Kainen:
Stan has been stealing from the bank for a long ass time. We all knew that. Even the sacks knew it. You all chose to stay anyway. As Rakeen said, and has been saying forever, the kid busted his ass for that shell. He could have made a billion gil in the time he spent leading, and maintaning the site. Stan has always been greedy... even if it came in spurts it was always there. It's something everyone accepts by being a part of that shell. It's a tradeoff. If you wanted gil, ex probably wasn't the shell for you. But it was if you wanted to kill the hardest mobs, and get the best rare/ex gear pretty quickly.
Doom didn't confront Stan about it. He confronted the LS while Stan was taking a week break from the game. Quizno saw it though... and Doom was later kicked, although Stan said for other reasons.
That was when I first found out about Stan stealing. We discussed re-pearling, and me and Hmok had every intention of doing it. But the fund, I coulda cared less about. It was the threatening to kick Flaw if he lotted the RDM AF hat that set me off. It was just a downward spiral for Stan from there. After that we stole 2 Tiamat's, and intentionally flailed Nid, before I finally said fuck it and just never logged in again. Stan said the game was changing, and we had to start playing dirty to stay on top... that was how he was. He always wanted more.
I didn't agree. I quit, sold my char, stayed away for months before getting the itch to come back. Couldn't get my old char back so I bought a new one on Cerberus. It's peaceful here. No drama... 2 NA shells dominate, and they GET ALONG and actually trade off king camps and Tiamat. It's great. I do miss how hardcore excellence was though