+1 Very eloquently put and I agree 100%. I sure appreciate it when someone manages to write a message that is not filled with Social Media abbreviations and bad spelling.Originally Posted by Drixx
I appreciate the opposing opinions in the thread, and I can see that apparently there has not yet been enough ****play that people are tired enough for it that all can agree to end it. People should really not delude themselves though on one point: If we had fought, it would have been because we felt there was something to gain by doing so. Ultimately we would have farmed a huge chunk of acres to either AMA or BB, so in the end nobody is "screwed" by our choice to take the chart shaping out of play. Nobody was going to overcome whichever of those two kds finally ran us out of gas and then took us for 30k+ acres plus warwin bonus.
To believe someone could have somehow caught up to the 270k+ range and beat AMA or BB after they were done farming us and then beat them is so unrealistic so as to seem like merely a pretense for stirring the pot.
I am willing to put my money where my mouth is. When intentional farmout cost Rage crowns, I was angry about it. Playing kingmaker or "going down with a fight" would have been highly hypocritical. I put forward an attempt to make a statement about the top needing some agreed upon standards and the backbone to enforce them, regardless of whether violators are friends or foes. People will either get tired enough of the ****play and that will happen, or it will continue to get worse until there ceases to be any game.
We aren't going to tolerate any ****play we have the power to stop going forward. I believe we've put our money where our mouth is and when we say that we play with clean ethics, we've demonstrated that we mean it. Even though BB/AMA/EJ are our opponents, it would be ethically wrong to screw them out of a fair competition. So when we step in and take action against ****play in the future, nobody will be able to say we're doing it only because it benefits us. Take a look at this thread and see people who are friends, allies and even one of the people in my kingdom who is in our leadership who are angry with this decision. Making it cost us an ally (at least for the moment ... I'm hoping that time will calm things down a bit, but we'll see). This decision clearly wasn't made for our benefit.
If you have ethical standards and you really believe in them, sometimes that obligates you to act against your own self-interest. The game has devolved into the state it is at the top right now because kds don't apply a consistent ethical standard in all cases. It's much like warring really. Sometimes you have the advantage and sometimes you don't. If you change you ethics to suit your benefit, then you have no ethics. I hope that all of the top kds will take some time to consider the past few ages and to put themselves in the shoes of the kds who got ****played and screwed and that we can find common ground and stop manipulating what 'fair' and 'right' mean.
That said, RBL has two core things which make up our ethos, and in this instance they were in conflict. We always fight hard and won't run from a fight (so you won't see us arranging to war a 3rd party because we have the disadvantage) and we play ethically. Given the very large amount of ****play these last few ages, I felt that ethics superseded the "go down fighting" mentality.
I don't want anyone to misconstrue what I said in the previous sentence so let me be very clear. Giving notice to a kd doesn't entitle you to fight them. The proper thing to do if a kd fights someone else is to simply wait and hit them afterward. I personally believe that running from fights causes more problems for the kd running, but if someone runs, that doesn't make it acceptable to ****play them.
Top kds and alliances or friendly kds to one another would do well to consider that things shift frequently and while it's easy to walk all over people when you have the power to prevent them from fighting back, the scales will eventually tip away from your favor, and people have long memories. Better for all, I think, if people would get together and wipe the slates all clean and start fresh with a commitment to play with whatever standards everyone can agree to live with. Whenever you all get tired enough of the ****play, we'll be around.
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PEW OR DIE
