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Time for another hiatus from CF for me. I don't like the current state of the game so I'm stepping away. I'm sure I'll be back. I've given too much time and energy to this game and community over the past 20+ years to not post some thoughts before I step away for an unknown amount of time.
1) I know our imms are stretched thin. But it feels like the community has mentioned some pretty pointed imbalances and gaps that are just left completely unaddressed. Most notably: cabal dynamics. I'm looking at you, chamo, state of empire, lack of imm oversight for (most) cabals, etc. This is thrown further out of whack by the limited number of imms and how heavy in interaction/rewards some imms are vs other imms. I think this is even further exasperated by some players playing the same sort of religions and having good chemistry with a few specific imms, culminating in a positive feedback loop that carries over across multiple characters in a row. It doesn't help that these imms generally cater to the same alignments.
2) I think there is a lot of sketchy #### happening. I don't have a smoking gun. I just have observations and general 'that doesn't feel right to me'. I'm going to try to be vague here because I don't want to stir the pot or sling mud. I've tried to be more report-based, but my prays have oft gone unanswered. I've reached out through Discord with thoughts/log snippets etc with varying degrees of success, but at least those typically get answered. I understand that this is a game and that we're all playing to have fun. But knowing that some players talk to imms on a friendly basis is one thing. Knowing that some players routinely push the envelope because they know the windows that imms will or won't be watching, and while what they're doing isn't explicity against the rules it's just ####ty behavior/rp and therefore not really a rules infraction worth reporting...and then seeing those players get rewarded. That doesn't sit well with a lot of the playerbase.
3) As a mud, we (collectively) have drifted away from the 'this character is doing cool ####, let's give them a carrot (whether it be an edge, title, lastname, bigger reward or whatever)' to 'this character needs to exist long enough to give them a carrot' .... and then it doesn't seem to matter if they do cool #### or not. As long as you put in 300+ hours, even if it's lukewarm tapioca mediocrity, you'll get rewarded. I wish we would reward on longevity AND cool factor. But due to imms being stretched thin, there being a lot less imms, I don't think cool factor has that much of an impact anymore. Which is a shame, and tangentially it reminds me of the felar warrior Vozmuir. Who was _great_ when Baer was vis and when things were going his way. But he knew Baer's times pretty well, and when Baer wasn't around he was an absolute terror to interact with. Like a serious PITA. There were other imms who documented this and as a result, I think Voz's rewards were well earned and it helped the character and player grow. In today's environment, we still have players being awesome when XYZ is vis or whatever. But in general, players also know that there isn't much oversight, so the 'weredouche' (credit to Nep for that term) aspect is much more elevated and often times without a balancing aspect.
4) The playerbase has a gross, gross amount of alts. Whenever this comes up in Discord discussion and Ish lends some statistics to it, it's infinitely worse than how bad I thought it was. Having alts, especially in a game with a playerbase the size that ours is, is inherently detrimental for a ton of reasons. The bias factor alone is huge, and that's not even mentioning how it impacts swings and leadership and cabal dynamics.
5) And finally, I know I'm a CF purist and a little bit on the harder line of things. But we have softened to such an extent that I don't get the rush that I used to. Floofy roleplay circles are more common, blurring cabal dogma is a nonstop affair, and we give out more participation trophies while simultaneously, we don't reward the hardliners who are actually trying to do things the 'right' way. I'm tired of being on my soapbox about it. I understand somewhat why this is happening. CF is a game, it should be fun, but for me at least it takes away from my enjoyment.
I adore CF. I think it's a truly unique creation and I applaud the efforts of the players and Imms, I know they Imms in particular are doing the best they can. After I played Ghrudzar I kept finding myself going back to 'Do I walk away from CF or do I try to imm and be the change I want to see?'
I can't seem to play a character past 200 hours, and after 6 months of trying to find a char to stick with for that long, I've found the answer to the 'do I imm or walk away' question. I realized that my past few deletions weren't even after a death or a loot, the way that they typically would be. It was just after some sort of exposure to one of the points above that had me grinding my teeth in frustration. We'll see when or if I come back and what direction I go. Food for thought above, wishing CF's players and imms nothing but the best.
Shams
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