A Call to Action!

This is a call to action on Barad'Dun and our tribunal members. There are responsibilities in the realm that are not being upheld, and honestly there is no reason for it with how many awesome vets we have and how big our realm has become. Through several hiatuses, demotions, promotions, and nominations for new council members, we need to take a step back and look at the current issues and what solutions we can find for them, this isn't a complain thread, but a thread for finding a middle ground where we can promote some more growth.

1. Loaners
First and foremost are Loaners. I've donated them, Izzy and Convel bring them, Smithy had a few, Taco has one or two, Konradr has had TONS. The problem I see right now is that realm administration, or a single deity in our group, should manage all of our loaners. This individual is in charge of storing them between practices, bringing them out, etc. This should be a council member or tribunal member. Hand's down, this is your job. Whoever is nominated to be in charge of this, I will donate several pieces of equipment (a couple new shields) for you to keep hold of. We have given loaner spears out to members of the tribunal in the past, however if they do not show up for 3-4 weeks, that's a long time for no spear fun.

2. Heralding
Secondly, we have heralding. Heralds are a HUGE importance to Dagorhir, they keep battles flowing, prevent idle times at practice, watch for cheating, and monitor safety hazards on the field. We cannot afford to have a free for all of 20+ people, with no herald. There is too much that can happen. It should be the responsibility of our practice attending council to nominate someone in the group at practice to herald for a round. If someone is sitting off on the side, not fighting, then they can easily herald for 10 minutes.

3. Water
Third, there was no water today. I donated $5 for 5 weeks of water last practice. I was kind of disappointed to not see any brought out. This also comes just a week after the council stripped Anthony of being in charge of it, and Anthony was consistently handling it just fine. I agree, realm administration should manage the handling of money in the realm, and donations for water, but we need someone to at least show up from our council to do so.

4. Safety
Razi pointed out a fantastic point, but I blame it largely on not having experienced heralds watching for issues on the field. We need people watching for safety hazzards and games where injury can happen in charging battles. It should not take more than 10 seconds to realize someone is injured on the field. There was also a VERY failing weapon on the field today, and I'm shocked it passed weapon's check twice. Demie's Zephyr blade I brought out and let someone use, has one side of 2 layers of blue foam completely separated that you can literally fit your fingers through. Not good guys.

5. Council/Tribunal
This is a lot of work and responsibility to thrust upon a set of 2 and a half individuals. Our realm council does not need to consist of just a King, Shepherd and Scribe. A tribunal is fine, the king needs his disciples, but he also has access to other units. Heretic is in all three units, he's the only one. I believe we need a council consisting of the tribunal, and 2 members from each unit. Surt believed that including unit leadership in the discussions and going on's in the realm was important. This is why we have a command forum now, but it needs to be used more, and we should include more people in that forum as each unit has grown. I get it that the tribunal is only Royal Army, but there's a good 3/4ths of the realm that are not RA, and need to be just as informed and in the loop.

War Wolves: Konradr + Izzy + Convel
Black Lions: Taco + one he chooses.

We have SOOOOO many people in this realm who do a LOT for the group, but honestly these people are doing jobs that can and should be primarily managed by those actually in charge of the realm.

Izzy and Convel
You guys are 75% of our loaners on the field, you've planned more garb/weapon builds than our council, and done a wonderful job at managing/training newbies in the areas they want. You've really stepped up since you came out, and I want to thank you personally for managing the influx of newbies we have had in our booming season.

Konradr
Before Izzy and Convel, there was Konradr, tons and tons of loaners he's made have been retired, and honestly it's a bit of a money pit to continually build for a growing and budding realm. Thanks.

Taco
Hard headed, but you are one of our best fighters. You've helped train people from other units without question, and consistently run a second practice that has pulled in quite a few people that are now attending Saturday practice. Thank you.

Smithy
When you can make it out, you bring a lot of charisma onto the field. Having you out last practice, explaining the event, really made me feel good about the direction things were going. I hope that you can continue to drive the realm in a positive direction, but you need to outsource the responsibilities to those who are already going above and beyond to balance the load that people put forth to keep our group growing.

Anthony
Jesus dude, you are a trooper. When we had no King, Scribe, Marshal, or Shepherd coming out for several weeks you stepped up and brought water out, and took donations to keep it coming. That alone deserves some recognition, I hope you like the gift we gave you for your efforts, keep being awesome.

There are a lot of other people who have stepped up and done stuff, but you can only plug for so long before you get burnt out (Kilanos?). I'm making some new loaner shields to give to whoever will be in charge of that.

If you feel like you have an opinion, or a solution to something, then please post it below. Smithy said we need more solutions, less complaining. So lets figure it out Barad'Dun.

Someone else will need to bring the water from now on I'm not doing it anymore. I don't mean to sound like an ass about about it or anything but I hated that job.

-Edit-

Knubbs also told me on my last day of bringing the water out that the donations were for the realm and not for the water which would mean my parents would have to pay for it every weekend. I don't have a job yet because if i did I wouldn't mind doing that. When my sister told smithy about it he didn't say anything about what knubbs said, and so after I finished bringing the water out that day I'm not doing that anymore. I can help out with other stuff but I'm not helping out with the water.

And thx for the gift you and the black lions gave me phoxly I really apriecate it.

Anthony wrote:

Someone else will need to bring the water from now on I'm not doing it anymore. I don't mean to sound like an ass about about it or anything but I hated that job.

LOL no problem man, Kat and I have both donated 35-packs of water to the realm before, and honestly I don't mind doing so when it's only $5 for 35 bottles of water which will help the group out. Just as long as there is someone who can accept it from our group. If I have to give it to Konradr or Izzy, or just keep it with Taco and myself I will.

good post. Lot of issues so little time and probably nothing will be changed.


Anthony its silly to not use the donations for water so yes by all means DO NOT do the water if that is the case. I might have to do the water just because and it will be just for Water funds. We CAN NOT have a practice with over 25 people and no water just silly. Very disappointed with this issue. If whoever is in charge of it and is going to miss practice needs to ask someone to take over for the week.

Yes we need more loaners also need someone in charge of loaners. Its at the point where some people will get their loaner and not ever give it up so someone else can try a shield or dual wield or what not. Have to spread it around let everyone try different fighting styles. I had people i did not really know using my weapons and they are not loaners but we had so many people i had to loan them out.

Lack of heralds and maybe preoccupied heralds is getting sloppy. I will start helping out Heralding every couple games, gotta get these games running smooth. We had 25+ people after Konrad and Heretic left.

Also thinking people need to start Honoring their shots a bit better. Watching new people call light on another new person is driving me nuts. Think we should just take the whole light call totally off our field until everyone gets a bit more Honorable.


WAKE UP Barad"Dun

Barrikaide wrote:

good post. Lot of issues so little time and probably nothing will be changed.


Anthony its silly to not use the donations for water so yes by all means DO NOT do the water if that is the case. I might have to do the water just because and it will be just for Water funds. We CAN NOT have a practice with over 25 people and no water just silly. Very disappointed with this issue. If whoever is in charge of it and is going to miss practice needs to ask someone to take over for the week.

Barrikaide wrote:

Also thinking people need to start Honoring their shots a bit better. Watching new people call light on another new person is driving me nuts. Think we should just take the whole light call totally off our field until everyone gets a bit more Honorable.

I agree with the bolded lines.

Addressing the 'light' thing, the only thing that should ever really be considered light is if someone scrapes you, or some other form of not FULLY hitting you. It was annoying fighting yesterday specifically against someone who didn't call out when I was hitting too light. This being just a week after I hit someone hard in the face, I wasn't really trying to murder the guy. I'd rather not do what I think Heretic does, and judge solely on gender, but if everyon's gonna be calling light on me, I guess that's what it's all about. The only thing I have with 'honoring my shots' is the hesitation of 'was I hit here or here? was it too light?' because in some scenarios, they did just scrape, or bounce, etc. And I usually end up ruling in favor or the other guy, because I'm never certain I'm right, and in turn, I feel guilty about not taking their hit when it's very possible that it was legal.

EDIT/P.S. As a sidenote, the rules say nothing about light hits, aside form them being taps (which some people do when they back-stab) and hits that don't actually 'connect'.

Quote :

3.4.1 - A hit from a hand-held weapon counts when the weapon's striking surface hits with sufficient force. Clarification: taps, grazing, and glancing shots do not count as sufficient force.

We should do the power hit training and speed test training we were doing a while back for the new people so that they'll get a better idea of how much is a "light hit" and a solid hit. The speed test thing would be good so that they can practice alot more shots and get better accuracy from the shots they throw.

Sylar wrote:

EDIT/P.S. As a sidenote, the rules say nothing about light hits, aside form them being taps (which some people do when they back-stab) and hits that don't actually 'connect'.

Quote :

3.4.1 - A hit from a hand-held weapon counts when the weapon's striking surface hits with sufficient force. Clarification: taps, grazing, and glancing shots do not count as sufficient force.

Usually when someone taps you on the back and you don't see them they have done a courtesy shot. Meaning they didn't want to run up to you and break your spine while you're not aware. You don't HAVE to take the courtesy shot and you CAN call light, but don't get angry the next time when they snap your back in half.

Strider wrote:

Usually when someone taps you on the back and you don't see them they have done a courtesy shot. Meaning they didn't want to run up to you and break your spine while you're not aware. You don't HAVE to take the courtesy shot and you CAN call light, but don't get angry the next time when they snap your back in half.

Yeah, I know. That's what I was referring to.

I have a few possible solutions. It will mostly entail breaking aspects like the water issue down to individual units.

1. Loaners. This could be broken down to Unit level. Each Unit provides and maintains a set of "public weapons". This I believe, would help in two ways. One, it will ensure that there is always someone who has a sack of weapons for use. Two, it will show some unit pride.

2. Heralds. I belive that the time has come to set up a Cadre of Heralds. Two people from each Unit, answering to the Marshall. The Marshall Can implement criteria of evaluation for the Heralds that will be apporoved by the Tribunal and Unit Leaders. An important note that I think is being missed is that when someone donns the yellow tabard THEY have the final say. Period. In that regard they are not your buddy, they are not trying to be spiteful or pick on the players, and they are not trying to settle some score by making people miserable.

3. Water. Again this can be broken down to Unit level as stated above in number one as a measure to keep some redunancy.

4. Safety. I agree with the original post so from my perspective, "Nuff Said".

5. Coucil/Tribunal. I again agree with the original statement up to he point where it says that the Tribunal is in the RA. Let me clarify that and point out that the all caps isn't me yelling I just don't want it missed. THE KING HOLDS A POSITION IN THE ROYAL ARMY AS IT'S COMMANDER. HE ALSO HAS AN AFFILIATION WITH ALL OF THE REALM UNITS TO PROMOTE UNITY THROUGHOUT THE REALM. THE SHEPARD HOLDS NO POSTION IN ANY UNIT AND IN DOING SO REMAINS COMPLETELY IMPARTIAL WHEN SETTLING DISPUTES. THE MARSHALL IS THE "STEWARD" OF THE ROYAL ARMY UNTIL AN ADUNABAR IS APPOINTED.

Still, most of the tribunal is RA.

Maybe there should be a Black Lion rep and a War Wolf rep or something.

A neutral party still can't report on behalf of another unit accurately.

I agree that some things should be broken down to a unit level, but lets be honest, it's really the Warwolve's Loaners, and the Black Lion shields and the broken loaners Smithy had. I'd absolutely LOVE to see weapons on the field with unit emblems on them, sporting our colors, repping each unit, but if we are dividing things among the units as tasks and responsibilities...

Shouldn't the unit leaders have a say in what goes on in our realm? I'll happily donate loaners, manage them among the black lions as "Black Lion" loaners. The War Wolf shields have the war wolf symbol too! However it's not fair that units carry such a load, while having such a small presence in what goes on in the group. For a while it was just Anthony coming out for the Royal Army, and aren't he RA supposed to be leading the group?

The Royal Army needs to get it's "armory" back. I want to see 5-6 swords and shields on the field sporting those colors. All this emphasis in our tribunal about the Royal Army, but they are doing the least for newbies and the realm (aside from Anthony working/fighting with newbies, bringing out water and Strider who volunteered to herald last practice.)

For all the emphasis there is about the Royal Army being the chosen ones for council picks and tribunal, I expect to see them step up too and try to lead this realm as much as the rest of us have stepped up.

You wanna know why so many newbies are drawn to the War Wolves and Black Lions? We represent our colors, and loan gear out all the time with our symbols on it. Again, Izzy and Convel are 75% of the realm's loaners swords right now and are one of the only units with spears they will happily let newbies use after some short training.

Quote :

2. Heralding
Secondly, we have heralding. Heralds are a HUGE importance to Dagorhir, they keep battles flowing, prevent idle times at practice, watch for cheating, and monitor safety hazards on the field. We cannot afford to have a free for all of 20+ people, with no herald. There is too much that can happen. It should be the responsibility of our practice attending council to nominate someone in the group at practice to herald for a round. If someone is sitting off on the side, not fighting, then they can easily herald for 10 minutes.

i don't mind doing this and being herald. i watch the field anyway when i'm just sitting around i just need to make a tabard
can i please add that for anyone who is heralding and if i'm heralding I will be enforcing this. if people can't play by the rules if we have to constantly tell people to take their shots! over and over and over again. it's like if you hit someone over the head obviously you can tell when it's an accident when it's not but when it keeps happening. you call death. if some isn't playing by the rules sluffing shots ect whatever you can think of. we need to have them step off the field or go home!. yesterday... urrg was irritating to me cause i heard and watched MANY sluff shots. and i would have just loved to tell them to go home. people come to this practice to have fun and i know sluffing shots is something that's gonna happen but when it's like the head shots if it's gonna happen over and over and over we need to tell them to leave. go home step off the field something it's not fair that someone who can't play by the rules is ruining the fun for people who WANT to learn.




everything else phoxly said i agree with. thanks tooka for bringing these issues to the table i would love to feel like our realm is a whole again!. we all started out friends..

so let me get this straight Shepherd holds no position but arent you like the biggest royal army guy there is? Marshall leads the Royal army supposedly. I dont care how it works what i do care is that our "Tribunal" does not seem to be doing much. Its a fact that cant be denied. When the Tribunal was Surt/Kilanos/Konrad it sure seemed like stuff got done. Now we have maybe 1 at practice if lucky and nothing gets fixed.

Sounds like you want to pawn the work off onto the other Units but they cant help or have a say in any other matters... makes sense to me... err wait...

PER KNUBBS;

Quote :

Anthony, I apologize for not being clear and possibly hurting your feelings. I talked to you about the water, and I am sorry for the miscommunication. It is not, and never was, my intent for you, personally, to cover the expense of the realm's water. That would be totally unfair to you, and was never part of the plan.

Next time we meet I will try to clarify exactly what I meant. You are a valued member of the RA, and your hard work and deep devotion to Your King, Your Unit, and Your Realm has been noticed