Hello,
This seems very much like a panic-inducing bait thread. The thing is we are working on the issues in the background and are in the process of making reforms and a thread to explain what we are doing while you are waiting, but may I say a few things first which I would like to essentially shoot down.
Currently, the CP faction is considered a joke, with, quite frankly, mediocre leads.
For the EU Players? No. For the US players? Maybe. I play quite a lot during the EU timezone and quite frankly we and a lot of the staff have seen the CPs act and RP very well for 95% of the time. Sure there is a few hiccups here and there, but it is quite rare to see anything go wrong in the CP faction during the EU timezone. Now for US players, I heard the story is quite different... but to blame that on the Leads, who by the way are EU, not US is a bit ridiculous. And I, who see a lot of what they have to deal with makes me understand that quite frankly the proof and evidence of what you see going wrong with the CP faction simply is nowhere to be seen? Like the leads have been asking on a daily basis for proof of the shit that goes down relating to their members and they get nothing. No one has been able to provide them with anything, no unit taglines, no info about what happened, only the generic "AH, CP TOOK MY CLOTHES" to which admins look through the logs and we find it to be all lies...
Like the issues with CPs are minor cases here and there, with a lot of lies poured into the mix and no one able to prove anything, apart from the occasional fuck up which is actually true from just 1 or 2 CPs. You make it sound like the whole faction is broken when really some people are just basing off the very few encounters they have that may turn sour.
Until someone can create a thread listing all issues out, every unit they have seen fuck up personally and provide video or screenshot evidence to boot, then sure we can look into it, find the context, etc etc. The leads can not do anything to their own members when they got nothing on them. But again, when I play, all the CPs are acting like they should.
Sure the CP leads are not the best at PR and explaining what they are doing, but they are at least working reforms based off the little information they have been provided.
The current Staff Team seems to either A. not have a backbone or B. no power to act due to de-centralization of power. The GMs are basically inactive.
This again depends on timezone. EU side, you got a lot of Admins online. On the US side, there is barely any around and can not support anywhere near the numbers we were getting before. We have once considered dropping support for the US playerbase since our staff, factions and systems are pretty much all an EU bias. Even in the EU however, we noticed not all GMs were really interested in hosting any large scale events, only special characters to create little mini-events or interactions with players with a strong focus on the underground to try to coax people out of there.
We have just done a reform around the whole staff system in fact that should fix some of the issues the staff have been having over the last couple of days. We are not sure how this is going to turn out yet, but we will see.
The rebel faction is in shambles, resembling a gang wars RP in the sewers at this rate.
There really is no Rebel faction, so I can't really comment on this. The duchy exist for sure, but they don't really act or behave as rebels, just an underground group of protectors started by 2 staff members at first, but then taken over by the players. It has become quite a good hub for rp for the outcasts.
Now gang wars we have tried putting a stop to with new rules because it seems some "bandit" groups were going out of their way to start killing and pretty much RDM'ing people out of the blue with no questions asked. This stirred up a whole shitstorm of drama which we are now cracking down on completely as it was getting out of hand. This issue is technically already addressed in its own way.
PKs are being revoked for staff-protected groups with absolutely no reason at all, and they're hiding the thread about it.
What thread is my question? I do not know of any PK thread that was hidden or anything of the sort. All the threads so far we have kept open? So sorta lost on this point, so as I look through the forums and try to find a hidden PK thread, I will think of this as slander and lies for now. PK's being revoked from "Staff-protected" groups? No, we have not revoked someones PK over protection as there is no such thing. We only go off the PK policy as shown here:
PERMA-KILL POLICY Definitions PK (Perma-kill): Permanent Kill (PKs) are the complete removal of a character, making them unplayable. NLR (New-Life Rule): New-Life Rule (NLRs) means you can keep playing after your character’s death, but they forget the events leading to their death...
willard.network
We follow this PK policy, though not all staff do follow it as I have noticed a lot of deaths in the underground/sewers have been ignored... though rightfully so. As the moment, TBC has had a few issues involving deaths via people abusing the system or generally misusing the broken melee sweps which the damage is now fixed... apart from the broken part where you can keep swinging outside of your turn.
If you are talking about the fact the PK appeals are now set to be viewed by staff only by our web developer just like our ban appeals are, then yes. This was done as people seemed to like to hop onto a train of hate towards a player or head in with their friends to fight against the situation. So at the moment, those have been set to be seen by staff only to avoid further attacking of players and dramafests on the forums because 7 people do not like Jimmy who just died to a broken Knife. Just to create an example.
One of the Mod Leads quit the Staff Team because he was being ignored and insulted, regarding current problems.
Now... I am going to say no to this one chief. He left solely because of the current problems and feeling like nothing was being done with the problems and concerns that were being brought up. Even though we were dealing with the issues overtime and told him it would take him for things to change... he wanted him there and then. To him, time was not a option to consider. Changes had to either happen now, or everything to him was simply a waste.
I have come to believe that he either got far too stressed for all the issues and even let the CP faction become a personal thing to him, even when the problems he brought up did not exist on our end. And even when we asked for proof for the US CPs who were abusing their powers and shit or something of the sort... we got nothing in return. Only player said this, player said that, one guy said this, another said that. Which gives us a total of 0 information on what the issue is.
We could not and can not think of what the issue was in the US timezone, other than there being a lack of staff and no US rank leaders to lead the CPs which in itself is the one issue we could think of. Not to mention a lack of dispatch in US timezones as well. There is once again a EU bias with pretty much all issues pointing to the US timezone.
The majority of the community stood up and went vocal about the issues present and presented many possible fixes for most issues yet the staff-team only gave us half-measures, and when contacted we're told
"A lot of stuff is going on in the backroom. It'll all be fixed soon
." yet we have still to see any significant changes.
Yes, and some of those fixes have been implemented. Others have not as not everyone provides actual solutions other than "just remove the problem". Which a cause of a problem is not the solution to a problem, it is merely hiding a problem. Reforms are being worked on all around and hell, we where even writing and still are writing a massive megathread to explain all issues and how we plan to fix them. All I can ask for here is patience. We have been gathering information this whole time.
The leading roles are still occupied by the same incompetent people, even though a lot of community members have presented many issues present in the way they manage.
I assume this is still referring to the CPs? To which read above.
And this isn't just speculation. It is simply my point of view as a mere community member, that has been talking closely with one of the staff members that are also not very happy with the current situation, yet still is fighting to fix it.
Not got much to say here other than... "Mind actually sending such info up the chain and to the Community Managers, the ones who deal with this stuff?". As I have yet to here quite a lot of this information... even from our own staff. Like 2 at most have come up to us with info on things but I can't really say much else than that. Like, we are working on things.
Well, to cut it short: Close the server. Do it. Close the doors, shut it down. Get a month, maybe two so you can all actually re-structure EVERYTHING, because apparently that's what we currently need to put out this dumpster fire, and we need to do it fast because there's a gasoline canister inside it that is heating up fast.
Not everyone wants to shut the server down though. Some people want to play while the changes, talks and discussions happen in the background. We even had a vote on it internally, and not everyone wants to close. We can work on issues while the server is up and even collect more info as time goes by. And restructuring everything is not required... not every single thing requires a restructure as that would be like saying "Nothing works, literally unplayable."
The admin ran, admin funded, and admin protected group of Styx
There is no admin ran or funded group. This is literally just hearsay at this point. The Duchy and many other groups in the underground are operating off of their own resources and supplies from the trash spawners. The Duchy, for example, was created by 2 admins like I said above somewhere else... but is effectively ran by the players with the admins sitting in the background letting the group run on its own 2 feet. It has become a RP hub down there now and some people really do like it.
The only time something was spawned for them... was when the crafting system was not working. So we asked them to hand over their materials, and we would give them what they were trying to create. Which we did. We do that for all groups and players who have asked. Not to mention, there are some massive groups you are competing against and the bigger the group the quicker you can craft the highest tier stuff in the game.
That is all I wish to say for now... but while we consider shutting down for a set time an option... it may not happen as not everyone wishes for such drastic action.
EU timezone is still almost capping at 70 players. US timezone is pretty much dead. Welcome to the EU bias I have been talking about.
