Anyway, I’m now well rested as well as feeling a little happier about life (work is still there, but that can wait for a bit), so it’s time to buckle down and do my job…
So where to start? With a thank you, I guess. Thank you all for your support and faith in my ability to lead our family, and take us forward over the coming year. I feel deeply honoured that you chose me, and confess to a certain nervousness that I’ll be able to live up to your expectations.
I have huge shoes to fill. Not only those of Lee, who has been an exemplary leader over the last year, but also those of j0nny and Geth before him. Each of these individuals brought their own style to the position, and left the clan in a stronger position than it was before their tenure. And now it’s my turn. What legacy will I leave to my successor? How will we evolve over the coming months?
I’ll be honest with you all, when it first became apparent that I was going to win the election, I was uncertain as to whether or not I would be prepared to take on the job. This was for a few reasons:
1. Clan activity was rather low. Interest in BF2 had been steadily waning, and I was concerned whether or not the clan would survive another year. Believe me, there is nothing that would scare me more than being the leader of the clan at the time of its demise.
2. I am somewhat time limited. My weekly gaming hours on a good week sits at about 10. Having a young family means that I am unable to commit more than that, and now I will have to use a portion of that time for clan management? Tough call.
3. No-one in the clan asked me how I would go about moving the clan forward. We all have strong views on how things should progress, but no-one asked what mine were before voting. It seemed to me that I’d been elected on the basis of my forum presence (yes, I’m on the forum a lot during the day when I should be working), and the fact that I’ve been a member for a long time. Interesting fact: after discussion with j0nno over the weekend, it appears that I was never actually invited to join the clan, but rather that I just started wearing the tags and hanging out with the existing members (true story, depending on who you ask!!)
Anyway, after a little should searching, and discussion with the other admins and former leaders, I decided that this was something that I would like to do. It’s an honour to be chosen, and I won’t let the clan down. Regarding those three points above, they are addressed as follows:
1. I realised once again at rAge that there is no way that this clan is going to die. We are a diverse bunch of people, but the genuine love and affection that we all have for one another (yes Paul, I said love) shines through. I used the word family earlier in this post, and I mean it wholeheartedly. I spend more time chatting, laughing, cursing, and above all having fun with the members in this clan than practically anyone else other than my wife and children (and sometimes more than them). We have strong bonds, and those won’t be broken easily.
2. My wonderful wife was the one who solved this issue for me. When I presented her with the issue and my concern about the time that I have, she was very quick to respond. She said that if this was something that was important to me, she and the kids would help me to make additional time for doing this job. She will take on additional responsibilities with the kids, in order to enable me to spend time required on clan management.
3. How do I believe that we need to grow over the coming year? By consolidation and diversification. Lee and I devised a series of ‘feeler’ threads that we posted over the last month, asking for clan input on direction. Clear input was that we needed to diversify. BF2 is an old game now, and a number of our members no longer play the game. However, we are all gamers, so we are all playing something!! The plan here is to harness that enthusiasm, and encourage our membership to represent the clan is games that that they want to play.
So here we are. I’m the new “al presidente”, and I need to start making some of these things happen. Agreed? Truth is, I can’t make anything happen, as always we can only succeed if everyone is dedicated to making that happen. You all saw comments that I have made in the past about what it means o be a member of this clan. We need to participate, in whatever capacity we are able. If we are able, we should be playing games with our clanmates, and having fun with them. If we are unable to play games online for whatever reason, we should at the very least be contributing within this forum.
I am not going to take any radical action within our member base at this moment in time. I want everyone to have a chance to consider what they want, and take appropriate action. For those who have not been active in recent times, this will give you an opportunity to decide if you want to remain a member of the clan. If so, you can show it in your actions. Get involved in discussions, sign up for a team, and play games with your clanmates. Any and all of these things show intent. If however, you’re not all that bothered, do nothing. Sooner or later, we’ll get the message, and take appropriate action.
If we are going to compete in multiple games, we need to structure ourselves accordingly. We need sufficient active members to ensure that we don’t fail ourselves and the leagues that we compete in. We have chosen to compete in two game genres going forward, BF and COD. Considering that this is where we started, BF has a stronger following, and should be much easier to keep running. COD however, is where our challenge will lie. We tried this earlier in the year, and we failed. Why? A series of unfortunate occurrences meant that we lost the core of our team at a critical time, and we were unable to field a full team for practices and matches. This can not be allowed to happen again.
Sheri, as game leader for COD, will take on the responsibility of running our COD team. This includes registering and entering competitions, recruiting members to the team and the clan where necessary, scheduling and running practices and matches, skilling up players and competing to the best of our ability. Clearly, this is far too much for one person to do. Sheri will, I’m sure, be calling on members of the COD team to assist wherever necessary. Please provide her with all of the support and assistance that you can.
On the BF side, there are different challenges. The game is old, and we are unsure of its future. We don’t even know if there will be a BF2 league in AGASA next year. However, there is this bright and shiny thing on the horizon: Bad Company 2. If you haven’t seen the gameplay videos for this upcoming release yet (it’s due on the 2nd March 2010), I urge you to take a look. They are posted in a thread in the BF board on this forum.
Community anticipation concerning this game is high. So well is our standing within the BF community, we have already been approached by certain individuals of high standing in the community concerning the possibility of forming a consolidated BC2 team (including members from ASF, BOC (guess who
), and grrr), with the objective of stopping FiB in their tracks. A tempting thought, I must say. However, it’s early days for such discussion. The point is, BF is alive and well, and grrr will continue to be one of the pillars of this community.Okay, I’ve waffled on enough for now. For those who’ve made it this far, thanks for reading on. You can sleep soon, I promise
.All that remains is for me to introduce the leadership team for the coming year, based on your votes, and also chosen appointments (what’s the point of giving me power if I can’t enjoy a little nepotism
).So here it is. Please join me in congratulating all of those mentioned below on their appointment:
Venerable elders
Megageth
S3xy_j0nny
Leelo the duck
Clan Leader
Yours truly
BF Team Leader
Leelo the duck
COD Team Leader
Niteshade
Website Maintenance, Technology, Video editing and pure awesomeness
Leelo the duck
Forum Admins
Leelo the duck
Niteshade
Onyx
Megageth
S3xy_j0nny
Dragonne
As new blood takes on responsibility, those who have done their share get a well deserved rest. Please join me in thanking the following members for the hard work they've put in over the last year.
Admins that are stepping down
Fluffster_wolf/Thor
Gravity
Candidate
That’s it for now guys. Long post, apologies for that. I hope that we have a good a year this year as we have in the previous years. You guys are the best bunch of friends and extended family a guy could wish for. On a personal note, if there is anything that you need, anything that’s bugging you, or you just want to chat, feel free to look me up on Steam, MSN, Skype, our shoutbox, the forum, by phone or failing all of those, just send me a letter
Thanks again guys and gals, and let the year of the Dragonne commence…
