[April's Fool] The Council of Councils - Definitive Solution to Defias' Ailments

Alright, this isn't really about a Council that unites Councils, but the name is too awesome to skip.

Defias Brotherhood's population is dwindling while Argent Dawn is growing rapidly. I think it is clear that we will never beat AD when it comes to numbers, but I believe we can become the greatest server when it comes to quality. This is a major project, which will require dedication and a lot of effort and fidelity from all of you. Together, we will build a server to be proud of and a role-playing community that will make Argent Dawn green with envy!

This is a huge undertaking, requiring a lot of effort from every single role-player on Defias. A project of this size cannot be successfully finished without good leadership. By leadership I do not mean some 'Server President', by leadership I mean a single unifying vision with passionate and talented people ready to devote themselves to seeing it brought into being and a lot of patience and understanding from the community, which will have to support and perhaps even sacrifice for the good of the Community.

This thread is about formulating the overarching vision which will unite the server and finding those individuals ready to put a lot of work and effort into making it happen. Here, I share my vision which of course is not final and open to feedback and criticism.

Guilds & Characters : Quality Assurance

DefiasRP has an amazing section for advertising and discussing guilds and fleshing out and sharing characters. Characters and guilds are the cornerstones of Role-play and if we want to eclipse Argent Dawn in terms of quality, this is where we need to begin.

First of all we need to see all role-playing guilds and characters registered. All active RP guilds already have an entry on Registry, now these guilds must encourage their members to register on DefiasRP and make an entry in the Population section. I personally find that refusing promotion past the rank of recruit to those not registered is a good way to encourage registration. Un-guilded RPers will have to be directed here by registered members and encouraged to sign up on the forum and register. This is also in their best interest, since not being registered on these forums will exclude them from being informed on ongoing and upcoming events and RP.

One of the biggest problems with guilds and characters are overpowered characters and lore-lols. We need two or four dedicated forum&game moderators who should:

-Encourage guild leaders to keep their guild's entry up-to-date and relevant, monitoring the threads and the guilds and deleting threads which are not kept up-to-date.
-Reading Guild&Character entries and doing some fact-checking and thinking, and providing constructive criticism if lore is being violated or a character is too overpowered or Mary Sue-esque.
-Listening to feedback from ordinary members who report OP characters and lorelols, and contacting people in question by either providing feedback in their Registry/Population thread or by reaching out to them in game.

I too started as a loller, and now that I've learned more about the WoW lore and was taught how to create believable, balanced characters I am able to enjoy RP much, much more. In the end this measure may seem a like a megalomaniac exercise in nitpicking, but ultimately it benefits not only the Community but also the individual players who will be uplifted from lolling around and stumbling into understandable hostility from other RPers and will be raised to being valuable members of the community who can have a lot of marvelous time RPing on Defias.

How can ordinary people assist this quality-assurance?

-Put pressure on your guild leader and officers to keep their registry-thread relevant and up to date and to encourage forum&population registration of all guildies.
-Talk to your guild members who are not registered and encourage them to do so. They just don't know the benefits and probably heard bad things about this forum from some drama-mongers out there. Help them see for themselves!
-Reach out to RPers who are without a guild or part of a non-RP guild and encourage them to register here, explaining all the benefits of doing so.
-Contact the 'quality-moderator' if you encounter lore-lols or poor and overpowered characters if you can't teach the newbie yourself. They will take it from there.

Now, this is very important. Some people are on our server for the sole reason of disrupting RP. Sometimes they are even smart enough to disrupt it by RPing (alas poor and very trollish) and have no intention of improving. It is important that we make a Blacklist, signal those individuals and put them on a community-wide ignore to discourage them and make them leave. Again, maintaining the Blacklist is the work for the 'quality-moderators'. Those who consistently refuse to improve their RP despite the moderator warnings are more likely than not to be lollers.

Storytelling : Synchronization

Lack of synchronization is the source of endless drama and frustration, and decreases the quality of RP. For instance, the Disciples of Light have an event where they cleanse Tranquil Gardens chapel of corruption. Next week Holy Lightbringers RP doing the same, because they do not OOCly know what Disciples did.

Enter the Storytellers. We need several devoted individuals to:
-Keep an eye on ongoing RP and create and moderate a thread which informs other RPers of what has been done and what is happening. (Maps are good for this)
-Get in touch with those who break synchronization and point them to the up-to-date thread where they can find all the relevant information for the zone they chose to RP in.
-Mediate between guilds and people in cases of conflicts of synchronization (Group wanting to treat Gilneas as a safe resettlement zone, while another group treats it as a dangerous warzone)

In the end, synchronization will give all of us greater context and allow us to enjoy RP on a far bigger scale without running into difficulties and disrespecting the effort and plots of other Rpers. Synchronization also gives rise to well-documented Server Lore which we can use to advertise Defias Brotherhood. Those who are deliberately trying to screw synchronization and ruin the RP for the entire community and do not wish to RP with others and respect the synchronized Server Lore should also be black-listed. Obviously, they are not here to RP with the community but to troll!

Synchronization also involves structures such as laws and institutions, law-enforcers and so forth. It is very important that everybody is on the same page. If a criminal-player OOCly thinks that selling bodyparts is legal, while a guard thinks that it is not, it will result in drama. Synchronizes should encourage clear and expansive laws, rules and guidelines as well as agreements to the status and possession of various territories and areas.

If Storytellers feel up for it, they can actually use their vast up-to-date information to mediate between guilds and suggest and organize story-driven events, giving them more of a Dungeon Master function if they want it. Alternatively, storytellers can simply mediate and hold meetings akin to Aleric's old Stormwind Community meetings where every two weeks people would gather together and plan some fun event.

Fancy Titles and Lethargic Guilds: Cleansing

Many people have fancy titles as part of their guild rank or something else, sometimes those titles are justified. What we need is a resource for military, religious, noble and civilian titles and ranks for all factions and religions to be used and referenced. That is one. Council has come a long way with normalizing Stormwind military ranks, now other factions and domains should do the same!

Secondly we need to make people realize that rank comes with responsibility, outside of guilds and within guilds. I am very confident that every guild has officers who do not do anything or barely log on, but keep their rank due to being friends with the Guild Leader or having been in the guild since the start.

Every community-rank (General, Captain, Bishop) must come with conditions and responsibilities, and if a character no longer fulfills these conditions the Community must demand a demotion. Fortesgue is still known as Bishop, but when was the last time he held a mass or did something for the Church-RP? Inactive Bigwigs should be shamed into resigning their mighty rank and outright ignored if they refuse to either step down or step up their performance and do something to deserve the rank!

Guild members must have a greater passion for honesty and good conduct and demand demotions of inactive officers so that they can vacate the spot for somebody more motivated and active. If a guild leader falls into the pitfall of filthy nepotism and keeps people at fancy ranks just because, then that guild is not worthy of a good Defias RPer and you should take a stand for what is right and leave it if the Guild Leader doesn't listen.

Similarly, you must subject your guild to the same scrutiny. If you've joined a Military Order dedicated to liberating the North, but all your leader and officers ever do is attend councils and sit in taverns while the guild languishes in Stormwind and gets drunk in Pig&whistle, you've been cheated. You must make the hard, but right choice of speaking up to the officer and leader about it and leaving the guild if situation does not improve. This way the Community will be cleansed of lethargic, half-assed guilds and clear the field for more dynamic and ambitious ones. Some kind of blind loyalty to guild concept or circle of friends should not stand in the way of weeding the garden for the good of the Community.

It cannot happen from the outside, each guild is sovereign, so you as a member must save your guild from the inside or deliver it a coup-de-grace if it cannot be saved!

Just imagine how much amazing w-PvP events we would have if every guild that claimed to be military tried to hold a 2-3 day mini-campaign once every two months? Just imagine how glorious it would be if every guild actively did what it advertised to be doing and had active, caring officers?


Bouquet of Goodness

At last some smaller but no less useful tips into turning Defias into the great and shining hub of quality RP:

-Report OOCers and OOC names. ALWAYS. Even if you have to AFK for a while or if you are with 40 other RPers. Don't think 'somebody else will report it for me', no! Report it. The more people report, the better. Stand in Trade District and report them all while waiting for raids or dungeons!
-Be watchful of new RPers and direct them to this forum, encourage them to register on Population. That way other players and moderators can help them design their character and avoid becoming a loller.
-Hate the clique, shun the clique! Try to meet up and RP with new people all the time. The more interconnected the community becomes, the greater it will be for us all.
-Make alts on another server RP and play them when bored, advertising DB while you do so or encouraging people to give it a try.
-Share as much information about your RP and RP hubs/locations as you can. The more people get involved, the greater.

Conclusion

This is my vision on how to elevate Defias, please provide constructive criticism and share your own views. If we all work together for the common good of the community we can overcome the plague that is Argent Dawn!

Trouble is what is the right way to RP, you will never find a majority decision on this front.

On the Loller front, sure it is fine to say "lets do something" but ultimately you cant o alot other than try to teach. Setting standards is pointess an will likely just lead to RPers trying to force them on others, which is a waste of time (imagine how unlivable half the people on this site will become).

Finally DB needs to move off its pedistal and stop viewing AD in the way it does.

Lexgrad wrote:Finally DB needs to move off its pedistal

Fully agreed to that. Acting high and mighty puts more people off than lure them in (I've seen countless examples of such where people just get disgusted by it and leave, instead of getting intrigued and stay for the RP if people had acted properly). We need to be able to take in fresh blood without chewing them out for being new, or RP'ers will be a dying breed here.

I actively discourage recruits from joining this forum. I'm on it because I'm an officer and it is occasionally useful but every time I view it its like being stabbed in the face repeatedly.
Too much rage, hatred, idiocy and ignorance on this forum.

All in all, if the server stopped trying to rip each other's throats out constantly moving to DB would be a more attractive prospect to people from other realms.

My guild are doing fine The Horde still seems healthy!

In before this is a really elaborate april's fool.

XD You troll, though it is too early for an april fools thing so meh to you.

Ixirar/Kavalis wrote:In before this is a really elaborate april's fool.

I sincerely hope it is.

It is not.

And I'm going to be one of the quality moderators.

I have a list of badrper's ready to ban.

... I think I'll distance myself from the internet for April's fools. I can't handle it... My brain can't handle dis internet sarcasm.

Vangrel Lansire wrote:It is not.

And I'm going to be one of the quality moderators.

I have a list of badrper's ready to ban.

in before Drustai agrees with Eph.

Of course. I am also going to be a quality moderator.

I really hope it's an April Fool's, because - with no offence meant, Melnerag - it all sounds like a recipe for, at best, well-intentioned catastrophe.

stop trying to take over the world melny

And who will keep this council in check?

The council of councils of councils?

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes, Melnerag...Who watches the watchmen?

me.

king of db.

I didn't vote for you.

Bloody peasants!

Could you make any reference less trite and obtruse?

It's easy points, isn't it? Thrown in a Monty Python reference and get all the nerds laughing and jolly well on your side?

It's a smokescreen, that's what it is - to hide your malignant purposes. Sure. Hide behind the thin veneer of bad grammar and April Fool's jokes, but the fact is you - all of you - are always out to tell others what to do. Power, that's what you're after, in whatever shape or form; and in an internet videogame community, too.

You express yourselves more clearly during April Fool's because you think you can hide behind the merry festivities of foolery. That's what April's Fools have always been about, you know: the purest epxressions of the true bile that lurks deep in men's hearts, sneaked into civil discourse in the guise of silliness and sarcasm.

Well, I'm not buying it. You're not fooling anyone, April's Fools - Vangrel/Epithos, Melnerag and whomever is posting these 'funny' suggestions - I see your true intentions clearer than ever trough the chuckle-muck.

It's a good thing there's still sensible people on these boards that will never let you get away with your nefarious scheming.

...

Wow.

Do you think I am out for Power? I've left the council more times others have applied to it put together. I know you and Erwtenpeller are all about free and fun RP, which is of course good. But it has no staying power. You can fuck syncrhonization, ignore server lore and snub at player-power and go and have fun but it will never have the staying power. Where are Naaruvada and Blooming Lotus now? Stormwind Council still stands as strong as it did at the server start.

Meditate on that.

Both of you are terrible actors.

Melnerag wrote:Where are Naaruvada and Blooming Lotus now?

Blooming Lotus, with 74 members, stands as one of the most active role-playing guilds of this server on the Alliance. Just because we don't whore ourselves out on the forums for attention doesn't mean we're not active. That's the problem with you people - you act as if acknowledgement by the role-play elite on this forum is the one and only true and proper standard of legitimacy.

Well guess what? I don't need your fucking legitimacy. You can keep your grubby hands off of my role-play thank you very much. Blooming Lotus doesn't need the council and never will.

This thread confuses me. But also makes me not want to tell people to join forums. Still i am lazy to keep telling people of some events that others make.. Hmm...

Nah still confused.

Vangrel Lansire wrote:Both of you are terrible actors.

Would you shut up already? I hate you and your posts. These boards were better when you were banned. Every single thing you say is either full of bile against others or full of your own ego.

That wasn't acting - that was the truth. Like I said, April's Fools is all about the truth.

siegmund wrote:This thread confuses me. But also makes me not want to tell people to join forums. Still i am lazy to keep telling people of some events that others make.. Hmm...

Nah still confused.

It's all pretty obvious. Do not put much stock on anything you read this day.