realBelloWaldi

hello

My go-to is usually hip-hop:
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwmuvqFzfLI
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3y00T97Fkeo
 
Can't forget my boy Yung Lean:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAeEhEyWHKg
 
Feels:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3XK1e5VCRI
 
Night driving music (which I do a lot):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G02wKufX3nw
 
There's way to much to list, but you get the idea.

Alright then, how about this? DM/DL ____ says "I don't see you on servers very often", so the appropriate response is "Oh, well then screw it, I quit"?
How about instead you find that higher up in a game on our servers and join it and maybe play with them a bit? You know, show them you're alive? Do this a few times and "I don't see you" becomes "Hey, you're pretty active!"
 
Standing out doesn't mean wearing a lime green Scout set and hitting people with a pan, it means showing a lot of initiative and potential with being staff. When the time comes for promo/demo, staff would be able to say "Hey, you know Mod ____? They do a really good job, they're active, and they're super mature, we should promote them"
 

 
Ok, I feel I need to squash this attitude, because people keep thinking this is how it works. If one person -1'd her, that doesn't mean she was barred forever from being promoted. That person had a reason to -1 her. Even if all the others +1'd, if the one who -1'd gave a really valid reason why they shouldn't be promoted, then obviously that reason was good enough for the other higher ups to agree or even change their mind. As @Bello said, "majority rules" is fairly flawed. If we had 15 higher ups +1 a guy, but one person -1'd them because they constantly abused, then that -1'er had a good reason for doing so. Hell, the others may not have known that, and that one guys -1 could turn the 15 +1s into -1s.
 
However, one person -1'ing doesn't automatically mean a "no" either. I've seen instances where one higher up would -1, but all the others would +1. If they have a good reason to strongly suggest that player, they could still be promoted.
 
You getting a +1, a -1, and a neutral does not seem like a yes to me. That means only 1 of 3 dentists approve, and don't think you're ready. Like I said before, Probationary Mod is for making sure someone is ready for staff, not to go "Hey, let's throw powers at this guy and see what happens!". They still have to feel you'd be responsible with those powers, as limited as they may be.
 
Final Note: While I don't condone bias against a player, the higher up(s) who -1'd Spooks had a good reason for it. They genuinely thought they weren't ready for the position (again). And from the way she stepped down, they may have been right to do so the whole time. Spooky, huh?

This. This sentence right here. This sentence defines the reason as to why I haven't gotten staff yet. What I am about to say is most likely going to affect my chances now, but I have talked with higher ups. They told me the same thing. One person -1, another +1, another neutral. I guess that automatically means a no right? Well it shouldn't. Just because there is a single -1 shouldn't change the fact of getting declined or not. At least keep the application open for a little bit. (Also this might be a problem happening with me but +1 on staff application doesn't feel like it does anything. If it does, I have 0 chance of getting at least probationary mod because nobody sees my fucking application. A great example is my last application; the one before my most recent. Anyways. Back to your regularly scheduled immediate no staff for sepdick.)
 
My main point here is this: Higher ups need to talk more instead of having an instant decline because one of them doesn't like him/her/helicopter/catboy or doesn't know him/her/helicopter/catboy. Actually use the probationary moderator to see what they can do. If they don't do well, then they don't get full mod and get put back to member.
 
 
Anyways as for Ms. Spooks herself,
I am sorry that shit isn't going right for. It was to suck to be moderator for as long as you have and not get promoted. My biggest hope right now is that I wasn't part of the reason for you leaving. I try my best to be nice to everybody. I just feel like I didn't talk enough with you. I'm sorry for not doing so. Truly I am. I hope that everything works out for you in the future. Thank you for everything you have done for the community <3

Hey look, it's another reply you probably won't read, but I feel it's necessary.
 

 
But it isn't some "mystical, magical, special role". If anything it's basically "Veteran Moderator". Someone who's more than trusted enough to handle the extra responsibilities as well as being a trusted source of information for not only players but for Moderators who may not feel as confident in their authoritative abilities.
 
Plus, becoming Admin is basically stepping down the importance ladder. Let me explain, the ladder goes like so: Randoms/regulars/members > Mods > Admins > DM > DLs. Why? Because members/randoms/regulars are the most important part of the servers. They make up like 95% of our population. Without them servers would be barren. Next are Mods, these guys basically work for the former. They make sure they enforce rules to keep the servers enjoyable for everyone and keeping the non-staff player base happy. Admins help out Mods and Players by enforcing rules, but by also teaching and helping newer Mods (and maybe even old) to be better at their job. DMs are next, these guys help to choose who gets promoted, basically who they think would be the best choice to keep the player base happy and on the servers, as well as the aforementioned duties. Finally, there's DLs. They do all of the above, but also make sure the servers have the maps, plugins, and settings the community wants to keep people on the servers.
 
TLDR: The "higher" you get on the ladder, the more you have to humble yourself because you basically get more bosses and more people who depend on you.
 

 
I'm gonna stop you there. No, it isn't. It's to make sure the candidate is able to handle the job, not only in a responsibility way, but in various personal ways. For example: I've been a Mod 3 times, Admin once, and DM once, if I reapplied for staff right now I'd probably get Probationary Mod for the sole reason that my work requires a weird schedule so activity is tough for me. Would I care? No, because even I know that's something I'd have to work on and improve.
 

 
While I agree this is an issue, and staff should be versed in all servers, some may feel like they're not as experienced with a certain server's rules to enforce them (or they don't like the gamemode). It was like that with me and Jailbreak. I didn't feel like I knew the rules as well, so I'd ask someone who was more knowledgeable in that area to take care of it, you know, to do the job correctly.
 
Also, I don't feel it's just server based, but more uhh, clique based. There are cliques within the TF2 div, I know, shocking right? Point is, these people may not be groups who regular one server but stick with just their buddies. Anything their friends do is totally fine, but if someone outside of their group does the same thing, then oh boy, here comes the member protest/abuse report.
 

 
This goes hand in hand with the previous topic. While I feel, yes, witnesses are important, especially since Staff can't see everything, just someone saying they saw something happen doesn't make it true. Allow me to give a ridiculous exaggeration to prove my point. A group of buddies in the TF2 div don't like a player. He's a big meanie and they don't like that kind of thing. 5 come forward and say "Admin ____ abused! 5 of us saw it!" and bam, guy gets in trouble and buddy group removes their nemesis from the ranks. Though that's a far reach, this could happen by "just taking their word for it"
 
Another thing is, you're telling me, that 15 people saw this happen, and none of them took a screenshot or could type "record demo" in console? Ehhh...
 

 
To be honest, letting people condemn someone without evidence promotes sucky, bandwagony mentality...
 

 
Agreed. We're all humans here (as far as we know..), so treat each other like one.
 

 
Again, agreed. But this whole thread was made due to you not getting your much anticipated promotion. Was the promotion anticipated because you wanted to serve the community more, or because you wanted a higher rank? If you enjoy serving your community, you'd be content with Mod, since you still get to enforce rules and (try to be) somewhat of a role model for others. This is coming from someone who's been Mod 3 times, and all 3 times was happy to make the servers I could call my TF2 home a little bit of a better place with what little I could.

For the most part, I agreed with you until I read this:

 
It was then I decided to go back, read everything again, and make a response here. You've said like 8 times that this is a volunteer job, which it is, so how thankful of a job did you think this would be? Whether you like it or not, this is a volunteer job which requires a lot of work, energy, and dedication (well, at least if you want to do it right). Plus the fact you said you wouldn't try to justify anything you said or even "bother" responding, and that's an awful mentality to have.
"You proved me wrong, but I'm still right and I don't have to prove it, I'm right!", which sounds pretty immature...
 
If you truly felt there was a huge amount of bias against you then, you know...

 
Talk to the Higher ups, find out why they may not feel you're ready for promotion or why you aren't promoted yet, and if the reason is "Ehh, I just don't like you". Then work to change their mind and prove them wrong. If you felt it was more extreme than that, then contact someone even higher than them, tell them you feel biased against by DL ___ or DM ____.
 
And final note: You coulda posted all of this without stepping down, or by talking to the higher ups to bring these points to their attention. They'll listen, they aren't gonna bite. Worded the way it is, your post sounds more like the ramblings of a disgruntled employee rather than a concerned community member, but do whatever you feel is necessary. If you ever decide to come back, you're always welcome.

This right here.
It honestly bothers me how people leave, comeback, and expect their spot back. Let other people have a chance to show what they can do.
 
Also, maybe this is a hint for a staff structure reform? Either that or clean up some (potential) grey areas.

*Any underlined text is personal opinion*
Not what she meant. Pretty good point on the second part, though.

I think she was more pissed off that she got probationary moderator for zero reason at all. She did a great job as staff the first time, but she stepped down because personal reasons/TF2 was getting boring. She feels like she was being unfairly treated and rewarded for amount of work she put into the servers.
She was given a fairly large amount of recommendations and thinks that they were disregarded completely. She feels like she was pushed aside even though she was doing just as much as the others who were jumping ranks for sucking more higher up chode than she was.
Now, I'm only trying to break down a few of her points, I'm trying to leave this as unbiased as possible as an attempt to not cause a shit storm. Hopefully this might better explain what she means, @Goblins : )

I could write 10 thousand paragraphs to discuss everything you stated, but in conclusion I agree with a lot. And instead of continuing the arguments we already had, I'll just agree to disagree with some things.
Welcome to the step down squad, though!
However, there are two points that I wanna say something about:

In my opinion majority decisions don't always lead to the best. Just think about why you don't vote for political decisions directly and elect representatives instead. I think your logic is in some instances very understandable, but in others not.

Good idea but it has too many downsides imo. I mean, just think about how devided this clan is in certain groups. Imagine if one of these groups would want to get someone demoted. They could simply just agree on a wrong story and accuse someone falsey.
 
To conclude: Sad to see more staff step down, but I can understand the reasoning behind it. This clan is by far not perfect. Also, since I've been a higher up for like two years, I wanna tell you that - as long as i was a higher up - we always tried to do what was best for the community and sometimes it failed, however, I don't think anyone is intentionally doing something you really hate.

I believe she was talking about the times where, for example, Silence added a bhop pluggin all out of the sudden which everyone hated, not some internal decision that hasn't happened anyways. Another example could be simple rule changes that no one announced.

Sad to see you go, I did read your post in detail, there are a few things that you posted that are ill-informed which I'm happy to break down a little bit just out of respect for you as you leave.
 

Decisions do not have to be unanimous, many times higher ups who do not agree with a decision will usually say "I'm not for it, but if you guys want X to happen, that's fine". That being said, there are times where one higher up has the most experience with a certain individual which is why we will go with their reasoning, since we respect their views over our uninformed ones.
There are some decisions we don't fully explain to the public due to the fact it causes unnecessary drama, for example in the past Rabid was discussed to be DM of CS:GO or CS:S (I don't remember which one) but I refused it due to how many times I had to personally ban him or punish him. Rabid is one of my closest friends in this community but when this was discussed 6 years ago, why would we make a post explaining that Rabid didn't get DM due to his past? What benefit is there for the community to know something like that?
 
Some decisions have no say on the matter because Silence (rhododendron) likes trying things out to better the community, instead of getting approval from 10 people and waiting weeks to implement, he implements it as long as there is net gain. Of course it would be nicer if it doesn't affect the community in a bad way, but at the same time his heart is in the right place and he always thinks about bettering the community and keeping people happy. Nothing else. This does not include the shitty John Cena meme on the forums that he still needs to remove.

My own thoughts on this matter though is that I do think you were wrongfully treated, I saw how active you were on the forums and didn't speak up on the promo/demo thread like I should have since I definitely thought you deserve Admin weeks ago. I definitely think we let you down, and for that there are no excuses so I would like to apologize to you on behalf of xG. I personally don't know how you interact on the servers and so I didn't want to make a decision that I wasn't informed on and I trust my higher ups on TF2 + VIrr to deal with Promo/Demo without my help, I will look into the matter for the future to make sure no one feels this way again.
 
I wish you the best of luck wherever life takes you, and thank you for all your support on the forums + servers as staff.

I'm leaving xg for good. This is my only and last formal goodbye. In case you didn't know what happened I'll sum it up. 7 months ago now I took a break from being staff for personal reasons that I chose to keep to myself. Tf2 wasn't fun for me at the time. The drama in xg was unbearable at that point. There were several decisions being made that in my opinion weren't in the best interest of the clan. No I'm not going to go into detail about them because I can't be bothered.
I came back roughly a month later 2 weeks after pyro update dropped and it took a lot of time an mulling over to forgive tf2. At this point I was hearing a lot from community members that missed me being staff(not just other staff) and eventually I was convinced to come back to staff. Now since I stepped down quietly I was expecting the process to be easy. It was not. Instead of resuming my position as staff I'm put unfairly into a probationary role solely because of 1 higher up's bias against me. I was being punished for no good reason.
I was assured that it's no big deal I'll most likely get admin back as long as I keep staffing well. I got mod quickly and ended up staying mod for the last 5 months. To say I'm disappointed is an understatement. In fact multiple times I even considered just giving up entirely, but I decided to stay for the people in the community who actually appreciate what I do. I stayed because the servers liked having me.
I don't know what the accused hold up is now and quiet frankly I'm over hearing lies and excuses like I have since I first got staff. From the beginning it was "who the fuck is ms. spooks?" "You need to be more established with the community" "you need to do more." "I never see her online so I can't make a good opinion on her" etc. Now keep in mind since I was considerably new staff at the time it wasn't a big deal. However time started passing by and I've watch many staff (you know who you are) go from member to admin before me, and now they're dms before I've even gotten admin back. I kept asking what am I doing wrong and keep getting the same run around. "Nothing, why?" just to be followed up later with some half attempted accuse "Oh you just need to do more." As time went on that clearly didn't end up being the full truth getting comments like "If you did more you'd already be admin" "You're not entitled to admin" "You're too passive" etc. It's not fair that I do the same amount of work as an admin, spend more time than a majority of the mods, and have been an established community member for 2 years without even a blemish.
Now some of you will take this as an outcry because I didn't get a rank that's just slightly better than mod, however my problems run deeper than that. It's not fair that I had to harder than other staff the entirety of my time of being staff. It's not fair that I keep getting pushed aside for other staff who are better at sucking off the higher ups than I am. I'm done playing the charade of "work a little harder" "Do a little more" Because even with the backing of multiple staff and plenty of recommends it clearly doesn't mean jack to you. It's incredibly disrespectful not only to me but other people who have gotten this treatment to string us along like a grunt. I'm not your lackey. I didn't become staff to do your job, and I most certainly don't see anywhere that says I'm supposed to suck you guys off in order to even get looked at. It's beyond hurtful to continue to be punished for things out of my control and more importantly I didn't do.
This is my only request of all of you staff. If you're not my friend and you're only friends with me soley because I'm staff. Get the F U C K off my friends list. Get out of my servers. Get out of my life. I have enough garbage I have to deal with in my life and I don't need more fake people around who don't care about my feelings. Stop pretending to care about what I have to say then just doing the same garbage I'm complaining about. I have rooted for and defended most if not a majority of you even if we haven't been the best of friends. I've stood up for you and I tried to be there when you're down. It's funny to me how people forget the people who rooted for them when they get power.
I have been mulling over for the last couple days what all I'm going to say when inevitably I say goodbye after being shafted again for no good reason. So I'm going to finish this with a list of what xG should improve on.
 
1. Staff are volunteers not lackeys
This "do more" mentality and backwards logic of having more mods than admins is part of a huge issue that doesn't respect your staff equally. despite all staff volunteering their time and efforts to improve the servers and the community. Treating admin as some mystical, magical, special role that's Juuust out of reach feels really really shitty for all the mods who have to work harder than other staff to prove themselves.
 
2. Stop using probationary for no reason.
This is a punishment role. It's used for staff who don't deserve a full demotion but still want to make things right as staff. Likewise It's used for people who have a dirty history. Stop slinging it around for every person who you don't feel like fits the personality mold even when they've done nothing to deserve it. Stop using it as a compromise because 1 higher up doesn't like the person. It should be used to establish wrong doings not "We just trust you a little less."
 
3. Majority matters.
It's been a huge problem for a while where higher ups have to make unanimous decisions. What this means for all the other staff is that if 1 higher up disagrees despite everyone else agreeing on said thing. It won't go through. The voice of one is too strong in this community specially for higher ups who don't go on servers enough to see what is going on or that just choose to disregard the intent of the community and more importantly the other staff. To fix this, it should be that majority rules. It should be that the community or staff vote count for 1 higher up in of themselves, because giving the people no say is what's going to kill the community.
 
4. Be transparent.
All decisions should be clear, concise, and have good *valid* reasons. It should be your goal to be as unbiased, well informed, and clear as possible. This under the table garbage that's been going on is just sleazy. You don't want your real opinions out there and you don't want to be held accountable which quite frankly is an embarrassment to your role. Be open and honest with your staff and not just string them along with excuses everyone knows are lies. If you make a decision you're accountable to that decision. Don't just keep letting everyone else have to figure it out.
 
5. Stop only caring about people in your respective group.
This is a big clan with large divisions and even in tf2 large sub divisions. Its been an issue for a while that surf staff only favor surf staff and tgh staff only like tgh staff. Unfortunately it has even gone as high as the higherups. Just because you haven't played on the servers (which isn't a good idea anyways) doesn't mean you should give only people in your respective server the special treatment. If you want to be taken seriously you have to take others seriously as well. It's ok to get more information to form your own opinion, but it's not ok to say it's not your problem because it's not your server.
 
6. Witnesses matter.
I'm all for innocent until proven guilty, but some of you take this as an opportunity to ignore issues all together because no tangible evidence. Staff witnesses have just as much say as a normal witness, none. It doesn't matter how many people say a person did an action because without proof you're never going to confront the issue. You make no effort to gather more information. It doesn't help when you expect people to be recording EVERYTHING that goes on, and to be honest if you are wanting people who record everything just to nail one person it's a pretty sucky, bandwagony mentality.
 
7. Stop treating other staff like dirt.
This is to all staff. Stop staffing over each other when someone else has it handled. I'm not talking about you both get on at the same time or accidentally warn at the same time. I'm talking that another staff handled the call, they're already trying to resolve the issue, and you jump in gung hoe and start shafting them. It's not acceptable. Trust the staff members to do their job. Unless you have to make a decision that involves perms only you have as staff it should not be happening that staff are stepping on each others toes. Likewise, Mods are volunteers. Means they donate their time and energy into the servers just like you. Stop talking down to staff who are a lower rank and stop kicking them around because you can. Stop rubbing your rank in their face. They get it. It's not acceptable to disregard another staff as a whole just because they're a lower rank.
 
 
8. Share the interest of the community not just yourself.
There has been many times where higher ups have made decisions under the table that are looked at negatively by the community or ultimately effected them negatively. Yes we get you like this one plugin idea and the other higher ups are all for it, but when you implement it out of nowhere and it effects the players to the point of complaining about it that's not in the interests of them. Part of making the community a better place is by making it unified, and when you keep making decisions that effect a mass in the community you create division.
 
With all of that in mind I want nothing to do with this community anymore. If you're really my friend you'll accept that. I'm not going to keep getting a run around, doing your jobs, and investing time and energy into a clan who doesn't care about me back. I'm not looking for a debate here. I'm not justifying any of my points. I'm not going to bother responding so don't bother baiting for a response. No I'm not changing my mind. I don't know if I'll ever come back to xg after all that it's put me through. I don't want your excuses so don't bother sending them to me. I may still come on the servers once in a while but you're not going to get much out of me here. Goodbye xg.

I don't know if this is a glitch but my account shows that I have 2 alerts, but when I go to click on alerts, it say that I have no alerts.

mario kart double dash????

Whats up @TacoSmasher47

(only cool people will understand)

Whats up @TacoSmasher47

(only cool people will understand)

I feel like this is something that needs to be said because it's happening way too often.
A joke is only funny if everyone is laughing. There is a lot of times when people are being quite rude or intentionally trying to make certain people angry. Unfortunately the jokes have gone from the occasional playful teasing to outright making fun of certain players.
Now I'm not going to tell you that you can't shit talk each other all together. Sometimes it's in good intent as long as both parties are content about it. It's been getting out of hand recently though. It's gotten to the point where multiple people start bandwagoning against one person even though they don't like it. So to get to the point, I want to write this reminder that disrespect is NOT allowed on the servers. When someone asks you to stop or is clearly getting upset please do not continue to heckle them. I'm sure I'm not the only one who wants a friendly environment for everyone. I would like it if you all would consider how you effect everyone else on the server so noone feels alienated. I'm not trying to say you need to be on good terms with everyone. All I ask is that the playful shittalking is consensual or at least acceptable.
I hope we all can keep enjoying the server!

Started thinking this was a good idea then I remembered how you changed your name on the forums, started trolling, had several witchhunts against people like @Goblins and had several circlejerks on discord. -1

Chances I'm going to get flak for this.
I'm going to have to stay neutral on this one.
 
You've caused issues not too long ago with people (you know who), and it worries me that it could happen again. Bello has made a good point about how when you snap, you go all out with such.
 
And as for the people that are saying "Don't worry about the past!", you can't just ignore that stuff. How they act or can act should affect your vouch towards the applicant. Sesh has only done it once (if you group the event all together), but would you wanna hire someone who acts like such when they're triggered and upset?
Can Sesh handle the job? Well sure, he has done it before. But behavior issues is why I'm stating I'm neutral on this.
 
Honestly, I feel as if it's too soon for you to re-apply, Sesh.

Started thinking this was a good idea then I remembered how you changed your name on the forums, started trolling, had several witchhunts against people like @Goblins and had several circlejerks on discord. -1

Oh you were responding to me. Ok then, let me explain myself because I think you missed the point of my post.
 

I can't ignore the only notable point of reference I have.

BIAS??? Really? Did you not pick up that I was saying I don't know him at all? How can I ignore how he has been recently if we have never talked in the first place?
The entire point I was going for was that I have literally no other point of reference as to his character based on my experience. Tell me how I can be biased against somebody I don't even know?
For all I know that could be an advantage, a blank slate minus one dated event.
As for how he did as staff, well to be frank I didn't play on either of the trade servers quite often at that time so I didn't see all that much from him, and I am sure you are well aware of how that term as staff ended (the cause for my concern).

Of course you think he should have a chance at mod, he is your friend.
Also the question was not of his capability in the first place...
 
In as simple of terms possible; I was telling Sesh that if he wants me to change my vote he better well try to at least help me get to know him.

When I first saw you I would have definitely -1ed you due to your toxic behavoir.
However, I believe you changed. I haven't seen you in game recently but before that you seemed to be quite nice and I also believe you know the rules. Septic additionally browses the forums too which is a pretty good thing imo.
I also had a huge misunderstanding with him once that could have easily turned into a war between the two of us (I was kind of at fault there) but he was super chill about it and not confrontational at all.
Can't plus one though since I don't play enough to judge you, but good luck!

When I first saw you I would have definitely -1ed you due to your toxic behavoir.
However, I believe you changed. I haven't seen you in game recently but before that you seemed to be quite nice and I also believe you know the rules. Septic additionally browses the forums too which is a pretty good thing imo.
I also had a huge misunderstanding with him once that could have easily turned into a war between the two of us (I was kind of at fault there) but he was super chill about it and not confrontational at all.
Can't plus one though since I don't play enough to judge you, but good luck!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b84Z3IRg3VA
XDDDDDDDDDDDD
 
will srsly miss u doe ;(

I'm really sorry guys, I just have not been doing a good job and I'm not enjoying the game anymore :(
I just wish I could have done more to help you all out in the servers, but I just.. couldn't bring myself to it, I let other things get in the way of my true goal, which was to turn the server into a marxist countr-, I mean create a safe and caring environment for all.
So I from this point announce my resignation after many hours of hard work I've put into the server, I hope you find some happiness in what I've done.
Again, this is me stepping down,

from minecraft ;)

-1 Hating on people while they're not on the servers with very silly reasons, such as "being british", Doesn't seem too nice to me.