First, a disclaimer. I'm not here to Argue Matrik's ban, how he reacted to the situation was wrong, and that's something you can hash out with him personally if you want. This is about the original ROTD situation.

I know there are rules against Permas. I've been ROTD occasionally for it (honestly just because sometimes I would play on the same IP as my brother or uncle, who don't even play at this point. It even happened once when I had no idea it was them.)

If what he was saying was true, though. They were just helping someone through the academy who had never played before. As long as it just stayed in the academy...I can't really see the problem with that.

Yes, the playerbase is dwindling. We just lost a chance to get a new player, though. And at this point, every little bit helps. All that was necessary was for someone to listen to his explanation. I know just punish and move on has become the new norm, but some of us are actual civil when it comes to these things. I know I have been. Don't think I've ever cursed out an Imm for a ROTD or anything. I know you're time is just as valuable as mine. I suppose my main point is, why not try and listen to an explanation first? Try and work it out first. I'm not saying spend 20 minutes of your time doing it. Just that extra minute or two could help. We might have that player Matrik brought in, and perhaps he wouldn't have reacted so childishly and gotten himself a ban. I really don't want this game to die. I've spent almost half of my life playing it on and off.

Anyway...that's my point made. Just to take an extra minute or two for that communication. I'm sure in that specific situation (and maybe a few others, I don't know) everything could've been cleared up quickly.

We don't have a history of punishing people for showing their friends (for example) the ropes, especially when they give us a heads up first (via pray) or politely explain what's up if/when we pull them aside. We're really pretty good at telling the difference between what's innocent and what's not.

As best I can tell from the information I have available to me, the above doesn't accurately describe the event(s) that led up to Matrik being "realmed".

Nothing after that point matters because there are zero scenarios in which his subsequent behavior are even the remotest degree of okay.

If anyone wishes to appeal a ban or express concern with the way they were treated by an Immortal they may, as always, email the Implementors (which neither I or the Immortal who dealt with Matrik that evening are) at imps@carrionfields.com.

I understand you are making an effort to be helpful and stand up for a player who I would agree has played some very good characters, and that's commendable.

Lastly, I would encourage players to remember that regardless of how you feel about this or episodes like it, you almost always lack information and context that we do not. That doesn't automatically make us right or someone else wrong, but do try to acknowledge that reality when not only forming your opinion but specifically when passing judgement in writing on a public forum. Thanks.

That is the extent of the public discourse we'll allow on this subject and these forums.

I don't think it warranted a perma-ban, but then again, I don't know what he was saying in the ROTD.

I know I was laughing at the stupidity on the newbie channel and their char names, but at the same time, I tried to roll a new character to check something out afterwards and couldn't because the IMMs had to stop new character creation. If some new player had been linked to the MUD during that time and wasn't able to create a new character, that's rather damning.

tl;dr Just don't drink and MUD

like...utterly and completely.

"**It's late at night and few people are playing. We come up with some dumb names and jump right in to start
**teaching. As we are slowly walking him through the mud school pointing out the important bits of how to play, we
**all get transfered to the ROTD and told by an immortal "That's enough." In hindsight, this may have gone a bit
**better had we been typing the instructions in game, but I doubt it. Most of our communication was over Skype to
**expedite the process. A few moments and we have no communication with the immortal. I send up a pray letting them
**know that we don't intend to play out this little perma, it's just for the sake of introducing this guy to the
**mud. We get no response. Naturally, I take this as cause for some light hearted antics. I delete and create a
**character something like "Nonewplayer" or something. Get ROTD. Repeat for an hour or two while I enjoy a few
**drinks and eventually go to bed."

He's not saying there was no communication, he's doing a lot of para-phrasing and simplifying.

For all we know (since Matrik was admittedly under the influence) he told the IMMs "Yeah we are perma'ing to try and get this guy to learn the game", the IMM was like "Yeah, knock that off since it's against the rules of help perma", Matrik was like "Dude, but we are trying to teach him the game" and then went Full Stevers after that.

Of course, the sad thing is Tsunami/Matrik can't defend himself here or even start a discussion since they banned his official account (which is ####ing stupid...but whatever).

As to what you point is, IE, "More communication"...this is not a new thing. As I posted 5 years ago with my Jindicho log, the default IMM dogma is NOT TO COMMUNICATE. Not sure why, but there it is. That being said, it's mostly an individual IMM thing, and I'm fine with that. Not every IMM is going to be good during an admin/player interaction. Some will do badly, some will make players go "Wow that was really understanding". I got RoTD'd by Iunna back in 2010 (first time ever) and it was great. She was upfront about what she suspected, we chatted, I offered to sac all my gear, she said "Nah, it's cool" and off I went.

When they were inviting him to IMM?