It is not vanity. Not in this case anyway.
My “reign” in Aegis gradually brought up many questions, questions asked not only by the server’s players but from myself, questions most of which started with “Why”. This is an attempt to answer those questions in the only manner I can, in the only manner I’m actually good in – writing. When you run a server you become responsible for the time your players are having. Your server is your work – are those players content with your work or are they disappointed? Are they having fun or are they complaining (“bitching” as it became a fashion to say)? Will they stay? Will they help? Or will they run away screaming? More or less it is all up to you. And when everything you’ve worked for has gone south you are not the only one who is paying the price. It’s paid by the people who have spent unimaginable number of hours in your server, who have worked and fought for its survival, for its improvement, even when all the odds were against the server’s existence. And when those people pay the price it is only fair that they know the truth. The only truth you are capable of giving them. Yours.
This is not my story and it’s not a story just about Aegis, for many of the things that have transpired in this server went back a couple of years. Many of the decisions I’ve made and the paths I’ve taken as an Aegis admin are explained by events that occurred years earlier. This is a huge text and I realize this well. Perhaps not many people will have the nerve or time to read through all of it and perhaps it won’t be interesting to everyone. If you want to read something specific, you might want to “ctrl+f” and search for your name or any particular event. If you decide to read the following (however you decide to read it), I hope you enjoy it. If you think I’ve been unjust about something or someone, if you think I wasn’t accurate, I have lied about something, I have missed mentioning something or someone that shouldn’t be left out, if I haven’t answered an important question you have had throughout your experience in Aegis – I apologize. It (most likely) wasn’t on purpose. Please send me a PM instead of posting here and I will make sure to correct the mistake. Naturally you could post here as well - any comments or remarks or questions would be appreciated.
Freud has said that behind all of the humanity’s great mistakes stands a woman. 27.02.2007. I was 20, studying Law in the Sofia University for a second year. I’ve just came back in Sofia after my girlfriend left back to Germany to study some fucked up technical shit that could have just as well studied here (3 years later she came back, disappointed, failed and broken) . Naturally I felt quite devastated for I really deeply loved her. Bitch... My exams were recently over so there was nothing to distract me from my recent loss. WoW was a game I was vaguely familiar with though I’ve never actually played it before, because I didn’t think it was my kind of game, being too time taking and too slow. Still, that day I decided to give it a try. Downloaded and installed. Fine, now what? I started searching the Bulgarian torrent site I downloaded it from, for a decent “private server” because there was no way on Earth I would start paying for a game (not that I could afford it anyway). That’s how I came across ZeronixWoW.
I quickly became impressed with the game. Basically it was a standard RPG, involving interaction with many different people which wasn’t as bad as I imagined at first. I was as nooby as it was possible to be – not knowing shit about the game but I quickly managed to find some Bulgarians and some rather cool people who helped me find my way around Azeroth. I can’t talk about the rates Zwow had back them but it sure was much less than 3x… I’m not sure if it wasn’t even Blizzlike for it took me ages to level up. I played a fire mage, Blood elf, called Cathrine, while my forum name was RectumBlazer (yeah I know… ). At 34 I met an undead guy in STV – Forneus, 33, frost mage, Poland, who insisted I dueled with him. I won my first duel Of course then he went on to beat me like 5 times in a roll. From that day, up until the last days of Aegis, I’ve been playing a frost mage Somewhere along the way I met the Mortus umbra guild, whose members stroke me as being immensely rude, arrogant and borderline retarded. Needless to say I refused the subsequent invitations to join them and joined a small Bulgarian guild instead – “Horde BG”. At ~60 I took part in my first real dungeon run together with Forneus whom I’ve befriended by the time and Farathor – BE, hunter, 70, Brazil in Stratholme. Back then mobs respawned in instances so we never managed to complete it but boy was I having fun! One of my greatest experiences in WoW to this date! Then I got involved in an endless grinding of bugged peons in The Abyssal shelf (HP, Outland). Allies and horde had a fragile cease fire declared for that zone and we could talk to each other so I had the opportunity to meet some great personalities from both sides, although I can’t recall specific names anymore. I have also met some “stalking-and-ganking-me-whenever-they-could-madafaks” but it made the thrill all the more exciting At 67 I participated in my first real raid. BWL. Imagine a total noob like me in BWL. It was humiliating. I was almost kicked at several occasions because the “need before greed” didn’t function so people had to /roll for their items, a detail I wasn’t aware of and successfully ninjad several items (after the first time I did that, nobody cared to explain the rules, thinking I was simply some kind of an uber idiot). 5 Minutes after I reached 70lvl, the server shut down. It didn’t come back for several months.
From a technical perspective the server was a mess. It was a total disaster from our current point of view. Of course I didn’t realize it back then for I had no basis for comparison but boy it truly sucked a depressive amount of balls. Waiting for minutes on the logging screen to connect, frequent DCs, huge downtimes, no explanation given from the staff whatsoever, player support was virtually non-existent with bug reports, and pleads for assistance remaining unanswered for a long,!!! long time if answered at all. There was a “New” GM who has been hired around the time I’ve arrived to the server - Fruitty, who replied to my message 3 weeks after it was submitted. Exams. Outland not working. Talents, spells and pets, all fucked up beyond recognition. Bugs all around the place, many of which were truly gameplay-breakers that were abused on a constant basis, and I’m not talking about the bugged mobs –but the autoshot bug, the wand bug, the ability to learn all talent spells no matter your specs….etc.
This is the reason why I believed I could do it with Aegis. “Hey if THAT server with all of it’s flaws, bugs, poor management, retarded abusers and hackers could survive and could hold its playerbase together and united up until the point it was shut down, It will be no problem to do even better with much more bug-free server, ran and policed by people who cared about it, who wouldn’t allow hacking and abusing and who would help players on a moment’s notice”.
Zeronix was shut down in April, 2007 and remained down for more than a month with very vague and uncertain explanations given by its admins. Then this ausie guy came – iNDRLM with the promises of a bright future for the Zwow players. Apparently the arrangement between him and the Zeronix owner - Footy was that they would create together a new server from the scratch, called RTK. New dedi, new core, new database, all much more sophisticated and advanced that what Zwow had to offer but with the old Zeronix playerbase. The test realm was opened for public testing in mid-May and all the Zwow players were invited to join and “test”. For me, a player used to Zeronix – a server that as far as technical stuff was concerned, was shot in the head, the new RTK seemed like the perfection incarnate. I didn’t believe Blizzard could offer something significantly better themselves. Almost instantaneous logging! Talents working! Pets working (if a bit overpowered)! No DCs! Promises of working outland dungeons. WOW! To me, this server looked so much better than the old Zwow that there was no place for comparison. Sure, iNDRLM behaved kinda inadequately threatening people with bans for the slightest thing from his console but…ok… he is a new admin, he must be nervous about all of this, let’s give him a chance, since so far he has done such a great job! Yes, back then I thought it was admins who code and program everything in their servers, so for everything that worked I thought I had iNDRLM to thank for. I’m not sure and I can’t remember if he made those promises count and if he actually banned anyone but I could tell people weren’t happy with him. I on the other hand respected him and admired his job.
I decided to have a change and instead of a horde mage, I rolled a night elf hunter, called Neya. At about that point I came up with the nickname “Odysseus” (pronounced o: disias, not odiseus !) but not after the Greek king of Ithaca (now that would be gay wouldn't it) but after a badass M2 (destroyer) class starship from the game “X3:Reunion” of which I was a great fan at the time. The “Ody” was a magnificent, deadly vessel and one of my personal favorites.
Then all of a sudden in the beginning of June the server was shut down. Shorty the explanation followed. Footy who should have supposedly worked together with iNDRLM has cut his access from his own server and has shut RTK down. What a knife in the back! “Testing” I have reached 45lvl so once again all my efforts and my time were wasted. But it’s not just about me. What has happened was outrageous! Footy has practically stolen iNDRLM’s server with all of his job, all his fixes, all he has done and achieved – things that Footy was never able to do himself! This was not simply unjust, it was a crime! And it couldn’t have continued, not if I could do something about it. RTK was my server now and iNDRLM was my admin – a person who has done great things and who I had an utmost respect for. Now that prick Footy has dared to fuck with all that... well guess what? Not on my watch!
So I opened my MS Word and prepared to unleash the full extend of my writing skills and eloquence and restore justice to the universe by opening a shiny can of verbal whoopass against Footy’s lair – the Zernox forums. That’s what my initial intentions were anyway. Instead, with my first post there (now with the nickname Odysseus, that I used in the RTK forums as well) I demanded a public explanation from Footy about the recent events and insisted that he returned iNDRLM his access. In return I was duly explained by the Zwow community that I was nobody and neither Footy nor anyone else owed me explanations about anything. Hm is that so? Three years later I can’t remember exact quotes of my following messages but I do remember writing in my RTK forum signature this: “What is Footy’s favorite class? Rogue. Because he likes to backstab people”. Basically those following messages in the Zwow forums could be more or less summarized with that phrase as I openly and directly accused Footy of being an asshole and demanded iNDRLM to be given back what already belonged to him. Also I didn’t spare my opinion about his server as well, saying the same things about the technical realization I mentioned in chapter one. Although true to the letter, those comments weren’t particularly well accepted With the usual delay Footy’s response came. Again I can give no exact quotes but he said he’s been undergoing several surgical interventions during the last few months, his health was all but royally fucked up and my attacks, including that RTK forum signature have hurt him a lot and that I had been making rushed conclusions based only on iNDRLM’s own side of the story. He didn’t really give any explanation about those events. He said only that iNDRLM has been trying to take things over and I would likely get banned should I continued with my attacks. In turn I told him that I don’t give a rat’s ass about his threats. However his reply managed to touch me much more than I could have possibly expected. I realized I’ve gone a bit too far with the personal attacks, deleted that RTK signature immediately and apologized. This is the moment when I received my first internal hint that I might be on the wrong track here. This apology was the last thing I was to write in the Zwow forum for another year to come. Much later we went to become good friends with Footy but to this date he has never given his side of the story about what has actually transpired between him and iNDRLM at that period. And I never asked.
My “glorious crusade” as I liked to think about it, throughout the Zwow forums has started a chain reaction in RTK. By iNDRLM’s own admission, my efforts, my fight and my words have inspired him, have made him believe he shouldn’t give up on the server but fight to create a new RTKWoW despite the Footy’s vile betrayal because apparently there were players who appreciated his work. And from there, iNDRLM went on to create his dream server.
Now imagine that! Suddenly I was the nobody, the noob, who has sparked the light of a new server, my campaign in the Zwow forums has put a beginning to a new era and I got the recognition and gratitude of iNDRLM and his staff (in the face of the moderator Mekka (Romania, 19))! My crusade was successful! RTK would have prospered! I wouldn’t be nobody anymore! I was really proud with what I did back then not because it fed my ego but because it felt like I’ve done the right thing and I’ve helped justice to triumph.
Once being noticed by iNDRLM and his associate – BloodHunter (Timmy, Germany, 16) it all continued quite smoothly. I was invited to take part in the initial preparations, as an advisor in the mIRC chat where we had long detailed talks about the admins’ plans for RTK. Naturally I was one of the first assigned to test the new server and was soon given a moderator status. That moderator status was soon complemented by restricted GM powers (I forgot the word iNDRLM used to describe my position in the beginning – I think it was something like “councilor”). Soon the server launched and about a month later was wiped clean and reset because of severe bug abuse by players which allowed them to amass a “shitload of money”. The first time I’ve heard that expression, iNDRLM made my day. When the server was reset and launched for a third time I was officially promoted to a GM status. And I’ve been 70 for 5 minutes, knowing very little about the game, details which naturally I didn’t share with the admins.
The beginning for RTK was a nightmare alright. We quickly lost the initial boost of players provided by ZeronixWoW because of that “incident” with Footy. The wipe in July made things even worse. About that moment was when iNDRLM and BloodHunter implemented the 30x “fun” realm of Pandemonium (PM) in addition to the existing “increased blizzlike” 3x realm of “Aftermath” (AM). This didn’t help things a lot. We had a very few players and horrible technical issues resulting in frequent crashes of both realms and iNDRLM wasn’t always around to reboot the server as back then the autorestarer used to be flawed big time provided we had such a thing in the first place. This contributed to additional loss of players and a hell of a headache for iNDRLM and his staff. That’s when I was given access to the server’s dedi – the computer which used to run both realms. This was done so I could manually boot the server when it crashes and the admins weren’t in the neighborhood. Almost immediately afterwards Bloodhunter taught to me use navicat and handle the database. I was very anxious and nervous about all this access and power I was given because frankly I had no idea how to make use of it and the opportunities to fuck up and screw something big were many. Ok I was also quite thrilled and proud as well, realizing the scope of the responsibility I was entrusted with. I’m not sure if my involvement made any difference at that time for we continued losing players and that went on until iNDRLM found a way to stabilize the situation and stop the crashes.
The end of the summer was a great time. My time. For that’s when I turned from an errant boy into a real GM. Some sort of database malfunction caused continuing random bugs in the characters’ skills including professions, weapons, defense etc. There was a tremendous demand of GMs and I was pretty much the only available one in AM. I doubt iNDRLM ever realized the time and efforts I put into fixing each and every character in the realm (some of which – several times). Many characters were bugged beyond .fixing and had to be recreated from the scratch. I came to know pretty much all the skills IDs by heart. Additionally I spoke with almost each and every player individually trying to persuade them such things happened everywhere and they had to stay in RTK. All of this was backed by series of events in AM and even 2 tournaments which I now can’t objectively evaluate but I know players had fun and enjoyed them and I guess that’s all that matters.
HeadGM
While I was working on one of the events, iNDRLM sent a console message, declaring that I was promoted a head GM for the AM realm and Aeress (American, female, 19) was the head GM for PM. Back then I thought it was a just recognition of my work. My first project as a head GM was to start recruiting new GMs to help me out in AM. My second project was to start competing with Aeress.
Natalie
As a player in RTK, I played the BE mage Cathrine again and I was able to establish strong bonds with the horde community in the realm. The “Natalie” project was meant to be an alliance undercover character. Natalie was a female enhancement draenei and my official background playing with her was “Bulgarian, 20, who had Odysseus on Skype thus could quickly acquire a GM assistance when necessary”. This was done mainly because alliance was really back in development compared to their horde rivals. Lack of playerbase prevented them from raiding and I’ve already accumulated enough experience raiding with my guild to be able to help them with ideas, advice and most of all – by encouraging them to never quit but keep fighting forward. “Natalie” was a great success. Alliance quickly acquired the equipment to rival the horde in the pvp events and finally the scales were even. This is what inspired me later to do the same thing with Oberon. However during one of my conversation with an alliance paladin by the name of Blooargh (Scottish, 47, male) he told me my English was so good and sophisticated that if I hadn’t told them I was a Bulgarian they could easily confuse me with a native speaker. Hence Oberon’s “British” background. I was really confident I pull could this stunt off.
Neka (Romania, 19)
I met that Romanian guy while looking for officers in the guild I created – “Silvermoon Highguard”. Still didn’t know much about the game but already thought I could run a guild. Together with his RL friends and a few Belgian guys, he really helped bring life into SH. Those people formed the backbone of my guild and we gradually conducted series of raids of the Outland dungeons. At that point as far as I was concerned Neka was hardly anything more than a capable and reliable player. I was hesitant at first to offer him a GM position suspecting it would complicate things within the guild but as time went by, I became confident he would make a fine GM. He got the job in the mid autumn, 2007.
iNDRLM (Australia)
A very controversial personality and my opinion of him varied greatly in the different periods of my interaction with him. On the positive side, he is very energetic, resolute and ambitious, pursuing his goals no matter obstacles and odds, going after success with unwithered determination. Sure of himself, exceptionally resourceful, intelligent, moderately competent. He cared a lot about his server and it’s future. He often made up stories to emphasize the significance of his work such as Footy asking for his “fixes” or things like fixing the mage’s spells even though he had no clue what those spells were. Stuff like that. It was funny but I let him experience his moments of glory, being confident he deserved it. The problems with iNDRLM lied in a very different place. He was very hard to speak with and I’m not talking about him being rarely available. His self-confidence and closed mind weighted heavily upon his staff and we all considered him to be exceptionally arrogant at times and not just with us but with players too. On a personal note what bothered me most was that the word “gratitude” was absent in his vocabulary. He didn’t acknowledge or recognize the contribution of his staff. Words of commendation or encouragement were rarely heard from him and I know the power of those and I know how much they were needed back then when our sense of duty was the only thing driving us forward into spending untold amount of time working on the server. In fact what we mostly heard from him were remarks and “bitching” on a constant basis although I admit we were given a great freedom of choice doing our job. It was a firm belief among us that he couldn’t care less for his staff. Right or wrong, one thing’s for sure – those days he was hardly a people person.
The truth of the matter is despite his flaws, or who knows…maybe even because of them, iNDRLM succeeded where I failed – RTK is now a great server and Aegis is dead. This alone is enough to negate all the bad things I’ve said about him and earn him my deep and sincere respect. Because arrogant or not, iNDRLM proved to be a successful admin. At the end of the day, that’s all that matters.
Ghosty (Australia 21)
iNDRLM’s brother. He had quite the opposite image. Always there to help, always friendly, always eager to assist, to matter, he had a great personality and was a real pleasure to work with. Loved by players and the rest of the staff, he had an inspiring presence and influence upon the community, something I’m afraid iNDRLM never realized. Much later I offered him a position in my “cabinet” in Aegis as a head GM and I deeply regret his refusal.
Bloodhunter (Germany, 16)
A very nice kid Competent, helpful, naïve and polite. He had iNDRLM’s self-confidence but he never imposed it upon the others. He was encouraging, thoughtful, open minded and with no real power in RTK when it came to making important decisions.
Aeress (USA, 19)
She was a bitch alright. But a damn cool bitch. At first we were opposed to each other because frankly I found her ways of “GM”ing rather distasteful and downright wrong. Especially irritating was the way iNDRLM treated her despite her abuses and failures. iNDRLM’s head was dug so deep between her tight Asian legs that he was blind about what was really going around. Or so we thought because he eventually booted her – something that made me really happy and something I later came to regret. After she left RTK we became quite close, having long chat sessions and I came to really know her. Then she enlisted in the US military and we stopped all communication. Knowing how beautiful she was and how strict the military code is I suspect she’s been the major cause for broken hearts and tired wrists in the US army since 2008. Now I can honestly say I miss her.
Xmaveric (USA)
I didn’t get to know him very well. I didn’t have the time. He had a great, warm, compassionate, very friendly personality. His competence was unmatched. His usefulness – unrivaled. Although at some point I stopped keeping track on the progress of RTK I seriously doubt that till this day, there has ever been a more useful and prominent staff member in that server. He was simply perfect in any possible way. When we started Aegis I didn’t even dare to offer him a job with us. I knew he way beyond my league.
Ace (Egypt, 18)
A cool guy with subordination issues, tough childhood, very reliable and devoted to his GM work. After we started Aegis I offered him the position of a head GM after Ghosty turned me down. Even though he accepted at first, real life troubles prevented him from fulfilling his duties. Then he got engaged.
Hrist and Ayos (USA, 21)
America is bad. Ran by arrogant, complacent, power hungry politicians, populated by ignorant, not giving a damn people. A country of hypocrisy, impudence and sick ambitions. That’s what I’ve always thought of USA and my current opinion doesn’t really differ from that. If I was to know nothing about the USA at the time I met those two I would have thought “America is great! Americans are friendly, very smart and knowledgeable, kind and helpful, really amazing people!” Hrist and Ayos were a true credit to their country. I was so captivated by their personalities that ended up eager to make them both GMs and teach them everything I’ve learned. Respected by everyone, they had an incredibly inspiring presence and their influence over the alliance was vast. It was a real privilege meeting them both and I deeply regret that the turn of events prevented me from knowing them better. By the beginning of 2008 I’ve lost contact with them both.
SIP (Server Internal Police)
December, 2007, I resigned my GM position because of being overly occupied with real life engagements. I believed that if one can’t perform his duties to the letter he should find himself other duties. Resigning my GM job and becoming SIP was a sort of self-promoting because SIP’s job was to stay above all GMs, both in the AM or PM realms (so far my authority was restricted to the AM realm only) and oversee their job. It was a “desk job”, that didn’t require much time – just checking the logs and giving GMs directions, event ideas or advice whenever they were needed. If you think it was a sort of inquisition, you wouldn’t be too wrong but such an inquisition was needed back then when our GMs particularly on the PM realm had very… flexible understandings of their job. This should have not continued and the admins couldn’t spare the time to do it, so that’s why I came up with the idea.
Fired
Now SIP’s duties were restricted to the GM affairs only although I had an admin (unrestricted) level access and account. I was reluctant to interfere in the players’ business ingame, preferring to point the GMs in that direction instead. Then one day I noticed massive whining in the chat about some guys abusing bugged spells even though these same guys had been warned against doing so in the past. So I log in, go to the crime scene, confirm the abuse, ban the people, send notification letters to their e-mail address and close the case. In the past I’ve banned players for one reason or another with the iNDRLM’s subsequent approval so I had no reason to suspect this time it would be any different especially given the ban was only temporal. The next day upon logging into the chat, I see the message of the day being “SIP is fired”. I was outraged. I kinda thought that before firing someone who’s been working for you for half an year in your server’s hardest period, he deserves at least to be heard before that or at least to give him the news personally. Now whatever iNDRLM’s reasons were (I was told later I was fired because I had no right to ban anyone, and the “anyone”s in this case were donators). I’m sure that if he had talked to me about it we would have ended up laughing about it and things would have gone on just fine. Instead I was publicly humiliated. After that nothing could make me return. My career in RTK was effectively over.
Community
I was a “horde GM” alright and truth be told in the beginning it was a problem and it raised suspicion among certain circles within the alliance. However in time those suspicions fell off and I quickly became respected by both factions. In fact alliance even liked me more because I spent quite some time talking with them trying to help them to get into a competitive condition. Good communication and a lot of efforts doing my job brought me a great reputation and a solid name with pretty much all the players. Ayos called me “the most prominent presence in the server”. Blooargh – “the best GM a player could hope for”. Smog – “the best thing about RTK” Bloodhunter: “the man who’s been keeping the server going”. It really meant a lot to me. I had a boss who treated me like his errant boy but I had an entire community that deeply respected me and so did the rest of the staff. Naturally I thought that if I can reap such huge success with players and staff alike being a simple GM, I can do even better as an admin, having all the power I could possibly need, not realizing in time that this logic was profoundly flawed.
I’m a very calculative and level headed person. Perhaps that’s why I’m so fond on playing chess. When embarking on a new endeavor I deeply analyze the environment, the conditions, the odds and the people. Being a GM in RTK I never lost track on what was happening in ZeronixWoW – its struggle, its success, the way it developed and the way it failed again. I was well aware of the problems Zwow was experiencing, its strength and weaknesses and now I had the experience and competence to properly evaluate them.
After iNDRLM booted me from RTK, Zeronix was the logical choice to continue my WoW career mainly because of the old rivalry between the servers and mainly between their owners. Given what kind of person iNDRLM turned to be, Footy must have been the right guy in that conflict 8 months ago. A logic of a grim convenience, I guess. I didn’t realize it back then but both admins were no longer in conflict with each other and the relations between the two were quite civil, something that was a credit to them both. One day I contacted Footy, reminded him promptly of my actions 8 months ago against him and his server, told him I was sorry (which I really was, much before I got fired from RTK) and I offered him my services and my experience with the game and handling staff in particular. I believed I could be of help for him in his forthcoming attempt to resurrect Zwow. To be perfectly honest with myself and anyone who would have read this far – I never really expected Zwow to succeed. Don’t get me wrong, I hoped it would succeed and I wanted it to and I would have worked hard to that end but I was also well aware the chances were grim. The problem with Zwow since RTK emerged on the scene was its fluid power structure or more like the absence of such. There were 4 people with admin status – Footy, Vampyr, Zerox and Zeronix, all sharing the responsibility and power and nobody actually exercising it. There were nobody in Zwow to actually make what we later called “admin level decisions” – those decisions that direct and shape the server. Because the admin’s job goes well beyond determining the experience and drop rates in the beginning, it’s about managing the server and responding to the changing situation in real time. There was nobody to do that in Zwow. My arrival was meant to put some order in the chaos but only order in the GM level because although I answered directly and only to Footy, formally all of those 4 stood higher than me and I had no authority over them. I could make no “admin level decisions”. My position was “staff manager”, responsible for hiring, training, managing and supervising the GMs. Something I proved to be quite good in RTK and I had all the reasons to believe I’ll be successful here as well. I was granted a limited database access to that end. I wanted to join Zwow despite the odds because it was a challenge. I wanted to see if I could make a difference and if I could help the server be and I was looking forward to work with its community. Well I DID make a difference but not in the direction I hoped for.
Again we started building the server from mIRC where the staff and some of the players tried to hang. I spent quite some time there trying to get to know the community as a whole as well as individual players better. To get a picture of what I was getting involved into, so to speak. The good thing about Zwow and the thing I’ve always admired it for, was it’s exceptionally strong community and the bonds between players even if they were from opposing factions. The zeal with which they cared about the server and each other. It was mind boggling! Impressive and deeply moving! I’ve never seen such a dedication from a community before or since. Utterly amazing. My initial communication with some of the players was promising. I talked with the staff and Andromeda and Shifty and SatanReaper in the mIRC, laughed, planned, shared expectations etc. I thought it would be easy to win this community but this is where my calculations hit the fen.
Frankly I wasn’t keen on the idea about that post – reopening old wound wasn’t something Zwow needed in its (new) beginning. But Footy asked me to do it and I owed him that much. The idea of that post was to remind people who I was, what I’ve done in the past (chapter 2) and to apologize. That’s it – we turn our backs on the past, we shake hands and move on to a brighter future together singing kumbaya. Should have stood up to Footy…
Instead, this post started the largest, most severe forum flame war in my life. As usual I was very calculative and careful what I was writing there because offending someone was the least thing I needed at the time. Diplomacy, maneuvering and explanation didn’t work. I was accused by different members of the community (mostly Shift and Andromeda and her sister – Brawurka) of insulting the community and individual members during the RTK-Zwow “war”. I asked Footy to allow me to dig out the forum logs from those times but he refused, claiming it’s a closed subject for him that he didn’t want to reopen, although it was already widely reopened for me. This must have been the most difficult and lonely time for me since I got involved with WoW. Footy and his staff remained distant. I couldn’t ask RTK players who witnessed those events 8 months ago for help for it wouldn’t be a good idea. I was all alone against almost the entire community facing charges I couldn’t handle for I couldn’t prove anything. It was my word against theirs and my word had pretty much no value. There were only a few comments in that thread of a very different nature but I wrote their authors’ names down and kept them. For future reference. It’s impossible to describe now how hard it was for me to handle matters back then. Eventually I gave up arguing and fighting a lost cause and went on to do my job. I have my theories about what ignited this uprising against me but I can’t prove anything so I’ll keep them to myself.
It’s worth mentioning that I seriously considered concealing my identity before taking the job and present myself under a different alias to the community. I expected my past actions would inevitably bring certain…consequences but I never imagined their true magnitude. I thought “Oh, well, I was wrong in the past, I will take the responsibility for my action and live with it.” It’s my pride that registered “Odysseus” in those forums those days. I can’t help but wonder how would have things turned out if the staff manager in Zwow and the admin in Aegis was someone who the players didn’t hate? My guess is – very, very differently.
SatanReaper was the first I invited in the GM team. I’ve monitored him ever since he joined RTK during its testing stage. He was well known and respected by players, his posts suggested competence and experience, he knew the community in turn, he seemed intelligent if overly sarcastic at times. He was also very frank, direct and blunt, traits I’ve always respected. All in all he was the logical choice. Besides he weren’t officially pro-my crucifixion, although much later I learned we wasn’t against it either Unfortunately Zwow didn’t stay operational for long enough to properly evaluate his work and the merit of my choice, but now I think it was a good decision and never really came to regret it.
Arthur I invited only because Footy “recommended” him and I was too new, my name was already too compromised and my authority and position too fragile to allow myself to decline Footy’s “recommendations” although officially it was within my prerogatives. We started good but ended up having serious conflicts with him for reasons I no longer remember. He was very young (15 or 16 at the time), very impulsive, single minded and…well I really don’t remember much about him. Thank god Zwow got closed before I had to boot him.
Another problem was that the Zwow admins were Footy’s friends and relatives which gave them an annoying sense of liberty to do whatever they damn pleased even if it meant obvious and quite impudent breaking the rules. And I could do pretty much nothing about it because hey! - they were the owner’s friends! Give me a break!
That conflict between me and the community, the involvement of someone like me in the staff, the lack of management, the lack of staff-to-players communication inevitably drove players away and we had to close Zwow down even sooner than I anticipated. Seeing how NOT to run a server I was confident I can easily do much, much better myself as long as I was given the freedom to do it.
After closing down Zwow my plans were to join some random private server as an ordinary, unknown player, gain some more experience, get to know the game and its mechanics better and then, after an year or so to try to reset my career. Creating my own server wasn’t an option really because I couldn’t afford to buy and maintain it and I was reluctant to invest so much time into something that big. At first I took some break from WoW, working on my book and my studies as I was nearing the end of my 3rd year in the university and the exam session was promising to be a bitch. For one reason or another I didn’t maintain tight relations with my colleagues and friends from RTK or Zwow although I had occasional talks with Ace, Aeress and Neka. I don’t recall how it started really but at some point Neka brought up the topic about having our own server with us both being the admins. It sounded really naive and evoked mainly sympathies within me – a very ambitious plan but I really doubted Neka had the faintest clue what he was talking about – the expertise, the knowledge, the time needed to pull this off, the responsibility that goes with it, the immense difficulty to gather players and reliable staff and last but not least – the money required were all well beyond us. A “long shot” was a vast understatement.
But then gradually I understood that Neka was actually quite serious and determined about it and he managed to get my attention which was mainly based on simple curiosity. The very least, trying to build a server was something that could prove useful to me in the future. The “plan” he came up with, was to use Footy’s server. We knew well enough he couldn’t spare the time to work on Zwow again and we knew he was very disappointed about his last failure and would eventually want to try once more. In time that Romanian managed to get me really hooked up on this crap. Bastard.
Fairly surprising was that Footy was quite cooperative… when we could talk to him. Literally months passed in attempts to get him on the line to speak with him and arrange the details and on plenty occasions it seemed as if he was deliberately ignoring us. He was absent for days even weeks and this all made us quite nervous. We had to balance on the fine line between getting what we wanted from him and not being TOO annoying and irritating in our attempts. At times we thought he was toying with us and we were making no progress but eventually we had some long, detailed talks and reached an agreement.
Basically this is what we offered Footy – we would run his server on his behalf while he formally remained on the top of the command chain. He would help us with updates, fixes and provide us with his renowned connections with devs and coders while we are officially in charge of the server, having the complete freedom of shaping it and running it our own way according to our own understandings and views. Thus we would be permitted to make “admin-level decisions” as long as Footy was notified. A key point in these negotiations were for us to be allowed to assemble our own team and ONLY those we wanted would work in Aegis. The point is I wanted to get rid of any person who’s been a part of the former Zwow staff. Having Footy’s friends and relatives around my toes was something I would avoid at any cost or the chaos would be unavoidable. Every single staff member would answer directly to us and no “screw you, I’m a friend of Footy, so you can’t tell me shit” would ever come to pass. This was very important. Slowly but steadily we agreed on all key points – we decided to start a new server from the very scratch with a new name, using the old players as a foundation to build upon. Footy insisted on taking larger role in making the decisions which we theoretically agreed upon but we knew we could erm… circumvent this, being confident we could handle Footy afterwards. We got a complete freedom to assemble our own staff. Footy’s brother had subsequent claims to a GM position much later after we’ve already launched Aegis, but he was dealt with. Other than that we had no problems in that department. All in all this was a major diplomatic victory for us. We got all we wanted and in some cases – even more. In theory our freedom wasn’t limitless but we never really hesitated to breach the boundaries set before us. Truth of the matter is that Footy while greatly competent about internet and server stuff was utterly clueless when it came to WoW. He knew pretty much nothing about the game, nothing about the way it was played, nothing about what players needed and expected other than the technical stuff – lag, stability, downtimes, core and database revisions. That is why we were confident that as far as gameplay mechanics were concerned, we were way more qualified to make the judgment, simply because…well… we were players. The name, the rates, the core and database were chosen and in mid July we were almost ready to go.
July is when I contacted a guy who left me with very good impressions during my time in Zwow. Unlike SatanReaper I didn’t know Keeper prior to my assignment in Zwow but he was one of the few to back me up in the forum wars which honestly, was enough to impress me back then. I wanted to start building a team and again I wanted someone who was well known the Zwow community, someone with the intelligence and the reliability to be entrusted with a GM position. Frankly I wasn’t sure if keeper possessed the latter two but I was certain to establish this quickly enough in my communication with him. Instead of a “I’m gonna be a GM?! Cool!!!” his response came as a thorough interrogation about myself my previous deeds and future plans. I don’t recall ever having to answer so many questions in such a short time but I didn’t mind it at all. In fact it came as a pleasant surprise that showed me I was dealing with a thinking being rather than one of the many spoiled morons that litter the WoW universe. I was charmed and once again – very impressed. In the first chat sessions we had together I already knew he was capable of thinking by himself, and he was frank, direct and honest to the point I started to suspect problems in our future relations meaning that back then he didn’t seem much of a “subordinate” type of guy. I thought issues obeying the chain of command might arise but non the less I was willing to take the risk and have him in my team.
I was considering offering SatanReaper a GM position again but I was too hesitant and eventually abandoned the idea. Now I don’t know why I hesitated so much about it and I think back then I didn’t know either. He’s never really done anything to disappoint me or let me down and in fact as far as I can tell he was doing his job fine in Zwow. I guess the main reason not to invite him was that I wanted to start clean with different people and nobody from the previous staff that could remind me of the events from the previous chapter. I still had my respect for him but just couldn’t make the decision to have him in the staff again.
I had talks with some of the RTK staff that I had good relations with, such as Ghosty and Ace and tried in vain to reach Hrist. I also tried to recruit some of the players I knew there to strengthen the players’ ranks we would begin with so we are less dependable on the old Zwow community. Those efforts had a variable degree of success. Some of those players refused, some joined and some wanted to join under condition if we were to provide certain... “services” in return. The truth is neither of the RTK players remained in Aegis for more than a month, safe for the Neka’s friends.
Something other happened those days. Prior to those events I knew Neka only as a player but this was the point when I started to respect him for what he was outside the game. I liked his determination, persistence and passion. He was smart, thoughtful and much more optimistic about our joint endeavor than I was. I had all reasons to think we would work well together although prior to his idea about Aegis I’ve always believed a server should be ran by a single admin who holds all the power and bares all the responsibility. Eventually this dualism turned to be working just fine.
As for me, my greatest doubts were related to my competence or more precisely – the lack of it. For all intends and purposes I was still a noob player and even more nooby admin. Naturally those were things I would do my best to keep the players from knowing. Simply because a community must believe in its leaders’ strength. Strength comes with knowledge and understandings and I knew that if people were aware of how much I lacked those, they would have little faith in us and our server. I was totally unaware how to run the technical stuff – running updates and back ups, fixing core related and stability issues, relying mainly on Footy and Neka who was running his own test servers at home to deal with those. I was quite adept handling the database which gave me enough flexibility to do my job but didn’t enable me to fix things like spells, talents, scripts etc. We needed a coder to that end and Footy has promised to provide us with one. He never did. As far as handling the server goes, Neka was much more adept and proficient than I was. My job was mainly to acquire our GMs and moderators, train them and make sure they were doing their job the way those GMs in RTK that I hired did theirs. I was good communicating with people and I thought I could do a good job establishing strong admins-to-players communication. I wanted to win the core community’s respect and trust as quickly as possible because those were the people we relied upon and the success or failure of Aegis depended pretty much on whether those people would stay. This is the second time I had to consider if signing as “Odysseus” was indeed a good idea and again it turned up being a very bad idea and again I didn’t realize that until it was too late. Why changing my name and pretending to be someone else? Sure me and Zwow community set off with a bad start, sure I wasn’t particularly competent but then again I knew myself well. I knew I had all the qualities needed to succeed. I was smart, had great communicative and writing skills, I knew a lot about the GM affairs, I was very proficient in diplomacy having huge experience with high-level negotiations in real life…how could I fail? How could I not earn those players’ respect? Were they that different to the RTK players? Nah, it would be easy.
Aegis was something big. It didn’t work out, that’s true but back then when we launched it, it matter more to us than I could possibly describe here. The hopes, the ambitions, the plans we had about it, the dreams… We invested a lot of time preparing its launch and we didn’t rush it. This was the largest internet endeavor we’ve ever embarked on and failure was not an option. We were determined to pursue success, to build something great, something big, something lasting, a place where players would have “the perfect WoW experience”, where they would enjoy themselves and the game, where they would be fairly treated and respected. To that end we have prepared the best emulator + database available for private WoW servers in the world. A stable, fast dedi, hosted in a famous datacenter in the Netherlands. The initial crew I have prepared I had an utmost trust in – Keeper, Jericho (an old Zwow players who I came to admire and look up to during the events in chapter 1) and Ace as a head GM. I had an utter confidence that I had assembled a reliable, capable and trustworthy, team that I would in time expand with fresh recruits from among the Aegis players ranks. The website was joomla based, simple but in my opinion very stylish and most importantly – it was easy to handle, fix and change, something very important for my limited knowledge in that area. We had everything to believe we were going to make it. It was all up to us now and all we needed was a little luck in the beginning but from now on, nothing could go wrong. I mean...could it?
Aegis-What it should have been
We wanted to build an elitist community playing in an elite server. Aegis was supposed to be a completely hack/bug-abusers free place without the legions of spoiled pricks that populate the competition. We wanted to have a zero tolerance against any rule violations that would spoil the gameplay experience of the others. A safe heaven for good, honest, hard working players. We would have provided this community with competent, dedicated, honest and fair GMs that would never EVER abuse their position for personal gains against the server's interests. We would have had a tight control over everything that was going in the server and anyone who dared to deviate from the rules would have been severely punished. No hacks, no abuses, no moronism! Not here! Not in OUR server! However in order to require an elitist community you need to be able to provide elite services. We couldn't. Not only that, but we lacked the foundation to attract such players. We bet on the "quality before quantity" formula without being able to afford this quality. All in all there was a significant imbalance between our expectations and requirements from one side, and what we were able to offer in return from another. This was a huge strategical mistake and in time we paid the price.
The Start
We did expect problems alright. We expected hardware failures (every server sooner or later experiences those) playerbase and staff crisis and interpersonal conflicts because of my history so far described in chapters 1-5. What we didn't expect however was that all of those problems would befall us in the same time and in the moment we were most vulnerable - in the very beginning when we were most dependable on every individual player and had least control over things.
Initially we had about a constant number of around 20 players online which was a pretty good start and within our predictions. The first ten days it went pretty fluently without any serious concussions. Then things went seriously fucked up. By the end of the first month we experienced a terrible series of downtimes due to dedi crashes - problems that lied in the dutch datacenter, well beyond our reach, problems we were totally helpless to deal with. This royally screwed things as it drove plenty of that initial playerbase away but it wasn't everything. We caught plenty of those players that we relied upon to build a real Aegis community abusing bugs and hacks. I'm really bad with remembering names so maybe Neka could remind me of the more pivotal cases but Morphy's sure wasn't the only one. I for one remember 4 members of "The lions" and about 4-5 that i wasn't familiar with getting burned but i recall no names. We quickly had to decrease the penalties for hack and bug abuses because of the rate we were banning players. If i recall correctly we ended with a "3 days for any first time" punishment - far below any competitive server out there. However safe for Morphy, those banned, if even for a few days, never returned afterward. We quickly became the bad guys in town because of this. What's worse, is that the banned dragged other players away with them too. This was devastating.
By the end of the first month HGM Ace and GM Jericho left because of "real life issues" and Keeper was effectively the only active GM - hardly the staff manager's dream. We were quickly losing players with no immediate way to compensate with new ones. Things were getting out of hand really quickly. This wasn't the way we planned it.
Andromeda
I'm writing this only because it refers to the previous topic and till the end there were some wild speculations going around that I'd really like to extinguish for once and for all. Somewhere in August/September. Rapidut reports his character deleted. Neka accesses the core logs and tracks the IP that was used to delete the characters. We find it in the database to be a polish IP but it leads to 2 players that we are unfamiliar with. Then i start cross-checking every detail we have about our perpetrator with the old ZeronixWoW databases down until the first of its days. Imagine that! The e-mail that those 2 accounts were registered with was the same e-mail address that Andromeda used to register every one of her accounts in pretty much every of the Zwow servers. Sorry but this can't be misinterpreted in any way and is pretty much conclusive. That same e-mail address led to a forum account by the name of "Moon". We banned the IP and the accounts. Later Andromeda has the audacity to claim she was banned because i didn't want her in Aegis. Odd because i had no problems welcoming Shifty abroad after all the crap he poured against me. I would have done it for her as well because Aegis needed players and that need went beyond any desires for revenge even if i have ever had such in the first place. If i needed more evidence i would ask - If that IP that we banned wasn't Andromeda's then how come she complains for being banned? I'm sorry that players who I respected till the end could allow themselves to be so easily manipulated by that girl.
GameMasters
For all intents and purposes my weak spot. This is where chapter-3 RTK comes in place because it explains entirely my attitude and my approach towards the people working for me and ultimately working for Aegis. I've learned how important it is for a GM to feel respected and valued not only by the players but by the admins as well. I wanted not only to be their boss but their friend as well, I wanted to be the person that would listen to them, consider all their ideas and opinions, help them and guide them, be there for them not, and only for WoW-related matters. I wanted to be the person that would trust them UNCONDITIONALLY and back them up whenever they needed it. I believe that pretty much all GMs who have actively served at least two weeks in Aegis could confirm that I succeeded in large part to fulfill those intentions and if i could be accused of anything that would be taking my "caring" a little bit too far. But later for this. All this comes to explain why I felt so offended by the completely ridiculous talks about hiring only "horde GMs." My GMs and my GM program throughout all of my adminship stood quite above the petty allies-versus-hordes dispute and certain individuals' attempts to draw me and my crew in those, were downright misplaced and inadequate. Those people were meant to work for Aegis not for the horde.
I believe this was explained in several occasions but once more wouldn't hurt. GMs in Aegis were hired in 3 ways.
-By a public contest through a forum announce that a hiring campaign was in progress and everyone interested in being a GM would submit an application with a specific form. There were only two of those and the reason we never made a third was because there were a discouragingly low number of applications and we ended up accepting most of them, just to fill our quota. For the record, regarding the previous topic, the only alliance player to submit an application who was NOT approved was Doom (because of his relations with Rapidut which would imply subsequent conflicts that i wanted to avoid). The people who applied in those were almost exclusively horde players, something, I don't really feel responsible for.
-Notable players. Or pretty much the way i hired SatanReaper or Keeper. We find someone who we think might be suitable - we give him a chance. It's that simple.
-Recommended by staff. Since both me and Neka played (initially) only horde, our ingame contacts with horde players were far more intense and productive and we couldn't really get to know the alliance community to the point we would pick GMs among them. So already active GMs that play in Alliance could recommend other players for a GM position. I relied heavily upon Keeper's and Baghira's judgment to that end and everyone that was recommended ended up in staff. For one reason or another those were really few.
In my opinion Aegis GMs were given unparalleled freedom to do whatever they wanted according to their own views and desires and some of them - Ace, Keeper and Baghira were all given unrestricted database and admin control panel access. If anyone could think of a greater gesture of trust - let me know.
Rapid
I don't recall how things with Rapidut went wrong exactly. He found me on MSN and was very supportive initially - something that I really needed back then because the good words we heard weren't that abundant. All changed after i warned him in one of the first events against the excessively vulgar language he used against another player, even though he had all the rights to be "bitching". His behavior took a rapid turn then. I didn't like his attitude, he didn't like mine and things started degrading quickly until those PvP hours in Hellfire Peninsula when i simply couldn't put up with him any longer. Besides, switching to personal insults against the admin leads to pretty much the same ending everywhere, so why should I be any more forgiving? Still, the decision to ban him was purely emotional and entailed plenty of complications that we really didn't need back then. That ban wouldn't have lasted long and i would have soon come to regret it if Rapidut didn't decide to retaliate and launch a forum war against me - a war that not only he couldn't win but it further alienated the others. Needless to say that war was no less due to my resolve to win that conflict at any cost. Now it was personal, Rapid has made it personal and had to pay for it. That resolve was a mistake. Nonetheless Rapidut then assumed the role of his cousin and even applied in the GM academy with it but i was so mad with him, that i spent quite some time tracking him with all the server resources to make sure I was aware of who his characters were at any given time. That's how i caught him much later when he was leveling "Aquilo" but then i let him go because the server was paying the price for my own conflicts.
Later with Oberon i had a chance to get to know him from another perspective. Rapidut is not stupid alright. On the contrary - he is quite resourceful and smart but has the habit of behaving like a 13 years old hormonally imbalanced kid - very very childish at times which makes him very hard to deal with. He was a good player and there was no question about it but often he was hard to play together with, especially when he started making scenes.
Fun realms
Ever since iNDRLM created the Pandemonium realm in RTK and i witnessed the immense stupidity that reigns in funrealms, so I started looking with a vast contempt and disdain upon those players and funrealms in general. I already described my vision for Aegis as being a place for hard-core players and I've always been against turning Aegis into a funrealm or adding such. I knew i would have to deal with the pricks, spoiled brats, kids, insolent noobs and such and i wanted to avoid this - I wanted to avoid additional conflicts and keeping Aegis "pro", again relying on quality rather than quantity. The bitter irony that i didn't realize until it was too late to make a difference, was that those same pricks, spoiled brats, kids, insolent noobs and such were in fact much easier to deal with - warn, then ban and that's it - chapter closed, moving forward - the iNDRLM's way. Those people are insignificant and could pose no real threat. However it's those "pro" players, the smart, cool guys that we always wanted to have and I always wanted to have on my side, that admins can't really handle. Because if those people decide for one reason or another to stand up to you or even fight you, that's when you have no winning move. You can't let them go against you and your ways because your pride wouldn't allow it and your authority would suffer, and on the other side you can't ban them either because you risk turning the entire community against you. Those people are influential and ingenious, creative and able and if you choose to fight them, you can't win, no matter your omnipotent admin powers. There are fine examples of these in the following paragraphs. No, a funrealm wouldn't have ruined the server. On quite the contrary, I believe that adding such a realm would have brought more players more quickly and would have helped us build a solid foundation, something we never really had up till the last days of Aegis.
"The black temple" incident
Nothing new could be said about this topic. That was our first BT run in Aegis. We tried it several times in RTK when it wasn't even barely scripted so I didn't know what to expect. I was aware that Zamolxis- Neka's friend and a pretty nice guy with a provisional developer status has undergone tests to enhance the script performance for the bosses. What i didn't know was that those scripts had worked prior to his efforts and his attempts have completely disabled the already existing scripts rendering the bosses to nothing but huge mobs. Therefore our raid looked like we've deliberately bugged the bosses and then killed and looted them, which frankly, wasn't away from the truth. Naturally the allies and Geary in particular figured that out and accused us of abusing our powers for personal gains. I took the responsibility for all of this (as i haven't exercised the supervision needed upon the staff) not because i felt somehow responsible but because it seemed like the right thing to do. Zamolxis took it the hardest from me. He stepped forward, admitted his guilt and naturally wasn't believed. It looked as if he was protected our asses which was also not far from the truth because Neka has known the bosses were bugged by the time we attacked them. This is one of the two times i was really disappointed with my Romanian colleague who ducked for cover and waited out the storm, leaving me and Zamolxis to take all the shit while being the second most responsible person for the fuck up. It was pretty cowardly of his alright
Truth be told, even though Geary and the rest had all the right to be mad on us I was deeply offended and saddened that the community accused me of perpetrating the same crime I was so determined to stop and prevent. From that moment I pulled back and stopped my communication with the players leaving all these relations to the GameMasters for a very long time. The repercussions upon the server weren't that severe but it was a major personal defeat for me on a very deep, emotional level.
"Admin-level decisions"
After the disappointing start and the subsequent terrible conflicts, our resolve was shaken and we needed to make changes quick in order to stay in game. I struggled to find and train new GMs while Neka was working to constantly keep up with all the database and core improvements regularly released for private servers. We had to make compromises that i never thought we would. Such us those three Belgian guys that we used to play in RTK with - Mallyx, Skaarj and War'something' who joined Aegis after our invitation and who started making demands as soon as they logged in. It hurts me to admit we initially agreed to those demands - such as levels and items (they were given about ~50lvl with corresponding blue items, nothing really OP, but back then all players started from lvl1), professions, flight paths and well... gold. We didn't do this because they were our friends but because we needed players we knew we could count on to stay, players we were well familiar with, who we could expect not to turn us down. They did. Reluctantly we kept giving them things and for a short while, one of them- Skaarj was given a GM status, something I was really embarrassed with. I'm very ashamed writing this now, just as i was ashamed back then. In a very short time we decided enough was enough and Skaarj was fired which was enough for all 3 to leave the server.
We tried meddling with the rates in hope it would make the difference, increasing them to 5x. Then we had all characters to start from lvl 56 which was a bad decision. 56 is a rather intermediate level that is too low to grant you an Outland access but so high that it required players to spend untold amount of time discovering flightpaths and grinding in Azeroth for only two levels. We thought it was a good compromise between "increased blizzlike" and "funrealms" and just like all compromises, Aegis turned out being neither a good funserv nor a good blizzlike one but something in between, something which...well...wasn't that good. Modifying the starting lvl to 58 with 3x rates was better, letting people straight to Outland but there were still problems such as skills (weapons skills and defense in particular being too low for a 58lvl combat), gold management that allowed severe abuses and such. It was an acceptable decision but now I'm not sure if it was the best.
What I personally take pride in, was all the work and time we put into “fixing” the instances. Wheres the competition would rely on official core patches to fix those, we did everything possible to improvise and provide our community with a raiding experience that was available nowhere else. I’ve literally spent days testing and working on those heroics, Obsidian sanctum and Naxxramas to fix whatever we could and bypass the problems we couldn’t solve without a specialized coders’ assistance. It’s true that some of those dungeons were more successful than others and OS turned to be quite the failure but we worked to the best of our imagination and skill, utilizing every idea that we could come up with or were offered.
In time Footy provided us with a faster, more stable and reliable dedi. However we didn't dare to make the best of it. We were too hesitant to add another realm but i will talk more about it later. I kept being purposely distant from the players' affairs, working from the shadows to come up with plans for advertising the server, together with my GMs. Truth is we really lacked ideas how to make things better while we felt really stressed because of the apparent lack of progress we were having. We tried to hold things together with events and some interesting ideas such as "Aegis Senate" (developed by GM Baghira) which was a pretty good idea but in fact too good for Aegis and its low population. Ok, i guess the most accurate expression here would be we were shooting at random, hoping to hit something that would turn the tide. When months ago I was dreaming about the freedom to do whatever I want and shape the server however I want, I had no idea that a moment would come when I had no idea how to use this very freedom.
Neka
That "Black Temple" crap from above really managed to shake my relations with Neka for a while. Neka has worked really hard and he wanted all of this to succeed as much as I did. The months we spent working together I came to deeply respect him, trust him and count on him to always do the right thing. If I didn't like him that much (may everyone who thought "gays" get cancer and die), I wouldn't have been bothered that much about his approach to that issue. The second and last time when he let me down was much later, almost immediately after my resignation when he violated the very foundations that our relations were built upon – the respect of the other’s decisions and opinion. It seems my memory has failed me and I can recall no details. It's better that way I guess for I've been trying to forget that part of my biography, but those events, pretty much made me leave my own guild and stop playing on the horde side for good.
Neka is a very clever and communicative person that is very easy to talk to and is a real pleasure to work with. Initially I had serious doubts about whether two people with the same rank could run a server together. However I was proven wrong very quickly. He turned out being very open minded, having great sense of humor and determined to learn along the way, striving to get better all the time. We teamed up and worked really well, easily and smoothly together. Neither of us had any ambitions to dominate in the server and play the "main admin" around. We respected each other too much for that, taking all important decisions together, coordinating anything that we were doing. As far as I am concerned we made a very good team.
Neka is not a particularly knowledgeable player, just like me and the most part of the horde community that has spent their wow-life playing in private servers where "scripts" was a dirty word. But he didn't have to know how each and every boss out there worked to be an exceptional and irreplaceable tank - the best I've seen so far. Again his sense of humor, his friendliness and reliability made him a great company and a pleasure to play together with. In the same time I was pretty envious with him and probably downright jealous because of the immense influence he had upon the "Silvermoon Highguard" community, that consisted mainly of his real life friends while in the same time I felt I was playing a "secondary"role in my own guild. A mage is hardly nearly half as valuable as a good main tank, especially in such a small server. Neka was the most important and valuable player on the horde side. Something, I can't really blame him for
Footy
It is true that I’ve had had intense talks with Footy during my job in ZeronixWoW in chapter-4 but by the time we started Aegis, for all intents and purposes we (and especially Neka) were still strangers to him. Even so, he gave us pretty much unlimited freedom, powers and trust to handle his dedi and his server by our own accord. With that in mind it will be very unfair if I could now say anything bad about the guy. Truth is Footy loved ZeronixWoW. He didn't know the players, he didn't know WoW but he has spent years working on it and he wanted to finally succeed so Aegis was his last chance for that, his supposed "swan song". However Footy for a long time now couldn't have spared the time to tend and care for a server, which is why he relied so much on us, and that is why he gave us pretty much all the power we could have possibly have. He really hoped and trusted we would make it. He is essentially a very gentle, friendly and polite person, very easy going and we pretty much have never had any problems with him. On the other hand... we didn't really have opportunities to have conflicts because he was rarely available. Saying "rarely", i mean that literally months passed without him coming online because of health or any other real life issues. Sometime he would say "dinner brb" in the middle of a very important conversation and come back 10 days later. That mean less unwanted interference in our ways which we perceived as a rather good thing but in the same time it meant we had to wait for excruciatingly long time when we required his assistance, mainly regarding issues with the dedi. At first he wanted more control over things, not allowing Neka to update but he was soon convinced in Neka's abilities and reliability and completely gave us the ball.
While formally on top of the food chain, Footy wasn't in the team. He didn't get to know the staff, the players or the current problems before Aegis and its community, he didn't read forums and all in all, wasn't aware of almost anything that was going around. But he was really supportive, really encouraging, trying to cheer us up and lift our spirits at every occasion, give us confidence and strength when at times we really lacked those. He was a very good listener, very pleasant to talk to, very smart and he really cared about us.
All of the above sums up one of the reason to resign my admin position in Aegis. Failing in my job, I have failed him and his trust. This is how "responsibility" works.
Zeronix
Really talented web designer. I mean...really! Not only because of the site he has made for us but because of his other projects I've seen. If he actually gave a damn about Aegis, we would have utterly loved him and his talents would have made a real difference. Unfortunately he didn't.
The first website we had was a joint endeavor between Neka and Footy. It was of a very simple, amateurish design but it was really effective - it could get the job done and it was really easy to modify and handle. However in time Footy wanted something better so he asked Zeronix to create something really good for us. And so he did. The new website was obviously vastly superior to the old one, both in terms of design and functionality. The problem with it is that only Zeronix could modify it - only he could add, remove and modify stuff as only he had access to the source code. More importantly, only he could work with that code as we were totally unfamiliar with it. That all meant that when we needed something done, added or changed in our website we had to wait for Zeronix to find the will and time to do it, something that became increasingly difficult with time, until we reached a moment that he no longer replied to our requests which gradually were turned into pleads and downright begging. We were little more than moderators in the website of our own server. The greatest problem was that when something broke it remained broken. It's hardly necessary to dig into the complications because of that. Zeronix is great in his job but he prefers spending his time working on projects he gets paid for. I'm not accusing him as I understand him perfectly fine, but this doesn't mean I like it. Because we soon regretted not working with our old, crappy, nooby website.
Keeper
This is by far the hardest person to write about. This is because my relations with him and my opinion and attitude towards him rapidly changed shape and color on a regular basis. He could make me admire him and he could piss me off big time (Sartharion anyone?), there were months when he was inactive and therefore useless as a GM and in the same time he managed to be the most valued person in my staff. His time in Aegis was so controversial and our relations so dynamic that now, even after so much time I still have a problems describing those relations and my opinion on his personality with a clear black/white definition. I could explain this mixed, motley experience with him by us both having a rather complex, varicolored nature. I don't know how to start this... Keeper wasn't a GM in the truest sense of the word. As i mentioned earlier there were huge periods of time when he wasn't active. He rarely hanged online with his GM toon (several horde players complained they've never seen him online for half an year), he didn't make events and one of the main reasons for it was he didn't want to bother. "Lacking inspiration" he called it. Another reason was pure laziness. What astounded me was he had no sentiments about telling me about his unwillingness to do his job in the manner I expected and requested from all my GMs. Balls or audacity - guess it depends on your the point of view. Keeper was extremely blunt talking with me, never aiming to make good impression about himself, never saying something just because I wanted to hear it, never talking about the things he has done about the server or any given player, even when it was objectively useful and needed for me to know it. Instead he was direct, honest, and not-giving-a-damn-about-my-consequent-reaction to the bone. And lazy. That's why my conversations with him were a unique and very challenging experience - he simply was like no other GM I've ever talked with before or since. Screw the GM thing, I've never seen such a person in the internet at all. But those conversations weren't what kept him in the staff. If I had to evaluate his performance and usefulness by the strict rules and standards that I've set for my staff, honestly... he wouldn't last for long as a GM. The reason he did was because he became my friend. This is something really hard to describe because i saw in Keeper something that I can't define.
Keeper was instrumental in keeping the alliance together and reducing the tension and easing the spirits among its players after the various conflicts have arisen. Keeper is what we called "a key player" and he was one of the main factors that kept the alliance going. This was something he didn't really need a GM account to do but i believed that allowing him to retain his position was a just recognition of his immense contribution. A good example of how vast this contribution was, is that the server lasted very shortly after he left it. It is not just that. He is responsible for a good number of quest fixes along the way as well as a very competent and reliable GM support whenever he was playing with his "regular" account. Something that mostly the allies could benefit from but I never heard anyone calling him "an ally GM" or any of the sort, nor did I perceive him as such. Even so, Keeper wasn't doing things "by the book", he did them the way he thought was right, something that both me and Neka found rather irritating at times. To put it delicately Neka wasn't Keeper's greatest fan but he ultimately trusted my judgment. And that judgment wasn't based only on Keeper's objective usefulness to the server but it goes to a subjective personal level, that I couldn't be able to explain to Neka. It's about that "friend" thing above. My relations with Keeper weren't built on the official working admin-to-GM level but much rather on a great mutual respect and trust. He trusted me that whatever I do, I do it in the server's best interest and I trusted him that whatever I do, he will back me up. And he always did. Even if he was bothered by something I've done, he would come to me and tell me his views but he would always back me up in front of the players. His advice and opinion was always very accurate and adequate to the situation, and was always well accepted and considered. He also provided me with a valuable insight about the moods and general opinion among the players.
Keeper was a HGM with a control panel and DB access before I created Oberon. But going "undercover" among the allies, being able to witness first hand the things and processes that were going there I was deeply charmed and impressed by his actions, the way he cared about the community, guided it, the incredible influence he had upon almost all of the alliance players. He and Baghira were no doubt the best GMs Aegis has ever had but for very different reasons which is why i can't compare them to one another. While Keeper saved the server and kept it going by working from within it, doing things his own way, Baghira was a shining example of the perfect GM, the way I've always imagined it, the kind of GMs, doing things "by the book" that I've always wanted to have in my staff.
When Keeper left he didn't really give me any explanations for his decision and I never really asked. It wasn't unexpected and I hoped to postpone it farther in time as much as possible, fearing that the alliance would lose more than would be able to recover from. It was a significant blow to the community but still I respected his decision -he has already done more than his job description would require.
At times I might have regretted it - his personality suggests such times, but ultimately hiring and keeping Keeper in Staff was perhaps one of the best decisions I've made as an Aegis admin.
Baghira
My most beautiful mistake
Having a couple working together is a very double edged idea but often it creates more complications than benefits. Baghira applied for the GM academy in the late autumn of 2008 despite of Keeper’s disapproval but of course hers was the opinion that mattered. After I had talks with both of them in which they assured me working together won’t be a problem, Baghira was officially welcomed in staff.
The way this extraordinary and rather beautiful Lithuanian girl was doing things was pretty much the opposite of Keeper’s. Her energy and willingness to help, to matter, to change and improve things, to make players happy was utterly amazing and earned her my admiration very quickly. She was working with a sparkling enthusiasm that didn’t fade up until her last days in Aegis.
In order to know what happened with Baghira in Aegis one must have known both of us. If this paragraph is important to you, you'd better read the one titled “GameMasters” from above if you have missed it, as it explains a lot about my approach to her. I’ve always said that I’ve been looking not for experienced and good GMs but for trustworthy, hardworking, dedicated and good personalities. Experience and skills weren’t needed, they could be forged along the way. But personal traits and reliability are a constant digit, and those are things I was searching when hiring new staff members. Ultimately Baghira proved how correct and effective that formula was – the best persons made the best GMs. She has worked with an utmost resolve, fighting to learn new things and get better all the time. She was very well accepted by the community and quickly gained the players’ respect and trust, but more than that, she had that unique ability to make people happy, to make them feel valued and cared for. Also did I mention she was very beautiful? Together with Keeper, she was the other major factor that kept the playerbase together, going forward. The efforts she put into advertising and popularizing the server were vast and very successful, efforts that were spread off-WoW, working in various websites and in-WoW, attending to new players and doing her best to make them stay. She was very friendly, polite and respectful in her dealing with the rest of the staff to the point where she quickly became the favorite team member for all of us. Her events were variable, entertaining and well organized, her ideas were original and creative, and her presence – truly inspiring. Being honest – there was nothing more an admin could ever ask from his GMs. She was simply the perfection incarnate.
But Baghira’s traits are not limited only to her GM side. She is immensely kind, warm, very, very gentle and fragile person. And before I forgot – very beautiful. She had a personal and emotional approach to any given situation. In fact if there was anything, any remark I could possibly make for her GMhood was that sometimes she was too emotional which made her very vulnerable, especially when for one reason or another, given player or group of players weren’t happy with her performance. She demanded the very best from herself and when that very best couldn’t be achieved, she took it as a personal defeat, which at times deeply hurt her. But this was the easier part to tell.
Throughout almost the entire career she had in Aegis, Baghira was going through a very tough period in her life which emotionally drained and exhausted her. She was lonely and hurt and desperate and I thought I could help her. Help her by doing what I’ve always wanted to do for my GMs – be there for her, be her friend, someone she could easily talk to, no matter the subject, someone to offer her advice and opinion and a different vantage point. There were times when we talked pretty much every day and talked for hours. I guided her and taught her all I knew about being a GM but most of those talks had nothing to do with WoW. The record of our conversations has reached 700 MS Word pages at “Times New Roman#12” which should say enough. Somewhere along those 700 pages I became...emotionally involved for the lack of a better phrase to describe it. She was so lonely and fragile and broken (and before I forget – very beautiful!) on one side and on the other I was so moved by her hardships myself, so caught up in my efforts to help her that I eventually started feeling her pain myself and turned helping her into my own personal crusade, because I knew she deserved it and I thought she needed it. Of course she didn’t really need it and she didn’t really need ME to help her but back then I sincerely believed otherwise. Believed it so much that I eventually booked a flight to Vilnius.
Creating Oberon was another great way to help her – by doing my best, not only as an admin and her boss, but as a regular, ordinary player to make her feel valued and appreciated, feel respected and loved. Allies were already doing great in that department, they’ve never been ungrateful or unappreciative towards her, but I wanted to play my role in it and do everything possible within my powers and imagination to make her happy.
The bad thing about playing a psychologist when you are clearly not one, is that you can screw up so much that others would eventually pay the price for your misguidance. In my efforts to help her I wanted to distract her from the real-life issues that have been rooted in her thoughts. What a better way to do that than stress on her GM job? Baghira was given a database pass and access to the admins’ server control panel. I gradually increased her powers and freedom but in the same time started demanding more from her, trying to keep her occupied with Aegis as much as possible. It was a major mistake. The stress from the increased responsibilities and duties didn’t alleviate the stress from her real life but added to it. Thanks to my efforts, the emotional and psychological pressure upon Baghira has reached the point when she couldn’t cope with it. This resulted in many emotional outbursts on very random occasions, regarding random topics, she started overreacting and misinterpreting as insults many of the things I’ve said. I saw where things were going but now I could think of a way to stop them and no way to mitigate the consequences. So I asked her to take a break from WoW and her GM duties for a while. She refused, claiming she could handle it and I believed her. I wanted to believe her. Then things escalated, she started being rude with me and other staff members and eventually I sent her on a “forceful vacation” for a week. She however kept logging with her GM account so that forceful vacation turned into a ban with canceling all her access and powers. It was only temporary of course but she was due to leave for Spain soon and spend the summer there and I felt Aegis would have never had his old Baghira again. I really hoped that after firing her she wouldn’t post the forum message which she did anyway, which once again caused excessive drama, rumors and some reeeeally interesting and amusing speculations among the players. I returned the ticket for Vilnius.
This was a rather horrible and inglorious end to the best GM Aegis has seen and I deeply regret coming to it. Baghira is very beautiful girl but even more beautiful person and she deserved better. Now she is happy. True, I have nothing to do with it but frankly...it doesn’t matters. Way to go lass!
Krystal and Alleria
Those two are the same person alright. Something I didn’t know until a few months back when Rapidut was kind enough to tell me. That girl managed to fool me for a very long time, something I could only respect her for
In the end of the summer, 2008, Keeper recommended Krystal – a draenei female shaman in game and a Romanian girl in real life for a GM position because of her friendliness and polite, warm nature. I trusted my HGM’s word and invited her on preliminary talks. We talked for quite some time on a “virtual glass of wine” for many things, most of which not related to WoW. She was quite bright and cheerful, very dynamic and energetic. I liked her. After she was accepted in staff, she spent about 2 weeks in Aegis as a GM, performing up to the expectation, having firm will and resolve to do her job, taking active part in the regular staff meetings that we had back then. Then one day she disappeared without a word. Krystal reappeared a month later, explaining her absence with health issues, announcing her readiness to return back to work. So I made a “welcome back GM Krystal” forum thread and I didn’t hear from her again until about 9 months later.
Alleria was my own project, trying to find another GM as good as Baghira who would help her managing events. I met her playing her character Alexa while leveling Oberon in the spring of 2009 and she made a very good impression with her views and understandings. She liked a lot Baghira and her work. Gradually we started to talk a lot and I already decided I wanted to have her abroad but I didn’t want to ruin Oberon’s cover so I had to be quite inventive to allow her to win Odysseus too. This is where testing the .combatstop command came in handy and this is how my official communication with her started. She was quite a sweet girl and she never managed to spoil my excellent opinion of her. Her transition into staff was quite smooth, although initially she refused a full GM status, only wanting to help Baghira in events. Unlike the events with Baghira, during my relations with Alleria I managed to keep cool headed and with a very sober view upon her and her job. The official version back then was that she was a close friend to Krystal’s and that Krystal would eventually return in Aegis but was long absent because of severe real-life complications that I was never told about. I didn’t ask either. Alleria was very inventive and thoughtful GM although she lacked availability and could work only during her long night shifts. In my opinion her event in Thousand needles was downright amazing, something she spent 2 nights to prepare. We had long and interesting conversations with her, and I firmly believed in her will to help Aegis and we were getting along really well. She explained not only Krystal’s disappearance but her frequent absence as well with some really heavy problems and difficulties that is not needed to get into now. For all I know, parts of it might still be true. Then one day she disappeared without a word and never came back again.
In August 2009, about a month after Alleria disappeared, Krystal reappeared, claiming her friend was in a hospital for two weeks because of suspicions of a swine flue infection together with a whole other bunch of crap that I had real difficulties believing in. By the first 10 minutes of that conversation I knew I was played a fool but didn’t know what was really going on and could prove nothing. At the end, I told her I’m not buying her stories and I would very much like to talk with both her and Alleria as soon as possible. I never heard from “them both” again.
I never understood why all this deception and theater were necessary. Alleria exploited and played my compassion and care but for no apparent reason, for no apparent goal because frankly, it didn’t give her anything, it brought her nowhere that she wouldn’t have reached by being honest with me. If Krystal has returned half an year later saying “meh, I was lazy but now I want to return” I would have accepted her back anyway without any of this being needed. So much later, I’m still deeply puzzled and confused by what she did back then.
Geary
What I conveniently call here a “BT incident” is how things with me and Geary started. And this here is how they ended. Now how cool was that! Feeling the thrill of having a worthy opponent! It was a nice fight, although I could and should have done it much better
I won’t comment on individual points from those letters but I regret that the forum posts that were the reason for this correspondence were lost thanks to Neka, together with every single thread posted in General discussion between March and September 2009. Basically I didn’t really have problems with Geary between BT and those forum posts in which he was accusing Alleria of lying about the tests she has ran and the events she’s been working upon. Now Alleria wasn’t what (and who) I thought she was. She fooled me and who knows, maybe she really played in different servers while she was supposed to work in Aegis (though I still doubt it) and she did after all turn out being a lying wench. But frankly it doesn’t matter now and back then it mattered even less. It could never matter. She was my GM. This was enough. This was enough to trust her unconditionally, to help her and protect her by any means possible against such actions and words, unless those words could be proven. And they couldn’t be proven because I’ve witnessed her job myself and no matter if she lied about everything else, she really did her job to the letter and this is all that matters for this topic.
Since after BT I pulled back and no longer communicated with players, which included Geary so I had no relations with him whatsoever, not as Odysseus anyway. Talking, playing, raiding together with Geary while I was “undercover” with Oberon was a unique experience – another reason why I was so glad I managed to pull off this stunt with Oby. It gave me a great opportunity to get to know people like Geary who I’ve perceived as opposition so far, from a completely different angle. It’s like two utterly different people with the same name and that “second” Geary... well I could only feel sorry I didn’t meet him earlier in different circumstances and that I never managed to win his respect with Odysseus. He was a great person of a solid integrity, a great player, who would have been of great asset to Aegis if perhaps I've played my cards differently and fought for his respect since the beginning, things would have much differently. Who knows, but there was nothing bad about this Geary that I could possibly say and while writing those mails I knew Aegis was about to lose a lot and not only because of the additional players that we would lose. And although I’ve neither asked him to leave, nor banned him, but in fact gave him a choice, I anticipated events to turn out as they did. I offered him my admin position and I would have really given it to him if he accepted it, but I didn’t really expect him to. No, I knew he would leave himself and I knew the way it would reverberate upon the community. So why did I write that mail? Having in mind I was much more calm and cool-headed than I was when dealing with Rapidut and this decision wasn’t emotional at all. I did it because it was the right choice. Not the best choice, not even a good choice but the right choice – standing up to my staff has always been the right choice, no matter what. It’s not just about Alleria, I would have done it for everyone else. I’ve been the son of a bitch in town for long enough, being some more of it wouldn’t kill me but at least I would have lived knowing I’ve done what I believed was right. So no, it was not about me and certainly had nothing to do with my pride, it was about things I could never make compromises with.
Zumifumi Lu (also known as Zumifumi) has always been a core player, not only for the alliance but for the whole Aegis community. Rarely an individual can have such an impact on a server and its playerbase as he does. His presence and skills have been an inspiration for all who had the privilege of playing with him. Being an exceptional healer in raids, dangerous adversary on the chess board and a good friend, this interview with him was nothing short of an honour
This is the introduction from the interview with him . Those words are not some “journalist’s twist” to make the article and the interviewed more interesting to the readers. They reflect my truest, most sincere opinion on Zumifumi even if this sounds fake now, said by me. I’ve read that interview several times because it offered a very important and objective insight on some of the things happening in the server, an insight I couldn’t get otherwise and I needed back then. Which is why I conducted this interview in the first place.
I really wish I could speak with him. And I tried, I really tried but it never worked out. I simply wasn’t comfortable talking with him and I can say with a fair degree of certainty that it was the same with him. Zumifumi didn’t like me. I am not entirely sure why, for what particular reason, I’m not sure when exactly I’ve provoked this disdain and hell I’m not even sure if this is indeed the case but that’s how I’ve always felt whenever I had to deal with him. He mainly played it the opposition, the critic and words of support or approval were rarely heard from him even when we objectively deserved it. Zumi has a very good grasp on reality, on the things that were going around, on the other people and on WoW which is why his opinion was so valued even if he never really realized it. He was a very good psychologist, very perceptive, extremely intelligent and maybe not despite of it, but because of it I felt so intimidated talking with him – I just sensed I must be careful with him, which is why I avoided contacts in the first place – I don't like to measure my words all the time.
Even though unlike Geary, Zumifumi had my respect much before the Oberon project, it is with Oby’s help when I managed to understand with what kind of a person I’ve been dealing with. Zumi was a very complicated person with an unparalleled sense of justice and honor and experience I could only envy him about. If I start listing his traits I’ll repeat that introduction above. The most interesting about my interaction as Oberon with him was how easy and pleasant was talking to him. For all intents and purposes we were the same people but I guess my different clothes changed everything. Or was it my different attitude? Did I behave so differently as Oby as I did as Ody? I don’t think so but my opinion is subjective. Truth is I enjoyed every damn single minute talking to and playing with this guy. Basically he is the kind of persons you would like to hang with and the kind of players you want to play with, knowing you could rely on him for anything. If before creating Oberon I respected him, after that, I came to truly consider him my friend and it was killing me that he didn’t know who his friend really was. There was a point when we were considering a second realm (which I will talk more about later) and my plans were Oberon to get “promoted” to admin for that realm and make his own team to run it. Zumifumi was on top of my lists. I never considered inviting him in Odysseus’s staff because I thought it would be really hard for us to work together, but with Oberon... I was certain we would make a great team. I can only regret those plans didn’t come to pass.
Just as I can only regret that I never managed to get to him as an admin like I managed to do as a player. As he was one of those really rare, exceptional personalities that was damn worth having as friends.
Moonlight
The most of the people I’m talking about here I have controversial experience interacting with. I rarely categorize someone as being completely good and never as being completely bad. My relations with the various Aegis staff and community members were of various color – some were brighter, some were darker but there were nuances everywhere. This is what makes Moonlight so special and different. There is simply nothing negative about him that I could say without lying to myself here. He’s always been immensely supportive, very positive and friendly personality. As a player, he is nothing short of great. In the few battlegrounds and arena games and the many raids we have had together he managed to prove again and again how skillful and competent he was. He was “cool” on every possible level in every possible area. Not only I’ve never had any problems with him as either Oberon or Odysseus but I can honestly say it was a great thing having him in Aegis, just as great was the time that I’ve had playing together with him. His presence made a difference everywhere. He didn’t seem particularly happy with all that “undercover” thing of mine but it can’t change the fact – he was one of those people I called “a friend” with Oberon, a word which I truly meant.
He stood behind us throughout all the difficulties, supporting us however he could even when there were no apparent reasons to do so any more, even after the server was for all intents and purposes dead. Now what can I say about that? I hope we've done something to earn all of this. The only words I can find are “Thank you dude!”
Fallen
Because only one imba pali can kill another imba pali
I hired Fallen in the beginning of summer 2009 in a moment when I was completely devastated and disappointed by the developments with Baghira, the problems with the Aegis Council and the overall lack of any notable progress. As if it was not enough but we’ve recently lost a good number of Lithuanian players who had migrated into Aegis from their previous server that got closed for some time. Amidst all this it was hard for me to believe in another GM and put all the time and efforts to train him the way I wanted and the way I thought was necessary. After hiring Fallen I gave him a brief educational course “on the go”, covering the most of the basic rules and principles but essentially he was let loose in the action without much preparation and practice, having to learn things himself. By that time the saff was well complemented with GMs Alleria, Baghira, Sora and Keeper and there were plenty of people to help him. I had a keen observation on him with both my horde and alliance characters, playing both with and against him so I was fairly familiar with what I could expect. Soon after I hired him however, I resigned my admin position and could no longer exercise supervision on him so Neka is more qualified to judge him from an admin’s point of view. I can speak only as a player about him and I can speak only good things. He was frequently available and was always quick to offer and provide support even if the timing wasn’t particularly convenient for him. Although his lack of experience didn’t suggest a wide competence and knowledge he was always very helpful and friendly, eager to lend assistance when necessary. I am not familiar with the reasons why he left Aegis and his position eventually, without any notification but I assume it was because it’s always been hard to be an active GM in a dead server with inactive players. But again, I can’t be sure what went wrong there.
There is nothing about the player Sunwrath that I could say that the Aegis players’ weren’t already familiar with – if he is on your side...well... lucky you, if he is marked red however, damn this guy was dangerous! He was imba beyond recognition alright but this imbalance was complemented by skills, reflexes and knowledge so he’s earned my deepest respect no matter if I was playing horde or ally.
Morfy
He is not a bad person alright, even though he was very persistent on constantly showing his "dark side" on every occasion possible. It is completely mind-boggling how such an adult and mature player could have such a childish behavior and act so immaturely! The interview with him described well his “adventures” in Aegis. The first time when we busted Morfy abusing hacks was when he was flying happily above the isle of Quel’Danas. I didn’t know whether to feel amused by his “it was my neighbor playing with my account” crap or feel offended by this apparent questioning my intelligence...I mean...his neighbor?! Give me a break, I wasn't born yesterday! We never really came even close to believing him but we eventually unbanned him because we needed the players. Very soon afterward we caught him teleporting around and we were rather entertained by her clumsy attempts to persuade us it was a .st abuse + hearthstone, even though he teleported to different places and the core hack log was spitting entries like crazy. He was permanently banned but again this “permanently” proved to be shorter than anticipated because a few months later I allowed him to play again and even returned his druid to him. “It is now about my honor” he’s said. 4 days later I had real problems keeping up with him using all GM commands available to me, while he flew the distance from Teldrassil to Wailing Caverns for about 40 seconds. I felt a little embarrassed there. Several months later I again allowed him to play in Aegis for the same reasons I've always done it but this time we didn't manage to catch him. I resigned soon after this and couldn't play his nanny anymore but who knows, maybe he's stopped abusing hacks? Even though there is a saying that there is no such thing as a "former hacker".
I no longer know what’s worse – allowing hackers in your server or banning them. Because in Morphy’s case, whenever he got banned he dragged players out along with him. In time I got over those abuses and the harm done on the server and its population, but the thing I’ll always remember him with and which I will never manage to forgive were his posts in the thread about “the BT incident” – the last posts to be published on that website before it was changed with the new one that Zeronix made for us. What he said then had nothing to do with the topic discussed. It was spiteful, insulting, unfair, deeply hurting and completely undeserved. It was also wrong.
As a player Morfy was a relatively good one although I knew him only as a rogue – a DPS dealer in which role he truly excelled. But he was too full of himself, very complacent and this complacency often turned into arrogance and downright rudeness, and at times it was against people that didn't deserve it in any way.
The Alliance
That same community that I deeply admired and respected in the ZeronixWoW times, I became really disappointed with in the first months of Aegis. Hack and bug abusers, Andromeda who deleted Rapidut’s characters and later Rapidut himself, people who criticized us and questioned our judgment on every step along the way – these were all members of the old Zwow guard and “The Lions” in particular. The lions were meant to help us build a community, not to stay in opposition all the time. Or at least that’s how I perceived things back then. It is true we’ve done mistakes and we gave them reasons to be unhappy and to complain but most times it was completely ridiculous.
Me and Neka were playing horde which was the source of almost all problems with those folks. We not only liked the game and wanted to play it but we also knew that playing in our server would bring us closer to players and their problems and since we knew each other and played together before, we preferred joining the same faction again. I played horde because I liked the look of the female Bloodelf’s butt which I would have stared in for hours. Neka played horde because he liked taurens. Neither of us gave a rat’s ass which faction would have an advantage because we were very capable of distinguishing our admin duties from what we did and what we needed as players. Still there were people who didn’t buy that and believed that just because we were playing horde, we would use and abuse our position and powers to give that horde advantage over their rivals- the allies. In fact we neither needed nor wanted that. There have never been things that “work for horde and not for allies” – simply the game mechanics don’t allow that so such claims were rather amusing. Honestly if there are still people that think alliance were discriminated in any way I doubt this article would dissuade them. I hoped that the Oberon project would prove my point but frankly unless they know us and our ways... all of this would remain just words for them. The story about us hiring only a “horde” staff was just as equally terribly misplaces and inadequate. I have no words, it’s just so unfair and untrue. I think I’ve already talked enough about that in one of the previous paragraphs.
Playing with Oberon changed profoundly my views and the way I perceived those alliance folks. I guess that leaving your life in the hands of those around you tends to do that. In order to respect them, you need to understand them and in order to understand them you need to know them. Oberon is what allowed me to know them and get to know them well enough to say they (the allies who played in Aegis by the time Oberon was created) were very decent, very honorable and capable players, who preserved their sense of unity and belonging to one strong, undying community. They were really helpful and kind and I had a truly great time playing among them and together with them. But I’m afraid I’ll start repeat the things I’ve said individually about some of them in the points above so I will stop here. Bottom line is I’m really happy and proud we had them in our server because they did make a difference and because of their devotion and persistence, Aegis kept going and lived as much as it did.
The Horde
I didn’t talk much about the horde players did I? About Reyn and Praetor, Fiona and Unstoppabull, Razienx and Zamo who I played together with since the RTK days and who remained in Aegis all this time, despite the difficulties and the low playerbase, keeping the horde alive and being the backbone of its community. We’ve spent so much time together, raiding more times that I could count, we went through so much that I would never be able to forget those folks or what they’ve done for us and our server. There were many other notable players of course – Satoshi and Vili, Sunwrath and Kantus, Thull and Sylvanas but those above are the guys who came here from day one and who stayed no matter what. Horde went through turbulent times, faced several guild conflicts, interpersonal differences, moments of decadence and triumphs but it endured. They were always beside us encouraging us – the thing we missed most from the allies.
When I created Oberon (and then Dakota) I spent the most of time I was available leveling and developing those two but I still struggled to find the time to play together with my old friends, who weren’t easy to abandon because of the Oberon idea. However in time things turned out in such a way that I had to leave my guild and therefore horde, leaving my characters and giving them away. It was a huge disappointment but it gave me more time to work with the allies. Who knows, maybe one day...
Oberon
Screw this. I’ve been rewriting this paragraph 3 times. Instead of trying to explain what was Oberon and why was it created, I’d rather declassify this document here as it best explains it all. This was the moment when I revealed Oby’s true identity, a moment that mattered a lot to me because it was the showdown, the last card I was to ever play in Aegis, and a moment I’ll remember till I draw a breath.
Before that meeting took place four people knew the truth. Neka, who I told in the very beginning because I believed he has the right to know and had to know. Keeper whom I told only after he left the staff and announced he wouldn’t play any longer. Zamolxis’ whom I didn’t tell but who managed to recognize me in Oberon’s behavior and manners with his own “undercover” alliance character, something that was a huge shock for me because I was confident that I can conceal my identity from the allies but never even thought about having to hide from the hordes, and from one in particular that I’ve spent so much time playing with, and who knew me so well, like Zamolxis. The other person I told was Alleria. I did that because I needed it. I needed desperately to hear that I was right, that I’ve been doing the right thing, that this Oberon thing would only benefit the server rather than make things worse. Not because of vanity but because of weakness and desperation – I felt so broken and helpless at times, facing severe moral issues because of what I was doing, that all I wanted was just a few words of support that never came. I needed to hear “I understand, it will be ok, don’t worry!” so much that I turned to the only place I knew I would get it from for sure – Alleria. Keeper was too frank and direct and I knew he wouldn’t really appreciate the idea of this theater, not at first anyway and I would need to explain myself more than I wanted. Baghira was one of the main reasons to create Oberon in the first place and I didn’t want her to think all the support and good words she’s heard from him were fake (not that they were). Neka’s opinion wouldn’t be objective. There was nobody among the players who I would trust enough not to reveal my secret or not to get offended by it in some way. No, Alleria was my only choice and she did well. She offered me the comfort and encouragement I needed so badly back then. Damn this was mushy...
It’s funny when I think now about the efforts I took to preserve that cover. I had two capable GMs with DB access who could easily reveal my identity by running an IP check on either Ody’s or Oby’s IP address, so every time after logging in, I accessed the DB, scrambled the IP of every account I’ve previously logged with, making sure Oberon's IP was always a genuine English one. I often logged in with both Cathrine and Oberon and I've had discussions in the /world channel between them both. It was funny but it was done to solidify my cover, not to mock the players.
For the record Oberon was not my first undercover character in the alliance. As soon as Aegis launched I had another one – a female draenei priest by the name of Mishel. I mainly stood aside from the main events, just observing them and analyzing them from a distance but eventually I couldn’t bare it any more. The things I saw, the comments that I read in the guild channel of “The lions”, the unbelievable and rather depressive things I heard about us (the admins) weren’t worth the efforts. It was too much of a painful experience so I soon dropped the idea. Besides I was afraid that if the truth was ever to come out, allies could think I’ve been spying on them and I would be having a hard time proving them wrong. Of course we’ve been running chat logs since the very beginning so such “spying” wasn’t necessary – a simple ctrl-f + a key word could give us all the info we would need on what were people thinking on a certain topic. At first we used that chat log often but the more we used it, the more depressed and desperate we were becoming (/waves at Daffy) even though we tried not to take it personally.
You can’t hope to preserve your identity by telling the truth about yourself alright? Presenting myself as a British was the safest choice. I didn’t want to imply any connection to Odysseus by admitting I was a Bulgarian (like I took the risk with Natalie in RTK) and I didn’t want complications if say I said I was from Botswana and then a Boatswain guy comes along and I have to reply to him in his own language. I was confident that my English could handle it, although there were pretty major grammar screw-ups that thankfully went unnoticed by the players (or at least I think they did). Later when Vexred, who was a real Brit came to the server I was really relaxed by the horrible amount of mistakes he was making, many of which were clearly not typos I forged a behavior, a background and manners to correspond to this “Brit” version of me and I even overdid it at times, especially with that “bloody hell” thing .
As I said during that meeting, Oberon was who I truly am. I behaved in the exact same manner as I did when playing horde which eventually allowed Zamolxis to discover me.
Communication
This one is for Zumi. Communication between staff and players is essential for the server’s development and progress, something that I was well familiar with as early as my RTK period. In order to describe how I’ve always understood communication, I will break it down into several different categories.
-Direct admin-to-players interaction. We started very strong with this one, spending quite some time talking with players and collecting different opinions. Both our MSN and Skype messengers were open and available for players to talk to us for whatever they wanted and needed. However when you keep being accused of deliberately “ruining the server” and abusing your powers on a constant basis, a time comes when you prefer doing something else rather than trying to defend yourself and your name and justify your actions. That’s why after the BT I decided enough was enough and pulled back from this. Maybe it wasn’t the best admin’s move but it was a human move.
-Direct GMs-to-players interaction. As far as I can say Aegis has set very high standards in this department. The few complains from players were timely and accordingly addressed.
-Forums. That’s where I believe we’ve beaten the competition decisively. There is not a single forum post that went unanswered accordingly. Staff was swift to reply. Both me and Neka provided an admin’s response whenever it was required. There is not a single bug report that wasn’t checked, worked upon and answered to with haste, not a single PM that wasn’t replied to, not a single idea or suggestion posted that wasn’t investigated.
-Notification. Notification when something was wrong with the server as well as notification about its current status. I think we performed to the best of our abilities there. When there were problems with the server, we’ve ALWAYS announced this as soon as we managed to diagnose them. Sometimes we weren’t home when those occurred and sometimes it wasn’t physically possible to warn and notify players because the problems were with the dedi and the website wasn’t working. But we’ve done everything within our powers not to keep people in the dark. Any complains here would be unfair. I also did my best to keep the community up to date with the current condition of the various Northrend instances and raids, only asking the players to provide us with as much feedback on those as possible so we can fix them if doable.
-Player support. This is something that everyone perceives differently and is very subjective. What matters to me is that admins and GMs helped whenever they could however they could. The rest is a matter of availability, competence and possibility because many people failed to realize that some of the things they wanted or needed from us simply couldn’t be done, there were no mechanics to allow us to do them. Admins don’t equal gods.
-Listening. That’s about considering and getting into the problems, opinions and ideas of the players and then change things, shape the server accordingly so you can improve the overall experience for those players. I’ve always “listened” to my staff, something they could easily confirm. As for “listening” to players, we’ve tried to manage it to the best of our abilities. However since we were playing horde, “listening” to hordes was far more easier and successful. That’s where Oberon came in.
And if there is still anyone who thinks that communication in Aegis was bad, let me ask this – how many times did those players seek a personal contact with us? And how many times did we turn them down or ignore them?
ANN
The ANN project had three main purposes . One was to create interesting, humorous articles for the players to read and enjoy, in order to bring more life and feeling to the forums. I have a good sense of humor and wanted to make the most of it with that Patchwerk story being my all-time favorite one. The second goal I was after was to introduce and discuss topics that were important to the community and individual players such as the dual-realm topic, battlegrounds and raids and others. The third reason was to introduce the key players from both sides to one another, get them to know each other better which would hopefully contribute to a more united and harmonious community. My opinion is that ANN achieved its goals and proved to be a very good and successful idea and I hope nobody got offended after he eventually realized it was me who has interviewed him. I wanted free, easy-going and objective interviews.
Dual Realm
This was the greatest mistake Neka has ever done. During my last month as an admin and the next month after my retirement, we were negotiating with Footy the conditions and options to create a secondary realm with a distinctively “fun” image. It would have been either instant 80, or like 30x xp or purely PVP instant 80lvl realm while the current realm we were having would have undergone modifications to a various degree. There were different plans for it and one of them was for me to take control over the new realm with Oberon and split the responsibility between me and Neka. As far as I can tell by the time of my retirement there were no obstacles to the idea. It has come late but not too late for it to be achieved. A second realm was never implemented for reasons I’m still not really aware of and reasons only Footy and Neka know. I can’t be sure if a second realm would have saved Aegis but it would have at least given it a chance.
Resignation
I resigned my position and stopped interfering in the server's affairs on 21.07.09 on the first birthday of Aegis. It was explained in the “stepping down” thread which is now gone as well as in that transcript from my meeting with the allies in Temple of Divinity. First of all I felt I have failed. I’ve been running the server for an year with no progress, many conflicts, many lost players, many disappointments, and a crapload of crap that my name was involved in. I felt responsible before Footy, before the staff and before the players so resigning sounded like the honorable and fair thing to do. Second as I mentioned in that transcript I was tired. My work in Aegis was so emotionally draining and so exhausting I can’t possibly explain it and you can’t understand it if you haven’t been in my place. So much emotions and hopes were invested in it, so much work and ambitions that at some point I felt empty, like I couldn’t go further. Not anymore. The third reason which I never shared was because I was afraid. I gave up and capitulated. For a long time I could see no way out and no way up, nothing I could do to improve things, nothing I could do to bring players. Baghira was gone, Keeper has gone, Geary has gone and things didn’t look good. For all intents and purposes Aegis was dying and I didn’t want it to die on my watch, especially if there was nothing I could do to help it. I guess it sounds pretty cowardly and it probably is but combined with the other reasons I could no longer run Aegis.
There was something else. I hoped that with me gone the stain upon the staff would disappear too and relations within it and between it and players would go much more smoothly. Maybe with me gone Geary would have returned. Maybe Baghira would have come back as a GM. Maybe staff would no longer be accused of power abuse and favoring the Horde. It was worth a try.
Leaving
As soon as that gathering in Storm Peaks concluded, I left Aegis and WoW altogether, deleting the game from my hard disk and I never logged in again, only occasionally dropping by the website to check how things were going. This is also described as thoroughly as I could in that transcript. Resigning wasn’t enough. I needed a looong break from WoW and everything related to it. Besides, I couldn’t make the transition from “the admin” to “just a player”. Not in Aegis, not in the same server I’ve been nurturing and caring for, for that long. The only way I could continue playing with Oberon was to come back with Odysseus. And this was something I knew I would never do.
I can’t help but wonder “What if?” What if I didn’t abandon Aegis? What if there were still things I could do to save it? What if my actions were the last few nails in its coffin and only doomed the server rather than help it? What if resigning was nothing but the final fragment of the long chain of mistakes I’ve done here? I don’t know which is worse – knowing the answer, or knowing I could never know it.
After I left I cut my communications with almost everyone except Neka, Baghira and Keeper who I felt too close to me to let go. But the rest of the staff including Footy and Zeronix and the players, including my friends from both the Alliance and the Horde I did my best not to see again. It was an emotional shield meant to protect me from all those memories that evoked sense of guild and failure on many different levels. I always though that one day I would seek to reestablish those contacts because these are all people that is worth keeping around but so far I've never found the strength to.
After I left I’ve been only occasionally checking the website and for about six months I’ve never even thought about WoW, working hard on the final year in my university. But in the spring I spent a month in ProWoW which was a good, successful Bulgarian server after an invitation from a friend of mine. That was in March. In April I spent another month in WoW Arthas and in May and June – a month and a half in EchelonedWoW. Those were all servers with a relatively low population between 150 and 300 players but with long traditions and stable and strong, if not particularly big playerbase. I wanted to see what was the competition doing better than us, how come they managed to pull this off and we didn’t. I spent a lot of time talking to staff, admins and owners in all three places and talking to players in attempt to gather as much information as possible regarding the server mechanics, the working and bugged things, the raids (since those were low rates servers, I never managed to make it to 80 and start actively raiding), etc. Two things became clear after all that time spent playing and investigating those servers. First, Aegis was better in every single department than each of them. Working mechanics, dungeons, player support, staff availability, that already renowned communication...everything. Everything except the size of the playerbase. Now i recon my opinion is rather subjective because looking on a server as a player and as an admin wields different results but I’m confident those comparisons were accurate. The second thing that impressed me deeply was that admins were everywhere arrogant, closed minded, always deeply convinced they were right, not listening to anyone with severe “god complexes”. Boy does this sound familiar? For starters this was my exact opinion on iNDRLM. Those were also the opinions I’ve heard about myself throughout my reign in Aegis. I didn’t know those admins and owners, I never really bothered to get to know them and understand them, seeing them only for what they were on the surface – admins. Then how could I wonder why the Aegis players never came to know and understand us, seeing us only for what we were on the surface? Ultimately its not the players’ job to. A player goes to a given server to enjoy WoW, be a part of a community, have fun and spend some good time together with his friends. He doesn’t go to that server to understand its admins. Not understanding this, is why I took so personally and so deeply the various conflicts I’ve had with certain players and this is why some of those conflicts have arisen in the first place – because I thought they owed me something that they most certainly didn’t.
What does the future hold for Aegis? I have no idea. Whatever Neka is working on at the moment, I have nothing to do with it and I know little more than the players do, so he is the most qualified to answer that. As far as I am concerned I am done with Aegis with just a few pieces of this giant jigsaw puzzle remaining for me to put together, and these chronicles were written to help me do it. I’ve often thought about returning and starting anew with Neka. However I no longer have the confidence I had an year ago. I no longer think I’m nearly qualified, competent or good to run a server and be responsible for something that big. Just as I don’t think I’ll ever again find the energy, the passion, the love to work on a server the way I did when we started, something that is of a major importance. Something that a server can’t go without.
I wish Neka and his team best of luck and hopefully they will draw the right conclusions and ideas from their past experience and mistakes as well as mine described here. Whatever Neka is up to now, I’ll always hang around to offer an advice or opinion. That’s what friends are for.
This was meant to tell the tale about Aegis and our decisions here, not to be my personal auto-wow-biography as it eventually turned out to be. I guess I thought that letting you know all those things about me would better let you comprehend the events and processes in this server.
The vorlons say that truth is a three edged sword: your side of it, their side of it, and the truth. I started writing this, clarifying this is my truth and I accept that some or many of the things written here may not have been or might not have transpired exactly like i describe it, but this is how I really perceived them. If you’ve read the above you would already know that it wasn’t written to defend or justify my actions, or try to redeem my name, or to convince anybody what a good admin I’ve been or to blame anyone. On the contrary, I regret making many of those mistakes and I am not proud of many things I’ve done here and others I’m downright ashamed of. But again this is not about my pride it is about the truth. And this is my real truth, this is what I’ve really thought, really felt, considered, feared, believed and hoped for in all the various occasions and events described here.
Being an admin is a fucked up job alright It was like nothing I’ve ever imagined before that and was certainly nothing like my experience as a GM so I never really could predict the difficulty, all the impossible choices I’d have to make, the pressure and responsibility. Half an year after I’ve first installed WoW I was a head GM in RTK. Half an year later – a staff manager in ZeronixWoW and another half an year – I was running my own server. A rapid growth that I would be proud of otherwise but unfortunately I was not prepared. I wasn’t prepared for running a server so quickly, because the things I didn’t know and understand went far beyond fixing and updating stuff. I wasn’t prepared to handle the pressure, the stress, the responsibility, to communicate with the players from the place of an admin. My opinion on whether I was a good admin changed plenty of times for the last two years and I guess it depends pretty much on the criteria used. If the criteria was the final outcome, then obviously – no, I was quite a bad one But I’ve done everything up to my skills and knowledge, according to my conscience and moral and and ethical standards
It is true that I have had many different faces in Aegis but it is also true I deeply and sincerely cared about this server and its community behind every one of them. Ody the admin, the cop, the bastard, the friend, Oberon the ally, Cathrine the horde, Jeremy Anderson the journalist, they were all created with one purpose, pursuing the same goal - making this place better and lasting. I can’t hope to manage to describe what Aegis meant to us or how devastating was our failure to us. Aegis was much more than a private WoW server, it was an embodiment of our faith, strength, will, courage, persistence, imagination, resourcefulness, and all of our flaws and weaknesses. It was all a very tough, very burdening and exhausting experience. But it was also one that allowed me to meet all these truly great and “huge” personalities. Neka and Footy, Keeper and Baghira, Lu and Moonlight, Fiona and Razienx... people that knowing them, made all the hell I’ve been going through at times, totally worth it. They are the reason why I could never really leave and forget our server, because those people...
they are what Aegis truly was.
P.S. Now that was some huge text I thank anyone who has read at least some of it. I will always keep an eye on the forums so if anyone wants to leave a remark or a comment, please don’t hesitate to do so.
Of course then he went on to beat me like 5 times in a roll. From that day, up until the last days of Aegis, I’ve been playing a frost mage 
