You've Displeased the Gods!

alternate title: Whiners, Cry-Babies & Cowards

My dog barks at the mailman. It starts when he opens the sliding door of his truck and doesn't stop for some time. I can tell who's house he's at by the sound of the other barking dogs in the neighborhood. Our regular carrier is pretty cool it about though. But, when he takes a day off....

The alternates get all weird. One won't get close enough to the house to give us our mail. Another punishes us by giving us extra junk-mail. "Sleet nor rain (except barking dogs) will stop the U.S. Mail".

Just deliver the dam mail and ignore the dumb dog already!

I'm amazed at how many players log on to BadLands RPG and mention that they are old pals with Leaf Stone. Which is fine and all that, except, then they (about 90%) start asking for favours. Free levels, free boss items......

Some get pissed because we've made changes.

"The balance is all wrong."
• (Meaning their one build can't dominate the field.)
• It seems to me that the balance is actually pretty damn good finally.
"OMG! An Orc fighter with Blindsight. How will I ever HIPS (Hide In Plain Sight) from him?!?"
• "How do you HIPS a from a cleric with TS (True Seeing)?", I ask?
"Leaf promised me something that no other player could have and now I want it!"
• Guess what! I'm not Leaf and everything in BadLands RPG is equally available to all. Go earn it, find it or steal it.
"What? No more PVP? Why can't I PK?"
• There is plenty of PVP. PK (pronounced PIKE), is Player Killer. As far as I'm concerned, PK'rs are baby-killers and only want to hunt easy, defenceless lowbies. You can PK, but there are consequences. Player driven consequences.
What happened to the original BadLands?
• The "original" BadLands went down about 4 years ago.
• At which point in time, BadLands 1095 was made public and all the current BadLands servers (including BadLands RPG) sprang up using that module.
• Each has been modified in their own way.

There are others, that simply cheat.

I caught one guy killing Duergar Dwarfs once. He was alone, naked and weaponless. A monk perhaps? At level 10, you can't kill Duergar's with one punch and not get a scratch. He had 100 strength, 100 dex..... Then he called me an asshole when I confronted him.
There was that guy with bunches of extra feats. Had a build the equivalent of 6 classes. Fighter, Barbarian, SD, RDD, Bard, Ranger. And yet, he still complained that others had better toons.

The list could be endless, if I was keeping a list of whiners, cheaters and cowards.

This brings us to the current and the present. Specifically, Dano and Dark-Clan.

The Dark-Clan leader, Midnight80 (he claimed to be their leader) wanted to have a guild at level 5. You all know the rule is level 50. He wouldn't take "NO" for an answer and kept asking every DM, getting the same "NO". After hounding me with countless emails, I finally said, "FUCK NO!" Which he turned into, "Fuck-off, you're not welcome here". I had even shown him some of the really cool Outposts his Clan could fight for. But, while players like Dano and Dark1432 where out earning there 50 levels, Dark&Dumb (I didn't coin it) kept making noobs and never got over level 10. And why wasn't his Clan helping to earn a niche for themselves?

Slade (Dark_1423), on the other hand, has earned 50 levels and started the first new Guild since the Wipe to end all Wipes. "Phoenix's" is a lawful-good guild. Good job Dark_1423.

I'm not sure if Shady Cranky Bull (dano1122) thought he was role-playing his new-found alignment or if this was just his way of getting ahead, but... Dano likes to tell me all the little things he thinks other players are doing wrong. Anybody that is a better builder than him is accused of cheating. Anybody that can loot more gold faster is a cheater.

I got tired of all this "tattle-tailing" and reaped the wrath of an angry God on him the other day. No, I did not ban him, not even for a second. Dano is not a bad guy.... I took all his quest items, boss drops, port stones (including the Mystic Mirror and Snow Pipe) as well as his weapons. Then ported him to Dozo. At which point I said something like, "Mind your own damn business and play the fucking game."

Demoting levels is not a valid punishment in BadLands RPG. An RDD build will always get damaged as well as all toons over level 40. By damaged, I mean the character file will become unusable and we the DM's will be forced into replacing it with a new toon.

Banning is a last resort when all else fails. It is not something we do lightly.

The first jerk I banned kept logging on and spam shouting, "I hate niggers". He didn't give me many choices.
The guy with the level 10 and 100 strength, he got a permanent ban.
As did the guy with 6 classes.

The "Big Wipe", wiped the ban list as well, so, if you want to start clean, you can. Act like a jerk and get treated like a jerk. Follow the rules and reap the rewards. The only player to not get wiped from the ban list was Gart, logon darkdraft. (banned on 4 CD Keys) I won't go into details, but.... Gart must have pissed off the Gods something awful to still be on the ban list after a full melt-down. Jeez, even cockroaches can survive a nuclear meltdown.

For the record, me and my DM's have always earned our levels. I did ask them to loot for gold on their first toon, just like everybody else. Even I am looting for gold. I'm up to level 33 and have finally maxed out all my gear. A good selection of scrolls will require more looting though. This does not include any level 22 gear yet nor any Boss Items. Us DM's of BadLands RPG are first and foremost, PLAYERS.

Qwildurn Bluemoon,
server host of BadLands RPG