The diary of a newbie [long]
I decided I would start a new planet, acting as a new player, to see what kind of attitudes existed and how I would be treated. I made sure I sent attacks, built half decent construction/research, defending IN-GAL though wasn't particulary active and no irc. I made sure I asked in each gal for help on how to play the game.
To me, the results were startling. Before reading, please note: * This post does not differentiate between alliances and alliances are only mentioned to show this is a cross-community issue. * Co-ords are removed but nicks are not. This was decided on because I wan't people to see how we all act. It is not to name and shame. I took a long deal of thought over this. * Please do not spam thread or posts will simply be removed. This thread is being watched carefully by mods. * I am copying/pasting actual messages from ingame. These will not be edited. I will write my own thoughs on these underlined just so it will differentiate between myself and the post I have pasted. ------------------------------------------------------ Tick start missed due to real life. Logged in tick 89ish and set res/cons up. These have been kept up decently throughout. Gal #1 Landed in a gal. Tick 90 Spammer (Ult/App-unconfirmed) lo Tue, 14 Aug 14:06:25 Do you have access to irc got pnick? My reply... I will have full access soon, comp broke so on the missus' comp. No irc nick. Is this a good gal? Hugger RE: RE: lo Tue, 14 Aug 22:06:31 Can you do big favour go to preferences hit self exile tryin to. get my mate to get in the gal but you've took his spot do that for me pls thanks So already, I am getting asked to exile. Nothing prepared me for what was to come though. tick 98, built roids (300), ships (corsair) tick 99, gal sent mail saying ground fleets. mailed spammer offerig ships, no reply started msging planets showing as online "I have 15k corsair next tick." Planets mailed include paisley, deras, spammer, JBG, motti, flyer, blizzardstorm. No replies whatsoever. Shall I send them to #9?", offered def to paisley, 107, no reply 10 mins later offered def to deras, 10 mins later, got an 'aye' answer from paisley, nothing more. Defence sent to Deras 108, def sent as promised 111 pulled def quickly 111 questioned the gc as to why he ordered ppl to build cutlass as anti-co 114 suggested better to get rogues and not spread defence too thin. spammer replied with 'What do you know your a noob'. 114 'how do I join up with you guys? I would ask the gc but he is not very nice to me' sent to each gal member This bit is quite telling, I was hoping someone would step up and offer help. Replies from Deras... Deras RE: com unit Wed, 15 Aug 13:46:18 You don't. you go to the preferences and hit self exile. Charming Forest RE: RE: com unit Wed, 15 Aug 13:53:54 So I bother to work out irc and get treated like this? Deras RE: RE: RE: com unit Wed, 15 Aug 13:57:43 You've been told to do that long before you bothered check out irc. I'm sorry, and if it had been any other round we'd taken you in and helped you learn the ropes of this game, but this round we don't have that possibility. I do however hope you end up in a gal that will help you with it. For alilances I'd recommend you contact Howling rain, as they're a starter alliance. they can be reached on #hr on irc. Good luck. Forest RE: RE: RE: RE: com unit Wed, 15 Aug 14:02:13 I wasn't told to. I was asked if I had a irc nick and I said I don't have access atm and no p nick. The GC replied telling me to exile. I was given no opportunity, no-one has talked to me and no-one is helping. Another planet replies... Blizzard RE: com unit Wed, 15 Aug 13:43:16 Unfortunately you have to have specific access. The GC sets that access. He has already drawn the conclusion to boot you from the Galaxy. There isnt a whole lot any of the rest of us can do. My suggesstion though would be to get him to pay you to leave instead of just kicking you so you get something out of it. Forest RE: RE: com unit Wed, 15 Aug 13:45:08 That is not very nice, what did I do wrong? I build ships, sent defence. Blizzard RE: RE: RE: com unit Wed, 15 Aug 13:49:10 There is more to the game then building ships and sending defence. YOu need to get on chat and get in an allaince, etc. Dont let it frustrate you, it has nothing to do with you. We are trying to get a friend in the gal. GL on the rest of your round. Forest RE: RE: RE: RE: com unit Wed, 15 Aug 13:55:24 I took the time to work out irc with NO help from anyone here ;/ basically the guy tried to be upbeat but the decision was already made to get rid of me. So I mailed the GC, Spammer, again... I mailed GC... Forest exile Wed, 15 Aug 14:06:59 So I am told you are exiling me. Don't see why, seeing as I sent defence etc. Any idea when I get kicked out so I can at least be online for it? x3 the same mail Spammer RE: exile Wed, 15 Aug 14:15:37 Self exile and you wil know Forest RE: RE: exile Wed, 15 Aug 14:19:22 500k of each res, send to me and i will This is when I got incoming, three fleets from xVx. Remember earlier, I defended Deras. Yes, this was my reward. Conversations on irc confirmed deras organised it. Then a mail from Deras Deras RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: com unit Wed, 15 Aug 15:30:53 Since you're marked for exile you'll be getting no defence if we get any incomings in the future. So might be smartest for you to exile and get into a gal that might help you out. I took the opportuity here to tell Deras and Spammer that they were fools for treating a newbie like this and that I would twat em, like I do. Tick 135 I was getting co-opped a lot by now. I only had 300 roids. If I was a new player I most probably would have quit by now. Instead, I exiled to carry on the experiment. _________________________________ Gal #2 Galaxy Ministers Galaxy x:x Auto-message Thu, 16 Aug 10:36:04 Welcome to x:X Message any of the colored names in the galaxy to get into the galaxy channel. IF not active enuff/or on irc / low roids, youll just get booted within 48ticks of arrival so be careful. - GC Nice welcome. I did think this is where it ends. Landed in a hc gal, with , GM, Chaos, Puppe. Surely this would be where I get a prod. No contact at tick 171 so mailed... Forest lo Fri, 17 Aug 22:46:09 how do i attack? im struggling to get to grips with this game.. Puppe (ND) RE: lo Sat, 18 Aug 03:32:08 under "fleets" select things where to send from the "galaxy" map Forest RE: RE: lo Sat, 18 Aug 04:15:49 ok ty I am hitting a big planet, go me! I got no reply and Puppe let me crash on the #2 planet Forest def Sat, 18 Aug 11:19:24 Location Target (eta) Mission 7hrs 41mins Defend Ship Class T1 T2 T3 Type Count Corsair Fighter Corvette - - Steal 15830 I sent def, as a good gal mate should. I knew it wouldn't target it but wanted to see if this would get me any support/help Puppe RE: def Sat, 18 Aug 12:25:22 its FR inc Totally useless reply giving me no help whatsoever, nor even a ty. A tikc later he sent a mass mail asking for co/fi flack too. tick 200 - Information You are being exiled! Sun, 19 Aug 03:35:15 Your GC has started a vote to exile your planet. If at least two of the ministers vote for it, your planet will be teleported to a different galaxy. Your GC supplied the following explanation of his descision to exile you: Write a reason for the exile here. This will be sent to the exile-planet as a message as soon as he is exiled. Charming, no-one offered any help, then when I asked for it, it wasn't given. Again I would have quit but wanted to give it one last shot. -------------------------------------------------------- Gal #3 Only one other planet here, gal disbanded. -------------------------------------------------------- Gal #4 Got two messages from a DS guy, one asking if I have irc and another if an alliance. I replied... Hi My computer has just broken so I am using my mobile atm, so not able to get onto irc. No p-nick. I don't have an alliance Bob He replied.... Could you please selfexile then buddy I will give u the funds to do it Charming! Then I got another 3 messages saying 'please exile' before getting incoming from his alliance mate. This is when I got bored and spoke with him and his hc. his hc made a full apology and said people would be spoken to. It did the trick, I had a personal apology from the planet concerned and after a chat it seems his attitude to new players had changed. And so ends the experiment. It was hard. I had to watch people who I thought new better treat me badly, or totally ignore me It is my opinion that attitudes to new players need to change. We can blame pateam. We can blame Jagex. But what is the point in them doing anything if we treat new players like this? I know pateam are interested in seeing if this thread brings suggestions as to how they can hard code things to make it easier. I don't personally know if they can. All the things are there for new players to be able to access. But at the end of the day it is the personal touch that counts and that can't be coded. I dont know if anything can be done, but I do believe that we need to try. Thanks to the 2 or 3 ppl who made this possible with intel and support/ideas, you know who you are. |
Re: The diary of a newbie [long]
yeah i know it was hard but tbh u ended in idiots gal i will give u a good example of a player called des he landed in 2 10 last round had somw fights about keeping him or not than we decided fuk it we keep him teach him how to play i vouched him to maxi from dfwtk and he was nice to take him told him what to build gave him targets and tbh he saved our asses alot of time he enjoyed the game that he started saying i wont be alot active than he started to spam us to send def:) as for now in ds we took 3 brazilian players playing the brazilian version of pa we took them and 2 of them are doing greate so yes for all of u superstars who cannot handle newbies in ur gal or alliance remember one day u were noobs i still remember my self few rounds ao back in apprime when cain recruted me few are the players who took the time to teach me so speciall thanks to dedin stojke (btwn first day i was punked they let yoshi mentor me)but tbh he was very very nice and also inforza who helped me alot so yeah it hard for new players but some people have still the power to be nice and teach :) sorry
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Re: The diary of a newbie [long]
Check it out. Dustin Hoffman, 'Rain Man,' look retarded, act retarded, not retarded. Counted toothpicks, cheated cards. Autistic, sho'. Not retarded. You know Tom Hanks, 'Forrest Gump.' Slow, yes. Retarded, maybe. Braces on his legs. But he charmed the pants off Nixon and won a ping-pong competition. That ain't retarded. Peter Sellers, "Being There." Infantile, yes. Retarded, no. You went full retard, man. Never go full retard. You don't buy that? Ask Sean Penn, 2001, "I Am Sam." Remember? Went full retard, went home empty handed...
fyi monroe isn't in my gal and i received no mail from you |
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Anyway, Blizzzard was actually alright though. To be honest though, doesn't matter if this is real or fake - the community is one big, bitter old fart and we all know it. If you're a newbie you get treated like dirt and I'd say that it's a contributing factor to why the number of planets keep dropping. Great stuff Forest. |
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PA's just a crap game to play whether you're new or not. Nobody but a very very select few has the time to play it properly now, and everyone just ends up being bitter that there aren't enough people around them with a greater commitment to the game. "Top" gals are among the most hostile place. Even well-established members of the community get crap unless they're willing to meet ridiculous activity expectations.
And, the thing that gets me more than anything else, is that anyone who isn't available to play PA "full time" is considered a "noob". You could have probably told everyone who you were, and still without IRC access you'd have been given much the same treatment. The playerbase is too old with too many RL commitments to invest as much in to it as we once were. Those who are still able to spend days and nights staring at the computer and can go without sleep if needed probably should all surround themselves with each other. It's the only way they're going to get as much out of PA as they can whilst still justifying their own activity. The ridiculous decision to limit PL to 4 ticks has a lot to do with lower activity this round. Lower participation in attacks means to less logging on, which means less defending. It also means there are more people around failing to meet the expectations of the active minority and creating greater animosity between alliance mates who aren't as readily available for each other anymore. But, more 'on topic' - your experiences aren't hugely surpising but then I think that says about as much about the community as any of your evidence demonstrates. |
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It depends where you land, i was exiling around and got this message from my GC.
Evening Mon, 13 Aug 19:22:49 I see you are logged in to the game a lot, but your roid count is really low. Do you have a strategy behind this, or are you perhaps new to the game? We would love to see you in our gal chan in any case, and please dont hesitate to ask any questions *nick here* I almost stuck around in that gal purely because he seemed to want to help, new players will never be given a shot in this game, unless they can fill a spot that other people cant. (eg so people wont just exile to get someone else in) On my 8 or so exiles, not one person actually asked me to self exile either. |
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I cant comment on whom messaged forest, or who did what to him, but the messages he got are actually true.
It is a really shockingly POOR type of behaviour to a potentional new player of the game, and all involved should be ashamed of themselves. |
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Why should new players have to mail every single planet in a gal to get any help? |
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Other than that, I'm disappointed (but not surprised) to hear of your experience. :( |
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Blizzard indeed seemed sorry about the whole thing, I put that in to highlight good and bad |
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I actually think it's terrible the way you've been treated!!! The community as i know it goes on about the lack of new gamers!! If it wasn't for newbies then "our" game wouldn't evolve!! As for Paisley your lucky to get an "aye" from him as I keep saying to him "What we have here is Failure to communitcate" that goes for Spammer too...can't you tell they're brothers!!! I am really disappointed in the way they have treated you and all I can do is apologise for it!! Hopefully you'll realise that we do have a close knit community and we love having new players!!! I am sorry that my BF and his brother have given you a bad first experiance of the game/community but, hopefully in the future we can show that we are not all for the win of the game, but the community that we *should* all pride ourselves of being a part of!!
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I experienced this in round 16 the gc said if your not upgraded donate your funds to gal fund and delete. This sort of stuff put me off playing the next 15 rounds. I only came back because id played before and remembered how much fun it was. on my return I was in a crappy gal with pa_bear and great. they helped me and I joined fcrew as they were a starting alliance. the hcs and community were very helpful. I do not know first hand of what hr are like inside. but the hcs are friendly and it is a training alliance I always send new players who haven't played before go hr. if they don't have irc and aren't willing to get it within a week. I exile them. why you ask? Because I don't want to invest time into someone who doesn't want to learn how to play. irc is a necessity if you want to perform well. As for original post. while the first mail was rude. you gave the gcs too many reasons to exile you. yes they didn't tell you what to do. but did you read the manual at all?
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TY kit Just to confirm though, I am not a new player, I am an established player from round 1. I was just acting to see what it would be like |
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Most people dont even wanna spend time playing the game itself, cant really expect most people to bother teaching up new people after all theese years. Kudos to the ones putting in effort to teach new players(or oldschoolers from pre pay2play) its actually a good way for new alliances with ambitions to grow.
Also might be an idea to have a newbie alliance or smth which the pateam(you must be sick of being sitting ducks in 1:1 already) or some kind player from the community could run it. |
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A simple scan would have showed that. I had res/cos running, 300 roids (could mine 300) etc etc |
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I understand that but, it's still the same newbies shouldn't be treated any differently!!!but shown the pro's and cons of the game and the community!! Its harder when I know these 2 players personally and I know that they constantly go on about the lack of new players in the game and how it should be advertised more to attract new players. |
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tbh though, had he told them who he was, they would probibly of given more abuse and exiled faster :p
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i would point out that for his second gal, he did not ask chaos or i for help as he knew he would of gotten it im sure... doesn't look so dramatic for his forum troll then!
in reality we are way too busy with rl and running alliances to notice every planet that passes through our gal. a tip to any newb is get on irc! from an alliance point of view though we have had to reject several new players at the start of this round simply because of tag limits. if the game (pateam) isn't going to help us support new players then what can we do. |
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I had a somewhat similar situation last round.
I missed tick-start due to my relationship breaking down and having to find somewhere to live et al so when I joined the game I landed in a Haven Gal. Nothing on the overview regarding an IRC channel or anything, no mail to tell me the galchan, next thing I know I'm being exiled. no reasons or attempt at communications, just straight out exile. Luckily, I mailed the GC and managed to get access sorted but for a new player the game can be daunting enough so communication is not always fore-front in the 'newbies' mind. I think some sort of 'getting started' type tutorial would benefit new players, The quest system is okay but it's more a case of, do this, do that, do the other thing. |
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Anyway, the community is to a certain extent, only a product of the game. Sure, we as a community can take a certain degree of responsibility, but PA does not cater much for new players, and probably never will. Let's be honest, why should you have to resort to using outdated and old fashioned chat clients to actually communicate with your galaxy? |
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he was pretending to be a retard, not a newb. when that happens people see through is and assume its certain other pa players or intel whores
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The name "bob" wasn't the best pick either.
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If GC/Ministers have set a channel (with +k, not +i) under the ingame Politics -> Update Messages system: Put a link to joining the galchan through com-unit on the Overview page?
(Ofc I ain't claiming this will fix the issue, but its a start on getting newbs on irc faster) |
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- Increase PATeam to 15+ with the new members designated to training, they are compensated for their time with a free credit or two, the role is basically to support all the new/returning players in the fundamentals of planetarion. - Instead of everyone shuffled at PT12, all planets start in 1:1 those that have played 4+ rounds recently are automatically shuffled out and there is a check-box to allow your planet to be shuffled if you're a new/returning player who hasn't played many rounds. at PT 13 all planets that aren't shuffled are in 1:1 to be coached by the PATeam on how to play and they are allowed 1 free exile out of 1:1 when they believe or PATeam believes they are good enough to join the crowd. - All this requires is a few people who want to keep this game alive, an IRC chan dedicated to help even by using #support as the chan. I think the notion of 2 credits for every round that is donated to helping newbies will attract more people to help and allow a turn over of "helpers" so that we don't all burn out or bored of repeating the same instructions ever round. Thiere could be an extra credit which can be given to a promising new player like a new player of the round award. |
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think i have said it a few times before but will say it again. remove the exile option. then galaxies will have no choice but to try and communicate with noobs and get them into the game. also, stop having tag limits so mass noobs/less actives can compete with super actives. change PL.
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report them. def them to annoy their farmers. get them hit by your alliance mates.
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Reporting doesn't always work. so it would just be awful waste of my fleet usage, when i could have just exiled them and deffed a real player. its SELF exiles that are the problem
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I'll actually bother responding to this one :)
I'll start by saying I totally stand for what I said, everyone that's been through our gal in the last 5 rounds atleast know that we'd be more than happy to help them learn the game and how to play, and that this round we couldn't do that due to other reasons I'm not getting into. First I'd like to say nice idea on how to try and find issues in how to increase the memberbase on this game. Though the idea was nice your way of executing it was terrible tbh. You didn't act like a noob at all. you acted like a retard (we even asked you if you were the person we thought you were, though I'm not gonna mention which name that was, and the way you responded confirmed that you were just playing with us). If you wanted any credits for your "experiment" you'd learn to play a noob first and not a retard (though I'm sure that's easier for you to play). Šeras |
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Back when I still played, it was very common for people to ask if there were random newbs in someone's gal they could farm. This was a win/win for both sides: risk-free roids for the newbie roider and lower exile costs for the newbie's galmate.
What I have not seen is people asking the newbie to self-exile. The gals I was in always did normal exiles, as far as I can remember. I think your experiment would have had a much more positive outcome if you'd joined IRC. Like it or not (and I don't), but you need IRC access to play this game in any kind of cooperative fashion (and that's the only way to play). If you refuse to join IRC from the start, or are unable to, then you'll have to go to incredible lengths to convince people you're worth their time. I am not surprised you were unable to. Also, was your ruler name really "Forest"? Because that's hardly a good undercover name... |
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[04:23:15:22] <@Clouds> You of all people know how the bp has helped with new players [04:23:25:28] <02+Doffeh> Me? [04:23:45:70] <@Clouds> There was a new/returning player in the galaxy when you joined [04:24:05:61] <@Clouds> Plus we didn't exile you just because you were hr etc [04:24:26:67] <02+Doffeh> you didn't exile me because I'm active, good shit Cough.. You would have preferred that I changed alliance when I was in your galaxy, I'm quite sure. Anyway, stick 5 guys in a group and once they start playing to win I'm sure they'll become douchebags 9 times out of 10. To a certain degree one could almost call it a natural thing, but that certainly doesn't help new people. Anyway, the next time I land in "your" galaxy, remind me to consider myself blessed if I'm allowed to stay. |
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I suppose you wouldn't be happen to able to provide a more balanced account of the conversation, would you?
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Removing exiling is something I honestly dont mind considering. Most arguments as to why it is bad are based on flawed perceptions.
Make somewhat larger buddypacks, remove exiling in total, and I think new players will be valued more. (maybe also considering disbanding galaxies if they're not functional) A good gal should be more teamwork than exiling 2312312 planets so that some guy you want in your gal can exile in. |
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as much as this shows a reason why some new players dont stay, it doesnt really address the much larger issues of pa, ie the fact it hasnt moved on in 10 years.
PA needs to get with the times. new fresh looks, facebook app (even if its just a posting of feed type thing), mobile apps. however, there is not the investment or drive from those in control to do any of this. pa is in the internet dark ages and is never going to come out. it'll eventually just fade into a foot note on the early days of internet gaming. |
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Forest RE: RE: lo Sat, 18 Aug 04:15:49
ok ty I am hitting a big planet, go me! I got no reply and Puppe let me crash on the #2 planet Forest def Sat, 18 Aug 11:19:24 Location Target (eta) Mission 7hrs 41mins Defend Ship Class T1 T2 T3 Type Count Corsair Fighter Corvette - - Steal 15830 crashing on purpose... MH should close you!! |
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Oh shut up gm.
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I am not trolling, I am trying to explore ways to make the game more accessible. My point is, why should a newbie HAVE to mail EVERY planet in multiple gals just to get help? |
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Earlier I was in the wrong for not messaging you, now you say because I didnt message you, you think I was an intel whore? Make your mind up. |
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Asking to self-exile is a common issue these days and happens a lot. I did say when I joined first gal that I would have access soon. And I asked for access to gal room. I was told no and to exile. No it wasn't forest lol, I used nicks in replacement of co-ords :p |
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its your own words forest, you said you crashed on purpose... is that not against the rules?
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<Forest> and yeah i crashed, i wated to see if puppe would do something seeing as i told him i was doing it
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I could have roided if def was fake
And I stole ships |
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