Reality Behind Quest Information Enforcement

[Arilou]

I received a private message today from a player telling me that the griping against the evil wizards who couldn't see that quest information shouldn't be against the rules is ongoing. Since I'm sure this will continue ad nauseam, I've decided to make this thread so anyone who wants to can link people to it when such claims are made.

First, I would like to point out that we were never given the authority to shape the rules. Our view of our job was to suggest rules, not make them. If we disagreed with a rule, we therefore felt that we had to speak with Rhialto first and convince him to change it. In the case of quest information, he indicated that changes would be made to that back in the day but never followed through and, as I've said time and time again there were higher priority issues that we were trying to address with him when we were able to get his attention.

Second, here's a slightly modified version of what I sent to Rhialto regarding this very claim:

Here Teshuvah and Valkon talk about the annoyance of being stuck enforcing unenforceable rules. The conversation concluded with Teshuvah noting how she, personally, wanted half the rules removed, including QI. She notes that I argued against this. I don't remember that and I couldn't find any conversation between the two of us about it in the logs so I assume the conversation happened in 2004/2005. That would make sense as, early on, I did believe in the no cheating on quests rules. I don't recall when I got fed up with it and wanted it gone, but I assure you that that has been my position for quite some time now.


2008-05-08 08:37:17: teshuvah: i love these old players being back..........not
2008-05-08 08:37:24: teshuvah: it's always us "abusive wizards'
2008-05-08 08:38:09: valkon: *nod* You're just very strict about the rules and they don't understand.
2008-05-08 08:38:18: teshuvah: i didnt boot him lol
2008-05-08 08:38:43: valkon: I know. They think being strict about the rules is abusive, lol
2008-05-08 08:38:47: teshuvah: ah
2008-05-08 08:39:12: valkon: if you weren't strict it would cause more problems
2008-05-08 08:39:23: teshuvah: *Shrug* somedays I think it's all a waste of time anyway lol
2008-05-08 08:39:59: teshuvah: I wanted R to remove half the rules (QI etc) and arilou ate my brain lol
2008-05-08 08:40:43: valkon: I understand why they were put in, but they're almost impossible to enforce
2008-05-08 08:40:55: teshuvah: yeah exactly.

Same thing here again. I don't know that Teshuvah and I had talked about the issue around then so she may have just been relating my position from years ago but even if I held out that long, you can see that Teshuvah clearly was not of that same mind. Also, she's mistaken about me feeling strongly about any rule that I would leave over it changing as I always believed the rules are the rules and they're there for me to go along with whatever they may be. However, she was right that I was once a fierce defender of it.

2008-06-10 05:29:24: valkon: most players cheat in some way
2008-06-10 05:30:00: valkon: getting qi is just too easy, without us knowing about it
2008-06-10 05:30:03: teshuvah: yeah it is
2008-06-10 05:30:15: teshuvah: and Arilou would have fits, but it needs to be made legal except in shouts.
2008-06-10 05:30:35: teshuvah: if people dont want it, thats fine, but its too ridiculous to try to keep it and punish for it
2008-06-10 05:30:48: teshuvah: randomization was for that reason.
2008-06-10 05:30:56: valkon: yea,we might've lost lots of "good" players because of it
2008-06-10 05:31:04: teshuvah: probably so
2008-06-10 05:31:18: teshuvah: but that is just my opinion lol i have to enforce rules i dont agree with, thats the job lol
2008-06-10 05:31:26: valkon: quest points should be removed from the scorelists
2008-06-10 05:31:32: teshuvah: *nod*
2008-06-10 05:31:42: valkon: let them buy items for it, or HoF images
2008-06-10 05:31:49: teshuvah: i really see no reason for it to be illegal, just in public to keep it from those who dont want it.
2008-06-10 05:31:53: teshuvah: *nod*
2008-06-10 05:32:03: teshuvah: but we are dreaming lol
2008-06-10 05:32:25: valkon: heh, first convice Arilou and then R *sighs*
2008-06-10 05:32:32: teshuvah: R actually spoke of it
2008-06-10 05:32:40: teshuvah: but Arilou would leave most likely.
2008-06-10 05:32:44: valkon: *gasp*
2008-06-10 05:32:54: teshuvah: it is that important to him.

...

2008-06-10 05:35:23: teshuvah: I dont think its going to happen so its not a huge deal and im sure arilou's input would help how and if it is ever done
2008-06-10 05:35:37: teshuvah: i was just sharing my feelings on it thats all lol
2008-06-10 05:35:51: valkon: *nod* at least we feel the same about it
2008-06-10 05:38:01: teshuvah: we'd still have to enforce it in public of course. Some people dont want QI
2008-06-10 05:38:14: teshuvah: but how we feel about it doesnt change the rule lol
2008-06-10 05:38:40: valkon: *nod* but it's always good to know you're not the only one


Here now Contrare gets in on it:


2008-10-08 11:40:36: contrare: And FYI, I really hate the QI rule.
2008-10-08 11:40:46: teshuvah: and FYI doenst matter what we hate lol
2008-10-08 11:40:53: teshuvah: But I think it's ridiculous
2008-10-08 11:40:55: contrare: But I will still enforce it.
2008-10-08 11:41:08: teshuvah: "keep it out of shouts" should be the only rule IMHO>

Unfortunately, I don't think I have the logs dating to mid-2009 when Tesuvah and I had a lengthy discussion about mini-quest information and how to handle quest information that led to us putting warnings in place to try to prevent mistakes from happening as a best fit solution within the current system that we had to deal with. However, if I did I could show you more of the same, including from me.

In any case, if anyone has any questions or would like to have reasoned dialogue about this I'll be happy to discuss it with you as time allows.

[Unknown]

well on the bright side I believe it is a win-win situation and the rule is gone. The problem is that it took 5 freaking years of the game been down! XD well not a big deal for me but still...

Nice of you Arilou to come up and clean other wizes names. now, it's a bit creepy after all this time you keep the logs

[Arilou]

Mostly, I worked off the logs on the server without downloading them so there's a lot I do not have. During my tenure as arch wizard I made sure no logs were removed from the server as I believed in accountability and I wanted everything to be there for Rhialto. What I did download I downloaded as part of mass downloads of entire folders relevant to my work and I keep everything because I have the kind of personality where I think everything will be useful one day (as it was in this instance). Again, though, that was very little so I asked Contrare what he had so that I could prepare a response to these types of things and what he had he had because he downloaded the entire server in order to run a copy of the game on his local machine to help him with his coding work. He had to dig around for the files for me and, still, he didn't have anything past the mid-2009s.

If your concern is for your tell logs; that's not something I mess with. I'm not interested in your private conversations and did not cull any information from them in preparing the email I refer to in my above post. Everything was taken from the shout log (which is public) and wiz-tells (which is what the above is from).

[Unknown]

Good to know.

To be honest I'm not too worried about my chats, odds are most of them will be impossible to understand due to my poor English XD!