Ok, another TLA member wrote in to me and I decided to hold on till after Fuxyas article to post this one. But you dig the star-warish-like titles, right? Meet TLA Woof:

Apparently I'm a bad person because I play with a good clan. Apparently I deserve peoples abuse at me in Tribes, not because of what I do, but because of who I am (dare I say a 'good' player in a good clan?) Apparently I also deserve my team mates shooting at me (with team damage on) with the message of "I hate all tla". Apparently I deserve abuse in bulletin boards as well. Apparently (depending upon which gender people decide I am for the day) I'm either a lesbian or gay.

Apparently trying to encourage people when they start to learn the game and do things the smart way gets me no respect. Apparently congratulating someone for a good spinner shot, or shooting me out of the air with a sniper rifle etc gets me no respect. Apparently I shouldn't try to give people advice. Apparently I shouldn't tell people their generators have been down for the past five minutes and really need repairing, or where to get the repair pack. Apparently I shouldn't tell people to jump before they jet, or to use an energy pack, nor how to 'ski'.

Apparently easing up when our team has a clear lead is the wrong thing to do. Apparently joining a team by pressing 'TAB, '1', '1' (which is AUTOMATIC placement) is the wrong thing to do (yes I know there are exceptions to that rule). Apparently killing someone lots means I cheat.

Apparently trying to be a helpful and considerate player is the wrong thing to do. Apparently I deserve abuse for it and zero respect, even from most of my fellow clan members.

Sure, I've told some people from time to time I don't care what they think, that they can go get stuffed, but I can guarantee you that those people are complete assholes, imho. If anyone out there thinks "no, you're the asshole woof, you abused me for no reason, I was just having fun", I can still guarantee you I didn't start the fire.

All I've done since I've joined Tribes is tried to enjoy myself, but not at the expense of others. All I've wanted is to have good games and to not only be congratulated on my skill (if I had any), but on my attitude and helpfulness.

Noone remembers the nice things people do, they only focus on the negatives, it's a sad fact of human nature, one I have always tried to deny to myself, but it's unfortunately becoming more and more apparent. It's sad how a game of all things is driving this point home.

Makes me wonder why I bother. Makes me wonder if I should.

:tla:woof

P.S. I would like to take this opportunity to thank IronSite for prompting Fuxya into writing his article.

P.P.S. I do agree with your article, though tla didn't always play all on the same team, and definately don't now.

P.P.P.S. Someone said a very odd thing to me the other day "I left Networx Tribes and went and played on Splash because Networx is too high a quality game." Something to think about really... people would rather get lots of kills and lose the game than no kills and win? Could it be because it's not the fact that people don't mind so much losing the game, but they don't like the fact they don't get all the kills, all the glory, whether tla (or other good players) are on the same or opposite team? Hrmm.

The Hard Word

Ok, now that I've got a few replies from both sides of the fence, it seems everyone is blaming each other here. TLA seems to think (or I'm getting that impression) that they are disliked because they are good (best) players.

Meanwhile everyone else resented this "ganging up" which according to TLA never happened as much as we're making out anyway. Also a recurring theme here is the number of accusations and "bad vibes" still being directed at TLA even though the "ganging up" issue has been resolved. Hrmm....

Now I've done my best to be objective during this whole mess and your now about to find out why I titled this little subsection "The Hard Word". (Also explains the title of the article somewhat.) I've been relunctant to this but I'm getting that "righteous anger" thingo happenin, so I'm gonna do it.

I, personally, don't have much sympathy for TLA during this whole thing. Allow me to explain why.

Obviously, if the ganging up hadn't occured as much as we say (which is what TLA is saying) then I would never have wrote this article and even if I had no one would have agreed with me.

I will now recount for you an incident that occured one time, which is what makes me reject the "poor me" I'm getting from them.

Picture this, it's one of the DropZone maps. No happy lemmings, jumping off and attempting to survive here. No, it's one EvEm (me), two TLA (Fuxya and Ironsite) and some poor bastard who's name I can't remember. Two per team. Now even then I was unhappy with the "ganging up" situation, and I was determined to stay on the team I was put, no matter what either TLA said. As luck would have it, I was assigned to the team with Fuxya, whereas Ironsite was delegated to the team with the other guy. A hint was dropped about me "being on the wrong team" but to Ironsites credit, he didn't push the issue. (So basically all we had to do was ignore them and everything would have been fine...)

What followed was Fuxya and I stomping on the other two. The other guy was either new or dumb, he wasn't very good. But then Ironsite began with things such as "it's really two vs one you know" (which I take to be an "indirect" insult) and then with the "God damn it do something useful" and I can't remember all the comments made by Ironsite but I do recall raising an eyebrow. Suffice it to say Ironsite soon got stuck into the poor bastard so much he disconnected. When some other guys joined the game the attitude continued. The behaviour I witnessed that night was the worst I'd seen, that is until I met [DS] in action quake (whom I beleive have "dick" tattooed across their foreheads). If I had said anything like that to anyone, I would have found my sorry ass removed from this clan before I had time to at least put on a clean change of underwear.

This is why I'm not completely buying into "we're angels, you hate us because we win" routine. That night, I did not see any effort on behalf of either TLA player to "teach" the guy how to play, or take him under anyones wing, or any of that. In fact he wasn't treated with respect at all. And you wonder why people don't like you guys. Gee. You can deny that incident as much as you like, make any excuse you like, but I saw what happened.

Also we hear about the we're approachable, talk to us etc. I beleive Muzzman said he did and was called a whinger for his efforts. And didn't Gen say he did tried to do so as well? And what was it Gen said.... "their care factor was zero".

Arg I don't know. I'm about prepared to drop the whole thing, but someone, or something, has screwed up somewhere, else none of this would have occured, but no ones prepared to take the blame. Personally, I feel like blaming the programmers. Hell, the fact that they only supported Glide just goes to show how short sighted they were, and in fact to my mind it makes them morons. (I don't care what their reasons were.) Then there was the whole "everyone in the UK can go f*#@ themselves" routine as it took them ages to release it over there. (Have they actually done that yet?)

The solution is simple: if it gets you steamed, go play something else, that's what I did.