The Shot Heard Around Paragon City - SCORE Public Release

[etnies445]

It's not contradictory,  because I didn't address SCoRE's benefit or guilt,  because that is implied in statements about it being NCsofts property,  benefiting at ncsofts expense and labeling it as stolen..... all are not good.   But what was done is the past.


The point is what will happen going forward,  and although you conveniently skipped the second half of my post,  you so eloquently demonstrated that mentality of entitlement when you wrote that "they are completely guilty in the eyes of the community" and the only way to earn "good faith" back is to release the code.   


Two wrongs do not make a right.

So you feel that despite all the wrong in the past 5-6 years, suddenly they should care about NCSofts interest? Suddenly they can take the high ground? If thats the case, they'd need to shut down the server completely and immediately, and that wouldn't even be high ground, that'd be "oops we got caught ground". They cannot take the high ground, the damage is already done, two wrongs don't make a right, but they committed way more than two wrongs.

At this point, add one more to the list, because if they were willing to have this up and running and hidden for all those years I think they can go ahead and release it for the community that still actually mourns.

[Ohioknight]

I also think that because there were efforts to literally buy the game from NCsoft, people put their hopes on that, instead of an emulator... 

Yeah, everyone on Titan Network had heard of SCoRE, but I was under the impression that they were working in secret to build something *to release* - and right now, I tend to lean towards believing that what they had was releasable, which is where the betrayal comes in.

So do you REMEMBER the "don't do anything to upset the negotiations" that went on for years and never did get finally resolved?  At what point during that should SCoRE have effectively announced "HEY, Look at this, there's already a private server up and running!".   

You write that at this point you "lean towards believing..." .  You don't KNOW.  You don't know anything at all about the private server except that it exists, has run, apparently with considerable success, for years, and has supported a population of approximately 3000 users with several hundred active at once.  You don't know it's stability.  You don't know it's configuration or what it takes to run.  You don't know it's origin, whether completely reverse-engineered or a modified copy of the beta code that they got to run on some insane combination of obsolete software versions and virtual machines.  You don't know if it's release could implicate someone.  You don't know anything except that it wasn't made openly available to anybody who wanted to use it.

[Arkasas]

If the SCORE server population really has been play-testing and working towards a better future for the entire City of Heroes community... where are they?  Why the silence?

Why is no one coming forward as a SCORE playtester or dev and backing up Leandro's statement?  (to be fair, it's only been two days)

Well, like many things in this matter, nobody can say for certain, but leaving aside the NDA for a moment, do you honestly think anybody wants to open themselves up to that kind of abuse?

[Ohioknight]

Well, like many things in this matter, nobody can say for certain, but leaving aside the NDA for a moment, do you honestly think anybody wants to open themselves up to that kind of abuse?

Very good point.  This is insane.

[Fringe Element]

Well, like many things in this matter, nobody can say for certain, but leaving aside the NDA for a moment, do you honestly think anybody wants to open themselves up to that kind of abuse?

That's fair

I don't like it, because I believe the SCORE participants set themselves up for these kinds of recriminations what with all the gaslighting being done at reddit, but I agree that not wanting to face the kind of abuse that's aimed at Leandro and the /r/Cityofheroes mods is understandable

[therain93]

So you feel that despite all the wrong in the past 5-6 years, suddenly they should care about NCSofts interest? Suddenly they can take the high ground? If thats the case, they'd need to shut down the server completely and immediately, and that wouldn't even be high ground, that'd be "oops we got caught ground". They cannot take the high ground, the damage is already done, two wrongs don't make a right, but they committed way more than two wrongs.

At this point, add one more to the list, because if they were willing to have this up and running and hidden for all those years I think they can go ahead and release it for the community that still actually mourns.

Actually,  this is the absolute point of turning back if there ever was one,  simply because the code (assuming it is ncsofts) isn't in the wild.  It's quite easy to encourage someone to commit (another) wrong when you'll be a beneficiary.  As painful as missing out on the possibility of playing on the server these past 6 years maybe, it doesn't hold a candle to the kind of fallout that could occur if ncsoft proprietary code is released-- its not just another for the pile.

[Zombie Man]

I tend to give Tony and Leo the benefit of the doubt. If Tony says he wasn't involved with a secret server, then he wasn't. If Leo was afraid of NCSoft (with good reason, those jerks), then he was afraid.

Why wouldn't one give them the benefit of the doubt? Emotion. And personalization.

But emotion isn't proof or evidence. It's not an appropriate rationale on which to make accusations. Residual anger and feelings of being left out are coloring people's judgement to assume the worst of people. People jump to the conclusion that someone somewhere acted in bad faith and they're going to sleuth around to try to prove it. That's not how reason and logic work, and it's not a path to knowledge.

This is called "personalization." First, something bad happens. In this case, it's the presumption [which could be false] that for all this time there was a fully functional server that had no issues whatsoever that they missed out on. Then, it is perceived as a personal affront, a slap in the face, and targeting of one's self. They're crying out to the powers that be, "Why me!? Why was I left out?!"

Maybe what has transpired has nothing to do with you. And your perceived sleight is just that, your perception, like Jonah angry at the broom tree.

And so, in order to justify their feelings, they twist and turn every possible thing that anyone said or did to give it the worst possible interpretation. And the best possible interpretation isn't considered... why? Emotion.

Is it possible someone acted in bad faith? Sure. But lacking real evidence and not just emotions, I'm discounting that.

Eliot LeFebvre posted a opinion piece earlier.

Well, there's a lengthy diatribe based on emotion. Someone did the community harm and everybody's feelings are hurt.

Well, mine ain't. And when I played CoH I was an extremely active player and member of the "community." I was in almost all the closed betas. I was invited to California for the Ultra feedback group. I edited the wiki. But it wasn't really a community, not for me. Sure, some people forged strong friendships, but I had my own personal life and family and friends. I didn't look to people on my Task Force or CoH Bulletin Board as "my community." I tried to help a spiritual successor with time and money, and when I saw it wasn't going anywhere fast, I gave up on it. I didn't take a vow to join a monastic community of CoH for the rest of my life. Furthermore, how are people forgetting all the strife that existed between various player 'communities'?

"Somebody destroyed the community" is just another emotional personalization of this whole affair.

If a working active server of CoH becomes available, I'm right there and playing it day one. If it never happens, I'm OK.

[Ohioknight]

Personally, I REALLY miss the game -- it's absence is a hole in my life.  Paragon Chat goes furthest to help that, but I REALLY miss the game.

I think the work done by SCoRE is by far the best chance anybody will ever get to play it again.  To the degree that some people have gotten that chance... man that is so incredibly awesome.  I can't deal with "if I can't have it then other people shouldn't".  I don't know how people do that.

[weenus]

Pruned the post for the sake of thread flow

This is the second time now that I've been accused of trying to troll up some kind of massive insurrection. You say that you understand my cynicism, if you truly do, that means you're willing to step outside of your insider position within the community, your personal context with different parties involved, and see how it looks from the outside.

You made multiple references throughout your post to things like haves and have nots, and conspiracies over the years, also about how people have been conflating Paragon Chat and discussion with Paragon Chat with private servers, at best, these points are being made disingenuously given the context that we know now in the wake of the leaks.

There are, quite literally, haves and have nots. This is not up for debate any more it is simply a matter of fact. The question is, was that being done deliberately, or with some sort of elitist glee, I'm 100% willing to learn that it was not. The idea that this has just been a completely secret project that Leandro wanted to make as perfect as possible before bundling it up and releasing it into the world to become it's own unstoppable monster, popping up and forcing NCSoft's legal team into a constant wack-a-mole game of trying to shut down random private servers, that's entirely plausible. It just doesn't look that way in some ways in retrospect, largely on account of the manner in which people have guarded this secret over the years.

You have to be willing to understand here, that we have 100% full knowledge now that Leandro was running the server, that is out in the open and confirmed on multiple major news websites. This is going to naturally create a lot of guilt by association, though that may be completely unfairly, and I can understand your position here, if I was accused of being involved of something without actually reaping the benefits of having access to it I would be pissed too. It's not fair, but given the circumstances I also don't think it's fair to react to the feelings of guilt by association incredulously.

You mentioned that the conspiracy theorists over the years doing a victory lap, I've never understood this position socially, that anyone who has ever posited a conspiracy theory is forever marred as incorrect, even when their theories were confirmed over time. I can understand that there are some theories out there that was completely outlandish or unfounded, but some of them were spot on and likely directly informed by earlier, smaller scale leaks. I don't quite understand the disdain for those people who were on the money with their theories of a server existing that we all now know to be a fact. As a third party, one who was not banging on the conspiracy wardrums over the years and one who is not a community insider or, more so, a member of the NDA party, it looks like people being upset over getting caught with their hand in the cookie jar. That's just how it comes across. I don't mean it as an accusation I'm just asking that you understand that the optics look bad on it.

I apologize for pushing the concept of a caste system, and ultimately that is unfair. My personal background was working in the esports industry, I know that at the time CSGO was being developed, a number of pro players from previous CS iterations were invited to playtest and provide feedback and I completely understand the importance and the value in that. I can see how that may have been the case for this server, where they needed people they knew were active, knowledgeable players and I can understand that people were being extremely selective because it needed to be people who could guard the secret long enough for it to reach fruition. I just don't think the outright vitriol and condescension towards people who have caught wind of this project over the years and felt it was sinister is fair at all.

People involved with the project can follow the NDA and protect the secret without being jerks about it, and in retrospect going back and seeing posts where people are quite literally outlining some of the aspects of it that we now know to be true, while scoffing at it and mocking the idea of it, it's a MAJOR contributor to why people feel there was overt elitism and gaslighting involved and I truly hope you and others are willing to understand that.

[Kistulot]

[Edit: Deleted... stuff. --TonyV]

I might not have posted in the forums, but I stayed up late at night, running people through iTrials, teaching them the mechanics, and carrying them through badge runs of content.

I was one of those people tossing inf at newbies to encourage the game to grow.

I was one of those people who invited her friends and family to play alongside her.

I'm not a troll. I'm not here just to make problems. My concerns are not inherently invalid and do not need to be silenced because there is a chance that everything "will work out in the end and that's all that matters."

[Edit: I don't believe you're a troll, which is why I'm not nuking this post entirely. But that stuff you said at the beginning... I have NO idea where that came from, and honestly, I don't want to know. Needless to say, it's baseless, and we really aren't going to let stuff like that just hang out there. Again, you don't have to be unicorn and rainbows happy, but we're not going to allow angry lashings-out, either. --TonyV]

[Felderburg]

So do you REMEMBER the "don't do anything to upset the negotiations" that went on for years and never did get finally resolved?  At what point during that should SCoRE have effectively announced "HEY, Look at this, there's already a private server up and running!".

I do remember. I also remember the gradual death of anything concerning negotiations, and what I perceived to be the general assumption that negotiations were over. Sure, it was good to not open up about a server while the negotiations were going on, but I personally lost hope completely in NCsoft negotiations. Maybe SCoRE didn't, but then they should have said "we were secret because of potentially ongoing negotiations," which has not been mentioned at all in this drama.

You don't KNOW.  You don't know anything at all about the private server except that it exists, has run, apparently with considerable success, for years, and has supported a population of approximately 3000 users with several hundred active at once.  You don't know it's stability.  You don't know it's configuration or what it takes to run.  You don't know it's origin, whether completely reverse-engineered or a modified copy of the beta code that they got to run on some insane combination of obsolete software versions and virtual machines.  You don't know if it's release could implicate someone.  You don't know anything except that it wasn't made openly available to anybody who wanted to use it.

Based on two things you've said, I'll clarify my position. If the release of code would implicate a dev who stole code from NCsoft, that is the only *current* reason that not releasing would be acceptable to me (I'm not sure they actually have dev-stolen code; the only thing confirmed is a character database, which is not quite the same (although just as legally questionable)).

I highlight "current" because of what you say we know: the private server "has run, apparently with considerable success, for years, and has supported a population of approximately 3000 users with several hundred active at once." If the code was still being worked on, I would understand delaying release until it was "good enough." But it seem like we're in agreement that it was completely viable, usable, and that it *works*¹. And it was my understanding, and I think the understanding of a lot of other people, that SCoRE was *supposed to release what they appear to currently have*. I do have serious doubts about the credibility of the leakers, especially when they start calling people out individually. But based on what I've seen, it doesn't seem, to me, like there was actually any short-term internal SCoRE plan to release the code.

I'm still willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, but none of the statements released by SCoRE so far have given me any indication that they have not betrayed what I believe was their original purpose: to create, *and release*, a working CoH server. Maybe they *were* going to release for the 15th anniversary... but if that's the case, there's absolutely no reason to push that back, now that everything is public.

¹You do mention that we don't know its stability, but that's right after acknowledging it's stable enough to have hundreds of concurrent users (although I admit there may be semantics between "concurrent user" stability vs. "long term server stability and how long it goes before crashing" that we may differ on, and I probably use "stability" in a more colloquial sense than a specific programmer sense).

Personally, I REALLY miss the game -- it's absence is a hole in my life.  Paragon Chat goes furthest to help that, but I REALLY miss the game.

I think the work done by SCoRE is by far the best chance anybody will ever get to play it again.  To the degree that some people have gotten that chance... man that is so incredibly awesome.  I can't deal with "if I can't have it then other people shouldn't".  I don't know how people do that.

Since I'm replying to you, I may as well reply to you again :p I also disagree with "if I can't have it then other people shouldn't". My stance is more like "if other people have it, everyone should have it" ("it" being an actually working CoH server, not just one that was in development).

Edit: Due to the migration of posts from "New Efforts" to this thread, the quotes above no longer link properly. But they are unmodified, and the originals can be found in this thread (I don't want to put the effort in right now).

[Kheprera]

*sigh*

I am not angry at the SCoRE team. I am thankful. We believed the game dead. It's not. There is hope.

But so many assumptions is slowly killing that newfound hope. Anger. Passion. Belief of being personally victimized. I do understand those feelings. As said before, being left out, of not being one of the "Chosen" can be a bitter pill.

Assumptions that the private server has been useable for all these 6 years is just that, an assumption. Leandro has dedicated a great deal to support this community, Paragon Chat, the successors, and SCoRE. I don't know him except from his posts here and his videos. I sincerely doubt he has any more idea of who I am than any of you do.

We now know the game isn't dead. It has been in hiding, healing from the blow dealt by NCSoft. We know that part of the reason NCSoft would not sell is because some of the code used in CoX was used in some of their other games that were (are?) still running. I can visualize that SCoRE's mission would be to clean up the Spaghetti Code, re-engineer it, maybe to the point that it is entirely new code that would keep NCSoft off their back. Such an effort would take years of work and enough playtesters to check for bugs and issues.

I'm a technical training writer for the US Government. My coding abilities are limited to HTML, Javascript, and a bit of CSS. I can code a very pretty webpage and that's about it. Keeping some of the stuff I write secret is a requirement of my job. I've been doing it for 20 years, and it really isn't easy to always stay quiet. When the massive changes to the Form 1040 hit last year, I wanted to scream about it to everyone because of my frustrations, but I had to keep quiet.

It could not be easy for people on the Private Server to stay quiet. I can imagine the desire to scream, "LOOK! OUR CITY ISN'T DEAD! STAY STRONG!" But in order to make sure the debugging, coding, and testing went as smooth as possible without a lot of extra chefs in the kitchen making scrambled eggs out of tomato soup, silence was required.

I hope the community's anger passes, and that forgiveness can be found. I hope that, in the end, we'll be able to fly side by side through Paragon to defeat the invading Rikti once again.

Kheprera: Paragon Gris Gris, Fennec Enterprises, and The Dawn Academy

[SilverAgeFan]

[slickriptide]

¹You do mention that we don't know its stability, but that's right after acknowledging it's stable enough to have hundreds of concurrent users (although I admit there may be semantics between "concurrent user" stability vs. "long term server stability and how long it goes before crashing" that we may differ on, and I probably use "stability" in a more colloquial sense than a specific programmer sense).

It's worth noting that in his video, People's Hero Mr. Destroyer Stroyer specifically called out how:

• Hardly anyone was on the server at any given time; sounding pretty much like Paragon Chat on a non-event day.
• When he hosted an event in Rikti War Zone, "RZW ran like crap" with more than a handful of people in the zone

That is a description of a server with a handful of active users that is still in need of further work; not a server with hundreds of active users and smooth as silk performance.

"3000 users", wherever that number came from, is a number spread over six years or more. If we take Mr. Destroyer Stroyer at his word, via his statements on his video, most of the people invited to the server either declined the invitations entirely or only came in for a short while before losing interest. He is not describing a thriving server full of supergroups and a vibrant community. He's describing the same sort of user base that uses Paragon Chat. Putting his "Liberator of /r/CityofHeroes" act aside, I suspect that what Mr. Destroyer Stroyer really hoped would happen is that the the server admins would be "forced" to open the server up to the public and Mr. Destroyer Stroyer would get the server-wide community in-game that he felt was missing and was therefore responsible for his feeling of it being non-fun to be a member of the server. (Yes, I'm aware he was banned. I don't think that changes his motivations, particularly, but only he really knows why he took the actions he took.)

[weenus]

"3000 users", wherever that number came from, is a number spread over six years or more. If we take Mr. Destroyer Stroyer at his word, via his statements on his video, most of the people invited to the server either declined the invitations entirely or only came in for a short while before losing interest.

Very valuable point that a lot of people conflate in the discussion of this. The amount of users the leaker had seen signed up on the forums is in no way indicative of the server's capacity or capabilities, especially given other leaks that show that a number of the invited players never even signed in or signed in once and did not play.

Overlooked statements like the zone running like crap definitely lends a lot of credibility to the point that this was not some glorious, perfect time capsule but a work in progress that is not ready for the sort of traffic that a full public release would garner and the attempts to pressure them into releasing it AS IS RIGHT THIS SECOND is likely a "Watch what you wish for" lesson in the making.

[Kistulot]

Overlooked statements like the zone running like crap definitely lends a lot of credibility to the point that this was not some glorious, perfect time capsule but a work in progress that is not ready for the sort of traffic that a full public release would garner and the attempts to pressure them into releasing it AS IS RIGHT THIS SECOND is likely a "Watch what you wish for" lesson in the making.

I think most of us would prefer to be a part of that development, and don't particularly care about how crap it runs when they have our characters, and supergroup bases.

Some have even seen screenshots of the characters, names and all, of friends' toons, friends who have been dead for years since the end of CoX.

[Super Atom]

Everyone keeps trying to say the server wasn't ready, except the guy who made it.

Direct qoute

Leandro writes. "The last discussion on an open event leading to a public release was for the game's 15th Anniversary, which is coming in just a couple of weeks. Nobody who wasn't part of SCORE will believe that, but sometimes timing is just that bad."

Clearly it was ready for public testing. Please stop saying it isn't.

[Zombie Man]

I remember you from the original forums and it's good to see your level headed post here, ZM.

And I, you! **hugs**

"3000 users", wherever that number came from, is a number spread over six years or more. If we take Mr. Destroyer Stroyer at his word, via his statements on his video, most of the people invited to the server either declined the invitations entirely or only came in for a short while before losing interest. He is not describing a thriving server full of supergroups and a vibrant community. He's describing the same sort of user base that uses Paragon Chat.

Back in the days, if any player server got down to those numbers, we'd be declaring the server 'dead' and demanding the Devs to let everyone transfer to a live server.

[weenus]

Everyone keeps trying to say the server wasn't ready, except the guy who made it.

Direct qoute

Leandro writes. "The last discussion on an open event leading to a public release was for the game's 15th Anniversary, which is coming in just a couple of weeks. Nobody who wasn't part of SCORE will believe that, but sometimes timing is just that bad."

Clearly it was ready for public testing. Please stop saying it isn't.

The initial comments I saw about that anniversary event seemed more like a short term shindig for the public and not just them opening the floodgates to everyone for sustained gameplay.

[Ohioknight]

And it was my understanding, and I think the understanding of a lot of other people, that SCoRE was *supposed to release what they appear to currently have*.

I'm not quite certain where you got the idea that SCoRE was "supposed" to do anything at all aside from the personal statements of people that such a loosely affiliated effort existed and that it would eventually "return the game to the community" as a "promise to the community" and that a "server would exist" and the community "would have it" at some undefined point in the future.   I don't recall anything at all regarding timeline, form, obligations or really anything at all since all references prior to Leandro's public statement were couched in deniability. 

People may have made assumptions on that, like they won't run a server for several years with only invitees, or "as soon as they have a functioning server they'll release the code publicly" but there was never any such commitment that I recall and I obsessively poured over every remotest hint on what SCoRE was up to.

Furthermore, SCoRE has never, to my knowledge, taken anything from the community (I gather they took donations from players to help fund the servers per a screenshot of a forum I saw) but they've given the community Paragon Chat with Leandro being the host/supporter of the Tequila loader software.  And that means I have derived great personal value from them with no cost or commitment from myself which would make me pretty ungrateful to complain that they haven't given me more.