Berrik

I have a complaint that Locutus, a moderator on the HW2 Completed Mods board, is abusing his powers for personal reasons. Sorry in advance for gigantic post, but I have a lot of stuff to fit into here.

To provide a little background, I recently left the Point Defense Systems dev team for personal reasons, but have continued to post both on their website and in the mod thread (as I am still interested in the mod and hold no ill will towards the majority of the staff there).

In response to a post of his in this thread that had the content:



I replied something like this (can't reproduce the post exactly for reasons described below):



In hindsight, this was a bit flippant of me, but a valid criticism of his attack plan considering the situation he described and the capabilities of Vaygr ships in the PDS mod.

My reply was edited by Locutus to read *Spam Deleted*.

Afterwards, I recieved the following PM from Locutus (a small part is censored by me as I feel the reason I left the PDS dev team should be private; if it is important I will provide the missing content via PM):



My reply was:



I gave this no more thought at the time, though I was a bit irritated since a post directly below mine with similar (albiet more detailed) criticisms was left untouched.

After that, I wandered over to the PDS website to check some replies to a thread I had made (content not important to this discussion) and saw the following conversation in the shoutbox. I have taken screenshots as well as saved a copy of the shoutbox html as evidence. Included at the top of the fourth screenshot was my response.

The shoutbox history may be viewed here, though I am not certain if it can be viewed by non-members, and I know it can be edited by moderators and administrators-- which is why I took screenshots and saved a copy of the HTML, which is available for download from my webspace at the bottom. The screenshots are linked due to their size.

Screenshots

http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/6459/sb11tq.jpg

http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/7721/sb20ns.jpg

http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/8361/sb30qr.jpg

http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/6832/sb44mt.jpg


The saved copy of the shoutbox HTML is in my hosted webspace; you may download it by right-clicking and saving-as here.

I won't bother to suggest any course of action as that is not my place; the only thing this post will do is show the evidence I have collected. The PMs are still in my boxs, and may be viewed, assuming the admins here have that capability.

I will also freely admit being biased in this matter; I dislike Locutus for a few different reasons that (as far as this matter is concerned) are unimportant; they can be posted here later if you admins feel they are.

reki

The "abuse of power" claimed in this case is the deletion of one of your posts, of which you concede "could have been made in a less flippant manner". What you or Locutus say about eachother outside of this forum is not of any concern to us. If you call eachother assholes on the PDS website, then that's the concern of the PDS website staff.

The PM you received from Locutus on the Relic forums was pretty standard fodder for a post warning. You've had one post deleted (a decision I agree with), which hardly constitutes an abuse of power. I'm sure you might find this frustrating, but the personal issues between you and Locutus on other websites should remain as so for obvious reasons.

severijn

Hmmm, I am going to agree with Berrik. This is plain wrong, and is the second time such a thing happens.

Homdax

Reki is spot on.
Dont bring offsite grudges here. Even if I might think that Locutus warning to Tel'Quessir might have been a tad harsh, thats no excuse for jumping on Loc for stuff that may have originated on another Forum.

Starblade

How's Locutus abusing his moderator powers here if he's in a shoutbox on another site? That shoutbox history to me looks like he's being sarcastic.

As for your post, if you agree it 'was a bit flippant of [you]', then I don't really see any problem.

SquidDNA

Because there's a difference in flippancy in tone and flippancy in content.

See: Mac Bug

One would think this was a misunderstanding best addressed by some PMs between the two people involved, who happen to know each other better than most boardies and staff.

Of course, anything that goes on outside the fora is just that-- extraneous to the issue.

Starfisher

I don't see how it's flippant, or spam, or how it warranted a delete. It was mildly sarcastic, but perfectly valid in the context of the thread. In the GD, such a post would have been fine. Is the HW2 Complete Mods subforum so wildly out of control that harsh action is necessary to control the populace?

I'd suggest extending the warning to keep outside conflicts outside to both of them. It's clear bad blood is part of the problem.

Locutus

I sent that PM not only because of that particular post, but also because of what I consider to be a history of noncontrustive posts in that thread. The posts don't break any rules, but they contribute very little to the discussion. I don't know if it counts as 'evidence' but Berrik recently left/quit the PDS dev team over his behavoir and another internal issue.

Berrik also left out the smily in his quote. I would not have deleted it, but the smily struck me as Berrik intending the post as a taunt. Otherwise it would have been fine. In any case I merely edited his post, I did not delete it. Berrik is free at any time to go back to that post and edit in a non-inflammatory statement.

About the warning to Tel'Quessir, I did that for two reasons:
1. Two PMs on the subject had proved ineffective in altering his attitude
2. After several months of association with him working on the PDS mod I know his personality rather well, and I felt that confronting him publicly would be more likely to achieve the desired change in attitude.

Additionally, before you think I offended him with the post in question, here is his reply to a PM on PDS site about the post I made:

TheLoneKnight

I think it'll be fine if both of you can keep your business off-forum.

But then again I think most of the Senior Members/Moderators/Administrators are excessively good at keeping grudges outside of the RF. I've annoyed a few of them countless times, yet am still treated amiably despite all of the possible things they could attack me with.

So yeah, Berrik, I think you might be getting just a wee bit paranoid about all this. It doesn't seem to me that Locutus has shown you any overt hostility in deleting your post, (at least no more than you'd expect from a moderator in an unpleasant mood), but I think that if some kind of grudge or tormenting actually leaks onto the forum it should be dealt with swiftly.

ThirdDanScoota

Hmm.. The way i see it, bad blood is a part of this issue. While Berrik's post may have been a bit sarcastic, it was relevant to the discussion. How it could be called "spam", i'm not too sure.

Was the resolution of the issue generally harsh? Not at all. Was it a bit "excessive" for this situation? I would think so. I think it really also comes down to Locutus' personality on this board - he seems rather blunt, to the point, and far less "gentle" than many of the other mods here. Don't get me wrong, i sincerely respect Locutus (as do i the other mods) and think that he is doing a fine job, but could perhaps be a bit.. "Nicer" about things.

That of course is just my opinion, and could be completely incorrect.