w4tch3r

To join in a little late- I have a suspicion that ISIS is counting on anti-Muslim xenophobia to make their case against the West even stronger. What I fear will happen is a large scale reactionary aggression toward all Muslims based on fear created by actions of extremists radicals. Sadly, this to me seems the only logical conclusion to continued acts of seemingly random and well orchestrated violence- at least the logic of governments. You've now peed in the proverbial breakfast flakes of Russia and France which will increase violence in the Middle East, leading to more terrorist events in the West, and so on ad infinitum. This is the easiest way to both demoralize the enemy as well as further radicalize currently moderate Muslims- poking the skunk so to speak. I agree that the game from our end needs to be limited to special ops groups surgically and precisely taking out small numbers of combatants- the worst thing anyone could do is to mount full scale bombings or a large occupying war effort as these would effectively marginalize the otherwise peaceful people of the region and seal the deal for ISIS in gaining more power. I also agree that the Middle Eastern nations need to take greater responsibility in fighting these groups- not because of a responsibility to self-police, but because it would help in lessening the credibility of ISIS in using "The West" as a common enemy and recruiting tool. I do not see any of this ending well- short term solutions are decidedly short sighted and in the electronic era it's a now or never mentality. Not sure if this link has been posted before, but here it is anyway: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xkM-SDNoI_8

Great advice panerai153, thanks for such a thoughtful reply. So far I've been using the forums for the vast knowledge base of users who have been at this hobby a long time. Many of my questions are answered by using the search function as the same things tend to come up for all of us it seems. I really just wanted to chime in to say that there are folks out here who really enjoy this hobby, but are less vocal in their approach due to being new and not having a great deal of experience to add to the conversation- knowing what you don't know is half the battle in learning.

I'll chip in here as a newbie. I spend most of my time on this and other forums reading others' experiences, looking for tips/tricks in modding, figuring out which version of a particular rep is really the best, and spending money with TD's. I'm relatively new to the game. I haven't made any m2m trades on the rep forums because I'm usually too slow to the draw- most of us are looking for the same things, and when that rare item pops up it's gone in a heartbeat. It really has been a PITA at RWI in recent weeks as one after another scammer has come out of the proverbial woodwork to take a few hundred dollars from members- barely worth it in my opinion. The problem is- since I play it pretty quiet- I have no measurable trust with the community despite my sincere interest in the hobby. If I wanted to post a sale, I fear I'd be marked as a scammer in most people's minds due to low post counts. It's kind of a catch 22- when you're a newb- there's a lot of "read more, talk less" and "don't ask, use the search function" advice from senior members, and now a lot of talk about low post counts- which is what you get when you spend the majority of your time reading. I also see a lot of "watch out for sellers requiring paypal as a gift" but then see that most TD's don't accept paypal because of frequent chargebacks- another catch 22. It's a bit frustrating from this vantage point. All that being said- I feel like all of the forums I have joined are quite supportive of new members, and most of the longtime active members are generally willing to give us newbs a chance. My two cents in wanting to add to the conversation as the subject keeps popping up.