(Apologies for a long post; it's not directed specifically at those who posted in this thread, but rather at all those who have voiced messages of outrage and injustice over the last week.)
I have no issues with my goodbye thread being locked. I said goodbye and alluded to the reasons I chose to leave TW. Many people wished me well and expressed postive feelings about their time playing alongside me, I was appreciative and flattered; I responded to all of these - some in general and some specifically, and the thread was closed shortly afterward. In addition to the posts about my departure, BabyBew popped in to show everyone that he had accidentally sealed his anal orifice closed with polystyrene cement, and was spurting diorrhea from his mouth (and typing it for us all to see) and several other players wanted to highlight a weakness many of us see in the system. These things were off topic, which is why the thread was locked, and also because some of the posts risk breaking the rules regarding discussions of a ban in the forums.
There is a very good reason for not posting details of a ban in public; it can be quite assailing to someone's character and the propoganda of a forum could easily be mistaken for a formal announcement of undisputed truth. In my case, I was quite happy for people to know the details of my ban, and they are posted by me in the thread. However I would NOT have been happy to have seen any member of the admin team posting in the forum, or in a game announcement. No one can accuse me/a banned player publically of cheating under the current rule; if bans were allowed to be discussed in public then such defamation could occur.
It is very difficult for the forums to be effective if single topics keep going off on a tangent. There are several topics which got confused into the threads that sprang up last week.
The first is simply me saying goodbye and people saying goodbye to me. The second is did I deserve to be temporarily banned. The third is whether the current ban-first, appeal-next system is the best way to deal with rule infractions. The fourth is whether it is acceptable for players who have, or who once had, greater privileges and access to information the rest of us have (admins) to play the game against us. The fifth is whether a specific member of the admin staff committed such and abuse in my case. The sixth is whether he committed an abuse after I had announced my departure. And seventh and and eight are very tangent threads regarding Ihatemybrains historic temporary banning, and his recent retirement from World 1.
If all 8 threads stuck to their topics, then at least 5 of them would stay open for open and frank discussion I am sure, but I have to agree with Ihatemybrain for closing the ones I saw locked.
Now, if anyone wishes to continue to send messages to me, I will continue to lurk around these forums, and the HOT forums, and keep up with game events via TWplus. I am as interested and excited as everyone else that a (minutely small, I admit) step of hostility has occurred between the giants of RoBAC and TW.
The second topic is also a closed issue. Playing an account that you are sitting in an unviable and/or suicidal manner, where it is apparent that it's existence is purely for the benefit of another account is against the rules. I broke this rule; I was given an account by someone who was leaving the game, and that day I cleared the troops from it by launching them at a player who was attacking another account I was sitting at the time. I have accepted the punishment for the infraction, just as Hoodoo and her team have accepted it was not an intentional breach of the rules, and that it is quite commonplace. This is why the ban was lifted a day later and I was invited to return, however I declined to. There is no longer a ban on my account.
The third and fourth topics deal with how Hoodoo and her team choose to run the game. Whilst I personally disagree, this isn't my business and I respect her choices. There is no right and wrong answer; but if you wish the team to consider alternative policies, I suggest phrasing them in a non-accusatory manner, regardless of your own personal experiences. I think these issues do need to be debated on the forums, but I feel that it should be done in a way that doesn't cause the admins to need to defend the status quo, but rather how it could be changed for the better. However, I am sure that these policies will be discussed and reviewed in light of players such as myself who feel forced to leave because of their failures.
The fifth and sixth topics have a proper procedure to be raised; contacting Hoodoo via the support system or privately. I have done this. I have indicated to her why I feel that the admin concerned abused his position and acted in bad faith. She has investigated and countered, citing reasons and methods that he may have obtained the information used against me with the resources available to the "common" player, and has made a decision that she does not believe their was any intentional foul play on the part of the admin concerned. I do not feel that my complaints were avoided or ignored. However, that player has continued his hostilities against the affected HOT accounts, and because my first inclination remains that he is not playing fair, my motivation has ceased to be 'defeat him within the confines of the game' to 'prove he is cheating.' That isn't the way I want to play a game, and that's why I chose to leave. It was a realisation by myself of what I was getting out of the game, rather than a protest over his actions. I do not feel he was protected by the team; but rather that my accusations were based on a lot of circumstantial evidence that when each was taken in isolation could be explained.
The seventh and eight topics are also pretty dead topics. Ihatemybrain has even linked his posts from the past detailing his infraction.
If you feel that one of these threads is not closed and needs further debate, then try to open it as a debate, and not as an attack on either the forum moderators who are trying to keep the forum organised and user friendly, or the admin teams who need to juggle a large amount of demands.
