I intern thought that I would never see this player again...and was wrong
Recently, a member joined my medieval/fantasy message board RP. One of the first things they did was post a WIP application for one of our needed characters, which is a mage guild leader. This is unfortunately a role that we've had a lot of trouble filling, mostly due to lack of interest in it. One of our biggest rules regarding needed/"canon" characters is that members must respond to the thread for claiming a character, and that they have two weeks to submit an application for that character. This player, we'll call them A, completely ignored this rule and submitted the WIP application anyway.
One of our players who's been a member since the board was opened was the first to respond to this application. He nicely pointed out two things: 1. the character they were applying for has a sister with an application already written up and 2. the player needed to respond to the appropriate thread and claim the character. Despite the fact that not only did the member point this out, but I did as well when I responded to point this as well as numerous other things out, it was still ignored.
Initially the application was for an elf named Raatidosa. This elf had something called "empathic vampirism." In my response, I mentioned that I knew it was a WIP, but I was concerned about this term and wasn't sure how they planned on using it. The player responded and essentially she decided to fix the fact that the character was an elf and make it human as well as change the term for "emphatic vampirism," due to the fact that the character's sister is human. This, however, would pretty much be the only thing that the player did not ignore.
Due to how long the application is and how much spooning of your eyes you would need to do, I'm going to spare everyone from having to read the entire application and instead share bits and pieces of it, which at the moment is mainly their description of their character's magic abilities. I'm also going to include their reaction to my rejection of their application further down in the post, which again will require spooning out your eyes.
Keep in mind that ours is a low magic setting, and the most our telekinetic mages can currently do is levitate a book.
Edit: I goofed and for some reason only copied part of her magic ability write up.
Major power: Telekinesis
The power of the mind is the power which courses through her body even when she is not using her magic her eyes often hold a slight blue glow. Noir’s main and most prized magic is telekinesis which she manifest in a very particular way. When Noir begins to cast she often separates her focus into six palm sized blue orbs these orbs are physical representations of her conscious will and are thus subject t her every command. Though it is possible for her to manifest more orbs she is unable to maintain stable control when she begins to use more than six at a time. Noirs specialty is concussive physical force which she imbues unto every attack she launches with her powers. From each orb Noir has the power to launch bolts of blue light which carry with them the force of a hammer this is the most common application of her power but it is not the only trick she has up her selves. Each orb also hold the power to lift an object and cause it to act according to her will. Because her power comes from herself not the dragons she has to depend on only her own strength, this translates to how much weight she can lift and how much force she can generate. When lifting and object less than her weight there is little to no strain upon her body. when she must lift and object which weight more then she can comfortably physically lift under her own strength then she must apply will. His is where her powers begin to wear her down her will is strong but it has its limits double her own weight is not a huge stressor upon her will and thus she can often carry objects which are larger than her with easy but when she begins to attempt to carry object over ten times her weight the stress take a very real toll upon her body. She can alleviate some of this stress by fusing some of the orbs to place more concentration upon the weighty object but anything more than about thirty times(A bit over a ton) her own weight is likely not with her power to lift. This also holds true with her power to create bolts of concussive physical force. She is able to create bolts that send human bodies yards away with ease but to crush stone and shatter metal are feats which take increased focus and concentration. Though it is possible for Noir to create sharp edges with her power she is not so quick to do so for she must stop and concentrate in order to do so for just as with a metal worker to work with haste is to create an inferior product. This is why she avoids it for she has to take extra time out of her casting to refine her powers into blade like shapes.
On a side note Noir is quick to hide the true nature of her powers by manipulating the solid forms of the other elements. Though Noir's power holds no sway over the magical element of water she does of the power to telekinetically move it with her mind and thus appear to be water mage. This is the same with earth she has the power to lift and throw rocks as well as crack the ground beneath her thus emulation some earth magic. Fire and wind are her weaknesses Noir can make her powers appear like a breeze but she cannot twist the air at any consider able speed and so she would appear to have the skill of a child when she emulates wind magic. Fire magic is wholly lost to her because she does not have the power to create it she cannot practice moving it with her telekinesis. Both wind and flame have very little weight and thus would be almost impossible to determine just how much force it would require to move just the flame and not the object on fire or to push the wind in any particular direction. So she often elect to manipulate the elements which are abundant to her for they are simple and they can mask the true nature of her powers quite quickly and effectively.
1. Small Scale Telepathy
Through mind to mind contact one achieves much Noir has the benefit of being able to send out her mind and thoughts and relay them to other, and in return she call the thoughts of others whom are drifting around her into her own mind. This is an active power and thus she will not hear the thoughts of people she does not wish to simply because. In a group of people her mind is silent to other and theirs are to her. What Noir can do is connect her mind to another person’s on the conscious level and thus they are allowed to share thoughts ideas and emotions without verbalizing them. This power only allows her to her surface level thoughts similar to ones own inner monolog and thus memories are of limits unless the other person is actively running through the event as it happened in their mind as their minds are connected. But this leaves holes in her recollection of the events for she gain opinions and insights because the other person thinking of the event will likely have them. This also leaves her vulnerable to fabrication because she is not a lie detector and what some other thinks in their conscious mind is not always true. In the end this power is mostly for shock value when applied alone because to tell someone that you can hear their thoughts is very unsettling to their metal security and will likely cause them to second guess themselves. Besides that she can use this power to communicate without speaking and thus have silent conversations with people. This power has no affect upon less than human creatures for their thoughts are on a different spectrum than humanoids. That intern makes them sound like a sort of static noise to her. When communicating through the mind most people’s thoughts sound like a whisper because volume is not something normally necessary but in her case she can increase the volume of her thoughts making it sounds as if she is yelling. Though it is possible for anyone to do this it takes practice to gain control of the effect often only disturbed individuals have an inner voice which screams. This contrast is quite auditable when she is either frustrated and or angry. At maximum power Noir can only perform this ability when she is less than twenty to thirty feet from her target beyond that and she cannot hear most people. The maximum amount of minds she can communicate with at once is two to try to connect to an more forces her head to throb and earns her and intense nosebleed.
2. Empathic Impression
Along with the power to hear the thoughts of others Noir has the power to feel their emotions. Emotions on the other hand carry far more energy than a simple thought when one feels an emotion there are comparable to a star shiny and radiating an aura. While most people can feel these moods and it affect theirs in return, Noir has through concentration and effort found a way to turn these energies into extra power. When she feels an emotion it is project just as with your average person and she has no control over this the energy is just shot of into the either. But the emotions of others can be absorbed and thus turned into more magical might to fuel Noir’s spells. This however like all good things has a downside or disadvantage when her opponent or whomever she is connecting to through telepathy feels a low energy emotion like sadness or depression some of her magical might is leached off from these seemly black hole like emotions. This is why only high energy emotions benefit her for they give off energy rather than suck it. This I why people give attention to people whom are melancholy for their aura demand that they gain emotion energy. Noir gains great amounts of energy from emotions like excitement, and anxiousness. One emotion that give tremendous extra energy is hate for it takes conscious effort to hate someone or something. This power has little to no effect upon the person she is drawing from because they would be releasing this energy into the void any way.
So basically, this is a character who can manipulate all of the elements (which is not something mental mages are able to do in this game- they can't control any of the elements, never mind four of them), move things up to thirty times her weight and up to six things that are ten times the character's weight at once, and also creating telekinetic blades.
Like I said above, the player didn't only ignore the fact that the mage guild leader is meant to be human, they ignored other things as well. Even once the player of the character's sister responded to the application and said they were willing to make their character into an elf (before the applicant responded and said that they would make the appropriate changes since the player playing the sister has been at the game longer), the player did nothing (as far as I am aware, but based on the amount of things they ignored and contradicted, I'd say not) to contact the player of the sister, M, and make sure the information in their application was correct or even okay (because a number of the things meant making changes to the sister) before stating that it was finished.
At the beginning of the application, it asks for who the character's parents are. A did not fill this out completely, nor did they fill in the spot for siblings, despite the fact that there's already an application for one of the three total siblings. Based on M's application, the mage guild leader is meant to be male and is meant to be the oldest. In this player's application, they made the brother the oldest but made their character female, the middle character and the mage guild leader. This is something that, again, should have been discussed with M.
Another thing this player chose to do was completely add in a town that the character grew up in (which, again, is not in the application for the sister) instead of using one of the numerous towns on the map. There are also numerous contradictions with the application for the sister. Our plot basically entails one kingdom banning the use of magic and sending out bounty hunters to capture mages, so in the application for the sister it states that the parents were wary of allowing their children to practice magic, but in A's application, it states that the family was widely known for breeding mages. Again, something that was not discussed with M. A also stated in their application that the father was a tinker, but M's application mentions nothing about this. These are only a few of the major things about the application that contradict and otherwise ignore the applicant of a player who's been on the board longer, but these are all major warning signals to my co-mods and myself.
That's not where the story ends, though. Today, A, responded to my rejection of their application with this (be prepared to gauge your eyes out):
Sorry about any grammatical errors most of this was typed at work when i found free time...they should be fixed when I revise. But before you get into the meat of this post I want to state that I am not upset and so therefore I hope you will not be either. I hope that you take my concerns for what they are, they are concerns about the way you have looked over the app.
As far as power go let’s take three seconds to think about this with telekinesis you can lift objects. This means that if she were to place her power into an object she would lift it. Intern I thought then why not lift water. To not be able to lift water would be weird would it not? I had the same thought process with earth if you can lift a rock it looks like earth magic would it not or am I wrong and she can only lift things like metal or a bench. To say she cannot lift earth or water is strange. It would be silly to assume that she could not move earth and water with her mind for they have discernable weights and thus easily moved. I guess you misunderstood the next part because it clearly states that since fire has no discernible weight that it cannot be lifted and wind has about the same problem so she cannot manipulate every element just those she can see. I also made special not to mention that she could not create these element this signifies that she is not using magic but simple moving things with her mind. For this is the way telekinesis works if I am not wrong. And i was not aware that I could not use her power to make sharp edges but hey I will take that out. The weight thing the average healthy weight for a woman is near about a hundred to a hundred and thirty pounds this times thirty is a little over a ton which is about two thousand pounds. I just thought to clarify that if as not some ultra huge number. I can lower it but I can’t promise it will be by too much. Also in her powers I never stated that each orb can carry ten times her own weight only that when she attempts to do so that there is a bigger strain more realistically she would need two orbs or three orbs to do this maybe was not clear enough but I can work on that with the revision.
Her story is not so different from the one I posted, first it said nowhere in her app that her brother started the guild it says only that the two eldest of them did so this leads me to believe you must have skimmed and/ or not completely read through both apps. In my history it clearly states that she has a bother and that he is the eldest ( this would solve the ring issue that you brought up as well). I think you need to reread both apps because some of your critique holds merit but some are things are unacceptable and just plain wrong. Just above your post looking over my app is her post says she is will to change anything except for her power to manipulate fire. I took this as a way to stretch out the little story I had to work with and if something was mention in her app i tried to avoid talking about it so much because it would intern make our apps to similar. And because I need a back story I added a few things her family were all mages so I said that they were prominent mages, these two things are not entirely so different and then I created a town to be burnt down because she stated that not just their home but the town was burnt to the ground. Why would mage hunter burn a town of average Jo’s to the ground if it weren’t a town full of mages, I gave rhyme and reason to some things that were left in the air because of the statement she made. It would be hard to name a place on the map to be burnt down because it’s on the map and I did not want to affect anything in the story that might have taken place in that town. If I were just select a place to be burnt down it would make that place on the map a city of ash and thus interfere with any one app whom used the place in the future one has to consider these thing when they pick places on a visible map. I think you choose this because you had not thought of the ramifications that would occur from such an incident but I had time to take note of such a future problem. Thus with this made up town I avoided a potential issue with any one making note of the town which was burnt to the ground.
Something else I notice nowhere in M(edited) history that her parents gave Bridgette the necklace but that was not mentioned in the critique. I don’t see how not mentioning that in the history is such a big deal does it ruin the history I think not to much it was just something I left out because I mentioned it else were. I also feel a bit like your nitpick with things like that because I don’t see those criticisms on other apps and also this does not affect the overall quality of my work. Also when I sent the other brother away again I did it to give a reason for him not to be in the room when I post with my character since no one is playing him it would be hard to have him in the room.
Oh and you mentioned that I did not mention that she had a brother in my app but yet you clearly state that I said that her brother went away again which is it you cannot say these two things for then you would be contradicting your elf. As I stated before I am will to make changes but only when my app is looked over correctly. I don’t mind harsh criticism but some of what you have mentioned is just plain wacky.
“Okay, this goes back to the family thing. You don't make any mention of her having a brother. Also...her having a brother is something you needed to discuss with M(edited out)”
This statement makes little sense for both M(edited out) and I mention that there is a third sibling. Why would have to discuss this with M(edited out) if we both make mention of it she says that there is a brother as do I.
These are her exact words so I changed or added as little as I could to keep the story’s as similar as possible without them being the same. Now in that regard I will edit the gammar and some of missing words to create a little more clarity but I expect that you reread everything because to tell me what I did not mention is when I did mention. It is not that I disregarded her app it is just that I was told that I could make changes any changes I wanted as long as I did not change her magical powers so I have her permission to do a lot of the things I did.
“Hey there, I'm sooo glad you are wanting to me the leader because I want to get rping with my character. I'll just say that I'm really willing to make a lot of changes if I need to, I don't mind changing the face to elven if you want, though the only thing I do want to keep the same is my elemental power. Other than that just chat with me and I'll change anything else.”
So in closing I will changes the things on the powers for I can take the weight down a bit and I can take out mental blades but the anything in the history stays unless M(edited out) has a problem with it and she addresses me upon it. Also it bothers me that so things that were said in you critique were contradictory of themselves this distress me for it is not a good sign.
One other thing I forgot to post that I was signing up for the character but I’m pretty sure since I was the last member to join that the character would likely not be taken away from me by someone whom joined after me. Because let face it there Is not a new person joining every day I could post that I wanted the mage guild leader just about any time. Look I have had close to ten days to finish the app and no one else has signed up.
There are numerous parts of this response that I could point out and respond to, and I'm sure I will be if the time comes. After reading it today, I decided to wait until my co-mods were able to respond to the player instead and just replied with this:
Just because a player says they're willing to make changes to their character it does not mean that you should not discuss any of those changes with the player, especially when you're changing a number of things that would mean she would have to edit her character a fair amount. It's common courtesy. Just because a player says they're willing to make changes it doesn't mean you should take advantage of that and not check with them before putting everything in place. Personally if I were M(player of the leader's sister) I'd be pretty unhappy that you had made all of these changes without even talking to me.
After I saw their reaction to it, I got curious...I never made a post about it here (because it wouldn't have been as funny without their application, which they unfortunately edited out), but before this game (back in like...October to around November/early December) one of my current co-mods for the game this player is trying to apply to were running another medieval/fantasy RP. There, we had a player who...well, the biggest warning sign we had with them, among other things, was their calling themselves "this one." They called themselves "this one" both in the cbox and in their application. We ended up denying their application for various reasons and they flounced before they edited out their application (as well as encyclopedia write ups they submitted) and they were banned by email address, IP address and username. We thought that was the last we'd see of them.
After the reaction of A to my denial of their application (which must have taken about two hours to do because I was trying to read their application and had to do so so many times to make sure I got everything), I started thinking. Between the grammar issues (which the member from our old game also had) and the reaction to being rejected, I couldn't help but wonder if this was by some chance the same player from the old game. The fact that A did not use "this one" (which, at the original game she admitted to using it in her college essays. D:) in any of their posts they made or their application completely threw me off from thinking that my suspicions were right.
I went to the ACP of the old game and looked at the part for where it lists banned IP addresses, email addresses and usernames, and then I went into the ACP of the current board and searched for the username of A where you can see their IP address and email address and such...and it turned out to be the same person from the old board. What's just as hilarious as that is that both my co-mod and I are using different display names on our current board, so she probably doesn't realize it's us.
Surprisingly, A did not react in their application thread to what I said about not contacting M and instead sent me the following PM:
I'm not to have some epic ego crushing debate you guys are a small site and that's not healthy for growth. so I think I'm gonna delete my things and take my leave no need to leave on hard terms this suppose to be fun and if I think my fun or others fun will be compromised whats the point of hanging around.after you and the other admin have had your chat make a list of concessions you would like me to make and if i feel as if any are unreasonable i will take my post and head out no harm no foul.
Moral of the story: whether it's a needed/'canon' character or just an original one to the game, it is never okay to ignore and otherwise contradict the information of a pre-written application belonging to another player and not bother to contact that player about any of it, especially if you're told right off that the character exists and the player might be willing to make some changes.
It is also not okay to ignore the rules regarding a needed/canon character. If the rules state that you need to claim a character, then you need to do it. If not only a player but also a mod tell you that you need to claim a character, you need to do it. This is, of course, assuming that you have bothered to read the rules. Knowing who A is now, I'm 100% convinced that it's very unlikely she didn't bother to read them.
Also, just because no one else is joining and saying that they want to play the mage guild leader, it doesn't mean you can just ignore the rule about claiming the character. The rule applies to everyone no matter what the situation is with no one else wanting the character at that very moment.
I offer a new pair of eyeballs to anyone who just had to spoon their eyes out after reading all of this. XD
Edit: edited because of a goof- I forgot to include something about her magic abilities.
Edited a second time to fix the LJ cut a bit.
Edit 2: the subject is in relation to something the player said in their reaction to being rejected- "Intern I thought then why not lift water." I originally had a note in the post but took it out. Sorry for any confusion.
Edited again slightly to fix a sentence that I didn't finish. My bad.
One of our players who's been a member since the board was opened was the first to respond to this application. He nicely pointed out two things: 1. the character they were applying for has a sister with an application already written up and 2. the player needed to respond to the appropriate thread and claim the character. Despite the fact that not only did the member point this out, but I did as well when I responded to point this as well as numerous other things out, it was still ignored.
Initially the application was for an elf named Raatidosa. This elf had something called "empathic vampirism." In my response, I mentioned that I knew it was a WIP, but I was concerned about this term and wasn't sure how they planned on using it. The player responded and essentially she decided to fix the fact that the character was an elf and make it human as well as change the term for "emphatic vampirism," due to the fact that the character's sister is human. This, however, would pretty much be the only thing that the player did not ignore.
Due to how long the application is and how much spooning of your eyes you would need to do, I'm going to spare everyone from having to read the entire application and instead share bits and pieces of it, which at the moment is mainly their description of their character's magic abilities. I'm also going to include their reaction to my rejection of their application further down in the post, which again will require spooning out your eyes.
Keep in mind that ours is a low magic setting, and the most our telekinetic mages can currently do is levitate a book.
Edit: I goofed and for some reason only copied part of her magic ability write up.
Major power: Telekinesis
The power of the mind is the power which courses through her body even when she is not using her magic her eyes often hold a slight blue glow. Noir’s main and most prized magic is telekinesis which she manifest in a very particular way. When Noir begins to cast she often separates her focus into six palm sized blue orbs these orbs are physical representations of her conscious will and are thus subject t her every command. Though it is possible for her to manifest more orbs she is unable to maintain stable control when she begins to use more than six at a time. Noirs specialty is concussive physical force which she imbues unto every attack she launches with her powers. From each orb Noir has the power to launch bolts of blue light which carry with them the force of a hammer this is the most common application of her power but it is not the only trick she has up her selves. Each orb also hold the power to lift an object and cause it to act according to her will. Because her power comes from herself not the dragons she has to depend on only her own strength, this translates to how much weight she can lift and how much force she can generate. When lifting and object less than her weight there is little to no strain upon her body. when she must lift and object which weight more then she can comfortably physically lift under her own strength then she must apply will. His is where her powers begin to wear her down her will is strong but it has its limits double her own weight is not a huge stressor upon her will and thus she can often carry objects which are larger than her with easy but when she begins to attempt to carry object over ten times her weight the stress take a very real toll upon her body. She can alleviate some of this stress by fusing some of the orbs to place more concentration upon the weighty object but anything more than about thirty times(A bit over a ton) her own weight is likely not with her power to lift. This also holds true with her power to create bolts of concussive physical force. She is able to create bolts that send human bodies yards away with ease but to crush stone and shatter metal are feats which take increased focus and concentration. Though it is possible for Noir to create sharp edges with her power she is not so quick to do so for she must stop and concentrate in order to do so for just as with a metal worker to work with haste is to create an inferior product. This is why she avoids it for she has to take extra time out of her casting to refine her powers into blade like shapes.
On a side note Noir is quick to hide the true nature of her powers by manipulating the solid forms of the other elements. Though Noir's power holds no sway over the magical element of water she does of the power to telekinetically move it with her mind and thus appear to be water mage. This is the same with earth she has the power to lift and throw rocks as well as crack the ground beneath her thus emulation some earth magic. Fire and wind are her weaknesses Noir can make her powers appear like a breeze but she cannot twist the air at any consider able speed and so she would appear to have the skill of a child when she emulates wind magic. Fire magic is wholly lost to her because she does not have the power to create it she cannot practice moving it with her telekinesis. Both wind and flame have very little weight and thus would be almost impossible to determine just how much force it would require to move just the flame and not the object on fire or to push the wind in any particular direction. So she often elect to manipulate the elements which are abundant to her for they are simple and they can mask the true nature of her powers quite quickly and effectively.
1. Small Scale Telepathy
Through mind to mind contact one achieves much Noir has the benefit of being able to send out her mind and thoughts and relay them to other, and in return she call the thoughts of others whom are drifting around her into her own mind. This is an active power and thus she will not hear the thoughts of people she does not wish to simply because. In a group of people her mind is silent to other and theirs are to her. What Noir can do is connect her mind to another person’s on the conscious level and thus they are allowed to share thoughts ideas and emotions without verbalizing them. This power only allows her to her surface level thoughts similar to ones own inner monolog and thus memories are of limits unless the other person is actively running through the event as it happened in their mind as their minds are connected. But this leaves holes in her recollection of the events for she gain opinions and insights because the other person thinking of the event will likely have them. This also leaves her vulnerable to fabrication because she is not a lie detector and what some other thinks in their conscious mind is not always true. In the end this power is mostly for shock value when applied alone because to tell someone that you can hear their thoughts is very unsettling to their metal security and will likely cause them to second guess themselves. Besides that she can use this power to communicate without speaking and thus have silent conversations with people. This power has no affect upon less than human creatures for their thoughts are on a different spectrum than humanoids. That intern makes them sound like a sort of static noise to her. When communicating through the mind most people’s thoughts sound like a whisper because volume is not something normally necessary but in her case she can increase the volume of her thoughts making it sounds as if she is yelling. Though it is possible for anyone to do this it takes practice to gain control of the effect often only disturbed individuals have an inner voice which screams. This contrast is quite auditable when she is either frustrated and or angry. At maximum power Noir can only perform this ability when she is less than twenty to thirty feet from her target beyond that and she cannot hear most people. The maximum amount of minds she can communicate with at once is two to try to connect to an more forces her head to throb and earns her and intense nosebleed.
2. Empathic Impression
Along with the power to hear the thoughts of others Noir has the power to feel their emotions. Emotions on the other hand carry far more energy than a simple thought when one feels an emotion there are comparable to a star shiny and radiating an aura. While most people can feel these moods and it affect theirs in return, Noir has through concentration and effort found a way to turn these energies into extra power. When she feels an emotion it is project just as with your average person and she has no control over this the energy is just shot of into the either. But the emotions of others can be absorbed and thus turned into more magical might to fuel Noir’s spells. This however like all good things has a downside or disadvantage when her opponent or whomever she is connecting to through telepathy feels a low energy emotion like sadness or depression some of her magical might is leached off from these seemly black hole like emotions. This is why only high energy emotions benefit her for they give off energy rather than suck it. This I why people give attention to people whom are melancholy for their aura demand that they gain emotion energy. Noir gains great amounts of energy from emotions like excitement, and anxiousness. One emotion that give tremendous extra energy is hate for it takes conscious effort to hate someone or something. This power has little to no effect upon the person she is drawing from because they would be releasing this energy into the void any way.
So basically, this is a character who can manipulate all of the elements (which is not something mental mages are able to do in this game- they can't control any of the elements, never mind four of them), move things up to thirty times her weight and up to six things that are ten times the character's weight at once, and also creating telekinetic blades.
Like I said above, the player didn't only ignore the fact that the mage guild leader is meant to be human, they ignored other things as well. Even once the player of the character's sister responded to the application and said they were willing to make their character into an elf (before the applicant responded and said that they would make the appropriate changes since the player playing the sister has been at the game longer), the player did nothing (as far as I am aware, but based on the amount of things they ignored and contradicted, I'd say not) to contact the player of the sister, M, and make sure the information in their application was correct or even okay (because a number of the things meant making changes to the sister) before stating that it was finished.
At the beginning of the application, it asks for who the character's parents are. A did not fill this out completely, nor did they fill in the spot for siblings, despite the fact that there's already an application for one of the three total siblings. Based on M's application, the mage guild leader is meant to be male and is meant to be the oldest. In this player's application, they made the brother the oldest but made their character female, the middle character and the mage guild leader. This is something that, again, should have been discussed with M.
Another thing this player chose to do was completely add in a town that the character grew up in (which, again, is not in the application for the sister) instead of using one of the numerous towns on the map. There are also numerous contradictions with the application for the sister. Our plot basically entails one kingdom banning the use of magic and sending out bounty hunters to capture mages, so in the application for the sister it states that the parents were wary of allowing their children to practice magic, but in A's application, it states that the family was widely known for breeding mages. Again, something that was not discussed with M. A also stated in their application that the father was a tinker, but M's application mentions nothing about this. These are only a few of the major things about the application that contradict and otherwise ignore the applicant of a player who's been on the board longer, but these are all major warning signals to my co-mods and myself.
That's not where the story ends, though. Today, A, responded to my rejection of their application with this (be prepared to gauge your eyes out):
Sorry about any grammatical errors most of this was typed at work when i found free time...they should be fixed when I revise. But before you get into the meat of this post I want to state that I am not upset and so therefore I hope you will not be either. I hope that you take my concerns for what they are, they are concerns about the way you have looked over the app.
As far as power go let’s take three seconds to think about this with telekinesis you can lift objects. This means that if she were to place her power into an object she would lift it. Intern I thought then why not lift water. To not be able to lift water would be weird would it not? I had the same thought process with earth if you can lift a rock it looks like earth magic would it not or am I wrong and she can only lift things like metal or a bench. To say she cannot lift earth or water is strange. It would be silly to assume that she could not move earth and water with her mind for they have discernable weights and thus easily moved. I guess you misunderstood the next part because it clearly states that since fire has no discernible weight that it cannot be lifted and wind has about the same problem so she cannot manipulate every element just those she can see. I also made special not to mention that she could not create these element this signifies that she is not using magic but simple moving things with her mind. For this is the way telekinesis works if I am not wrong. And i was not aware that I could not use her power to make sharp edges but hey I will take that out. The weight thing the average healthy weight for a woman is near about a hundred to a hundred and thirty pounds this times thirty is a little over a ton which is about two thousand pounds. I just thought to clarify that if as not some ultra huge number. I can lower it but I can’t promise it will be by too much. Also in her powers I never stated that each orb can carry ten times her own weight only that when she attempts to do so that there is a bigger strain more realistically she would need two orbs or three orbs to do this maybe was not clear enough but I can work on that with the revision.
Her story is not so different from the one I posted, first it said nowhere in her app that her brother started the guild it says only that the two eldest of them did so this leads me to believe you must have skimmed and/ or not completely read through both apps. In my history it clearly states that she has a bother and that he is the eldest ( this would solve the ring issue that you brought up as well). I think you need to reread both apps because some of your critique holds merit but some are things are unacceptable and just plain wrong. Just above your post looking over my app is her post says she is will to change anything except for her power to manipulate fire. I took this as a way to stretch out the little story I had to work with and if something was mention in her app i tried to avoid talking about it so much because it would intern make our apps to similar. And because I need a back story I added a few things her family were all mages so I said that they were prominent mages, these two things are not entirely so different and then I created a town to be burnt down because she stated that not just their home but the town was burnt to the ground. Why would mage hunter burn a town of average Jo’s to the ground if it weren’t a town full of mages, I gave rhyme and reason to some things that were left in the air because of the statement she made. It would be hard to name a place on the map to be burnt down because it’s on the map and I did not want to affect anything in the story that might have taken place in that town. If I were just select a place to be burnt down it would make that place on the map a city of ash and thus interfere with any one app whom used the place in the future one has to consider these thing when they pick places on a visible map. I think you choose this because you had not thought of the ramifications that would occur from such an incident but I had time to take note of such a future problem. Thus with this made up town I avoided a potential issue with any one making note of the town which was burnt to the ground.
Something else I notice nowhere in M(edited) history that her parents gave Bridgette the necklace but that was not mentioned in the critique. I don’t see how not mentioning that in the history is such a big deal does it ruin the history I think not to much it was just something I left out because I mentioned it else were. I also feel a bit like your nitpick with things like that because I don’t see those criticisms on other apps and also this does not affect the overall quality of my work. Also when I sent the other brother away again I did it to give a reason for him not to be in the room when I post with my character since no one is playing him it would be hard to have him in the room.
Oh and you mentioned that I did not mention that she had a brother in my app but yet you clearly state that I said that her brother went away again which is it you cannot say these two things for then you would be contradicting your elf. As I stated before I am will to make changes but only when my app is looked over correctly. I don’t mind harsh criticism but some of what you have mentioned is just plain wacky.
“Okay, this goes back to the family thing. You don't make any mention of her having a brother. Also...her having a brother is something you needed to discuss with M(edited out)”
This statement makes little sense for both M(edited out) and I mention that there is a third sibling. Why would have to discuss this with M(edited out) if we both make mention of it she says that there is a brother as do I.
These are her exact words so I changed or added as little as I could to keep the story’s as similar as possible without them being the same. Now in that regard I will edit the gammar and some of missing words to create a little more clarity but I expect that you reread everything because to tell me what I did not mention is when I did mention. It is not that I disregarded her app it is just that I was told that I could make changes any changes I wanted as long as I did not change her magical powers so I have her permission to do a lot of the things I did.
“Hey there, I'm sooo glad you are wanting to me the leader because I want to get rping with my character. I'll just say that I'm really willing to make a lot of changes if I need to, I don't mind changing the face to elven if you want, though the only thing I do want to keep the same is my elemental power. Other than that just chat with me and I'll change anything else.”
So in closing I will changes the things on the powers for I can take the weight down a bit and I can take out mental blades but the anything in the history stays unless M(edited out) has a problem with it and she addresses me upon it. Also it bothers me that so things that were said in you critique were contradictory of themselves this distress me for it is not a good sign.
One other thing I forgot to post that I was signing up for the character but I’m pretty sure since I was the last member to join that the character would likely not be taken away from me by someone whom joined after me. Because let face it there Is not a new person joining every day I could post that I wanted the mage guild leader just about any time. Look I have had close to ten days to finish the app and no one else has signed up.
There are numerous parts of this response that I could point out and respond to, and I'm sure I will be if the time comes. After reading it today, I decided to wait until my co-mods were able to respond to the player instead and just replied with this:
Just because a player says they're willing to make changes to their character it does not mean that you should not discuss any of those changes with the player, especially when you're changing a number of things that would mean she would have to edit her character a fair amount. It's common courtesy. Just because a player says they're willing to make changes it doesn't mean you should take advantage of that and not check with them before putting everything in place. Personally if I were M(player of the leader's sister) I'd be pretty unhappy that you had made all of these changes without even talking to me.
After I saw their reaction to it, I got curious...I never made a post about it here (because it wouldn't have been as funny without their application, which they unfortunately edited out), but before this game (back in like...October to around November/early December) one of my current co-mods for the game this player is trying to apply to were running another medieval/fantasy RP. There, we had a player who...well, the biggest warning sign we had with them, among other things, was their calling themselves "this one." They called themselves "this one" both in the cbox and in their application. We ended up denying their application for various reasons and they flounced before they edited out their application (as well as encyclopedia write ups they submitted) and they were banned by email address, IP address and username. We thought that was the last we'd see of them.
After the reaction of A to my denial of their application (which must have taken about two hours to do because I was trying to read their application and had to do so so many times to make sure I got everything), I started thinking. Between the grammar issues (which the member from our old game also had) and the reaction to being rejected, I couldn't help but wonder if this was by some chance the same player from the old game. The fact that A did not use "this one" (which, at the original game she admitted to using it in her college essays. D:) in any of their posts they made or their application completely threw me off from thinking that my suspicions were right.
I went to the ACP of the old game and looked at the part for where it lists banned IP addresses, email addresses and usernames, and then I went into the ACP of the current board and searched for the username of A where you can see their IP address and email address and such...and it turned out to be the same person from the old board. What's just as hilarious as that is that both my co-mod and I are using different display names on our current board, so she probably doesn't realize it's us.
Surprisingly, A did not react in their application thread to what I said about not contacting M and instead sent me the following PM:
I'm not to have some epic ego crushing debate you guys are a small site and that's not healthy for growth. so I think I'm gonna delete my things and take my leave no need to leave on hard terms this suppose to be fun and if I think my fun or others fun will be compromised whats the point of hanging around.after you and the other admin have had your chat make a list of concessions you would like me to make and if i feel as if any are unreasonable i will take my post and head out no harm no foul.
Moral of the story: whether it's a needed/'canon' character or just an original one to the game, it is never okay to ignore and otherwise contradict the information of a pre-written application belonging to another player and not bother to contact that player about any of it, especially if you're told right off that the character exists and the player might be willing to make some changes.
It is also not okay to ignore the rules regarding a needed/canon character. If the rules state that you need to claim a character, then you need to do it. If not only a player but also a mod tell you that you need to claim a character, you need to do it. This is, of course, assuming that you have bothered to read the rules. Knowing who A is now, I'm 100% convinced that it's very unlikely she didn't bother to read them.
Also, just because no one else is joining and saying that they want to play the mage guild leader, it doesn't mean you can just ignore the rule about claiming the character. The rule applies to everyone no matter what the situation is with no one else wanting the character at that very moment.
I offer a new pair of eyeballs to anyone who just had to spoon their eyes out after reading all of this. XD
Edit: edited because of a goof- I forgot to include something about her magic abilities.
Edited a second time to fix the LJ cut a bit.
Edit 2: the subject is in relation to something the player said in their reaction to being rejected- "Intern I thought then why not lift water." I originally had a note in the post but took it out. Sorry for any confusion.
Edited again slightly to fix a sentence that I didn't finish. My bad.