Well, I read Hekko's post and skimmed the rest (unfortunately having to sift through all that mindless +1, viva la revolution, you win one free internet, etc. drivel, c'mon guys) and am dumbfounded. I know I'm late to the party, but I'll throw in my two cents.
This has seemingly sprung out of nowhere and caught me completely off guard. Maybe I'm out of the loop (completely possible, as the Prussian Army tends to keep to ourselves), but I was largely unaware of these issues and in my eyes this has been blown completely out of proportion.
While Hekko presents some valid arguments, they could have been presented in a less inflammatory and preferably a more private manner. All this has accomplished so far is to widen the rift in our community (whose existence I, and I'm sure many others, weren't even aware of), and to incite the more immature and/or confrontational among us to hop on the band wagon as it were, and proceed to perpetuate this needless drama.
I've honestly never had a problem with an admin on the official servers and I'm all for strictness where it is called for. I generally hop on the public servers to relax after my classes, before starting on homework and such, and I'd rather not have to deal with children and/or immature "adults" antagonizing the admins and calling each other derogatory things like fa***t and n****r while I'm doing that. I'd hardly call it heavy handed. Behave on the public servers and you'll be fine. While admittedly I haven't been around as long as some, I've been playing on the official servers for about a year and a half and have yet to be warned by an admin, let alone banned.
As to the administration of the FSE (and Taleworlds) forums themselves, I think there are a couple of things which should be noted.
1. The Devs are busy people and have a bit more on their plates than just babysitting these forums. Much better in my opinion, to preemptively shut down potentially problematic threads and individuals before issues arise, rather than having to waste time moderating them down the road.
2. These guys aren't necessarily professionals when it comes to administrating forums. As has been stated, they are first and foremost coders, modelers, and the like. They are admins merely because it is their responsibility. That does not mean they are and should be inherently adept at the task.
3. Sure there have been a couple of terrible admins, but c'est la vie. You're gonna have shitheads wherever you go (and particularly so on the internet). Pinning the blame on the team as a whole is hardly fair.
4. In regards to nepotism, I'm really not all that surprised. It occurs everywhere to varying degrees and in a place like these forums, where the community is based solely upon the relationships and personal ties between individuals, it's inevitable. There's just no way to organize a complete meritocracy in this environment and FSE is going to appoint people they know and trust. Whether or not that trust is well-founded is another matter altogether.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, cut the team some slack. Do you think you or anyone else could do any better if placed in the same situation?
And please, everyone, stop acting like FSE is hell bent on oppressing you. I'm
sure their primary objective is the alienation of their playerbase and potential customers.
While some mismanagement has occurred and there are definitely issues to be addressed, this thread has done nothing but blow these things completely out of proportion, and these issues have unfortunately been manipulated by some (both willingly and unwillingly) to create divisions within the community. All I hope is that this can all be resolved in the most civil manner possible and without irreparable damage to the community.
Oh and one last thing. It was entirely uncalled for (and poor form) to insult the quality of the game (or DLC rather). That has
absolutely nothing to do with the issue at hand and introduces a degree of bias to the argument. It's unfortunate that people are still upset about paying for the DLC, the melee changes, what have you, but it has no place here. It merely adds insult to injury and further alienates you from FSE. Same goes for any comments in regards to FSE's competency at running a business. Please, let's keep this about the
community, not the game or the company.
That turned out much longer than expected, guess I'll be working later than I thought tonight.
I know I'm in the minority here, and will likely take some flak for this, but I've got a busy week ahead of me so don't expect me to respond for a while. In other words, I'm a sitting duck!
