(03-28-2015, 06:16 AM)Domri Blackblade Wrote:(03-28-2015, 05:42 AM)Graeham Ridgefield Wrote: But as I've pointed out before some of the people who lace their words with sugar on this site are among the most spiteful and manipulative individuals in-game and are massive drama magnets. Despite that, their popularity and perceived status as 'gud rp' tends to protect them from any direct criticism.
On the other hand, quite a few of the 'blunt' posters who may put forth controversial and unpopular opinions have, in fact, turned out to be some of the friendliest and coolest people I've met thus far.
(03-28-2015, 06:01 AM)Graeham Ridgefield Wrote: I think the best route to solve any potential misunderstands is really to just get in touch with people in-game or shoot them a private message. I mean, a lot of people parrot the phrase 'communication is important' but that should apply across the board rather than just in regards to IC affairs in my opinion!
I just feel like it's more beneficial to do that and come to some sort of compromise/informed opinion of someone through direct interaction rather than reading into people's posts or relying on what other people say about someone.
Open minds and all that!
I really don't feel I understand your stance at all. You seem to contradict yourself in a few of the points you make. Forgive me because it's 6AM and I've a fever I could cook eggs on, so I'm not going to defend the capability of my thinking parts.
However, I feel you have this huge chip on your shoulder about popularity and people who see a lot of RP. Are you not judging them based off of things like forum posts or have you spoken to every person who is 'popular' on some sort of personal level? Maybe you have specifics in mind, but the way I read your posts, it could apply to people you don't mean it to apply to. Frankly, I don't know if your words are taking a jab at me due to how vague this underlying problem you have is, but that's neither here nor there. I'd just be careful about the complaining about groups in such a vague manner cause people might not know who you are applying it to.
Okay, this is slightly unrelated to the topic at hand, but I feel like I need to get this down on the table and out in the open because I get the feeling it's a massive source of tension in conversations like these:
Graeham, I have to be honest in that every time a vague "popular group of people who are manipulative two-faced assholes" gets brought up, I pause and feel some level of anxiety over whether or not I or folks I know are getting lumped in there. I have to keep reminding myself that it's impossible (well, at least for me specifically) because you and I have never interacted outside of this website and I haven't really even been online enough for the past three months to really do much RP to begin with, but the anxiety is there nonetheless and I'm sure other people likely feel it too.
Logically, I know you probably just mean a couple of specific jerks you've encountered, but because everything is worded so vaguely, it just comes off as "Most of these established/'popular' RPers consist of heinous dickwads who are nice and sweet on the surface, but are complete assholes in game that mistreat new folks."
Toss in the fact that there is a reoccurring theme of "Popular/Veteran Members VS Newbie Members" (which I totally get because whenever you have a long established group and a new, shiny group, rifts sometimes do form that need to get bridged) and it just makes the entire conversation feel really tense and anxious.
I want to have an earnest dialogue with you and other new folks. I've agreed with things you've said on these forums before and because you ARE one of the 'new guys' and are in the ideal position to tell the community what things are like - I definitely want to keep discussing things with you to figure out how we can make things better.
BUT - I also have no idea if you're taking the time to make subtle, passive-aggressive jabs at various people in the thread or if you're literally just expressing frustration with how some folks outside of this conversation have acted because of how broad the paintstrokes are.
[Edit: Tweaked to make it clearer who I was referring to. :V]
[Edit 2: Just wanted to clarify one thing before it gets misunderstood: we ABSOLUTELY should talk about how established folks snubbing newbies is a problem. It's a negative thing that can really poison a community and if it's going on, it needs to stop.
However, if we do talk about that, we need to be wording it in a way that doesn't immediately make 80% of the established community members squint at their computers going "Wait. Who's he talking about? Did I accidentally piss someone off recently? Is he talking about me? Have I even MET this person in game?" I don't know if this will be seen as policing tone, but it makes it really stressful to have these conversations if you have no idea whether the other person actually genuinely holding out a hand and trying to have an earnest dialogue with you about how to improve things or if they're making thinly veiled jabs at you for reasons you don't really understand.]
