(This is not meant to incite offense in anyone, rather to express as objectively as possible the overarching behavior I feel exists generally between Goretooth and disputably banned players. It is not to say that Goretooth never bans those that deserve it.)
Goretooth administrates somewhat in denial of other peoples' right to have feelings. He keeps behind the line of verbal propriety so as to always have justification against the banal vulgarity of the internet. But on the internet, and especially in internet gaming, vulgarity is banal. Commonplace, within expectation, and most importantly, trite. On the flip side, banning is the most absolute and cold action that can be taken against anyone in a game, which is why its usually reserved for genuine asshats.
The behavior of Goretooth's I'm referring to hinges around heated/negative words towards him, and seems to involve some denial about human communication.
1) Not everyone who communicates in a rude manner is a troll or without a point because they're angry.
2) Every person in front of a screen has feelings, no matter how internet mutated.
3) There is still a message behind the vulgar veil. If it is not uttered explicitly in the sentence, that is because the contextual information passed between you two is abhorrent to the person swearing. So much so, they aren't going to believe that you don't know how you made them so upset.
This couples with forum Goretooth playing everything off as simple and straightforward when clearly many of the people he bans do not think it was either of those things.
Ignoring the context that framed in someone's mind as X event unfolded is cruel because in language people communicate largely by establishing and referring back to contextualized information. The written form doesn't exist without a spoken form to be represented, and is not required for language to exist. It is however needed for us to communicate while gaming, and its fairly obvious that people communicate informally in internet games. So is there really cause for banning because of moderate vulgarity? I'll answer a question with a question.
Should players really have to tip toe around individual admins, even when they feel wronged? I can recall about a month ago, Goretooth tk'ed me and I thought, ahhh Goretooth is an admin, he'll say sorry. I even said 'thank you goretooth' as a joke, expecting an apology. None came. Mission accomplished! I got the feeling he could give two shits about cutting me down to get to more kills. That may not be the case, but many players will risk dying to type sorry after a TK. I couldn't exactly call him an asshole without expecting a kick or ban, so I left.
I think what NA players want is consistency from admins in general on their style. Goretooth seems to decide more by the letter of the law, and thus bans if you do anything to qualify yourself in his eyes. But other admins tend to be more light hearted and take the least necessary action to stop someone from griefing the players at large.
Admins have power. That power influences the fun of the game, making it both a privilege and a responsibility to keep the player base alive so that the game stays fun (especially in NA, since the servers are linked). Every person banned unnecessarily resonates negatively through the experience other players have.
CRPG doesn't have an infinite player base and it likely won't balloon until Strategus comes back. I don't think Goretooth should necessarily be removed, but, Goretooth: I'm telling you, NA players fear you as an admin. Its implicit knowledge that is quickly acquired even by newer players. Maybe you would consider learning to relax the lines by which you admin?
Thanks to anyone who read all of this.
