Linkshell Membership - The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

In snooping around last night on the internet, I ran across a few opinions on how to rate linkshell members. It got me thinking about how I go about watching the various people I associate with and the members of Obsidian as well.

Now Obsidian is a bit of an aberration. When it was created, we only wanted it to be filled up with people on Dynamis days. We weren't too worried back then about actually creating an overly social environment. Dynamis, at the time, was probably one of the hardest events to organize and actually succeed in consistently without large numbers. With the addition of the merit system and a large number of job adjustments, it's obviously cake now and can be low-manned very effectively.

Back then, Obsidian did something that I believe set a standard. It was essentially a melting pot of the largest end-game shells on the server with large portions of LB, BBQ, and TK present along with good chunks of what I termed "fringe big end-game shell" like Unsent, Resu etc. We didn't have their entire shells combined into Obsidian mind you, there were those who disliked the guys organizing it and vice versa, but when you look at the combined attempts of things like AV (Awesomeland KC Zerg), it looks a lot like what Obsidian did in it's early days.

That being said, Obsidian suffered from a lot of drama. There wasn't really any sort of comraderie between the various groups that joined up. We had made a very blunt point of making sure that any drama that wasn't dynamis-related gets left at the door, but that didn't always happen. When it was go time, there wasn't really a whole lot of drama going on, but after hours...let's just say the forums weren't really ever quiet like they are now. It was during this time period that I really started learning about the types of players that are out there.

The Good

These will be the people that make up your core of your linkshell. They aren't always the best geared, but they're always the ones that pay attention and attend everything they can. These are the people that have their priorities straight, understand that anything in FFXI takes time to get and have the patience for it. They also understand and accept the system that's put in place and will also challenge the leadership if they feel a poor decision was made in regards to system changes.

Wait...challenging leadership is a "good" characteristic?

Yes it is. You see, any leader, at any given point in time, can make a bad decision. Just like it's good for the leader to be able to stand up and say "You know, I screwed up. I'm sorry." to the masses, it's good for some members to tell said leader they screwed up. Why is that?

Sometimes the leader will not know they screwed up. Leaders are not perfect. Decisions they make are based on the information they have handy along with their own personal ideals. A good linkshell member will say (paraphrasing) "You screwed up, here's why." in a manner that doesn't cause the leader to draw a line in the sand. In the leader's position, they are hopefully listening to the member and weighing what's being said against the overall benefit to the linkshell. The good member will also be thinking of this as well.

The Bad

These aren't really bad people per se, these are people who aren't as commited/active as the Good due to various circumstances like work, school, etc. The chance to get to know them online isn't as great, so knowing where they stand on various issues is often times hard to gauge.

Drama tends to start in this category unfortunately. There are often times conflicts between The Good and The Bad (that pun wasn't intentional...I swear) over a perceived sense of entitlement. The system that's in place for your linkshell can often times diffuse these sorts of scenarios, but what gets asked a lot of times to leadership is "I put in 10x more time than he does and he's going to get byakko's haidate before me?"

(The short answer to that is to look at everything the person asking the question has spent points on and point that out. 10x more active doesn't mean you're entitled to 10x more loot.)

There are some that would look at this group and just instantly want to kick them from the linkshell without ever really making an attempt to get to know them. Can't make all the events and you're trying to get something before one of our more dedicated members? /breaklinkshell target (name).

Wrong approach.

Every linkshell is going to end up with these sorts of players. They're absolutely required. Just because they can't make every single event and a number of months down the road, they happen to have more points for ONE item than a far more active member doesn't mean they don't deserve it. They've worked within the system you have created. As long as they have a good attitude, follow the rules and generally show up when they can (meaning you don't see them out xp'ing when linkshell events are going on...see 'The Ugly' section), who really cares if they make 100% of the events or 25%?

Unless one of your rules is "you have to make at least 50% of the events to be eligible to lot" or something to that effect. On top of that, most of these guys will have the foresight to actually tell you on their application what type of play time they're capable of putting in...especially if you have that question on whatever linkshell application you use.

Again, these are generally just good people with far less time to commit than most. A leader's job is to make attempts at getting to know these people. The more you know, the better you feel about their presence in the linkshell overall.

The Ugly

These are your members that rarely make it past the trial period. They're usually in the "catastrophically-leveled socially inept" category of human beings. They generally will have no concept of time, commitments or teamwork.

A lot of the times, an application or an interview will not tell you these things. You generally have to pick it up during the course of events. Are they logged in the game but not at the event? Are they AFK while the event is going on? Are they out XP'ing while the event is going on?

That's not to say people aren't allowed to go do some other things while an event is going on, but if they're online 'doing other things' while events are going on the vast majority of the time, then it's pretty clear where their loyalties lie and it's rather safe to boot them from the linkshell.

These are also people who like to alienate themselves and split bonds apart among other members. Usually too scared to have a one on one discussion with whoever their issue is with and preferring to just talk about it with anyone else other than the actual subject the discussion is about. If you somehow end up with someone like this in leadership, get ready for the drama to be magnified ten fold. It's like I've always said...Absolute power corrupts absolutely and Absolute power is often absolutely abused by significant others.

In Obsidian, it's pretty easy to tell who will fall into this category. During the interview process, we go over the primary points of the linkshell. Points like the schedule, the bidding system and some basic do's and don'ts of the specific job they applied with. Said interviewee will usually state they understand, but promptly fail to show up for the first 4 runs they've signed up for and they're off in sea somewhere doing god knows what. When asked about it "Oh I didn't know the schedule."

Yeah, {See you again!}.

These are also people who can't have a serious, one on one discussion about issues bugging them in a mature manner. I know I'm prone to some rather poorly verbalized responses to various issues, but these guys will generally make me look like a seasoned politician when it comes to vocalization.

The rifts they can cause along with the irritation they can create just leaves a leader no other choice but to get rid of them...and of course they usually won't go quietly.






Next week (hopefully), another leadership discussion, Cookout Stories, Vol. 5 (final volume), and some more math. In the mean time, here's a picture of me stabbing a rat: