ack! i just woke up, what happened to the delosian estates (and another thing!)

Tahquil

@makarios: was there a way to track who paid for what on the admin side and maybe offer relocations to those put out?

Makarios

Unfortunately, not reallistically.

Ahmet

Makarios said:

Bluef made every effort to solve this particular issue. I spoke to her at length about it and it boils down to this: housing rental was not something the administration was willing to support as a player-moderated system, and we're not going to lock a player into their account because they're the linchpin of an operation of that nature. Its very unfortunate that this happened, but Bluef wasn't at any falt here.

@Makarios If someone else wanted to keep the Delosian Estates going, would it be possible to buy the plot and re-implement what was already there? Or is that gone forever? Or would the administration just not do that?

Achimrst

If I had known she was retiring I definitely would have offered to run it. It would be nice if that could still happen though!

Jinsun

Honestly feel like it's a bit of a cop-out and profiteering to say "Ohhhh, nothing we can do about a player scamming other players" She may not have intended to do it, but she sure as shit did in the end. They bought something IG for permanent value and she deprived them of that. Whether it was actually permanent or not, they paid for it based on her promises.

Cooper

The admin should have just made a special case and not deleted the housing when she retired.

Kresslack

Make out-of-sub plots able to be org-owned (irreversable) much like ships and clans can be.

Ahmet

Kresslack said:

Make out-of-sub plots able to be org-owned (irreversable) much like ships and clans can be.

Houses have estates. Orders have temples. Cities have... well... cities. No need to waste resources on out-of-subs housing.

Clan-owned housing I could get behind, though.

Skye

I did think it was a terrible waste. Perhaps what could have been done was for Bluef to have dismantled the entire Estate.  She would have had a list of all the investors. She would have only gotten like half the room credits back,  or maybe a quarter since it was out of subs.  And admin could have reassigned or distributed the room creds on her behalf.  The plot could've been passed on to someone else too. 

I've spoken to someone else who had a stake in the estate too and while they were sort of cool with it,  I wish for their sake it could have been better handled.  As it is,  all those people who bought in on it have a zero return on their investment. And it wasn't a small investment either. 

Feulb

Skye said:

I did think it was a terrible waste. Perhaps what could have been done was for Bluef to have dismantled the entire Estate.  She would have had a list of all the investors. She would have only gotten like half the room credits back,  or maybe a quarter since it was out of subs.  And admin could have reassigned or distributed the room creds on her behalf.  The plot could've been passed on to someone else too. 

I've spoken to someone else who had a stake in the estate too and while they were sort of cool with it,  I wish for their sake it could have been better handled.  As it is,  all those people who bought in on it have a zero return on their investment. And it wasn't a small investment either. 

So things are entirely clear, Bluef asked numerous times for the Garden to assist her in the preservation of the Tharosian Estates. She requested that it be made a permanent fixture moderated by the Gods, by the Delosian clan, or by a another player. When they said no, she asked if it could simply continue to exist in her retired name without new changes able to be made. 

When they said no to that, she explained how much of an investment had been made by players and how she knew it would make some people feel like they lost a huge investment of time and money. The TOS about expecting acceptable losses were quoted back to her. 

She asked one last time for some assistance of any kind, even if it was just RP-based (the Zaphar flooding and wiping away the homes would at least have given people a point to continue playing and rebuilding from IC); she was told not to worry about it and any complaints would be handled by the Garden. 

She waited 6 full months to retire as she tried struggled with this. It wasn't an easy thing for her to walk away from the game let alone leave it this way. 

I'm not writing this to make the Garden look bad  by the way -- you have to realize how many projects they're working on, so stopping everything to deal with one character's retirement, regardless of how deeply it cuts into the fabric of the world we play in - is a bit much. I just hope everyone understands that Bluef tried to think of a million ways to "make this right" as she didn't want the loss of the Tharosian to be her final in-game legacy. 

Frederich

Didn't someone get retirement by Babel (or Twilight???) going "lolno.  You stay dead now".

Cooper

No.   

Tahquil

They guy was retiring. The admin decided to make him a plot point by killing him off.

Cooper

That's not how it went!

Tahquil

How did it go then?

Shirszae

I think they just picked someone dormant and random. No one asked, and no one was retiring. At least thats what I got from it.

Anaria

I'm late noticing this thread. I had no idea Bluef retired and it explains a lot. This would have been important information for me to know as a player a couple months ago.

I will ask, is there a way to determine if a character is 'retired' beyond simply hearing it by word of mouth? If not, there really needs to be.

Xaden

Anaria said:

I'm late noticing this thread. I had no idea Bluef retired and it explains a lot. This would have been important information for me to know as a player a couple months ago.

I will ask, is there a way to determine if a character is 'retired' beyond simply hearing it by word of mouth? If not, there really needs to be.

Honours <adventurer>

Atalkez

They have an honours line.

He\She has given up the adventuring life, or something to that effect.

Aylek

Shirszae said:

I think they just picked someone dormant and random. No one asked, and no one was retiring. At least thats what I got from it.

Spire logged in just before it happened, walked around for a bit.

When I checked honours later, he had the custom denied rebirth line.

Shirszae

Aylek said:

Shirszae said:

I think they just picked someone dormant and random. No one asked, and no one was retiring. At least thats what I got from it.

Spire logged in just before it happened, walked around for a bit.

When I checked honours later, he had the custom denied rebirth line.

that could have well been them controlling the char. But dunno. They claimed the thing had not been arranged in any way, and I am inclined to believe them.

Trey

Cooper said:

That's not how it went!

Yes it is.

Ula

i dont hold any illwill towards bluef. she was great, and the tharossian estates were an amazing thing that she built. just sucks considering all the creditsi dumped in there. admins should do something about this, so it doesnt happen in the future.

Ryldagh

Like maybe put some sort of disclaimer in somewhere that says that they don't guarantee the continued value or availability of anything you buy due to a... Oh wait... that's already their standard disclaimer.

13. Consequential Damages.
IN NO EVENT WILL THE COMPANY, ITS AFFILIATES, LICENSORS OR SUBCONTRACTORS BE RESPONSIBLE OR LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY CONSEQUENTIAL, SPECIAL, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, EXEMPLARY OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES OF ANY KIND, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY LOSS OF USE OR COSTS OF SUBSTITUTE SERVICES, HOWEVER CAUSED, WHETHER FOR BREACH OF REPUDIATION OF CONTRACT, TORT, BREACH OF WARRANTY, NEGLIGENCE, STRICT LIABILITY OR OTHER THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER OR NOT THE COMPANY, ITS AFFILIATES, LICENSORS OR SUBCONTRACTORS WERE ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH LOSS OR DAMAGES AND NOTWITHSTANDING THE FAILURE OF ESSENTIAL PURPOSE OF ANY LIMITED REMEDY STATED HEREIN. IN JURISDICTIONS THAT DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OR LIMITATION OF INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES, THE COMPANY'S, ITS AFFILIATES', LICENSORS' AND SUBCONTRACTORS' LIABILITY IS LIMITED TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW.

Sauce: http://www.achaea.com/TOS

Kiskan

A lot of companies have disclaimers like that.  I am definitely not saying they weren't fair and honest here, by the way.  And that's not the point either way.

There's such a difference between having a legal cya, and treating your customers in such a way that they generally don't start to consider taking up pitchforks, and yet a lot of forum posters weirdly continue to confuse these two things.  Even now.

Aerek

The Admin really can't be held responsible for insuring player-to-player transactions aside from the scam protection they already provide. While I can empathize with those that lost an investment in this instance, the entire concept of Delosian Estates doesn't strike me as a wise investment in the first place. Folks paid a large sum of credits to another player under the assumption that player would always be here to provide a service, forever. That's not really a reasonable expectation of another player, and so anyone with foresight should have known that Delosian Estates was, inherently, a temporary investment.

You can argue that in the event of dormancy vs retirement, your room would have stayed available, and I'd agree, but there are a dozen other ways that investment could have been lost. Bluef could have joined a city that didn't like her harboring city enemies. She could have decided to sell the plot, which requires breaking it down. She could have simply decided it was her property and she wanted it back. All of these would have resulted in the same loss of investment, and none of these things would fall under "scamming" protection as far as I can tell. Think of all the clans that have been "stolen" by a leader getting elected and re-purposing it; the Admin have rarely (ever?) stepped in to stop that, and it's essentially the same loss of an (assumed) permanent investment.

So sure, it sucks if you lost a 100cr investment, and I don't understand why out-of-subdivision plots must be deleted upon retirement, but you can't really claim damages when you didn't own what was lost. Only Bluef owned her OOSD plot, everyone else was "renting" at their own risk.

Kiskan

Right, this is one of those times I don't think pitchforks are warranted.  Even before retirement (which to be fair truly does change the landscape) I'd take one look at something like that and go "if I do this, 100 credits ain't a bad deal for a sublet out of subdivision plot I might get to hold onto for a good while.  Still, uh, should this even exist"?

And if they untangle this one, they plant the seed in people's minds that they'll do that sort of thing in the future.

More clarity on similar stuff wouldn't ever hurt though, because a lot of people don't seem to automatically get this kind of thing.  Just like I don't automatically get coding I guess.  Shops for example, are never really owned.  But we call it ownership, and that creates an idea in people's heads if they don't really think through and understand the actual terms, which are more like an indefinite lease.  As for this, if nothing else, I'd either say "you can't "sell" sublets on your out of subdivision plots at all" or at least say "you have to be super clear that those plots might poof one day".  Something like that.

Jinsun

I've always been curious about how well the "no value" provision holds up across so many jurisdictions internationally. Of course there's the choice of law and forum provisions which generally hold up but I'm wondering how the gambling promotions work out across all the jurisdictions. There's the argument that there's no value but there's obviously a large amount of cash that could be regulated and taxed. I also don't touch complicated, multi jurisdiction contracts but that just sounds like a nightmare to litigate from both ends which probably makes it a safe gamble for them as a company 

Tahquil

I wonder if the estate value went into her retirement pool.

Taarkos

Very doubtful. What value? The room credits aren't actual credits like they used to be, the value of the plot is subjective, and beds cannot be traded in.