Meguca Micro Empire Quest (PMMM)
- Thread starter inverted_helix
- Start date
I cannot say that I have been reading every post carefully, but this thread seems to have devolved into two separate morality debates. One is about morality of various Meduca organizations (mainly the Serenes and the Magick Company), while the other debate is about the nature of altruism.
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1: Have we the players become motivated primarily by self interest in our Tokyo dealings?
1a: Specifically was our loan deal with Magick Corp motivated primarily by self serving desire to expand into Tokyo, or by the need to deal with refugees?
2: Does Tokyo long term stability require Serene expansion or not, and if so to what extent?
2a: Does said expansion require the Magick Corp loan? Would it have been required without the refugee issue?
2b: Do we have to raise Tokyo quality of life to Serene standard immediately? Or do we have a grace period? To what extent and how long would this grace period apply?
2c: Can our business expansion begin in Tokyo without first hunting DS back up to 0?
3: Are we morally responsible for the refugee issue?
3a: Does "Saving Tokyo" provide sufficient justification for creating the refugee problem?
3b: Do we have any right to expect other organizations to do their "fair share" in handling the refugee problem?
3c: What is that fair share?
4: Should we have been more politic in how approached Magick Corp?
5: Is anyone perfectly unselfish? Are we not all sinners? Doesn't that make us nothing but hypocrites?
5a: If we are not perfect, then how do we have any right to criticize other magical girl organizations? Why do we think we are better than them?
5b: Would the world be a better place if we were more powerful? If so does that justify seeking more power so that we can make the world better?
5c: Do the ends justify the means?
5d: If we can find neither perfect ends nor perfect means does that make us bad?
You know, the usual debate.
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Under a normal economic recession, yes, because the only thing that has changed is the economic circumstances of the region. People's motivations and such are still generally the same. People are still trying to build, but the market numbers are conspiring against them.
This is not a normal economic recession. This is a recession induced by magical killer depression, that is only a few months away from straight-up magical death. This is not a failure of "the market", but of "the people" that normally try to make the numbers work. And until the people are fixed, they will largely not act in a way that helps recover from the recession.
I get the sense that #5 was intended as parody more than anything else.
Unitveras
"Return to nothingness!"
- Location
- Tatsumiyajima
Yep.
Though I agree with how Nolrai said that there is no reason to debate this as the idea of morality is absurdly hard to entirely comprehend, much less have a debate about.
I had to take a few days off this quest myself to calm down given how heated I got. I'm usually better about keeping an even keel in this quest.
You have to keep in mind that I'm modeling these groups as people with their own ideas, goals, and plans. If you have something they want and you want something they have, there is at least the potential to make a deal. Especially when your goals align.
Also in terms of difficulty the quest isn't nearly as difficult as I'd originally designed it, but I think given how heated and precise the arguments about plans can get that there's sufficient sense of danger on the player side. Well that and the occasional despairing comments.
Well for the most part you've had some sort of compromise position you could reach. You've never asked someone for something they were completely unwilling to give yet. And at least with Hiko you made a rather large concession, one I wasn't sure you'd be willing to go for.
You have to keep in mind that I'm modeling these groups as people with their own ideas, goals, and plans. If you have something they want and you want something they have, there is at least the potential to make a deal. Especially when your goals align.
Also in terms of difficulty the quest isn't nearly as difficult as I'd originally designed it, but I think given how heated and precise the arguments about plans can get that there's sufficient sense of danger on the player side. Well that and the occasional despairing comments.
This isn't a normal recession though. This is a recession due to the fact that by in large humans in the zone have basically lost access to the positive side of the emotional spectrum. When pessimism reigns in business you get a recession because everyone saving money means there's less economic activity. Consumer Confidence is an important factor in business for a reason. There's no motivation and no hope.
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Yes.
Yeah, wasn't going to weigh in on that. Too heated for me (which was a pity, because the quest had seemed to be more stable than that - more discussion than arguments sort of thing).
Compared to average in a long running quest this one is very civil.
Aranfan
Team Plasma Grunt
I did bow out instead of continue to escalate. Which I am given to understand is rare. Also, the morality debate kinda petered out without mod intervention, which I am also given to understand is rare.
Not to toot my own horn, just to point out that this thread is unusually civil for it's length.
Oh yeah, totally agree. I've just found that I can be a touch prone to escalating as well, and it's not something that I end up enjoying, so I thought I'd nip it in the bud by not participating at all. By comparison, the earlier discussion I was fine with, since it was pretty civil.
Powerofmind
In Madness Fallen
- Location
- United States
It's because the base tone of the quest is more rational and clinical. Even when things escalate, it's only really as bad as the low to moderate points in other monster-sized quests, where it's still rational.
Ah yes, that's what I was thinking. It was feeling...less rational, recently.
Powerofmind
In Madness Fallen
- Location
- United States
Definitely on that. An actual, bald threat got through voting, and then we're supposed to be upset that the QM doesn't see us as moral paragons?
Nolrai
weak to fangs
- Location
- Porltand
Could we not start it up again?
@inverted_helix Is this something we can do, or have we moved past the point where we can reasonably tack things onto that meeting?
[X] Accept Sachiko's counter offer, with the caveat that the NPV calculations must be reasonable, simple, and standard.
-[X] Apologise for our comments to her regarding the refugee problem. It was overly confrontational, considering how willing she has been to help us.
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Unfortunately, apologizing for the threat doesn't make sense either. It just makes us look schizophrenic. It should never have happened in the first place, but, having happened, you have to accept it as a legit part of the discussion. You can back off from it, and adjust your tone, but immediately apologizing for it just makes you look a bit stupid.
Edit: Unless you completely replace the person you had handling the discussions, and put it up as, "This person should not have been saying those things, and that's not what we officially support."
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We didn't even make an explicit threat.
Doubling down on a mistake just to avoid admitting we made one makes us look worse then stupid. Being willing to admit to mistakes and back off from them is an important part of reducing tensions and leaving a good impression on people.
We did, however, make overly hostile suggestions. The apology for our implicit threats is implicit in the explicit apology for our explicit statements.