Manolevent Conspiracies

All spelling mistakes are due to lack of sleep and caring. Today, 'read more' is about MUSHes in general, and administrative conspiracies and the revolutions that spawned them...

Having read the Otherspace Player-Admin contract, I noticed a few things. Keep in mind, my other reading for tonight has been OSC works, all of them having to do with the Ender universe. Specifically, parts of Xenocide out of boredom, and all of Ender's Shadow. Hedgemon is next...

Wes states a very simple truth that people forget. To have a manolevent conspiracy on a MUSH, you need a consolidation of power. I was part of one of the most amusing (in the long run) declines of a MUSH that I've had the ability to see. The second one was simply not amusing, as I knew the admin and helped shape the organization. Anyway...

I have fit squarely into the 'Revolutionary' player type that Wes describes on one game, and one game only. My character was, by definition, a 'Rules Lawyer,' as he was ICly the sole embodiment of Law Enforcement for the major affiliation, responsible for the enforcement of IC law for over 80 players. The Wizard in charge of the game was a real court drama buff, so she encouraged the adoption of a working legal system. My character was known, as was I in an OOC capacity, for the efficient and quite honestly brutal enforcement of the law. ICA=ICC, which usually meant a reset.

At first, another organization started a rivalry against mine, stating they were not subject to our IC authority. They would then begin to commit acts against others players that not only violated IC laws, but violated the sensibilities of most players OOCly. Kidnappings, forced seizures. Basically playing like my organization, without rule of law or fairness. They were, in their minds, above the IC law, and able to do anything they wanted to to further their temporary RP high. Being heros, even when there was no one to hero for. They would kidnap prime ministers and interrogate them, etc. I began my campaign not as a revolutionary, but as an enforcer of IC and OOC law. Players who violated OOC covenants within the IC scope of things, such as "rules of engagement" and the like were allowed their actions to be IC. Then, they would request we 'investigate.' These matters always ended up with a reset by the offending player, as they did not wish to languish in the court system, which was excrciatingly RPed out, taking months. RL months.

One day, the administration team changed. Fewer administrators at the top, quite a few RL family members. One Head Wizard who did not share the vision or 'dream' of the MUSH, simply ran it because she was asked to by her RL significant other. Her 'deputy head wizard', charged with the same powers that the 'head wizard' had, began to quietly change the IC world by fiat and OOC order. To form the game in a way she wished. IC leadership in certain empires was taken over by players who were extremely obscure. They, in turn, were the family members and lover of this 'deputy head wizard'. The finely tuned justice system that was designed to work fairly was now a tool for OOC punishment of players who violated the will of the 'deputy head wizard.' The head wizard, when called on this, said: I don't care. She can do what she wants.

From there, it went downhill greatly, and I became a revolutionary. The head wizard abandoned the MUSH, stating in a non-MUSH forum that the idiot deputy head wizard could pervert the game all she wanted, she was through with it. Several people protested the first wave of changes, and within a month found themselves screwed over by the first wave of alternate IC characters now under the new head wizard's control. Entire IC governments were placed under one person's control overnight, by form of alts taking power.

Having an administration run government, nothing wrong with this. Except when someone takes over player run governments, concealing the fact that they are now administration controlled, and begins forcing out players who do not subscribe to their ideology, no matter how un-IC it is.

In the end, players fled from this MUSH. I served as an administrator during the worst period of the 'restructuring', watching administrators powerless to do anything out of fear of losing bits they've held for years, empires they've babied and created for years, to the head wizard's sway. The message was clear. I have a hatred for two organizations and all their players. You will not interfere in my purging these organizations, or I will turn my attentions to purging YOUR organization. Starting with you.

People fought back against the systematic gutting in IC law and budgeting of organizations which long grudges were held against, the running off of players, the public humiliation of high ranking IC personnel, and the complete standstill of a military that a quote I will never forget was constantly applied to: "They are sheep. You have to lead them, and if they get uppity, that's what @nuke's for. No one in that empire is worth anything." This, by the way, was the core empire of 140 players that made the Trek themed MUSH go, the United Federation of Planets. An administrator in power held contempt for the core group of players.

So, what happened? The administration team suffered purges, their best coders removed for the mere suspicion of subversion of admin rule. Such as responding to player questions about IC elections, or stating that one person controls an entire empire ICly and OOCly. The server suffered multiple downtimes. And people just stopped logging in. They stopped caring. In the administration's quest, one woman and her family to dominate the game and shape it into what SHE and SHE alone wanted... She left no room for anyone else to play.

Its still around. Starfleet, under an administrator and former Fleet Admiral who loved her org, resurged. Now, they too are gone, players stopped logging in.

If your down to here, there is a moral to this story. I was a revolutionary. I sought change from a one woman regime who @nuked, humilliated, @jailed, and harassed a game that many loved to her own personal vision of what it should be. That vision had no room for others, and quite frankly others were not needed. Each family member had several government, administration, trading, and military alts, in every empire. They could play the game themselves, without outside interference, the way they wanted.

The moral is simple. If, one day, the MUSH you love begins to die... If it is taken over by one group, in charge and purging every other viewpoint. Let them. Speak your mind, track the changes, tell those who ask. But you cannot change the way it occurs. All you can do, if you feel so inclined, is to map the progress, and see if you want to play on this new game.

I used to play on Strange New Worlds. The name is the same, but the people, the mission, everything about the game is different. The most noticable, now... I used to play, now I sit and idle, because it is a ghost town. Every viewpoint not compatible with the Administrative 'cabal' was run off long ago.