Event Cards (removed from the event)

[Memorystick]

You are absolutely 100% wrong.

I don't like this- it screams of "I am right no matter what, and you are wrong no matter what"

Also, I'd like to bring up this:

OUR GOAL
These rules are not to limit people's freedom of speech or discussion. These rules simply strive to keep the boards on topic, productive and inclusive for all members. Accidental violation of minor rules will not result in strict penalties. We want everything to go smoothly so that our users can enjoy this forum.

Taken directly from the forum rules, I'd like you to read the highlighted parts.

I think it would be a good idea, BEFORE posting, to take another look at what we wrote- if it seems condescending, offensive, or is doing nothing more than repeating something that was already said, erase it and start again- if you still can't get it right.... well, they say that if there's nothing nice to say, it's better to simply say nothing at all. I would LOVE to see meaningful discussion here, as was occuring earlier, however, it seems to have degraded to repeating ourselves again. If all we're doing is repeating ourselves, why bother? It's nothing more than a waste of time. However, if we're having meaningful discussion, and actually trying to see the others' point of view, much more will be accomplished, and the next war will most likely be infinitely better because of it.

Finally, how about we show our opinions as exactly that- opinions. There have been many cases in this thread where I've seen an opinion treated as though it were fact, which, quite frankly, annoys the hell out of me. (yay for full circle)

[Indrejue]

sir V quit butt kissing it is not going to help you win the war.  it is in fact annoying the whole community with the way you degrade every other player who was against the whole age of (element) series.  we had a reason to be against it because it did truly unbalance the game.  if i was your general i would be putting you at the bottom of the list and benching you as quickly as possible because your attitude is disrespectful of the community as a whole.  you are the only one trying to defend the age of (element) card which should obviously tell you something about how bad an idea it was.  the community did what was necessary to get it removed because SG would not have heard us any other way.  She even admitted as much in chat that the only reason she took any action was because we cried out so loudly that it was an unfair card.  so sit your keaster down and quit trying to call people childish for taking action against a problem.

[Daxx]

...the tournament organiser broke the social contract first by deviating from expectations about how the event was going to be run.

It is highly delusional to think that the organizer(s) of this free event deviated from any reasonable expectations.

Hyperbole aside, you have not actually justified your position on this at all, much less explained why it is "delusional", highly or otherwise.

I think it's very clear that there was a general expectation that the event would be run in such a way as to allow all the teams a relatively even chance of winning. It seems obvious that a lot of people (if not everyone) signed up under this assumption, and I believe it is a reasonable one to make. If anything, this is made obvious by the large amount of complainants. Therefore, you have a social contract between the organisers and the players of "I will run this event fairly and to your expectations, and you will play in it".

Let's imagine for a minute that Scaredgirl had given Team Darkness an extra 50 cards in their vault, simply because she liked them and wanted to help them win. This is a clear violation of the same social contract, but under your reasoning, the players would be "delusional" or perhaps "unethical" to leave the game in protest of its unfairness.

It is also clear that the "Age of..." cards violated this assumption of an even playing field. As I said in my last post (maybe you missed that part, as it was in a footnote), they provided an arbitrary bonus to specific teams, but not others. This violated the principle that the only thing differentiating the teams were the elements they had to work with, and everything else was a choice or earned by the team.
There are two conditions that could have made them consistent with the assumption of a level playing field, but neither was true in this case. The first would have been if they were all played out over the course of the game (requiring the game to be at least 13 rounds long which seems unlikely), and the second would have been where the choice of round for each one was non-trivial (not the case, as teams could be eliminated before their Age appeared).

So, having established that, it is clear that protests against the event cards are perfectly reasonable reactions to their introduction. Whether this is a passive protest, as Mr Blonde initiated, or an implication that a player would not participate (as is, let's not forget, perfectly within their power to do so). The optimal response probably would have been a reasoned discussion but as far as I can tell that is exactly what the participants sought, in addition to their passive protest.

The community did not choose one of the options of the event card. The community chose to abandon the event card. It does not matter what the event card said; it matters that the community decided to abandon it. You cannot abandon a rule -- that's the same thing as breaking it.

In the United States, sometimes people make donations to charities. When an American citizen makes a donation of $1000 to certain charities, there is a law that says he is allowed to pay $1000 less dollars in taxes. Obviously donating to charity is an option, so if someone just pays the $1000 tax, that's fine.

Now: let's say an influential US citizen doesn't like the law. Well, he doesn't have to donate anything. He can make that choice. However, he ABSOLUTELY CAN NOT make a public speech about how he and all the employees in his company are not going to donate in such a way as to encourage other people in similar positions to also not donate.
*snip*

You're again drawing a false equivalence between passive refusal to use an advantage and deliberately breaking an explicit rule. You can attempt to justify your position by talking about unwritten laws as part of some social contract, but then you need to stop implying that it is equivalent to breaking a rule.

Furthermore, your analogy to the governmental rules on employers influencing their employees doesn't hold in this situation. What you're attempting to describe is a prohibition on coercion. I don't believe that MrBlonde engaged in any coercion at all. In fact, as QuantumT has said, it seems like he was actively trying to get people to make up their own mind and was very careful to state that if other members of his team wanted to they could continue to use the bonus.

Essentially the problem with your line of argument is twofold. Firstly, even if he had directly asked his teammates and other teams to take the same stand it is difficult to argue that this is inherently unethical because collective action can be a good thing if it addresses a problem effectively. It is like arguing that unions are unethical because they attempt to unify a workforce to negotiate with the employer, and that it is unfair because it upsets the employer's edge in negotiation. Secondly, your implicit assumption that MrBlonde's actions were coercive doesn't seem to hold, rendering the entire first point moot. It is difficult to argue that influencing opinion by taking a non-illegal, non-coercive stand is unethical.

You can suggest that breaking the social contract was in your opinion not appropriate, but as I have already pointed out I think it was a fairly reasonable response to the situation. You seem to be hung up on the inviolate sanctity of the tournament organiser's rule, but you seem to have missed that a game operates in the social context of all of its players as well as its organisers.

Secondly, you miss the point when you cite examples of things ScaredGirl could have done that would be egregiously unfair. The fact is that her "Age" cards were not unfair at all. They were completely within the realm of normal, to-be-expected possibilities. The only argument was whether or not they were balanced. Your example was of something unfair, not unbalanced. Of course doing something unfair would be a breach by ScaredGirl. Of course doing something unbalanced is not a breach. [...] The Age of Light card was not unfair. Whether it was unbalanced is irrelevant. But it was not unfair. And the actions undertaken are only acceptable when something is unfair.

Unfair and unbalanced. Are they the same? I think, as I explained above, that within the context of a game which people entered on the implicit assumption that it was going to be run in a balanced manner, that being unbalanced was a violation of that assumption and therefore considering it "unfair" is reasonable. Bear in mind that unfair in this context does not mean the mathematical bias towards one group or another, but in fact the introduction of arbitrary biases towards arbitrary teams.

The reason was to say: This card is unacceptable. <--- That statement, which all of you were making, is the problem. It is a false statement which you are NOT ALLOWED to make. By making it and making decisions based on it, you broke the rules.

You can declare such a thing to be "false" and "not allowed" all you like, but you need to provide reasoning, and so far I haven't seen a good argument that supports these outlandish statements. Also, you are yet again conflating the implicit social contract with the explicit written rules.

I absolutely am allowed to make that statement. If people aren't allowed to make these kinds of statements, then you have ABSOLUTELY no right to expect them to continue to participate.

I'll say it again to emphasize it, if you completely ignore what the participants want, you have no right whatsoever expect them to continue to participate.

You are absolutely 100% wrong.

The entire definition of a participant is someone who submits to the rules of an event. If he doesn't like it, he can leave. As the organizer I have a right to expect him to participate and follow the rules, or he can leave. I would be stupid to expect him to stay if I completely ignore what he wants, but that doesn't change what I just said: I have a right to expect him to participate and follow the rules.

You are trying to have it both ways. You are trying to have participants not leave, but stay and ignore the rules. That is not acceptable. If someone wanted to leave because of the Age cards, of course that would be acceptable.

Actually despite your protestations you are not actually providing the requisite reasoning to explain why an event organiser has any "rights" with respect to players participating. Bare assertion does not make someone else "100% wrong".

EDIT: I fully intend to stay well away from moderation actions in this thread as by involving myself in the discussion there would be an assumption of bias. However, you might be well advised to follow Memorystick's advice. He is not the first person to comment on your attitude - you are coming across to a number of other people as highly abrasive and overly personal. I'd like to think I have a thicker skin than that, but for your own sake I advise you to put in the extra mile as regards keeping this conversation civil.

[Kuross]

Just a few observations...

- The Bill of Rights does, in fact, legally allow U.S. citizens the right to assemble, so movements such as the Civil Rights were indeed legal and, many would go so far to say, was our responsibility.

- More a sidenote than anything else, in the U.S., 501.c3 businesses are prohibited from donating to or participating in politcal actions as it would violate their tax status.

- If you make a product that someone doesn't like, yes they can go elsewhere and not buy from you. If you take that stance often enough, you'll be out of business. You can make all the products you want, but without a customer base, you'll run out of funds fast. So you are as dependant on your customers to buy your product as they are in buying it.

- Any reference to rules broken are completely invalid. The event card allowed for the use of upped cards, but did not require each and every participant to use them. If the card had stated "All players MUST use upped Light cards" then I'd agree the rule was broken. It did not say that and the rule was adhered to.

- Let's all be clear. Just because one person spoke publically that he and his team weren't going to use upped cards does not mean he broke any rule, written or otherwise. It was his choice and he voiced his opinion publically to others. The choice was legally allowed by the event card and everyone had the same right to choose to use upped light cards or not. The irony here is that he did successfully what some people are trying to do unsuccessfuly in this thread- sway the opinion of others. Whether or not it was this person's intent is irrelevant. If I say I like the color red outloud and someone nearby, who felt blue was their favorite color, decided to change their prefence in color to red does not mean I broke some law as to the outcome of their choice or am in any way responsibile. That's the beauty of democracy when it works; the notion and belief I have the ability and right to possibly change someone's opinion about something. But no matter how I grandstand, or how large my commentary piece is, I can never expect to change someone's mind to suit my needs or beliefs, only give other options to think about.

With regard to my last point, it is clear that I share many similar beliefs to what many have posted, and to be blunt without trying to be disrestpectful in any way, those beliefs and viewpoiints clearly at odds with the belief system you have, Sir Valimont. I don't agree with many of the sentiments you have posted, though I will say you do seem very well thought out in them. I have worked in advocacy, law and business. I am also probably one of the more older players here. I have been around and have met many people that do share some of the beliefs you possess. To that end, I will agree to disagree with you on this particular topic. It is clear you will not change your opinion on the matter, as is your right, but you must also understand we (and I mean all that share in our beliefs contrary to yours) have not been swayed by your opinions and thus are at a standstill. I submit that we all take a step back and and agree to disagree.  A vast majority of this thread as been point-counterpoint discussion that is becoming redundant. I guess the bluntest way of putting it there really seems no more point to post or vent except to reiterate a previous point. The discussion is more or less dead, except for some last minute banter. I'd rather discuss the event cards so we can implement them in the next WAR (which I will make the time to be a part of ).

[smuglapse]

Since this conversation seems to have degenerated to politics perhaps a new thread could be created in that section of the forums.

[Sir Valimont]

Daxx,

A lot of very good points made. I think the issue we are having is really one small set of assumptions; the extrapolation either of us makes on those assumptions are perhaps less relevant. If one were to take the assumptions you are making as true then many of your conclusions I believe are completely valid.

The crux of our disagreement is within this quote:

I think it's very clear that there was a general expectation that the event would be run in such a way as to allow all the teams a relatively even chance of winning. It seems obvious that a lot of people (if not everyone) signed up under this assumption, and I believe it is a reasonable one to make. If anything, this is made obvious by the large amount of complainants. Therefore, you have a social contract between the organisers and the players of "I will run this event fairly and to your expectations, and you will play in it".

There are several assumptions made herein that I find wrong.

First, it seems that the interpretation of event cards as preventing teams "a relatively even chance of winning" is a foregone conclusion for you. My problem with that is twofold: First I don't think it's an accurate assessment that event cards gave any particular team a major advantage. I think the advantage was significant but not anywhere close to game-breaking. Second, the players who reacted negatively to the card did so through a visceral reaction rather than collected discussion and/or debate and they credited their own initial negative reactions far too much therefore. Whether or not it is accurate to believe that these cards totally disrupt the game, it is not appropriate to reach that conclusion and proceed without weighing it appropriately. The presumption of correctness in saying the card was "bad" is a large part of the problem, which could easily have been solved by using appropriate procedure.

Getting back to your quote above, you mention a social contract which exists between organizers and players. Here is the trouble: What you are referring to as a social contract is in fact just the expectations of the players. It fails to account at all for the expectations of the organizers. In other words, players with misconceptions about their engagement in the war presumed that their interpretation was representative of the relationship and now want to hold the organizers accountable to that. Well, from the organizers' perspective, there was never any promise of "I will run this event fairly and to your expectations." The organizer has no reason to have to answer to players' expectations, and certainly did not set up the game with the intention of ceding that authority to them.

By definition the organizer defines the terms of the relationship proposed, and players can accept or not accept them by choosing to participate. Nobody ever said "Here is a game I am offering, in which I am bound to your expectations." Someone said "Here is a game and here are the basic principles of that game." The players' collective belief that they are entitled to their own expectations therefore is off-base. For them to be in a position to decide whether something is too unbalanced in the game and then use that consideration as to whether they will respect a rule or not, they would have had to be given that entitlement up front.

--

A separate point you've raised is that in your opinion nobody has shown why the Age cards were within the realm of reasonable expectation. Honestly that is a very hard question to answer in exact terms because we will be attempting to delineate areas of expectation which of course are incredibly subjective.

Nonetheless, I think there is a universal and rather simple to understand basis upon which expectations for this type of game could be made. Everyone understands the variables of the game -- the number of cards in one's vault, the selection of those cards for decks, the limitations on upped and unupped cards, and salvaging and discarding in accordance with victory. Everyone understood that event cards were meant to alter the interactions between decks in each round.

The mechanic of having allowances on upgraded cards within a fight is a core feature of War. Certainly in preparing to fight Masters or Lieutenants, opponents realize they are up against some upped cards. Nonetheless, strategy changes very little, and statistics bear out that victory numbers for Masters/Lieutenants are not especially biased. The likely explanation is that those players get to use whichever decks they want, usually taking the better ones, usually choosing first, and after all they are some of the better players.

All of that considered, everyone knows that the real key to victory in any one duel is how well one's deck competes, and that's usually based on the type of deck rather than its "strength." This is why Masters lose so often.

Since everyone is aware of everything I've just said, it is really not a fair reaction to claim that Age cards constitute completely unfair advantages. Not only is it understood in a game like this that there is supposed to be an element of random luck that favors some over others, but it is understood that event cards, as I've said, would alter the basic constraints of the way decks interact.

I believe that considering Age cards game-breaking is therefore an acute overreaction. And I think it's quite understandable that this is the sort of setting -- an online gaming forum where folks take things very seriously indeed, and in an event considered the biggest and most important of all -- there is ample room for inflated and emotional responses that when one reflects calmly on the situation are really out of proportion. To me, that is exactly what happened here.

Nonetheless, to summarize I will return to the point: the primary issue is not with people's interpretations of how good or bad the event card is/was. The primary issue is the presumption that as a group of players, one's immediate visceral interpretations on event cards trump the necessity to uphold the social contract mentioned above. Simply put, the players are in no position to decide whether a rule is acceptable within the confines of the event, because they didn't make the rules of the event, and they don't have authority over design of the event. Yes, a player can definitely decide if something is acceptable to him personally, or to his team, or to every single player for that matter if they all agree ... but that does not give them the right to enforce change over the event anyway. As I've said before: if someone offers to sell you a car but only if you buy a house, you can say "That's unacceptable to me" and walk away. But you can't say "That's an unacceptable condition" and force him to sell you the car but not the house. You'd be making two mistakes: 1) It's not your place to do that because you don't have that authority; and 2) You are treating your own interpretation of the situation as "right" without allowing for an intelligent discussion on the matter.

[Nume]

Nonetheless, to summarize I will return to the point: the primary issue is not with people's interpretations of how good or bad the event card is/was. The primary issue is the presumption that as a group of players, one's immediate visceral interpretations on event cards trump the necessity to uphold the social contract mentioned above. Simply put, the players are in no position to decide whether a rule is acceptable within the confines of the event, because they didn't make the rules of the event, and they don't have authority over design of the event. Yes, a player can definitely decide if something is acceptable to him personally, or to his team, or to every single player for that matter if they all agree ... but that does not give them the right to enforce change over the event anyway. As I've said before: if someone offers to sell you a car but only if you buy a house, you can say "That's unacceptable to me" and walk away. But you can't say "That's an unacceptable condition" and force him to sell you the car but not the house. You'd be making two mistakes: 1) It's not your place to do that because you don't have that authority; and 2) You are treating your own interpretation of the situation as "right" without allowing for an intelligent discussion on the matter.

First in response to the bolded section, yet again I say we did the first thing you said, and noone said we had the "right to enforce change over the event". We just did as you said in the first sentence in that we decided it was not acceptable and not to use it, personally, ourselves. As far as the car/house example, that doesnt apply because a part of the contract was that they had to buy both. That would be the same as if the event card said everyone HAD to use upgraded light cards and we didnt. Again, this was not the case, so the example is moot.

[Sir Valimont]

We just did as you said in the first sentence in that we decided it was not acceptable and not to use it, personally, ourselves.

That may be how you interpret what you did, but that is not what you did.

What you did is make other people in the community feel pressured into not using the event card because you believed that the event card shouldn't exist. You didn't say "darn, I don't like this, so I won't use it myself." You said "this is an unacceptable card that should not exist, so I'm going to treat it like it doesn't exist, and I am going to say so publicly so that the rest of the community also says that."

The whole point of what you did was to make the event card "not happen" because you didn't like it. You are not allowed to make event cards not happen. That is the problem.

[Kuross]

Daxx,


...snip...



Nonetheless, to summarize I will return to the point: the primary issue is not with people's interpretations of how good or bad the event card is/was. The primary issue is the presumption that as a group of players, one's immediate visceral interpretations on event cards trump the necessity to uphold the social contract mentioned above. Simply put, the players are in no position to decide whether a rule is acceptable within the confines of the event, because they didn't make the rules of the event, and they don't have authority over design of the event. Yes, a player can definitely decide if something is acceptable to him personally, or to his team, or to every single player for that matter if they all agree ... but that does not give them the right to enforce change over the event anyway. As I've said before: if someone offers to sell you a car but only if you buy a house, you can say "That's unacceptable to me" and walk away. But you can't say "That's an unacceptable condition" and force him to sell you the car but not the house. You are making two mistakes: 1) It's not your place to do that because you don't have that authority; and 2) You are treating your own interpretation of the situation as "right" without allowing for an intelligent discussion on the matter.

Response to 1: You don't have to have authority to voice an opinion.

Response to 2: If anything, you've received a lot of intelligent discussion on the matter, especially from Daxx. It's just you don't agree with any of it.

General response: No one was enforcing a change on anyone else. People expressed their opinions and others agreed. Some expressed what action they were going to take and others thought that action was a good idea. None of which conflicted with the rules or the event. I don't see where you perceive a rule infraction when none existed.

Short and simple- Players join an event. They know the rules going in. At some point in the event, something dramatic happens that alters the event. Why do you expect people to continue as if nothing happened? If I buy a product that was advertised to do X, but when I get home it does Y instead, am I to say "well the designer made it that way, but it wasn't advertised as such, but I must accept it and not expect a refund or exchange"?

To be blunt, where you say...

2) You are treating your own interpretation of the situation as "right" without allowing for an intelligent discussion on the matter.

... you inversely do the same thing. In other words, you are treating your own interpretation of the situation as "wrong" regardless of the intelligent discussion and debate to the contrary. I will reiterate; it's probably best you simply agree to disagree and allow this to pass into the night. It's become obviously clear to everyone else there will be a stonewall between you and the others in this debate.

[Kurohami]

I would very much like to join the discussion, but it seems that it would never end, the same things are just being brought up over and over again. It is entirely apparent that this discussion would not reach a conclusion and nothing whatsoever is going to come off of it. Sir. Val's posts are a lot of times quite provoking and aggressive, but since no one side can persuade the other anyway, lets stop this endless "discussion" between Sir Val and everyone else so we don't aggravate the matter further. We all stated our opinions, now we can just let it go. The age cards are gone, the matter is settled. Let us move on.

[Kuross]

I would very much like to join the discussion, but it seems that it would never end, the same things are just being brought up over and over again. It is entirely apparent that this discussion would not reach a conclusion and nothing whatsoever is going to come off of it. Sir. Val's posts are a lot of times quite provoking and aggressive, but since no one side can persuade the other anyway, lets stop this endless "discussion" between Sir Val and everyone else so we don't aggravate the matter further. We all stated our opinions, now we can just let it go. The age cards are gone, the matter is settled. Let us move on.

Here, here!!

[ddevans96]

*points at where this is located*

This is in the archives now. It does not need to be discussed any more. Please take all further talk about this to PMs.