Well I hate that it has come to this but they just can’t stop beating me up even after all of these years. I will let the reader be the judge.
I did indeed talk to my lawyer about a libel suit against Pirates Ahoy! but he said it wouldn’t be worth it because its a foreign (outside US) site owned by foreign owners.

They continue to accuse me of things I have never been responsible for and they have no proof. They might as well accuse me of Global Warming and hacking the DNC before the US elections as well. This has become ludicrous. I noticed recently on their site that a new member began to post all kinds of nonsense. I remember that same guy when I was on the site as his jargon and nonsensical musings are unmistakable. Thagarr said I was warned about banning – thru one of my other alter-ego false memberships. Well guess what. Those people he is referring to ARE NOT ME!!! That guy posting over there right now IS NOT ME! They are just making really bad assumptions here with no proof. I now know how tall tales get started – I am MK the SUPER TROLL with my ARMY of minion super trolls!

I wonder if they have ever considered the following. OK so maybe they are being attacked all of the time. However, I can tell you that it isn’t me or any of my people. I made some threats when I left because I was really angry and hurt – but they were more akin to KARMA coming back up on them to kick them in the ass and to watch out.

1. Could it be that other people may really hate them? I am not the only one they have banned and it may escape their comprehension, but a few of their moderators come off constantly as extremely condescending people who talk down to others with a tone of utter superiority. Anotherwords – A5sholes. Could it be that there might be others that are conducting these alleged attacks against them?

2. Their site is not well protected and is unsecured with only an http prefix. When one checks the address using threat assessment software warnings for malware come up concerning their website. Our own site here is attacked by spammers all of the time trying to gain membership. This even has made it hard for legit people to gain access because the email buffer will fill up with thousands of these fake requests for membership and our EXTREMELY GOOD filter will pick them up and hold them for my review. Well if I have no time for a couple months to go through these there may be several thousand and only a dozen of them might be from legitimate people who really want to become members. Could it be that because of their poor protection that they can’t avert these types of commercially driven and scammer phishing attacks? However, instead of actually looking at their origin points they just blame me? MK the Super Spammer extraordinaire? Frankly I don’t have the inclination, the time nor the energy for such a weak pursuit.

3. Could it be that because of their name alone “Pirates Ahoy” and the fact it is an unsecured “foreign” site with membership from all over the world – that several nations might have identified their site on the surface and its members as simply being “internet pirates” and are treating them as such without actually looking more than an inch deep at what they are really about – and thus erroneously labeling them as another PIRATES BAY type of site? Subsequently they might have dedicated a certain amount of national assets in probing them, blocking them, etc.??? With my own experience this is the one that I would guess might be more true than anything else.

So now because Mr. Boelen continues to attack my character with unwarranted slander, defamation and calumny, (Read this post on PA!: http://www.piratesahoy.net/threads/gentlemen-of-fortune-2-0.19345/page-76 ) I am publishing here for you all of the complete and full correspondence between myself and PA! members to include himself from the time I was banned so that you can make up your own minds about me.

To set the stage: A modeler who had built a beautiful model for POTBS had come over to PA! I knew her work and admired it greatly. I was very excited she had joined PA! The contract that POTBS modelers had signed (which I have a copy of) with Flying Labs and still stands with Portalus allowed them to give their models freely to anyone they liked. They were not restricted to POTBS only and this is why we have some POTBS models in the 2.8 Storm mods now. I asked this modeler if I could get a model called the Oliphant (a beautiful Dutch style 50 gun two decker from about 1650) and was even willing to pay her because I wanted it for the COAS and Storm mods. I was also willing to pay her to build more models if she was willing for both ERAS and for a new game I was trying to get off the ground at the time. If she had given the model to me, I would have freely shared it with anyone else on Pirates Ahoy!

However, I was attacked immediately by the guy/PA moderator (Post Captain) leading up the Hearts of Oak effort. He deleted all of the posts having to do with my queries to this POTBS modeler because he could not stand her doing anything for ERAS. At the time the PA! modding team were almost twisting the arms of all members to get on board with HOO even if they wanted to support other games or activities. This was one of the largest areas of concern I had and why I was beginning to make my exit anyway. Then this same moderator comes onto my mod thread and starts deleting my posts telling the community about what he has just done and nobody can be an honest judge of the matter because he would continue to delete my posts which had no profanity of any kind in them. I posted my side of the story six times in a row and each time he would delete it. Finally I had had enough and asked publicly when someone was going to limit QUOTE: “this little Hitler Nutjobs power here”. Well he knew he could get me with that comment and so left it up without deletion…….and that was the comment that they all ganged up on me with and threw me out of the boat. I was angry and hurt = especially after so much contribution that they would regard me so poorly.

Bottom line this was all about getting a ship model – nothing more. But they never got that. The resulting unpleasantness caused this modeler to disappear forever taking any chances of future contributions with her – such a shame.

At that point they decided to blame me for all that ails the world. There has never been any proof of any of their allegations to this day. I have challenged them and they have never produced one iota of proof.

Because of this I now offer for your entertainment and their utter embarrassment the full correspondence that took place directly after my banning so that you can see that I am not the monster they suggest. I am so tired of this. But I have to do something to defend my character – right? MK

{CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN PIETER BOELEN AND MYSELF}

modernknight1
modernknight1 Apr 3 2014 says:

Sorry Pieter,

I posted a comment to your personal profile when I had intended it to be a message.

My first question is: would it be possible for me to get limited access for an hour or so to copy all my personal messages from my inbox?

Second question is: Is it possible to wipe out all content I’ve ever contributed to the site?

R,

AS
Pieter_Boelen
Pieter_Boelen Apr 4 2014 says:

I send this reply to you in confidence and good faith.

Before I answer the above (because it is not just my decision to make), let me ask you about this here which appears to be aimed directly at myself:

modernknight1 wrote: Last, a few people at PA always said they would support me and some did to an extent. However what I find amusing about that is – none of them actually game that much or even play COAS. I also find it funny that people who gave me their supposed “best wishes” would decide to ban me and not even look at the core complaints that were the source of my unhappiness before taking such action – nor even answer the complaints.

It is exactly things like this which have allowed the problem to escalate in the first place.

To address the various issues you make here:

1. Indeed I do not play much, which is due to a severe lack of time on my part.
I cannot do ALL the following at the same time:
– Have a very demanding professional situation
– Lead some sort of a personal life
– Provide support to everyone on the PiratesAhoy! Forum, including those playing and modding AoP and CoAS
– Continue modding PotC myself
– Support and supervise the Hearts of Oak project
– Post news articles and promote our work on various websites
– Actually play games
That is physically impossible, even though I try to juggle everything as well as I can.
It is also beside the point, so I do not know why you bring it up.

2. I can assure you that we DID and DO look at the various concerns you have voiced.
In fact, we have been discussing them in private and hope to address them properly soon.
Unfortunately these are quite difficult discussions, so they take time and effort, which is why nothing has been posted about it in public yet.

I have always been on your side and tried to support you as well as I could, given the limitations listed under #1 above.
Additionally, I have also given you the benefit of the doubt wherever and whenever there were conflicts going on.
That only ended with this post of yours here: Piratesahoy.net
The following personal attacks have not been helping either. And neither does the above.

It would be my biggest wish that everybody can get along and treat each other with proper respect.
If we can do that, then we can continue doing productive things again and have FUN.
Like we’re SUPPOSED to be doing with this hobby of ours!
modernknight1
modernknight1 Apr 4 2014 says:

Pieter,

That was not directed at only you. With the exception of Hylie, none of you game much and have all of you have said as much one time or another. None of you play COAS. I made the comment to illustrate that I have not got a fair hand in this business because of how you all judge and value my contributions. They are not of value to any of you because none of you care about them. However, other members do very much, but I don’t think you guys can see that. I have always felt like a second class citizen and alone in this regard, and that my opinions and desires were never or rarely considered. The fact that you could allow Post Captain to delete my posts whenever he pleases and for no good reasons is what really set me over the edge.

Just so you know – that last bit with the Hitler comment was added only after I had tried to justify my own reasons in my own thread six times. Each time, Post Captain would delete my post and each time I would put it back. Finally I was so upset I put the Hitler comment in and that’s when he let it stay because he knew he would have ammunition against me with it….what a piece of work.

I have always been a passionate gamer that made the time to game any time possible even during a long military career. I am addicted. I was programming the first TRS-80, Apple, and Commodore 64 games back in the late 70s/early 80s. I spent a whopping $6000 on a state of the art IBM 486 when they first came out in the mid nineties and I am the owner of every single video game console ever made. In addition, my Aspergers syndrome causes me to be overly passionate about a couple areas. One is computers and the science of data morphology and sharing, another is sailing, and the last is ships. My 1st and 2nd grade teachers had to bribe me with brand new pieces of typing paper to get me to pay attention during class and not draw little pictures of ships on my assignments. I won first place in the junior art fairs from 1st grade to 7th every year with drawings and paintings of…..sailing ships.

This is why I am willing to pay thousands for good models and am willing to share with everyone with no profit for myself. You guys just are unable to understand me or who I am. You guys don’t even realize that Jan Marten released a new version of MOTCS with unbelievable amounts of new content. The mod compressed is even bigger than ERAs at over 9.5GB. I would have made an announcement and published links but with Post Captain ruling the roost and HoO the only consideration I’ve been kinda like, “why bother doing anything.” I wrote several really great historical articles when their dates came, and I thought, “why bother”.

I don’t think any of you even know what the model Oliphant is. It is absolutely gorgeous and a think of worship for those that love the Golden Age and ships of the 17th century. Post Captain ruined my chances of ever getting that model. I have been in discussions with Marion anyway privately about employment in six months time. And I do not see a conflict of interest here if she wants to volunteer her time at PA! but she gets to be paid for work that she would really love to do.

If you don’t already know it, there are a lot of people besides me that are unhappy with Post Captain’s dictatorial ways. Anyway, enough ranting. I will just say that a new website about all things Pirate would not have to be considered a threat. It could even be a partner site with a lot of mutual cooperation. I tried to buy PA! from Keith, but he didn’t want to sell. I thought about offering him more than he could resist, but decided against it. With my own site, no one will be able to delete my posts. With a focus on COAS, we can get much further with it also. There are a lot of break-throughs happening and Jan has had a lot of breakthroughs as well. POTEHO is about to be released in English and that will open the flood gates for so many new things. Not every gamer wants a super realistic environment. I know lots of guys still playing 16 bit side-scrollers. Also, these games are here and available for someone that gets the itch right now.

Aaron
modernknight1
modernknight1 Apr 4 2014 says:

Oh and BTW, Post Captain has gone and deleted more of my posts now that
I’m gone after the fact. These posts were of a historical advisory
nature only and had nothing in them that could be considered incendiary
or offensive at all. But he knows best…

Aaron
Pieter_Boelen
Pieter_Boelen Apr 4 2014 says:

Do you really seriously believe for even a split second that I do not care about the Storm games?
I have spent TEN YEARS working on PotC! Is that not proof enough in and of itself?
True, I have never been able to support CoAS as much as I supported PotC, but that is mainly because it is too much to do everything at the same time.

And I did try to get work done on CoAS. I distinctly remember a time when it had just been released and I was actively contributing for a while.
Of course back then, a LOT of my suggestions went completely ignored, resulting in me caring less and less.
But I never completely stopped caring. Was it not last year that I sorted out some issues you had been struggling with?

The same goes for Armada. In fact, last year we were both looking into porting PotC stuff to CoAS!
That didn’t work out because the games are too different for this to be a simple job and we just didn’t have the people to actually make it happen.
But again, we DID try. And it is a crying shame that apparently you were never able to give us the benefit of the doubt.

I am very well aware of the concerns about Post Captain and have indeed heard things about it from several people.
Not to mention the things I have seen and experienced myself.
For example, I personally don’t even remotely care about realism as much as he does and often get tired of the continuous debates on it.
Especially the ones that keep going round in circles with a distinct amount of not listening to each other going on.

I am really very sorry it has had to come to this. But we are trying to address it. Which is quite annoying in and of itself,
because it does mean getting several people (including him) to FINALLY agree on what we have been discussing for two years now.

You really should have sent your concerns in private to Armada and/or myself though, rather than making a public scene on the forum.
That just made things worse. And worse. It does not help to antagonize those people who were on your side to begin with.

It would make me very happy if we can continue making actual progress again. But for that to happen, the fighting must end.
modernknight1
modernknight1 Apr 6 2014 says:

Well I do believe that you care very much about POTC. However, I seem to remember when we built our very first modpack you didn’t even want it on PA!. You wanted us to put it on MODDB.

I don’t feel you read or considered my explanation at all – and I am not fighting with anyone. I can’t – I have no voice. Most websites at least have a warning system. In my mind all of you took his part before mine. I had no advocate in the matter. I don’t think any of you have the love of sailing ships that I do nor understand my love of ships. That is the major reason for my highly emotional reaction to how I was personally treated and injured by Post Captain. We will now never have the Oliphant….that is still an extreme tragedy to me and I don’t think any of you care about that at all.

It also comes down to one additional very simple equation in my mind:

Post Captain’s contributions and administrative rights are greater than MK’s contributions and his ability to manipulate his own content/intellectual property.

MK’s contributions are not that great or substantial to PA! or it’s current focus, and Post Captain is so engaged and committed to HoO, so he should have the rights to censor MK at anytime – even on his own threads.

I still would like to get my messages. I will ask again, is it possible to remove all content I’ve ever posted?

Aaron
Pieter_Boelen
Pieter_Boelen Apr 6 2014 says:

The reason I wanted to have your modpack posted on the ModDB is so that interested people would get to SEE it.
And also to make sure there were extra mirrors available. In other words: I advised to do that specifically to support you.
This had exactly nothing to do with “not wanting that on PA!”. That is nonsense, plain and simple. And you should know that!

If you hadn’t noticed, the ModDB has been the MAIN download site for the PotC Build Mod for years now.
It is a great place for sharing modpacks with the “general public” and I would have been very happy if it could have been used for Eras as well.
It would have done a lot of good. For Eras and for the regular GoF versions as well.
But virtually nobody on the CoAS Modding Team would listen to my advise. Well, that was your loss, not mine.

And if you remember, both Armada and myself suggested making a separate subforum for your modpack.
This was to actually give you the space you deserved. It was you who decided you did not want that.
The both of us also spent quite some time and effort to promote your work,
adding it to the forum banner and posting about it on our public profiles. So don’t claim we were unwilling to support you.

There never was a “Post Captain’s side” vs. “Modernknight1’s side”. Mostly all forum members had great respect for both of you.
Until the fights started. That didn’t do either of you any favours. But I never saw PC actually attack anyone personally on the forum.
There were definitely mistakes on his part too. And a great many at that. You are not the only person to get annoyed there, I can assure you.

You had a lot of supporters on PA!, most definitely including Armada, Hylie Pistof and myself.
In other words: Just about all the long-time staff members. We would have probably agreed with you if you had contacted us directly,
rather than posting increasingly unpleasant and disruptive posts on the forum.

I remained on your side for the longest of times, which, as I said, only ended with this post here: Piratesahoy.net
That was unfair, uncalled for and also on many accounts factually untrue. As were most of your posts made after that.

I had hoped that you might have been able to realize this. Apparently not. I am really sorry that I have been unable to convince you.
modernknight1
modernknight1 Apr 6 2014 says:

You guys banned me. What else is there to be said? There was no discussion with me included. No offer or opportunity to retract what I had written or apologize. You talked among yourself and banned me.

Let me ask you this….if I was not starting my own new website, continuing my work with me mods, and trying to reclaim my content from PA!, would any of you have bothered contacting me to convince me of anything? Would any of you tried to get me to come back? I don’t think so. I think you guys were hoping I would just quietly disappear and you wouldn’t have to bother with me anymore.

I am quite willing to apologize for the Hitler comment – even in light of my explanation of it. I am even willing to apologize for becoming emotionally distressed. But I am still so unhappy about losing the Oliphant and Post Captain’s out of control deletion powers. You guys do not care about acquiring new ships for our members. That is the single most important thing to me. If I was unbanned I would never write another story for PA! or ever comment again on anything but questions about my own content with simple concise one line answers. However, because I am banned, I do not want my intellectual property or comments to continue to exist on a site that doesn’t appreciate my contributions. So I will ask once again, is it possible to pull all my posts and content from PA!?

Aaron
modernknight1
modernknight1 Apr 7 2014 says:

Is it possible to pull all my posts and content from PA!?
Pieter_Boelen
Pieter_Boelen Apr 7 2014 says:

You have been warned on the forum several times, so surely your banning did not come as a surprise.
You have lost the trust and goodwill of just about every senior forum member. And through your own doing, no less.
Every post above is still downright disrespectful and has only reinforced this.

On the subject of your PMs, you should have considered that before making some of the posts you made.
Shame, because I would have been willing to help you with it if this were not the case.

We are already cleaning out the dead wood on the forum.
We don’t like deleting threads unless they are spam or something repulsive, but they definitely will be closed and unpinned.
In other words, they’ll be going down to Davy Jones’ Locker soon enough.

As for your content, what is left to be removed? You already pulled the links to your modding work.
None of your work was ever included in the PotC Build Mod either.

We have done a lot for you over the years, but apparently you were never willing to accept our good intentions.
I have better things to do than to waste any more of my time and effort on what is clearly a lost cause.
Just know that if you want people to do something for you, it helps to treat them with friendliness and respect
modernknight1
modernknight1 Apr 7 2014 says:

I am sorry we are at such an impasse and you will not consider my position at all.

Please show me where I was warned. There are no tools on the site showing number of warnings as other forums have. I received no written warnings that I was about to be banned publicly or by PM. For goodness sake, I was receiving best wishes messages from you people so I don’t know what you’re talking about.

You say you have done a lot for me. What about what I did to educate the PA! population and provide countless hours of fun for gamers. I have had many of my supporters tell me that I was the only true historian PA! ever had and that they came there often to read what I had written.

As for my content, it should be obvious I am talking about my news articles and stories of historical fiction that have received thousands of looks. I guess you never read them. I am also talking about over 2300 posts – many advisory or long discussions of historical authenticity on numerous subjects. So if you consider all of that “dead wood” then please just clean it out.

Respect is a two way street young man. I have commanded thousands of men and know full well what the measure of respect consists of. I have had men risk their very lives for me. I can tell you that one of the most important aspects regarding respect – is fairness and consideration of others value and opinions. I received very little respect from you folks. If I had – we wouldn’t be having this discussion now.

I am sorry you consider this your final dealing with me because it forces my hand to take actions I didn’t want to. (*NOTE: I was referring to legal action to remove my content – not hacking or attacks. My lawyer advised against as I cover at the top of this topic – and he told me the same thing again just yesterday. )

Good Day Sir,

AS

{CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN THAGARR AND MYSELF}

FROM: Thagarr to MK

You are the last person I am going to take any kind of advice from about my conscience, I sleep perfectly well at night, thank you very much. Even more so since you were banned from PA. Which, since you are so interested in the details, was not my decision alone. In fact, my opinion was that you be demoted, and your moderator privileges taken away. However, it was rightly pointed out to me that you would use whatever “clout” you had obtained with people around PA to further fracture the forum, which is exactly what you have been doing from day one. You are also the last one to be giving me a lecture on forum rules, you know very well what they are because you have violated every single one of them, in fact we had to make new ones to deal with the crap that you pulled. You were warned on many occasions, and several times by me. Those warning may not have been issued to moderknight1, but you were warend. You are hardly an innocent party, and we are still dealing with your spam bots and troll logins, not to mention your DOS attacks and hacking attempts.

I am well aware of your communications with Pieter, he showed me every one of them. And since your obviously curious why I came back to PA, it was to deal with your crap, and the aftermath of your banning. Apparently you forget just how long I have been around PA, numbers as far as visitors mean absolutely nothing to us. A big reason for some drop in numbers is the fact that your bots disappeared when we banned your IP’s. I also don’t need a lecture from you on how the Internet works, I have been a geek for 40 years. Your “son” can blame you entirely for his banning from PA. I will continue to ban anyone that is a threat in any way to PA, and using IP’s linked to your account is a threat.

I am also well aware of the fact that you tried to buy PA, and I thank God that Keith is a good judge of people and turned your offer down flat! I still have all our PM’s, and knowing what I know now, it is very easy for me to go back through and see just how much division and contention you were stirring up on PA. I am sure that there are other PM’s you sent to other members that were just as divisive, I have talked to some who received them. Yes, we wished you luck, but you just couldn’t resist stirring the pot even more before you left could you? Couldn’t leave well enough alone and just move on. To be honest Arron, if that is indeed your real name, I hope your new website succeeds and is a big hit, then maybe you will realize just what it takes to keep a site going, and all the crap that you have to deal with from trolls and spammers, both of which you are intimately familiar with.

Lastly, there is absolutely no need for you to correspond with me again for any reason. You have nothing to say that I want to hear, or will pay any more attention to. You have shown me just what your friendship means, and I want no part of it or you.

—– Original Message —–
From: “01 11”
To: “Thagarr” email address omitted – if I were a really horrible person I would include it…
Sent: Friday, June 6, 2014 6:21:27 PM GMT -06:00 US/Canada Central
Subject: RE: Pirates Ahoy!

Hello Ron,

I must say that I am really disappointed in you folks at PA! I thought you were a fair minded bunch and that you yourself were a Christian centered person, but I can see your temper and pride are much stronger than your moral compass.

The only word that comes to mind when I think of this whole business is “hypocrisy”. I wouldn’t even bother sending this but my son just informed me that you banned him too? REALLY? You know I should point out that anyone that has a home network has routers. I have a 4000 square foot place and I installed a CAT-5 LAN network in it to every room over 6 years ago. The IP that you banned is a ten port router that serves the entire house and all the computers within, NOT my own computer’s mac address or any of my other actual computers. I can simply plug direct to my native router or I could go down to Best Buy right now and buy a new router if I wanted to get back on to PA! to see whats going on, but I have no need to as free proxy services are easy to obtain if I need to reference something from past posts. This is a computer Geek family you see. Both of my sons are gamers and have both played my mod. My nephew in Idaho has helped with the mod a lot although has lost interest after my banning. I also have friends that play and help out.

So you can believe that my son is me if you want to, but he isn’t. He is not a spammer either. He has a lot of time on his hands right now as he is out of school and not working. He is an avid gamer and made a music mod some years ago for COAS. He decided he wanted to play the latest version of my mod when I got back here from Idaho and he has been the best beta tester ever. He says with all my added content that the game is now as good as Borderlands – and that’s high praise from him.

He has played almost all the quests in the last two weeks. The game has inspired him to change the music again and I have encouraged him. I am so glad that he is inspired so much by the game that he wants to create and contribute. He has been very active on Corsairs Harbor of late and I think this is awesome because his major in School for the last five years has been Russian. Last thing I want to tell you concerning my son is that he didn’t deserve what you did to him today. You did it at the drop of a hat and without thought. You just assumed it was me. That is not only unfair, but should be against your flimsy forum rules at the very least. I guess rather than follow any type of procedure, protocol or rules yourselves, its just easier to ban whoever makes you slightly angry. I guess PA! isn’t a very good example of our American free press and ideas concerning open communication anymore. But I guess you know best Ron. My son attempted suicide a couple months back which is one of the main reasons I returned here from Idaho. So just squash his creativity if you want, but that will just allow him to thrive on the Russian sites and on my own site when its ready.

As far as I am concerned, I have hardly paid you guys any attention since I left. I was leaving anyway you know. You guys gave me best wishes. My new site will be up by July. The only reason I haven’t gone public yet is because I want to ensure there is plenty of meat on the bone when it comes up….and believe you me there will be. The only thing that makes me mad is your actions in banning me as I was leaving anyway. Again no rules or procedures. No verbal or written warnings received. I don’t know if its possible for Xenforo to issue warnings like is regularly done on other sites. Many of the Russian modders have asked if it was a temporary banning. I frankly don’t know what to tell them.

You know I am just so confused by so much of this. You disappear for a year and leave me alone to fight all the little late period whipper snappers. When you do suddenly and miraculously come back you take a stand with the little goofballs instead of with me. Boelen is as wishy washy as they come and follows the winds of popularity. He never takes a stand on anything unless it might be something that makes him or his precious Build mod look bad. Sometimes one must make a stand and for the right reasons. People are never going to agree on everything or get along. His bad leadership is largely what broke up the COAS modders because he let them go in a dozen directions instead of maintaining one logical united front….all while he had very little to do with our efforts. This made me always suspect this was intentional and that he was jealous that we had more interest on our projects than his precious buildmod. He was always trying to convince COAS players to come play the build when they were already involved with GOF. In addition, his wishy washy stance allowed the later era to prevail over the Age of Piracy when the surveys showed overwhelming desires to develop HOO in OUR (PA!’s) former favored era. That stance alienated a huge (but silent) segment of the community whether or not you people want to admit it or see it.

PA! has become so misguided. Instead of trying to recruit modders and modelers for all of PA!’s efforts, only HOO is considered. Look at how dead the rest of the former efforts have become since that focus. I attempted to buy the site from Keith before I started my own effort. The reason was so that I could steer the ship back in the direction it needed to go in. You know that I have a huge following. I get a dozen emails a day asking about what happened and when/if Eras is still continuing. Last time I checked on my closed topic, it was hundreds of views ahead of where it was a week before and that’s in fact hundreds of more views than most of your other topics on PA! get at all.

Last, I think your decisions to do what you did to me have been really bad for PA! and have made the site and all of you moderators look really bad. Rackham immediately responded to Boelen’s statement that it was not right and his concerns were the same as mine. But as usual you guys closed ranks so you didn’t have to hear the opinions of the PA! populous. You know your decisions should be to try to service their needs and desires….not your own egos. In my final dialogue with Boelen I told him that another Pirate website did not need to be seen as a threat. That it could be seen as a cooperative partner. But no. I have had many long time modders write me and give me support. Modders and modelers that have now gone silent on PA! They are waiting for my site to come up so they can continue their hobby there on an open forum that will not simply ban someone for voicing a strong but justified opinion about something. They all know that what you guys did was very wrong and you all must realize by now that it was very damaging to you and not popular at all.

PA! has never had a strong readership or attendance, but since I left I have noticed your numbers dipping down to the single digits – Something I never saw before. I have to believe that this is in part due to how you guys are rolling and how you dealt with me. Your negative treatment of my son today just reinforces that and he has been telling others in the gaming community and the Russians especially all about it. You realize that the Russian pirate game sites get hundreds of members online a day – not just the trickle of double digits that PA! does.

If you have any kind of a conscience at all you should at the very least apologize to my son Stephen, regardless of how you may feel about me…..even though I still don’t think I deserved the malice and treatment I have received in all this rotten business.

Good luck and God bless you.

Aaron (MK)

> Date: Fri, 22 Mar 2013 01:41:06 -0500
> From: Thagarr
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: Re: Pirates Ahoy!
>
>
> Hi Aaron, good to hear from you man! Yeah, I have been a bit scarce around PA for a while, I just needed a break. I appreciate your kind words mate, I was getting a bit burnt out and just needed to take some time off away from PA. I am used to the no comments thing, it’s been like that for a while, with a few exceptions such as Hylie and yourself and a few others. The main reason however has a lot to do with me reconciling my love of all things pirate with my Christian faith, there is quite a lot to reconcile and I have been doing a good bit of soul searching lately. It’s something that I will have to come to terms with myself, but I wanted you to know exactly why I haven’t been around.
>
> There are a couple of other minor reasons as well, the Hearts of Oak project for one. It really doesn’t seem to be going anywhere at the moment, and seems to be completely dominated by the Napoleonic crowd. Overall the Seven Years War was a pretty boring era for pirates, with a couple of exceptions.
>
> There is also the official AC4 announcement a couple of weeks ago, I had heard rumors for several months but I never posted anything about them, I was hoping that they really were just rumors. I have many issues with the AC franchise, the least of which is the blatant disregard for actual historical fact. I simply have no desire to get involved in another pointless argument with some 19 year old kid who thinks the whole world revolves around his narcissistic perception of reality. As you point out, there does seem to be an abundance of them around lately.
>
> Sorry to hear your funding didn’t pan out like you wanted, I was really looking forward to seeing what your team could come up with. I sometimes get the feeling that Pieter thinks that no work gets done around PA when he is at sea, but I know there is still quite a lot of activity going on for both Mods. He would be the one to talk to about getting access to the source code. I am really looking forward to your Era’s mod, and I know several other people are as well!
>
> Anyway, thanks for your concern, I am sure that I will probably be back at some point.
>
> Sincerely,
> Ron
>
> —– Original Message —–
> From: “01 11”
> To: “Thagarr”
> Sent: Thursday, March 21, 2013 5:54:29 AM GMT -06:00 US/Canada Central
> Subject: RE: Pirates Ahoy!

> Hey Ron,
>
> Just thought I’d drop you a line and ensure all is well. Your absence from PA! for a few weeks is very conspicuous. I took a week off from the site and modding last week because I got burnt out.
>
> I know participation these days is thankless because of the youthful generation that make up the majority of participants.
>
> Some of these folks are just lost or idiotic. I keep plugging away and see myself as an educator on the site. So if none of these knuckleheads ever give you any encouragement or kind words, for what it’s worth, I appreciate what you have done/ and do for PA!
>
> I was only able to raise 770K for my game development. Which fell short by two thirds of what my business plan required. That’s OK. I plan to use AC IV’s popularity this year and my own GOF Eras mod as an example of what’s possible to refine my pitch to investors for next year. The 770k obviously isn’t sitting in my bank account but is pledged support from some people that want to make my effort succeed. In the mean time I plan to sail, visit relatives, improve my property and make GOF: Eras the best it can be.
>
> BTW I need the 2.8 sourcecode to get new colonies and flags to work in GOF properly. Simple scripting of executables will not work here and I have some expert friends helping me out. Pieter Boelen made the comment that modding for New Horizon’s and GOF was dead. He has never bothered paying attention to what we do and has never played our mods. I think he will be shocked by the popularity of Eras when it goes public in a few more weeks.
>
> Let me know if you’re OK at least or just on vacation or something. I’m sensing burn out or “fed-upted-ness”.
>
> V/R Aaron

Thanks for the birthday wishes Arron, much appreciated. Things are slowing down at work, but that just means I have more time to do yard work now! I hope things are going better for you my friend, sounds like things were a bit rough from your last email. I dealt with a lot of that crap back when I was on IRC, script kiddies never change. I have had a couple of people poking around, but I really don’t care who or why, I figure if they are wasting their time on me they are leaving someone else alone.

I have noticed that there are usually 60 or 70 people just hanging around, and yeah, only a handful actually logged in, and I agree, the last few years have changed a lot of things. I think part of it has to do with the fact that there really haven’t been any good pirate games released lately, and the modding activity has dropped off quite a bit. It’s been almost 3 years since COAS was released in the west, and 5 years since it was released in Russia! As much as I hated the fact that Armada of the Damned was going to be another Disney game, it was at least going to be a pirate game. I have lost all confidence that Raven’s Cry is going to be anything but worthless, and Risen 2 is simply trying to cash in on the pirate craze of the POTC movies. Port Royale 3 however looks fantastic, and it appears to have the same solid game play mechanics as it’s predecessors. I am not sure how modable that one is going to be, but it should pick up the traffic around PA a bit, and maybe spur some new modding interest as well.

Take care,
Ron

—– Original Message —–
From: “01 11”
To: “Thagarr”
Sent: Monday, March 19, 2012 1:05:28 PM GMT -06:00 US/Canada Central
Subject: RE: Pirates Ahoy!

Hey no issues Ron,

I have been really having hard times myself. I moved out of my nice DC apartment into my motorhome in hopeful anticipation of retirement in a few more month. Moving all my crap into storage and cleaning was really hard while I’m still weak and recovering from my surgeries.

I have been depressed and burnt out as well and very lonely. I got attacked worse than ever last week. Nearly destroyed my computer. I’m still going strong though and rebuilt everything. I have numerous good back ups both in terms of hardware and software. I’m very demoralized about the origin of the attack. I have a couple of netbook type PCs I’ve never put on line. I’ve never even updated them because I keep important stuff there I don’t want to lose. I take them everywhere with me.

Seems like a few people were wondering if I would post again and it got some additional looks. Its funny because I put a really obvious nugget in this last one that lets me know when someone actually reads it, because its so goofey, people have to say something to me about it. No one has left any comments, but I have got some PMs which makes me happy to see that folks notice.

I’m going home this week to refinance my house, so that will be good. I’m sure my mood will improve and I will want to contribute more.

Have you noticed that we have about 60 to 70 folks online almost at all times, but it seems like only 2 to 5 members are signing in at any given time. I think this is a reflection of the times we live in. Everyone is guarded. Its really too bad. The internet was supposed to be a free area to share ideas. I hate that some people and governments/industries/corporations have to ruin it for everyone.

Hope things get lighter at work for you and that you can jump in a little more. I also hope you had a great birthday.

Take it easy brother,

Aaron

From Thagar to MK

Hi Arron, sorry for taking so long to reply mate, but I wanted to take some time with this one. Part of the reason why haven’t been very active is because of work, but there are other reasons as well. The recent influx of script kiddies and morons has been part of it as well. We have had our share in the past, but this recent wave has been almost intolerable. Part of it is just the way the forum has always been ran, in a way, we are an awful lot like a group pirates. Taking in the misfits of society that don’t fit in anywhere else. That’s the main reason I have called PA home for such a long time. Usually the good ones stick around for a bit and contribute, and the rest loose interest and drift off. Part of what makes PA a special place is the fact that our mods are rather lax and do tend to tolerate a lot more than what a normal forum would. They have always been more tolerant, but I think a lot of it the past couple of years is they are just plain loosing interest, some of them hardly ever show up anymore.

I believe I understand exactly what you mean about some of the old modders, I have seen several do that. Some only show up when we get close to a big release and do just enough to have their name added to the credits, then disappear again. I wish you could have been around back in 2003 and 2004, PA was a much different place and mods were being churned out all the time. I wasn’t around much during 2005 and 2006, and that’s when a lot of things started to change and most of the original modders disappeared. But I am not trying to give you a history lesson mate, just trying to point out that we have had growing pains in the past, and I have a feeling we are going through some now as well. I am sure we will come through them stronger, we always do, but I also sure that PA will be a different place going forward. Not necessarily better or worse, just different.

I’m glad you are enjoying New Horizons mate, it has really changed POTC into a completely different game. To be honest, I have only played it a few times over the past couple of years, and that was mainly just to check out a few things and make sure my install was functioning. I haven’t played CoAS much at all either since early last year. I tried to fire myself back up for it during December and play a bit to check out some of the great things the mod team has added, but I just couldn’t work up much enthusiasm. I think I have just become a bit burnt out, not on pirates, but with the whole supernatural crap that Disney, and almost every game developer over the past few years, has been forcing on us.

The recent stuff with Raven’s Cry hasn’t helped much either, that game was supposed to be a realistic look at genuine pirates. Instead we get a game that focuses on a psychopathic lunatic that chops off and collects peoples heads and summons ravens during battle. Yeah, supernatural crap on top of it. Back in January I sent an email to my contacts at Octane Games, trying to get them to finally answer the questions we sent in 8 months ago now. I got a response saying that they would talk with their new publisher Topware Interactive and see if they could release any information, and I haven’t heard anything from them since, well over a month and a half. I’m assuming Paradox isn’t even involved with the game anymore, but I have no conformation on that. These people have no clue who or what pirates were, they simply found a couple of examples of what they considered to be bad asses and decided to build a character based on them. Typical game development, give them blood and blow stuff up, a little bit of eye candy and get it out the door as quick as possible. I should have really expected nothing more than that. At least I have Port Royale 3 to look forward too, I am pretty sure I know exactly what we are going to get with that one.

Anyway, enough with the wall of text! I hope things are going good for you mate, I’ll try to be a bit more active, but sometimes it is tough to work up the enthusiasm to post anything for the current crowd. I just have to keep reminding myself that there are a LOT of other good people like you out there who really do appreciate all the posts and all the information that we can dig up.

Take care my friend,
Ron

—– Original Message —–
From: “01 11”
To: “Thagarr”
Sent: Friday, February 3, 2012 12:35:55 PM GMT -06:00 US/Canada Central
Subject: RE: Pirates Ahoy!

Thanks for the reply Ron,

I thought you might just be taking a breather. Well I posted the movie review and its had 40 hits as of this afternoon. I don’t understand how to use the rating bar tool. I set some ratings but they haven’t appeared, and I got a little message that said they would be reviewed.

It is interesting to watch who shows up regularly. I think lots of folks get tired of the forum. Some of the older regulars only stop by from time to time. I’m a bit frustrated with the modding because it takes us so long to get anything done. There are only a few of us that consistently work the COAS mods. When old guys show up for a little while, they download the mod and want to play, but usually don’t want to help. They simply ask a lot of why questions, sometimes criticize what we’re doing and dissappear again.

The other thing that frustrates me is the hackers on our site. I have been attacked numerous times. They’re always trying to leave backdoors on my system so they can snoop. A couple of times they’ve been successful and I didn’t find them until hours (in one case a whole day) later. I suspect one of the attacks originated with the german modders (I traced the IP) and so I haven’t been doing anything with them since that happened. I just don’t trust them now. Ever since that attack (a couple months back) their activity on the site has diminished noticeably.

Big brother is watching me all the time because of what I do professionally and I just accept that. So I wouldn’t be surprised if the perpetrator didn’t get some unwanted attention – and the word spread. The thing that sucks is that I just want to have fun and contribute. I just got back into POTC with the new Build 14 with ENB graphics. I am amazed and completely hooked again. I love these games and with my poor current health, they are my favorite hobby and pass-time, along with the writing and art. I wish people could just keep their grubby hands to themselves.

I’ll see you back at PA! when you’re ready. I know what you mean about the Kindle. I bought one for XXXXXX for her birthday and she reads it constantly. She reads to me sometimes which I love. I haven’t got into it yet just because I have so many books on my list that I’m currently reading. I too have watched every version of Treasure Island and own them. I’ve even got the old hokey Long John Silver series from the 1950’s on DVD. Lets face it, Pirate stories are the stuff our dreams are made of. They were the first thing to really inspire me to consider other possibilities/paths in my life might be possible when I was just a small child.

FYI, I may find something else to post as filler just so their is a larger gap between story chapters. I will post the next segment of the story this weekend. Take care my friend.

V/R Aaron

• This topic was modified 7 years, 10 months ago by modernknight1.
• This topic was modified 7 years, 10 months ago by modernknight1.
• This topic was modified 7 years, 10 months ago by modernknight1.