Potential suggestions to improve Phantom and Character interactions

[Jinx]

there has been a very positive change in the admin team lately... i have seen them publicly announce that they made wrong decisions. - i don t know how that came into being... but that is showing a touch of humanity and human error that every player can understand. - it gives players the feeling that they are no subjects, but beings. ( i seriously mean it - its a VERY positive thing... that might also have happened in the past... but not as a public apology to those falsly accused - that has not really happened in "the old days" )

why i say that? - phantoms - and many other exclusive factions have a tendency to paint the community "black and white". - you either are a flamer or you re a flamed - usually both end up in fire. but no one gives in, no one shows any concept of compromise.

it was mentioned in the other thread that i just read up. - it would be beneficial when "bad" roleplay was really acknowledged - also non ones own part. - i read stuff like "you get bad roleplay, so you are given bad roleplay" ( what utter rubbish is that - really ) it helps in a feedback to say that one has made mistakes. - that ones roleplay was really inappropriately bad in that situation. - everyone can understand that - everyone has done it. - what NO one can understand is when its said "my roleplay is always good, it is entirely your fault" - cause no one is so good to always give out good roleplay.

everyone ( without ANY exceptions ) gives brilliant roleplay one day - and utterly silly and stupid one another.



but to get to a point - how can phantoms ( and also those other factions having trouble expressing their exclusiveness ) improve their interaction?

i ll start with what they CANNOT do.

- they are no server police - so they must not act as such
- they must not exploit and abuse the greater freedom they have, they must instead JUSTIFY it.
- they must clearly separate out of character and in character ( what i saw in that video was two players bickering, one player however with a farmers alliance bomber ( i get to that later... ) and the other with a mining ship and no dps

*farmers alliance bomber? - don t the phantoms have their own ships now? - i can understand an old relic like the osiris staying with the phantoms - but the mamamoro is a 4.85 bomber in a base that is also hidden in a nebula and hidden from sensors. - no i have not read the story of how he got the bomber. - but such "flexible" use of stuff all around sirius makes people look suspiciously upon you. - really, it does. NO other faction can pick "whatever they like". - phantoms should really make a shiplist and stick to it... especially when they want to have their own ships and weapons.


what CAN they do.

- rethorical skills are not common. - a faction that wants to spread fear needs them.
- the problem with that is that phantoms appear to be handpicked based on popularity and pvp skills... which is a bad thing. - instead they should be picked MUCH more on their ability to roleplay ingame. - their ability to squeeze the maximum of meaning into the minimum of words required. - the way its done right now is a focussing on pvp - its like employing a plummer who is REALLY good at dancing; - the problem is, you want him to do the plumming works.
- they must introduce themselves and they also must sometimes let go. - not a day passes that i make a proper introduction to a trader as a pirate and he uses this time to get away - leaving me pretty silly standing there.... which sometimes leads to the very nasty reaction that the next player "pays for the player that got away" by getting a much shorter introduction. ( that is really a bad thing.... )


in general:

- fear is not given by saying "fear me" - fear is spread by calculated terroristic acts. - sometimes it doesn t even take a "blue message". - many a players fear phantoms ( even if their chars don t know them ) ... here is an example:

* some time ago - the keepers attempted to attack delta. - a handful of zoners gathered around the station. - we only defended ( meaning we stood there waiting ) - all the keepers did was hovering "just at the very rim of the detection range" - popping into targettable range briefly sometimes - appearing "from every direction" ... that situation lasted over 30 minutes! - the tension was high. - and then.... they retreated ! NO blue message... - that was "fear" roleplayed.

* had they just came and said "*** fear us, we are light ***" it would have been a laughing matter.



REAL fear is often subtle. - its the difference between a trash zombie movie where the people die by the second - and the horror movie that relies on subtle tension that slowly builds up and maybe hasn t even have to kill anyone.


these are the skills needed for such a faction - pvp skills are secondary.

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