I've debated writing this entry, because the person who is the subject of this post honestly didn't merit the attention. He's a toxic, demanding, and spiteful soul not at all geopolitically relevant in Solitude, concerned only with his small, myopic, and solipsistic goals. He has no local allies and everyone pretty much unanimously loathes him. "Don't feed the trolls", as the old adage goes. But as time passes, I begin to understand that the person I am writing about is not a troll, but rather, an individual who suffers from severe mental health issues. This post isn't meant to be a burn, but rather, as a means of raising awareness of mental health issues and what poor mental health looks like when you encounter it. Without further introduction, I will tell you the tale of Darth Gualu the Wise.
Way Back Last Year
Once upon time, there was a Tatara in Vevelonel. This Tatara belonged to Galaxy Lords Holding, the structure holding corp for Galaxy Lords Newbies. The CEO of [GLN] is Gualu Echerie. Now, I don't know if Gualu anchored the Tatara himself or if he purchased it off someone. I've heard conflicting stories about that, but either way: Gualu had a Tatara in Vevelonel. Here's how it went:
This isn't surprising. Galaxy Lords Newbies is a small, fairly inactive 20 character corp, most of which are alts. And they had a refinery on an R64 moon in LowSec. Basically, a little fish in a big pond full of bigger fish. Gualu is also exceedingly diffucult and frustrating to deal with, stubbornly clinging to his opinions even when they are clearly and demonstrably wrong. He's completely incapable of compromise, willing to butcher logic, contradict himself, and move goalposts in order to cling to his position. As such, he is not the type who really has friends and builds positive relationships with other players outside of "associations of convenience". The problem with "associations of convenience" however is that when it's no longer convenient or beneficial to associate with you, and you're an exceedingly annoying and arrogant twat, it's easy to justify rolling your shit and taking you for whatever you're worth. Which is probably exactly what happened with Gualu's Tatara.
Every Solitude veteran who I've spoken to who has had any dealings with Gualu has pretty much told me the same story; that they associated with him at first because of what he seemed to offer, but eventually broke ties with him because he tries to tyranize everyone and take over everything. Gualu is a very bossy and pushy person, and most people don't like that. And when he didn't get his way, he would relentlessly harass people and spread wild rumors about them for months at a time. That fact alone is indicative of mental instability. But there's more. So much more.
The TL;DR of ancient history: annoying antisocial person owned an R64 in LowSec. Annoying and antisocial person pestered a larger group. Larger group came and took said R64. Nobody likes annoying and antisocial person.
It Doesn't End There. Of Course.
Gualu's Tatara died around the time I moved to Solitude. In fact, it was only a few short weeks before. If you've read my "Life in Solitude" series, you'll remember that shortly after moving to Solitude, I got involved in a region-wide conflict with the <STFU> alliance. We had a Discord channel on my corp server and a couple of in-game channels. Word spread pretty quickly and Gualu made his way into all the associated channels like crabgrass. But he might as well have not been involved, and eventually, due to numerous complaints from my Solitude compatriots, I had to remove him from the channels. He was just too much for everyone to deal with, and talking to him about his behavior only seemed to make it worse. Essentially, he doubled down. So he had to go.
During the war with <STFU> I found Gualu to be insufferable. He spent pretty much all of his time in Vevelonel with a stealth bomber shooting at the <STFU> Athanor that had replaced his Tatara. If you check his Zkill for this period, pretty much all of his Solitude kills are in Vevelonel and Anckee. He simply wasn't a team player, and wasn't involved beyond his own benefit. While we were running around camping <STFU> everywhere we could find them, and while I was spending hours talking in diplomatic channels trying to build a post-<STFU> Solitude, he just sat in Vevelonel, selfishly fixated only on his own personal goal. He tried to take over Solitude Free Radio (which is what us "rebels" called our loose coalition, and what our main chat channel was named) and use it to fulfill his own agenda, constantly calling for people to drop whatever they were doing and come kill a lone Covetor on the Vevelonel moon or to bring stealth bombers to shoot at the Vevelonel Athanor. So we all agreed to cut him out.
This is just a small snippet of his intel spam. Look at the timestamps. It would go on for hours like this and it started to strangle the life out of the chat.
[ 2021.04.19 18:36:30 ] Gualu Echerie > Vindi warped
[ 2021.04.19 18:37:05 ] Gualu Echerie > a Tempest warped too
[ 2021.04.19 18:38:13 ] Gualu Echerie > Machariel warped too
[ 2021.04.19 18:38:19 ] Gualu Echerie > Naglfar undocked
[ 2021.04.19 18:39:50 ] Gualu Echerie > Naglfar and Apostle warped to heluene
[ 2021.04.19 18:40:43 ] Gualu Echerie > oh, no...
[ 2021.04.19 18:41:55 ] Gualu Echerie > maybe docked agin
Spiteful Twat
Eventually <STFU> got removed from Solitude. Their activity levels began to drop and pretty much everyone in Solitude reset them and started shooting them. Eventually, <WHBOO> reset their standings with them and allied with <SPORK>, and the rest is history.
As far as the Solitude Free Radio coalition was concerned, the plan was to remove <STFU> from Solitude so that <WHBOO> could move in and fill the power vacuum that would be left behind. Pretty much all my diplo work during the final weeks of <STFU>'s presence was ensuring a smooth transition. We had a group chat on Discord titled "Solitude Family Therapy". Everyone was there - except Gualu. Gualu refused his seat at the table: <GSC>/<N.E.S.T> were now his enemies, so he blocked them, despite them having had zero involvement in the conflict or the destruction of Gualu's Tatara - simply because they had been blue to <STFU>. And because <WHBOO> had been blue to <STFU> once upon a time, they were also his enemies.
So, with Gualu in absentia, everyone began making plans for the future of Solitude. Gualu had his own idea about what would happen, however, and his silly ideas would soon crash into the immovable, rock solid wall that we call "reality". The <STFU> Athanor in Vevelonel was destroyed, and the plan was for <WHBOO> to anchor their own refinery on that moon. <WHBOO> was standing by to anchor their Athanor, but Gualu - without discussing it with anyone else, since he was voluntarily out of the loop due to his own stupid stubbornness - anchored his own.
Of course, his Athanor was destroyed before it finished anchoring and <WHBOO> put their own. Gualu - unable to do anything on his own - began batphoning everyone he could to try to get them to come and "get a free structure kill". So the <WHBOO> Athanor died - but they simply anchored a replacement. Gualu was unable to prepare another batphone in time, so instead, just began shooting it with his super risk averse 200km stealth bomber and creating incessant Discord pings. After a few days of this, <WHBOO> opened a diplomatic channel and tried to reason with Gualu and offered him a really sweet deal that would have allowed him to mine not only the Vevelonel moon, but all the moons in Solitude as well as utilize former <STFU> assets, which included very nicely bonused reactions, refining, and manufacturing.
But because he's incapable of compromising - even when it would benefit him enormously to do so - Gualu opted out of the deal and decided to bite off his nose to spit his face. And now we will begin diving into the mental illness that is Gualu. I will TRY to keep this in order:
Nothing will change! Because an entire alliance didn't up and instantly move overnight. Also, Gualu is the victim here who's only defending himself because people are shooting his stuff!... that he anchored without checking if the larger and more powerful people who lived next door were okay with it.
<WHBOO> offered to replace the Athanor that they had blown up. But Gualu is incapable of ever being satisfied with anything, and immediately jumps to talking about his Tatara and Raitaru.
I never said former <STFU> corps or pilots would stick around. Receipt further on.
Telling other people who to talk to and who not to talk to is a Gualu theme that will repeat itself later on. But for now, the point is: I never said anything about anyone "sticking around". What I said was that it wasn't a problem if former <STFU> corps or pilots stuck around, since <WHBOO> would be the ones in charge. The problem with <STFU> was their leadership, not the individual pilots (although they did have a few bad apples). <WHBOO> are actually nice people and generally play nice with others. They honor they agreements and they don't scam people.
I had asked Gualu what it would take for him to stop pestering <WHBOO> and creating structure alerts. His answer was that people who <WHBOO> had no influence over had to reimburse him for his structures, as well as return GARSA's structures. And of course, Gualu demanded "his" moon "returned" to him, even though <WHBOO> never took "his" moon - they took <STFU>'s moon. So here we see the start of Gualu's mental deficiency: his understanding of "ownership" stopped developing in kindergarten. "Waaa! I was here first, it's mine!" Sorry bud, not in EVE Online.
By the way: None of the old <STFU> corps, or <STFU> pilots joined <WHBOO>. They all left Solitude and moved on to other things. But Gualu still demanded exhorbitant amounts of ISK from <WHBOO> to replace his structures.
And this is why Gualu has no friends. <WHBOO>, for their part, were being exceptionally patient and generous with Gualu. They were offering him blue status to mine on any of their moons in Solitude. What they wouldn't do, however, is pay for structures they played no part in destroying. Why would they? Such an idea is simply ridiculous nonsense. But Gualu wasn't having it. He was convinced that because <WHBOO> had been blue to <STFU> - even though this was after <STFU> blew up his Athanor - that meant <WHBOO> was obligated to Gualu to "do something" about those corps and pay for Gualu's losses.
When I explained to him why he was wrong, he simply blocked me like a small boy. This is another Gualu pattern that will repeat itself over and over. Gualu is completely intolerant to being incorrect. He simply can't handle it; it would destroy him emotionally. So he will twist logic and move goals posts and, when cornered, simply stick his fingers in his ears and hum like a child. And he'll act smug about it and put smiling emojis to overcompensate for how bothered and frustrated he is.
He's really transparent.
Back to the conversation with <WHBOO> diplo:
He blocked me because I wouldn't agree with him.
I'll repeat that.
He blocks people who won't agree with him.
He doesn't want to have "discussing", because "discussing" means that people who don't agree with him might have a point, that he might actually be incorrect or unjustified in his viewpoint, and that he might have to compromise or yield a little. And Gualu can't have that. It would shatter his ego and his very sense of identity.
For all his bluster and smiley faces, Gualu is actually a deeply disturbed, freightened and insecure individual. He reminds me of the autistic people I help. People with autism find the world confusing and freightening; they don't like change or unpredictability - they simply can't tolerate it. So, as an adaptation, they form strict routines from which they brook no deviation, become stubbornly set in their ways, and refuse to yield or change. Any deviation in "their way" often results in a behavioral episode - loud shrieking and screaming and acting out, until people cave in and give the autistic person their way just to make the ear shattering shrieking stop (by the way, this is actually bad for people with autism).
This is also something you see in people with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. People with NPD are infamous for their absolutely insane temper tantrums when they have a meltdown due to not getting their way or having things how they want it.
And that's how Gualu goes through life. Stubbornly set and fixated. Anyone who disagrees with him must be pestered, harassed, and beaten into submission. Gualu must have total control over the lives of everyone around him, so that he can engineer his experiential space to be exactly as he wants it to be. Any admission of error or agency on the part of other people would allow the reality of the unpredictable, often chaotic nature of the world to come crashing into awareness. And Gualu is simply too weak to withstand that.
Note that I'm not saying Gualu is autistic. I honestly could only guess at what's wrong with him. But it's clear that something is deeply broken inside of him.
There's actually 20 screenshots of Gualu just going around and around in circles. See, for Gualu, it's not really about being consistent and correct in his reasoning. Those sorts of things are just incidental. It's not about conducting himself with respect and authenticity or coming to actual mutually beneficial arrangements or making peace. It's all about getting his way, without compromise or concession. Words and "discussing" are just a means to an end. They're not bridges to help build relationships or instruments of truth seeking. They are simply implements to be used, ad hoc, in that specific moment, to gain advantage and get his way. He actually doesn't care about truth, or logical coherence, or even the correct chronological order of history. He only cares about getting his way. Everything else is just a piece on a chessboard to shift and manipulate to that end. Here's some examples:
[ 2021.12.19 22:59:12 ] Gualu Echerie > when you scared wh guys give our corp moon back and stop touching anything in Vevelonel/Ratillose we could talk about a NAP for Miner/Industrials. Start unanchoring your Athanor to let us know you are willing to talk. No need to answer here, can't read it, have your alliance blocked.
TL;DR - "I have you blocked so there will be no discussion as I cannot withstand the stress of people disagreeing with me. Now, give into all my demands and then we can talk about a ceasefire/NAP." But no gaurentees, right? Gualu has to leave it unsettled and open - to give himself flexibility to juke and waffle. Because, in Gualu's mind, agreements can only work one way - to his benefit. Any obligation on his part, even if it's something he agreed to, means other people have something over him, and that is simply unacceptable. <WHBOO> was never going to get that NAP; Gualu would just make more demands and shift goalposts and find problems.
I really have to applaud Danny for his patience. Dealing with idiots is a Sysiphean task. So the gist of this is that Gualu not only wanted his structures reimbursed by the people who didn't blow them up, he wanted the people who didn't blow his stuff up to kick the people who did out of the region. He also wanted "his moon" returned to him, and all the structures in Anckee to "burn". All the "corps and pilots" involved in blowing up his Tatara must "hurt really bad", the same way he was "hurt really bad". And for some reason Gualu had convinced himself that it was <WHBOO> who was obligated to make all this happen - otherwise there would "be no peace".
So Gualu is a vindictive, spiteful little boy - who expects other people to enact his revenge for him.
Gualu was under the impression that "nothing had changed". While <STFU> was in the process of moving out (and eventually closing), Gualu had it in his addled mind that nobody was actually moving. That all the old <STFU> corps would still be hanging around, and that Red Kardia was still pulling the strings in the background. This was unacceptable to Gualu: everyone he didn't like had to go, and that meant anyone who had any association with <STFU>. Even former miners who weren't involved in the drama beyond being victims of ganks had to go. Gualu was on a righteous crusade, a holy war of purification, and as far as he saw it, if the old <STFU> corps - even individual pilots - joined <WHBOO>, that meant that <STFU> still existed and the old <STFU> leadership were still the ones really calling the shots. <WHBOO> was just window dressing. A "greenwashing", as Gualu called it.
His entire basis for this wild conspiracy theory? That there was a period where things were still undecided. So things being undecided, in Gualu's mind, meant that things were decided.
<WHBOO> doesn't know if they'll allow former <STFU> corps or pilots to join them? Well that means that Red Kardia is still calling the shots! This is all a ruse, obviously!
[ 2021.06.04 23:03:25 ] Xuixien > Faust Eerst hey Best Faust o/
[ 2021.06.04 23:03:28 ] Gualu Echerie > is my corp moon....
[ 2021.06.04 23:03:38 ] Xuixien > Gualu still giving you guys problems?
[ 2021.06.04 23:03:46 ] Faust Eerst > nah
[ 2021.06.04 23:04:25 ] Gualu Echerie > no one wanted really a deal about peace...
[ 2021.06.04 23:04:50 ] Xuixien > Gualu Echerie why do you put "...." at the end of every sentence? Kinda weird.
[ 2021.06.04 23:05:05 ] Xuixien > Anyway there is peace now. You're the one disrupting it. That moon isn't yours. It never will be. Stop causing problems.
[ 2021.06.04 23:05:08 ] Gualu Echerie > to confuse you... :)
[ 2021.06.04 23:05:27 ] Faust Eerst > incorrect. we offered you a great deal. unforunately you wanted 30b + the moon + us to pay you so we can mine it. not really a deal. we offered very fair terms and allowed you full access to mine along with us. but it was decline. so if you don't want to share, then there is no sharing :(
[ 2021.06.04 23:06:18 ] Gualu Echerie > nah... there is no peace... no deal. no peace.... so I'll still fight the invaders....
[ 2021.06.04 23:06:31 ] Faust Eerst > see you every hour then
[ 2021.06.04 23:06:48 ] Xuixien > WBHOO was invited. Murderers, GSC, and SW-TC all talked about it and agreed this was the best way forward.
[ 2021.06.04 23:07:19 ] Xuixien > You're all alone in this.
[ 2021.06.04 23:07:34 ] Gualu Echerie > I wasn't involved in these talks...
[ 2021.06.04 23:07:41 ] Xuixien > Because you blocked me. OOPS. You had everyone blocked, so you fucked yourself. vOv
[ 2021.06.04 23:08:30 ] Gualu Echerie > was no more intrested on more lies and bullshit...
[ 2021.06.04 23:08:46 ] Gualu Echerie > same then for the one from TDSIN...
[ 2021.06.04 23:09:15 ] Xuixien > Bro I'm gonna be honest. I don't give half a fuck about your stupid feelings. Shut the fuck up. Stop being a crybaby. Stop causing problems. You're not gonna get anywhere. Fuck "your" moon and fuck your corp.
[ 2021.06.04 23:09:18 ] Xuixien > Take care. Loser.
He complains that he wasn't involved in the talks, but also wasn't interested in the talks because it would be "more lies and bullshit". lolok, I guess it's aaalllwaaayyyys someone else's fault. Everybody else is always doing things not to Gualu's satisfaction, because there is no satisfying Gualu unless he 100%, without compromise or concession, gets his own way. Keep in mind: Gualu is not the victim here. He started this entire nonsense situation with his stubborn vindictiveness. He was the one who refused the seat that was offered to him at the diplomatic table. He absented himself from the planning and negotiations out of childish spitefulness. He was the one - his little 20 man corp - that anchored a structure right next to a larger entity without first contacting their leadership to see if it was okay. Gualu refused to accept his loss and be a team player, and as such, started a childish fued that lasted almost a year.
For the next several months, Gualu and <WHBOO> fell into a routine. During the fallow weeks when there was no moon ore, Gualu & Co would shoot at the structure with stealth bombers. This would result in a ping on Discord, at which point someone from <WHBOO> or myself would jump in system. Gualu would then immediately cloak and sit in station for hours until the system was empty, at which point he would immediately begin shooting the Athanor again until another ping was sent and he was driven off once more. Several times each week I would jump into system just passing through, to see that Gualu & Co had suspect timers. I would catch a glimps of stealth bombers on DScan, which would quickly vanish.
This went on for months. Nonstop. Literally. There are over 10 pages of pings:
Based on a spreadsheet that was drawn up, it was determined that Gualu either A) bots, B) acccount shares, or C), never slept more than 2 hours at once over the course of 6 months.
When there was moon ore, sometimes Gualu would light a cyno and a few barges would get killed (any mining ship that died on that specific moon was SRP'd, so the individual pilots didn't suffer much for it), or he'd drive by in his Loki and kill a straggler or solo miner. He would then spam up the Murderers Inc. Discord server about it, gloating over killing a few million ISK of barges while <WHBOO> was making tens of billions in R64.
Like myself, everyone thought Gualu was just a troll at first. But after a few months of this behavior, serious questions regarding Gualu's mental health were being asked.
It Gets Creepy
During Timmy N-Bomb's campaign in Solitude, Dishwater Alliance would attack the Athanor in Vevelonel. They ended up destroying it twice, and one of those times Gualu anchored a new Athanor (he must have dozens of Athanor's in the Vevelonel station). But, Gualu being powerless to stop it, <WHBOO> blew it up using an assortment of rookie ships and destroyers while fighting Deepthroaters in Anckee. Here's a conversation I had with one of Gualu's corpmates after Gualu, once again, lost his refinery.
At that point George stopped talking to me. I attempted to privately convo George, but he had blocked me. It seems Gualu was scared of what I was saying. And it seems George was scared enough of Gualu's disapproval of him talking to me that, at a word from Gualu, he blocked me. This is deeply disturbing dynamics to see even in real life, but over a video game it somehow feels worse.
Gualu Gets His Moon; His Goalposts Shift
Many months ago I had given Gualu a warning: Even if he was to somehow manage to anchor an Athanor on the Vevelonel moon, he would still have to deal with me. That doesn't work out very well for most people, so it would be better for him to just come to a reasonable agreement with <WHBOO>. This would free up his time to do other things in the game, such as actually being able to mine, grow his corporation, etc. I went a step further; Gualu is such a loathesome and disgusting presence, that I decided that even if <WHBOO> left Solitude, I would never let him mine the moon, and I would not negotiate any sort of treaty or peace deal with him.
Of course, Gualu had me blocked, and would have just posted some nonsense with a bunch of "....." and too many spaces between sentences anyway. So Gualu never got the message. That's the problem with sticking your fingers in your ears; Gualu was operating with imperfect information, and didn't consider the X Factor.
I'm a man of my word. Gualu did indeed manage to anchor an Athanor on the Vevelonel moon the 2nd time Deepthroaters blew up the <WHBOO> structure. And the moment I discovered his Athanor, I jumped 100 Catalysts and a few special toys into Vevelonel and began to camp the shit out of him. He was able to kill a few Catalysts, but the attacks unnerved him and his corpmates so much that they docked back up for hours while I worked on school and watched The Expanse.
Almost immediately Gualu began whining to <WHBOO> leadership, and anyone else who would listen, about it.
In Gualu's mind, and his mind alone, a deal had been struck. The deal was that <WHBOO> and [GLN] were blue, and that <WHBOO> would leave [GLN] alone and let them mine in peace. That's it. That was the "deal". But apparently, there was much, much more to the deal. In fact, the "deal" was whatever Gualu made up ad hoc. As things happened that Gualu didn't like, he kept adding to the "deal". Apparently, <WHBOO> was obligated not only to let Gualu have the Vevelonel moon and let him mine it in peace, as per the imaginary "deal", but <WHBOO> was also obligated to defend him from gankers, otherwise "the deal was broken" by <WHBOO>. Gualu began demanding that, "as per the deal" in his mind, <WHBOO> was now obligated to kick [SW-TC] - a corp that I have zero characters in - from <WHBOO> and also protect [GLN]'s miners.
Gualu also feels he's entitled to tell <WHBOO> who they can and cannot allow docking rights to. In other words, Gualu wants to dictate to strangers on the internet who they'e allowed to be friends with.
When his demands weren't met, Gualu went on a smear campaign. He wrote a blog, once again concocting wild conspiracy theories about how [SW-SS] and <WHBOO> are the same group, and how <WHBOO> is "bluefucking" ([GLN] was actually never set blue by <WHBOO>... that was a fiction of Gualu's own addled mind) by using "out of alliance alts" to do their dirty work. Because [SW-SS] and <WHBOO> are on friendly terms and dontchaknow, [SW-TC], the sister corp of [SW-SS], is in <WHBOO>. That makes them all the same "group", which means <WHBOO> is obligated to micromanage everyone and make sure they leave poor Gualu alone.
(A note: Since Solitude Pest Control and Tear Extract [UL0ST] is comprised entirely of my alts, and since I have zero characters in <WHBOO>, the claim of "out of alliance alts" is, in fact, an entirely false fabrication and outright lie.)
This has come up as an issue in more than one situation, so I wrote a public service announcement explaining the situation. The fact remains that [SW-SS] and [SW-TC] are two separate groups, with different people in charge, and that I have no characters in the <WHBOO> alliance. [SW-TC] and [SW-SS] decided to separate from eachother months ago, and I pulled all my characters - even my mining toons - out of [SW-TC] and put them in [SW-SS]. [SW-SS] does not inherit blues or diplomatic agreements from <WHBOO>. [SW-SS] is independent. We are friends with <WHBOO>, but we do not fall under the purview of their authority, technically speaking.
With The Face > Gualu Echerie i saw your blog
With The Face > can you tell me more about the situation
Aralaz Echerie > what is unclear?
With The Face > well i check with leadership and it seems solar winds is two different groups? but you say theyre the same group, but they dont seem to be. its confusing
With The Face > i guess im having a hard time seeing what the "problem" is
Aralaz Echerie > at the time I posted that blogentry they were still maincorp and subdevision....
Aralaz Echerie > and fact is too, SW-SS can act this way only because WHBOO allows and support it...
With The Face > theyre two different corps though.......
With The Face > im confused why you think whboo is responsible for what ss does? ss isnt in the alliance.....
With The Face > what is ss doing that bothers you?
Aralaz Echerie > they have to say that, omly that way SW-SS can shoot all the others, but all know even SW-SS belongs to that group...
With The Face > what do you mean by "belongs to that group"? what group?
With The Face > do you mean "group" as in "a group of friends" or do you mean "group" as in "alliance"?
With The Face > i cant tell if youre talking about game mechanics or something else. whats the issue you have, specificially?
Aralaz Echerie > SW-SS is a subdevision of SW-TC, now saying they are independend from each other is a lie, they removed that subdevision part from info after I wrote that blogentry.
With The Face > as far as ive been able to figure out, there is no "subdevision" mechanic in the game regarding corporations.
With The Face > i cant speak to their corp info but since ive been around the two corporations are separate groups.
With The Face > are you saying its a problem that theyre friends?
Aralaz Echerie > lol....
With The Face > do you not have an answer?
Aralaz Echerie > the eones who won't act with respect and not be trustworthy will always talk about game meachanics...
With The Face > what does that even mean?
Aralaz Echerie > that this discussion ends here.... :)
"With The Face" is correct. There is no such thing as a "subdivision" for corporations in EVE Online, at least not mechanically speaking. And talking about game mechanics has nothing to do with "respect" or "being trustworthy". If that was true, then it would also apply to Gualu, since he's demanding that <WHBOO> kick corps from their alliance (which is all game mechanics).
Gualu can bloviate as much as he wants over a snippet of (outdated) roleplay text in a corp description, but facts remain facts: [SW-TC] and [SW-SS] are separate entitites, with separate leadership, and separate missions. Thus, Gualu didn't have any solid answers for Face's questions - unable to set a definition of what he meant by "group" - and, because of this, felt backed into a corner and had to run and hide behind the block button, lest his emotional state become compromised even further.
Gualu spent days flying around Solitide "leafletting" the region, spamming his blog to anyone who happened to be in Local - including to <WHBOO> pilots. Now, call me silly, but I think trying to sew discord and subversion within an organization with the goal of destabalizing them them is a hostile act, no? And trying to dictate to other players who they're allowed to be friends with or have in their group is overstepping his position - but Gualu is known to overstep, as noted above.
[ 2022.03.21 13:14:57 ] Gualu Echerie > Seamus Krill O'Sullivan talk to your leadership to get it fixed: https://gualuecherie.wordpress.com/2022/03/17/the-whboo-and-solar-winds-problem/
[ 2022.03.21 13:19:02 ] Gualu Echerie > Joseph Barnacle O'Sullivan talk to your leadership to get it fixed: https://gualuecherie.wordpress.com/2022/03/17/the-whboo-and-solar-winds-problem/
[ 2022.03.21 15:01:21 ] Gualu Echerie > prof joe talk to your leadership to fix it: https://gualuecherie.wordpress.com/2022/03/17/the-whboo-and-solar-winds-problem/
[ 2022.03.21 20:13:55 ] George Fearless > yes
[ 2022.03.21 20:14:04 ] Seamus Krill O'Sullivan > lolol
The fact remains that Gualu doesn't get to dictate how other groups organize their internal affairs or who they're allowed to be friends with in a game that they pay a subscription for. Gualu, once again, tries to take control over everything and be a little dictator.
Gualu, like many mentally unstable people in Solitude, is obsessed with me. He blocked me on Discord, and then spent months - unbeknownst to me - talking about me on the Murderers Inc. server.
Everyone in Solitude is my alt at this point.
Even Martin Twotongues was a little confused by Gualu's growing obsession with me. "It's not about Xui" he says, while Gualu plays his victim narrative ("Xuixien is harassing me, WAAA") and spins conspiracy theories. Keep in mind... this was as I was coming back from a months long period of near complete inactivity in the game. Gualu was still talking about me to anyone who would listen.
Yes, because Gualu is certainly not a toxic person who tries to get everyone to do what he wants...
Projecting like a movie theater!
Gualu's Pyrrhic "Victory"
One day Gualu was mining the moon in Vevelonel. I was camping the system with my Catalysts as usual, but had some real life stuff to take care of, so I was mostly AFK. But I did see the Local chat.
A pilot from <WHBOO> was warping around on grid in a cloaked stealth bomber, occasionally decloaking and bumping Procurers while posting "BOOP" in Local. While a bit trolly, nothing about this behavior is inherently "hostile". The pilot in question never initiated a target lock or shot anyone. He didn't even bump the Procurers out of mining range. Of course, Gualu didn't like it, so it was a "breach of the terms": The <WHBOO> pilot was having fun, and tyrants and toxic people can not allow other people to have fun. Everything must be super serious business at all times! So, naturally, Gualu amended the "deal", once again ad hoc, to make being on the same grid a hostile act, by dint of "disturbing" him, in order to justify shooting at <WHBOO> again.
[ 2022.03.21 17:58:45 ] George Fearless > o/
[ 2022.03.21 17:59:29 ] Gualu Echerie > we count actions like that as attack, so be carefull, we have no idea who of you will support SOlar Winds
[ 2022.03.21 17:59:40 ] Joseph Barnacle O'Sullivan > lol
[ 2022.03.21 18:16:13 ] Gualu Echerie > so WHBOO wants again attacks on their miner?
[ 2022.03.21 18:19:11 ] Gualu Echerie > ok.... :)
Translation: "The 'deal' is no 'hostile actions'. I will define whatever I want as a 'hostile action' because I'm a control freak."
So the <WHBOO> pilot lost their stealth bomber. An argument ensued in Local. Winning arguments is very important to Gualu. More important than anything. His entire attention and focus was fixated on winning an argument in a video game chat. While he was distracted, he didn't notice the Catalysts landing on grid. At least, not until it was too late.
With the terms of his own agreement broken - by himself - <WHBOO> declared that it was now okay to shoot Gualu. So the next day:
[ 2022.03.22 19:45:34 ] Devon Boucher > I thought WHBOO told Xuixien what to do?
In a move of sheer brilliant trolling, <WHBOO> mined the rest of the R64's and an appecriable chunk of the lower value ores with Type C crystals, completely deleting Gualu's profit for the pull, and then anchored a POS and an Astrahus on the same grid as Gualu's Athanor. Gualu of course complained about this "hostile action" and batphoned whoever he could to come and kill it. Unfortunately, Gualu's batphone was no match for <WHBOO>'s kung fu, and <WHBOO> managed to hold grid until the Astrahus was finally anchored. What ensued were many days of Catalysts orbiting the Astrahus, watching Gualu, and being on the same grid!!!!!! as Gualu.
Gualu was now realizing, somewhere in the back of his spongy brain, that he had made a serious mistake. He underestimated the X Factor. He thought that I was irrelevant, and that by ignoring me he could "defeat me" and "make me mad" and that I would go away if he killed a couple of my Catalysts. He also failed to accurately assess his ability to actually utilize his Athanor while 30 angry <WHBOO>ians sat just 1 jump away.
So Gualu did the only thing he could do. He fulfilled my warning to him about not being able to mine the moon in Vevelonel: he simply canceled the pull, and turned the drill off. It has sat idle for over a week now. This resulted in a tremendous cacaphony of laughter and gleeful cheering from everyone. Of course, Gualu has his own interpretation of the situation:
That's right Gualu, you sure showed us!
Final Anlysis
- Gualu is emotionally frail and has weak ego development.
- As such, Gualu interprets the world as a scary, confusing, and threatening place. This results in a paranoid, conspiratorial style of thinking; Gualu does not trust other people and thinks they're all lying to him and trying to "pull one over" on him. He imagines things that aren't there, such as relationships and loyalties that don't actually exist and/or exagerrating existing relationships out of proportion with reality. This paranoia results in him taking any small scrap of information - such as seeing a certain pilot in a certain system at a certain time, or the presences of outdated roleplay text in a corp description - and running to extreme and hyperbolic conclusions.
- The aforementioned paranoia results in him distancing himself from people and not developing deep connections and relationships with them unless they are 100% under his control. This isolation creates a self-fulfilling prophecy and exacerbates his felt sense of threat and ultierior motives in social interactions.
- Because he exists in a constant state of psychophysiological arousal - ie, stress - as a result of seeing threats everywhere, Gualu is very self-centered and lacking in empathy for other people.
- Gualu regulates his emotional state, protects his ego, and tries to reduce (perceived) threats from others by trying to control everything - and everyone - around him.
- The need for control and his self-centeredness obviates coming to any sort of compromise or making a single minute concession when dealing with other people. Gualu must have his way at all times, without exception. Gualu is too emotionally weak to withstand being wrong, and compromising would mean that he is not 100% correct. This would destabalize Gualu psychologically, as he copes with an uncertain world by imposing the certainty of his own correctness upon it.
- Gualu's sense of correctness is not rooted in logical consistency, arguments supported by evidence, of truth seeking. Rather, it's rooted in dominating others and getting his way. Thus, language, arguments, logic, reasoning - these are tools to be used, ad hoc, without regard to previous statements or reasoning, to win his arguments with other people and get them to do what he wants. For Gualu, correct = being in control, and being in control = being correct. Being correct and in control are the same thing, and they result in a feeling of safety. Essentially, being in control is like a pacifier or weighted blanket for him.
- Blocking people - and telling other people not to talk to certain individuals - is another means by which Gualu maintains control and protects himself. If Gualu cannot exert his control over someone by winning an argument, he will block that person to protect himself from the stress. He will also attempt to socially isolate that person in order to remove them from the equation. He will spend months and inordinate amounts of time and energy pestering, harassing, and spreading misinformation and rumors about a person in an attempt to destroy them and re-establish control and correctness.
- Because Gualu is emotionally weak, he has an underdeveloped sense of self-efficacy. He ultimately lacks the confidence and the means to accomplish his goals, so he gets other people to do the heavy lifting (ie, batphoning third parties, demanding that other people protect him, etc) for him while he "leads from the back" - because being in the front would be an inherently vulnerable and exposed position.
- Gualu's major personality flaws are a deep and over-inflated sense of self-importance and entitlement, vindictive spitefulness, and a lack of consideration for others. He is willing to hurt himself to get back at someone who he perceives as having hurt him.
- Ultimately, Gualu has a victim mindset in which the fault lay with everyone else (by necessity, since Gualu can never accept being wrong, and fault = being wrong), and to rectify the situation, he puts inordinate demands on other people to coddle, protect, support, and cater to him. The goalposts constantly shift, of course, because the world is an unpredictable and often chaotic place, and human beings have limited capacity to predict the future. For Gualu, a deal or agreement isn't about the actual deal or agreement and sticking to it, but rather, a means of him gaining control and maintaining a feeling of security. As unpredictable and bothersome events arise, Gualu seamlessly alters the terms of the deal, because in his mind, the actual terms of the deal are his feelings of security and stability. The rest is window dressing.
- Gualu's "big tell" are emojis. The more smiley faces he puts, the more upset/destablized he is emotionally. As his use of smiley faces increases, so do the chances of being blocked once the conversation exceeds his emotional tolerance.
And that's really it. Gualu is a control freak. And like all control freaks, is an emotionally unstable and vulnerable person. That said, I have rarely encountered someone as severely unhinged as Gualu is. Despite my disliking for him, I sincerely hope that one day he schedules an appointment with a competent therapist who will help him overcome what is clearly a developmental disorder that has kept his emotional growth stunted. However, this is unlikely to happen, as that would mean admitting to himself that he has a weakness. It would also mean risking an encounter with the fact that, no, he is not always in control and no, he is not always correct. But, one day, hopefully, Gualu can find his way out of the maze in which he has trapped himself. Even if only a little bit.
i had to block him because i got tired of how much he whined about you
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