Ungrateful Slackass PosterBoys

[SK Fish]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Fionn:

Unfortunately a few of the old-timers sometimes, when pissed off at some newbie attitude, do over-generalise and that's not right.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

ROTFLMAO;

Coming from Fionn, that's got to be one of the funniest thing said yet on this forum!

;D

[Fionn]

SKFish,

Coming from someone who obviously hasn't ever searched and found the numerous times I've defended newbies who have been attacked due to poor English or something similar your (above) post has to be one of the most pathetic ones I've ever seen.

Thanks for participating. I suggest you SEARCH in future to actually gain enough info to base a statement on.

You registered on the 22nd of June and think you know the dynamics of the forum only a month later? There are people who've been here since BEFORE this forum software was even initialised. Your post is the sort of post ( based on only a TINY sliver of available info) which gives newbies a bad name.

[This message has been edited by Fionn (edited 07-20-2000).]

[PawBroon]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by SK Fish:

Coming from Fionn, that's got to be one of the funniest thing said yet on this forum!

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

That's exactly what I had in mind when I said that we have to police the forum in my above post.

Rule #1 is: DO NOT MAKE IT PERSONNAL.

Say, Fionn has well over 3000 posts.

Some of them very well may be piss poor.

It's not about the tiring newbie/oldie gimmick but when you do that much contribution to a community, your errors (because we are ALL prone to do some) are more often than not noticed by the crowd.

Give Fionn a break, you are just feeding a sterile argument and pinpointing our attention to your usefulness or lack thereof.

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Either he's dead or my watch has stopped

[Guest Germanboy]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by SK Fish:

ROTFLMAO;

Coming from Fionn, that's got to be one of the funniest thing said yet on this forum!

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Funny sense of humour that. I can only agree with what PawBroon says - he may not always hit it right with his tone, but he has certainly defended a lot of newcomers and he is always ready to share information or contribute to a discussion.

And if you care to do a search with the topic 'Waffen-SS' and 'moral', you will see that Fionn and I have had our run-ins, but I still respect him for his attitude shown on this forum.

Posts like this are exactly what I am talking about when I talk about the lack of respect for other people.

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Andreas

[Darstand]

We now interrupt this Flamefest with an important Public Service Announcement………….

Do You suffer from WHINE behavior? ((Wimpy, Horrendously Infantile, Nitwit in the Extreme))

Examples of WHINE

1) Taking something totally out of context and being totally offended.

2) Being incredibly rude

3) Unwillingness to admit incredible rudeness.

4) Treating this area like a Personal forum when it's a Public one.

5) Treating CM:BO like it belongs on a shrine.

If you suffer from any of the above symptoms

PLEASE DIAL

1-800-GET-A GRIP

Our counselors our standing by…..

We now return you to our regularly scheduled Flamefest

[Fionn]

PawBroom,

While you are right insofar as you say this isn't a newbie vs oldie issue basically it IS an issue which is divided along those lines simply because the vast majority of members who have been here since 1998 or 1999 have come in, had a few scrapes with eachother and then reached a modus vivendi.

I remember a number of posters who are now good friends with eachother and swap jokes who, when one or other initially joined, had terrible fights.

The problem, as I see it, is that new forum members who are coming on now are having, generally, the same amount of problems adjusting and raising hackles as we've had all along BUT because there are so many more newbies the problem seems worse than it is. ( It is just more concentrated IMO).

On the other hand I WILL say that there is a specific subgroup of new members who think they know an awful lot more than they think they do and are carrying on in a quite atrocious manner insofar as they're attacking people who know an awful lot more than them and not listening to reason.

Just recently we've had people who think that nuclear handgrenades are common, who don;t understand even the basics of the scale of the war on different fronts etc. |The problem is NOT that these people don't know these facts but that SOME of these people are attacking others who DO know the facts.

We've always had a constant trickle of newbies who post and never stir up any trouble because they ask nice, honest questions and are willing to listen to an honest response from someone who knows more than them. No-one ever notices this 80% or so of newbies who post.

However about 1 in 5 ( this is a guesstimate on my part) seem to come on here with either an attitude, an agenda or a vastly overblown opinion of what they know and make a bit of a nuisance of themselves.

A small number of these guys do eventually see some sense and adopt a more mannered approach to asking questions and receiving answers and then are quite quickly accepted and given the benefit of the doubt but probably half continue to behave as though they have a right to be an obnoxious asshole whose opinions are the subject of holy writ.

This is a phenomenon which occurs on ALL fora and even in society at large and isn't something which I think can be avoided on this forum BUT I do think we owe it to ourselves to be realistic about the issue and admit that the reason there is constant friction about questions posted by some newbies is because these guys DO come here with a piss-poor attitude.

Blaming old-timers for reacting to someone who comes here with a piss-poor attitude and very few correct facts etc is a bit rich IMO. Definitely old-timers shouldn't over-generalise BUT there are quite a few newbies who:

a) don't know their ass from their elbow as far as the history being discussed here goes and

have serious attitude issues when asking questions.

Let's simply realise that and only trample old-timers when they really ARE attacking someone who doesn't deserve it. Condemning them for bitching about someone who doesn't know his **** and comes here with attitude is not the right approach to take IMO.

Also, let's realise that so long as people come to the forum we're constantly going to get an influx of :

1. A few really knowledgeable people.

2. A lot of people who know the basics

3. Some people who are totally new to wargaming and know nothing BUT who know and admit that they know nothing

4. Some opinionated guys who come in a little too belligerently ( some of whom will see the need to mediate themselves a little and often have much to add to the forum and some of whom never change their spots).

The above is just the way it is and always will be unfortunately.

To whatever newbies might be reading this... Ask politely and without reference to conspiracies or the idiocy etc etc of others and you'll probably be surprised at the extent of detail and time old=timers will take in responding to you.

OR ( and this is something a fair few newbies have done over the past 2 or 3 months) email an old-timer and ask him if he thinks your question makes sense and if it would be a good "first question" for the forum.

A fair few forum virgins have emailed me with various questions they wanted to post to the forum over the past few months just to make sure it wasn't something which had been asked 5000 times already and to make sure that it wasn't offensive to anyone.

Obviously the guys who take the time to worry if they are going to offend someone with their wording are usually the guys whose questions are totally valid and polite already BUT I just outline something some newbies have done and which has worked wonders in ensuring that their first post comes across as intelligent and friendly ( since first impressions count).

[Fionn]

Hehe trust you Andreas .

Yeah Germanboy is right . We DEFINITELY do not see eye to eye on a lot of things BUT, apart from a few times we've both gotten a bit hot under the collar during the heat of the argument, we both understand that we're simply disagreeing about an ISSUE .

I respect Andreas' position on this issue. I think he's about as wrong as can be BUT he's intelligent, willing to argue his position, back it up with whatever research and reading he has AND makes an intelligent case. I'm sure we'll both go to our graves safe in the knowledge that the other person is 100% wrong on our "Waffen SS" disagreement but that doesn't mean we can't respect eachothers opinions AND intelligence and research .

See, disagreeeing vehemently with someone doesn't mean you can't respect them as a person etc. OTOH once someone takes an attitude and doesn't apologise for it or change their ways then retaliation etc etc becomes inevitable.

Ah, Darstand steps in with his helpful post ( you know Dar, if you're trying NOT to start a flamefest then why would you post something so obviously aimed as that? ). Seems kind of misleading to me.

Oh, and I'll also note that as someone with about 4000 posts ( some of my posts weren't counted due to server errors) it IS possible for me to have a bad day and snap at someone BUT I DO contribute far more AND if you want to do a search you'll find a number of occasions where I have apologised if someone just caught me on a bad day.

I don't apologise though if someone comes here with attitude and I respond likewise. If someone hit me I'd hit back without apology too. I don't believe in being a meek little target for morons.

[PawBroon]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Fionn:

Oh, and I'll also note that as someone with about 4000 posts ... it IS possible for me to have a bad day and snap at someone BUT I DO contribute far more AND if you want to do a search you'll find a number of occasions where I have apologised if someone just caught me on a bad day.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

My point entirely Fionn.

Thousands of posts make for some statistical disparities.

Hence some of them are prone to be bad day posting.

You are right when you say it's REALLY a newbie/oldie issue.

What I had in mind is that the new batch (me being one) and the old Guard should be more fighting on issues than against someone in particular.

My 2 cents is that people like Moon, Madmatt, you and some others had reached a certain "icon" status and some of the newcommers seemed to believe that a showdown on the forum is the best way to improve in their status.

Waoow, that was Headology if I ever saw one...

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Either he's dead or my watch has stopped

[SK Fish]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Fionn:

I don't apologise though if someone comes here with attitude and I respond likewise. If someone hit me I'd hit back without apology too. I don't believe in being a meek little target for morons.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Good to see that you can roll with the punches hahaha.

Hey when is 1.03 patch going to be out, I though it was going to be today, and will it have the East Front in it. Oops perhaps I should do a search.

;D

[Guest Madmatt]

Geez, the evolution of Madmatt:

Newbie...

Troublemaker...

Sycophant (didn't last long since I didn't know what it meant!)

Head of Church of New Scenarios

Hated New inductee to Beta Club

Captain of CMHQ...

Self Absorbed Overly Hostile Fanatic...

Megalomanical Bot bent on enslaving humanity

Icon...

Seems fitting somehow... I sure hope I dont have that damn arrow in the lower corner! I hate those in my icons..

Madmatt

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If it's in Combat Mission, it's on Combat Mission HQ!

CMHQ-Annex, The Alternative side of Combat Mission

Combat Mission HQ

CMHQ-Annex

Proud members of the Combat Mission WebRing

[This message has been edited by Madmatt (edited 07-20-2000).]

[PawBroon]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by SK Fish:

Good to see that you can roll with the punches hahaha. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Can't see what you hope to attain with that Fish.

Do yourself a service, wipe your slate clean, log with another name and a new attitude and enjoy that game and some of the sound advices you could get in here...

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Either he's dead or my watch has stopped

[PawBroon]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Madmatt:

Geez, the evolution of Madmatt:

I sure hope I dont have that damn arrow in the lower corner! I hate those in my icons...

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I'm glad you liked it.

I was refering to the little pesky buggers you double click on, or maybe it had a more severe religious twist...

I was clueless (as usual, me being french I tend to proceed on a "In case of emergency, say something" basis) as to whether it was one or the other.

But you made your choice...

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Either he's dead or my watch has stopped

[This message has been edited by PawBroon (edited 07-20-2000).]

[:USERNAME:]

This thread is completely puke inducing. Maybe the Icons need their own special forum.

Lewis

PS Who has had the most number of threads locked up?

[Guest Madmatt]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by :USERNAME::

PS Who has had the most number of threads locked up?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Hmm, could have sworn it was YOU in fact Lewis...

Madmatt

------------------

If it's in Combat Mission, it's on Combat Mission HQ!

CMHQ-Annex, The Alternative side of Combat Mission

Combat Mission HQ

CMHQ-Annex

Proud members of the Combat Mission WebRing

[SK Fish]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by PawBroon:

Can't see what you hope to attain with that Fish.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

It's a F#@&ing joke PawBroon, do a search on joke, joking, teasing and Fionn, and see what you come up with.

Well that's ironic. hahaha

;D

[Talenn]

Well, this thread is going downhill quickly, but I'll put another $.02 into the pot.

Germanboy:

I didnt mention the MG Thread as an example of 'newbie dissing' but as an example of the possibility that someone new to the forum might have something worthwhile to contribute. It also adequately displayed the attitute that 'nothing can be wrong with CM, it MUST be you.' I cant say I blame some folks for that attitude given the number of posts that ARE obviously of questionable merit (Nuclear Handgrenades anyone?)

It must be difficult to tell the sheep from the goats, but IMO, its worthwhile to the old-timers to give it their best shot. There are alot of issues being brought up by folks new to CM that I find very valid. Many are, IMO, not worth niggling with at this point, but are valid still the same. Occasionally, some of the things brought up (by new posters) are things I feel would benefit the game greatly. I'm sure others feel the same way.

Regarding the Search response: I didnt mean to imply that everyone should have to restated their positions on every point every other week. But if someone missed a discussion, they might want to bring something up of their OWN and get a response. True, if asking questions like 'Is a buttoned vehicle suffering a hit percentage penalty', they might find an answer to their question. If they wanted to open a discussion concerning whether that penalty is too large or too small, they would have to post their OPINION on the matter.

Overall, the 'Search for it' response tends to come off as "We've already covered that...go look it up. Nothing you say will change anything. Have a nice day". Perhaps that isnt the way it is intended, but it DOES often sound that way. Again, its an understandable attitude given some of the recurring questions. I've been here for a month, and have seen some of the same questions over and over.

The reason I jumped on this was because both the original post AND some subsequent responses have implied that 'people shouldnt question the game mechanics..its been tested and re-tested by people better than you'. I just think that that attitude is not only poor, but dangerous to the continued growth of CM. If people dont actually have that attitude, they should take care not to give others that impression. I am veteran of many forums, and many discussions. I am not going to be 'offended' by post on GAME board that I use a hobby.

Also, people should keep this in mind. The ones who you are complaining about ARENT the ones who are going to read this thread and leave. They dont care WHAT people think or what they respond like. Often, I think they are posting trash just to see what kind of response they draw. But the folks who DO have valuable things to contribute read too many threads like this one and think 'Why bother?

Talenn

[Guest Mirage2k]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Talenn:

Also, people should keep this in mind. The ones who you are complaining about ARENT the ones who are going to read this thread and leave. They dont care WHAT people think or what they respond like. Often, I think they are posting trash just to see what kind of response they draw. But the folks who DO have valuable things to contribute read too many threads like this one and think 'Why bother? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Good point. There is no need to feed trolls. Complaining about newbies will only drive away those whom we seek.

I was a newcomer once. I still consider myself a newbie, and have very little knowledge compared to some of the other blokes here. I don't post much, because a lot of times I don't feel like I have much to add to the discussion (total posts right now are 123).

But even when I was the most ignorant, un-WWII-educated, smiley-lover on the planet, I was never treated unkindly by anyone in this forum. I see NO reason why that feat can't be repeated. Most of the people here are very nice and understanding of a person's knowledge (or lack thereof) of World War II. I have never heard of anyone being flamed for not knowing a lot about history. I DO see people flamed for pretending to know a lot about history, and that's a different matter entirely.

Also, I don't see why pointing someone to the search function or to the relevent thread itself isn't a good answer. If you're in high school and you ask your teacher a question and they point you to the right place in the textbook, is that a bad answer? No, it's a perfectly acceptable response, IMHO.

If Jeff is still reading this thread, I think the reason people jumped on you was because your attitude seemed to be one of "This is what BTS is doing wrong. Why am I the only one who sees this? Are these guys at BTS just plain ignorant or what?" I'm not saying this is what you were actually saying, but I think your posts could easily be confused for that. Certain people reacted the way they did because they have been here a long time, had a hand in actually creating/testing the game, and understand that Steve and Charles (of BTS) spent several years of their own time, without pay, to research and code Combat Mission just because they wanted to make the most realistic WWII wargame ever. This is not to say that they game is perfect, or that Steve and Charles should be nominated for the Nobel Prize. One can make very legitimate criticisms of CM, and I promise you that they will be taken seriously by BTS and the members of this forum. I just think that some people may have taken your post the wrong way, as I mentioned before.

I hope this was all just a misunderstanding that we can move past like the mature people we are.

Just simmer down, people.

-Andrew

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Throw me a frickin' smiley people!

[This message has been edited by Mirage2k (edited 07-20-2000).]

[Guest Big Time Software]

This thread has been on the brink of getting closed for quite some time now. Long enough actually.

I think most valid arguments on the topic newbie/oldtimer have been made in between the flames in this thread. Not that I see much disagreement on the topic as such, the flames seem to be residuals from other threads or personal grudges.

Please resolve any remaining grudges via email.

Let's all go look at some of the other threads where we'll hopefully see respectful and polite oldtimers help out respectful and polite newbies.

Deputy Moderator