Continuing Discussion from In-Game

Since talking takes a hell of a lot of AP after a days worth of reviving, I'll post my questions, statements, arguments etc here on the board.

***

Some of you might know me already. I'm that guy with the stupid attitude from the SoC in St. Pius starting arguments in St. Pius at the moment. Hear me out first, it's difficult to fit all I have to say into the UD chat box while getting my point across. I don't mean any disrespect what-so-ever and I come here with the utmost respect for you all.

Here is what I have to say.

It is great that you have come up to The Heights to help with the revives and FAKS, but I must bring up this one thing which has been confounding me.

During the siege of Caiger, a lot of the survivors were fighting without full health, infections ran rampant amongst us all, generators were constantly destroyed causing our already horrendous search rates to drop for essentials such as FAKS. We didn't have enough AP to make it to the Trinity Hospitals (St. Eutychian, St. Pius and St. Matheos) and back without leaving Caiger severely underhanded. But throughout the entire siege, I can't recall seeing or hearing from any MCM member within the SE corner where we needed the most aid. Of course, you might have sent members to Caiger and I might not have noticed it of course. But I did keep a track of everyone within the SE corners health. I was a designated Medic to Caiger and I was hard pressed for time as each time I returned, we'd have slightly less numbers than before. I know the people I healed, and, who I didn't heal. I kept track of the people I couldn't get to (either due to them not being a priority target, or a comrade of mine requiring the first aid more), and I mustn't have been the only Medic within the mall but still, the people I couldn't get to did not receive proper Medical Attention.


I return to St. Pius from the newly ruined Caiger today and I see over 50 survivors (a majority of them being "MCM" or "MCM Support") who are talking about baking cookies and drinking tea and such. This has me concerned of course and the first thing which comes to my mind is that the people who are here, were not in Caiger, helping the wounded. However, perhaps I didn't notice you MCM'ers for my eyes were peeled for wounded comrades and known PK'ers. But, it angered me so to think that we had this many survivors not ten blocks from Caiger and we lost the Mall after we spilt so much blood over it. We might have won the siege (unlikely I admit), or at least post-pone the destruction for another week when we would've received additional reinforcements from DHPD. Yes, I understand, most of the number within St. Pius are still young bloods (I noticed a fare few in St. Pius) and would've just been fodder. But what siege is complete without fodder. When survivors embark on a siege defence within a Mall, they know their lives are equal to fodder which can nail a few planks and shoot a few bullets.

And I've noticed that some MCM'ers within St. Pius are of well established level and experience. Again, I might not have noticed you at Caiger but would you please tell me whether you sent help to Caiger or not. Don't get me wrong I have the utmost respect for you MCM'ers. You do a stunning job and make a fine cuppa, and your work recently is certainly showing around the hospitals (such as survivors being in tip top shape with full health).

Now onto over-barricading and recruitment. I noticed recently, your leader, Violet, said that people are over-barricading and that they are doing it to kill just like a PK'er would. I can assure you, SoC are well trained and disciplined soldiers (I myself being the head of the SoC Boot Camp) and support a well designed barricade policy. But to say that people are like PK'ers for over-barricading is going a little too far in my opinion. What I think is happening is, people are trying to protect the young bloods within St. Pius by raising the barricade levels due to the increasing zombie numbers outside St. Eutychian and surrounding tactical resource points. There are plenty of buildings to the East of the Trinity Hospitals which can be used to free run into St. Matheos and then St. Pius. Yes, I know they're just young bloods but free running really should be the first skill you acquire. This is not to mention the Christmas Lights outside which give all Zombies the "Tasty Brain-Burgers in here" sign.

Now with recruitment and player killing. As I said in St. Pius, we lost a few of our number permanently during the Caiger siege. This is sensitive information to the SoC but brining it out into the public eye won't be damaging, but more helpful to us so we can show people are views on the subject. Two members of the SoC decided to defect and join the hordes attacking Caiger Mall. At SoC, we look at and consider everything that comes before us. At the SoC, we are going for quality over quantity with our members, and these two members who defected were extremely well experienced and both of them defecting was quite a shock to us all at the SoC.

With two experienced members lost, I sought to replenish to ranks by looking around the place (I was the LCD commissar back in the day). I arrived at St. Pius and was at first decided against advertising within your HQ but the following events persuaded me otherwise.
At the moment, St. Pius harbours known PK'ers who have attacked us and/or hindered us in the past. At first, SoC respected your (MCM's) wishes of not attacking PK'ers in St. Pius, but I noticed that one fellow in particular killed a notorious PK'er known to SoC and who was on our KoS (Kill on Sight) list. I checked his profile and he was very well experienced and I noticed a few others who were well experienced and not being in any group. These people looked like the perfect recruits/replacements for our traitorous brothers and I proceeded to advertise. I hope this clears this issue up at least.

And onto my last point, PK'ers. You said that you try to reason with PK'ers and get them to act peacefully. SoC respected that and we did not attack the PK'ers within St. Pius or their other numerous hiding places. We return from Caiger, and we've got PK'ers such as Darethen still up to no good, even after you said you'd sort him out.
What are your thoughts upon the current 60+ strong PK'ers within Darvall Heights at the moment? So far, we are dealing with the Philosopher Knights, Creedy Guerilla Raiders, and The Spartans. Are you planning on having talks with them considering that they PK'ed the hell out of Caiger and with St. Pius being the next most survivor populated building around, they are sure to start targeting people within St. Pius.

***

And that does it for me, I hope I didn't come across in the wrong way. I try to be tactful and honest at the same time while not trying to sound like a prick.

EDIT: Disregard my Avatar. I just grabbed something random outta my pic folder.

I can't speak for everybody else but i was reviveing people at the caigar revive point but i didn't stay in the mall as for the pkers i don't care what you do to them so long as it doesn't happen in st pius and if you get killed just post your location here and you'll be up in a few hours as for Violet's opinions on over baricadeing i can't comment on that and the lights as you pointed out there are over 50 survivours in st pius it would take a highly organised strike team to take us out

Not sure that we need an entire thread of people like me, telling yarns about 'what we did during the siege'... but I suppose there are dozens of similar cases. So in a way, and without permission, I attempt to speak for several.

I visited the SE corner two days ago, just long enough to scrounge another generator and stuff. It took five minutes during the initial onslaught, so I don't expect you to have noticed me. I revived a bunch of folks at Salopia, and replaced a couple of generators at Herman and St. Euty's. I'm now out of everything, including AP. I chatter sparingly, and condense everything I say into one or two lines.

I think it's safe to assume most of MCM has a similar story for the past week. We are happy to do it, and do it happily. After what you have been through, it is understandable to feel like something went wrong.

John Spiro wrote:

And onto my last point, PK'ers. You said that you try to reason with PK'ers and get them to act peacefully. SoC respected that and we did not attack the PK'ers within St. Pius or their other numerous hiding places. We return from Caiger, and we've got PK'ers such as Darethen still up to no good, even after you said you'd sort him out.
What are your thoughts upon the current 60+ strong PK'ers within Darvall Heights at the moment? So far, we are dealing with the Philosopher Knights, Creedy Guerilla Raiders, and The Spartans. Are you planning on having talks with them considering that they PK'ed the hell out of Caiger and with St. Pius being the next most survivor populated building around, they are sure to start targeting people within St. Pius.

***

And that does it for me, I hope I didn't come across in the wrong way. I try to be tactful and honest at the same time while not trying to sound like a prick.

EDIT: Disregard my Avatar. I just grabbed something random outta my pic folder.

It's not the organized, disciplined, PK'ers (PKnights, CGR, Spartans), that you have to worry about in St P's. We are familiar with them, and they with us. They have respected our neutrality stance, and we are even recognized as an institute of learning by the Knights. What goes on outside of ST P's or whatever hospital we are set up in, is another matter. We do not aid and abet them in their PK activities, but we will not deny them humanitarian aid either. The same goes for legitimate survivor groups... We will not deny them humanitarian aid, plus we help with restoration of their affected suburb to the best of our ability.

We have had more troulble with maverick BH'ers and butt-hurt revenge seekers violating our neutrality, than we have ever had from PK'ers who seek a brief respit and warm FAK behind our walls. In fact they're more likely to stay and help in a siege of the hospital, and are usually the last to leave. On the other hand, most of the (so-called) survivor groups, tend to throw up their hands and flee the suburb, when more than 10 zeds are swaying outside our doors.

Neutrality and tolerance have their benefits, friend.

I made one or two healing runs to the mall, but I was more preoccupied with reviving, which I notice wasn't one of your complaints. The hospitals were also under siege, albeit not as much as the mall, but we had 20 some zombies outside at times.

We don't use our newbies as fodder (at least on purpose ) despite it being a good strategic decision because that's not our style. As others have already said, I'm sure I was not the only high level member making runs to the Mall.

I have not seen a problem with overbarricading recently, neither have I heard anyone complain about overbarricading recently. We used to have problems with the barricades when we first arrived, but even then I never heard anyone accuse SoC of intentionally overcading, you guys have been top notch. Mass overcading kills much more effectively then any PKer, but I believe that there are enough VSB buildings nearby that this doesn't qualify as "mass" even if it happens occasionally.

On to our PKer policy. As you probably know, our views on PKing are pretty controversial. Our policy stems from a combination of safety for our students, preference for focusing our energy against zeds, and the fact that many (I hesitantly say "most") PKers are very fun to hang out with.

Our policy, as I recall it, is that our hospital is a neutral zone for both PKers and BHers. As long as the PKers do not PK inside or outside the hospital, we ask that other people do not attack them while they are in the hospital. If they want to PK then they should sleep outside of the hospital so they can be killed in return. Naturally, this protection does not apply to zergs, Ignore Listers, and people who repeatedly violate our policies. As Fuzzy said, most of the organized PKer groups are in on this.

John Spiro wrote:

Now onto over-barricading and recruitment. I noticed recently, your leader, Violet, said that people are over-barricading and that they are doing it to kill just like a PK'er would. I can assure you, SoC are well trained and disciplined soldiers (I myself being the head of the SoC Boot Camp) and support a well designed barricade policy. But to say that people are like PK'ers for over-barricading is going a little too far in my opinion. What I think is happening is, people are trying to protect the young bloods within St. Pius by raising the barricade levels due to the increasing zombie numbers outside St. Eutychian and surrounding tactical resource points. There are plenty of buildings to the East of the Trinity Hospitals which can be used to free run into St. Matheos and then St. Pius. Yes, I know they're just young bloods but free running really should be the first skill you acquire.

I highly doubt its people trying to protect young bloods mate, more likely its either someone who thinks its a great laugh to cause trouble, a pker looking to waste peoples ap or wuss’s finding the hospital and then shoving a sofa over the door that just granted them safe haven in order to better protect their own skin.

A VSB building is not going to become a zombie snack when it has nearly 100 players inside of it. Heck due to the FAK pick ups it could be held indefinitely really.

New players and indeed older ones need a safe place to be at VSB, not just an empty building that no one defends next to a safe place. Think of it this way, if your travelling overground to the hospital and your running the wire on ap and there are a number of zombies in the area you arrive at the hospital with 1ap left to get inside and find it overcaded. You attempt the next hospital but have to wait your half hour for another ap, during said half hour your killed by a zombie/pker/anvil/20tonweight. This means that the person who overcaded has in effect murdered you does it not?

New players are serious force multipliers in a hospital (they can heal while we older hands ress and cade etc) so grabbing in as many as possible is a primary concern. After all if a dead newbie stands up and see's a gang of 10-15 zombies they are likely to just horde up with them, thus we lose there fresh minds under a pile of rot...

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I highly doubt its people trying to protect young bloods mate, more likely its either someone who thinks its a great laugh to cause trouble, a pker looking to waste peoples ap

Though you still harbour PK'ers and offer them a temporary safe-haven?

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Think of it this way, if your travelling overground to the hospital and your running the wire on ap and there are a number of zombies in the area you arrive at the hospital with 1ap left to get inside and find it over-caded. You attempt the next hospital but have to wait your half hour for another ap, during said half hour your killed by a zombie/pker/anvil/20tonweight. This means that the person who over-caded has in effect murdered you does it not?

At the SoC, we teach our recruits to be AP efficent. We try to steer them away from the common tactic of leaving your most crucial part of your AP run down to 1AP (or in other words; Don't leave your re-entry down to 1AP). A smart survivor, well taught in being AP efficient, marks down an additional (or perhaps several) different entry point buildings which are VSB and can be used to Free Run from. However, I do agree that over-barricading can be a selfish act and leads to the death of many young bloods. SoC scouts give us reports on building status, and we follow the Uniform Barricade Policy set in Darvall Heights and we are prepared to go along with temporary changes to such policies.

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On to our PKer policy. As you probably know, our views on PKing are pretty controversial. Our policy stems from a combination of safety for our students, preference for focusing our energy against zeds, and the fact that many (I hesitantly say "most") PKers are very fun to hang out with.

But let's say that a member of the SoC engages the PK'er on your neutral ground and manages to kill the PK'er. Even if we follow your PK'er policy and the previous statement occurs, the alleged PK'er/PK'er group will only have a problem with us SoC members, and not your staff. And so, your staff/students would be safe either way from PK'ers.
And if the PK'ers start to take their frustration out on you, then obviously that PK'er is irrational and is merely a trouble maker who is looking to upset the balance and fight with people with whom they are not involved.

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Not sure that we need an entire thread of people like me, telling yarns about 'what we did during the siege'... but I suppose there are dozens of similar cases. So in a way, and without permission, I attempt to speak for several.

No offence, but I wasn't really looking for that either. I was only detailing what I did to fuel my argument.

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than we have ever had from PK'ers who seek a brief respit and warm FAK behind our walls. In fact they're more likely to stay and help in a siege of the hospital, and are usually the last to leave. On the other hand, most of the (so-called) survivor groups, tend to throw up their hands and flee the suburb, when more than 10 zeds are swaying outside our doors.

Before you arrived, SoC was constantly forced to make... well, let's call them tactical retreats. If we were to stay, we would all surely perish and our plans and mobility would surely falter. But what I'm trying to say is more directed at your "PK'ers being the last to leave". From my past experience, PK'ers live off everyone else. They wait for the buildings to crumble just as they've sucked all they can from it, before moving to a safe house for a few days, then return as the tired survivors have spent days clearing out zombies from buildings and making them efficient and operational again once more. But the PK'er merely moves in, sucks all he/she can from the joint before leaving.

***

This is directed towards everyone. I'm glad to know you helped out with the revives (even though truth be told, we had around 3-4 Pro Survivor groups spread amongst Latrobe/SE corner, working the revives), but what we really needed was a good FAK'ing. It annoyed me when I entered St. Pius, a bit of my scalp missing, to find everyone on full health and myself getting readily patched up. But we needed you. As petty as this sounds, Caiger needed you while you were baking cookies and harbouring PK'ers and enjoying luxuries such as generators and light.

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Gee, I guess all those needles I used in reviving your butts weren't apprecciated. In the last couple of weeks I have used all my AP reviving people at the mall RP and I know I wasn't alone in doing so. Many MCM players were also sacrificing their AP to assist you.

Here's a question for you John, how come you didn't send a message or get on our IRC and TELL US YOU NEEDED FAKS MORE THAN REVIVES?

Now you have me mad as a hornet and that just isn't working for my bee-ness.

13 needles spent. Your mall revive queue was running like a well-oiled dragster when MCM was working it. You're welcome.

Revives are what keeps a suburb on it's feet, dude. You let them languish, people leave the burb or join the zombies. Keep them zooming along, people stay and fight for you.

And actually, I walked through the mall several times, spending my few remaining FAKs on the dying. I also caded the place up from DWO or lightly to VSB or HB more times than I can count. You didn't see me because I don't sleep in malls, ever. I tend to get PKed almost instantly when I do because of who I am, for rather complicated reasons.

Don't worry - we aren't staying in Darvall Heights. We're leaving as soon as either 1) things settle down a bit and there's no longer such a threat to St Pius, or 2) the Christmas tree and lights are gone. Seriously.

MCM plays for fun. People WANT to log in when we're around, and yes, it's due to the cookies and jokes and karaoke mid-siege. This is no longer fun, and we're going elsewhere.

John,

It seems obvious that we have a fundamental disagreement in strategy. That is fine, really. Every group in Malton runs things a bit differently. I wouldn't even dream of telling you how to paddle your own canoe.

I can tell you this, sir. MCM is pro-survivor to the core. We are dedicated to making Malton a better place in a multitude of ways. We heal the wounded. We revive the fallen. We reclaim buildings from zombie hordes and make them safe. We teach those new to the fight in Malton valuable skills and provide them a home to learn safely. We try to make Malton a sunnier place with humor, laughter, and a helping hand.

Because we operate teaching hospitals we do keep them no more than very strongly barricaded for the safety of our students. We don't raise those barricades until it is evident we can't hold the building at VSB. Not a lot of groups can get away with this, but we are very active and we have a lot of experience with this tactic. We don't mind that bit of risk that is associated with lower cades, because helping less skilled survivors is more important to us than our own personal safety.

I can understand that you might not understand why some in our group are pretty darn chatty. You can heal someone's the body, John, but if the soul is dark and cheerless inside that is just as bad as being one of the walking dead. We've found that healing the heart and providing a place of good cheer is just as important to the health and vitality of the survivors of Malton out there fighting the good fight.

While some of our fine members were lifting spirits, there were some of us more silent times out there spending every last bit of our energy helping out the people of Darvall Heights. I've personally spent every last bit of my energy the last several days reviving people so they could get back in the fight knowing that time was of the essence and every zombie waiting for a revive could be alive and be doing something productive in that fight. Since I've been in Darvall Heights I've been keeping a special eye on your members, and I have been giving members of your team priority revives over others. Something I've down several times over the past couple of days. With as much reviving our team has been doing in the area I can pretty much guarantee the Mall would have fallen a heck of a lot sooner than it did. Did I make it into Caiger? No. Because I was too busy getting people back up on their feet so we had as many people as we could fighting against the undead.

No matter how you want to slice it, John, we've been out there busting our tushes helping the good people of Darvall Heights and your group. I'm sorry you didn't notice, but it doesn't change the fact that we were. That is okay though, we don't expect to be pat on the back for the things we've done. I'm really sorry that it looks like things haven't been working out. I for one was looking forward to continuing to bring aid to the area.

All in all, mate, I don't hold anything against you or your group. I just really wish you would have given us the benefit of the doubt more and criticized less, especially since we have been here helping in every way!

=Red=

Since I am the current leader of SoC I thought I should perhaps make an official statement. I am foreign so my English is not as good as my lieutenant level of handling the language. So excuse me if some of my points are confusing. I don't want to sound like a badger badger badger badger but I am usually direct and very sharp with my words, I say what I think regardless. It is in my nature. So if I do come off as a badger badger badger badger that's isn't intended.


On policies in St. Pius - we respected all of your policies. I've told all my members what your guidelines are. We haven't hunted pkers inside St. Pius despite being killed by them many times. I told your representative that we will go by your guidelines unless we are attacked inside the building. When it comes to barricading, we aren't the ones who overbarricaded. I understand your goal to help out low-level survivors, we aim for that as well. Likely the person overbarricading is the same one who keeps overbarricading our own entry points. It's a good tactic for those that are anti-survivors.

While initially I was annoyed by the fact that you are making us follow your guidelines (we've been here for 4 years after all and you are our guests) I accepted them as a sign of our good relationship.

When it comes to recruitment though I think it's a fair game for us to recruit anywhere inside Darvall Heights. Your members have also recruited outside St. Pius. I think it's a fair game for any group to recruit anywhere. Nobody owns anything after all. Even if I don't take into consideration those aspects, nobody of the MCM has told me - "we would appreciate if you don't recruit in St. Pius."

Onto the siege, I don't doubt your efforts. I don't blame you for the fall of the Mall or anything like that. I saw you heal and revive people including members of our group. However we needed people staying inside the Mall, we needed people inside SE corner staying there (meatshielding to put it bluntly) and helping with the breach. I stated that in our embassy to your representative but perhaps I might have not been clear so I will put that to a miscommunication. There were plenty of people inside Pius that if they came inside SE corner would have helped out immensely. Like I said however I will attribute that to miscommunication. This is the reason why John is pissed off, those people if they came to SE corner could have prevented easily the final breach that killed the Mall. Again I will stress that it's nobody's fault.

Onto pkers again. I respect your neutrality, that's your choice completely. However you have to take into account that by reviving them, healing them and providing them with shelter and a neutral ground you are aiding them in killing us. A lot of the pkers we managed to took out, where back in the same day killing us again or healed after repeatedly shot. As such your efforts are counterproductive to ours as a proxy. I hope you follow my logic.

When it comes to strategy or AP efficiency I don't care, meaning every group has the decision to do whatever they wish to do and that is entirely their business. I don't blame you for anything.

All in all, I respect you as allies. I respect the job you did and I appreciate it. I wouldn't like for us to go on our separate ways in a bitter mood and negative feeling towards each other. However take into account that whenever there's an argument or a conflict, both sides and both points of view have merit. An issue always has two sides as a coin if I could make a metaphore. As such take our points into consideration, as we have taken yours.

We are soldiers, not medics. Our tactics are different, our demeanor more crude and harsh. We talk less and fight more. But we wish the best for everyone.

I wish you good journey and hopefully we'll meet again. Your cookies were delicious and your chit-chats indeed brought some light into a forsaken and destroyed place like Malton.

With respect,
Cortonna.

Cortonna, I have no trouble at all with you or with the SoC leadership, and your English is fine. You've been excellent hosts, and polite and respectful. I do have a problem with John Spiro, who came here with no intention of genuinely communicating.

MCM was looking for a home, not a place where we are guests. I think we can find this nearby, but we will not be settling in Darvall Heights. We need to be able to play Urban Dead in our own way. We will be in the general Northwest corner of Malton, and we will heal and revive the SoC just as always.

We still hold the Soldiers of Crossman in respect for enduring in the toughest corner of Malton when most other groups ran. I'm granting you trusted ally access to our forum, Cortonna, as a sign of respect and trust.

I'm locking this thread now so that we can end on a high note.