Serious Stasiland reflections

Hudson

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While we had archived some initial reactions to the server, I wanted to save some comments about what the culture of the Stasiland server was like in reflection (beyond those first few weeks). Some questions to spark things off, feel free to answer any or all of them:

What were the moments of action like? Were they disruptive? Random? Did they spark more passive roleplay? Were they bloodthirsty?

Did the experience evolve over the year before it ended? Did the pandemic have an impact? Should anything have been handled differently in hindsight?

Were there any long term storylines? What was fun about the server, and do any particular highlights come to mind?


I'm gonna ping the previous contributors @Cuttsy @SpaceInvader @Shadok @Psonic @Mesa
 
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What were the moments of action like? Were they disruptive? Random? Did they spark more passive roleplay? Were they bloodthirsty?
Generally were a lot more intense, sparked more passive roleplay and overall had more weight to them. When you ended up in a firefight there were consequences to dying. For Soviets - before it was removed - you lost your weapon(s) or patrol vehicle and left them in the hands of whoever killed you. For insurgents/civilians, you either ended up with a PK(which weren't exclusive to rule breaks), or lost gear that you had to go through a number of processes to make/acquire. Things being finite and not as arcade as die, respawn, repeat added depth to firefights as the outcome resulted in more than just out of character bragging and could very well have an impact on what happens in the future. That also applies vice versa as the insurgents actually did a number on their targets when pulling off a successful attack, taking vehicles/aircraft out of action that will benefit them in the long run. From my experience, people also took injuries more seriously, as opposed to pushing the rules to their limit and trying to get away with as much as possible to save their character or win the encounter.

Lastly, there was no explicit target for Soviets/Stasi. The civilian passing through the checkpoint or the guy perched on the distant hill could be the one to pull out a weapon and shoot you. Tensions were high and it rubbed off on how some of the Soviets treated civilians, returning to the phrase 'you create your own demons'.

Did the experience evolve over the year before it ended? Did the pandemic have an impact? Should anything have been handled differently in hindsight?
It changed continuously which was to be expected from a drastic redesigning of the gamemode that had never been tried or tested before. The server was almost one long beta test, feedback had to be acquired as the problems were encountered(which in retrospect is easy to do, at the time not so much) at which point they'd already done a number on people, as the problems themselves had an impact on people and their chars directly, rather than just being quality of life problems. By the time the changes had been identified and rolled around the damage was done.

Pandemic probably had an impact more than people think. People think that lockdown should be a boosting factor but it does the opposite. Normally people get home from work/school around the 4-5 mark which is when people would join the server regardless of the count as they know people are getting on. In lockdown those who weren't key workers or busy catering to family had no definite time to get on and just decided to invest their time in another game.

Were there any long term storylines? What was fun about the server, and do any particular highlights come to mind?
too many highlights, had lots of great moments especially since rp was at a high even during s2k situations. enjoyed it thoroughly and it's a shame the server didn't(doesn't) get a second chance resolving the issues in retrospect
 
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Deleted member 61

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What were the moments of action like? Were they disruptive? Random? Did they spark more passive roleplay? Were they bloodthirsty?
The action was definitely different between the initial rules that warranted PKs for most scenarios and it created a lot more action when they were relaxed. The addition of two military sides and a policing/state side, plus citizens sort did more harm than good to the feeling of overall progress of a story-line for the entirety of the server as well as the individual story-lines of characters.

Certain S2K events were destined to be bloody. Some I think could've been better planned out, but the staff team was solid when it came to the off-server events in my books. The on-server events are tough to balance, and a lot of the time, they run the risk of becoming something we weren't at the time.

Did the experience evolve over the year before it ended? Did the pandemic have an impact? Should anything have been handled differently in hindsight?

The experience evolved, as mentioned above. It felt like we were taking the right approach by making gradual changes to the preference of the 'voter base' as forum presence is concerned and it ended up watering down other elements and with the shrinking population, it made it all the more difficult to handle. In hindsight, I don't particularly think I would've wanted anything different. The experience I had were well worth the time I spent staffing and managing the faction. I feel like I sacrificed my grades a bit, but I would do it all over again, as I repeatedly do for some reason every nebulous.cloud gamemode EXCEPT HL2RP.

We can blame the pandemic, or new releases, or whatever. It seemed to me as if theme has niche audience and only a select few people that were politically and historically literate enough to understand and produce fitting content for the server. Most people probably don't know much about socialism, the German Democratic Republic, the aftermath of World War Two and I don't blame them, it was a long time ago and its hard to imagine what could've been. The lore was solid and the scripting was great. The question became how do we adapt the 'business' menu, aka, requsitioning from the stasi to fit in the different settings as time went on and the war progressed. That became difficult and then sort of obsolete, although, I still did what I could to provide injections into the economy here and there.

Were there any long term storylines? What was fun about the server, and do any particular highlights come to mind?


There were a lot of highlights in my memory, so many so that I probably won't be able to write them all down.

First of all, I'll start off with the most memorable story of them all... psych, I'll end with it.

How I became Federalist Lead
Alright, so I began playing resistance, and then when Stasi was struggling with activity, I did both. I ended up in a position where I led the resistance because Mendel made a poetic suicide to garner the support of the people. We (Stasi and Soviets) captured "Akula" during a breakout plan to get out afric or danny?, [classified, forgot lol] after s/he was arrested under and interrogated. Two Stasi are gunned down in the underground and I came down too late (on my stasi CO). Akula stays behind to deliver a message to the public because there was a public banquet celebrating Lenin's birthday. Akula makes a big stand and ends up getting shot by KGB played by Char. At that point in time, my other character, Frederick 'Freddy' Dietrich becomes the head resistance guy, leading the Federalist resistance.

How my leadership of Federalists came to an end
After an extensive recruiting run, we get a bunch of new people. I feel rough about leading the stasi and the federalists at the same time, so I decide to ICly write off Freddy, who was my day one character. A character I truly loved and cared for. I said my good-byes and farewell. I start walking off and somebody begins to accuse me of being a traitor because there was a mole and concluded that because some recently spilt information resulted in an attack on a few Federalists (with their deaths being PKs) that Freddy, was trying to make his escape and so they shot Freddy in the heart after he said, "What are you gonna' do, shoot me?" Bam. The Head Honcho and his Second in Command, put into first, both dead within the week, leaving the West to keep up the fight.

Covering undercover branch's rules
Another story, this time with myself being on my undercover Stasi character. For this faction, I set up very strict rules that require yourself to PK yourself upon death that others would usually simply be NLR'd under. I did this because our undercover branch had access to nice battle rifles, sights, silencers, etc. and very good armor which we rarely deploy in unless its necessary.

@Rondal the Mad Lad
So, here I was on my undercover character and the Stasi have pushed me out of my home and they took it as an outpost, so I decided to stir up some protestors before finding those among them that were active against the Stasi. I kept shouting about my bed, calling them thieves and so we were shouting and jeering at them at the line of the checkpoint. The Captain told us to back up, so we did but kept yelling at them and jeering. So finally, the Captain walks up to us and basically signals to his men by dabbing to the ground and all of us, the protestors, get gunned down. Now, being the man that I am, swallow my own medicine and character ban my own Stasi agent because of my own made up rules and put myself on 2 week probation for dying, leaving me on my Oberst.

Bomber Boy
One of the stories I remember that I believe was impactful at least to the atmosphere was the bombing of the Stasi/Sovet co-opted base. I was alerted to some information that there would be somebody to see me, and that I am not to take any visitors until one of them explodes. I abide by this and I'm radioed to come meet with somebody at the front gate, which I tell them to hold them outside far at an external checkpoint and stay away from him. I inform that there is a bomb within him and it ends up going off, killing a fuck ton of people (3?) and giving that paranoid feeling to the resistance that we have information.

Assassination of Tabarov
The story before last makes this one funnier, because its actually a story-line I personally missed out on, and it was the assassination of East's character, Tabarnov I think his name was. The Ministry received information from a trusted source and a prisoner that one of the plotters was still alive and well after Oberst Fischer had Hegel @whiskers executed for his participation in the surgery to insert a bomb into a poor innocent victim of democratic propaganda. We ended up having to do the mission with only three agents. The job was to capture or assassinate him discreetly. Turns out, the badass motherfucker was strapped with a suicide vest, ready to blow. The senior agent slipped out, but Rondal and @Shadok got blown up. (The situation was, the bomb was detonated, but oocly, somebody dinked east and they started walking out. Teleported the two closest ones back to where they were when the bomb went off and it blew up, killing two of them and almost killing the senior agent. I was down to one field agent, but the 'story-line' was completed to an extent with the retaliation for the assassination attempt.

The last story I'll touch on was the long play.

The Treachery of Rondal
When I first inherited what became the intelligence branch, then eventually co-lead and finally lead-lead, I kept the top secret stuff to myself mostly, to more or less balance what could and couldn't be done to harm the gameplay. I inherited an extremely valuable asset from Shrike, one that sort of didn't have much to do. He was passively gathering trust and I allowed him to participate in the siege of Frankfurt by not mentioning otherwise. He more or less gathered information on the top members and to see if he could get any info on any other elements that could be in the area of operations. I then turned it against him and threatened his life and using it as blackmail for failing to give me prior warning. I took him out of service for a time, put him into the Volksarmee to investigate fellow soldiers, particularly Rondal, my co-lead. I was informed during an interrogation with a civilian I later shot, as well as another civilian that I blackmailed into giving receipts of medical services who confirmed it, that Rondal was working in cahoots with the insurgents. Rondal's captain later approached my Oberst, who gave him a very stern talking to, shaming and ultimatum. He was to confess his treachery, explain the extent of it and explain the reasoning and beg for mercy to the Ministry for State Security and await the response. I allowed him to stay on base until the response rolled in, partially because I wanted to let him create something interesting, partially because I wanted to ICly hunt him down eventually. The verdict rolled in, Dazza responded to my PM saying, "yeah, if u want to kill him, go ahead", and I said aight. I called him into my office and he never arrived. I called again before putting the place on lockdown. I hear he escaped with an APC and blew his way out. Defected.

Capture The Captain
This leaves me to the next most epic piece of roleplay in the server, probably one of my favourite moments.
I'm on my resistance leader, Frederick 'Freddy' Dietrich and I'm in there with @Bio Junior now, I think there was somebody up near the elevator, but I can't recall what happened to them. So, I'm smoking a cigarette by the sandbags and I hear the elevator. I radio in, "who's coming up the elevator", no response. I ask again before looking. Soviet patrol in their PK zone, BALLS FUCKING DEEP IN MY SWAMP!

Last Stand cont. @mert @Colonel Sanders
I panic, I whip out my AK and I roleplay opening fire, and then, open fire. I stop shooting after like, 7 bullets and I realized, oh fuck, I'm out of ammo. BURISLOV DECIDES FUCK THIS IM OUT, and jumps off the elevator, probably hurting his legs, idk @WeakenedHen5 can confirm. I open my inventory, NO AMMO! I run inside, pull out two boxes of 7.62x39mm, load it up and fire like, a mag at them but they're finally up. I'm with bio in the main room. They have to go through a single doorway to enter. I'm in there with our hostage, Rondal's defecting Captain who has a bounty on his head. We fight them off and they're yelling in German and Russian, I'm yelling in German, and we basically find out they have two Germans and a Soviet left up there. All wounded.The only one hurt bad and not terribly is I think @mert (who I ended up giving a pretty good story-line to follow along with his battle-bro if he wants to talk about it with the whole prison ordeal/message to family). So basically, we're all hurt bad. We tell them that we've got friendlies coming to flank and sandwich them and that they can surrender or die with them. It ends up being 2 German soldiers, 1 Soviet (Balashor @Colonel Sanders ), myself on Freddy, Bio Junior's ex-NATO and Rondal's defector, which, I toss a gun when I'm so badly wounded I pass out after, only to be revived by Freddy's Waifu, played by @Danny who was also NJSOC. I'm saved. This was one of my favorite moments in it, and it was so good that I was prepared to PK myself if I died in that situation because those brave soviets were willing to die for that bounty. I would've given them that victory and not bitched out with, 'well pk rules say that if you kill me in my zone, its nlr', they would've earned it.

Mole explained further @Numbers @Bio Junior
As I was saying, there was a mole that we had in the insurgency. The reason we knew there was some sort of internal insurgent information being leaked was because two ex-NJSOC we straight up assassinated and I decided Freddy would leave directly after that. Now, it should be known that this actually wasn't my doing. This was one-hundred percent a KGB operation which @char pulled off by hiring a few mercs while working (unknowingly) a single NJSOC along side a few hired guns looking to profit. The operation was an astounding success, until somebody decided to blast his KGB enroute back to base, and for that, we remember him and all those times he blasted people's faces.

So, the mole.. yes, the mole I've been talking awhile for now. So, the mole ended up alerting me of the plot against Comrade Fischer's life (the plot against me) as well as those behind it. Did I mention it was the mole who shot Freddy in the back? Yes, well. It turned out that the same ended up being pretty much elected by the remaining Federalist and insurgents to lead.. which he did so up until the final plot against Tabarov.

Throughout the entirety of the server, I relied primarily on one person to infiltrate and find uncover people within the insurgency, which he did. He unmasked most of the leadership and was able to point to many NJSOC as members of the insurgency, but not specifically NJSOC, which was still pretty solid.

After the Tabarov situation, I recalled "The West", known to the GDR as, Master Sergeant Stefan Keller, now, after his service undercover became Major for toppling the Federalists, assassinating Frederick Dietrich, confirming Hegel as the doctor who participated in the bomb assassination plot against the Oberst, confirming Tabarov as the other plotter, (he failed to mention he was also one of the conspirators, this was somewhat evident considering he seemed to be able to tell when it would happen).

He returns decorated with a medal and now serves as Fischer's right-hand man.

Another fucking hilarious story.
I told one of my field operatives to infiltrate the clinic and get information from one of the women working there. They did just that, however, they ended up building a rapport with the wrong clinician. They ended up seducing the wrong woman and they straight up ended up with a "surprise" in the "sack". The amount of shame my operatives were willing to put themselves through in order to preserve order in the German Democratic Republic only reflects the amount of patriotism they have for the socialist cause.



It was a fantastic experience and I hope people who read this remember it all as well as I do. There was a lot more interactions, but I'd be here all night writing them out if I wanted to. I thought I'd bring some light to something not everybody was able to see or witness as a whole. As stasi lead and federalist lead I got to enjoy most of the story day to day that other people didn't so I'm glad I could fill you in. If anyone has any scenes or situations for me to recall and reiterate, I'd be happy to keep the memory of Stasiland going on.
 

Rondal

And whole beasts of nations desire power
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What were the moments of action like? Were they disruptive? Random? Did they spark more passive roleplay? Were they bloodthirsty?
The action was definitely different between the initial rules that warranted PKs for most scenarios and it created a lot more action when they were relaxed. The addition of two military sides and a policing/state side, plus citizens sort did more harm than good to the feeling of overall progress of a story-line for the entirety of the server as well as the individual story-lines of characters.

Certain S2K events were destined to be bloody. Some I think could've been better planned out, but the staff team was solid when it came to the off-server events in my books. The on-server events are tough to balance, and a lot of the time, they run the risk of becoming something we weren't at the time.

Did the experience evolve over the year before it ended? Did the pandemic have an impact? Should anything have been handled differently in hindsight?

The experience evolved, as mentioned above. It felt like we were taking the right approach by making gradual changes to the preference of the 'voter base' as forum presence is concerned and it ended up watering down other elements and with the shrinking population, it made it all the more difficult to handle. In hindsight, I don't particularly think I would've wanted anything different. The experience I had were well worth the time I spent staffing and managing the faction. I feel like I sacrificed my grades a bit, but I would do it all over again, as I repeatedly do for some reason every nebulous.cloud gamemode EXCEPT HL2RP.

We can blame the pandemic, or new releases, or whatever. It seemed to me as if theme has niche audience and only a select few people that were politically and historically literate enough to understand and produce fitting content for the server. Most people probably don't know much about socialism, the German Democratic Republic, the aftermath of World War Two and I don't blame them, it was a long time ago and its hard to imagine what could've been. The lore was solid and the scripting was great. The question became how do we adapt the 'business' menu, aka, requsitioning from the stasi to fit in the different settings as time went on and the war progressed. That became difficult and then sort of obsolete, although, I still did what I could to provide injections into the economy here and there.

Were there any long term storylines? What was fun about the server, and do any particular highlights come to mind?


There were a lot of highlights in my memory, so many so that I probably won't be able to write them all down.

First of all, I'll start off with the most memorable story of them all... psych, I'll end with it.

How I became Federalist Lead
Alright, so I began playing resistance, and then when Stasi was struggling with activity, I did both. I ended up in a position where I led the resistance because Mendel made a poetic suicide to garner the support of the people. We (Stasi and Soviets) captured "Akula" during a breakout plan to get out afric or danny?, [classified, forgot lol] after s/he was arrested under and interrogated. Two Stasi are gunned down in the underground and I came down too late (on my stasi CO). Akula stays behind to deliver a message to the public because there was a public banquet celebrating Lenin's birthday. Akula makes a big stand and ends up getting shot by KGB played by Char. At that point in time, my other character, Frederick 'Freddy' Dietrich becomes the head resistance guy, leading the Federalist resistance.

How my leadership of Federalists came to an end
After an extensive recruiting run, we get a bunch of new people. I feel rough about leading the stasi and the federalists at the same time, so I decide to ICly write off Freddy, who was my day one character. A character I truly loved and cared for. I said my good-byes and farewell. I start walking off and somebody begins to accuse me of being a traitor because there was a mole and concluded that because some recently spilt information resulted in an attack on a few Federalists (with their deaths being PKs) that Freddy, was trying to make his escape and so they shot Freddy in the heart after he said, "What are you gonna' do, shoot me?" Bam. The Head Honcho and his Second in Command, put into first, both dead within the week, leaving the West to keep up the fight.

Covering undercover branch's rules
Another story, this time with myself being on my undercover Stasi character. For this faction, I set up very strict rules that require yourself to PK yourself upon death that others would usually simply be NLR'd under. I did this because our undercover branch had access to nice battle rifles, sights, silencers, etc. and very good armor which we rarely deploy in unless its necessary.

@Rondal the Mad Lad
So, here I was on my undercover character and the Stasi have pushed me out of my home and they took it as an outpost, so I decided to stir up some protestors before finding those among them that were active against the Stasi. I kept shouting about my bed, calling them thieves and so we were shouting and jeering at them at the line of the checkpoint. The Captain told us to back up, so we did but kept yelling at them and jeering. So finally, the Captain walks up to us and basically signals to his men by dabbing to the ground and all of us, the protestors, get gunned down. Now, being the man that I am, swallow my own medicine and character ban my own Stasi agent because of my own made up rules and put myself on 2 week probation for dying, leaving me on my Oberst.

Bomber Boy
One of the stories I remember that I believe was impactful at least to the atmosphere was the bombing of the Stasi/Sovet co-opted base. I was alerted to some information that there would be somebody to see me, and that I am not to take any visitors until one of them explodes. I abide by this and I'm radioed to come meet with somebody at the front gate, which I tell them to hold them outside far at an external checkpoint and stay away from him. I inform that there is a bomb within him and it ends up going off, killing a fuck ton of people (3?) and giving that paranoid feeling to the resistance that we have information.

Assassination of Tabarov
The story before last makes this one funnier, because its actually a story-line I personally missed out on, and it was the assassination of East's character, Tabarnov I think his name was. The Ministry received information from a trusted source and a prisoner that one of the plotters was still alive and well after Oberst Fischer had Hegel @whiskers executed for his participation in the surgery to insert a bomb into a poor innocent victim of democratic propaganda. We ended up having to do the mission with only three agents. The job was to capture or assassinate him discreetly. Turns out, the badass motherfucker was strapped with a suicide vest, ready to blow. The senior agent slipped out, but Rondal and @Shadok got blown up. (The situation was, the bomb was detonated, but oocly, somebody dinked east and they started walking out. Teleported the two closest ones back to where they were when the bomb went off and it blew up, killing two of them and almost killing the senior agent. I was down to one field agent, but the 'story-line' was completed to an extent with the retaliation for the assassination attempt.

The last story I'll touch on was the long play.

The Treachery of Rondal
When I first inherited what became the intelligence branch, then eventually co-lead and finally lead-lead, I kept the top secret stuff to myself mostly, to more or less balance what could and couldn't be done to harm the gameplay. I inherited an extremely valuable asset from Shrike, one that sort of didn't have much to do. He was passively gathering trust and I allowed him to participate in the siege of Frankfurt by not mentioning otherwise. He more or less gathered information on the top members and to see if he could get any info on any other elements that could be in the area of operations. I then turned it against him and threatened his life and using it as blackmail for failing to give me prior warning. I took him out of service for a time, put him into the Volksarmee to investigate fellow soldiers, particularly Rondal, my co-lead. I was informed during an interrogation with a civilian I later shot, as well as another civilian that I blackmailed into giving receipts of medical services who confirmed it, that Rondal was working in cahoots with the insurgents. Rondal's captain later approached my Oberst, who gave him a very stern talking to, shaming and ultimatum. He was to confess his treachery, explain the extent of it and explain the reasoning and beg for mercy to the Ministry for State Security and await the response. I allowed him to stay on base until the response rolled in, partially because I wanted to let him create something interesting, partially because I wanted to ICly hunt him down eventually. The verdict rolled in, Dazza responded to my PM saying, "yeah, if u want to kill him, go ahead", and I said aight. I called him into my office and he never arrived. I called again before putting the place on lockdown. I hear he escaped with an APC and blew his way out. Defected.

Capture The Captain
This leaves me to the next most epic piece of roleplay in the server, probably one of my favourite moments.
I'm on my resistance leader, Frederick 'Freddy' Dietrich and I'm in there with @Bio Junior now, I think there was somebody up near the elevator, but I can't recall what happened to them. So, I'm smoking a cigarette by the sandbags and I hear the elevator. I radio in, "who's coming up the elevator", no response. I ask again before looking. Soviet patrol in their PK zone, BALLS FUCKING DEEP IN MY SWAMP!

Last Stand cont. @mert @Colonel Sanders
I panic, I whip out my AK and I roleplay opening fire, and then, open fire. I stop shooting after like, 7 bullets and I realized, oh fuck, I'm out of ammo. BURISLOV DECIDES FUCK THIS IM OUT, and jumps off the elevator, probably hurting his legs, idk @WeakenedHen5 can confirm. I open my inventory, NO AMMO! I run inside, pull out two boxes of 7.62x39mm, load it up and fire like, a mag at them but they're finally up. I'm with bio in the main room. They have to go through a single doorway to enter. I'm in there with our hostage, Rondal's defecting Captain who has a bounty on his head. We fight them off and they're yelling in German and Russian, I'm yelling in German, and we basically find out they have two Germans and a Soviet left up there. All wounded.The only one hurt bad and not terribly is I think @mert (who I ended up giving a pretty good story-line to follow along with his battle-bro if he wants to talk about it with the whole prison ordeal/message to family). So basically, we're all hurt bad. We tell them that we've got friendlies coming to flank and sandwich them and that they can surrender or die with them. It ends up being 2 German soldiers, 1 Soviet (Balashor @Colonel Sanders ), myself on Freddy, Bio Junior's ex-NATO and Rondal's defector, which, I toss a gun when I'm so badly wounded I pass out after, only to be revived by Freddy's Waifu, played by @Danny who was also NJSOC. I'm saved. This was one of my favorite moments in it, and it was so good that I was prepared to PK myself if I died in that situation because those brave soviets were willing to die for that bounty. I would've given them that victory and not bitched out with, 'well pk rules say that if you kill me in my zone, its nlr', they would've earned it.

Mole explained further @Numbers @Bio Junior
As I was saying, there was a mole that we had in the insurgency. The reason we knew there was some sort of internal insurgent information being leaked was because two ex-NJSOC we straight up assassinated and I decided Freddy would leave directly after that. Now, it should be known that this actually wasn't my doing. This was one-hundred percent a KGB operation which @char pulled off by hiring a few mercs while working (unknowingly) a single NJSOC along side a few hired guns looking to profit. The operation was an astounding success, until somebody decided to blast his KGB enroute back to base, and for that, we remember him and all those times he blasted people's faces.

So, the mole.. yes, the mole I've been talking awhile for now. So, the mole ended up alerting me of the plot against Comrade Fischer's life (the plot against me) as well as those behind it. Did I mention it was the mole who shot Freddy in the back? Yes, well. It turned out that the same ended up being pretty much elected by the remaining Federalist and insurgents to lead.. which he did so up until the final plot against Tabarov.

Throughout the entirety of the server, I relied primarily on one person to infiltrate and find uncover people within the insurgency, which he did. He unmasked most of the leadership and was able to point to many NJSOC as members of the insurgency, but not specifically NJSOC, which was still pretty solid.

After the Tabarov situation, I recalled "The West", known to the GDR as, Master Sergeant Stefan Keller, now, after his service undercover became Major for toppling the Federalists, assassinating Frederick Dietrich, confirming Hegel as the doctor who participated in the bomb assassination plot against the Oberst, confirming Tabarov as the other plotter, (he failed to mention he was also one of the conspirators, this was somewhat evident considering he seemed to be able to tell when it would happen).

He returns decorated with a medal and now serves as Fischer's right-hand man.

Another fucking hilarious story.
I told one of my field operatives to infiltrate the clinic and get information from one of the women working there. They did just that, however, they ended up building a rapport with the wrong clinician. They ended up seducing the wrong woman and they straight up ended up with a "surprise" in the "sack". The amount of shame my operatives were willing to put themselves through in order to preserve order in the German Democratic Republic only reflects the amount of patriotism they have for the socialist cause.



It was a fantastic experience and I hope people who read this remember it all as well as I do. There was a lot more interactions, but I'd be here all night writing them out if I wanted to. I thought I'd bring some light to something not everybody was able to see or witness as a whole. As stasi lead and federalist lead I got to enjoy most of the story day to day that other people didn't so I'm glad I could fill you in. If anyone has any scenes or situations for me to recall and reiterate, I'd be happy to keep the memory of Stasiland going on.
We were way too good at our job

That one week of mass killing of 90% of the insurgency went so hard it killed the server, @Numbers was unrelenting
 

Numbers

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(he failed to mention he was also one of the conspirators, this was somewhat evident considering he seemed to be able to tell when it would happen).
hahahaha what he didn't tell you was that he was the main conspirator, and designed the plan not only to build up trust between the federalists but also force fischer to feel personally attacked enough to order a killing on all the conspirators (who where luckily the main targets i wanted out of the picture too, so you can imagine how shit lined up perfectly)
 
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Rondal

And whole beasts of nations desire power
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Stasiland was a fever dream, at its height, it was the greatest game mode I've ever played.

What were the moments of action like? Were they disruptive? Random? Did they spark more passive roleplay? Were they bloodthirsty?
The action came around quickly, and usually always ended the same way. Where the old game mode had prolonged combat, hit-and-run tactics were especially popular, engagements never lasted more than ten minutes. The action was brutal, unforgiving, and often always terrifying. Early in the game mode, permadeath was on, which lead to a lot of deaths amongst insurgent populations mostly as groups struggled to settle into the outer territories with Soviet patrols basically looking for them in hopes of something interesting. I remember during the first week, some civilian had picked up a static machinegun and was very cleverly using it, deploying it at random to surprise entire squads of battle-hardened Soviet soldiers, mowing them down mercilessly.

My favorite action sequences were more-so during the later acts in the game, such as having any form of APC combat supporting ground forces. The conflicts between the Federalists and the GDR during the Brodenstein map were some of the greatest, and of course, the insurgency grew to its highest highs there- as well as its lowest lows. During this time, the permadeath was off within certain areas, designed to allow open combat and opportunists to strike. Opportunists did strike, of course, using methods to fight so powerful that @Roosebud had to develop a feature to add scope glints because the Federalists were just too damn good at taking us out.

Of course, escalation is the nature of all things, and when the Federalists started sniping my men, I had APCs brought out. When I brought APCs out, they brought Anti-Tank weaponry from NJSOC and molotovs from lone idiots up close and personal. Those molotovs caused a lot of internal stirring, as advocates for fair situations would argue that throwing a Molotov at an APC was grounds to disable it. It became a fighting ground, ICly and OOCly as combat became closer and closer to that WW3RP style we're all used to. I believe this may have contributed to the overall downfall, but people kept at it because the rivalry between the GDR and the Federalists was still massively present.

One good example of creative thought in the game mode is @Mesa, who's most notable appearance would be the ballad of Wilhelm Drescher and his factory. The factory was smack-bang in the middle of the fighting ground and could provide the Insurgents with crucial materials they needed to keep producing ammunition. The factory was fought for on all grounds, even Drescher himself turned over against the State - or at least Against at least the State, he wasn't really associated with the Federalists. I remember the operation to capture him - and how he cleverly outwitted us and fitted his car to explode, which was brutal but ultimately deserved for us not going as far as to secure that part of the operation.


Roleplay hubs were often also the center of armed conflict, which would naturally in turn provide more passive to the area too, as people were on-edge 24/7 because both the insurgencies and governing forces were omnipresent, in reputation at least. The unspoken territorial control was the greatest part of the combat because that's where people began to bring in passive roleplay in the most applicable form.

Did the experience evolve over the year before it ended? Did the pandemic have an impact? Should anything have been handled differently in hindsight?

I think the opening month of the game mode was the biggest thing that hurt it. Misdirection and misinformation were omnipotent during the early weeks, and I think the Stasi faction was the core front of this. WW3RP has been a very consistent game mode in establishing its characters through association to factions. We've always had Soviets/Coalition, we've always had Civilians and we've to an extent always had Militia. The State police branch was brand new, nobody knew how to actually play their characters because we'd all been so used to what came before that the idea of a new faction really shook things up.

The lead of the faction at the time had grand plans for the faction, and they seemed fruitful from what I'd spoken to him about it. The issue began for the faction at the introductory event, where we began to unravel the fact that barely anyone in the faction could develop an agenda applicable to their character from the wider faction. This combined with a lack of presence from the faction lead meant that in the first month, the faction which had its name in the title of the game mode became the most inactive faction on the server. I'd wager that NJSOC were more active at this time, with more active members at least.

The direction to move to the Volksarmee was steered by me, as @Poopship McGee had only just joined the faction and I wasn't kept in the loop that he'd be assuming the role above me, so I worked with what I had to try and drag the faction out of its desolate state. I concluded in time that I understood the intelligence side of the server and that if I wanted it to flourish, I'd have to offer up a grunt-styled enforcer type of faction. This was the ultimate goal with the introduction of the Volksarmee, a large appealing faction that would be similar to the Russians but have the ability to speak German and be more closely tied to the State. This worked as I'd hoped, more people signed up to be a Volksarmee soldier and more people began to play their characters because I provided them with an agenda that they could more-so relate to, whilst still allowing those who wanted to the path of Intelligence and the tools to achieve it from within.

The people who ran the factions remained the same throughout the entirety of the game mode being up, bar some exceptions (as mentioned above). Credit where it's due to those people because the staff and management team were at their height during this server's runtime, we just dwindled in numbers day-by-day, as more and more people lost motivation after every transgression, every slight hitch and bump in the road.

Were there any long term storylines? What was fun about the server, and do any particular highlights come to mind?

Gerhard Haas. The character I entered the game mode with. I loved playing as this pseudo-sheriff type character in the chaotic state of Frankfurt and Brodenstein, and I naturally grew to love his broken internal thoughts. The character was so conflicted in his resolve- the State and Resistance both passed themselves up as valuable allies, and from day one I had a backup plan in the untimely event that I be made an enemy of the State.

Literally. I had an apartment which I at one point showed @Danny to where I'd bundle up any weapon I seized from any crook. I had enough guns in those lockers to barter my way into any militia's arms, and an escape plan to suit. This in turn provided me with the overall duality of Gerhard Haas. Whilst his character often presented himself as a loyalist, it was often to the German people, regardless of who ran the country. This made him the perfect candidate for the Volksarmee, the People's Army, especially its commander. The dynamic I worked to establish within the Volksarmee was brotherhood and to create lasting bonds between characters, and Gerhard Haas perfectly represented this as a character.

My ideas for the Volksarmee were exemplified when Gerhard Haas went rogue and defected to the insurgency at the fear of his own life being taken. There was an incredibly intense moment during the massive firefight which happened on the insurgency base in Brodenstein where the combat stalled due to a chokepoint being held, and this, in turn, allowed me to communicate with my own men, people I'd fought with on front-lines before, and negotiated a peaceful end to the fighting. My every fiber of loyalty I instilled in the faction was put to the test, and at the moment succeeded.

Gerhard Haas will always be my favorite character to come out of this gamemode, and his duality sets him aside from the other character, Dugalle, that I played. Some of the moments on Gerhard Haas were absolutely fantastic. From befriending the insurgency in an intense hostage situation, to then mercilessly causing the deaths of many of them- some at my own hand (@Silanus lest we forget), to then joining them and repairing an APC for their use- to then stealing that APC back and using it to go ham against the State in one last stand. It was a wild ride, and I loved every second of it.
 
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Northgate

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you forgot me....


What were the moments of action like? Were they disruptive? Random? Did they spark more passive roleplay? Were they bloodthirsty?
When I was in action, it was usually in a more passive position, I only was holding a gun at one point and even then only because shit hit the fan.

When I was on my character, I always remember being fast to respond to situations like those, with any other firefighters (@Nick @Psonic @Chains @FreeSpy443 and more, or @Laura @UkuP on their medics). It was a crazy amount of fun, I loved when I was able to be in the middle of it all on my passive character, helping both sides - but always focusing on the civilians first. During intense bombings in Frankfurt, I drove around in a truck and evacuated everyone to the sewers, and all kinds of things.

Usually these events were very welcome. Action was there more often than on HL2RP, but it fit the setting and never disrupted roleplay in my opinion. Although, things could get bloodthirsty.

Did the experience evolve over the year before it ended? Did the pandemic have an impact? Should anything have been handled differently in hindsight?

Everyone already mentioned it: the big issue was simply that Stasiland was an awesome server, but launched at a wrong impression. I admit it, even I was bored at first - that is, until I met @Goopy 's character, who I was able to roleplay with a lot during Frankfurt. The pandemic boosted numbers at first, but again - people got bored quickly.

If I would have handled anything differently, I would have put more motivation and focus on developing the firefighters. It was a crazy amount of fun, but they were severely underdeveloped because of my laziness (and partially because I always roleplayed, so I had no time to write)

Were there any long term storylines? What was fun about the server, and do any particular highlights come to mind?

For me, it was Patrick Majerus' whole story. Started in Frankfurt as a basic firefighter, ended up as a tripple agent. Made friends with lots of Stasi characters like @Anthrax_PL or @Rondal and @Hunk (new name). Was a pretty cool time in Frankfurt, but RP got stale and I welcomed Brodenstein with open arms. Goopy helped me get into the other side of the roleplay which allowed Patrick to massively develop over time.
I also remember Arne, @mert who I hated in-character but really appreciated OOCly. His raves in Brodenstein were fucking amazing.

Met more characters in Frankfurt like Nick, who became my co-lead for the firefighters, or @Hushhx's Russian Translator who Patrick was very close with. I even remember Dany's char, who I think was a Federalist / NJSOC agent. Still remember @Poopship McGee's Elizabeth Fischer, a Stasi officer who was terrifying. When we switched to Brodenstein, Patrick was already pretty well developed. But there was more to come.

I met @swexs who roleplayed a very cool quest-giver character, who Patrick got pretty good with. During this time I also worked with Laura's character, and some others which was a lot of fun.

My biggest highlight was literally just the entire server. I enjoyed it to so much, and miss it every time I look on these forums. @Roosebud really did something amazing, even if not everyone appreciated it. Those who did were loyal and cool, we all had a close community.


There's a lot more to write, and maybe I'll write a bit more another day but that'd take multiple pages. I'm just blessed and grateful to have been part of this.

TL;DR: the freedom of Stasiland was insane, and I loved it.
 

Sil

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Although I feel that my character's death was a bit shit, I've grown from getting angry at the player behind the character and instead appreciating the general situation.

The concept of operating a mechanic shop/garage seemed to be a fun one, and good on paper, but since virtually no one bothered to utilise the shop I had little reason to keep it operating. I wasn't a fan of how the Stasi were dealing with getting business stuff done, and I still feel like I got stiffed when an officer decided to basically imprison me for not getting an officer to sign off on me changing business locations (despite the fact I logged each and every single thing down in a public blackbook, on the forums, without being asked to.

A fun concept, albeit one that I feel had too strong a similarity to HL2RP to properly sustain itself. If the focus was entirely on a citizen life, rather than on the battles between the Soviet Army, the Stasi and the Insurgents, then I feel it could've lasted longer. I guess I'm nostalgic for the old WW3RP citizen life, being an uncommon sight among the dystopic war raging overhead and almost always being distrusted or pitied by the separate armies.

It was very free. A freedom that probably did help it grow, but unfortunately I feel also made it a bit too difficult to sustain for some. However, these are only my thoughts on it all. It was a weird time for me, and I opted to play on it rather than build friendships with some people IRL which eventually led to us not being friends anymore, so I have mixed feelings on my memories.
 
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Rabid

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A fun concept, albeit one that I feel had too strong a similarity to HL2RP to properly sustain itself.
I'm of the opposite opinion, honestly.

Stasiland had everything there it needed to succeed; what caused it problems was, as @Rondal said, a few very big missteps early on in the server's lifespan it just wasn't able to recover from properly. The map especially where everyone could just book it out of the city within a day or two and never come back was a big factor in that.

It also really didn't help that the second the server hit problems the usual crowd came back and crowed "Stasiland didn't work old WW3 now" as if literally everyone couldn't point to why it was failing - it wasn't some big mystery, it was primarily the shift to conflict being far too quick and easy to get to.

I'm not surprised people got even more demotivated after that.
 
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Sil

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I'm of the opposite opinion, honestly.

Stasiland had everything there it needed to succeed; what caused it problems was, as @Rondal said, a few very big missteps early on in the server's lifespan it just wasn't able to recover from properly. The map especially where everyone could just book it out of the city within a day or two and never come back was a big factor in that.

It also really didn't help that the second the server hit problems the usual crowd came back and crowed "Stasiland didn't work old WW3 now" as if literally everyone couldn't point to why it was failing - it wasn't some big mystery, it was primarily the shift to conflict being far too quick and easy to get to.

I'm not surprised people got even more demotivated after that.
I may be biased, but playing Stasiland just made me feel like I was playing HL2 in a different setting with more freedom.

The Stasi felt like Civil Protection at times in their unnecessary brutality, the Soviets had this mysterious nature about them that made them feel like looming murdersquads (albeit far weaker than OTA), and the insurgents (as well as being one) felt like rebels with a new coat of paint, ridiculous access to guns and even during the siege didn't feel like it could've actually worked/sustained itself without admin intervention.

I'm all up for creative liberties and freedoms, but the Soviets had a Tank or APC or something whilst we, the insurgents had three vans with mounted guns. All three vans were blown up almost instantly without having a chance to be used. If the tank/apc wasn't present then yeah it could've been more believable but it just felt incredibly forced and basically drained the immersion out from me.

There's no doubt in my mind that Stasiland could've absolutely succeeded, and possibly sustained itself. But the handling of a few things initially really did cause issues- like you said, letting people be able to really easily leave the city was a massive flaw.

On the bright side, I still remember the opening event. And the general reliance on rations at the start was a fun concept, though one that would've prospered if it was more consistent. I would've genuinely enjoyed it if the insurgents where wholly kept out of the way, and I know in the past I complained but I really do mean going to the extreme in making it an admin event faction like most of NATO. But I know people would be pissed that they need to be admin/need to apply if they want to go and actively partake in the assaults against Stasi.
 

afric

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Were there any long term storylines? What was fun about the server, and do any particular highlights come to mind?

I think the intrigue was the most fun for me as i was placed in the unique position of playing one of the from launch njsoc guys

elia meier aka lawerence aka samuel kelly mi6

At the start myself and a few others blackbagged a stasi and did general 'stuff', none of it amounted to anything on account of the guys didnt actually know much lol

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after that i did some awesome gaming by providing the federalists with their identity (MY IDEA!!!) and also like rifles and machine guns in double figures, along with most of their ammunition and equipment being funneled through njsoc

of patricular note i very much enjoyed myself and @Goopy's storyline where I basically had to bite my lip and make friends with a russian veteran that had become jaded with the soviet union, directly at odds with my characters almost blind loyalty to the british state and NATO

i throughly enjoyed the tension being njsoc brought, as the only way to talk to the boss was the usage of a private network. there were no 'secret terminals', so I had to get access by breaking in to places, i think at one point i called BASE in an internet cafe lol

things began to fall apart after a while due to no ones fault the issues i can't be bothered explaining

but effectively the federalists became more militarised and thus I followed suit on the character

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i did enjoy the server but for many i could imagine the turn off it the rather cliquish systems presented to them

eventually most of the original but inactive njsoc agents got removed until it was down to me, taborov (east) and danny's epic doctor who's name escapes me now

eventually the feds got word that there was a mole, i attempted to suss it out, but couldnt and the various events poopship described went down

i got arrested by the soviets on purpose by afking in a car because i thought it'd be fun and the server was dying anyway, they had me by the balls with all the info and also had nabbed innokenti (goopys russian)

Think one of the favourite things I did was ask Major Fischer what they preferred, a unified germany, socialist or not, or east germany under socialism, pressing the characters nationalist buttons a bit

in the end i knew i was going to die and had already decided a month prior if I was going to get captured I would commit suicide instead of being tortured

myself and goopy made a break to escape the soviet base as an inspection occured on the surface, we made it out with goopy to rendevous with me at the villa

i call BASE and demand an evac, collect my NJSOC gear and meet goopy where I explained that I was in NATO, told him he can come with me but cannot return, etc

both of us pile on to the little bird and escape to england



funny enough there was a moment when i was decked out in njsoc kit running to meet goopy where @Numbers drove right past me undercover

wHIP2mc.jpeg

It felt like a full character arc, went in as a plucky intelligence officer ready to serve the kingdom to being the only operative left in the area, out of friends, out of time
 
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Deleted member 61

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Somebody please remember the name of the guy who volunteered to be the bomb? I swear it was something stupid like,

"Alex Baum" or "Joe Baum".
 

Roosebud

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I was/am gonna write up my own personal reflection thread, with all the issues from my own (development/direction) point of view. I'll make sure to incorporate these questions into it. Also wanted to put forward all the different scenarios/ideas we had for the server in the long term, simply because I believe a lot of them would've been awesome but it was all cut short due to a number of issues.

the server died because 30 percent of the server wasn't allowed flags to there own national language

Miss me with that "englishman in the heart of soviet controlled territory" or "im fluent in russian, german and english because I was in high school" bs
 

maxi

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I didn't play much, but I wasn't a fan of the gamemode in general as it wasn't my taste. I think the main issue stemmed from the coinciding release of HLA and WW3RP. It was a bad time to release WW3RP and when HLA released and HL2RP's numbers shot up, the WW3RP server couldn't compete.

I also think the community's gotten so use to just one server between us all, that the new server felt strange and somewhat intimidating.

Plus, I don't think it was what people wanted. The server may have fared better with a different map or if it was released around October when HL2RP was stalling, but head staff don't have a crystal ball and I still think roose did a hell of a job.