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> DISCLAIMER I'm not here trying to stir drama. I just want to start a meaningful debate on our stances on interacting with the rest of the community. Any shit that goes down in posts on this thread was not my intention, nor my fault. Have you ever been in a multiplayer game with someone who can't accept defeat? To whom, winning is the validation of their life? Do you recall them throwing a verbal tantrum when things don't go their way, when they get killed, or when their team loses? Do you remember just how annoying it is? We've probably all experienced it at one point or another. We all click our tongues and shake our heads at this obviously immature behaviour, wondering how someone could get so worked up over a videogame. It's ridiculous, right? Winning is nice, sure, but losing isn't the end of the world. That's how the game works - sometimes you win, sometimes you don't. No biggie. Which is why it confuses me so when so many members of the Second Life military community, both within Ordo and without, refuse to accept the idea of a defeat. And - frankly - it's easy to claim a victory whenever you want. This is Second Life, the only game balance we have is entirely voluntary and often discarded in a matter of minutes. If things don't go your way, just pull out a bigger gun. Bring in more people. There's no team autobalancing or the like. Simulator rules are often unenforced. Go nuts. Now imagine if you could do this in every other online game. Imagine playing Call of Duty where you could whip out a tank in the middle of an infantry battle the moment things tip against you, and there was no enforcement to stop you. To a lot of people, this might actually sound appealing at first - but let's look at the varied ramifications of doing so. Other players would be pissed off, and refuse to play with you, as they would always lose. You'd quickly get a disliked reputation in the game's community. Victory after victory would make victory itself hollow and worthless. You drive other players away from the game. These are just a few examples, but are probably the most prominent ones that come to mind in a scenario like this. In the end, the result is simply that everyone loses - everyone else loses the match, and you run out of other players to play against. And even the few matches you find become meaningless because you win every single time. You can probably see where this is going. Let's translate this back over to Second Life, specifically, back to Ordo. It's a cold day in hell when we accept a defeat. In fact, defeat is something reviled, failing is punished by revoking the privileges of being able to lead raids or hold OIC. You can say that it doesn't happen, but I know it does, and it concerns me deeply. When we begin to lose territory on a defence, we immediately jump to the biggest guns in our arsenal. It's not terribly uncommon to have a tank on both extremity objectives, taking out anyone who gets close, or a Thanatos strafe-bombing the roads leading to the objectives. We will often continue doing this even after the threat has been mitigated and we have things locked down again, parking the tanks or bombers there until the enemy simply gets tired of being stonewalled and leaves. And then we throw down the victory card, cheer about how skilled we are and how poor our opponents were. Even on raids, it's not uncommon for us to bend the enemy simulator's rules to secure a victory. And doing all this has the exact same consequences as it does in any other game: it pisses off everyone else, and makes the concept of victory a tired, beaten horse. It's complained that we rarely get anyone other than lonewolves coming to attack us - well, perhaps this is why. Perhaps because the only time an enemy raid has secured victory conditions was by rushing us during early morning hours when we're understaffed, an act which we counter with outright hostility and annoyance, even though it's not unheard of for us to do the exact same thing to others. Every time I've brought this up in the past, it's been met with derision and denial. Commonly, other members will flatly deny that any of this happens, or tell me to lead my own raids or be OIC more often, which is entirely missing the point. I think it's an issue that has been swept under the rug for too long, and needs to be put on the table for a serious, thoughtful discussion. 1. "We can't accept defeat, because if we do, other groups will jump on it as an opportunity to erode our reputation and standing." We're Ordo. We pride ourselves on following our own standard, and we often consider ourselves above and beyond the reach of other groups. It's easy to see why: we have an enormous member count, an intricate and complex rank and command structure, we have our own established protocols and divisions, and we've followed this formula to relative success for years now. Other groups will often spring up, stay around for six months and collapse again. Not us. We've held out for a long time. That's why we should be maintaining a standard above and independent from the rest of the community. Cheap name-calling and ego-inflating actions by others shouldn't affect our judgement and ethical guidelines. The hollering by other groups who oppose us vehemently never really bothered us before, so why should we start caring about that when it comes to offensive or defensive combat? I'm not going to outright say that we're solely at fault for the sheer amount of hate directed at us - those who direct it at us are just as much at fault for perpetrating it, and we are still a damn sight more fair than them. But there are some things we can be doing about it, things we should be doing about it, because we're the motherFfffing Ordo and we don't need to listen to a man-child cockwaving about how they defeated us. Let them have their circlejerk. It shouldn't faze us in the slightest. If we lose, we should lose graciously, rendering their boasts hollow and worthless. 2: "Other groups would do the exact same thing if they had the manpower or gear." We should be the forerunners of progress, not following the trend set by others. Once again, we're Ordo. We don't need to bow to pressure from others; we should be the ones who stand above the others in a sea of churning faeces and egotism. And if that means that sometimes we have to bow to a fair defeat, then it should be so. Be "the bigger man" and all that. Because in the end, if we're doing what they do, we're simply being no better than they are. 3: "We need to make our gear more powerful to meet the threats posed by other groups." Arms races are pointless and yield nothing but wasted effort. Having been in Munitorum for as long as I have, I've gradually witnessed concerns for balance and fairness crumble in the face of an enemy military that has the bigger stick. Trying to match the gear used by enemy groups has historically resulted in nothing but a race to see who can make the bigger booms the fastest. This just destroys the point of combat entirely, as instead of fighting our battles on the field; we're fighting war in the R&D departments instead. On top of this, we have the best training out of any military on the grid. And I say with confidence that nine times in ten, training will always trump gear. The reason why an enemy group resorts to such bullshit is because they can't accept defeat. They're the kid who yells on the mic and throws a tantrum when they get fragged in Call of Duty. And elevating our tech to match theirs is simply validating them, and encouraging them to make an even bigger stick. See where this is going? Straight to critical mass. There's a word for equipment that is overpowered and unfair. It's called "bullshit". And it's something we shouldn't be even entertaining the thought of doing, even for moment. Once again, we're Ordo. We have our own Ffffin' standard. Just because we have the ability to throw down the big stick, doesn't mean we should. 4: "It's demoralizing to accept defeat." Pulling out the stops to claim victory makes victory itself meaningless. I'll refer again to the introductory section of this thread - that in the end, being on the winning end every time inevitably causes a loss on a larger scale than just the match you're in. If we believe it's acceptable to think like this, then we're essentially becoming the ubiquitous Call of Duty kid. Let's theorize for a moment that we go on a raid, we play fair, and we're losing. At this point, almost every raid commander would yell for a bigger stick, whether or not it violates the enemy's rules. You can't really blame them - losing a raid is frowned upon immensely, and often punished both directly with the stripping of privileges, and indirectly with a loss of respect. Let's say that we lost because the enemy flew off the handle, they brought out every big stick they have and they rained every piece of bullshit down on our heads to maintain their superiority. Should we validate this "tactic" by meeting it in kind, or should we laugh it off and leave them to stew in their anger, knowing that we played by the rules, they didn't, and that's victory enough for us. Now let's say that we lost to an opponent who was playing fair, by the rules and generally being fairly reasonable. Do we really want to become the kid who throws a tantrum when we lose? Or should we accept a loss, and be mature adult men who can tolerate the concept of losing. After all, there's always a next time. So what do we do? There's several ways to approach this. One way is to lay out more comprehensive policy regarding Ordo conduct on defensive and offensive operations, ensuring that force is met with an appropriate response, avoiding overreactions, and that we maintain our standards wherever possible. Hold training and seminars focussed on addressing this issue. Be more lenient on people who bring home a loss instead of a victory sometimes. I'm not suggesting that we become anal about balance and fairness like our good friends the Merczateers. I'm not going to throw around terms like "game design" in a game where anyone can shoot a nuke out of their crotch and destroy several simulators. All I'm suggesting is that maybe, just maybe, we can avoid being the Call of Duty kid. Discuss.