Phantom Thread

[Stargoose]

This kind of thing is not what this thread is for.

I'm sorry, this sentense:

Some feedback on what would actually be appreciated and now labeled "powergaming" or "metagaming" would be nice.

could be understood as you asking what we consider powergaming and metagaming, and what we would appreciate for you to do.


If that is not what the sentense meant, consider what I said as

Additional ideas also appreciated.

on how you could solve some of your problems with player hostility.

You might not like to hear what I say, but sometimes you help someone more if you also tell them the stuff they dont want to hear. Because that's what Im trying to do here. To help you not get people pissed off at you, and to help the players that get pissed off at you to not get pissed off.

Please take the time to peruse our 45 page Feedback Thread of these exact questions to address all of your concerns, because it has been done multiple times. You can probably stop on page 5. When you've done that, please come back and comment on the ideas I had on having fun for everyone.

Ok, I took some time and looked through your feedback thread.

What I learned is that what I said was basically already said by multiple people multiple times, as you said,

One post on page two of the feedback thread, made by Jinx, I found particularly accurate, observant, and full of foresight.

The post is too long to quote here and I encourage people to read it there, I'll just take out this small part:

phantoms are a relic of discos past. - if THIS faction proposal was made today - i am 100% sure that it wouldn t even be denied but also put into flood and earned a few retarted images and much laughter.

they have freedom that no other faction would get "nowadays" and so they require a lot more responsibility than those that are forced to act "within the official server rules".

fact is - phantoms ARE double standards. - they adhere to different rules than the official ones as a whole faction - and they need to give something in return.

what they need to give in return is elaborated roleplay. - not on every occasion - everyone can have a bad day. but there should NEVER be a formula like "you give me rubbish RP, i give you rubbish RP in return" - when that formula is applied, we end up with rubbish RP all around.

Pity that phantoms didnt pay more attention to it later on, but kept their "I'll blow you up without respect or much words if I dont like you or if I think ur a noob" policy.

Your first post here sounded like were more willing to listen to players now, but then - again - you refused to acknowldge any of the problems that people have kept pointing out over and over again.

You just say there and here that you follow rules, but you ignore that the rules are shifted in your favor, and that rules that apply to almost everyone else dont apply to you.

I am convinced that this shift in rules in favor of your faction does more harm than it does good, not only for the people you encounter, but also for your faction.

Simply abiding to easy-to-follow rules like "dont blow up a trader without a demand", "dont blow up a trader in a cap ship", and "dont immediately shoot people after saying BOOIMAPHANTOMANDURDEAD" would already reduce the amount of flak you get a great deal.

Making the phantoms a more normal faction may also get players inside the factions off their head trip and show a little more consideration for the average player again, which will automatically result in more positive feelings to your faction too.

As for repeated allegations in your feedback thread that who ever criticizes phantoms is simply upset that he didnt get invited/accepted, upset that they died, or the carrier of a silly little oorp grudge against... phantoms as a faction, for what ever reason other than the one they are stating... or have oorp grudges against players, who all coincidentally converged into the phantoms...

You might just as well turn it around and say that anyone who gives positive feedback is doing it to get invited/accepted, or is/was trying to please one of the 5 admins/ex-admins that are/were in the faction.

Funny thing I noticed while going through both the phantom roster and feedback thread was that some of the people who post positive feedback about encounters with phantoms actually also have phantom characters xD

Ok this is going to be repetetive, but with the sort of half-truth answers you give, this is never going to get sorted out.

Not only that, but your claims are completely unfounded. Let me enlighten you about a few things (no pun intended):

Please read the restrictions of our ID on the tech chart. As you can see, we have fewer green boxes than someone with a Freelancer or Mercenary ID.

We must ask factions and file SRPs for many of our ships. Those ships which we do have that are unique are mostly SRPs, such as Nightsmoke (Kusari Bomber), Pitchfork (Corsair Bomber), and Ze'ev Barak. They have been approves SRPs, tested by the community, not just the Admins, from before the time the current SRP rules were implemented. Everything else we have that is eccentric is either drawn from the small pool of ships (smaller than Junkers!) that we have access to or is a Phantom ship.

First of all, Freelancers and Mercs dont even have their own shipline, and are more a multi-house occupation than a faction. Phantoms are a faction who have their own shipline (and also their own bases and technology background).
Second, its really nice that you point out that your ships with red boxes are SRP. But wouldnt you agree that when you are an admin or are in the same invite-only faction as an admin, it may be a lot easier to get your SRP through than when you are not? Its also a high percentage of granted SRPs for a faction, no?
Third, lots of white boxes, lots of ships that are linked to white boxes, but...
I couldnt find a single post where the phantom asks the particular faction for permission to fly a ship. Kinda like you are docking at bases although your rep list says "hostile everyone, allies none", and you dont have a diplomatic relations thread with the factions you dock with either.
Mind you I only know about the phantoms and ships that are listed in your roster, and the roster probably isnt 100% accurate.
I searched the communications thread to find the rogue gunboats and black dragons of Valentine, Iscariot, and Psychosis, but couldnt find anything.
But its entirely possible that I didnt look in hte right place/way. If permissions like that exist, could you show me where to find them?

We do not have any special treatment by the rules.

Except that rules allow you to go everywhere, shoot everyone, and blow up traders in cap ships without making a demand, while rules dont allow that for all other factions except nomads and wilde. Yeah, repeating it to infinity, but you refuse to acknowledge it although it is perfectly evident for everyone.

Every single gun we use is a Phantom gun. There is not one person who does not use a complete loadout of Phantom guns. Where does anyone get this idea?

Some people in this thread say they have seen otherwise, and so do some people in the feedback thread. If you changed your gun policies now, people may not have registered the change.
But since the phantoms have a class 9 gun with 4 shots per second, 666 speed and 2400 damage per second, I wouldnt be surprised if they dont put anything else in a slot where they can mount that one. Except maybe the damage output or archangels, which are class 10, have slower refire rate and slower projectile speed, thus making it harder to hit with them and leave less options for gun slot setups.

Docking rights is not even our choice. We are playing our role of taking advantage of the unlawfuls, if someone else has a problem, its his turn to RP with us, FR 5 us, or just ask us OoRP to be hostile.

I think the liberally granted docking rights, the liberal engagement rules for your faction, liberal ship rules, liberal granting of SRPs, and a lot of people's previous willingness to go along with it were a product of your faction leader temporarily being an admin, the high concentration of admins, and the high concentration of veteran players who are also friends with both admins and faction leaders.

I dont think they were a product of RP logic or particularly valuable RP. And I dont think they are needed for RP logic or valuable RP, but only to give yourselves the l33t feeling.

Ok, since it seems you didnt want that to be addressed, I'll try to address the things I'm sure you want me to.

Yeah, propaganda posts in the forums, diplomatic threads, and more care with your RP ingame would definately be a good idea, I support that.

But honnestly, I wonder how you expect the junkers to cooperate with you considering the tone and content you used in the linked message, and considering the way you killed them before.

Is being respectful and diplomatic, at least on the surface and in certain situations where it is useful, so difficult for an allegedly so advanced faction?

You already said that you dont care if your RP story is good, but you should acknowledge the reality that if your RP background isnt sold and doesnt appear to make sense, and you are systematically arrogant and disrespectful to everyone you meet, not all people are going to give respect simply because you demand it and you think you are the elite.