sadly GM's appear to have dropped the ball

[Starcade]

Blasphemy? Justice? Really?

It has absolutely nothing to do with how much time, or "effort", a group puts into getting a pop set. That pop set is used to give you the initial claim on the monster, nothing more.

Then it doesn't even give you that. If I can steal a monster, given any loophole in the game which allows me to do so, then it's not even their initial claim. All they did was put an aggressive monster into play, especially because they have done nothing to get on it's hate list. If they can lose the spot because they are not on the hate list, then the monster (as I said before) should only pop purple/red if the content is exclusive to the popping alliance.

Any other result renders kill stealing, content monopolization/denial, and griefing completely legal in FFXI, because the most effective way to advance in Abyssea vis-a-vis NMs is to identify when a group is badly inferior to killing a desired NM, steal it, spit in their face, and tell them to go play WoW.

It prevents you from having to compete with other groups for a spawn claim. That is the reward you get for putting forth the effort to create a set. You are not, ever, entitled to the NM itself beyond that initial claim.

There's no reward unless the content is exclusive to the popping alliance. If you are not ever entitled to the NM beyond the supposed "initial claim", you were never entitled to it in the first place. The only reason that kill steals are not more prevalent is because of the fact that the game has attempted (with some success) to tighten up the situation.

But minus making the content NM specifically exclusive to the popping alliance, the NM was _NEVER_ theirs to begin with, and neither was their pop.

Do you see how ridiculous you sound?

Once you forfeit that claim, the NM is no longer yours. If you want to reassert your claim, the NM becomes yours again. If you fail to reassert your claim, and someone else claims it, the NM becomes theirs.

And that's the problem. No one else has the right to claim it -- EVER. Unless you basically want to say that the initial claim did not belong to the popping alliance, because the monster can not, then, belong to the popping alliance (beginning, middle, nor end).

Those are the rules. Period. Regale us all with your thoughts on justice as much as you like. That will not change the fact that it is absolutely not against the rules to take an NM that goes white. Ever. No matter who spawned it, or how long it took to spawn.

Then it's similarly not against the rules for me to do anything in my power to ensure that NM goes white if I wish to steal it from you. Two can play the loophole game, and you don't want me playing that loophole game.