Defcon 1? More like pointless.

[Smeck]

Okay I want to preface this by saying that all of what I will say is just purely my opinion. An opinion which I have formed and based on observation and conversation with events on the server and the people who participate in them and make them.

I've talked to around 15-20 ish people from ranks as low as Private to people in Command to see when the last time Defcon 1 was called. The results were all pretty similar, everyone I talked to said they either didn't remember or said something along the lines of "I don't know, at least 4-5 months ago.". So my main questions are, do we really need Defcon 1 if none of the game masters have the balls to make it happen? Do we really need to teach new players about its existence if they will hardly ever see it (the same can be said for formations, though that's a topic for another time.)? If we rarely ever use it and barely even remind ourselves of it, then why have it? Just make things simpler for everyone and have a total of 4 instead of 5. I get it though, one of the main arguments against my own is that emergency evacuations of military operated bases don't happen that frequently, and that it would be lame to not have it should the situation finally arrive. Honestly I 100% agree, we should have it and should be able to use it should the opportunity present itself. However, this is still a RP server, something that people go to for entertainment, and one that in all honesty isn't totally in line with standard military operations (even for Star Wars standards). Defcon 1 has potential to be quite fun and entertaining, though it's lack of attention can be traced back to what I believe is just a little bit of laziness. Defcon 1 should be a special thing and not happen all that often, but that's not to say it shouldn't happen at all, which is honestly what it's feeling like, not only to myself, but to those I asked as well. All I want is some high octane, shit hit the fan kind of role play and fun every once in a while. Defcon 1 is a great tool for that, it's just rarely used. At least just make it like a once in 2 months kind of thing, not twice a year.

 

[Ratio]

Smeck more like Freck

[Ratio]

But naw GM's need permission from a higher GM rank... GMO I believe. And for a while the GMO's were freaking inactive. Maybe there's new hope now that we have so many exac points to choose from and more active leadership in the GM program.

I could just be talking out my ass but you gotta realize that having to ditch the base too often would probs get annoying.

IMO, I think Defcon 1 should be a tool in case the playerbase is being dumb and isn't following battlestations, letting bad guys roll us over and spank up with a leather belt until we start screaming "NO PAPI NO"

otherwise battlestations are pointless

[Marvel]

@Smeck

Actually from what I remember DEFCON 1 events are locked behind GMM+ permission (Might be GMO or GMC but my gut says GMM) so that the quality of these type of event are better than normal. I say it’s still a useful DEFCON as it would make sense to have a bail the base option.

Hopefully with all these new planets for us to flee to of our base got shit on would give some Game Masters the ability to do them more often without having to take everyone to the Event Server.

(If you want to see DEFCON 1 events more often but not too often I suggest a monthly DEFCON 1 event. Doesn’t sound half bad to me personally and maybe a GM is selected to do it or a GMO+ can host it who knows)

 

[Dax]

I was thinking about this the other day. I think maybe one of the potential reasons we dont see this is for "narrative" reasons. I think being on a base makes certain things make less sense from a continuity point of view. When the server is based on a ship, defcon 1 makes more sense because you can go planet side and "wait for extraction and reassignment to a new ship" with a whole base its harder to make sense of moving back into the same base that just got overrun. This also applies to event server deployments too. With a ship you could justify entire server deployments as "our ship will be moving to this system to launch an attack on this planet" but with a base... you cant exactly just leave the base totally undefended while everyone goes to do a battle. 

[Smeck]

6 minutes ago, Dax said:

I was thinking about this the other day. I think maybe one of the potential reasons we dont see this is for "narrative" reasons. I think being on a base makes certain things make less sense from a continuity point of view. When the server is based on a ship, defcon 1 makes more sense because you can go planet side and "wait for extraction and reassignment to a new ship" with a whole base its harder to make sense of moving back into the same base that just got overrun. This also applies to event server deployments too. With a ship you could justify entire server deployments as "our ship will be moving to this system to launch an attack on this planet" but with a base... you cant exactly just leave the base totally undefended while everyone goes to do a battle. 

I get that, but the point is that we're in the middle of a war. We're never going to leave the base undefended and the chances of Defcon 1 happening are very real, It shouldn't happen too often, but on the scale of a galactic wide war we should see it at least once every 2 months as opposed to not at all, ESPECIALLY in the Felucian theatre. Because again, It's war, we don't always win, we get shit on just like the C.I.S do, I just want us to take an L every once in a while to make things more realistic and entertaining. Also it's not like we're gonna abandon the base all together, the reason military bases exist is because of positioning relative to the battle and resources at hand, we could and should always make an effort to take it back if it's been overrun by droid forces.

Edited May 28, 2020 by Smeck

[Harsh]

20 minutes ago, Smeck said:

I get that, but the point is that we're in the middle of a war. We're never going to leave the base undefended and the chances of Defcon 1 happening are very real, It shouldn't happen too often, but on the scale of a galactic wide war we should see it at least once every 2 months as opposed to not at all, ESPECIALLY in the Felucian theatre. Because again, It's war, we don't always win, we get shit on just like the C.I.S do, I just want us to take an L every once in a while to make things more realistic and entertaining. Also it's not like we're gonna abandon the base all together, the reason military bases exist is because of positioning relative to the battle and resources at hand, we could and should always make an effort to take it back if it's been overrun by droid forces.

Honestly this hits home especially hard for me. I feel that GMs (reasonably) have issues with making the players actually lose a fight. Taking away the risk by ensuring that we always come out on top is a surefire way of ensuring that events become stale. 
 

I think implementation of a more high stakes-esque event style would work really well to re-engage the community with events, and Defcon 1 could be instrumental in a shift towards this new style. 

[Comics]

The republic never loses because gms aren't incentivised to make testing events.

All events are the same shit. We need a DEFCON 1 event to actually shake up the server. 

Everyone needs it but no one is brave enough to Let it happen as far as I can tell. 

Btw if there are incentives they aren't working. All GMs know today is fill out quota and spawn droids.

Quotas just make people do a sloppy job imo. People treat GM like another job when it should be more like something which allows you to help the community have fun 

[Dennis]

29 minutes ago, Comics said:

All GMs know today is fill out quota and spawn droids.

I mean all the events i've done since coming back that aren't spawning droids have gotten mostly 2's saying that "tHe RePuBlIc DiDnT wIn" so its a double edged sword. 
 

People may try to do them or want to do them but when they get 1's and 2's they don't want to do them in fear of ruining their overall score and then being talked to or being removed from the GM program. 

[Smeck]

8 minutes ago, Dennis said:

I mean all the events i've done since coming back that aren't spawning droids have gotten mostly 2's saying that "tHe RePuBlIc DiDnT wIn" so its a double edged sword. 
 

People may try to do them or want to do them but when they get 1's and 2's they don't want to do them in fear of ruining their overall score and then being talked to or being removed from the GM program. 

I don't understand then... The people I've talked to about this all said they wouldn't mind losing every once in a while and would also like to see more D1 events. However the people that complain about stale "shoot em' up" events are also the ones that I've found vote 1's and 2's on AARs for the events that actually offer something fresh and fun. Just ignore the hypocrisy and have people who are higher up in the GM program evaluate the quality of the event. At this point community feedback just contradicts itself and loses it's worth, so I don't see the point. I'd rather have better event quality than appease 15 piss boys who take the time out of their day to complain about having something different and more engaging for once.

[Fizzik]

This is like saying the US military should just get rid of their domestic nuclear attack plans because we've never been nuked before.

Nah. Nice to have something there on the event the base explodes or something.