I'm quitting, hope to see you all around

[bestovv]

This is a HARD TL;DR – so for those of you who are dyslexic (Burt, Slathar), just throw a random meme about how you didn’t read anything in the thread that you just clicked on with the intention of reading and actually did read but will pretend not to have read. I don’t really know where else to put this (since Empire doesn’t have forums), and it’s mostly for the pals I have in Empire.

For everyone else, maybe you’ll get some rich forum drama out of it.

I should say first that since my leaving Empire, I have had no interest in publicly announcing why it happened. I had resolved to stop playing the game shortly after leaving, so it was a nothing issue at first. I also figured that someone would’ve mentioned what went down and why it happened by now. Like, the actual truth - and not a bullshit fib. Unfortunately, when I’m online I get asked why I won’t come back and what happened over and over again.

After asking several Empire members what they’d heard, I’ve come to find that the majority of people were either wholly misinformed or just plain lied to about the situation, which is actually ironic in a weird way. And I’ll explain why.

Let me just preface this story by saying the general guild members involved in this situation weren’t the real issue. The officers’ reaction to the simple, practically already solved problem was, almost completely, the entire issue.

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So it goes.

Empire was raiding ToV – normal day, same bullshit. The only real difference before pulling started: there was a concerted effort by many people at the raid to try and sacrifice Gyno The Lizard to the pixel gods just before pulling Dozekar. People were hoping for lots of ruby tears. Whatever, who cares. I wasn’t involved.

I’m buffing people the second I enter the zone. I have literally no offensive spells up (aside from Theft of Thought). Incognito (Mornin) starts attacking me (this is probably where his account of the events go in a different direction). He says something in Teamspeak, I’m not paying attention – usual day. It’s playful, whatever. He keeps attacking, so I just chain rune myself. At some point in this horseplay he gets Draga (Retti) to join in.

I’ll stop here.

Draga fuckin’ hated me, and judging by the daily anonymous characters he tries to harass me on currently, I’m guessing he still does. Everybody knew this then, everybody knows this now. I don’t enjoy Draga, either. These two facts were well known at the time, most of all by the officers. I don’t hate him with a passion – I recognize petulant children with anger issues when I see them. I was an officer in Empire for a reason, and it certainly wasn’t for my penchant for the irrational. Draga asking me for buffs would have been mind-boggling, let alone a situation where he’s attacking me.

At this point, I’m sure the majority of non-Empire reading this are really surprised to find out that a person kicked from literally every guild he’s been in (for being disrespectful and a general asshole) is making an appearance in a similar situation. Who would have thought?

So while two NToV geared warriors are attacking me, it’s only natural that I’m getting low in spite of the runes. At about 20% health, Incognito stops attacking. Draga does not. At about 7% health I stop moving, expecting Draga, who I’m surprised even had the balls to attack me given our history, to stop attacking. He kills me. This, to me, was nothing more than a player using the guise of horseplay to get away with disrespecting me (an officer) publicly.

I zone to my bind, immediately kick Retti from the guild, ban him from Teamspeak and have him killed by players at the raid.

“He can raid tomorrow. He’s not getting his corpse tonight.”

I get a rez. Incognito freaks out and starts yelling in Teamspeak that I’m abusing my powers. We’re in the middle of raiding, so Incognito eats a Teamspeak ban from me, and rightfully so.

The main idea being - unban them after raids. Problem solved. Time to pull Dozekar.

Apparently not. This is where the officers (Colgate, Gongshow) pull my legs out. They unban both Incognito and Draga from Teamspeak, rez Draga back in, and ultimately try to be diplomatic in a situation where it’s not only completely uncalled for, but where it does more harm than good. Keep in mind that this part of the situation is just angering to me, because it’s a spineless response to a problem that requires actual gumption. While this is happening, I’m repeatedly saying in Teamspeak, “Do not rez Draga. He’s not raiding today.”

Needless to say, I was superseded. This happened in front of everyone at the raid.

My problem with this is:

As an officer of a guild you’re charged with commanding a certain amount of respect from your members and peers while maintaining halfway decent decision making skills, and generally speaking, you have the autonomy to use said skills in what way you see fit (especially to benefit the guild as a whole). You’re also typically, as a rule of thumb, not undermined in public.

Interesting sidenote: Draga was kicked from Empire just days ago for disrespecting another officer in a completely separate situation (apparently with no questions asked and no qualms had with his removal). Funny how things work out.

Moving on. Draga loots his corpse after my order to slay him. He immediately attacks me in retaliation for what happened, killing me in one round. I sit at my bind and await the justice that surely awaits this idiot.

“Guys, stop. Rez Cyren.” Nothing more.

Spineless response – I am not happy.

Something I still haven’t told anyone about that moment and the series of events that followed – it was legitimately, utterly humiliating to have the officers, who were probably my closest pals in the guild, and people I invested a good deal of my time with on a daily basis, blackball me like that. The worst moment in Empire. I was an officer, and they let a nothing trashcan walk all over me after taking my power away. Feeling that way is saying a lot, because I’m not high strung, I don’t take things personally, I care very little about the micro-aggressions taken against me. But these quickly became major aggressions via neglect from particularly Colgate and Gongshow, and it was done in ironically the most passive of ways.

It was unacceptable, and probably still to this day lost on the both of them.

Anyway – after the situation is deemed “over with,” Draga begins sending me tells, taunting me. He taunts me because he thinks he’s untouchable (and in this case he was, lol). He’s horrible at trolling, has Down’s, irrationally angry - just a complete mess of a human being. What angered me was his thinking that he’s allowed to do it without punishment. What was far more angering, though, was the fact that the officer’s knew very well he would do it and thought nothing of thwarting it. They both know Retti very well, and they knew he was going to be Retti after all was said and done. They did absolutely nothing to curb this retard’s behavior. They acted as mediators rather than leaders. I think their reasoning is that they expected me to roll with it, thought Retti’s advances would roll off my shoulders, rather than choosing to, say, just man up and handle the situation like a real person.

So, whatever, the night ends. I was pissed off at Gongshow and Colgate – and I decide, yeah, I’m probably going to go over it with them the next day. Raids end for the night. I talk to Colgate briefly late at night about how retarded the series of events were. He tries to diffuse it, make it a non-issue, which was just pussyfooting around it. I’m not convinced.

Next day comes. We start with Dain, normal shit. Draga arrives. He’s openly criticizing and disrespecting me in guild chat over the previous night’s situation. 60 people are standing there watching it happen.

I wait on Colgate or Gongshow to step in. They apparently don’t see it or do see it and don’t care (maybe they expect me to be okay with it?). I’m not okay with it. Their passivity is getting to me.

Anger builds. Their nonchalance is getting more and more irritating. I now have no intention of bringing it up to them. I’m just going to shout at them if I do, which is not really productive.

Dain drops a Tri-Plated Hammer (best loot for PvP). I move up a channel. The names of people that sent tells on it are listed out.

First thing said -

Gongshow: “Uhhh… Draga?”

I leave channel – because if I don’t I’m going to rip Gongshow and Colgate a new one. Draga is sending me tells, still taunting me. They amount to: “I’m untouchable, faggot.”

I move back into the channel to catch the tail end of their discussion.

Gongshow: “…I mean he’s partly to blame for what happened with Retti.”

Keep in mind “what happened” is still ongoing with Retti, because it was never dealt with in the first place. “Happened” implies past tense.

Cyren: “Are you fucking kidding me? Are you fucking kidding me?”

I explain to them the actual events clearly, but probably not all that calmly. They explain that a loot diet is sufficient. I’m still very displeased with that off-handed comment from Gongshow. I explain that a loot diet isn’t sufficient – trying to focus more on the greater issue, which was still, Retti not feeling the weight of a real punishment, and that I’d been publicly undermined by my own officers without a second thought.

The hammer is ultimately awarded to Gyno. At this point, my thought is: who really gives a shit – it’s clear nothing will be done about Retti beyond a meaningless loot diet, meaning I’ve been rendered meaningless as an officer, meaning there was no longer a point in being there. So I stood by my principles and left.

I log out, leave Teamspeak permanently, text Terp the situation and that I’m leaving the guild.

Terp: “They spaghetti spined you?”

I removed my characters from the guild two days later.

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The somewhat smaller (but still TL;DR) version:

Basically what you need to know is, I didn’t “step down,” I didn’t leave with the intention of “taking a break,” and I didn’t “berg out.” I was all but forced out and left because Gongshow has an enormous problem with his own vanity, which manifests itself in the perpetual state of needing to be seen as a good guy, the pal, and to never dirty his hands in a way that might make him enemies. Trust me, leaving Empire wasn’t a decision taken lightly. Being an officer of Empire is very good. It’s pixel heaven. I could take anything I wanted at any time. I had many pals, many of who I still miss playing with, and most of whom I doubt I’ll play with again given the circumstances.

My way of doing things (which is the art of being a man) got in the way of vanity. Retti and Mornin cried in AIMchat, Gongshow and Colgate didn’t investigate the problem, they hamstringed their own officer, didn’t attempt to fix the problem, suggested it was my problem, haphazardly dealt with the real issue at ahnd and left me feeling desolated.

They figured a loot diet was enough for Draga, as though a warrior at 40% RA would even notice or give a shit about something like that. Draga also stopped raiding entirely after this happened – so it actually was a meaningless punishment. My punishment was immediately felt, real, necessary, and a nice, old fashioned punch in the gut. In a lot of ways, I felt like I was being too soft.

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This is probably the most comprehensive list of events and my feelings toward those events that I can give you, and it’s certainly the last time I’ll give them.

For those of you asking me to come back,

I don’t really care for the guild anymore. I have no interest in it. From what I understand most of you have no interest in the guild anymore, either. It’s loot. Nothing more. Even the officers don’t care.

This is evidenced by:

Multiple people telling me that everything in the off-time took a huge shit after I left. I’ve even been told that Retti admitted he fucked up. I’ve been told lots of things are different now. Hindsight is 20/20, I guess… though I don’t expect anyone to admit fault.

I don’t expect remorse. I’d just like you to know what actually happened, so you don’t have to hear your officers continue to obfuscate the actual story in an effort to conceal a black mark. What happened was not cool, and that’s okay. I imagine if I’d stifled how I actually felt, I probably could’ve salvaged it – y’know, at least enough to get fully geared.

But no one is going to leave Empire over this, and I don’t expect people to. It was over two months ago. Most of you don’t even care. Most of you won’t even give this a real response beyond what trite, unoriginal phrases you parrot on a day to day basis.

I will say that with some perspective, rehashing the situation over again with the officers may have done some good in the long run, but I think the sort of blind acceptance of some random dipshit’s story over my own and the general unwillingness to hear me out (when I was completely in the right) is what struck a chord so deeply and unnerved the bonds we had as pals in the first place. It felt like one of those situations where you’re just not on the same page with someone anymore, and you realize you’re not really talking to a pal any longer. Just humiliation after humiliation, which is a horrible feeling – and which is saying a lot of the bond shared with the officer core, that it could even produce those feelings in the first place.

It’s probably indicative of investing too much into an internet pal (and the game in general). Call it lesson learned, I guess. But it’s also sad to see a guild I helped build from the ground up, and for a long time after, seemingly no longer about sharing the bonds with pals first and foremost, and more about maintaining the status quo of a raid-ready guild. It shifted somewhere… maybe I just missed it happening. Maybe that’s the point – everyone else saw it, and somehow I didn’t.

Retti recently told me from one of his various alts, “Gongshow said your leaving was like an addition by subtraction.” It’s not a great sentiment if truly said and felt (strangely, I don’t doubt that it was), but it’s certainly a poetic way to think about the whole thing. There’s that, at least.

On a final note:

To be clear - I don’t mind Gongshow and Colgate as people, and I did enjoy their company as officers at one time. It’s just that after everything, they register to me as acquaintances now rather than the good pals they used to be.

And that’s a little sad. But… shit happens.

See ya, queers