Ahhhh, the Corp Drama Bomb. Spend any amount of time in player corps in New Eden and you're likely to experience a corp explosion that leaves you blinking your eyes and thinking, "WTF happened?!!!" Everything was going great--corpmates liked each other, people worked well together, corp goals were being pursued and achieved, energy and enthusiasm were high. Then something--maybe one event, maybe a series of related events--initiated a failure cascade that tore the corp apart, probably damaging or even destroying relationships among players along with it.While the discussion revolves more about how Drama Bombs occur and what factors lead into them and the almost inevitable failure cascade that can follow, I decided to review my checked past and look at some corporate / alliance failure cascades I've had the pleasure of participating in myself.
Late 2006 - early 2007 : IPORC / Strife 1.0
My first corp I was part of, the group of us were all fairly young players and tried to dabble in piracy, holding low sec, mercenary work, 0.0 in Syndicate, moon mining, and mission running. Ultimately we just burnt out and fell apart to our own directions.
Mid 2007 : Omen Incorporated & Coreli Syndicate
A group of us old Strife pilots joined back up together and were recruited into Omen Inc. We tried to make a good go of it there but ultimately the CEO was a power hungry jack ass and we left Omen to join another corp in our alliance that looked a lot better, Coreli Syndicate. It was a lot better: more organized, experienced, enthusiastic... but then the leadership broke ranks over course of the corp and essentially spilt down the middle. I might have stuck with one of the halves of the corp except I was well and truly burnt out from corp drama after this and the previous Omen Inc debacle, and I left 0.0 to regroup alone.
Early 2008 : Strife 2.0
I still can't believe this spectacular example of a failure cascade. We were doing so well, gelling, enthusiastic, recruiting good people, having fun time. Then we tried to work with an alliance back in Syndicate. Alliance politics burnt our visionary CEO out, frustrated some pilots eager for other 0.0 experiences, and we never really recovered from the tension even though there was no real drama bombs at the time. We left the annoying alliance and tried to regroup in low sec, but our main leadership either took a break from Eve or went to 0.0 themselves to make ISK and the remainder were quickly scattered in a "hiatus" over the summer that we never recovered from. We are all still friends and a couple have tried to rebuild the corp for Strife 3.0, but I was too scarred from the feeling of abandonment from the last time and having a good time in m3 with its far more grounded leadership and solid plans.
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Sadly my brief foray into 2.0 was the best corp experience I've had and hasn't been matched since.
ReplyDeleteSad sad sad.
That having been said I've been driven to round myself out skill-wise and try to "fly smarter, not harder."
Strife 2.0 was my first corp experience, and I couldn't ask for better. It was hard to see it drift apart. The leadership enlisted me as a raw newb with only about a month or two in game, and it was a great group to fly with. I learned a lot from them. I have a lot of respect for them and would fly with any of them again. I still don't fully understand how a group that got along so well - and still keep in touch with each other - didn't make a longer go of it as a corp. I'm glad that I met these guys and flew with them in Strife. I'm also glad to see several of us in a corp together again, thanks to Kirith's recruiting prowess. :)
ReplyDeleteAlthough Strife is over, I can't call it a failure. I learned stuff, had fun, and made new friends who I respect a lot. You just can't call that a failure.
I remeberr some of those days very well my friend, I'm glad I had the oppurtunity to fly with all of you. It was awesome to go through the learnig curve from IPORc to STRIFE with you.
ReplyDeleteYou may be seeing more of me very soon.
YIKES!!
ReplyDeletelol - Actually that would be real cool.