Honestly I really liked the idea of Friend rank and am still confused as to why it was removed. That is my first question:
Why was friend rank removed and what "problems" did it cause?
Secondly,
darkai202 is correct, I can think of several really good moderators who never got that 'free platinum' rank. Some old moderators had to buy it for themselves, since they never got it. Others bought a rank and then got their platinum, still costing them money. Friend ranks who had it for other reasons, like you
levi_the_potato? Some of them never even got a rank. Their friend rank was taken off and that was that. I'm thinking about
Thedorkyd1 as my main example for this, but I am sure this is not an isolated situation.
Besides that, I feel that getting platinum as a retired moderator, if you even get it, does not give that same recognition to a player as the Friend Rank did. I heard from someone somewhere that they removed it because too many players were getting the rank. I never quite understood that, since what defined too many? Many people may read this and say: "demon, what could a player want more than too have the highest donor rank?" To that I may respond that it is fair enough, I would believe this acceptable to give a moderator after they resign. I assume their is a certain amount of time a player needs to be a moderator for, around 3+ months maybe. In fact, for a moderator's service, in return they receive a $100 dollar gift!!! What more could you want?
Ex-moderators getting platinum is sufficient to repay them for their services. However, it doesn't give the same recognition that the Friend rank did. I may be isolated in this, but when I saw an undisguised Friend Rank, my first question would be:
Are you a retired mod?
If they answered this question yes, then I would thank them for the work they had done on the servers. If they answered no, I always wished that I could figure out what they had done to get that rank. What had they done differently? Unless they know an Administrator in person or are related to Chad, what had they done that so many others haven't? Then to get VIP instead of a lot of moderators (clears throat)
HyP3rKi113r is to me just outrageous.
levi_the_potato, I am in no way blaming you and if this came across like that I am sorry. You simply did what was best for you and the outcome came it our pretty well and I applaud you for that. I am, however, upset that you received such a kind gift while other moderators have been left sitting in the dust with the removal of the friend rank, while you, a member who really did nothing to help the community, gets the highest non-staff rank.
Thoughts?