RPC has moved! These pages have been kept for historical purposes

C'io Behkt · **07-18-2013, 02:59 AM**

(07-18-2013, 02:00 AM)Spiritual Machine Wrote: I just think that having one person respond on behalf of Crystalline might make things neater and less cluttered, and more effectively convey the desired attitude. It's just a suggestion though--it's possible that that sort of misconception isn't happening at all in this thread.

I was just about to suggest this very thing, but SM beat me to it, Smile

. It would just make organization much easier and give everyone commenting a single username to look out for for responses/explanations/discussions on how to whether a policy shift would help this or that/etc.

Hehe, there's so much PR involved here! I'm admittedly taking notes in case I'm ever in a similar position.

My first exposure to Crystalline was noticing it in the user-sidebar beneath Aysun's name. When I looked at it in the Linkshell registry, I read the blurb about its IC purpose and also saw that it was closed membership. It wasn't really anything I thought of at the time, but it made Crystalline something curious to me. When I asked Aysun about it, I was surprised to learn that it... wasn't an IC linkshell to begin with and was only now gaining its IC purpose? (Is that correct?) In which case I thought that was pretty cool how an OOC friend linkshell was transforming into one with an IC goal and mission, since that transformation would also give to and enrich the community at large. About a day after I asked Aysun, this thread popped up and the timing was amusing, Smile

.

Azelle · **07-18-2013, 11:25 AM**

For what it's worth, I offer my perception as someone new to the forum but a veteran in the RP genre.

I totally understand why a linkshell, no matter how old or new they are, would want to carefully examine their applications. I don't see it as an elitist action but as a measure to make sure their members really fit within their theme and get along well with each others. We all saw at one time or another drama caused by people not sharing at least the basics. Over the years that made many of us more cautious.

It of course has nothing to do with new or experienced role players. Both can be a good fit. A new Rper open to learning is a breath of fresh air and very welcomed.

But... there is always a but eh? the negative side of this is that the linkshell might miss many good postulants. Many, me included, will turn back if they see a closed to new members even if temporary. Something like: applications will be considered and IC interview needed for membership, calls more for a selective but still open attitude. Also, some, me included, would prefer to make friends and get to know the linkshell members before release to really start as a whole and not that new recruit.

There Â you go, from a new member of this fofo Smile

Asyria · **07-18-2013, 12:57 PM**

People in any given LS can have different opinions and point of views. I think only one person from the LS posting for all of them is unrealistic and restrictive.

Eva · **07-18-2013, 01:59 PM**

I'm sorry for the delay since my last post. Â It's been a busier week than I anticipated and I haven't been able to read/post as much as I would like. Â This post is going to be rather lengthy as a result and I'm sorry about that because I try to avoid wall'o'texts whenever possible but there were a lot of great points made and I don't want to leave anything out.

I'll address the point about some of our members posting here first since that seems the most recent/pressing issue. Â As I was busy for much of the day yesterday and this thread was/is still taking its course, I had encouraged any member who wanted to speak up on behalf of the linkshell to discretely do so. Â As we are a community I thought it might be a good thing to let some of the other members have their say as well. Â That and I was busy and didn't want to leave any points left unaddressed for too long. Â While I personally don't view any of their posts as being particularly defensive, I do see where some points that have already been made were reiterated and I apologize for this misunderstanding. Â I've since requested that no further posts be made on this thread by our members and will take it upon myself to funnel their thoughts here if any of them feel compelled to share anything. Â Going forward it should just be me addressing these concerns, but I may not be able to reply as promptly as I would like, so please take that into consideration.

@Averis: Â I've heard the phrase "RP Elite" - or variants of such - tossed around a bit, usually with a negative connotation. Â I've never really minded the implication that some of us take our RP interactions and experiences more seriously than others. Â It was explained to me in a Skype channel once as being less about being immersive in RP and more about being condescending or having certain expectations placed upon others. Â I admit we strive for realistic and believable experiences and interactions, and have certain rules in place about expectations for godmode/meta/etc. for our own members. Â I don't think any of us really have any sort of expectations of folks outside of our group who may RP different styles or exhibit more deviation from the game's lore. Â Instead we try to find common ground to make interactions work between our characters, even when our methods may differ somewhat. Â I hope this makes sense.

@Zeah: Â I can appreciate that the LS would not fit with your character, or many others. Â While we were hoping to create a company with a theme that would sort of cast a wide net regarding character types, it quickly became clear to us that not all would fit well with this theme. Â It felt important to find and fill a niche like this and it's not as all-encompassing as it was in FFXI, and we understand not everyone will be drawn to it, and may even stand to lose a few members (but hopefully not friends!) that we had in 1.0 as a result. Â Since FFXI was mentioned, I just wanted to be clear that the LS is entirely different in structure and purpose from what it was in FFXI. Â I asked around and figured out who your FFXI character was. Â Knowing that now, I can appreciate how you might feel some disenchantment with regard to your experience with us for the couple of months you were with us in XI, particularly given what happened with one of the officers at that time. Â Even though this is XIV and even though you probably will likely not be joining us, I would like to apologize for any bad feelings from back then. Â If you would like to talk more about the XI stuff, I invite you to send me a PM. Â All I can really say is that things are much different now and I hope we may still get a chance to RP at some point.

@Rhynka & Spiritual Machine: Â I hope the opening paragraph of this post addresses those concerns brought up on the last page. Â I don't think it wasn't really anyone's intent to leave anyone feeling they couldn't speak their mind freely here but I can understand that perception when a number of our members start posting and certain points that were already made have been reiterated. Â This was my fault as I encouraged it with our membership and I'm sorry for any confusion that may have resulted.

@L'yhta: Â I agree with the point you made of ignoring rumors. Â I generally base my own opinions of things on facts and observation. Someone recently related to me a paraphrased conversation that went something like:
Person1: "What do you think about Crystalline?"
Person2: "I've heard bad/negative things about that LS."
Person1: "What sort of things or why?"
Prior to this thread I don't know that there was really any sort of concrete answer to that, at least none that I've heard or been able to figure out. Â I have no such dillusions that everyone would like the LS, myself, or its members. Â People are always going to favor different things based on their own preferences and experiences, and I totally understand that Crystalline is not going to appeal to everyone. Â What I was hoping to discern by creating this thread was not so much what the rumors are. Â Admittedly I'm curious, particularly since a couple of posts now have indicated that they've heard things but haven't been much more specific than that. Â But the rumors themselves aren't the major concern here. Â The reasons for them and the reasons our LS may be seen in a more unfavorable light is my concern. Â So far the responses have been illuminating for us and we're using this information to try and make some adjustments so that we can integrate better with other linkshells and the RP community.

@Femgame: Â I can't think of a way to respond to your remark without it being regarded as somewhat defensive. Â So I'm sorry if it gives that vibe, but I don't want to sound like I'm disagreeing with your point. Â I generally tend to think we're pretty open to RPing with all RPers and not just our own members - and yes even little lalafell folk too! Â I'm not sure which member you may have bumped into or what happened there, so I can only speculate, but is it possible that he or she didn't realize you were a RPer or trying to engage in RP? Â I think it's fine if your character isn't a proactive sort, but if you would like to RP with us - or really with anyone - please feel free to send an OOC /tell to communicate that. Â If you did this and I'm off base here than I apologize, and I'm sorry if it left you with a negative view of us. Â We really don't want to be looked at as big, imposing, or frightening. Â We just want to have fun with everyone!

@Asyria: Â I agree that keeping a group to a certain size and RPing within can be perceived as insular or restrictive, and I can understand where some people might see that as a negative thing. Â For ourselves what we're going for is that sort of closeness but we also want to have open channels with the rest of the RP world. Â But you are correct that people do segment into these linkshell groups because they may favor a particular style or a particular sort of guild to another, and preserving that sort of uniqueness that makes us who we are is also important to us. Â Thank you for your first response. Â Regarding the second one just above this post, I'm inclined to agree that our members all do have varying opinions and not all of us are in agreement on every point. Â That said, I understand the point made by others where it may be regarded as a bit confusing with multiple members of our group coming here and in some cases reiterating certain points that have already been made. Â I've offered to be a sort of mouthpiece for them as well and will be bringing any concerns they have to the table on their behalf as well. Â I hope that this is a suitable compromise.

@Ellion: Â Thank you for welcoming me to your forums as well. Â I look forward to future cooperation both IC and OOC between our two guilds, and the other RP guilds as well.

@C'io: Â Thank you for your feedback. Â As a result of your post and others we've decided that I'll communicate on behalf of the LS solely as to avoid any further confusion. Â Also Aysun asked me to help clear up one point from your last paragraph. Â Crystalline as a LS was actually an IC linkshell to begin with. Â Prior to ARR (and presently) it was sort of a subnetwork. Â In 1.0 I belonged to a number of guilds over a period of time and either left some for one reason or another or in most cases they disbanded and this started out just as an IC way to keep in touch with friends who wound up joining a bunch of different guilds. Â Its purpose back then was to be a secondary linkpearl and it didn't see much use, but it was conducted in-character and at the end of 1.0 when Everwatch disbanded most of us kind of migrated over to that for the final weeks of 1.0 since the world was ending and all. Â So I guess in 1.0 you could say Crystalline was "Eva's Friend Network", and in ARR we're looking to sort of morph that into an actual company as you noted in your post. Â I hope this helps explain our history a little bit better.

@Azelle: Â I agree with everything your post says! Â We are hoping to maintain a certain atmosphere in the LS and want to make sure applicants/members are a good fit. Â This will mean that we may have to unfortunately reject some applicants, but in doing so we're hoping to be delicate about it and are also hoping to be able to make recommendations for other community LS's that might be an even better fit for them. Â But you are right in that level of experience is not a requirement. Â We have a few RPers in our group now that came to us brand new and are valuable members of our community. Â We're also hoping that the change of our recruitment status from Closed to Invitation may help us be seen as a bit more open to the possibility of trickling in some new members as time goes on. Â Moreover, I agree with your point about preferring to get to know the LS members before release and we have an avenue for this on our forums right now for anyone who is interested and registers, they need only communicate to us that they wish to be considered for membership and we can tag them on the forums which then opens up most of our threads so we can establish a dialogue - get to know the recruit and allow them to get to know us and make sure it's a good fit. Â I know this has been very poorly communicated in our LS posts and we're going to be making some changes to the phrasing of those in order to spell that out more clearly. Â Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us!

Again, I'm sorry this became a massive wall'o'text but I have been somewhat busy this week and I'm trying to address all the posts made at least once a day.

EDIT: Reworded one sentence at the request of one of the participants of this discussion.

C'io Behkt · **07-18-2013, 02:17 PM**

(07-18-2013, 12:57 PM)Asyria Wrote: People in any given LS can have different opinions and point of views. I think only one person from the LS posting for all of them is unrealistic and restrictive.

That's a fair point. That said, my argument comes more from the side of thread purpose than intimidation. Personally, I don't mind seeing everyone chiming in because I like discussion; however, it eventually becomes difficult to tell which is the Crystalline response and which is a personal response and then even harder to know what the balance of Crystalline to non-Crystalline responses should be before people start feeling uneasy about responding, which would defeat the point of the thread. Since the thread's purpose is to receive outside community feedback, the restriction isn't about silencing the voices of Crystalline members, but rather about receiving more of what the thread intends to collect: non-member opinions. I hope that makes sense, Smile

. I want this thread to do well because I think any organization willing to put itself out there for the sake of progress, community, and understanding deserves that chance.

(07-18-2013, 01:59 PM)Eva Wrote: @C'io: Thank you for your feedback. As a result of your post and others we've decided that I'll communicate on behalf of the LS solely as to avoid any further confusion. Also Aysun asked me to help clear up one point from your last paragraph. Crystalline as a LS was actually an IC linkshell to begin with. Prior to ARR (and presently) it was sort of a subnetwork. In 1.0 I belonged to a number of guilds over a period of time and either left some for one reason or another or in most cases they disbanded and this started out just as an IC way to keep in touch with friends who wound up joining a bunch of different guilds. Its purpose back then was to be a secondary linkpearl and it didn't see much use, but it was conducted in-character and at the end of 1.0 when Everwatch disbanded most of us kind of migrated over to that for the final weeks of 1.0 since the world was ending and all. So I guess in 1.0 you could say Crystalline was "Eva's Friend Network", and in ARR we're looking to sort of morph that into an actual company as you noted in your post. I hope this helps explain our history a little bit better.

Oh, oops! I'm sorry for that misunderstanding. When it was explained to me that Crystalline began on FFXI, I assumed that "group of friends" was meant in the OOC sense, but I see that it was meant in the IC sense instead, hehe. I got it now!

Maeve · **07-23-2013, 08:22 PM**

I'm rather new to the forums and I have just been in the last beta so I am definitely a newbie to the whole FF scene. Therefore I thought I would share my first impressions:

Being a new forum member one of the first things I did was check out the linkshell listings and admittingly Crystalline caught my attention because I assess how active a guild is by the posts and threads on their forums, and they appeared quite active. I could see they were closed off for recruitment but this did not deter me because I've often seen Heavy IC guilds close recruitment to ensure character stories can be built up and developed with one another before letting more in. However, the reason why I closed the browser tab and moved on to viewing other LS was because of the religious/charity theme of the guild - this was not because I didn't like it, just because I knew Maeve my character would not fit into this theme.

At this point that was all I knew about the guild & I didn't think more about it.

Then I saw this thread.

To be honest it made me winch and let me explain why. In the past I've worked as a human resource advisor for a large multi-national mining company and from yearly we would conduct employee surveys in order to get feedback not just on our departments service quality but also their thoughts about the company as a whole in order to improve culture and perceptions. When I first arrived they did them on paper and each person would hand in the survey to their supervisor. Naturally the responses we received were not very detailed and mostly positive, they had learnt in the past that those employees that were 'too honest' would have a more in-depth interview and would be informed why their opinions were incorrect. Luckily a few of us started to voice our opinions of how we were losing the trust of our employees through this method and how we weren't receiving any useful or objective data. Therefore we hired an outside company to run the survey, it was completely anonymous and computer based so we never even knew who had written the response or even what department it came from.

I know, I know what you are thinking - a linkshell is not a company and you're not seriously expecting us to hire a company. Obviously not. However, during my time on the internet, and most significantly in the second life community (that does this a lot with their shop brands) has shown me there are sites where you can set up anonymous feedback and survey forms. I honestly think that is the best way of getting feedback as people know you don't know where its coming from. Furthermore, when receiving feedback while it is very tempting to refute or explain something that is viewed as incorrect, in my honest opinion it really should not be done. Let people say their piece, both good and bad. Wait till everyone has said what they wanted and then sit down and sort through it with your officers. Really assess each piece of information and soon you will have a list of things that require addressing in order to improve your LS or community perceptions. This can be done in steps without ever needing to reference the original feedback or explain why you are doing something. Just over time you will be fixing these 'problems' and hopefully people's opinions.

See the trouble of having a thread where you are providing immediate feedback and explaining your position is that for a newbie like myself, that has no prior knowledge of your LS, is that I now honestly am a bit wary of the guild. Why? Well because I have now been made aware that there is a bit of drama surrounding the guild. I wasn't even aware that the LS members were moderators on the forum - now I do. I didn't realise there was a perception of these mods having a conflict of interest, and regardless of whether it's true or not, I now have a seed of doubt in my mind. And so on...

So from my own personal opinion this thread -may- have done more hurt than good to the LS's branding and perception by others, well in the very least it has impacted upon how I view the LS. Â I do think it's great that Crystalline is attempting to find out how it is perceived within the community, but just like with the initial survey methods of my original workplace I think the method of collecting this data is flawed and therefore you are not getting a full or honest picture. Worse may even be hurting your own brand image by going around it in this fashion. Its a mistake that many make (even massive professional mining companies! lol), and what counts is what happens from here and in the future.Â

That is my honest, personal opinion and in either case I wish your LS all the best.

Asyria · **07-24-2013, 01:35 AM**

I think Maeve nailed it just right.

I would add that this seemed very much unnecessary to me from the start. I believe I already mentionned that, no matter the amount of explanation, people will always form opinions and are not likely them change it from some PR.

Like we said in Star Wars The Old Republic: sith happens.

But mostly, if you skimmed through Maeve's post, I invite you to read it carefully. It was a good read.

sciencerob · **07-25-2013, 02:27 AM**

I was going to post something similar to Maeve. Before seeing this thread I hadn't heard of anything significant that made me feel any positive or negative inclinations towards the LS but this thread had me wondering.

No one posted anything damning but the fast responses by multiple people would definitely have made me wary if I did have a problem with the LS. I definitely think Maeve post is worth several reads as well.

Eva · **07-25-2013, 12:43 PM**

ADMIN EDIT: Thread locked due to author request.

Thank you for the additional feedback Maeve. The company I work for does something similar in contracting out a third party to perform annual surveys to assess employee satisfaction and any number of other things. While it may not be an identical scenario, earlier in this thread Alothia offered to take feedback and post it anonymously. I can still understand where there might be some reservation for that as well though.

The other point made was that this thread's very existence spoke to some element of concern. I admit I had some idea of this when I created the thread initially. Yes, I was putting ourselves under the microscope here and requesting honesty and some of that would include scrutinizing things. It was my hope that some might also see this for what it is as well - that being a genuine effort at furthering our self-awareness in the broader community. I wouldn't expect everyone to look past those flaws that we have to see a real desire to make some changes and adjustments to our community in order to better interface with the rest of the RP community, but I do think that is the point that underscores the reasons for this thread's creation.

It may be beside the point of the more recent posts, but from where I stand there has been a lot of really valuable feedback which has prompted us to take a closer look at ourselves, our policies, and the way we've operated thus far. Already we have enacted some changes, and there are a few more on the horizon. I admit there were taken some risks and I agree entirely with your post that some might view this LS more negatively, but I also feel this was necessary and that the opinion of some "on the outside looking in" - so to speak - has been worth that.

Finally, I'm of the mindset that this thread has run its course. I'd rather not discuss any further the merits or shortcomings of the utilization of this thread itself. Unless there is some specific thing about our group that hasn't been mentioned, I think this can be put to rest and if the thread remains inactive for a few more days, perhaps a mod could lock it for us after that time. This isn't to say I'm opposed to discussing our linkshell community any further or anything. I'm always welcome to hearing additional feedback. At this point though I don't know that it needs to be hashed out any further in front of the whole RP community so if you want to talk about your own impressions of Crystalline, I would invite you to visit our forums or send me a PM and I'll be glad to discuss anything further privately.

And again I want to thank everyone who did chime in and share their thoughts. I'm looking forward to our possible future interactions in ARR and I know that most in our little community are just as excited about it as I am.

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Perspectives of Crystalline LS - Honest Feedback Sought

RPC has moved! These pages have been kept for historical purposes