Lore Forum Decorum - Just What is Meant by Good/Bad Faith?

[SannaR]

Wait how is Theodric restating that him and Lauront know each other ok and doesn't get a post removal, but when I ask if they've had a fight cause one of them posts a reply to a thread that came off like something was off it gets deleted? And don't give me naming and shaming cause poster and player names get dropped all the time. Anyway even if I have said that there are some similarities between a few people I've never went dang when did said known forum troll get bored enough to slip into the lore section again? Considering that the rare time they do visit this part of the forum it's just to necro a thread or two and the majority just seem to ignore it.

[Theodric]

I find myself disagreeing quite heavily with posters whom I have no personal beef with, when it comes to Endwalker...
And yet you'll never see me engage in behaviors such as this, it's insane to me. It's QAnon levels of conspiracy; it's assuming that someone who ordered cheese pizza at a particular restaurant was actually secretly indicating that they wanted to engage in certain unsavory acts levels of conspiracy.

I have to wonder what these kinds of people do in real life when two people hold the same disagreement.

Yeah, I'm happy to agree to disagree with people over a fictional story in a video game of all things - it's not really something worth getting extremely worked up over as far as I'm concerned.

To be clear - because I admittedly struggled to follow whatever narrative Lyth was trying to push - Lauront and I live together under the same roof and Kizuya is a mutual friend that we met through the game itself. So, yes, I can vouch that both of them are separate entities.

What's particularly bizarre is the insinuation that providing someone with lore sources is 'brigading'. I wonder if Lyth is going to accuse some of the streamers here - such as Anonymoose and Cleretic - of such next time someone approaches them to discuss the game's story/asks for a source from the lore book or some such.

Somehow I doubt it - because mysteriously these 'concerns' are only brought up whenever someone states that they think that the Ancients or the Garleans were done dirty. Some would disagree with that or be indifferent and that's perfectly fine. Though the more certain posters attempt to stifle opposing voices, the more likely it is that some of us will continue to seek to say our piece.

Wait how is Theodric restating that him and Lauront know each other ok and doesn't get a post removal, but when I ask if they've had a fight cause one of them posts a reply to a thread that came off like something was off it gets deleted? And don't give me naming and shaming cause poster and player names get dropped all the time. Anyway even if I have said that there are some similarities between a few people I've never went dang when did said known forum troll get bored enough to slip into the lore section again? Considering that the rare time they do visit this part of the forum it's just to necro a thread or two and the majority just seem to ignore it.

I'm curious as to why you want such a post to be removed in the first place? Are you concerned that the attempt at defamatory commentary and harassment fell flat? Also, no, it isn't necessarily 'trolling' for someone to revive a discussion thread as new information comes to light regarding the ongoing story.

[SentioftheHoukai]

snip snip SNIIIIIIIIIIIIIP

Not even gonna lie, this entire spiel comes off as more of a call to action to get us, the "Mythic+ Alt Army out to destroy the good name of Endwalker and Venat" banned from the forums so you can all have your nice little echo chamber than anything resembling a cohesive, logical criticism of us.

[AwesomeJr44]

I think that this is the best place to discuss the concerns around alt account posting on this subforum that have recently come up in another thread. This is more of a meta discussion, but it's always a good thing to have the appropriate awareness and to be able to judge it for yourself.

What? So because you don't like what people are saying over there, we're all bot accounts? Jesus wept, that's a ridiculous claim. At least try and have an argument. And how do we know you and your ilk aren't bots? Or alt accounts or whatever? Go ahead, prove it! Prove that you're not an alt account! You pro-EW andies always say the exact same things. Would that not be grounds for an accusation of being a bot with your standards? Unbelievable.

I'm going to consider you an alt account of Cleretic now, you and her are 100% the same person. Oh, but I'm sure that you're the exception to your own standard right? Don't throw around these baseless accusations just because you don't like other people's opinions.

Influencing popular opinion is another. One individual posting or upvoting across different accounts might give the impression that a view is much more popular than it actually is. In some cases, you might be bombarded with responses from the same person across different accounts to pressure you into backing down.

And you're not influencing people by painting everyone who disagrees with you as an alt of one person? Maybe the opposing viewpoint just is becoming more popular and you're trying to stop that. And maybe when you have multiple people disagreeing with you, it's because you just had a bad take.

A final motive for this is to make statements that the poster in question doesn't want to be affiliated with or held accountable for. I think this last one is probably the most dangerous one, and is the one that worries me the most.

I think it's dangerous and worrying that you made an alt account to get away from your previous statements Cleretic.

Some people might feel that posting on a throwaway alt account is a free ticket to being openly abusive and insulting to others without putting their main posting account at risk of punishment.

Disagreement = Abuse. Got it. I hope I'm not abusing you too hard.

The easiest way to detect and address this is at a moderator or administrator level, simply because there's a lot more transparency around who is actually posting.

Yep, and they haven't been banned yet. I guess the mods didn't find the evidence you so clearly think is there.

There are plenty ways to judge this for yourself as well, though. It's extremely difficult for someone to disguise their 'writing voice' for an extended period of time, so you'll see them slip in and out of it. It's also difficult to maintain uniquely different personas, and you will frequently see recurring patterns, themes, signature styles, and obsessions spill out across several alts.

Hmmmm...

If Lauront and Theodric live under the same roof... could it be that they might have grown up in the same environment and picked up the same 'writing voice'? Nah, they must be bots.

What first caught my attention was a copy-pasted in-game quote. There was a text line featuring the player character's name, except that it did not match up with the poster in question. This was very quickly edited, but the original post was fortunately permanently snapshotted in a reply quote. That gave me the first link that I needed.

Character names can be changed, of course, but that doesn't mean that they don't carry personal significance, if you know where to look. And that's pretty much how I was able to confirm the rest. Again, none of this is hard. The entire thing was careless. But you just need to have the index of suspicion first.

*sigh*

I can't believe I'm saying this... but source?

Any proof at all that isn't bullcrap?

And again, this is really interesting, because at no point did anyone mention any demographic features of the characters in question.

Piecing together your own statements, one can infer that you are discussing the following:

• Two male Hyur characters who use the same face option
• One character has changed their appearance to do so

Forging on ahead.

Ah yes, the default Hyur race that a lot of people pick because they themselves are human. And the only face option with that kind of facial hair, a face style that RECENTLY was released. Maybe they just both wanted that? And I wouldn't be calling anyone out on their race choice, Ms. basic purple haired Viera. I mean, I know MY character isn't super original either, but let's not act like that's a sign of being a bot, ok? Also, FORGE AHEAD!!!

All in all, another 10/10 take from Cleretic. A shame she had to use a bot to post this...

[SannaR]

I'm curious as to why you want such a post to be removed in the first place? Are you concerned that the attempt at defamatory commentary and harassment fell flat? Also, no, it isn't necessarily 'trolling' for someone to revive a discussion thread as new information comes to light regarding the ongoing story.

I had a post removed and didn't get anything like you normally do when you get in trouble by the mods that had been asking if Lauront had had an argument with you as he had replied to a thread I had made in such a way that didn't fit with how he normally posts while trying to politely ask him from refraining of bringing up a certain topic in the thread as said topic didn't have anything remotely to do with what was being discussed. I'm just wondering why mine got deleted is all as I said I didn't get an email about it like you normally do when the mods feel that you've crossed the line. It's why when I did reply next in said thread I didn't mention names. Though thanks for that tidbit about Kizuya. I doubt the three of you and myself will ever see eye to eye or even agree on things but I always have enjoyed seeing the takes you have on things and to see what if any the two and now I guess the three of you might have about a subject. When I meant trolling I meant what Titanman and their alts do while bored out of their minds. Which tends to be looking for old posts that normally is about a subject that isn't the case anymore like some threads they've necroed from 2013 of problems the game doesn't have anymore. I also don't want your post deleted.

[Iscah]

What first caught my attention was a copy-pasted in-game quote. There was a text line featuring the player character's name, except that it did not match up with the poster in question. This was very quickly edited, but the original post was fortunately permanently snapshotted in a reply quote. That gave me the first link that I needed.

Aside of everything else, that can happen as an honest mistake if you have quoted several people for a multi-reply post and then accidentally skim over and delete one of the quote tags when trimming it down.

[Necrotica]

Detective Greenly:
What if it was one guy with six accounts?

Paul Smecker:
Why don't you let me do the thinking, huh, genius?

[Rulakir]

This is some serious conspiratorial nonsense just because people don't agree with you about a story in a video game. Loathe as I was to unblock you to read this absurdity in its full context, I now feel compelled to respond.

Influencing popular opinion is another. One individual posting or upvoting across different accounts might give the impression that a view is much more popular than it actually is. In some cases, you might be bombarded with responses from the same person across different accounts to pressure you into backing down.

How's that been working out? I'm willing to bet I haven't changed a single mind here about anything. It's been 'faction wars' ever since I joined back in November. Likewise, there have been many times I've posted something and been 'dogpiled' by the same people, it goes both ways depending on who's available and interested in engaging. I've also seen the most inane things here with a dozen upvotes likely because someone linked it on another site or a discord. Straight up headcanon gets upvoted here. Point being: upvotes are meaningless.

Some people might feel that posting on a throwaway alt account is a free ticket to being openly abusive and insulting to others without putting their main posting account at risk of punishment.

This is rich coming from you seeing as how the reason I blocked you was because you were routinely being abusive to Ancient fans.

There are plenty ways to judge this for yourself as well, though. It's extremely difficult for someone to disguise their 'writing voice' for an extended period of time, so you'll see them slip in and out of it. It's also difficult to maintain uniquely different personas, and you will frequently see recurring patterns, themes, signature styles, and obsessions spill out across several alts.

If I see someone say something better than I did or phrase something I'm thinking that I couldn't put into words, I'm stealing it. :P I may also paraphrase another poster because either I don't have the link handy to directly quote them or I figure people don't read quoted material that often (at least I don't). This is especially true with cross forum posting as I've noticed several lore posters rarely venture into general discussion and vice versa.

I also may get short with people if I'm low on patience for the day or hangry (which I am right now), so even my own posting patterns aren't consistent.

What first caught my attention was a copy-pasted in-game quote. There was a text line featuring the player character's name, except that it did not match up with the poster in question. This was very quickly edited, but the original post was fortunately permanently snapshotted in a reply quote. That gave me the first link that I needed.

Do you have any idea how many screenshots I trade with people, especially in different languages? I've had people send me screenshots of content I haven't done/can't do because it's locked behind prerequisites I haven't fulfilled (the curse of not doing side content). While I doubt I'm the person in question here, if I did screw up and post one of those screenshots without censoring the name then of course you'd see it wasn't my character. What difference does that make other than to add fuel to your conspiracy theory?

Two male Hyur characters who use the same face option

You mean the most popular male Midlander face? This is like my saying that everyone who uses Y'shtola's face is an alt (which is like 80% of all female Miqo'te players at minimum).

Ultimately, the place that this topic needs to be discussed and resolved is higher up, ideally in one of the live letter Q+A sessions.

Lol, yeah, they're going to waste their time entertaining your wild conspiracy theories just to confirm we're all actually individually owned accounts. Then what excuse will you have that more people than you'd like to believe didn't enjoy the EW MSQ?

That in turn deters them from posting in here, which limits its effectiveness as a community feedback tool.

Ah, no, it's the general atmosphere in here that does. Anyone trying to debate in good faith is going to quickly realize no such thing exists here. Good luck arguing against people who craft elaborate headcanon around things like Venat's summoners all being learned scholars, who independently arrived at the same conclusions she did, and were avid environmentalists being presented as fact with such little basis it's truly laughable.

This whole thing is so ridiculous I almost have second hand embarrassment from it.

[Teraq]

(snippy snip)

Look at Lauront's obvious female sockpuppet go, with the Elidibus fan art and quote in signature too! Utterly shameless.

[SentioftheHoukai]

Look at Lauront's obvious female sockpuppet go, with the Elidibus fan art and quote in signature too! Utterly shameless.

It's almost as if people can have gasp! similar or the same opinions about fictional media.

....I won't apologize, there's no stopping this bullet train.