Standards for cabal promotions

4 minutes ago, Atticus said:

Not everyone wants to sit back and rethink thier RP when they think they have been going well, esp. when you consider plus 100 hour investments into characters. Time is still worth something imo, burn out is real now lets just add another set of hoops to jump through and HOPE things turn out different.

This is, and has always been, a fundamental cultural problem within our playerbase. Everyone wants to be the storyteller - the force guiding the ebb and flow not just of their own lives, but the lives of others - without realizing that we are all just pieces of the story. Your RP and my RP may not be on the same page or even in the same chapter. But if you want to be in SAVANT, we had better be in the same book.

To that end, if you are unwilling to rethink, adapt, and be creative in the face of adversity when it comes to your RP then I can absolutely see where this would be frustrating and feel like your investment has been tossed in the bin. But the reality of the situation is that some people want to play solitaire, and struggle to cope when someone else comes along and messes up their cards.

3 minutes ago, Gifnab said:

This is, and has always been, a fundamental cultural problem within our playerbase. Everyone wants to be the storyteller - the force guiding the ebb and flow not just of their own lives, but the lives of others - without realizing that we are all just pieces of the story. Your RP and my RP may not be on the same page or even in the same chapter. But if you want to be in SAVANT, we had better be in the same book.

To that end, if you are unwilling to rethink, adapt, and be creative in the face of adversity when it comes to your RP then I can absolutely see where this would be frustrating and feel like your investment has been tossed in the bin. But the reality of the situation is that some people want to play solitaire, and struggle to cope when someone else comes along and messes up their cards.

I mean, having someone else's actions (perhaps even in reaction to your actions) FORCE you to change your Rp- kinda falls in line with your "fundamental cultural problem" as well. Not taking into account where others may be, and guess what if you come out on top who cares, its the dude on the losing ends problem.

Theres a grand difference between "overcoming adversity" and "this isn't worth my time" in these matters, and I'm sure i'm not the only one who feels that way.

16 minutes ago, Atticus said:

Not everyone wants to sit back and rethink thier RP when they think they have been going well, esp. when you consider plus 100 hour investments into characters. Time is still worth something imo, burn out is real now lets just add another set of hoops to jump through and HOPE things turn out different.

I used to think like this.  I used to think my RP was set in stone.  I found that this only limited the directions my characters could grow.  The point is if you do all the right things you WILL BE PROMOTED.

1 minute ago, Izzzzy said:

I used to think like this.  I used to think my RP was set in stone.  I found that this only limited the directions my characters could grow.  The point is if you do all the right things you WILL BE PROMOTED.

Idk man it sounds like you are bowing out to gain the promotion, but I cant prove that its just my opinion and I DO NOT mean it in a malicious way when I say that. "do all the right things" Until now my man, we had really no clue out of a score timer and a minimum of 5 RP across all the helpfiles in FL to suggest what the right thing is.

You are wrong izzy. Ive given two examoles just from me in the last year. People do get overlooked. You literally said you had been.

As a matter of fact @Izzzzy when I went back to copy the thread links to show you, you REPLIED TO THE COMMENT where an imm said it was their fault due to OOC issues. Again, I do not hold any ill will toward the imms for having lives, or for those lives being more important than FL. That is undeniably how it should be, and I hope everything is great in their life, I really really do. The fact remains I did nothing against my cabal, my rp, or the wishes of my cabal leader. I was exactly where I needed to be, but due to real life happenings I was not able to get the promotion. That is NOONE'S FAULT, and I would like to stress that a million more times. This is not about OMFG FUCK THIS IMM AND THEIR BULLSHIT. In absolutely no form do I have any animosity towards the imms for accidents. But I spent 70 hours at V, fighting everyone staying in character while people where going OOC on me (you included izzy, BLATANTLY ooc) and I watched you get to cabal elder in another cabal after I was still veteran. I didn't know what was going on, so I start blaming myself, but without a clear direction on where to go what was I supposed to do?

I just want to prevent players from unneeded problems when they are deserving. A clearcut set of basic standards to work toward handles that. It gives noone anything they dont deserve, you still have to work for it, you still have to earn your promotion. You just dont have to guess what your imm wants out of you, which is far friendlier a system than just "RP Hard, and you will prolly get Trusted."

Let's dial that back please - this has been a relatively productive thread, and I would hate to have to lock it.

Usually we catch ppl who are overdue for a promo. You can always ask on prayer if there the cabal imm is active and what would be required of you to get a promo if you think you are overdue. This is not the same as posting Blala got promoted faster than I, why am I still not T, imms are all biased, ....

Second = bad, first = totally ok.

5 minutes ago, Anume said:

Usually we catch ppl who are overdue for a promo. You can always ask on prayer if there the cabal imm is active and what would be required of you to get a promo if you think you are overdue. This is not the same as posting Blala got promoted faster than I, why am I still not T, imms are all biased, ....

Second = bad, first = totally ok.

Which is fine, and fair as can be- Though I believe standardizing / baselining what they are LOOSELY looking for at least makes the player go "okay I think it's time to ask about my situation", because I have felt at times -- asking can be worse, even if I am wrong on that (prob am). I have found it hard over the years to ask what I need to do, at least before I experience apathy/burnout from the situation.

While I can understand your example @Anume in the case of Seviks I was waiting patiently, it wasnt until everyone else in the cabal had been promoted to T that I deleted because I thought that I was doing everything wrong and vocalized the frustration. Only to find out that I was doing a good job (as you yourself observed, and stated in the prayer thread) but in those situations, with a safety net in place, you could have mentioned what you witnessed me doing in game, and the entire situation had been circumvented. My more behind the scenes manipulative/scheming playstyle was being overshadowed by the more aggressive, in your face style the other players in nexus at the time where putting out. It was my interpretation of Pandy, but i had no way to verify I was correct besides help pande, which is like a 15 year old helpfile. I was correct, but there was nothing to indicate I was. So without any direction, and seeing other players who didnt hadnt even been created while I was already V getting their promotions I have to assume I am doing something very, very poorly. It in turn makes the previous 200 hours I spent writing, and rping feel like a waste when that was not the case. I just wanna prevent things like that from happening is all.

1 hour ago, 'tarako said:

It was my interpretation of Pandy, but i had no way to verify I was correct besides help pande, which is like a 15 year old helpfile. I was correct, but there was nothing to indicate I was. So without any direction, and seeing other players who didnt hadnt even been created while I was already V getting their promotions I have to assume I am doing something very, very poorly.

You did have a way to verify, though. Pray in game. Post in prayer. DM on Discord. If you aren't certain whether your RP is in line with your alignment/cabal, ask.

That said, if I am reading the overall sentiments of this thread correctly, we do not truly seem to be talking about a "standardized" set of requirements for Trusted. What is being requested seems to be more clear and/or abundant communication initiated by the staff.

The reason I ask is because standardized requirements will not fix the problem you cited in your example. The problem of characters "slipping through the cracks" is not going to be solved by standardized, yet still A. subjective and B. manually implemented promotions and other rewards. What will solve those problems would be a mutual system of open communication between the staff and the players.

Before I go further on that, please feel free to correct me if I am not understanding your example.

Quote

My more behind the scenes manipulative/scheming playstyle was being overshadowed by the more aggressive, in your face style the other players in nexus at the time where putting out.

To this very point, I do not see any feasible way for us to quantify manipulation and/or scheming, at least not in a reasonable way. I could task you to "manipulate someone" to become Trusted, and you could convince someone to go to Gear even though they wanted to go to Dischord, adding in a guilt trip that you helped them level and went where they wanted last time. Or I could task you to "manipulate someone" and you could convince Tribunal to declare war on Knight. Those are two very different scenarios, but they both meet "the standard". Only one would, in my opinion, merit the promotion.

Quote

While I can understand your example @Anume in the case of Seviks I was waiting patiently, it wasnt until everyone else in the cabal had been promoted to T that I deleted because I thought that I was doing everything wrong and vocalized the frustration. Only to find out that I was doing a good job (as you yourself observed, and stated in the prayer thread) but in those situations, with a safety net in place, you could have mentioned what you witnessed me doing in game, and the entire situation had been circumvented.

People have repeatedly brought up their own past characters in the thread. Please keep in mind that it puts the staff in a very awkward position if we have/had concerns about your character and you identify examples that, on their own, make it sound like your character was perfect and simply falling through the cracks. As I mentioned before - quite vaguely, but intentionally - those cases occur very rarely. And even if you, yourself, are not aware, there may have been details about your character that also played a role in holding you back. The staff is almost never going to bring those up in a public venue, but it does make the discussion uncomfortable.

For example, if I watch you log out without the standard or hide/log off from big scary enemies, I am very unlikely to bring that up. If you then delete out of frustration from not getting promoted, and I say that you were doing a good job and I enjoyed your character, that does not mean that I also felt you deserved a promotion. It could mean that I was watching and waiting for the to improve or for you to do something great that offset it.

That said, if you genuinely feel like you have been overlooked, I refer you again to my first point - say something about it. Say it in game via note. Say it in game via prayer. Post it on the prayer forum. DM your Immortal on Discord or the forums. If you truly have been overlooked, the only way the rest of the staff can help to remedy the situation is if they know about it.

I'll put it out there, if anyone is unsure and is uncomfortable asking their imm directly. Let me know and I will run point on your behalf. Hit me in PM or Dsicord.

Lol, in the the end I'm really impressed by gifnab.

The cases mentioned specific to me are being brought up because I can verify beyond a doubt that it WAS a case of slipping through the cracks is all. I can speculate about other characters, but for these two I have verified answers from the imms over these chars that this is what happened. I am only using them as examples for those reasons because I know there was nothing behind the scenes halting a promotion. The exact terms for seviks is Lloth wanted to see that i was willing to betray other nexians for my own personal advancement, which I WAS but the manner in which I was doing it was super sneaky and Lloth was not outwardly seeing how deep I was going in betraying people. Anume witnessed it while snooping/reading notes/journals but Lloth did not because they where engaged with other characters involved in the plot to bring back Volgathras (there is a thread in prayer where you can see that, as well as general chat for Gilthok). I really am not trying to make things awkward. And my standardized idea was more to the tune of clear communication from imms what they want before promoting a char to trusted for their cabals/sub cabals. And I agree those cases rarely happen, but last year it cost me around 400 hours of gameplay thinking I had fucked everything up, when in reality it was just conflicting schedules, and demanding obligations IRL and IG. Adding in standardized goals was an attempt to create a checklist of sorts so when a player had met all requirements their Imm has given, they can take it to prayer like "look what I did!" and get their gold star. Other imms knowing these standards gives a system where staff can weigh in on characters because they know exactly what the head of another Cabal is looking for. It takes away the awkwardness of imms seeing someone doing all the right things, but it isn't their cabal so it is not their place to offer up a promo. They can say "Sure, Lloth hasn't killed anything since she left the arena, but her RP has been stellar, she has backstabbed many people, and never been caught, and is working on the start of a bigger plot."  and boom. Even though the imm may have missed it themselves, they have confirmation that the character in question is living up to expectations.

Maybe using my own characters as examples came across as a little whiny, and entitled but I really did not mean it that way regardless of my poor wording. As mentioned I just know that beyond a doubt it was a simple matter of things not aligning with staff's personal lives, and my playtime. After I knew what the issue was with the promotions I was fine. I will try to refrain from using personal experience as part of my posts to make sure it doesn't come across as me skewing things to get a direct personal benefit. Sorry again @Gifnab

Please don't mistake me - I am not suggesting that you were being whiny, or that you should not use your own experiences to support your feedback. In fact, you very much should, as that is all any of us has to go on. I merely wanted to make note that there have been several such examples in this thread, and while I was not an immortal at the time any of those characters existed, there exists the possibility that even you, the player, may not know the whole story.

Seriously. Are we ever going to talk about the issue of this thread and actually discuss specifically how to prevent this in the future? I've given a brief example but I don't play other cabals. Y'all gunna have to help.

5 minutes ago, Ulmusdorn said:

Seriously. Are we ever going to talk about the issue of this thread and actually discuss specifically how to prevent this in the future? I've given a brief example but I don't play other cabals. Y'all gunna have to help.

I just think these are probably terms best left to individual Imms to set because they are their cabals.

@Zoichan @Eledhwen @Razozuul @Lloth @Shagarh @Kassieti @Gifnab could prolly do better than players since we don't know their exact wants

Its also about YOUR wants. And what you think is requried as a player lol

I dint have a horse in that race. You are management, I am peon. You lay the guidelines I follow.  I just want guidelines to follow lol

3 hours ago, 'tarako said:

I just think these are probably terms best left to individual Imms to set because they are their cabals

I think this is done already and I don't want to be the barer of bad news, but Imms are running it they way they want it.  Are we so entitled that its impossible for us to say perhaps we just don't deserve the promotion.  Ill say this again.

-Defend your cabal item.  Do not log off on stronger opponents.  Fearing death is part of the problem with FL.  We put to much emphases on death.  Its okay to die.  Fuck if you have a good fight and you die and came close thats awesome.

Write notes to your Cabal.  Whether you are agreeing with the role play our not.   I understand that you may want to RP stealthy things to circumvent your leaders, make this clear in journals, and by your actions.

Journal to immortal

Journal subject Deuchbag

Ughhh I had to sit and listen to this stinky dirtbag that thinks they run this cabal.  They know nothing.  Soon I will put my foot over his throat and end his life.

NEVER QUIT.  Unless you've run out of play times.  Its okay to fight for 30 min and have a stalemate, or to get your asskicked for 30 minutes.  Do your best and it will be rewarded I promise.

Always try to bring members into your Cabal.  The idea is to build an Empire, and which one of us role plays the second string?  Its okay to understand it may not be about you all the time.  But you can do your best to play your part.

If all these things are happening, and you're not promoted.  Send a scroll to your immortal.  Then DM your immortal.  You will find out the "whole story."  Maybe your just not supposed to be promoted.  Trusted is not AUTOMATIC.  Lets keep the RP and PK so Trusted is still deserving.  This is a powerful position in your Cabal.  There is a reason you get to veteran Automatically.

I want to keep things as is.

THE END.