So I have pissed a few people off today. I have made threats in the streets, offered money (albeit a paltry sum) to the world to kill a leader, and generally acted a clueless n00b. Hell, my first post in the streets was asking people how I kill others. This was all a part of an experiment that, upon my last account recently dying, I decided to undertake.

The plan was simple, with their currently being way to many leaders for the userbase - 32 leaders for 526 gangster + accounts (450 once you remove the gangsters) - I wondered how stupid I could act, yet still be member whored.

And it seems I can be very stupid. I had 5 separate invites. One even after I openly mocked one of the invites in the streets. It highlights a few things to me:

1) People are so desperate for members, they are not taking enough time to truly discover who it is they are recruiting. The recruitment of myself has not caused any damage. However, poor recruitment can cost millions (imagine if I was a BG killer or a rogue). My advice - leaders: educate your sponsors better; sponsors: spend time on a new recruit.

2) People do not read the streets - All of my invites were after I had originally posted this in the streets: http://mafiareturns.com/comm/thread/382428, 3 invites after this: http://mafiareturns.com/comm/thread/382652 and two invites after I made an offer to of $13,000 (and some change) to people to kill a leader. It shows people are not reading the streets. I have essentially mugged you off and shown you up for being incompetent.

On top of that, I have been given payments of $50,000 & $250,000 'start up cash' - I have since returned this - it makes me wonder, what is going on?

Now this is not an attack on Izzy and those coding the game, they have always run a 'free will' policy. It merely highlights how many leaders there are, how many of them are poor. The game is top heavy, it is means every is trying to grab their little bit of flesh. I would advise leaders to really think before authing next, and really think about those who you have authed. Finally, look at those who can sponsor. Are they offering invites to everyone? Are you actively encouraging member whoring? Do you truly care who is in your crew?

Do I now expect to die? Yes. Will I suicide? I am not sure. All I know is its pub time.

Laters

I really don't know why anyone would want to become a CL at this point. Anyone going bold right now would have to fight for members or only end up with less then a hand full of retards. Oh well, each to their own I guess.

1. Who are you to decide. I'm not a person who dismisses entirely based on rank; but I'm always skeptical of people who take issue with something when they have nothing to lose. After the v. big war we had recently, I've had ding dongs with 4 individuals who've taken it upon themselves to decry the system of districts, too many leaders, too many GFs etc etc etc - yet these are the very same people who preserved the status quo when it suited them.

Don't mask your personal opinions as 'what's good for the game'. If you don't believe something is good for the game - take ownership of that when you are in a position to do something. Take ownership of your opinions. If you come out here and say 'I dont like how many leaders there are, it sucks and it doesnt make sense' then I will have  far more respect for you for at least having a proper opinion. Saying there's too many leaders for the userbase is just bollocks. It really is, because you're backing that opinion up with nothing. Let's say we had so many leaders that there were only 10 members in a crew - tell me why that is bad. Tell me it's not RP accurate, tell me it dilutes positions of power and I'll come back with the fact that it's far more engaging for a clueless noob to have an 'accessible' CL. Go further. Make me believe. Acting like a dick in the streets to draw attention to the fact you believe there are too many CL's is kind of meaningless when you are not backing that up. Make us believe!

2. I won't lie, it's a bit bizarre and frankly shitty that you got invites after how you behaved on the streets - but only because the standards on this game don't really align with how the mob actually worked. Granted, in the real mob if you threatened a leader you'd generally be dead. No worries. The fact is though, that the prevalent attitude on this game is that once you join a crew - that's it. Finito. You're in forever. This, in my opinion, is a fucking disaster in terms of roleplay;

            i. It degrades made man. The whole point of being made (the most important rank in the mob) is that you were officially in the   family. Forever. Job done. If people are expected to commit like this at thug, or petty thief - then a central tenet of what it means to be a made man is now meaningless guff.

           ii. Read the biography/account of any mobster. You'll find that whilst they may have worked for one family/organisation more often due to localities, they pretty much did jobs for everyone until such a time in which they officiallybecame part of the mob - ie a made man. Just to echo the previous sentiment, it is preposterous that an associate would be expected to sign up to a 'you leave in a pine box' policy when they are just hired help.

          iii. As far as I understood it, this was the central logic behind both the sponsor/associate system and the jobs board (for both of which, if you'll allow me a moment of arrogance, I was heavily involved in both the 'vision' and the implementation). The idea was that change to the code would draw a definitive line between made and non made. If you want an example, look at any associate who is sponsored by a sponsor rather than a CL. Not once in the coded section of their profile is there a mention of the Crewleader. They are demonstrably the responsibility of their sponsor. They contribute to the numbers of a CL; but they don't show up on that CL's crew list to an outsider. This is such an obvious demonstration that associates are not the same as made men....but the userbase doesn't care. This userbase is unbelievably resistant to change; I say this having been involved heavily with 6 or 7 PBBG's and MMORPG's from back in the days when I worked for an advertising firm full time. This userbase is more resistant to change than any other userbase I have seen. It's evident in almost every change the admin makes. Poker is coded? Unfair, it takes freedom away from the users. Poker ownership is taken away from users? That's unfair too. Almost any change is greeted with negativity simply because that is not what we know. The fact that this game

3. None of this is particularly relevant to your original thread, I figured I'd still waffle for one reason: member whoring. As I've already mentioned, in your case it is pretty ridiculous that you were offered 'work' (not shelter. Shelter? I fucking hate the term. IT MAKES NO FUCKING SENSE) after you literally contracted a hit on a mob boss. In general, though, why is member whoring considered such a grave offense? I've never really encountered a response beyond 'Uh...because that's how it is'.

Years ago, when 100 kills made you a scary prospect, I could understand the fear of member whoring. Every member you got into your HQ was big news, because if they went IA a +1 was a pretty big deal. It was only natural that if you were a naturally talented 'member whore' that other CL's might seek to limit your ability to member whore by shooting your face off. It's good for business.

These days, though, there are so many more bgs around. RIA's. Durdens. MIA's. A +1 is comparatively worth a lot less than it used to be. In fact, as far ago as 2009 Clause and me had a policy where we said something like 'one liners are actively encouraged', because it was RP accurate. Again, you read any biography. You watch any fact-based movie. Working for the mob didn't involve any great symbolism or commitment; you informally fell in with a crowd and it was years later when you were maybe going to be a made guy that the scrutiny started in a big, big way.

I should go on the record here, I've got no problem with someone getting killed for member whoring. It's not different to someone getting killed for having a massive gun; it's an area in which someone may excel at the game to the extent that they are a threat to someone else - if they die as a result of that, such is life. The problem is when member whoring is some sort of ridiculous activity that wouldn't happen in the mob. It's not really the case.

TL;DR: the biggest problem with this game at the moment, in my opinion, is that the users cannot or will not adapt. A good mate of mine who lives nearby to me made his first account in a couple of years about 2 weeks ago and he was baffled at what was going on. He didn't necessarily agree with every change the game had undergone in the past few years (does anyone agree 100% with the changes?) but what surprised him the most was that the userbase had consistently failed to react. Does anyone here play Fifa? A couple of years ago they changed the entire gameplay model and much more emphasis was based on defensive play. People moaned, but they adapted so they didn't get battered. The difference on MR is people moan but they don't adapt; for a pretty hefty percentage of the userbase, the game is played with outdated strategies and approaches that are no longer relevant or appropriate because of changes in the code.

(I'm sorry if this is massively rambly and I've contradicted myself/repeated myself/talked loads of shit - I wrote it in short segments during the Man United game and naturally my attention was on them more than this)

I do agree with you in some aspects Cantona. But I also disagree too.

I'll say that in ways the stratagies of the old are still in practice today and it sometimes makes the game dull to people. I think we need a shot of adrenaline sometimes. And its because the database in general is resistant to change here for some reason. Its like when Mugging and PP was put in, leaders did all they could to stop people from doing it. For what reason? To control their members and because they didn't like it or care to try it out. Its after all a mafia RP game. We're supposed to do things like rob people, shoot, stab, or whatever other unsavory things in life that happen. That's after all part of a real life mafioso.

Personally I believe we should have more stuff we can do as far as "war" goes. We should be able to rob the drug front properties, we should be able to shake down or bribe a CA. But if those were even coded into the game everyone would be afraid to do it because the leaders would get pissed off about it. So in turn izzy and enkindle would have coded yet something else that sits and barely gets used again. I think izzy and enkindle should punish leaders that try to stop their members from not using new features.

I do agree that moreless joining someone regardless of who the sponsor is, your expected to stay there until your dead and in a pine box. Its a shame when theres so much more money to be made by the people that are gangster, goomba, earner and wise guy. Those people would be more valuable to their sponsor if they were allowed to do jobs and such for everyone in say the district of their sponsor. But if their sponsor moves to another district or city they should have the option to stay there or go with them. There could be a lot of different stuff done with that. The made man stuff was spot on. Being made is useless on here compared to the real mafia or even what you would think of in the mafia. Being made used to mean a lot. It meant you were part of the family and you were really meant to be there and you were one of the family you were working for. Now it seems like everyone puts a money requirement to make made or any rank past that. Its the equivilent of hanging a carrot on a string and riding the rabbit to where you want to go.

Where I disagree with you is the member whoring. There is a lot of it around. I remember when I started this character, and even some before it, that I would be answering mails from people with "hey want to join such and such crew just message me back" messages. once in awhile i would get a well thought out RP or message. but generally thats how it was and most of the time i had no clue about that family or even the person messaging me. they were just trying to get a member. maybe they got a cash reward or a pat on the back, i never much cared what they got, but none the less they were doing it all the time. Its a shame that it happens and its an even bigger shame that the leaders don't realize whats going on as far as how their sponsors are trying to get people to join. Being a sponsor myself before being in a godfather crew I always approached people introducing myself and asking if they were new or needed help. I would rather build a little bit of a background or get to know them a little before i asked if they needed a family to join or a sponsor. Most of the time they had joined someone else that more than likely sent a one line message. But thats where it leads me to believe there is a lot of member whoring and how families end up with people in them that will randomly go off trying to shoot other protected members or that will just become a problem for them. Its the sponsors not taking care of their members, or not having the power to do so either. 

From what I have seen, the general rule around here appears to be that the more things that are coded and can be used, the less originality of thought exists within those using them. It saddens me that so much of the personality of this game has been crushed by the pursuit of realism, despite the diminishing returns that has yielded for years. I'm happy to be corrected, but from the outside looking in, despite the myriad of features, tools and options, the vast majority of crews, families and districts appear to just be carbon copies of each other with very few differentiating characteristics other than their state of development. 

That would appear to me to be the real tragedy, and a much greater disappointment than some attention seeker managing to get an invite despite being overtly idiotic. Is it a surprise to anyone that some sponsors didn't read the streets? I doubt it. Is it going to change because of this stunt? Perhaps, but there will always be some who'll make this mistake in the future. Would the world be any better if it was? Probably not. There are much more important things that could be done rather than worrying about which weasel has managed to snake their way into a crew, especially when a worthwhile BG killer or rogue is going to get into any crew regardless.

Now, I'm sure I have some semen on my face that I need to wipe off, so if you'll please excuse me.