Governor Events and Griefing. It's time for a discussion.

[Dot_Warner]

While I don't personally agree with Jerec's spirited tactics, this is something that needs discussed.

As a governor, you're expected to show up to the King's Council and run events. (In reality, the players only care that the trade deal is active 24/7, but I digress.) I've run some kind of event every month since last September, sometimes more than one. Its a lot of work and it gets expensive.

I've endeavored to be RP-lite in some of my events so as to not scare away any citizens who aren't comfortable with it, and I've tried to encourage a wide array of event types to help draw in more players. So far, I've been relatively fortunate not to experience much in the way of griefing, aside what happened during the March election and at a town hall event during it. In fact, I held the event in a house specifically to combat this, since I anticipated it.

Unfortunately, holding events in houses isn't always possible, nor even desirable in most cases. Holding a tournament in a house, while technically possible, requires the participants to leave their guild and join another. Sometimes getting back into one's original guild poses a problem.

The arenas are the best answer to the problem; however, they are inherently griefable. This is what happened yesterday at the Lost Lands arena on Great Lakes. (The only suggestion I have to directly combat this is to allow an event runner to reserve a block of time well in advance.)

The Colonial Challenge Tournament was the third and final prelim for the King's Cup. It had been publicly scheduled for weeks and announced in general chat almost daily since my original post about it on here. When and where it was happening wasn't exactly a secret.

Four governors actively participated in running it, while a fifth was kept away due to internet issues.

Near the end of the tournament, a well-known PvP guild decided to interfere with the tournament by creating their own match while the next official bout was being set up. Apparently they have a beef with at least one of the tournament participants. They entered the arena and proceeded to stand there, only damaging each other slightly every few mins. Another of their guildmates stood by the arena stone, likely already prepped to block the arena when the timer ran out.

In the image below you can see them on mounts, something that is prohibited by tournament rules.

While gen chat raged about it, things I will not repeat, at least 8 people paged on the griefers. (It has been over 27 hours now, without so much as an email or a "Sorry, we can't do anything" message.) One would think that 8+ individual pages for physical harassment would have set off an alarm somewhere...

We had to move the last two bouts to the New Haven Arena where they were completed without an audience. This was unfortunate.

We were fortunate enough to have another easily accessible arena to jump to, but what if we weren't?

A GM should have shown up within minutes, either visible or not, to investigate.

Before anyone chimes in with "They have every right..." or "You should have moved..."...uhm... NO. Why should a scheduled, public event held to benefit the shard be expected to accommodate griefers? They do not have the right to grief others. The culture of grief we've been expected to live with in UO is unacceptable. The ToS is blatantly ignored on a daily basis. GMs appear either unwilling, or unable, to enforce the rules.

As it stands, the King's Cup in November is in jeopardy. Certain people are reluctant to remain a part of it, and already have no intention of continuing the cycle next year. This is depressing.

I'd like to see a GM "on call" for governor-led events should they be requested. (No, I'm Not talking about a tedious Royal Council-approved, use up a "two-a-term" type request.) Simply inform your shard's EM(s) of your event within a specified amount of time so the GM pool can be informed to be on the lookout for a possible page on X day at Y time on Z shard should something happen.

I'd also like to see the ToS, especially the RoC, PUBLICLY reinforced by Mesanna. (I'd REALLY like to see the harassment rules modernized to better protect the one being harassed, the current rules give the harasser all the power.)

There is no reason that griefing/harassment should be tolerated in UO.

 

[Jordan Thyme]

I'm not a Governor, currently. But this is a topic that I agree needs to be addressed. So let's start with the fact that when it's actual griefing.. like above, then Yes something needs to be done about it. There are plenty of instances now across board where the system has been manipulated so that people can cause problems and do damage when the whole situation was innocuous to begin with. The issue is that the rules, when they get enforced, need to be very clear. Because it will take nothing for certain Governor's to say.. "Oh they're griefing me." When in truth what it is.. is a disagreement on personal character stances and issues. I don't want the line to be so rigid that people can't openly discuss what's really wrong with someone in office.

So at what point.. should they step in? Because in some cases you're looking at a grey area that is subjective to interpretation. And in some cases.. a lot of cases, it's a clear cut case of the person being an A1 Feminine Hygiene Product.

 

[TheScoundrelRico]

I'm sorry folks, they suck for the grief tactics.

This is one reason I have always preferred Siege. Grief tactics are usually dealt with by the population, since the griefers have nowhere to hide...la

 

[MalagAste]

Just saying that the DEV's/EA/GMs suck at actually dealing with harassment is sad... in the first place it speaks volumes of how long we have had to tolerate this behavior which I will say in 90% of the games today would NOT be tolerated. Scamming in many games in NOT tolerated... Gil Selling in many games openly in game will get your account banned as well as buying the Gil From a Gil seller will get your account banned. This stuff should have been dealt with sternly from the get go... but it hasn't been. This is one major reason many folk give on why they WON'T return to UO. Because there is NO SUPPORT. Neither in or out of game.... GM's and the DEV's seem to have NO real presence in game. Many have "gotten away" with grief tactics and scamming for such a long time that it's not only routine but somewhat accepted. This should NEVER have been the case. Also... since it's gone on so long many ignore it or ridicule the victim rather than putting the blame where it belongs.

Until this changes UO will still be considered second class... and most won't come back. Several over the years who were scammed, harassed, or hacked have left with deeply bitter feelings towards EA and the DEV's as well as the lack of support. Of late the fact it can take WEEKS to get a GM response is not something that says "yes come back to UO because it's really changed". It says no... stay away as it's business as usual at EA.... take the money blame the victim and treat all players as if they are all scammers, cheaters, hackers and liars. Not really something that brings fond memories to mind... nor does it make you feel all warm and fuzzy about returning.

I've spoken out about it till my fingers are sore writing to anyone anywhere I think will listen to get something done about the deplorable lack of customer support... I've seen little to no improvement in the last 3 years. I simply don't see any of that changing in the near future... and sadly from all the talks, interviews and DEV reports and comments I don't see that it's a "priority" either.

More than graphics, more than new content or new items... working on improving the customer support would go farther than anything else... Infact I think it would go a long way towards improving the satisfaction of the playerbase than anything else. That is both IN And OUT of game... starting with fixing the account management system, the ability to purchase game items from the store, and the ability to get qualified in-game GM support.

 

[Captn Norrington]

So at what point.. should they step in?

It doesn't seem like much of a grey area to me, someone saying "your a lazy governor" is fine, but someone who follows you around saying it for 3 hours straight is griefing you and should be dealt with by an authority figure like a GM.

 

[Captn Norrington]

Just saying that the DEV's/EA/GMs suck at actually dealing with harassment is sad... in the first place it speaks volumes of how long we have had to tolerate this behavior which I will say in 90% of the games today would NOT be tolerated.

That is so very true. It's pretty sad that they have dealt with it so badly over the years, that UO is pretty much the only game where griefer is considered a normal play style. It's not normal in a game for someone to be able to say "oh he's just another griefer/scammer" in the same way they would say "oh he's just a tailor/smith".

 

[MalagAste]

It doesn't seem like much of a grey area to me, someone saying "your a lazy governor" is fine, but someone who follows you around saying it for 3 hours straight is griefing you and should be dealt with by an authority figure like a GM.

I've dealt with worse. Having been followed about and purposely stood upon by no less than 5 people with greater dragons and everyother thing in tow... using TROLL costumes of all things... anywhere I'd go they would go. Couldn't attend an EM event for months without an "entourage" of griefers to follow my every move. Sitting on me.... standing on me.... casting and spamming greater cures, and every other "mass" spell in the game to continually fill my screen with spam to the point the only way I could "follow" an EM event was to come on a completely UNKNOWN character.... took weeks to finally get rid of them and only did so by standing so far away from the EM that they couldn't participate and missed out on 2 drops in a row. This seemed to stop the griefing finally. But everytime I mentioned anything about it on Stratics.... to a GM or the EM or even to Mesanna herself..... the problem would TRIPLE. You want to talk about Griefing I think I know full well what it is... and NOTHING was done about it.

I've had people make VULGAR named characters to "upset" me. Things that were insulting and rude... named pets things that should NEVER have been allowed ... yet nothing was done. I've seen worse even... nothing done.

Not once have I EVER been pulled aside by a GM and talked to about my conduct. I've had the EM tell me to shut up... and ignore the completely rude comments made toward me that caused me to speak out in the first place. Been so fed up even quit going to EM events for several weeks because I got sick of the griefing there.... and it wasn't directed at me... it was directed at the EM's... yet NOTHING was done about it. Even the EM's are utterly defenseless to the assault by griefers and NOTHING is done.

Were it up to me I'd give them the count of 5 to knock it off or I'd simply stop the event and say well we'll try again next week and if you can behave yourselves we'll move on otherwise I imagine we'll not be having any drop or event this month. Period. I would not tolerate such abuse and you know what? NO ONE SHOULD. They shouldn't have to... because it should be made CLEAR by GM's that its NOT acceptable. Should have been something the EM's were allowed to do... and they should have been allowed to call a GM to come and give them a warning... remove them from the event sit them in jail if they can't listen for the duration... or until they apologize... let them out but warn and mark them. If they can't behave then.... BAN them. Give them the 3 day vacation to start... if that don't get the point across or they think they can just pop on another character and start back where they left off then BAN them permanently. But this should have been done from the beginning.

If you think that's too strict than you haven't played many other games out there. Stuff like what goes on at many EM events in UO would NEVER be tolerated in most other games. EVER. We get banned for the strangest things yet when someone does something that harms a community or another player it seems that anything goes and it's the victims fault.

I was told I needed to "grow a skin" and get over it. Told that I should be able to tolerate people standing on me since well it's a free game and they can walk anywhere. You know at a busy event where there are 50+ people and space is a premium sure I can tolerate it.. but when it's done on purpose with the intent of "ruining" my ability to follow the event and enjoy the event and see or understand what is going on.... that should NOT be tolerated. It was CLEARLY visible to not only the EM's but many other players. Many of whom sympathized with me. Many who asked that it be stopped. Yet it was allowed to continue week after week. This sort of thing has driven dozens from the EM events and made them not wish to participate because quite frankly they can't. Without being in a large group who are all paying very close attention it's impossible to follow what is happening... most get lost but if you attempt to help them like some folk I know have done.... again the Griefer respond with ridicule... and harassment. One of my fellow RPers quit using his main character... can't say I blame him. He was constantly griefed verbally at the EM events. I had so many folk on ignore that I honestly couldn't tell half the time what the EMs were responding to at many times. Fortunately for many on my shard.... a vast majority of those who continually were causing the problem have left the game. I almost wanted to throw a celebratory party... but didn't for fear it would keep them around... or worse bring them back.

Not to say there are still a few around... but things like this shouldn't be allowed. I don't know how many events I was at that the behavior of some was so horrible that it caused those trying to run the events to quit doing them. But no amount of paging ever stopped the problems.

I've been at an event where no less than 10 people paged on the same person for the same horrid behavior and nothing was done.

I don't know why I bother even bringing up the subject of griefing... I suppose perhaps because I keep hoping that something will eventually change. It's like bullying... tolerated for many, many years... too many. And now schools are cracking down on it.... and all I can say is it's about time. Well if Schools can have a Zero tolerance policy then perhaps UO should start to think about it... or at least think about and consider the loyal players who care about the events and game more than about the bottom dollar and the resale of the drop... and start treating them like decent humanbeings and stop treating the victims like they somehow deserved it or treating them like they are wrong for caring.

 

[Captn Norrington]

Wow, I had no idea the griefing had gotten that bad on GL, we deal with griefers on an hourly basis on Atlantic, but I haven't seen something like you described in years. I've never understood why EM's can't page a GM during their events so the GM can kick out the troublemakers. Seems like it would be easy enough to have an EM's page jump to the top of the waiting list so no matter how busy the day is they get preference since they are hosting something. I remember one time when I was Yew governor I logged in and realized there were literally 100+ horses, chickens, and other animals around luna that all had insulting names, like "Norrington The Coward" and other random stuff, it was one of the days when the new GM's were walking around luna doing a meet and greet. Both of them saw every single animal, and saw me sitting next to them asking if they could track down who owned the animals and give them a warning or something, since some of the names were pretty bad, one of them turned towards me and said "I don't see any animals" then walked away. There were at least 10 of them within 5 steps of him....

Clearly customer service never has been, and probably never will be a priority in UO, I usually just ignore it or treat it like a joke now, since I know nothing will ever get done about it anyway.

 

[MalagAste]

Clearly customer service never has been, and probably never will be a priority in UO, I usually just ignore it or treat it like a joke now, since I know nothing will ever get done about it anyway.

That's what I'm talking about.. It's wrong and sad that anyone in UO should feel this way about being harassed or subjected to verbal abuse. It's wrong that this has been allowed to become so "normal" that it is accepted. It's like accepting bullying in HS and wondering why folk go postal and getting all bent when they do.... Is THAT the message we are sending? Be as rude and vulgar and do whatever you want to grief everyones fun and ability to enjoy the game they pay to play because nothing will be done about it... So go ahead and be a complete jerkoff?

I really don't understand why it's allowed to continue. Suppose I will NEVER understand it. Part of the problem is the perceived anonymity that the internet provides. But those who are important do know who you are. And the behavior should NEVER be tolerated.

 

[Dot_Warner]

Both of them saw every single animal, and saw me sitting next to them asking if they could track down who owned the animals and give them a warning or something, since some of the names were pretty bad, one of them turned towards me and said "I don't see any animals" then walked away. There were at least 10 of them within 5 steps of him....

So, wait, you're saying that a GM, charged with helping players and "policing" the game, blatantly ignored multiple RoC violations...in public?

That level of shirking one's job would get them summarily fired in any other setting.

 

[Captn Norrington]

So, wait, you're saying that a GM, charged with helping players and "policing" the game, blatantly ignored multiple RoC violations...in public?

That level of shirking one's job would get them summarily fired in any other setting.

Yep, it was on Atlantic, in Luna, so like always there were tons of people around them. Yet they did not even bother to attempt helping. Such hardworking GM's we have lol.

 

[Aurelius]

Sadly, the answer to all the problems we experience from the nastier, cheating and abusive elements in this game (both as Governors and players generally) is enforcement of the rules as they are very clearly written, and the basic decency to see that things that are simply morally WRONG are stopped. This requires only two things - GMs who are well trained and instructed to be aware that this garbage has to be stopped, and a manager who really backs that stance. We have neither, for all the warm words and promises.... and I'm resigned to the sad fact that all we will ever get is another repetition of the tired old 'we are really sorry and we know we have let you guys down' whilst it carries on as it always has.

Without a moral backbone in the people managing this game, all the things that are simply wrong, offensive and abusive of the other players and against the rules will carry on. Speeches will be made to cover up the simple fact that they will do nothing at all about it, except make more speeches and basically lie to us about how much they care and how important us players are. As far as I'm concerned, if you genuinely care about other people, you don't just sit on your hands ineffectually whining whilst they are abused, insulted and lied about - when you have the powers and authority needed to stop this, a decent human being damn well stops it.

Until they finally start genuinely acting against the people doing this stuff rather than hopeless wittering, it's never going to change. The only question I have is how much longer I'll tolerate this, because it's really getting to the point where I wonder why the hell I bother with this game when the people running it clearly don't give a damn - but will lie through their teeth to us about how much we matter........

 

[Captn Norrington]

To be honest all this makes me think the GM's have the "The customer is always right, therefore if the customer can never find us they can never be right" mentality.

 

[Pandora_CoD]

Dot, you know where I stand with all of this. You were there and saw the debacle that was Catskills for my election many months ago. It was simply deplorable behavior that should never be allowed. Now EM's have a bit more power as they can remove people from office if they are disruptive, but definitely doesn't alleviate the harassment and griefing that comes from the general population. But what can be done about it? Really and truly? I don't think anything can because it violates laws of subscription-based access to content. Technically, events we put on in public are (and have to be) accessible to all players. If we added buildings let's say that only allowed citizens, well griefers would just be citizens for that week or whatever to do what they do. Outside of that private buildings are the only way to go, and that's so limiting.

Sue (you know her as Bianca) quit the game after the stuff she witnessed at my election. And that basically broke my heart. I've found it difficult since that time to even play the game, I'll be honest.

 

[MalagAste]

Dot, you know where I stand with all of this. You were there and saw the debacle that was Catskills for my election many months ago. It was simply deplorable behavior that should never be allowed. Now EM's have a bit more power as they can remove people from office if they are disruptive, but definitely doesn't alleviate the harassment and griefing that comes from the general population. But what can be done about it? Really and truly? I don't think anything can because it violates laws of subscription-based access to content. Technically, events we put on in public are (and have to be) accessible to all players. If we added buildings let's say that only allowed citizens, well griefers would just be citizens for that week or whatever to do what they do. Outside of that private buildings are the only way to go, and that's so limiting.

Sue (you know her as Bianca) quit the game after the stuff she witnessed at my election. And that basically broke my heart. I've found it difficult since that time to even play the game, I'll be honest.

Can't say as I blame you... Many days I find it difficult to continue playing... With the behavior of some.... the lack of support with UO... the bugs that are currently plaguing the EC making it nearly unplayable for mage types... I don't know how some do it... I'm so frustrated I personally want to take my 9 accounts and 100+ dollars every month and put that somewhere else.

Now one of my oldest friends is telling me she has lung cancer and doesn't know how much she'll be around..... I've already lost one close friend in UO to Cancer... and both my parents. I don't know if I can stand to lose another good friend... I just don't want to watch her houses fall ..... I surely don't want to pack up her accounts like I did his... But we do what we must I suppose.

Anyway the griefing needs a Zero tolerance policy like Schools have for bullies.

 

[Matthias O'Hare]

If the King's Cup gets griefed the Friday after next, I am canceling my sixteen currently active accounts. Like others, I am ready to walk away. The culmination of a year long effort by many in the Great Lakes community doesn't deserve to be destroyed by those who lack honest social skills.

 

[Jordan Thyme]

Okay.. to be fair.. on Catskills there were a couple of tactics used.. By people not involved with the election at all, that were crappy. There were also tactics by both sides.. that on an rp standpoint were completely crappy too. For example.. If you rp a vampire.. expect people to call you on it.. and say.. "Ummm yeah no.. we don't want this". Also.. do not stand there and refer to your opponent as a pancake in broad daylight.. on the first day of the election.. with witnesses.. and expect it to be forgotten or swept under the rug. Current governor's are not exempt from crappy behavior.

So... yes.. Bullying deserves a zero tolerance policy. At that same token. Actual rp objections. And there were some, were also met with a... "Oh you are making this personal." on the part of the then current governor. So at the very least on that aspect, you can't call bullying on a lack of manners by Pandora. Now.. there are many speculations as to why "Sue" Quit.

And again I say, The name changing of the animals.. was uncalled for (that one was bullying).. So was coming into general chat.. and "Sue" Announcing..."Okay.. need to vote with my other 53 accounts." That too, was childish and extremely hypocritical. Does she own that many, sure. Did it really need to be said, No.

So then you get that huge meeting Catskills had.. which did NOTHING.. absolutely nothing. It was a complete waste of time for almost all parties involved. Many many many other shards deal with so much worse. Gl, Atlantic.. and when they have legitimate concerns .. one of the reasons I'm sure it doesn't get addressed, is because you have others who abuse the living crap out of calling for an EM or Mesanna. It's like a kid calling 911 because he wants to hear the operators voice tell him it's all going to be okay. Cannot compare apples to Oranges.. and 80% of Catskills was Oranges.. While most of the in game election bullying that happens is Apples.

 

[Deraj]

The answer to this question is not necessarily more policing, but better in-game systems for the playerbase to regulate itself. Being able to rent out designated locations such as a meeting area, or an arena as in the case of the OP, for a certain amount of gold (paid by the organizer, or perhaps, the treasury?) and for a certain period of time, and being able to lock things down and/or ban people from participation (for the duration of the event) would give players the same essential power they have in their own house. On top of that, give EMs overriding administrative power over this system in order to prevent any possible abuse (since they are, after all, event 'moderators') and now we have a means by which players can regulate their own events, prevent player abuse or griefing, and lock down decorative or functional items for limited amounts of time.

Then place any offending players on your ignore list, and now we have considerably cut down our need for GMs.

 

[Aurelius]

Until they finally start genuinely acting against the people doing this stuff rather than hopeless wittering, it's never going to change. The only question I have is how much longer I'll tolerate this, because it's really getting to the point where I wonder why the hell I bother with this game when the people running it clearly don't give a damn - but will lie through their teeth to us about how much we matter........

Ah well... two months on, the same few people continue to disrupt player events with total immunity from any actions at all. The same people abused the Advisors on the general chat channel, our supposed 'manager' feebly appeared in chat the next day, warned the entire shard she was unhappy with us all (you can guess how well THAT went down!) and was made to look a totally ineffective idiot by one of the griefers who she talked to over general who treated her as a joke - and of course, was proved absolutely right by her utter failure to do a single damn thing about the problems, so the same people were free to carry on destroying events and disheartening the community.

Reporting them is utterly worthless (rarely do you even get an acknowledgement of the call, and never do you see any feedback form to say how you rate the GM performance - mind you, as apparently the GMs do nothing anyway rating their performance would be pretty difficult), raising it again and again with Mesanna gets a series of what can only be called outrageous responses - she's 'not aware of a problem on the shard' despite all the pages, reports, emails and messages we know damn well she has received (amazing just how blind someone can be when they do not want to see - maybe the reporting system is a total mess, and someone other than Mesanna received the emails and forum messages to her and replied without her knowing ..... but let's be real, what is going on here is selective memory to avoid dealing with something difficult, whilst spinning like mad to create the impression of actually giving a damn), she says the EMs have never mentioned these issues yet when I speak to some former EMs they state outright they informed her of these problems, but apparently that's also been 'mislaid' along with all the other information she's been sent over literally years about these antics. She will not meaningfully act at all to stop any of this, but by God she will throw a hissy fit if you even suggest these people are being 'protected'.... so let's believe that then, they are not 'protected' by anything other than utter incompetence and apathy by EA/Mythic/Broadsword, repeatedly, for years - after all, it's not as if us players talk to each other, compare the replies and excuses we receive, and can spot a huge gaping 'discrepancy' between what we are all separately being told and the actuality of what we see going on.....

I've hit the limit now. I'm sick of dealing with someone who has demonstrated absolutely no intention, capacity or will to stop these creatures ruining the game despite the endless promises that it 'really, really matters'. I'm even more sick of paying the salary of someone who treats us with such utter contempt, whilst banging on about how much she cares and how she knows she has let us down again, and again, and again, and again.... all just hollow words without any content at all.

@Mesanna, long overdue you actually both made and KEPT a promise, so maybe this New Year might be the time for you to finally get a grip on this and actually come though on something. After all these years of what looks to me like spinning, misleading and dodging, for once, please ACT..... clean this mess up - or watch us leave.

Quit the endless recitations about what you will do, might do, someday, maybe.... no more worthless apologies, or meaningless verbiage - we have had those so many times it's just insulting us to try keep this pretence going. Keep your word, stop the worthless talking and act, stop saying how much you 'care' and damn well SHOW how much you care, fulfil the contract between players and company rather than just have some written rules to hide behind, as if writing them is magically good enough - actually enforce them properly and effectively.

Or is the truth that you care just enough to try look like you care, but nowhere near enough to actually do a single effective damn thing? Because that's surely how it looks from out here........

 

[Pandora_CoD]

*sighs*

On Catskills once again we had the same debauchery happen... with the same person. Back in March I think people did not believe the harsh targeting that I felt, that maybe what they saw had in fact been a fraction of that day's events after hours and hours and hours of taunts and name calling and other absolutely awful bullying tactics.

But now seeing it again first hand it has changed a lot of folks minds, I think. It's so obviously personal that it's hard for anyone to think otherwise. For some people this game presents a rare opportunity to be someone else. To act different than your own personal circumstances and sometimes that manifests into something really horrible. Sometimes someone has very few friends IRL and is dealing with poverty or illnesses and they have no other way to deal with all that than to come here and be horrible to others. It's their own game within this game.

The governor system in its current state does nothing but give a platform to people like that in order to hurt others. They think it's funny; that it's just a game. If it is not changed, this will continue. I feel our in game GM's should be more present but I'm not sure UO can afford that. So the changes have to come from the developers themselves.

The biggest cause of the headaches here have been the tying of what are primarily PVP buffs to an RP system. That's what makes people crazy the most. In my opinion those buffs either need to be neutralized so that every city provides ALL the buffs, and users purchase the buff themselves --- which removes the Governor control of these items --- or duplicate these buffs in other ways that is accessible for everyone. For example adding them to talismans that you rework the library rewards to be, or perhaps adding them to VvV in some way.

Voter reform also needs to happen, no one from external shards should be able to so freely vote on another shard --- in essence ballot stuffing --- without having worked on that shard for some time in some way. I would say that voters should be forced to have a certain level of VIRTUE in the city they are wishing to vote on.... Remove the "reputation" requirements and tie it to the Virtues. Or make it so that someone has to complete a certain amount of trade quests for that city before they can vote, and only count the ones done 30 days prior.

In all, changes MUST happen or you will be loosing a lot of the RP community players across all shards.

 

[Riyana]

*sighs*

On Catskills once again we had the same debauchery happen... with the same person. Back in March I think people did not believe the harsh targeting that I felt, that maybe what they saw had in fact been a fraction of that day's events after hours and hours and hours of taunts and name calling and other absolutely awful bullying tactics.

But now seeing it again first hand it has changed a lot of folks minds, I think. It's so obviously personal that it's hard for anyone to think otherwise. For some people this game presents a rare opportunity to be someone else. To act different than your own personal circumstances and sometimes that manifests into something really horrible. Sometimes someone has very few friends IRL and is dealing with poverty or illnesses and they have no other way to deal with all that than to come here and be horrible to others. It's their own game within this game.

The governor system in its current state does nothing but give a platform to people like that in order to hurt others. They think it's funny; that it's just a game. If it is not changed, this will continue. I feel our in game GM's should be more present but I'm not sure UO can afford that. So the changes have to come from the developers themselves.

The biggest cause of the headaches here have been the tying of what are primarily PVP buffs to an RP system. That's what makes people crazy the most. In my opinion those buffs either need to be neutralized so that every city provides ALL the buffs, and users purchase the buff themselves --- which removes the Governor control of these items --- or duplicate these buffs in other ways that is accessible for everyone. For example adding them to talismans that you rework the library rewards to be, or perhaps adding them to VvV in some way.

Voter reform also needs to happen, no one from external shards should be able to so freely vote on another shard --- in essence ballot stuffing --- without having worked on that shard for some time in some way. I would say that voters should be forced to have a certain level of VIRTUE in the city they are wishing to vote on.... Remove the "reputation" requirements and tie it to the Virtues. Or make it so that someone has to complete a certain amount of trade quests for that city before they can vote, and only count the ones done 30 days prior.

In all, changes MUST happen or you will be loosing a lot of the RP community players across all shards.

Agree completely on the need to end cross shard voting and change the trade deal. The trade deal has been a pain since day one.

I think the ability to buy loyalty with boards/ingots needs to be removed now that we have the trade quest. The virtue idea is neat, but many of the virtues aren't complete, and Vesper doesn't have a virtue. Not sure how that would fly.

 

[Pandora_CoD]

Agree completely on the need to end cross shard voting and change the trade deal. The trade deal has been a pain since day one.

I think the ability to buy loyalty with boards/ingots needs to be removed now that we have the trade quest. The virtue idea is neat, but many of the virtues aren't complete, and Vesper doesn't have a virtue. Not sure how that would fly.

This game was built on Virtues --- devs need to fix 'em. I mean its a CORE piece of this game no? That probably should have been fixed years, no decades, ago!!!

Vesper can just share Minoc's virtue, with x # of points in that virtue needed to vote.

 

[Riyana]

This game was built on Virtues --- devs need to fix 'em. I mean its a CORE piece of this game no? That probably should have been fixed years, no decades, ago!!!

Vesper can just share Minoc's virtue, with x # of points in that virtue needed to vote.

Well yes, the virtues SHOULD be finished, but I'd rather they weren't tied to the city loyalty system. For one thing, shoehorning characters into virtues they don't need or want is stifling to both gameplay AND roleplay--for example on my shard a pirate character took over Vesper for a while by "stealing" the one election then kidnapping my character's daughter and forcing her to bow out of the next election. There's no logical reason a pirate would have ANY virtue, and it would have been a painful and out of character grind to build a virtue on her.

Also, I'd far prefer they address the voting abuse by limiting voting to a single shard/home shard and rethink the problematic trade deal before overhauling the whole virtue system--and it would have to be a complete overhaul to be even remotely reasonable, as some virtues are really easy and others really hard (or annoying) to get. Can you imagine how frustrated Moonglow candidates would be having to build honesty? Or how limiting it would be to potential Yew candidates who can't or don't want to pvp to try to build justice?

And as a governor of Vesper, I would also prefer that Vesper have its own unique identity. I actually liked Nail Warstein's idea about each city having its own history quest, though that would be a lot of coding and work too.