I like the original rules and missions. Why cant we just follow them? Everyone was following them. Then ramano did that crazy shit at bespon. The ramano stepped in uninvited and surrendered dantooine. Then ramano stepped in uninvited and surrendered myrkyr. Everyone else had posted clearly their intentions to do a mission. This is literally an issue of 1 person famous for bending and straining rules doing just that, followed by the gm not stepping up and being clear about the rules and how they are to be followed and instead avoiding the issue and supplying vagaries about not wanting to limit creativity, as if that was an issue.
I don't know if the situation is that bad, honestly. I voided Ramano's crazy shit at Bespin and made him battle it out instead, although Dementat crunched the numbers and didn't feel like battling it out - and I certainly didn't have the time either to intervene and force a battle, so I let it slide. I also publicly denounced what happened at Bespin after the fact and said I don't want to see any more surrendering.
Dantooine was a Barren World and was wide-open for subjugation per description of a Barren World, which I quote:
Barren World (Players can visit this world, build facilities, and conduct any other operations without impedance.)
...Which effectively translates to "no conquest or diplomacy needed". Ramano surrendering the planet was uninvited yes, but it was also pointless and unnecessary. The same can be said about Myrkr. It's a Barren World. But did I allow Ramano's interruption to set some kind of precedent? NO, I didn't. I voided and deleted his post after a 24 hour public notice.
Does everyone see what's going on here? We had players that wanted to take over another system without having to do the mission, which for shits and giggles lets go and see what the Rules say about Missions:
Missions
Much like an RPG Quest, Missions will be specialized tasks that Hero Units can seek to accomplish in order to gain more notoriety, immense wealth, strategic power, or perhaps even win the game! They will often involve traveling to numerous planets, completing specific objectives, and then finally reaching a climax where the mission is completed. Each Hero will have a specific Mission related to their class that is repeatable so long as Mission Milestones are completed. Note: Only (1) Mission can be active at any time.
Is there any language in this description that would suggest Missions are mandatory? Or the exclusive means to completing a goal?
That is what happened here, and why jay reasonably doesnt want to continue, because we all know this will happen again as soon as there is a battle or ram tries to get away with something else that to him seems perfectly reasonable.
Do you want to know what really happened? --- Whenever a player wanted to move on another system, they contacted me via PM asking "hey Hale, is there anyway I can do this without the mission?" and my answer was "yes, you can take over a planet using conventional methods but you wont get the bonuses from the Mission because you aren't on the Mission". Dem and Ramano asked about this. You guys didn't because of your commitment to capture worlds using Diplomacy only, and since no "conventional fast-track" method existed prior to this shitstorm, Jay threw up the bullshit flag because other players weren't using Conquest when it was their prerogative not to in the first place. That is what happened.
Don't put this all on Ramano either, because I have corrected him on every occasion of rules infringement since Dantooine publicly and he has more than been compliant in the process because it's usually a situation of misunderstanding the rules rather than deliberate attempts to bend them. You may call me a fool for seeing it that way, but I am just as skeptical about Ramano as anyone else here.
Here's my plan for everybody:
1. Grow up.
2. Re-read the rules. Get back to me about anything you don't understand. I'll fix it and announce it on the Q&A thread if necessary.
3. Play by the rules to the letter. By the looks of it now we have a pretty good set of them with a Mission for every method to take over a conquest and an Award to reward exceptional storylines for completing mission milestones. What more do you want? It's all there now.
4. Get back into the game and play.
5. Have fun.