im entering my 14th year of monarching, and after increased utopia investment (and thus exposure to fail) last age ive further refined my thoughts on player fail
I think fail has two main components: lack of ability and bad intent. Both can be sorted into subcategories: lack of ability would contain things such as inactivity, being hard to reach, low cognitive activity, being sloppy with filling out fields in uto. Bad intent can be malevolence, spite, selfishness, epeen overdose etc.
Ive put these two main ingredients on two axes and tried to map my own minions:
I think the quadrants can be understood as follows:
1.
Top left: well meaning players, but who perform badly due to lack of motivation (which causes inactivity), lack of time (oldtimers), general incompetence and such. Theyre not trying to spite the KD, often they do the best they can, but theyre just not impressive. Most of them sort of realize this and will be apologetic about it. "If you want to replace me, thats fine"
2.
Bottom right: these players have activity and ability but happen to be complete asshats. In my experience, most "top" players fit this category. They think theyre the bomb diggity, and the KD has to meet their standards, not the other way around. They will make demands, cause drama, and threaten to quit if they deem stuff inadequate. My feeling is that most KD hoppers fit this bill. Theres no sense of loyalty or responsibility, and e-peen stroking is their prime objective and activity.
3.
Top right: this quadrant represents the worst: they yell, they scream, they demand, they disrupt, but they never deliver. Theyre the inactive asshole that saunters into the convo occasionally, blurts out inane bs and then disappears again for 1-2 days. Or theyre the one-trick-pony "top" player who think theres only one way to achieve a given objective and all others are unacceptable.
4.
Bottom left: this is the sweet spot, where you have low key, active, competent players. They are loyal, they dont generate work, you dont have to check up on them, they will even help out and take work out of your hands. Every monarch's impossible goal is to have every player fit in this quadrant. Minimum drama/policing, maximum performance.
None of the datapoints are static of course. People migrate from one quadrant to another depending on circumstance. A former monarch might travel from bottom left to bottom right because s/he has trouble adjusting to a new environment. A formerly great player travels north due to new work/life obligations. New players travel south as they figure out how the game works. And so on.
One migration that - i think - is very unusual is right to left migration: ive not seen rotten, dysfunctional people change their ways.
id be interested in hearing your thoughts! (esp fellow monarchs)
P.S. of course the ones closest to top right are Yanks and Romanians. Of course.