Dissidia: Final Fantasy ~ Words from a Splinter.

Dear Speedrun Community, dear Final Fantasy Speedrun Community, dear Community,

There are times when speedrunning is adding a new kind of flavor to the videogame hobby of ours. Going fast-pace within an episode we like, finding new strategies to go down on greater foes, searching for some little details to make some segments safer while still faster and faster. These are the core of a speedrun : learning, practice, thrill of the live run, satisfaction and self-achievement. On top of that, if you find a related community to a game you're granting a constant care towards, a community which is as caring as you, as welcoming as you want it to be, and as fun as you'd imagine ... that's even greater, isn't that right?




		Unfortunately, it's not that easy. And running a community is one of these steps you have to carefully take to ensure a good atmosphere, a genuine knowledge-enhancing feature, and a fun core of members as well. And the Dissidia franchise server is one these environment which totally failed at that. Explaining myself onto that particular point :

		I joined the Dissidia server at its very early days. At that point, it was mainly the speedrun dot com admin team, and a very little amount of people, mostly here to have an eye onto another newly found speedrun server. At this very time, very few were the runners involved into running the game, me being running some minor categories in order to prepare for the main and relevant one. Already by that point, the admin team was somewhat ... weird. Coming up with a set of rules very close to a dictatorship, censoring anyone who would feel the urge to contest any kind of point made from the admin team. Or should I say, from two members from the admin team in particular : one who only ever ran two or three minor categories, being an figure of the "afk" status in terms of activity, coupled with a very, very, minor understanding of the game ; the other one is a bit more active but has an even worse mindset, ditching every possible detail of the game while showcasing little to zero knowledge of the actual speedrun over a handful of marathons, always condescending on anyone having a different opinion than his, or simply when "his" best times are beaten.
	Not only the current Dissidia "Discord Server" is toxic, having litterally a duet acting towards the very own death of the community, no more no less, but they also lacking what is the most important to an admin position : knowledge. Not only they are showing an incredibly lacking sense of community management, but as well do they lack what it takes to fully advertize the game, the speedrun and the common vibe to it. And that is simply not acceptable by any means. It makes zero sense, and all the funky moves from them so far were based on the general enmity that one the two admins from the duet gathered over the face of all the main core runners of the area. Discouraging, shameful, unbearable.

		I already have a certain past with one of those admins, the one who spends most of it time spitting on the whole game, on every character possible available, and also showcasing an incredibly inexistant amount of knowledge over that game. Resulting in many biased rules editions over speedrun dot com, highlighting the serious lack of seriousness and capacity to know the game enough to be legitimately relevant in regards of the community. This situation led to multiple uproars on my side, deliberately contesting all the weird moves, facing this admin to his flaws, especially regarding the visibility and credibility of the whole speedrun Dissidia is. Dissidia 012 is another kind of beast, swiftly handled by ShinodaCM. Nothing to mention about him, he's doing his job. The best example of insecurity and self-centering coming from that individual was asking me if I was taking down his own top times just for the sake of doing so ... once more, showing his total lack of integrity, and highlighting his general behavior as an admin, only lusting for thoughts-control, speech-control and censorship.
	But the last move in date is the most alarming one. Not so long ago, one of the main core runners established his very first time onto a minor category, smashing the current top time by a good 3 minutes. My reaction : congratulating him personally through the Dissidia discord server. What did the insecured and dictator-kind of admin dare doing? Advising me to shut it down when it comes to that, because it is annoying to everyone.
	Cherry on the cake. Not only the only person who felt bothered by that genuine congratulation was the admin himself, but the main reason was because this admin was the one posessing the smashed top time. Not only the fallacious statement was already an affront to my own person, but the general sentiment behind that "admin"-worth move was motivated by anger, resentment and pure jealousy. I'm not known for shutting is that easily, so I stood up my ground, and got ban'd for it. Mind me for having a brain apparently.

		Yes, I never got to congratulate that admin in whatsoever way, simply because there was nothing to congratulate, as each of his appearances onto this game were sold onto the common outcome : demonstrating major flaws over the game mechanics, highlighting little to zero involvment towards the run in terms of practice and routing, and proving his lack of care for the community he's representing by making the general atmosphere of the game being a total joke.
	No, I'm not a dickhead. I, myself, have established some times I'm not content with, but instead of arguing with the top runners, for mind safety sake, I use my energy and my passion to talk with them, to introduce my thoughts over the route and the general mechanics, and I also participate in providing more and more ideas to improve all the routes. Not showing off, but I'm probably one of the most committed runners when it comes to advertize the speedrun and the community behind it.


		All this wall of text leads to this outcome, previously announced by Omegaphenix on the General Final Fantasy Speedrun discord server: splinters era is about to come. Splinters? Yes. The very core of active runners from the Dissidia game (not forcibly from 012, Prologus nor NT) decided to part with the original server, to create our own. Why? To give its noble letters back to the Dissidia speedrun. The farce has been on for too long. Mistakes were made at the very first, and never healed through time. Behaviors from half of the head team have made it all of a vain project. Dissidia needs more visibiliy, credibility and fun. And this is what we are going for.The current "new link" towards the new discord server isn't available yet, as it requires extra-time and extra-effort from us to compile all what we need to build this new place, with a sound basis, promoting all the best reasons to join and to actually get involved within the community.
	A google spreadsheet will also be created in order to gather all the current times ever made onto this very game, and will mainly be our own sources of submission and promotion for marathon purpose or simply for community events. I'll try to make that new plan possible, doing it at the best of my understanding when it comes to the game, and to the notion of "community" : being gentle, genuine, welcoming, tolerant and ... the most important ... in all humility.



This is all I had to state here. It may sound less critical/important than what it looked, but to my own eyes, it is a matter that had to be witnessed and reported. This kind of episode should not happen as easily as how it came up in this very server. This very kind of people should seriously question their sense of community management, especially in order to provide enough integrity to a speedrun community. Mean mindsets and condescending behaviors should be a no-go, and a plague to avoid.

So, if you ever feel like coming closer to Dissidia: Final Fantasy, whether it's for serious runs or meme runs, whether you're expert at routing/speedrunning or a newbie, whether you are agreeing or disagreeing with some rules/statements regarding the Dissidia Speedrun community or the speedrun it itself: do consider turning to one of these usernames: Omegaphenix, MrMizzow, Smartkin, Leonis07; and ask for being pointed towards the "Splinters" server, in order to access the one server which should prevail in terms of respect, humility, and knowledge about the run. If you aren't interested but find this story relevant to point out some divergence through the internet, and especially within the gaming/speedrunning scene, feel free to do so.

On these very words, I humbly thank you for the time granted to read it all, and for the consideration provided to my very own case.  Hoping to see some of you joining the new Dissidia environment, either as runners or spectators. The more the merrier. All for the fun and the integrity of the speedrun.

Yours truly,

Leonis07.