LMAO@SpaceBattles!

[Jedi Master Spock]

But SB.com is supposed to be a place where non gestapo types can go and debate VS without being abused and banned for maybe getting it wrong (or just disagreeing with the party line from the Talifan and crew SDN has on the board). The place is becoming like a armed camp with WR, LEO1 and other assholes charging around like fucking debate police spewing abuse at will and spamming the report button to get people bans.

While some may claim this is all about "standards" the fact they continually ignore the most vile insults from these individuals contrary to the same rules along with other crap sums up the standards quite well, i doubt this is what the owners of the board had in mind when they created it.

The sad truth is that if you want to handle that, you're going to have to play hardball with the rules right back. Report and document every single time that Leo1, White Rabbit, et cetera break the rules. Treat it like a legal case and keep your reports and the post URLs in a document on your computer.

After no response, point out the large number of violations. Document your interactions with the moderators - your reports, your questions, your responses. Once you have a large catalog of identified offenses, point out how uneven the moderation is. Point out what little it takes for others to be banned and how some established posters are getting away with it. Ask if the rules apply to everyone. Yes, I know that it seems unfair to use the rules as a weapon; but when the other side is doing it, you can't afford not to do so if you want to get anywhere.

Again, continue to document everything along the way. Once you have accumulated evidence that the moderator is unwilling or unable to moderate fairly, appeal to a supermoderator. This is per SB.com policy within your right. Point out that it is so:

While the decisions of the staff are generally final, it is permitted and encouraged for any issue over moderator decisions to be questioned privately with the staff.

The procedure is as follows:

1. A Personal Message (PM) or instant message (ICQ, MSN etc, where applicable) should be sent to the moderator who participated in the questionable act.
2. Should you still find the issue unresolved you can make an appeal to a Super Moderator.
3. The final resort if all this is unsatisfactory is to speak to the administrators themselves. It should be noted that the administrators are busy people and they might not appreciate trivial matters being placed on their doorstep. Once this procedure is exhausted the administrator decision is final.

At no point does this procedure allow for the creation of an open thread on the issue in question, moderational decisions are NOT subject to pandering to an audience and degeneration into a circus.

Also keep in mind that moderators do not spend 24 hours a day online and have lives of their own outside of the forums. A reply might not be immediately forthcoming, and all members are requested to show patience with their complaints.

In appealing to a supermoderator, you will want to be able to show precedent to establish that the incidents that inspired the appeal are not isolated, but part of a larger pattern; and thus that the supermoderator needs to correct the behavior of the moderator, rather than simply overruling some particular decision.

Once you have a case for the supermoderators not being any help, appeal to the administrators. At this point - if it comes to this point - you will want to have a well-documented case for systematic unfairness in the moderation staff, and you will probably want to be able to point to assenting opinions.

It will require work and patience. In general, it's been my perception that the higher-level moderators on SB.com are less closely tied to the VS debate section, so I don't think it's futile to appeal. This perception has developed from the discussions we've had about Alyeska and Thanatos here.

[Mr. Oragahn]

Simply not worth the time. I realized that too late myself. If you have to fight against the administration, and store every single link, quote, etc., you better get paid for that job. Seriously.
No, just screw that. If you really want to post on SBC and stay out of control of the moderators, play the hard ball the way they can't really do anything about it.

Be a Zinc.

[Kor_Dahar_Master]

But SB.com is supposed to be a place where non gestapo types can go and debate VS without being abused and banned for maybe getting it wrong (or just disagreeing with the party line from the Talifan and crew SDN has on the board). The place is becoming like a armed camp with WR, LEO1 and other assholes charging around like fucking debate police spewing abuse at will and spamming the report button to get people bans.

While some may claim this is all about "standards" the fact they continually ignore the most vile insults from these individuals contrary to the same rules along with other crap sums up the standards quite well, i doubt this is what the owners of the board had in mind when they created it.

The sad truth is that if you want to handle that, you're going to have to play hardball with the rules right back. Report and document every single time that Leo1, White Rabbit, et cetera break the rules. Treat it like a legal case and keep your reports and the post URLs in a document on your computer.

After no response, point out the large number of violations. Document your interactions with the moderators - your reports, your questions, your responses. Once you have a large catalog of identified offenses, point out how uneven the moderation is. Point out what little it takes for others to be banned and how some established posters are getting away with it. Ask if the rules apply to everyone. Yes, I know that it seems unfair to use the rules as a weapon; but when the other side is doing it, you can't afford not to do so if you want to get anywhere.

Again, continue to document everything along the way. Once you have accumulated evidence that the moderator is unwilling or unable to moderate fairly, appeal to a supermoderator. This is per SB.com policy within your right. Point out that it is so:

While the decisions of the staff are generally final, it is permitted and encouraged for any issue over moderator decisions to be questioned privately with the staff.

The procedure is as follows:

1. A Personal Message (PM) or instant message (ICQ, MSN etc, where applicable) should be sent to the moderator who participated in the questionable act.
2. Should you still find the issue unresolved you can make an appeal to a Super Moderator.
3. The final resort if all this is unsatisfactory is to speak to the administrators themselves. It should be noted that the administrators are busy people and they might not appreciate trivial matters being placed on their doorstep. Once this procedure is exhausted the administrator decision is final.

At no point does this procedure allow for the creation of an open thread on the issue in question, moderational decisions are NOT subject to pandering to an audience and degeneration into a circus.

Also keep in mind that moderators do not spend 24 hours a day online and have lives of their own outside of the forums. A reply might not be immediately forthcoming, and all members are requested to show patience with their complaints.

In appealing to a supermoderator, you will want to be able to show precedent to establish that the incidents that inspired the appeal are not isolated, but part of a larger pattern; and thus that the supermoderator needs to correct the behavior of the moderator, rather than simply overruling some particular decision.

Once you have a case for the supermoderators not being any help, appeal to the administrators. At this point - if it comes to this point - you will want to have a well-documented case for systematic unfairness in the moderation staff, and you will probably want to be able to point to assenting opinions.

It will require work and patience. In general, it's been my perception that the higher-level moderators on SB.com are less closely tied to the VS debate section, so I don't think it's futile to appeal. This perception has developed from the discussions we've had about Alyeska and Thanatos here.

I followed the procedure and got ignored by both the moderator and the super mod so i eventually sent all the material i had at the time to the observer who actually replied and sais it was being looked into, since then i have been compiling info in regards to the constant one sidedness of the moderation standards in regards to certain individuals.

[General Donner]

On a second note, I may have confused Connor with someone else. Shitty memories and all that, I'll have to look at the ICS again, but there's nothing on the laptop. I'll tell you.
EDIT: I checked out and it's Vympel who's listed in the ICS acknowledgments. Connor could fit in the random anons. It wouldn't surprise me though, as the way of generating silly numbers, everything about the methodology has been the same over the two sides of that river.

You'd be right in that guess. VS debater "Connor MacLeod" is the one and the same as one Mr. Adam Gehrls, who was listed in the EP2:ICS credits.

[Mr. Oragahn]

On a second note, I may have confused Connor with someone else. Shitty memories and all that, I'll have to look at the ICS again, but there's nothing on the laptop. I'll tell you.
EDIT: I checked out and it's Vympel who's listed in the ICS acknowledgments. Connor could fit in the random anons. It wouldn't surprise me though, as the way of generating silly numbers, everything about the methodology has been the same over the two sides of that river.

You'd be right in that guess. VS debater "Connor MacLeod" is the one and the same as one Mr. Adam Gehrls, who was listed in the EP2:ICS credits.

Thanks!
What a revealing thread, full of irony. I see my problem: it wasn't SDN but SBC that I should have look at. He joined SBC in 2000, debated against Mike Wong in 2001, joined SDN in 2002, and soon enough, in 2003, he took the decision to post and edit the X-virus databank thread, in support of of Mike Wong. Seems the cult mechanic started to gain momentum in 2001 and kept going for the next half decade, with people impressed by Mike Wong's and then Saxton's background, the amount of tech pages posted on SDN. This everlasting impression was all the greater as cherry picking was so efficient that problematic quotes or interpretations would not see the day.
Revelant SDN pages:
http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Hat ... amble.html
http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/HateMail/Virus-X/
Interesting how the gripes Wong still holds against Spacebattles dates back to that time. Didn't he notice the difference? Actually, the shift in the consensus seems to have been rather brutal at SBC, if back in 2001, Connor would ask if he should/could debate Mike Wong. This query solely due to the way Wong had voiced his challenge, while SBC denizens didn't give a rat's ass and knew there was no board committee's green light to be given there. Supposedly, SBC was a Trekkie board back then. After that, in 2002 and 2003, came the ICS furor years. I don't know when the shift occurred within the moderation staff, but clearly, there started the era when versus mods such as CPL_Facehugger, Thanatos, Skyzeta and else would clearly be warsies (or/and hammies) in heart.

[Nowhereman10]

You'd be right in that guess. VS debater "Connor MacLeod" is the one and the same as one Mr. Adam Gehrls, who was listed in the EP2:ICS credits.

Huh, that's interesting. So if this is correct, there may be other Warsies VS debaters hiding in that acknowledgement who go by anon nicks. So that's four prominent Warsies so far. Any others?

[General Donner]

You'd be right in that guess. VS debater "Connor MacLeod" is the one and the same as one Mr. Adam Gehrls, who was listed in the EP2:ICS credits.

Huh, that's interesting. So if this is correct, there may be other Warsies VS debaters hiding in that acknowledgement who go by anon nicks. So that's four prominent Warsies so far. Any others?

Several other people involved in the Internet vs debate on the Wars side besides the "Big Three" who go by their actual names online get credited by Saxton in both ICSes he wrote. I thought that wasn't news.

Dennis Aspo and John Edward Vermazen from the EP3:ICS are better known to us as "His Divine Shadow" and "Lord_Darth_Bob(TFN)/"Illuminatus Primus"(SDN), respectively. Julius Sykes is SDN's "Publius" and says as much on his own site. Kazuaki Shimazaki is the same guy as was booted off SDN, apparently for having some creepy personal opinions. Daniel P. Krouse, not mentioned in either ICS but listed among the "Acknowledgements" on a couple of pages at SWTC, is the "Ender" Darkstar talks about on his anti-ICS page. Those would be most of the major players, I believe, though I might've missed some.

[Kor_Dahar_Master]

more from sb.com:

http://forums.spacebattles.com/showpost ... tcount=138


Is it just me or could they have just proclaimed his assertions unproven and moved on with the debate rather than pointing him?.

Some of those guys call people motherfucker amoung other foul insults for no penalty at all, but dishing out points, short term or even perma bans for MAYBE being wrong is just a bit excessive imho..

[Nowhereman10]

You'd be right in that guess. VS debater "Connor MacLeod" is the one and the same as one Mr. Adam Gehrls, who was listed in the EP2:ICS credits.

Huh, that's interesting. So if this is correct, there may be other Warsies VS debaters hiding in that acknowledgement who go by anon nicks. So that's four prominent Warsies so far. Any others?

Several other people involved in the Internet vs debate on the Wars side besides the "Big Three" who go by their actual names online get credited by Saxton in both ICSes he wrote. I thought that wasn't news.

Dennis Aspo and John Edward Vermazen from the EP3:ICS are better known to us as "His Divine Shadow" and "Lord_Darth_Bob(TFN)/"Illuminatus Primus"(SDN), respectively. Julius Sykes is SDN's "Publius" and says as much on his own site. Kazuaki Shimazaki is the same guy as was booted off SDN, apparently for having some creepy personal opinions. Daniel P. Krouse, not mentioned in either ICS but listed among the "Acknowledgements" on a couple of pages at SWTC, is the "Ender" Darkstar talks about on his anti-ICS page. Those would be most of the major players, I believe, though I might've missed some.

I've only recently gotten involved in this VS debate stuff, and I never cared much enough for the ICSes to plunk down my hard-earned money to buy them. When I started reading Darkstar's pages to look for arguements and evidence to contradict the Warsie BS on YouTube and other places, that's when I really found out about the acknowledgements having the "Big Three" there, among others. None of the local new or used bookstores in my area have any of the ICS for sale any more, so I can't go and skim through them to check if it's true or not. Once I found SFJN and SBC, it was clear that Darkstar was right, at least to some extent. So this is really valuable stuff, Donner, of it pans out to be true, then my thanks to you as this is more evidence that Dr. Saxton used highly biased sources to wank out Star Wars tech far beyond it's actual limits, and possibly with the motivation for helping his pro-Wars VS debate friends win against Trek.

[Mr. Oragahn]

I didn't know about D. Aspo. I knew who Vermazen was, but are you sure he's in the credits of the third prequel-ICS?
Vympel/Leo1 is Dorian Kratsas and I recall he appears in one of the two ICSes.

[Mr. Oragahn]

more from sb.com:

http://forums.spacebattles.com/showpost ... tcount=138


Is it just me or could they have just proclaimed his assertions unproven and moved on with the debate rather than pointing him?.

Some of those guys call people motherfucker amoung other foul insults for no penalty at all, but dishing out points, short term or even perma bans for MAYBE being wrong is just a bit excessive imho..

I don't know.
Insults are not always considered a problem. Some moderators even think they're called for when the other side isn't good enough or honest, so don't expect any consistency. Yes, the problem is that it's tied to your performance as a debater, regarding the quality of your arguments. And Ricrery1's is simply not good enough yet. His Star Trek bullet list was tiring, and the one he threw at the face of hammies on 40K wasn't particularly foolproof either. He gives too many opportunities to his opponents to bash him with his own mistakes. Besides, WR is a good troll, very good at baiting other people and getting out by making the other side look bad. Ricrery1 could have circumvented that by going for a K.I.S.S. post, but since he doesn't easily let go points he should concede, that would have not helped him much I suppose.
Plus he was getting stuck into an argument about mass lightening (oh, the memories...) and the speeds of Nova projectiles.
At some point, he even finds himself saying that the Nova shells in "Shadow Point" were fired at .25c, instead of 5000 km/s. That's wrong.
I believe someone pointed out in the thread that the same author used the high c fractional speed in his next book, "Execution Hour". But again, I covered "Execution Hour", and I know how it is thesame book that comes with that:

Combat in warp space was up-close and deadly, the range of scanners and weapons targeters so limited here that engagements took place at distances measured in hundreds rather than tens of thousands of kilometres/ The area between the two ships was saturated with energy as enough firepower to level a city was unleashed across it. Void shield strikes registered as bright blossoms on surveyor screens, and both ships shuddered under the impact of on-target hits.

Which Connor conveniently ignored in his own thread at SDN.
Just as much as he ignored this one as well:

Indeed, the captain of an Imperial Navy warship commanded destructive capabilities undreamed of by any mere Imperial Guard commander. Its hull-side batteries could raze whole cities with sustained orbital bombardments.

After the initial shock of the attack, the wrath of the orbiting Imperial warships would be swift and summary, and the reinforced rockcrete walls of these underground silos and the hundred meters of rock and soil above their heads would offer little protection from the sustained bombardment from the gun batteries of a Capital class warship.

All were quoted by him. Connor posted them, but then his brain switched off like if they didn't exist or something, as he didn't draw the obvious conclusions out of them.

But I'm sure WR would want people to ignore the whole of "Shadow Point", right? It's such an outlier, after all (sarcasm).

Now, getting back to the Nova cannon speeds and MLT.
This is a touchy subject, especially considering not only the variety of speeds, but the variety of shells (the most basic one being an implosion device that releases a blast with the yield worth a dozen plasma bombs).
Here, Ricrery's arguing about "Shadow Point" and getting lost between the speeds and the evidence of a required application of severe mass lightening tech, no matter if they fly at thousands of km per second or near c (of course, it's badly needed if they fly near c).
See, he even had WR admit that there were contradictions, which he could have exploited if he had taken some distance, but instead, since he was pressured to prove his position correct, he almost found himself having to pretend that there were no such contradictions, even if this position wasn't his but merely a strawman.
However, he's partially right in that the use of MLT would explain the different speeds: the near-c shells would simply have a much greater factor of ML applied to them.
That said, his point about the mass of the projectile heaved by slaves was a good one, and it's very similar to what I pointed here about a macro cannon, where it says the cannon was heaved by fourty men. Heaving doesn't mean moving forward by merely pulling the object, it means lifting it.
WR's point was that it was better to ignore "Shadow Point" than accept the existence of MLT on some particular shell designs.
Well that's good enough if you think the ships do hurl giga/tera/petatons with mass drivers.
I'm yet to see evidence that a Nova Cannon, the most powerful projectile they have, is actually that powerful. And anyway, he's quite stuck, because you *could* actually accepted the non use of MLT on Nova shell if fired at 5000 km/s such as in "Shadow Point". I say *could* because there are obvious problems about such a sudden acceleration applied to materials (a reason why the UNSC figures were completely stupid for MACs among other things). So Ricrery is insisting on a point that's not even useful. If you want to argue about the Nova cannon in a more efficient way, you have to deal with the cases of near-c velocities and observe their effects, because this is where there's a glaring problem.
Various Nova Cannon references were mentioned by hammies in the recent 40K thread, notably by Orsai. That would be a good way to start, by using the board's search engine and finding ALL the references about the Novas.
Yes, WR was burying Ricrery1 under a load of strawmen as well, with accusations of modifying quotes, ignoring supposedly hard evidence, inventing or deleting sources. I know that by name, I've gone through the same flak.
And yes, globally, if Ric was more careful, he could have pinned creamy down. He could also completely cut WR's appeal to respect of rules by doing a bit of work and putting a link to the sources he said he had already provided, and then repeating them until WR would concede that said sources were indeed provided.
It's quite the crux of the matter here, since he was banned on not providing evidence.

Going back into the thread, we get to find WR's evidence of Nova shells' super power:

The preview information from the Battlefleet Koronus supplement BTW, describes Nova cannon shots as " Having the power to scour a planet" Not particularly quantifiable, but nor does it mesh with the idea of having the power to melt twelve city blocks of indeterminate size.

How many shots? How does that invalidate the description from the published BFG rulebook? Didn't he say that contradictions existed? Actually, is GW's canon policy so absurd that everything is canon and everything is a lie or a myth or half a truth?
And above all, how canonical is that text yet?
The text is found here:
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_ ... ?eidn=1875

Even more so than torpedoes, Nova Cannon ammunition is hideously expensive, and requires purchase. In addition, the weapons fire slowly and have a fixed minimum range (too close and they could easily destroy their own ship). However, when one has enough firepower to scour the face of a planet, one tends to see such concerns as trivial.

While these weapons are certainly powerful, they are merely tools, and it takes a clever Explorer to use them to full effect. But what other ships, weapons, and tactics will complete your arsenal? And what threats await you in the corners of the Koronus Expanse? Keep checking back for more on Battlefleet Koronus!

We will wait to see what was quoted from the book. The last sentence clearly shows that they're talking about the book, not citing it per se. Yet, the last paragraph still begins with a formulation that *could* be from the book. There's simply no line drawn between what could be a snippet of the book, and FFG selling their stuff, basically.
So we'll see when the book is out to see the value of this.

Ricrery largely got banned because he couldn't handle WR's debating tactics, as simple as that, and SS4 didn't make any particular effort to see if WR could be wrong. With Thanatos allowing people to ignore Ricrery1, it's a lost cause anyway.

[General Donner]

I didn't know about D. Aspo. I knew who Vermazen was, but are you sure he's in the credits of the third prequel-ICS?
Vympel/Leo1 is Dorian Kratsas and I recall he appears in one of the two ICSes.

You can look it up yourself quite easily -- Amazon's preview of the book includes the credits page with Saxton's dedications. The Warsie-relevant section goes like this:

I [Saxton] salute Michael Wong, Andrew Tse, Wayne Poe, Adam Gehrls, Dorian Kratsas, John Edward Vermazen, Michael Blackburn, Kazuaki Shimazaki, Dennis Aspo, Julius Sykes, Bryan Young, Ethan Platten, Michael Horne, Martyn Griffiths, and many anonymous others, for the scholarly and reasonable example they have set[.]

[General Donner]

Plus he was getting stuck into an argument about mass lightening (oh, the memories...) and the speeds of Nova projectiles.
At some point, he even finds himself saying that the Nova shells in "Shadow Point" were fired at .25c, instead of 5000 km/s. That's wrong.
I believe someone pointed out in the thread that the same author used the high c fractional speed in his next book, "Execution Hour". But again, I covered "Execution Hour", and I know how it is thesame book that comes with that:

Shadow Point doesn't say anything more specific than "near-light" speed for the nova shells IIRC. That's from the same sequence as the famous rok shooting.

Execution Hour doesn't give any speed for nova cannons, but it does say bombardment cannon shells fly at "something approaching quarter light speed".

[2046]

Dennis Aspo and John Edward Vermazen from the EP3:ICS are better known to us as "His Divine Shadow" and "Lord_Darth_Bob(TFN)/"Illuminatus Primus"(SDN), respectively. Julius Sykes is SDN's "Publius" and says as much on his own site. Kazuaki Shimazaki is the same guy as was booted off SDN, apparently for having some creepy personal opinions. Daniel P. Krouse, not mentioned in either ICS but listed among the "Acknowledgements" on a couple of pages at SWTC, is the "Ender" Darkstar talks about on his anti-ICS page. Those would be most of the major players, I believe, though I might've missed some.

You know, it's really rather funny that they think I'm all stalkerish regarding them, and yet the only names I knew above were the Aspo guy and, of course, Kaz. Although I hate to even count the latter, because he went by it.

I had no idea who Vympel was, and I really couldn't tell you if I ever knew he was also Leo1 as implied above (though that would explain why Leo1 is such a reject). I'm not sure I even knew that Adam whatzisname was actually Connor . . . I'd heard the name Adam, but don't remember it ever being associated it with anyone. I just saw his name elsewhere, possibly in Poe's text files from the Warsie Support Group that helped work on the ICS books. Ah yes, here it is:

http://www.st-v-sw.net/text/freaks/roidstuff.txt

I did know that Michael Blackburn was "Master of Ossus" who had such a thing for me back in the day. I'm not even sure he posts there anymore.

[Nowhereman10]

I didn't know about D. Aspo. I knew who Vermazen was, but are you sure he's in the credits of the third prequel-ICS?
Vympel/Leo1 is Dorian Kratsas and I recall he appears in one of the two ICSes.

You can look it up yourself quite easily -- Amazon's preview of the book includes the credits page with Saxton's dedications. The Warsie-relevant section goes like this:

I [Saxton] salute Michael Wong, Andrew Tse, Wayne Poe, Adam Gehrls, Dorian Kratsas, John Edward Vermazen, Michael Blackburn, Kazuaki Shimazaki, Dennis Aspo, Julius Sykes, Bryan Young, Ethan Platten, Michael Horne, Martyn Griffiths, and many anonymous others, for the scholarly and reasonable example they have set[.]

Great find, Donner! So let's see where we stand:


Michael Wong = himself, Darth Wong, Admiral Kanos on SDN

Andrew Tse = ?

Dorian Kratsas = Vympel on SDN, and Leo1 on SBC.

John Edward Vermazen = Lord_Darth_Bob on TFN, "Illuminatus Primus" on SDN

Wayne Poe = Cock Knocker on here on SFJN, Lord Poe on SDN

Brian Young = himself on asvs, SDN

Kazuaki Shimazaki = himself on SDN?

Michael Blackburn = Master of Ossus on SDN and SBC.

Adam Gehrls = Connor MacLeod on SDN and SBC

Dennis Aspo = His Divine Shadow on SDN and SBC

Julius Sykes = Publius on SDN

Ethan Platten = ?

Michael Horne = ?

Martyn Griffiths = ?

Wow! This is quite a list, well over a dozen Warsie debaters contributed directly and openly to the ICS books. Can anyone fill in the blanks those four.