Yellow Text: The Definitive Discussion

[heartbrand]

I hear the arguments for and against global OOC, and I think both can make valid points, even if I find one much more compelling than the other. What I don't truly hear is the valid argument against yellow text.

Issues that have been brought up:

- Reveals your location.

Response: Server pop is so low already, it's not like you don't know where everyone is already. I can do a /who all and know prolly where 60-75% of the people I see are at any given time. Sassy and crew are going to be in CT, the other FF are going to be in BB or WFP, Nihilum are in Fear or Guk, the low-mid levels are all in Unrest, etc. Of course if it's a huge issue to people can, we can simply have yellow text not show location, this problem solved.

- People will make troll account names like mycock beats xxxx or w/e

Response: Ban hammer with vengeance / make yellow text require minimum level 10-15 or something.

- People will use it to grief others.

Response: 1) It actually prevents some forms of griefing such as bind camping AFK people because now the server is alerted to it and can mobilize, would citychamp have taken 200+ deaths if nihilum knew it was going on? (lol if they were dong bawses maybe!!! ok sorry wrong thread) but seriously it would help stop that. 2) Sure, some people will do whatever they can to get that pvp kill...... but isn't that the point of a PVP server? 3) The main levels where true "griefing" can occur, the mid-levels, are all a bunch of people trying to avoid PVP at all costs so they can get through the terrible XP grind, and a lot of people at this point are being power leveled by themselves away from PVP anyway at this point.

Yellow text will make the server seem more alive, encourage PVP (right now there is little motivation to chase runners down and what not cuz why bother when they will loot up 2 minutes from now and be on their way?) make forumquest a bit more fun when we can truly see who is winning on the server, etc., etc. Player X claims to be a badass on forums? Let's see what happens when we have yellow text.

At the very least, can't we just give it a two week trial period? Is there really anything to lose on this server at this point? Also, it's pretty clear this server already has it's "niche" population, shouldn't we start catering to that population rather than to the non-existent "purple" pop on this server who have already quit/left and prolly aren't coming back?

Edit: Some have suggested raising level "cap" on yellow text even higher to perhaps 30-35, this would cut down on some of the "griefing" people see worried about at those levels. Others have suggest an "opt-out" or way to ignore the text as well. Both sound cool.

[Lazortag]

I've won this argument already, making a new thread is not going to change that. Even big xantille agreed with me.

[heartbrand]

Great response that addresses the pros and cons of the thread with good arguments. A++. I would add that wolfram does not play a great deal on this server, and holds opinions contrary to many on this server. While his opinion is by no means disregarded because of such, I would say that his opinions are outside the "mainstream" of the PVP server, and should be viewed as such.

[Lazortag]

I'm saying that I've addressed all of your points and thoroughly proven why YT is a bad idea in other threads, only for you to just ignore what I've said and make new threads.

[Arillious]

At this point, im willing to give anything a try. I have little hope for this actually getting done and even if it does, people will find something else to bitch about and be "The reason why the server is dead".

[heartbrand]

Originally Posted by Arillious [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

At this point, im willing to give anything a try. I have little hope for this actually getting done and even if it does, people will find something else to bitch about and be "The reason why the server is dead".

Thank you for you response. I think that's something I should have touched on more. This server is in crisis. Is there really anything to lose from a two week trial run of yellow text, followed by a poll/thread to get peoples thoughts on how it went and if it should be made a permanent staple on this server? Seems low-risk, high reward.

Also, I think people need to be honest about the PVP reality on this server. At the high end there are only three guilds, Holo / FF / Nihilum. Each are all bundled together at any given time. The majority of PVP at this point is really group vs. group. A lot of the griefing issues mentioned in other threads just wouldn't become a huge reality here given the population and state of the end game.

[heartbrand]

Took me a while to find your post Wolfram:

"Yellow text is stupid, Rogean already said it wasn't going in. Every time this is mentioned I make the exact same argument and no one responds except to call me a "fag" or a "pussy". News flash: being opposed to YT doesn't mean I'm afraid of pvp. It just means that I think this server shouldn't be turned into an FPS where the singular goal of everyone playing is to kill everyone you can indiscriminately, regardless of whether there's a good reason. Classic pvp wasn't like that. Some players were anti PK's, some players were PK's, some were elf-slayers, etc. Yellow text encourages people to kill just for the sake of killing."

Here's the issue in my opinion with what you said. This isn't a server with a large pop, with multiple non=pk guilds, non guilded players, etc. The end game is holo/ff/nihilum, that's it. Yellow text will just make PVP at the end game more exciting as you can actually show your accomplishments rather than play ForumQuest. There isn't a large enough pop to have the type of griefing going on that you seem concerned about. Because there's no teams it's basically join one of those three guilds at the end game or do nothing. All three guilds are at war with each other, so every PVP battle is "justified."

[Lazortag]

You can show your "accomplishments" just fine on the forums. One difference is that the forums would require you to post a screenshot showing the context in which the kill occurred, and yellow text does not. So if you zerg someone, kill them naked, etc. then that will be clear from your screenshot, but with yellow text this is not clear. Additionally, posting on the forums means you can add little captions to your kill (like Casey), or add other pictures, or whatever. It's just more fun, and it's also optional. If I don't want to be given attention every time I kill someone, or if I don't want to hear about other people being killed, I can just not read/post on the forums. Yellow text isn't opt-outable in the same way.

Moreover, yellow text has always been seen as an informal leaderboard on every server that it's been implemented on. If someone gets more yellow text, that means they're more skilled; if they get less, it means they're less skilled. Obviously we can all see the issue with this (since you can bind camp someone 20 times and get 20 YT's, but that wouldn't take any skill, for example), but the kind of crowd that plays on pvp servers will still act as if you're shitty if you don't get lots of YT.

Why is this bad? Apart from being a grossly inaccurate measure of someone's skill, it changes how people conduct themselves in pvp and what rules of engagement they impose on themselves. On this server I can walk up to a random unguilded player, /wave at them, have a conversation, and not feel the urge to kill them or vice versa. On a server with YT, that player would have attacked me out of fear that I'd attack first, kill them, and damage their "rep" with a server-wide announcement that they'd been killed. If you think I'm overanalyzing this you haven't been around long; this is a 100% accurate account of what happens on pvp servers with yellow text. Players become more paranoid, act like bigger douches than they already would have, all for the sake of getting more YT in their favor or avoiding being on the wrong side of YT.

I'm not saying no one should be allowed to play this way - I still consider myself anti-pk and I would have no purpose if there were no griefers. I just think that players shouldn't be pressured into playing this way. I know YT doesn't literally force you to want to kill everyone you see as if the game is an FPS, but it creates a social expectation to play like that, for the reasons I mentioned above. There's absolutely nothing classic about that - in classic less people griefed or attacked other players unprovoked. The playerbase was a lot more diverse - some people roleplayed as elf supremacists, anti-pk's, gnome slayers, whatever. While I admit it's unlikely that red99 will have that kind of diversity, it's at least possible without YT. When you have YT there's only one rule: kill everyone you see, run from anyone who might have a chance at humiliating you with YT, and ridicule anyone who doesn't have as much YT as you for being "less skilled".

[heartbrand]

Simple response to your post as said above, the players you mention don't exist on this server. If you're level 45+ there's a 95.999% chance you're in FF/ Holo / Nihilum. Each of which is highly KOS to the other.

[Smedy]

supporting YT for a better tommorrow