A player seeks to form a Grudge Team. Asks other players to play under him. They agree, opposition is found, set up coordinated and game begins. One player on the team ends up not communicating, not doing what he promised, and in general, screwing things up.
The question to the community: Does the Team Captain (and or the Team itself…) have the right to essentially fire that player and replace him? The only time MEGames would get involved would be to facilitate the account administration - ie remove Nation X from the Fired player and add it to the replacement’s account.
Or - is the Team now locked in and it’s in MEGames court to administrate a “fair” agreement between the Team and the Fired Player?
Situation being, a team recently expected the first scenario to be respected (the Team makes decisions and it’s none of MEGames business) but the Fired Player apparently complained to the Company and now there’s arbitration with possible financial implications being discussed, along with generalized pronouncements along the lines of “not allowed” etc.
What do the other players think? Do you think you should be able to “fire” a teammate (in a Team Grudge game, not an open game, of course!) or are you stuck in your Team Grudge and have to find a way for MEGames to arbitrate a resolution?
I would hope that the first option would be the one. I can’t understand the concept of financial implications at all. The replacement player takes the burden of the nations costs and the responsibility for that nation from the point handed over.
That’s my 2c worth
I don’t understand the finansial aspect either. I’d think ME owns all rights to the contents of the account, so if the replacement pays everything would be fine.
Otherwise you could essentially sell your position in a game, in which you were doing great.
Btw, feel sorry for a team-member to let the team down like that. It’s one thing in normal games, but not okay in Grudge games.
Why would you play on a team that doesn’t want you on it, and you don’t communicate with, the player in question should be the one to make the move, either comply with the team, or get out,
ME Games owns the rights and ultimately can make the decision, but my two cents should be that if a Grudge team forms and a captain is named, ultimately the captain gets the final say. If you have not named a captain then I guess if you get everyone else on the team to complain/say they want to remove a player, the player should be removed.
Maybe the House rules should be amended to say that.
Again, this is just an opinion like the previous thoughts.
I understand that ME Games has a sticky-wicket here, but I am 100% behind the concept that a grudge team has a captain and the captain is the boss. If a player is mucking up the team, the captain should be able to fire him/her an replace them with another player. I agree with Halex’s insight also: Why would that player want to continue playing if the team is unhappy and wants them gone? That in and of itself is a clear red flag that this person is disruptive and not a team player. Grudge games are TEAM games. If you don’t want to be a team player then don’t play on a Grudge Team in a grudge game. sheesh.
Tim has a good idea that the house rules should be amended to clearly articulate that a Grudge team captain can release a player from the grudge team mid-game and replace them with another player.
As to financial ramifications, there should be none. Who-ever owns the position for a turn pays for that turn. It’s just that simple. No one pays for past turns run when they take over a position. Usually (always?), positions being taken over are in worse shape than if the new player had run them all along. Why in the world would there be any talk of financial compensation to the player that mucked it up and is being asked to leave? double-sheesh!
Dave
p.s. Brad - is the player being asked to leave a lawyer by any chance? <grin>
Well Brad, they are in a sticky situation. The house rules don’t make it clear that a grudge captain can dismiss a player. And ME Games needs to be considerate of the fact that a person signed up to play and is paying to play. So they can’t just tell the person to leave.
All that said, the person should surely decide to leave on their own! How bizzarre!
My condolences to you sir.
Not a situation for condolences, just a bizarre one, IMO. But you’re working both sides of the fence Dave… (too much contact with lawyers…??). The question was whether Clint get’s involved OR NOT. If the answer is “NOT”, then MEGames doesn’t have to be considerate of anything - it’s the player’s business to deal with the Team and/or Captain. MEGames must also consider the single squeaky wheel vs angering, upsetting, and annoying the silent majority in many of these kinds of “sticky” cases.
I realize they play a fine line between “the devil may care” and over-micromanagement such that the line gets blurry sometimes. I can appreciate that. I think sometimes a little reminder that “Hey, there is a line, you know…” is appropriate, is all…
Should anything ever develop, my advice is get in touch with us and we can often, most cases even, help out. We’ve done that in this situation. Sometimes players can get a little vocal, and tempers raised and an impartial referee can help out. (Hence you see them in many sports and games).
Fortunately this particular situation has been resolved. Enjoy
As a TC (which I think of as “team contact” rather than “team captain” per se) of one grudge team, and a lieutenant on another, I find the notion that a captain could arbitrarily “fire” a player midgame as odd. (Yes, “arbitrary” as in, what are the standards of conduct for a grudge team member?)
Neither the game nor the team belong to any one person. A player pays his start up fees for a game, grudge or otherwise, the position is his. You could ban him from the yahoogroup, not invite him to start the next one with you, etc., but if he doesn’t voluntarily transfer his position when asked, who has the right to take it from him other than the moderator? Clint always has the final say, and it boggles the mind to think a player would play on in a grudge setting when he wasn’t wanted, but that call has to be Clint’s, not some potentially power-hungry Team Captain.
What if it’s not a “power hungry team captain”. What if it’s a Team… And they agreed before hand to play a game in a certain way, etc, blah blah. And one player broke the agreement. The rest of the team says ‘You have to go’. This is a Team game we’re discussing, not an “Open” game… So he get’s to keep his position and you have to banish him from the group? Sorry, the rest of the team just up and quits. If the Moderator supports the solo antagonist, well, some of the Team might just quit some other games out of protest. All bad. For the game, for Clint’s bottom line, etc.
I’m frankly, surprised that you would take the “moderator” position here - the Company can kill an entire game for 11 because of the supposed wishy-washy “rights” of 1…???
Oh, and for all the House Rules responses - note, my position is this is a Team issue and MEGames, published in the House Rules or not, has no business arbitrating a Team issue… I guess there’s a difference between a “Team Grudge” and a “Grudge” which is simply player-agreed upon positions with set neutrals. Well, there, that might be the difference that the House Rules can address - if your Captain speaks for the team in all administrative matters or not…
Brad,
please realize that Drew will take the devil’s advocate position on most anything, especially if I’ve already expressed a view that he can oppose! LOL. And Drew and I play on the same Grudge team and he IS the team captain. Guess I better keep my mouth shut… <wink>
If your team is winning, then you can probably afford to lose that player’s position. You could strive to make his gameplay miserable. Move characters into his capital, issuing challenges, steal gold, whatever. Drop bridges that he may want up. Strip artifacts off his characters. Emissary pop centers away. This is how it was done in the “old days” of MEPBM when your allies were less than stellar.
If your team is losing and the situation cannot get any better, stop playing. Invite the winners (the other side) to have another go of it, and leave the last player out.
Brad, my “power-hungry captain” comment was a bit tongue in cheek. Who is to say if a grudge team member has violated some unwritten code of conduct, and who is to say if the captain trying to fire said lieutenant is power hungry? One way to look at it is, a grudge team is nothing more than a voluntary association of players in a particular game variant. The individual player is who actually “joins” the game, even if it is the grudge captain who submits the list of players. You pay the setup fee, the position is yours. No so-called captain or vote of other players can force you out. They want you out, they can take the route Dwalon suggested.
On a larger level, sure a player can be fired from a team. The team can decide the mechanism, buck stops with the captain, team vote, whatever. But I just can’t see getting “fired” from a particular game. Individual games come and go, but The Game lives on.
Clint says this is resolved, so my comments are after-the-fact. By rumor I know about this situation.
Look at it from this perspective: The Team Captain/coordinator/ect made a mistake in jusgement. Should he be blameless in his poor selction of team mates? When Steve Jobs choose a wrong replacement for himself at Apple, was he able to excape the consequences of his mistake? When a king/president makes a wrong choice in the selection of generals and cabinet memebers, don’t they suffer the consequences? Didn’t Theodan make a mistake appointing Grima—and suffer the consequences?
This comes down to the basic issue. Is this a chess-like strategy game—which is the only thing some people can understand—a Tolkien simulation, or a wargame? If the first, then anything goes. If the second or third then the Team Captain learns a valuable lesson.
Grudge or not the player fronts with the money for the turn… they get to input the orders. The only answer is don’t pick them next time round… and advertise the problems to the next prospective employer.
Steve Jobs is a seperate case, as he was forced out of Apple but in your other examples, for example, appointing the wrong general, after enough screw ups, the general is generally sacked. That is pretty much what is being talked about here.
As for what kind of game this is, there are plenty of examples of team sports and games where players are replaced.
I am familiar with the situation and while nobody was blameless, to potentially blow up a game for 20 people would have been ludicrous. The only sensible solution was the pragmatic one, which is what happened.
As was mentioned, neither side was blameless. A player has booked his position when putting up the funds to play. Many team-sports have different rules, some allow replacements, some don’t. Cycling - you start with your team, and bad/good that’s what you have. The next race you have another team. Football you are allowed subsitutes etc. So there are lots of rules out there. In all formats though there are referees and ruling bodies to arbitrate when things go wrong as usually the people involved in playing the game are less likely to decide something that goes against them. Simple human nature. (Ie in the situation neither side wanted to budge to start with, as they wanted what they wanted!) Now, I understand that sometimes that ruling body gets it wrong as well… but with all these safegaurds it’s usually sorted out and a fair ruling applied.
In this case, things did go wrong with the team. Just ask us, and like was managed there, I was able to talk the problem out with the player concerned (and team) and found a solution that was able to be resolved. If the players had gone ahead then I don’t think it would have been resolved and even more harm done, due to high spirits on both sides. (I’ve seen that a lot!)
If a player brings the game into disrepute we can intervene (whether that’s cheating, or other reasons). We’re able to stand back and help with both a short-term solution, ie what ie best for this particular game, AND the long-term solution. There are myriad examples that have occurred throughout my years of running this game, and I find that the best solution is to talk to start with, find out what’s happening, inform the GMs whenever a sticky situation is developing and that cuts on 99% of known germs… sorry problems…
Generally I advise playing games with players you trust and respect. Where that is not always possible, or even goes awry due to circumstances beyond ones control, then ask for assistance and we can often provide that.
All nice and good. But the real lesson learned here was: “If you are hip deep in the swamp and surrounded by gators, don’t solve the problem yourself. Go to the man with the magic wand for rescue”.
For almost four decades I held leadership/command/administrative/management/executive positions. Real money, careers and lives were on the line. Think I didn’t meet with difficult subordinates and coworkers? I would have been ashamed of my leadership and management skills if I had to rely on Divine Intervention.
