Kill It With Fire: Packs Discussion Forum

Well, it doesn't have to be fire. You could use an Internet Kill Switch too, and I suppose it would technically work. Or any other number of final solutions. But killing things with fire is always fun.

(Side note: I take no responsibility for the content of those links.)

But seriously... let's take a look at the Packs Discussion forum...

To start off with, there's no reason for the 's' in there. We'd be perfectly fine calling it the Pack Discussion forum, or the Pack Discussions forum, or the Completely Pointless Forum Used Only To Boost Post Count (CPFUOTBPC, not to be confused with a CPTUOTBPC (Completely Pointless Thread Used Only To Boost Post Count)). As a grammar Nazi, such indiscriminate use of an additional 's' is an unforgivable crime, and, in and of itself, warrants the forum's deletion.

Aside from that, though, there is the forum's purpose itself. According to the forum page, you are to 'Talk about alliances and wars here.' Which would be all well and good... if there was any point to that.

Let's begin with pack wars, since it's shorter. We all know how pack wars work. They're not really wars, or anything like that. All they really are is pack-wide attacks. They don't work well, either - too much randomness, they can be launched by any member, alpha or not, there's no way to see who launched them, you can't fight back against the ghost pack, etc.

Really, they have nothing to do with actual conflict between two packs, in just the same way PvP is completely impersonal.

Pack enemies, as in other packs, and not the enemies feature, are extremely rare, and usually pointless. There is not a single major pack at 'war' with another one, and for good reason - a truce is far easier on everyone. Plus, there's no point in having packs at war.

Plus, complaining about pack wars would be taken badly, like complaining about PvP. Encouraging other packs to all gang up and attack one pack would probably be taken as harassment, so that's out. And who the fuck (aside from myself) would go out on the forums and say they're looking for enemies? And what idiot would actually accept an offer to be enemies? I mean, seriously...

So, that gets rid of any reason to do with pack wars. In all actuality, I don't believe there has ever been a thread that fit the definition of 'wars' in there, and I've been here for ages.

Now for alliances. Allow me to sum it up:

Alliances are completely and utterly pointless.

Of course, I suppose you want some more info than that. Let's see...

The concept of alliances has been around since when I joined. However, at that time, there were no pack wars... so it wasn't much of an issue.

These days, it's morphed a bit to include things like no PvP, no pack wars, 'helping' other packs in wars, no recruitment, etc.

Fact: nobody enforces no-PvP rules. Seriously. I've talked to leaders of all major packs who have them. They aren't enforced. No one would ever punish their own member just to keep some nobody in another pack happy. At least, no good pack leader would.

Plus, there's no fucking way to track it, now that pack attack monitoring was removed. And even then, monitoring was impossible.

As for pack wars... they aren't common anyway. DP is worthless. 100% worthless. At high levels, power ceases to have a meaning - anyone can beat anyone. It's just a matter of luck. And since you lose way more when you attack and lose, nobody bothers with attacks anymore.

So, it's pointless among packs with equal power. And it's pointless for a pack with much greater power to agree not to attack a weaker pack. No motivation for the larger pack.

As for 'helping' other packs in pack wars... gimme a break. That's not even physically possible. Not to mention that we don't even have real wars, as I already pointed out.

The only thing even moderately useful is no recruitment agreements... and you don't need alliances for that. I've had an unofficial non-recruitment agreement with Warg for months. No issues.

So, really, none of those are reasons for alliances. Because there are no reasons. It was once mentioned that alliances actually doing something might be coded in at some point, but until then, they're completely pointless. And don't give me any 'what about RP use' crap. You want to RP, you can do it. But you don't need to make an 'official' alliance for it.

More than anything, alliances just restrict packs. I've seen packs who allied anyone and everyone. There's no benefit, and the restrictions aren't exactly helpful.

I believe that should prove my point, though I could go on.

Thus, we've eliminated both of the stated reasons for the Packs Discussion forum to exist. It now has no reason to exist. Thus, it should be removed.

Besides, go look at it. It's completely unused, barely any topics. Always has been. Nobody really cares. Heck, the only time it saw any life was when BM/SN had a tournament there, and that thread could have easily been put in the main forum.

And, as I stated, it's only real use is to boost post count.

Now, does anybody have a single good reason to keep the forum?

I thought not.