Hydaelyn Role-Players
Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Printable Version

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RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Nebbs - 12-22-2017

Sorry my skepticism triggers so many comments, though no ones's comments have actually addressed my concern.

I did fill it in, so I can at least comment on that with some certainty.

I await the results with interest.


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Warren Castille - 12-22-2017

(12-22-2017, 02:48 PM)Nebbs Wrote: Sorry my skepticism triggers so many comments, though no ones's comments have actually addressed my concern.

I did fill it in, so I can at least comment on that with some certainty.

I await the results with interest.

You're overthinking this.

It's an article reflecting the general opinion of life on Balmung, as viewed through the people who play on Balmung. In order to get that information, you need to, you know, collect it. There's not really an easier way to explain it.


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Kage - 12-22-2017

Roleplayers on Balmung always seem to have issues when the clickbait articles are written up on Kotaku and the like (reddit perception). I don't see why you would be opposed to knowing what people perceive about it.

Is the ERP overstated? Is it not?


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Nebbs - 12-22-2017

(12-22-2017, 02:52 PM)Warren Castille Wrote:
(12-22-2017, 02:48 PM)Nebbs Wrote: Sorry my skepticism triggers so many comments, though no ones's comments have actually addressed my concern.

I did fill it in, so I can at least comment on that with some certainty.

I await the results with interest.

You're overthinking this.

It's an article reflecting the general opinion of life on Balmung, as viewed through the people who play on Balmung. In order to get that information, you need to, you know, collect it. There's not really an easier way to explain it.

You are probably right, and there is no more to it than simplistic trivia. At least now I am engaged enough to see what comes out of this.

Alas, I'm an old soul with old ways - “Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you.” Joseph Heller, Catch-22


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Ciel - 12-22-2017

It's just to collect data, folks.  The questions were selected based on things I'm sure we've all heard from time to time:  that Balmung is all kinks and ERP (thus the ERP question), that there are cliques (and there are), that there are so many negatives about it.  Kotaku's just an example of writing being biased toward all the negatives.

I'm trying to show that our server has so much more to it than the sum of all of these negatives which, to be honest, is all most people hear about us.  I like to think I was pretty balanced in the options provided for each question. 

I did refine a couple of things after Franz posted some feedback on tumblr about it, but it received so many responses so quickly that I couldn't keep going back to make more changes.  Every time something is changed anywhere on the form, that means there will be inaccuracies in the final data, because some of the previous submitters will either not go back to redo or edit it, or there will be duplications.

Since it was first posted, we have received a sample size of nearly 250 unique submissions.  That may still only be a small slice of Balmung's population, but that's still a much bigger sample size than I was expecting and I'm grateful to see so many people have been willing to participate.

This wasn't something "needed", to answer the question.  This was voluntary.  I was asked to write the article, and while I could have gone off of my own perspectives it would not have been fair to anyone else who might have differences of opinion.  I created the survey so the players could add their voices and make the results as authentic as possible, and yes, everyone who contributed WILL be counted - even the fill in answers which didn't have exact options available.

This is not being done in response directly to Kotaku, or to the Balmung Blunders blog. Neither one of them will be mentioned at all in the article, and this was in discussion with the head honcho at The Moogle Post a week or two before the BB blog became a thing.  The survey and its results are not intended to be something to inspire judgments or callouts, it's neutral and the results are entirely up to those who choose to fill it out.

Balmung is what the players make it.  But I think we deserve better than to be known as a cesspool if we have the opportunity to prove there's more to it.

Thank you all for your interest.  I look forward to sharing the results with you all at the beginning of February.

Also, if it helps, I'm the only one who has access to the results, so no one else is seeing the submitters' names or details. I have full control over this information, and it's not being shared. What's going in the article will be mostly numbers and stats. If I feel a need to add quotes from submissions, I will get in touch directly with the submitters I'm getting it from to get permission first.

So don't worry!


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Teadrinker - 12-22-2017

Based on prior comments and my own curiosity: Will results still be counted if the participant chooses to not cite a character?


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Nebbs - 12-23-2017

Thanks Ciel that helped ease my mind.


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Valence - 12-23-2017

(12-22-2017, 09:51 PM)Ciel Wrote: It's just to collect data, folks.  The questions were selected based on things I'm sure we've all heard from time to time:  that Balmung is all kinks and ERP (thus the ERP question), that there are cliques (and there are), that there are so many negatives about it.  Kotaku's just an example of writing being biased toward all the negatives.

I'm trying to show that our server has so much more to it than the sum of all of these negatives which, to be honest, is all most people hear about us.  I like to think I was pretty balanced in the options provided for each question. 

I did refine a couple of things after Franz posted some feedback on tumblr about it, but it received so many responses so quickly that I couldn't keep going back to make more changes.  Every time something is changed anywhere on the form, that means there will be inaccuracies in the final data, because some of the previous submitters will either not go back to redo or edit it, or there will be duplications.

Since it was first posted, we have received a sample size of nearly 250 unique submissions.  That may still only be a small slice of Balmung's population, but that's still a much bigger sample size than I was expecting and I'm grateful to see so many people have been willing to participate.

This wasn't something "needed", to answer the question.  This was voluntary.  I was asked to write the article, and while I could have gone off of my own perspectives it would not have been fair to anyone else who might have differences of opinion.  I created the survey so the players could add their voices and make the results as authentic as possible, and yes, everyone who contributed WILL be counted - even the fill in answers which didn't have exact options available.

This is not being done in response directly to Kotaku, or to the Balmung Blunders blog. Neither one of them will be mentioned at all in the article, and this was in discussion with the head honcho at The Moogle Post a week or two before the BB blog became a thing.  The survey and its results are not intended to be something to inspire judgments or callouts, it's neutral and the results are entirely up to those who choose to fill it out.

Balmung is what the players make it.  But I think we deserve better than to be known as a cesspool if we have the opportunity to prove there's more to it.

Thank you all for your interest.  I look forward to sharing the results with you all at the beginning of February.

Also, if it helps, I'm the only one who has access to the results, so no one else is seeing the submitters' names or details.  I have full control over this information, and it's not being shared.  What's going in the article will be mostly numbers and stats.  If I feel a need to add quotes from submissions, I will get in touch directly with the submitters I'm getting it from to get permission first.

So don't worry!

Thank you for the clarifications.

They still raise some concerns to me and I will respectfully disagree that half the questions weren't biased toward a goal, which you implicitly admitted below (to give another image/perspective of our server). I feel that the part on ERP tries to push people to vote for the only option where it was mentioned "for character development", which naturally leads to wash away all the ERP centric image we often see associated with Balmung. Similarly, the absence of RP elitism answers where the only answers were about "FCs are too lore strict" or "FCs are fine and diverse", will naturally make the result seem more attractive and less cliquish to readers.

The fill in answers sure help to alleviate the issue quite a bit, but they don't remove the bias of the survey. Not that with something more neutral I expect to see much difference in the results anyway, since that bias seems to represent pretty well the mainstream of the community: people naturally tend to answer that they do less ERP than they do in reality (a lot), and not a lot of people are concerned about the lack of strong RP themes in FCs anyway.

So I guess my issue lies more in a problem of principles/form, and that form tends to smother even more the minorities. I sincerely hope that will be taken in account in the article.

In short, I don't like the agenda behind, it biases everything. This is just my opinion of course.

On a matter of principles, I also would be very happy if you could delete all the characters names once you did your character check. I'm not that annoyed that someone knows exactly how I feel on most of those questions since they aren't especially personal, but I certainly feel uneasy knowing that all those names and their preferences are kept in the care of a single person.

Now then, if you don't, that's fine. We chose to answer and knew what we were going into. I just feel it's a matter of good etiquette.

I hope you'll understand.


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Ciel - 12-23-2017

As stated in the disclaimer on the survey, I need the names so I can confirm that the respondents are actually on Balmung and not just throwing information into it to throw off numbers.

I can't make any further changes to the form to add additional options, as I also stated, and I explained why.  I'm sorry you feel it's biased. I feel I did my best to not make it that way.  I'm human, I'm not a scientist or a statistician.  I'm just someone who plays a video game.  I did NOT bias the answers toward being all positive, and allowed plenty of opportunity for negative responses and individual elaborations which will be counted when it's time for the final tally.  If you feel it's biased, I'm afraid you're reading too much into it.

The data, including the names, isn't going to be retained anywhere once the article is completed.

I appreciate peoples' feedback, but I'm going to step back from here.  Again, if someone doesn't feel right about filling it out, then don't.  It's not that big of a deal.


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Marisa - 12-24-2017

Only question I didn't like was the ERP one. I never ERP, so my only option was "I stay as far away from it as possible." That makes it sound like I have something against it, when I don't. I just don't find it fun, and even if I did, my character is a child so it'd be... weird. That said, I have no issue with people ERPing near me or even being a third party for ERP, just as long as its not my character being sexual.


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Varinh - 12-24-2017

(12-23-2017, 02:25 PM)Ciel Wrote: I can't make any further changes to the form to add additional options, as I also stated, and I explained why.  I'm sorry you feel it's biased. I feel I did my best to not make it that way.  I'm human, I'm not a scientist or a statistician.  I'm just someone who plays a video game.  I did NOT bias the answers toward being all positive, and allowed plenty of opportunity for negative responses and individual elaborations which will be counted when it's time for the final tally.  If you feel it's biased, I'm afraid you're reading too much into it.

I dunno if I'd call someone's preference towards lore strict roleplay a "negative answer." There in and of itself is your bias.


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Valence - 12-24-2017

(12-23-2017, 02:25 PM)Ciel Wrote: As stated in the disclaimer on the survey, I need the names so I can confirm that the respondents are actually on Balmung and not just throwing information into it to throw off numbers.

I can't make any further changes to the form to add additional options, as I also stated, and I explained why.  I'm sorry you feel it's biased. I feel I did my best to not make it that way.  I'm human, I'm not a scientist or a statistician.  I'm just someone who plays a video game.  I did NOT bias the answers toward being all positive, and allowed plenty of opportunity for negative responses and individual elaborations which will be counted when it's time for the final tally.  If you feel it's biased, I'm afraid you're reading too much into it.

The data, including the names, isn't going to be retained anywhere once the article is completed.

I appreciate peoples' feedback, but I'm going to step back from here.  Again, if someone doesn't feel right about filling it out, then don't.  It's not that big of a deal.

Don't sweat it, it's not much of a big deal. I chose to answer nevertheless because 1) I felt I had to represent a point of view that isn't exactly mainstream, and 2) I wouldn't have taken the time to fill that survey if I truly had a serious issue with it.

Good luck!


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Ciel - 12-24-2017

(12-24-2017, 08:03 AM)Ashtrythe Wrote: I dunno if I'd call someone's preference towards lore strict roleplay a "negative answer." There in and of itself is your bias.

The options on the form are not my personal opinions.  Most of the options are a collection of things people have stated about their observations at one time or another.  Therefore, no, it's not a bias on my part.  It's an option people can select, or not, if they feel it matches their opinion.  People will apply their own connotations to it.


RE: Roleplayers' Perspective of Life on Balmung - Ciel - 01-02-2018

Final bump!  Survey closes at 10pm US central tomorrow, 1/3/18.  After that time, no further submissions will be accepted.

Thank you!