When Replying Is Outlawed, Only The Outlaw Forums Will Reply

Here at Shroud Unlimited, we just love ourselves some drama. We're terrible like that, we're just awful people. But at the same time, certain people who claim the moral high ground admit they can't stop lurking here too... so let's do this thing in the wilds of SU, shall we?! You know who you are, and you're reading this right now, yes? We know you are. You awful, awful person you!

You all remember GolemDragon's sad and dignified farewell to Shroud; I wish her well and many here hoped, like she did, that the game would actually work out. We just realised it wasn't going too a little sooner than she did. That's no personal failing, and GolemDragon never in turn accused us of being personally flawed for doing so. She just had hope for a little while longer. And it's a shame that hope was unjustified, but Portalarium let you down and the blame is theirs, not GolemDragons.

But then! In the comments, which I suggest you read before the rest of this post, Rune_74 tried to address the actual personal problems critics had with Portalarium, which led to alienating them from and their eventual banning from the community. And here the drama begins; WTFDragon, who is one of the Portalarium forum moderators as well, in a scrupulously fair and logical manner, basically said "I helped make that decision, I still agree with it, and if you don't shut up I'll tell everyone why." Now some people might consider that a threat of retaliatory action from publishing private correspondence. But who would dare suggest such a thing from a person with Portalarium's seal of approval? "I'll get back to this later"

At some point later, I came across the Steam post about even the dedicated backers now losing hope, and found Rune_74's replies. And as you will have seen, I decided to point out at the Ultima Codex that if one of the factors in Rune's ban was being active at Shroud Unlimited then it was clearly hypocritically applied, because they must know full well I did too; I used the same names, and even had my videos hosted here which show me in game and which account it was tied too. To which WTFDragon replied "Oh Boy"...

(Edit: See GolemDragon's post below. The claim of WTFDragon locking the thread appears to be incorrect, and I withdraw that claim)

... And then locked off the thread for any further reply.

Because nothing says "I have made a rational and logical case" like admitting you don't like the business model of the people you work for, but trying to enforce having the last word all the same. Perchance though that WTF should really be named StreisandDragon, after the famous effect instead. Because it's takes a staggering lack of awareness of modern interconnectivity to name directly the renegade forums, lock threads elsewhere, but not realise that you've just directed anyone interested to where a reply was most likely to be posted... and which you, with your Portalarium hat on was just going to end up reading there as well too. Yes, the awful person at the start of this post is you, WTFDragon. Let's not hide behind childish innuendo shall we? It was YOU ALL ALONG. *cue spooky music*

And now here's my reply, for the hive of scum and villainy here to enjoy as well. When you don't handle debate well and ban it, it doesn't go away, it just goes somewhere else... and festers. *maniacal laugh*

Firstly, for some reason I was under the impression you were Christian. I was attempting in my post to talk to you in language you would respect. But as you clearly don't understand that it's possible to disagree with someone but still respect their position on principle, it was probably a waste of time. So I'll drop that. Let's get straight to the basic points instead;

You use misdirection and outright deception in your arguments. You admit that you work for Portalarium as a moderator, but when the responsibilities of this are pointed out, that you are their public face, you state;

"No, I don’t. I run a fan site for a series of CRPGs which is no longer seeing significant active development, but for which a crowdfunded spiritual successor is currently in development."

But as a Romulan, and then a dragon once pointed out, "they stand apart." What you do at Ultima Codex is not the same thing as your Moderator position at Portalarium and you know it. But what is worse, your entire argument with a member of the public, Rune_74, is about his relationship with a Portalarium member of staff, FireLotus. You are debating dealing with relationships with the public. Because you work in public relations for Portalarium. You try to deny to me the very argument you are using to try and justify banning Rune. And where then, in the circle of virtues, is hypocrisy?

You then admit that membership of SU was "a contributing factor" but fudge what the definition of that membership was. Is membership here a morally good or bad thing? It's not academic; if I say "I want to see WTFDragon beaten to a pulp because he eats cake", is that a good or terrible statement? Well, if I define "eating cake" as "the cake is made of babies" then it suddenly doesn't look so monstrous, does it? Who could justify baby-cakes or tolerate people who eat them?! But if "eating cake" means "a transcendently delicious sponge cake" then the statement is back to being appalling.

In this case, you're obviously saying "Membership of SU is considered horrible", because it's taken as a negative contribution. Let's stay in the realms of pure logic, shall we? But you then go on to admit you know full well action isn't taken against other posters here on the same basis. This is the very definition of data mining, looking to interpret data to support a pre-arrived at conclusion, and that's the pure opposite of logic. The only way you can square that circle is if you state it is defined negative, but one which doesn't over-ride other factors; so other posters weren't bad enough to be banned for SU posting as well. This is what you are clearly trying to do by saying it was "contributory" in Rune's case.

But again, you are clearly applying a hypocritical standard; and I'll illustrate how. You ask me the following question;

"Would you think it unfair for him to face disciplinary action if he was your co-worker and he had called a female client of yours a flower?"

Needless to say, this is leaking information contained in a private personal message. And what have you just said about that?

"sharing private messages publicly is not a good thing in almost any circumstance (it’s a suspension-worthy Terms of Service violation on Facebook, I believe, if you need a better example)."

Oh.

But what about the use of the word flower? Shocking as it may be to you I expect, but I wouldn't consider it automatically a disciplinary action. Do I consider it acceptable to use the word myself? Not as such. But you seem to struggle with the idea that Rune is my "hero". Again, he's not, but it's possible for the worst people in the world to be on the right side of an issue occasionally. So at work, I get a report that one member of staff has called the other a flower. Is he sacked straight away? No; I call him in and ask "why?". Can you really not imagine a circumstance where someone might say it and be justified? Here's a few;

"She admitted she was having a relationship with my husband"
"I caught her stealing from my wallet"
"She said my son deserved his brain injury and I'm glad he suffers."

That last one came up from a fellow care worker for the client we were looking after. Had she said it to his actual mother... don't you think she'd have been justified in saying "you're a flower?" in the heat of the moment? I do. Justify is not the same as saying right. An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind and so on. But it also doesn't mean we should always discipline people for what are understandable human lapses.

You make a great deal of claiming to be logical. How is it logical to demand people be something they're not? You might as well say "bananas are bad because they don't fly". I'd have a lot more respect for your apparent belief humans should be logical machines if your own logic wasn't so clearly warped to fit your own personal, unprofessional agendas. But let's go one step further and apply it to another actual real life situation, shall we? I'm trying to be logical now. Let me share something with you.

In the late 1990s I was talking to a friend by the roadside, our two cars parked nearby. When I went to leave, as I drove off I saw my friend frantically waving in the mirror. I stopped and asked what was up; he said "Run like hell, your car is on fire!". I looked under the tail and flames were shooting along the exhaust pipe. I walked a few feet away and it suddenly bloomed into a fireball. Later on I realised that repairs I'd had done to the engine hadn't been done properly by the mechanic, a fuel line had been ruptured and leaked petrol onto the hot exhaust, until the safety features finally failed and it had got to the tank. But at the time all I could think of was "My favourite tape is still in there!"  And when the fire brigade came, I ended up doing the Waynes World "We are not worthy! bow in the middle of the road. They just got out of the fire truck and looked at me like "What the hell are you doing?" 

Now according to your logic what the firemen should have done was say "This clearly exceeds socially acceptable norms" and turned around and gone home. But because they were professionals and know that human beings do weird things when under high stress situations, they simply reassured me and got to work hosing down my car.

But again, you try and use an argument out of both sides of your mouth; you take my comment that "if he were running for office..." and turn it against Rune; "It's just a game, Rune has no right to be angry in this way". But who are you to decide what something means to others? How much had Rune_74 spent on backing Shroud? I don't know. Isn't it wise to ask first and then listen to what he says to discover first of all how stressful he feels the current situation is? And secondly, that's not what my argument even was. The point I was making was that you were clearly displaying total unprofessionalism. You were treating it as if it was like Rune running for office. Except Shroud becomes just a game again when you feel the argument can be used against you in turn.

Let me be quite clear here; You openly profess your dislike for many of Portalarium's practices too, whilst the moderation team as a whole and you in particular display open and quite contemptible double standards in the application of the rules. None of which means I don't think FireLotus has the personal right to be upset by being called a flower. I wouldn't personally have done that. But that doesn't excuse you from treating Rune_74 worse because he expresses the exact same feelings as you but expresses it in stressed out and unacceptable ways.

Or as you again hypocritically might put it; That Rune_74 behaves worse than WTFDragon isn't a point in your favour... an argument you also tried to use against Rune yet applies equally to you. But you are still clearly redefining words like Humpty Dumpty in "Through the Looking Glass", whilst I don't care if either of you are Adolf Hitler reincarnated, I judge you both on your behaviour and more importantly, why you might be doing it.

Which is why I'm not going to put in an official complaint about you, even though here I will openly and honestly say you're terrible at public relations which, despite your denials, is what you actually do. You just don't understand people. But perhaps it's because maybe you're just having a bad day, maybe the cognitive dissonance of working for a company you "constantly urge against allowing the level to which any backer has pledged to have any influence on how that backer is moderated when s/he is being a complete snot within the community." and yet we all know they absolutely do (you even agree and name Envy in turn) is wearing you out. Maybe just working in the public eye, just like care work, is emotionally grinding.

And working for gaming companies is shite, isn't it? When I worked (paid) on Ultima Online as an EM, I constantly argued with Mesanna and Kyronix about the chaos and lack of professionalism behind the scenes and the inability to actually listen to what players were requesting, being unable to deal effectively with griefers whilst having to take personal responsibility for event design documents done on the last day (or not done at all due to personal animus) which didn't work and final bosses we couldn't test but I suspect another EM leaked how to break, or actually did it themselves because that EM was a dick... (I mentioned in MIRC I planned to use a plague beast as the monster core, and nowhere else; and the instant it was pulled into the actual event someone double clicked a dagger, targeted it and triggered the plague puzzle code and froze it permanently.). And the amount of times I actually wanted to throttle the players for being dicks in turn... But apart from the trolls and troublemakers, I'm still considered one of the best EMs that shard ever had (no disrespect to current and former employees) because I didn't apply double standards or take it out personally on some players I secretly thought were scum. That's not part of the job, and if you're making it so, you're failing at the job.

And again again, I'm not going to personally blame you. The fish rots from the head, remember? I blame Portalarium's insistence on everything being about an Old Boys Network of fellow LARPers and Libertarian Big Spenders, and that a decent company would get on top of the fact they've hired someone clearly unprepared or unable to do public relations work because of his connections to the wider Ultima fan base. Just like the in game lore and plotting is horrendously written by EnderAndrew et all, but they get the job for the same flawed reasons. And the poor sods over in the Heraldry design do hard work but can't get the co-ordination lined up because the company is a mess. And I don't think FireLotus is a flower either, even if she's not a natural presenter of Hangouts. You're probably all great people in so many ways. But that's not what we, the public experience. We get what you put into Shroud. And that, frankly, is a complete bollocks up.

Even if it's Rune_74 saying it in ways I don't approve of. That doesn't make him a hero. He just happens to be right about the issues.

And you, hard working and honest as you might think you are, know full well the way the development is going now isn't right. Continuing to support it all the same doesn't make you a hero either. It might not make you a total villain either, just as I was compromised by a broken system when an EM. But I fought against it, and actually walked when I realised I couldn't change it. You haven't walked from Shroud. GolemDragon has. Even Rune has. That you have a better mouth but worse morals than Rune_74 in this particular case, does actually mean, on this and this alone, he's more of a hero to me than you.

Which you'll profess not to care about. And as I've shown, the unprofessionalism is rather obvious.