Welcoming Committees and Re-Tooling the Wiki

[Adam Cass]

Greetings,

I am the user AdamCassam2, owner of the National Conservative Party of Barmenia and one of these "noobs". I would like to explain our side of the story concerning the apparent "raid" of Barmenia, which we have been accused of carrying out.
The four parties currently in Barmenia belong to myself and three of my friends. We established the parties in Barmenia as there were no users currently residing there, and we decided it would be best if we could competitively run a nation, with each of us having differing ideologies.

After the first election, we decided it was best to alter some aspects of Barmenia's culture and administration to fit our vision of Barmenia. We consulted the Tutorials and the FAQs, where nothing was mentioned about a nation's culture. All we found was an OOC piece of legislation in the debate category of Barmenia's legislature, which did not appear to have any official authority, rather a proposal that had never made it to a vote.

We wanted a more realistic nation, in which cats were not the center of religious fanaticism. We made various changes, and albeit willingly ignored a large amount of work that had been put into the culture of Barmenia, including the language. However, we believed that as the nation was vacant, all interest was lost in it.

Then, a friend was contacted by a Moderator in regards to an apparent 'raid'. We read the message and then discovered that the forums, which we previously had little idea about, had more in depth rules with regards to culture. Upon reading these, we then realized we had infringed on the rules, and immediately afterwards we made the appropriate steps to fix this, by proposing the "Cultural Healing Bill" which will re-establish all previous cultural administrative laws which were in place prior to their repeal.

However, what has been said on this forum is not one bit pleasant. We do not appreciate being called "noobs", and we are certainly not maliciously raiding a nation. We certainly did make a misinformed decision, however, the in-depth cultural rules were not made clear. It is unfortunate that, for a game we had very high hopes for, has not started very pleasantly at all.

I apologize for any inconvenience our actions may have caused.

Regards,
The Members of Barmenia.

[Aquinas]

Adam,

This isn't the first time this kind of thing has happened. .

I'm sorry you and your friends have had this experience and I hope it will not put you off playing the game. In actual fact, from having read your message, I can't help thinking you're the kind of person whose voice we would benefit from hearing a little more of on this forum.

Please try not to take things that have been said too personally. As you may have guessed, you and your friends have unwittingly found yourselves in the middle of a lot of "cross-fire" here, concerning issues and controversies to do with the running of the game. Thanks for doing the "Cultural Healing Bill" and trying to work with the established culture in Barmenia. Others in your position, I fear, would have given up in frustration.

Yes, I acknowledge the points you make about the rules listed in the forum not always being as clear/obvious to new players as many of us older players think them to be. Again, you're not the first people to have found this.

But as I said: please try not to be too put off by this. This is a game well worth playing, I assure you. And do feel free to ask any questions you or your friends have. Amazeroth, I'm sure, will do whatever he can to help, as will others of us.

[EEL123]

This brings me back to the issue which was raised some time ago - we need new players (if you feel offended by the term "noob"; it's just a commonly-used term that isn't generally meant maliciously) to be made aware of the rules - at least the basic rules, and those that people are particularly touchy about (like cultural protocols) - before they start playing to prevent misunderstandings which will lead to an outpouring and hostility and so on. Is there any possibility that we could create a terms and conditions-like page that new players must read before they sign up so that they don't start off by making an innocent mistake that lands them in the bad books of the rest of the player community?

[EEL123]

I should also advise that if you're put off by our somewhat acerbic tendencies, you should probably try to stay off the off-topic forum, where things tend to get a little heated.

[soysauce]

(if you feel offended by the term "noob"; it's just a commonly-used term that isn't generally meant maliciously)

Em, "noob" is used commonly online as an insult (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Noob) so perhaps it's best avoided to lower the risk of misunderstanding? I mean we're not immature Call of Duty fanboys or YouTube people, why should we not be at least civil with each other?

[SelucianCrusader]

I mean we're not immature Call of Duty fanboys or YouTube people, why should we not be at least civil with each other?

On a related matter, I have a hard time seeing why anyone would voluntarily change the name of their HoS and HoG to "President" and "Prime Minister" respectively, even in an anglophone nation. A tiiiiny bit generic, no?

[soysauce]

Apologies, I mean the sort of people who get into silly debates in YouTube comments sections that generally results in people slinging shit and overusing "n00b" as well as other expletives,

[SelucianCrusader]

Apologies, I mean the sort of people who get into silly debates in YouTube comments sections that generally results in people slinging shit and overusing "n00b" as well as other expletives,

This is correct, I know. Of course we, under the safe leadership of knightly Amazeroth, should strive to archive a nice climate for everybody.

[Afrocentric]

Anyway....lets get back on topic shall we?

[MichaelReilly]

Jesus SelCru, let it go... People like generic English-speaking republics because it's realistic and it's where they're from and so feel comfortable. A lot of people come to play the original purpose of the game: politics. As a result they don't take too kindly to a bunch of stuck-up self-proclaimed gods of the game who hang around on some hidden-away forum telling them they're playing it wrong. Adam's kinda got a point. It was lying empty: how's he to know he wasn't to touch it?

I honestly do think we should start to re-look at the way we are sticking to certain cultural aspects of role-play and the way in which we treat new players.

I'm on your side here Adam, don't worry.

Welcome to the game.