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This is my experience with the moderator team at ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
rubilykskoye, something to which I alluded to in my SOTRP Plurk, posted 30 July 2024 AEST.
I originally wrote this draft on 24 January 2024 and completed it in August 2024. Please note all times/dates in screencaps and in this post are AEDT/AEST.
I've tried to keep this as concise as possible, but there's a lot of shit that's happened. I wrote this because I always intended to share these PMs. I've dropped because the game environment became too toxic for me.
*
The mod team at the time of the PMs I will be sharing was Tifa, Mal and Prox. At the time of publishing this post, I want to make it clear that I have no personal issues with the new mod team members.
I've endured bullying by the mods who've abused their power as moderators to try and intimidate me into giving them feedback they felt entitled to because I chose to complain/vent to my friends (which… everyone does), assigned blame to me for how other people feel, and attacked my character. I also believe they have been stonewalling me with my plots (something that continued under the new mod team, although I'm uncertain of how involved the new members were) and tried to alienate me from my CR.
It wasn't all bad in the beginning. I stayed in this game because I enjoyed playing with the players and my characters; however, January 2024 became incredibly uncomfortable for me, and I should've dropped.
I stated on my Plurk a few times over the last month that I refused to go to the unscreened mod contact post and will only provide feedback on an unscreened one. The experiences I'm outlining below are why.
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All screenshots in here are mine and are interactions I have had with the moderators on the Dreamwidth communities and Dreamwidth moderator account. I will not be posting any Discord messages or Plurks as I feel that's incredibly inappropriate and a violation of privacy (and these channels are not a part of the game). Click on the screenshots to make them bigger.
Other things happened in this game to me, but I honestly can't be bothered outlining it all as it's interpersonal conflicts with the people involved and some who I deem close to the mods.
tl;dr: (1) I had a mod-as-a-player overstep with me in private to reprimand me on someone else's behalf… when this person did not have a problem with me at all (people in this game love talking for others); (2) a player close to the mod team pushed me out of a player plot on Plurk; and (3) I felt excluded by my cast (which two moderators were members of) despite a group chat being made (which I was the last to comment in on 14 November 2023)—I stopped interacting with them in December 2023 because I was not enjoying the interactions.
*
These are Rubi's rules as of 24 January 2024.
*
November 2023
An NPC post (the Duchess) introduced PCs receiving in-game titles.
I complained privately on a player to player (and what I thought was a friend to friend) basis (not a player to mod) to Mal about the introduction of character titles, as I felt that they were establishing the game as a faction game. I had hoped those who were receiving titles and acknowledgement by the Big NPC would opt for negative consequences down the line.
What sparked this was that I was receiving negative consequences for Wanda's actions (something I accepted), while I felt other players (including a mod) were opting for soft negative consequences for their characters. I expressed that I felt the game was moving into a faction-based structure and that this would discourage other players who felt that they weren't progressing with gaining positive influence (something I felt the game balanced well until this post).
The below is a pm exchange regarding my concerns about introducing character titles and ICly singling characters out. I did not go to the mods to initiate these PMs and I did not give permission for Mal to speak for me.
I think my replies explain my stance and thoughts well enough that I won't go into detail here.
The mods' first pm -
For very brief personal context - I had all three mods added as players on my Plurk. I was upfront on my Plurk that I had a death anniversary coming up at the end of November. The implication that I would allow OOC feelings bleed into IC, quite frankly, irritated me and I still find this offensive to this day that what I vulnerably shared in good faith was brought up as a criticism of me. (This is a personal context I would appreciate no commentary on.)
My reply -
Their reply -
"Rubilykskoye isn't a faction game." Yet it's become one from March 2024. (Void-touched vs. Zlatniki vs. Blackguard forms a faction narrative structure.)
My reply -
Their reply -
I had planned to go to the mods about my concerns regarding introducing titles for characters, as I was concerned that this would bring favouritism and result in player discouragement. I came from a faction game many years ago where this occurred; I felt I could see the beginnings of this happening here.
I didn't raise this with the mods because I got distracted by things offline, and I was trying to figure out the best way to approach it to avoid… what ended up happening.
I confided my concerns with three people in-game, one person with more detail than the others. Two of those people still spoke to me after these PMs were sent; one did not.
I replied for one reason: it was my attempt to feel out the mods and their reaction to commentary that wasn't overly favourable. I felt their response was a mixed bag of fair comments and defensiveness.
I tried to keep the peace and close the conversation as I felt greatly uncomfortable about the fact I had to defend my character (me—Jade) from claims that were brought to the mods by someone else, and the mods were asking me to take accountability for it. Looking back, I should have expressed discomfort at the mods treating someone else's words as my own.
Back in October, I held the game's first player plot, Wandaween. Because the PMs were questioning me as a player, I decided to question the mods about a choice they made without communicating it to me first.
This pm contains an incorrect piece of information about the surprise consequence that was dropped on me for Wandaween: Wanda had killed NPCs by holding the townspeople outside of the town via a magical barrier. -
The plotting and initial interactions of this plot is on the screened Mod Contact post (I wanted Wandaween to be a surprise for the playerbase) -
The mods mentioned in this thread that they didn't know what to do with the townspeople, so they were happy that I wanted to plot to have Wanda keep them outside of the town with a magical barrier. No consequences were mentioned at this time.
I did not return to this post to follow up for consequences; however, I did follow up on the Plotting Post when I received a pm on 30 October 2023 from them that let me know Wanda would need to go to Moot Hall to stand trial -
This prompted me to head over to the Plotting Page to ask for consequences on 4 November 2023. I was not told at this point that Wanda was responsible for NPC deaths -
[ Click to expand and see it on the Plotting page. ]
The Duchess post was posted 17 November 2023. This is the post that triggered my concern about the game turning into a faction game. This is my thread where the mods ICly informed me as Wanda that Wanda had killed NPCs -
I rolled with it when I shouldn't have.
In the original draft of my reply to their 22 November 2023 PMs, I corrected the fact I did go to the mods for consequences. I sat on this and decided to erase it because I felt that if I brought up the fact that I had reached out to them via the Plotting Page, I'd receive a defensive response. Regardless, I was willing to let this go as I wanted to move on.
If I knew what would happen in January 2024, my response to this would have been different.
*
22 January 2024
I believe three things ultimately triggered this doozy of a pm:
I expressed frustration about a player plot occurring throughout all of January privately and on my Plurk. Should I have done this? No! (How stupid!) But my Plurk is my Plurk, I was frustrated about more than the January plot, and I'm allowed to share any disgruntlement I have. I did not do so maliciously. (Lesson learned! Will not do this again!)
I told a moderator as a player to player I didn't want to thread out what they wanted to thread out. (I don't understand why I wasn't contacted at this point about something the mods bring up in their PMs.) We were no longer Plurk friends and were not ICly interacting at this point (and I was burnt out on this plot).
I think favouritism came into play, and the mods wanted to control me.
This is not a commentary on the January plot, and I won't be providing any comments about it.
I responded to a mod-generated compliment thread for the player who ran the January plot. (I did not receive such a thing for running Wandaween for half of October, and no other player has received anything to this extent for running any game-wide plots.) I commented at 7am. I received the two PMs at 7.13am -
[ Blurred because I'm not comfortable including people's names and other people's comments when that isn't my point. ]
The PMs -
If multiple people complained about me during this plot, why did they wait until the plot was over to PM me? Nothing can change after the fact. It was also off-putting to me that as soon as I comment to the mod top-level, I get a split PM 13 minutes later.
I don't particularly want to form a rebuttal to these accusations because, honestly, I thought these PMs overstepped a line with me, but I did notice how they retconned the context of the November PM.
re: comments about communication
I don't understand why I am expected to directly communicate with people, but people are welcome to go to the mods and use them as a mouthpiece to me.
I have never been a problem player; the mods have never PMed me before this to state that players have (allegedly) complained about my behaviour until January.
The only time the mods ever contacted me about communication was when they accepted someone else speaking on my behalf (see the November PMs). I have never received a mod PM between November and January discussing my communication. This implies that I received a warning regarding my communication, which frames the November PMs in a completely different light to what I believed them to be at the time (a conversation).
re: the comments on Wanda
Several things:
1. I mentioned on Plurk that I wasn't quite sure what to do with Wanda (who is OP) during this plot because I was working on very minimal information while a small portion of the game was working on a lot more. (There were no planned OOC posts coordinating this plot and the OOC posts created were not utilised as everything happened on Plurk, and everything was done in real-time.)
While I see the fairness in their comment about how it's up to me as Wanda's player to find out how she can slot in (which is what I was doing both on Plurk and off of it), the other side of the coin is this: I'm a player who was struggling, and if the mods can comb through my Plurk to quote me, they can follow their own advice and reach out to me to say, "Hey! We see you're struggling. Let's brainstorm." If you're going to blame me for not reaching out to people, then you need to apply this to yourselves.
2. It's ridiculous to scold me for saying Wanda is "OP". I put that on Plurk in the hopes of brainstorming how to get involved; I look back at this and realise I should've been clearer in that intention. However, I did open up communication. Other people have said their characters are OP and have not received a scolding.
3. Regarding the accusation that no one knew Wanda was going to pretend to be a proxy, this is false. I was not a part of these Plurk PMs, but I have confirmation those involved were aware.
4. I talked to players involved in the fake death plot (and other proxy players who had their characters destroy buildings etc.) and had an active dialogue where I checked in with them and they checked in with me. I often checked in to ask if what I was doing was okay and if I needed to retcon. This was done privately. The mods were not a part of this discussion and did not need to be.
re: the comments about Zoya
In all honesty, it makes me uncomfortable that the mods felt the need to quote me on Zoya. I was high in my feelings and expressing them (again: not the best thing to do!). This was about me, I was being emotional; let's calm down on pretending I'm not a human being.
The comment re: seeking permission about Zoya's dragon is on the plotting post. I felt the need to ask if I could do this as I was already starting to feel uncomfortable with the mod team and like they were watching me.
re: Plurk commentary
This made—and continues to make—me feel very uncomfortable.
I don't really know where to begin with this one. My Plurk is not an official game communication channel and is my social media.
I will say this: I am not responsible for people's reactions. Their condescending "advice" to me is incredibly unhealthy.
The PMs as a whole made me very uncomfortable, but them quoting and feeling the need to reprimand me like I am a child was really disturbing, so on 23 January, I removed the remaining two mods from my friends list and people I felt were friends with the mods.
I felt removing the mods from my Plurk instigated passive aggression toward me. I had close CR with Tifa between Wanda and Mavis (I stopped tagging her Alina with Zoya as I grew tired of receiving aggressive tags and no relationship progression), and I found out via a Relationship Meme that she had nuked CR with me. (See here and here.) I had no interest in pursuing CR with her after how she treated me as a moderator. (For full transparency, this is how I posted my meme responses that featured mentions of the mod characters I had CR with - Wanda and Zoya.) This passive aggression was again on display in the Fuck, Marry, Kill meme in May 2024. When I was given Alina's name, I did not respond as I felt I was opening myself up to more harassment if I did, but Tifa had no qualms in responding when given Wanda's name. I'd have brushed it off as it being "Whatever", but given her treatment of me, it felt very pointed, especially when the other two characters got a tl;dr explanation (and our CR between Mavis and Wanda was never established as negative).
I have not had any issues on Plurk since removing these people.
Because of these PMs, I refused to interact with the mods in private and even considered blocking the mod account from being able to PM me. (Red flag, should've dropped.)
I did not reply to these PMs until prompted by the mods a week later because these PMs were a dogpile. But I did tell (and show) it to many people in and outside the game.
You can't make people respond to your bullshit, just so you know. (I did respond just to get them off my back. In hindsight, I wish I hadn't and had dropped instead!)
*
I have refused to go to their screened mod contact post after January 2024 and chose to keep everything public because of how uncomfortable their treatment and lack of accountability in PMs made me. I personally believe they were looking for a reason to ban me, so I refused to give them one.
I did not feel comfortable on my Plurk and was careful with what I posted until 27 July 2024, when I had had enough of tiptoeing around my space. I posted my SOTRP Plurk, where I received an incredibly overwhelming amount of support.
Since January, I felt stonewalled and like there are hoops for me to jump through that didn't exist for other players (something many players pointed out to me in private), which is all evident on the public plotting post.
Here are all my plotting comments (I have taken screenshots of these):
12 June 2023 - Wanda brainstorm - the start of her conjuring items in game.
15 August 2023 - Zoya brainstorm - I didn't pursue this as I wasn't a fan of the direction (which I had no problem with—I wanted to poke and see what I could do).
27 September 2023 - Zoya plot coin
4 November 2023 - Wandaween consequences
15 November 2023 - Wanda plot coin
18 January 2024 - checking in about Zoya transforming into a dragon and destroying the cave.
14 February 2024 - Wanda plot coin
15 February 2024 - Zoya plot coin
4 May 2024 - Zoya plot coin - developing her own metalsmith after being at the Blacksmith since 2 August 2023.
I had her create her smithy as I felt uncomfortable by player-driven developments in this NPC setting that were not communicated to me. I was uncomfortable that an NPC I had no involvement in creating (and had created, but was not asked if I had created to fill the position of Head Blacksmith, despite being the only player character who stayed consistently under the blacksmith heading) and was thus under the full control of that player had an opinion on my character. (How much of that NPC's opinion was the player's when the mods made it blatantly clear that player-driven NPCs were under the control of the player who created them?)
Zoya had been at the blacksmith for nine months. Why was she not deemed "skilled enough" by this point when I included her smithing in many of her threads? Why was she not supported by the Head Blacksmith, a player NPC, a character she should have a positive relationship with but I lost control over thanks to the official introduction of player-driven NPCs (a mechanic that greatly lacked any guidance), while characters who had relationships with mod-created NPCs (and relationships the mods could track) did not have this sort of trouble?
If it wasn't already clear to me, this is where it became blatant to me that I would always have a series of obstacles to jump over.
9 June 2024 - Wanda plot coin - to get her creation abilities back from March 2024 event. I expressed I was not having fun with a consequence I accepted in March, and did not appreciate the mods' lack of interest in wanting to ensure I was having fun. I felt I got a "Oh well, just deal with it" response instead. I don't feel like this was how they used to speak to me in 2023.
15 August 2024 - Zoya plot coin. I saw on the FAQ that missing powers could potentially be grandfathered in or purchased with a plot coin.
15 August 2024 - Wanda plot coin - someone else in the game got a similar response, but they got more detail than me. I honestly stopped caring; I just wanted to use my plot coin.
The one time I did provide feedback to the mod team was on 17 August 2024. I nitpicked their language because I was someone who had been surprised by the mods in an unpleasant way with a plot consequence before and I wanted confirmation about this as this had lasting consequences (and I was already having so much trouble getting Wanda's powers back!).
*
I originally decided to stay in the game because I enjoyed the players and characters. I was very invested in my characters as I had put a lot of energy into Wanda and Zoya, and I was having fun when I wasn't interacting with the mods and their circle of friends. But this game wasn't fun for me anymore.
I believe a lot of this aggression toward me started because of shipping (Mal invited me to the game to do Wanda/Darkling) and spiralled because I refused to do what was desired of me: giving my negative feedback to the mods. The desperation to see feedback given on the mod screened contact post was something that I witnessed in real-time growing increasingly tense since 29 July 2024 (no one was allowed to say anything negative anywhere ever, and the mods refused to make an unscreened feedback post despite being asked for player comfort), compounded with the head mod's policing of what players could and couldn't say across players' Plurks in 2024.
I have no desire to ever be in a game run by these players again. I knew Tifa's reputation and chose to app to the game on the belief that people can change. It seems I was more generous to her than she ever was to me.
*
I apologise for any discomfort sharing these PMs has caused for the players who have always been kind to me. I chose not to censor them as the mods chose to specifically name people in the PMs, and I felt that the PMs needed to remain undoctored.
Thank you to the people I confided in about how I was treated and those who said they saw what was happening to me.
I will not be responding to any PMs the moderators of this game (past and present) send me, as they have already said enough to me, and I'm not interested in whatever bullshit they have to say. As far as I'm concerned, the moderators who were active when I received these PMs consented to them being sent to me, and the "Rubi mods" sign-off represents them. If they send me a pm, I will update this post with it.
I'm glad to be done with this game. Buh-bye! ✌🏽
rubilykskoye, something to which I alluded to in my SOTRP Plurk, posted 30 July 2024 AEST.I originally wrote this draft on 24 January 2024 and completed it in August 2024. Please note all times/dates in screencaps and in this post are AEDT/AEST.
I've tried to keep this as concise as possible, but there's a lot of shit that's happened. I wrote this because I always intended to share these PMs. I've dropped because the game environment became too toxic for me.
*
The mod team at the time of the PMs I will be sharing was Tifa, Mal and Prox. At the time of publishing this post, I want to make it clear that I have no personal issues with the new mod team members.
I've endured bullying by the mods who've abused their power as moderators to try and intimidate me into giving them feedback they felt entitled to because I chose to complain/vent to my friends (which… everyone does), assigned blame to me for how other people feel, and attacked my character. I also believe they have been stonewalling me with my plots (something that continued under the new mod team, although I'm uncertain of how involved the new members were) and tried to alienate me from my CR.
It wasn't all bad in the beginning. I stayed in this game because I enjoyed playing with the players and my characters; however, January 2024 became incredibly uncomfortable for me, and I should've dropped.
I stated on my Plurk a few times over the last month that I refused to go to the unscreened mod contact post and will only provide feedback on an unscreened one. The experiences I'm outlining below are why.
*
tl;dr: (1) I had a mod-as-a-player overstep with me in private to reprimand me on someone else's behalf… when this person did not have a problem with me at all (people in this game love talking for others); (2) a player close to the mod team pushed me out of a player plot on Plurk; and (3) I felt excluded by my cast (which two moderators were members of) despite a group chat being made (which I was the last to comment in on 14 November 2023)—I stopped interacting with them in December 2023 because I was not enjoying the interactions.
*
These are Rubi's rules as of 24 January 2024.
*
November 2023
An NPC post (the Duchess) introduced PCs receiving in-game titles.
I complained privately on a player to player (and what I thought was a friend to friend) basis (not a player to mod) to Mal about the introduction of character titles, as I felt that they were establishing the game as a faction game. I had hoped those who were receiving titles and acknowledgement by the Big NPC would opt for negative consequences down the line.
What sparked this was that I was receiving negative consequences for Wanda's actions (something I accepted), while I felt other players (including a mod) were opting for soft negative consequences for their characters. I expressed that I felt the game was moving into a faction-based structure and that this would discourage other players who felt that they weren't progressing with gaining positive influence (something I felt the game balanced well until this post).
The below is a pm exchange regarding my concerns about introducing character titles and ICly singling characters out. I did not go to the mods to initiate these PMs and I did not give permission for Mal to speak for me.
I think my replies explain my stance and thoughts well enough that I won't go into detail here.
The mods' first pm -
For very brief personal context - I had all three mods added as players on my Plurk. I was upfront on my Plurk that I had a death anniversary coming up at the end of November. The implication that I would allow OOC feelings bleed into IC, quite frankly, irritated me and I still find this offensive to this day that what I vulnerably shared in good faith was brought up as a criticism of me. (This is a personal context I would appreciate no commentary on.)
My reply -
Their reply -
"Rubilykskoye isn't a faction game." Yet it's become one from March 2024. (Void-touched vs. Zlatniki vs. Blackguard forms a faction narrative structure.)
My reply -
Their reply -
I had planned to go to the mods about my concerns regarding introducing titles for characters, as I was concerned that this would bring favouritism and result in player discouragement. I came from a faction game many years ago where this occurred; I felt I could see the beginnings of this happening here.
I didn't raise this with the mods because I got distracted by things offline, and I was trying to figure out the best way to approach it to avoid… what ended up happening.
I confided my concerns with three people in-game, one person with more detail than the others. Two of those people still spoke to me after these PMs were sent; one did not.
I replied for one reason: it was my attempt to feel out the mods and their reaction to commentary that wasn't overly favourable. I felt their response was a mixed bag of fair comments and defensiveness.
I tried to keep the peace and close the conversation as I felt greatly uncomfortable about the fact I had to defend my character (me—Jade) from claims that were brought to the mods by someone else, and the mods were asking me to take accountability for it. Looking back, I should have expressed discomfort at the mods treating someone else's words as my own.
Back in October, I held the game's first player plot, Wandaween. Because the PMs were questioning me as a player, I decided to question the mods about a choice they made without communicating it to me first.
This pm contains an incorrect piece of information about the surprise consequence that was dropped on me for Wandaween: Wanda had killed NPCs by holding the townspeople outside of the town via a magical barrier. -
The plotting and initial interactions of this plot is on the screened Mod Contact post (I wanted Wandaween to be a surprise for the playerbase) -
The mods mentioned in this thread that they didn't know what to do with the townspeople, so they were happy that I wanted to plot to have Wanda keep them outside of the town with a magical barrier. No consequences were mentioned at this time.
I did not return to this post to follow up for consequences; however, I did follow up on the Plotting Post when I received a pm on 30 October 2023 from them that let me know Wanda would need to go to Moot Hall to stand trial -
This prompted me to head over to the Plotting Page to ask for consequences on 4 November 2023. I was not told at this point that Wanda was responsible for NPC deaths -
[ Click to expand and see it on the Plotting page. ]
The Duchess post was posted 17 November 2023. This is the post that triggered my concern about the game turning into a faction game. This is my thread where the mods ICly informed me as Wanda that Wanda had killed NPCs -
I rolled with it when I shouldn't have.
In the original draft of my reply to their 22 November 2023 PMs, I corrected the fact I did go to the mods for consequences. I sat on this and decided to erase it because I felt that if I brought up the fact that I had reached out to them via the Plotting Page, I'd receive a defensive response. Regardless, I was willing to let this go as I wanted to move on.
If I knew what would happen in January 2024, my response to this would have been different.
*
22 January 2024
I believe three things ultimately triggered this doozy of a pm:
This is not a commentary on the January plot, and I won't be providing any comments about it.
I responded to a mod-generated compliment thread for the player who ran the January plot. (I did not receive such a thing for running Wandaween for half of October, and no other player has received anything to this extent for running any game-wide plots.) I commented at 7am. I received the two PMs at 7.13am -
[ Blurred because I'm not comfortable including people's names and other people's comments when that isn't my point. ]
The PMs -
If multiple people complained about me during this plot, why did they wait until the plot was over to PM me? Nothing can change after the fact. It was also off-putting to me that as soon as I comment to the mod top-level, I get a split PM 13 minutes later.
I don't particularly want to form a rebuttal to these accusations because, honestly, I thought these PMs overstepped a line with me, but I did notice how they retconned the context of the November PM.
re: comments about communication
I don't understand why I am expected to directly communicate with people, but people are welcome to go to the mods and use them as a mouthpiece to me.
I have never been a problem player; the mods have never PMed me before this to state that players have (allegedly) complained about my behaviour until January.
The only time the mods ever contacted me about communication was when they accepted someone else speaking on my behalf (see the November PMs). I have never received a mod PM between November and January discussing my communication. This implies that I received a warning regarding my communication, which frames the November PMs in a completely different light to what I believed them to be at the time (a conversation).
re: the comments on Wanda
Several things:
1. I mentioned on Plurk that I wasn't quite sure what to do with Wanda (who is OP) during this plot because I was working on very minimal information while a small portion of the game was working on a lot more. (There were no planned OOC posts coordinating this plot and the OOC posts created were not utilised as everything happened on Plurk, and everything was done in real-time.)
While I see the fairness in their comment about how it's up to me as Wanda's player to find out how she can slot in (which is what I was doing both on Plurk and off of it), the other side of the coin is this: I'm a player who was struggling, and if the mods can comb through my Plurk to quote me, they can follow their own advice and reach out to me to say, "Hey! We see you're struggling. Let's brainstorm." If you're going to blame me for not reaching out to people, then you need to apply this to yourselves.
2. It's ridiculous to scold me for saying Wanda is "OP". I put that on Plurk in the hopes of brainstorming how to get involved; I look back at this and realise I should've been clearer in that intention. However, I did open up communication. Other people have said their characters are OP and have not received a scolding.
3. Regarding the accusation that no one knew Wanda was going to pretend to be a proxy, this is false. I was not a part of these Plurk PMs, but I have confirmation those involved were aware.
4. I talked to players involved in the fake death plot (and other proxy players who had their characters destroy buildings etc.) and had an active dialogue where I checked in with them and they checked in with me. I often checked in to ask if what I was doing was okay and if I needed to retcon. This was done privately. The mods were not a part of this discussion and did not need to be.
re: the comments about Zoya
In all honesty, it makes me uncomfortable that the mods felt the need to quote me on Zoya. I was high in my feelings and expressing them (again: not the best thing to do!). This was about me, I was being emotional; let's calm down on pretending I'm not a human being.
The comment re: seeking permission about Zoya's dragon is on the plotting post. I felt the need to ask if I could do this as I was already starting to feel uncomfortable with the mod team and like they were watching me.
re: Plurk commentary
This made—and continues to make—me feel very uncomfortable.
I don't really know where to begin with this one. My Plurk is not an official game communication channel and is my social media.
I will say this: I am not responsible for people's reactions. Their condescending "advice" to me is incredibly unhealthy.
The PMs as a whole made me very uncomfortable, but them quoting and feeling the need to reprimand me like I am a child was really disturbing, so on 23 January, I removed the remaining two mods from my friends list and people I felt were friends with the mods.
I felt removing the mods from my Plurk instigated passive aggression toward me. I had close CR with Tifa between Wanda and Mavis (I stopped tagging her Alina with Zoya as I grew tired of receiving aggressive tags and no relationship progression), and I found out via a Relationship Meme that she had nuked CR with me. (See here and here.) I had no interest in pursuing CR with her after how she treated me as a moderator. (For full transparency, this is how I posted my meme responses that featured mentions of the mod characters I had CR with - Wanda and Zoya.) This passive aggression was again on display in the Fuck, Marry, Kill meme in May 2024. When I was given Alina's name, I did not respond as I felt I was opening myself up to more harassment if I did, but Tifa had no qualms in responding when given Wanda's name. I'd have brushed it off as it being "Whatever", but given her treatment of me, it felt very pointed, especially when the other two characters got a tl;dr explanation (and our CR between Mavis and Wanda was never established as negative).
I have not had any issues on Plurk since removing these people.
Because of these PMs, I refused to interact with the mods in private and even considered blocking the mod account from being able to PM me. (Red flag, should've dropped.)
I did not reply to these PMs until prompted by the mods a week later because these PMs were a dogpile. But I did tell (and show) it to many people in and outside the game.
You can't make people respond to your bullshit, just so you know. (I did respond just to get them off my back. In hindsight, I wish I hadn't and had dropped instead!)
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I have refused to go to their screened mod contact post after January 2024 and chose to keep everything public because of how uncomfortable their treatment and lack of accountability in PMs made me. I personally believe they were looking for a reason to ban me, so I refused to give them one.
I did not feel comfortable on my Plurk and was careful with what I posted until 27 July 2024, when I had had enough of tiptoeing around my space. I posted my SOTRP Plurk, where I received an incredibly overwhelming amount of support.
Since January, I felt stonewalled and like there are hoops for me to jump through that didn't exist for other players (something many players pointed out to me in private), which is all evident on the public plotting post.
Here are all my plotting comments (I have taken screenshots of these):
I had her create her smithy as I felt uncomfortable by player-driven developments in this NPC setting that were not communicated to me. I was uncomfortable that an NPC I had no involvement in creating (and had created, but was not asked if I had created to fill the position of Head Blacksmith, despite being the only player character who stayed consistently under the blacksmith heading) and was thus under the full control of that player had an opinion on my character. (How much of that NPC's opinion was the player's when the mods made it blatantly clear that player-driven NPCs were under the control of the player who created them?)
Zoya had been at the blacksmith for nine months. Why was she not deemed "skilled enough" by this point when I included her smithing in many of her threads? Why was she not supported by the Head Blacksmith, a player NPC, a character she should have a positive relationship with but I lost control over thanks to the official introduction of player-driven NPCs (a mechanic that greatly lacked any guidance), while characters who had relationships with mod-created NPCs (and relationships the mods could track) did not have this sort of trouble?
If it wasn't already clear to me, this is where it became blatant to me that I would always have a series of obstacles to jump over.
The one time I did provide feedback to the mod team was on 17 August 2024. I nitpicked their language because I was someone who had been surprised by the mods in an unpleasant way with a plot consequence before and I wanted confirmation about this as this had lasting consequences (and I was already having so much trouble getting Wanda's powers back!).
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I originally decided to stay in the game because I enjoyed the players and characters. I was very invested in my characters as I had put a lot of energy into Wanda and Zoya, and I was having fun when I wasn't interacting with the mods and their circle of friends. But this game wasn't fun for me anymore.
I believe a lot of this aggression toward me started because of shipping (Mal invited me to the game to do Wanda/Darkling) and spiralled because I refused to do what was desired of me: giving my negative feedback to the mods. The desperation to see feedback given on the mod screened contact post was something that I witnessed in real-time growing increasingly tense since 29 July 2024 (no one was allowed to say anything negative anywhere ever, and the mods refused to make an unscreened feedback post despite being asked for player comfort), compounded with the head mod's policing of what players could and couldn't say across players' Plurks in 2024.
I have no desire to ever be in a game run by these players again. I knew Tifa's reputation and chose to app to the game on the belief that people can change. It seems I was more generous to her than she ever was to me.
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I apologise for any discomfort sharing these PMs has caused for the players who have always been kind to me. I chose not to censor them as the mods chose to specifically name people in the PMs, and I felt that the PMs needed to remain undoctored.
Thank you to the people I confided in about how I was treated and those who said they saw what was happening to me.
I will not be responding to any PMs the moderators of this game (past and present) send me, as they have already said enough to me, and I'm not interested in whatever bullshit they have to say. As far as I'm concerned, the moderators who were active when I received these PMs consented to them being sent to me, and the "Rubi mods" sign-off represents them. If they send me a pm, I will update this post with it.
I'm glad to be done with this game. Buh-bye! ✌🏽