record, I am also an Achaea player and rather active on the IRE Achaea forums. We've had quite a discussion about Kimberly over there, which let us see all sides: Kimberly, the guild leader who outguilded her, and the administration. I'm not going to go into all the ludicrous details, but most of us who have read the boards, know the people involved, or had some level of involvement with Kimberly, agree that the actions taken by the guild and by the administration were proper. I think Mihaly summed it up best- she expected the game to behave the way she thought it should, and when something happened she didn't like, she resorted to extremely immature behavior.

I also wanted to respond to an earlier question in this thread, about guilds sometimes requiring people to write essays, because I think Mihaly's response did not directly address that specific question.

There are generally two situations in which a guild will require an essay. One is as part of an entry or advancement in the guild. All guilds mandate a period of novicehood followed by a period of probation before new members are considered full members, and these new members are required to do various tasks to prepare themselves for life in Achaea and the guild, and to demonstrate their commitment to join even if it takes some effort. These tasks usually include purchasing a personal supply of curative herbs, learning the basic layout of the land, and various other things which vary by guild. Sometimes a person is required to write an essay...requirements vary from a couple paragraphs on what the guild means to you to one guild I know which requires a fairly intense research paper from its higher-level probationary members.

The second type of situation would be where a guild leader requires a guildmember (again, usually a novice or probate) to write an essay as a penance. Usually this is when dealing with someone who has committed a major offense against guild rules or policy, or with whom the guild has had multiple small problems. The guild leader is tempted to just kick the person out and wash his hands of it, but still feels the person deserves another chance. The essay is a way for the person to demonstrate that he regrets his action, understands why he should regret it, and will try harder. Often this essay takes the form of an essay on respect for one's guildmates or people in general.

This was exactly the situation with Kimberly. Previous problems in the guild, new problem that she refused to listen to the guild leader about, degeneration into a tantrum and disrespectful rudeness to the guild leader- but the guild leader gives her a chance to write an essay on respect and redeem herself. She refuses, more belligerance, and ends up outguilded.

Personally I understand the reasoning behind essays on "respect," but I don't approve of them generally. Too often the task is seen as meaningless drudge work and the situation is not adequately explained to the person required to write the essay. The whole point is to help them understand why the guild has such rules and why their behavior was not acceptable, but when the person doesn't understand and is refused an explanation, that person just becomes bitter and the whole point is lost.

By the by, I don't think that's what happened with Kimberly- it's just a general objection.

Wow seems kind of intense, writing an essay, normally I mud to get away from those :-P. Thanks for the insight into guildhood on Achaea, pretty intense, but hey what works, works. So is there one guildmaster (As I will call it) or is there a committee, or how is that done, is there just one person who makes the decision, could seem like a elitest game that way. Just wondering.

What was Kimberly's offense that required the essay?  The reason I asked is because I've always been curious of the mindset behind a request that could well be characterized as treating people like children that need to correction (and the subsequent behavior of them like children) versus treating them like adults (edit: to begin with).  Assuming you believe that most thinking adults response to being requested to write an essay on "respect" would be an indignant and mature "You can kiss my ass".  ;-)

Enola: There is a single Guildmaster, whose title is specific to the guild but can generally be known informally as just the "Guildmaster of GuildXYZ" who in turn appoints what are known as Secretaries, who act in different roles according to each guild. My experiences as a GM and as a Secretary and my observations of others in those roles leads me to the opinion that Secretaries generally act as their name implies: They do a lot of busywork.

Secretaries are often responsible for handling administrative work within the guild, monitoring behavior amongst members, and generally keeping order, as well as acting as leaders in lieu of the presence of the Guildmaster. Along with this role, they also serve as advisors, helping the Guildmaster to decide on and enact policies for the guild as a whole.

Now, certainly, due to their beaurocratic nature, Secretaries aren't always in a position to have any real power beyond what the Guildmaster grants them. Certainly they have privileges that extend to inguilding and outguilding members, as well as a variety of other things, but ultimately they are merely at the beck and call of the Guildmaster, and far too often he or she will simply appoint friends as Secretaries to avoid having to deal with any overzealous pencil pushers trying to vie for power.

Of course, people are often smart enough to realize when this is going on, and the Guildmaster can, at any time, be voted out of office by members of the guild. Unfortunately this process is also open to abuse, given that only members of a certain guildrank have the ability to vote at all, but this abuse is rare as it usually causes the Divine to step in so as to allow the guild to move on where otherwise it would fall into stagnation.

Wow, a nice little system there, and no I'm not to lazy to find this all out for my own just not enough time to infiltrate the system so to speak. I think this also gives everyone a better view of Achaea maybe in appeal to some people.

I am the guildmaster of the guild Kimberly was exiled from. Let me say first that though I was not the person who actually removed her, had I been around, I would have done so as well, no question.

1. We made /every/ attempt to treat Kimberly like an adult, and every chance for her to act like one. She refused. This was not her first, nor second, nor third major problem with her in the guild. I have had several lengthy conversations with her, during the last of which (before the event we are talking about), she admitted fault and said she would try to do better representing the guild and city. Which was quite obviously a lie, as she got herself into essentially the same sort of trouble.

2. The central philosophical tenants of my guild revolve around respect, tolerance, loyalty, and taking responsibility for your actions. This information is publically available in any text about us, and given how long we put up with her antics before she wore our her chances (and the novice test which she passed) there is no chance she didn't know that. Yet she repeatedly violated everything we stand for. She chose the guild, and then decided she didn't want to do anything except what she wanted.

The person who did remove her wasn't some power hungry person flaunting their position and screaming "You must respect my authoritah!" She's an ex-guildmistress who left on her own terms, who is entirely dedicated to the good of the guild. Kimberly was on her last chance, and she knew it. The request for an essay was a final offer of reconcilliation extended to her, and the response was a slap in the face.

If it had been me, the exact same thing would have happened. Its entirely in-character, and the appropriate response from any responsible guild leader.

Actually I was looking for something more specific than "antics" and concrete than a list of fuzzy platitudes... Did she make fun of someone's orange mohawk?  Did she call Bubba a wanker?  You know forensics.  What exactly did Kimberly do that really got everyone's dander up?