Damn sorry to hear you are ended your EQ career on such a bad note. Good luck in whatever it is you decide to do.
For Talies as well as anyone else interested, if you are thinking of playing U02:Origin, you might want to check out the UWOO Egroups mailing list:
http://www.egroups.com/group/UWOO
It is a very active list with a lot of interaction with the developers. A lot of subscribers to the list are fellow bards. There have been numerous threads bardic in nature on how/if they will be implemented in UWOO. So if any of you are interested in continuing your bardic career after EQ, then you may like the list. It does get a lot of daily traffic though, very similar to how this list was in its early days.
Galtin of E'ci
-----Original Message-----
From: Talies the Wanderer [mailto:
snicker@...]
Sent: Friday, October 13, 2000 11:15 AM
To:
eqbards@egroups.com
Subject: [eqbards] End of an era....
Well, I just thought I would share with you the end of an era. Today (or
pretty close, their records got messed up) marked my 6 month anniversary as
a Guide on the Tarew Marr server. It also marked my last day as a Guide,
as I felt that I could no longer in good conscience support a company that
chooses to treat it's customers in so heavy-handed a manner with no
consideration for the consequences. This refers to both the recent banning
issues (more than just Mystere were banned over this), and the Bard issues
thread. It is my belief that Everquest truly IS their world, and as such,
I have no place being in it. I haven't paid Verant a dime in 6 months, and
I'm not about to start today, so this was my last day on Norrath as a
player, as well.
I really believed that I could make a difference in Everquest as a Guide -
not just by summoning corpses, but also by being a good source of input for
things that needed to be fixed or changed. I'm well-versed in diplomacy
(being the Herald for my local LARP Kingdom), and I was very eager to make
the world a better place. Unfortunately, from day one, my rose-coloured
glasses suffered some pretty potent tarnish. While in IRC, being given
instructions on what NOT to do as a Guide ("no hunting, no looting, and
above all, no fighting with players!!!"), I was also online on my other
computer (Love having two windows machines!). As I was playing my
enchanter, I heard the shout that there was a "Giant GM" on the loose in
the Arena, so I invis'd myself and ran there. (why the invis? I dunno...
Just didn't want to attract any attention to myself, and didn't realize at
the time that GMs can see invis all the time.)
When I got there, I saw the giant GM - 3 stories tall, at least!, and he
was in the process of giving a warning to a rude player who was exploiting
the arena (charming the lower level guy every time he tried to retrieve his
corpse). While I grant that the player was being rude, and certainly
deserved the warning, what happened next was totally uncalled for. The GM
followed up his verbal warning with a spell (some kind of knockback that
does damage), nearly killing the offending player. I was stunned. I
immediately did a direct tell to a GM in the IRC room asking for
clairification on this, and at first, until they heard the GMs name, they
acted somewhat shocked. When they realized it was a programmer GM, they
suddenly backed off and said that "well, GM's know what they're doing -
it's not our place to question that."
This, incidentally, was less than two weeks after several guides were
banned for fighting players in the Arena. Even the Guides who were brand
new and just following their leader were suspended, and removed from the
Guide Program.
Basicallly I guess what I'm saying here is that *even then*, the hypocrisy
ran rampant, and that sort of attitude really ticks me off. I'm not going
to turn into any sort of Tweety, but I'm also not going to candy-coat
it. Verant's version of social engineering made me sick to my stomach, and
I refuse to be a part of that orwellian nightmare.
Another interesting note is that when I posted my letter of resignation to
the Guide board (which wasn't nearly as vitriolic as this one - but it did
include the phrase "rampant hypocrisy"), it was deleted inside of 3
minutes. I had to severely water it down before I posted it again to
ensure that it would stay up there. Way to control information, Big
Brother Verant. Ignorance is Bliss.
I will remain on the list as an active moderator, and to share Bard
stories, perhaps even get some input on Bards for my new project, but my EQ
career is over.
Sweet Songs and Light Laughter,
Talies the Wanderer
formerly
Jalviv the Just of Tarew Marr
Please send submissions for the eqbards newsletter to
lol@... with the subject submissions.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]