Our community is dying. And for three reasons....Is there an actual issue, or do you just feel like insulting everyone?
#1. Our community majority player-base is made up of selfish, jaded users, who will resist change of any kind. They refuse to take anything seriously, and seek to discredit anyone and anything that shows direct opposition to what they believe is correct.
#2 Our game-modes, and the choices and popularization of said choices of servers hosted with them, have gotten to the point it has made the base-game itself stale and uninteresting.
#3 The people who know that it's a problem refuse to do anything to change it, because they believe it is inevitable, and those who don't know can't figure out why it is, because every-time we try to discuss it, people destroy the debate and discussion before it can even start.
Quote from: "-RanRan"Our community is dying. And for three reasons....Is there an actual issue, or do you just feel like insulting everyone?
#1. Our community majority player-base is made up of selfish, jaded users, who will resist change of any kind. They refuse to take anything seriously, and seek to discredit anyone and anything that shows direct opposition to what they believe is correct.
#2 Our game-modes, and the choices and popularization of said choices of servers hosted with them, have gotten to the point it has made the base-game itself stale and uninteresting.
#3 The people who know that it's a problem refuse to do anything to change it, because they believe it is inevitable, and those who don't know can't figure out why it is, because every-time we try to discuss it, people destroy the debate and discussion before it can even start.
Now that we understand those are the underlying problems causing our death, we need to think of ways to stop it from happening, and then we need to act on them.You have no basis to fix the issue at hand. You're saying CS is dead because of toxic players. Whether or not this is true is irrelevant- people aren't going to hand you the answer if you throw this kind of accusation out into the public forum.
I warn you though, many of the side conversation are basically " Lol -Ran, trying to save 8BDM"No, the issue at hand was that you had literally everyone invite everyone and then were amazed when the chat devolved into a shitposting spree. Then, you were surprised when people left the chat after you muted all of them. People are not going to engage in discourse when they're gagged, nor would they want to be in a chat that amounts to you preaching about why the community is full of toxic players.
My reasoning for this being, if Cutstuff is truly going to shit, how do we still have a thriving community that continues to maintain a friendly relationship with each other?Ok, no. While this thread may not have a basis, Cutstuff is anything BUT thriving. And if you're talking about the Skype chats, I would rather try to have a friendly discussion on /b/. At least there, people don't recognize each other so that they can hold a grudge.
That is correct, I don't feel like there's an issue. I see things like these pop up all the time, and it amazes me.
My reasoning for this being, if Cutstuff is truly going to shit, how do we still have a thriving community that continues to maintain a friendly relationship with each other?
I might be missing something, but I haven't noticed an issue. Why fix what isn't broken? If you want to play a gamemode, actually play the gamemode. Complaining about the popular mode won't accomplish a thing.
Quote from: "-Ranran"Now that we understand those are the underlying problems causing our death, we need to think of ways to stop it from happening, and then we need to act on them.You have no basis to fix the issue at hand. You're saying CS is dead because of toxic players. Whether or not this is true is irrelevant- people aren't going to hand you the answer if you throw this kind of accusation out into the public forum.QuoteI warn you though, many of the side conversation are basically " Lol -Ran, trying to save 8BDM"No, the issue at hand was that you had literally everyone invite everyone and then were amazed when the chat devolved into a shitposting spree. Then, you were surprised when people left the chat after you muted all of them. People are not going to engage in discourse when they're gagged, nor would they want to be in a chat that amounts to you preaching about why the community is full of toxic players.Quote from: "ThunderErectlos"My reasoning for this being, if Cutstuff is truly going to shit, how do we still have a thriving community that continues to maintain a friendly relationship with each other?Ok, no. While this thread may not have a basis, Cutstuff is anything BUT thriving. And if you're talking about the Skype chats, I would rather try to have a friendly discussion on /b/. At least there, people don't recognize each other so that they can hold a grudge.
I know it won't stop them from doing it, but for those you who decided to be fully against either because of me backing it, disagreeing with my opinions, views, and ideas of how to solve the problem, I beg you not post here for the sake of bringing it down.
If you find yourself compelled to post negatively, please let it be constructive.
Also, you're attacking me.(http://discoverygc.com/wiki/images/thumb/3/34/Doge_(1).jpg/264px-Doge_(1).jpg)
If you find yourself compelled to post negatively, please let it be constructive.OJ's post was constructive. He simply told you what was wrong with your post and ideas.
#1. Our community majority player-base is made up of selfish, jaded users, who will resist change of any kind. They refuse to take anything seriously, and seek to discredit anyone and anything that shows direct opposition to what they believe is correct.
Excuse me? I can name a few people like that, but majority is an incredible overstatement. And what "change" are you talking about? Nothing has changed here other than the fact that Saxton Hale is hosted and played much more frequently than many other game modes. Nothing can really change that, sadly.
#2 Our game-modes, and the choices and popularization of said choices of servers hosted with them, have gotten to the point it has made the base-game itself stale and uninteresting.
This topic comes up every year. I know I bash on saxton a lot, but I've recently found out how fun it is to invite my friends from Tengu's skype group to come play vanilla DM or LMS games.
#3 The people who know that it's a problem refuse to do anything to change it, because they believe it is inevitable, and those who don't know can't figure out why it is, because every-time we try to discuss it, people destroy the debate and discussion before it can even start.
Welcome to the internet. People have differing opinions, and they will argue as such. Hell, we're doing it right now. To be honest, it's really making a mountain out of a mole hill.
Also, this doesn't happen EVERY time. While you were off in nowhere-land, we had a discussion not too long ago about this exact same thing. The discussion WAS a serious debate, and wasn't killed off by anything (mostly because it wasn't a skype call that people were forced into late in the day, under the label EMERGENCY)
Quote from: "-RanRan"Also, you're attacking me.(http://discoverygc.com/wiki/images/thumb/3/34/Doge_(1).jpg/264px-Doge_(1).jpg)
I'm not attacking you in the slightest. You may be interpreting that post as such in order to dismiss me, but I'm afraid that's simply not true. What IS true is that I was attacking the issue instead of "discussing it." Take that how you will, but it's entirely justified when the point being made is outright preposterous. But if I truly must...
My first quote simply states that you have no organized plan to rectify the issue. You're simply calling people "Jaded", "Selfish", and "Trolls". Especially odd that you're attacking these players, seeing that the second quote again pulls the "I'm being attacked" card. If you're going to try and make change, PLEASE HAVE A BASIS FOR YOUR ARGUMENTS. Otherwise, you're only going to perpetuate the "derailing and locking" that you're so concerned about. You can't come out and say something controversial with no basis and dismiss everyone as a troll or flamer and tell them not to post. That's not how intelligent discourse works, I'm sorry.
My first quote simply states that you have no organized plan to rectify the issue. You're simply calling people "Jaded", "Selfish", and "Trolls".
Our community is dyingI think that this community dying is not a problem at all.
I entirely support Alice's post 100 %
This kind of topic always ends up being an endless back and forth argument check that will not result in anything. Mine did, OJ's did, and so will this.
Fangame communities ALWAYS end up like this, as far as my own experiences have taught me: the community begins as full of brimming activity correlated with the playerbase (innocence), mods flourish and diversify tastes (puberty), until all that's left is a handful of old players-now-forumgoers grumping about the good ol' days that never come back until the next game update and for a short moment, while mantaining a relationship with their fellow forumgoers (adulthood), and a handful of new players that have stuck with a group of specific mods on specific servers that rarely connect with the community or the base game.
This is the natural course of a community's life. We still talk, some of us still discuss about the game, some of us still make stuff: what we all don't do much is play the game unless something cool comes out (which it always eventually will), because we've outgrown the game. What started as a group of people gathering around to share their excitement and experiences with an online game has turned into a group of acquaintances who gather to talk about many, many other things besides the online game.
Is the community dead? No, and it's not because "it isn't as alive as it used to be". Sure, MM8BDM isn't (and wasn't) popular enough to keep it brimming with new players gathering to talk about their game experiences, but if people still make stuff for it, and discuss in it about anything, you have to accept that the community hasn't died.
So what you're saying is that the chat as a collective couldn't come up with any solutions?
How we'll proceed with such an undertaking would need manpower and talents far beyond my own. But it's up there with my plan of also taking people by the hand and helping them learn to like and accept other game-types and modes, rather than pigeonholing to just one.Pretty sure we tried that already and it failed miserably. See above.
You want to keep MM8BDM from dying? You need to evangelize and bring in people from other communities who aren't epic morons. But if we did that right now I suspect they'd be driven away by Saxton Hale people. Obvious response: get rid of the Saxton Hale people. (Yes, this is rather dickish, but more diplomatic solutions have failed, so it's "no more Mr. Nice Guy" time in my opinion.)Do you even realize what this paragraph says about you?
Petition Jenova to remove all Saxton Hale wads from BEST-EVER, as it poses a clear and present danger to the survival and growth of MM8BDM. Drastically increases the intelligence barrier for hosting and playing Saxton Hale, with the bonus of reminding people trying to play it that the forums exist. (If you want to do this, please don't just drop into the IRC chat and bug Jenova about it. I can draft an open letter that will actually briefly argue a thesis instead of just saying "We don't like these people, make them go away.")
And Balrog, your comment was anything but constructive.
Or maybe people shouldn't be stuck-up jerks over their opinions ... oh wait, I'm often guilty of that, too.Sorry about that. Kind of in "mad as hell, and not going to take it anymore" mode at this point. I'm also rather cynical on this subject because of prior experience with SRB2. And Saxton dominating not being a problem is highly debatable; it's not illogical to conclude that a large number of people playing one mod you may not like with no alternatives is going to alienate people.
Well, I, for one, don't care. I have the Skype contacts of the people in this place whom I would consider something along the lines of being close friends. There is nothing on the line for me, nor for the other people who don't create mods or participate in the creation of v4.
And Balrog, your comment was anything but constructive. All it contained was destructive criticism towards Ran and two entirely nonsensical suggestions about how to fix a problem that does not even exist. And you insulted a rather large number of people. For example: not being able to host does not mean being dumb, there are more than enough other factors.Quote from: "Balrog"You want to keep MM8BDM from dying? You need to evangelize and bring in people from other communities who aren't epic morons. But if we did that right now I suspect they'd be driven away by Saxton Hale people. Obvious response: get rid of the Saxton Hale people. (Yes, this is rather dickish, but more diplomatic solutions have failed, so it's "no more Mr. Nice Guy" time in my opinion.)Do you even realize what this paragraph says about you?
Small hint: It's nothing good. At all.
Regarding the Jenova thing, that's why I mentioned drafting a formal letter: to establish a case for a genuine need as opposed to simple butthurt. (In case you don't remember, I was the one who had a debate about it at Tsuki's insistence.)Quote from: "Balrog"Petition Jenova to remove all Saxton Hale wads from BEST-EVER, as it poses a clear and present danger to the survival and growth of MM8BDM. Drastically increases the intelligence barrier for hosting and playing Saxton Hale, with the bonus of reminding people trying to play it that the forums exist. (If you want to do this, please don't just drop into the IRC chat and bug Jenova about it. I can draft an open letter that will actually briefly argue a thesis instead of just saying "We don't like these people, make them go away.")
IIRC, Jenova said something along the lines of "If we were banning wads/combinations of wads from Best-Ever for being cancerous, you wouldn't be playing MM8BDM on Best-Ever" in response to classton hale once, so good luck with that one :cool:Quote from: "Alice"And Balrog, your comment was anything but constructive.
Not gonna lie, this whole conversation didn't have any base to hold any sort of construction from the start. This thread probably has 24 hours to live at most. And constructive or not, he's right, and he raises a point that effectively undermines the goal of the topic. It's not being a jackass, it's being realistic.
This bureaucratic semantics debate needs to stop, and soon.I hate to come back to this topic because of how redundant it is, but seriously? Is that not the issue at hand?
I think specific actions to improve the way things are now are two-fold with emphasis on the first:
[8:06:31 PM] sick sad world: 1) Consistent with King Yams' earlier point about Shagg/Rose/etc having something accessible where gameplay is shown WITHOUT downloading will go far in promoting MM8BDM to new players (read: youtube people posting MM8BDM videos). I see this as essentially what Mike wanted with the cutstuff blog but as youtube videos. I may do this myself but I'm not an established youtuber
[8:06:46 PM] sick sad world: 2) Encourage people to play competitive modes but not modes where people are in direct competition
[8:06:55 PM] sick sad world: Think of something like classes target blaster challenge lol
[8:07:19 PM] sick sad world: From an engineering perspective making new target challenge maps would be trivial but you add in additional pwads to make things interesting
[8:07:47 PM] sick sad world: One thing we are not doing a good job of as modders (and perhaps in ZDR generally) is making things modularized. That is, each mod kinda stands on its own when the whole point of pwads is to mix and match
[8:08:10 PM] sick sad world: Why not play classes team roboenza swarm roll chaos
[8:08:27 PM] sick sad world: Well it turns out certain lumps like SBARINFO etc cause conflicts
[8:08:54 PM] sick sad world: So to -Ran's point, I'd encourage the discussion to separate out technical details from procedural/social/community issues
[8:11:06 PM] sick sad world: To the complaints about Saxton Hale, this is not a new phenomenon in our community. People complained when roboenza was the main draw. This shows us that there will always be a place in MM8BDM for "dynamic team/random antagonist selection" wads, probably for good reason. They are fun, engaging, a unique experience, and relatively casual.
[8:11:49 PM] sick sad world: Part of our strength as a community is precisely such a polarization effect. You've got the casual casualers and competitive organized duelers. Frankly, I'm impressed we have such diversity
[8:12:40 PM] sick sad world: At some level, we should collect data on what people like about MM8BDM currently, and what they feel could be improved. This will give us the beginnings of an "outcome based" approach to not only improving the community but generally the MM8BDM experience.
[8:13:17 PM] sick sad world: At some level it may be helpful to enumerate what types of features/modes/activities are consistent with that goal.
[8:13:59 PM] sick sad world: For example:
1) Duel with appropriate map sizes to support it
2) Some type of random selection mod (roboenza, saxton, bot apocalypse)
3) Some form of classes
4) ??? etc
[8:14:39 PM] sick sad world: What's important is to define the outcome. I see it as directing a new focus for pwad development parallel with social interaction
So to that point, these days we have more access than ever... best-ever provides a perfect vehicle to showcase underplayed mods and modes
[8:16:03 PM] sick sad world: Perhaps -Ran could feature different mods/modes weekly?
[8:20:17 PM] -Randen [# 6449]:I'm completely fine with that.
[8:20:26 PM] -Randen [# 6449]: Also, I am an established Youtuber, and with a Gaming Oriented Company.
[8:20:33 PM] sick sad world: See so there you go
[8:20:38 PM] sick sad world: You are well positioned to make a difference
Oh, and a small thing to note: Roboenza was what brought me here back in 2011. Not the normal game itself.Come to think of it, Roboenza was what attracted me to MM8BDM as well...although I immediately disliked it and started playing vanilla TLMS when that was popular. Mainly because I wasn't used to my consistently high ping and I sucked as a zombie, but my petty reasoning is irrelevant; I came to enjoy the core game immensely.
I'm going to start actively refusing to reply to any message that has nothing to do with the subject at hand, and doesn't even to have anything to remotely do with what this thread is intended for.
#1. Our community majority player-base is made up of selfish, jaded users, who will resist change of any kind. They refuse to take anything seriously, and seek to discredit anyone and anything that shows direct opposition to what they believe is correct.#2 Our game-modes, and the choices and popularization of said choices of servers hosted with them, have gotten to the point it has made the base-game itself stale and uninteresting.#3 The people who know that it's a problem refuse to do anything to change it, because they believe it is inevitable, and those who don't know can't figure out why it is, because every-time we try to discuss it, people destroy the debate and discussion before it can even start.I'm having a hard time trying to work out what this argument is about. The fact people won't stop playing a certain game mode or something else?I have no idea what Ran's talking about; I think he just wants attention at this point. I, personally, have been talking about the specific problems that people not playing anything other than one game mode presents for MM8BDM.
You can't stop people playing what they want to play. The Skulltag community curse seems to be coming full circle now. I made GVH, it was played all the time because some people found it fun, community decides it needs to be removed from server listings and starts secret clubs on IRC on how to stop GVH and finding CutmanMike's address to put an end to him (I'm serious). How is that fair on the people who just legitimately enjoy the game mode? You can't stop people playing COD or Halo because they enjoy it, and you can't stop people playing doom mods either.One difference between GvH and Saxton (or MMSP, if Musashi's dartboard of fate isn't on the blink) is that while having everyone playing GvH doesn't cripple your ability to fully enjoy single-player wads like Beyond Reality (or even other multiplayer Doom mods since the Doom community is so large), having everyone playing Saxton does affect your ability to fully enjoy other MM8BDM mods and modes, because bots suck and single-player mods are small and few in number. Another problem I pointed out previously is that, much like Brutal Doom, Saxton has created its own system of players who have never touched anything else. While other popular Doom mods also have this effect to a certain extent, it's much more severe and damaging for MM8BDM because the population gap between the Saxton-only community and "us" is so large. Imagine if 90% of all the people on the Zandronum master server were playing in one Brutal Doom server. Now imagine someone trying to get a game of priv going in an environment like that; I don't think it would be very long before they would ragequit.
I've said this time and time again, if you want people to stop playing a certain game mode, make a better one! Or work together to make better game mode, share some ideas. Don't just make more and more topics about the same damn thing. I do not and will not support suggested nazi methods to stop people playing or talking about things they enjoy playing.(http://i.qkme.me/3ua1jr.jpg)
As for "the community dying"... is it? I haven't heard or seen any hard evidence supporting this claim, like at all. The only things I've heard are the development team struggling to make everyone happy with their "we want your opinion on xyz" posts, which I've briefly gone over with Ivory. To me it just sounds like kicking up drama for no good reason (or little personal reason) but I am willing to hear people out if they can show me what they're talking about. Otherwise I'm going to lock this under the assumption nothing is going to come out of it other than adding more fuel to the fire.I think the problem is mainly worries about a multiplayer monoculture crippling new player adoption (see above) combined with the various asshattery on Skype stirring the pot. Those are valid concerns, mind, but the way Ran basically attempted to preach to everyone about how he was the One True Savior of MM8BDM poisoned this thread to be a mess from the start.
And for better reasons that are actually on-topic: to discuss if such a thing as "a dead community" exists, and if it does, what are the actual causes and what can be done about it. Ok, no. While this thread may not have a basis, Cutstuff is anything BUT thriving. And if you're talking about the Skype chats, I would rather try to have a friendly discussion on /b/. At least there, people don't recognize each other so that they can hold a grudge.
My reasoning for this being, if Cutstuff is truly going to shit, how do we still have a thriving community that continues to maintain a friendly relationship with each other?
It's also already been established that you're a self-centered fallacious alarmist (creating a massive skype group chat with "everyone" to expose them your opinion, in the hopes of everyone accepting your argument and shield yourself with argumentum ad populum), and a doomsayer (asserting as fact that the MM8BDM community is dying, regardless of what has been exposed, to the point of blind faith).I'm not insulting everyone. Those, in the quotes are the exact things everyone in the call and chat agreed were the root problems. If you don't believe me, I'll happily copypasta to you every conversation main and on the side.
I warn you though, many of the side conversation are basically " Lol -Ran, trying to save 8BDM"....
Also, you forgot the preface that explained that was the collective census on the matter. They are not my sole feelings.
Also, I never said "toxic players are toxic so this is why". That was the public opinion agreed upon by those actually willing to discuss it. Was my opinion involved in it? yes, it was. However, I was not the sole person who agreed on this.
A'ight. Now with that out of the way...let's not take things too far with "banning Saxton Hale". I don't care how shoehorned and badly designed it is: we simply cannot take away other people's fun simply because we think it's so memeticly popular it keeps new people from trying different things. And I think that there just isn't enough people that care about Saxton Hale dominating the servers, and therefore think it is necessary to "ban" it.
If we want people to play something else, we should get together and play it to make it popular: not get together and argue that some other people are playing something we don't like and want to force them to play something we like. Except that we have more refined gameplay tastes than the group that devotes to play Saxton Hale, so we all don't find one single thing to be the best: we all have different tastes, while they all share the same taste.Now, in the case our problem is one of disinterest, all we have to do is encourage those players who refuse to play other things because they feel unskilled at them by taking them by the hand, introducing them to the mode, and playing it with them, and then doing that on a regular basis so there's more than just Saxton Hale servers that are pulling most of the attention.
If the problem turns out to be one of resistance to playing because of the boredom with the basegame, which I define as the game modes we play on: DM, T/LMS, Duel, CTF, and the wildcard modes we've made over the years (In this context: Saxton, (Rage)Robo, ScrewScramble, BotApoc, Classes etc..) -- which is the core of every mode and gametype we play, not just a object that we can easily point at and say:" Oh, anything using mods on a server are pure evil, and vanilla is the only way! " -- then we have to take the second option:
Creating a game-type and game mode that appeal to those who are resistant to changing from it, and those who immerse fully in it now.
I've said this time and time again, if you want people to stop playing a certain game mode, make a better one! Or work together to make better game mode, share some ideas.
[*]Who established this vilified personification of me, and can you list everyone who established this by name?[/color]
-I hope you know that you brought this on yourself. That's what happens when you start the basis of your argument by insulting your audience.
[*]Have you taken Pre-Law, and do you understand what that term meant, without using Wikipedia's Law section?
-No I haven't. However, this isn't a constitutional convention, nor are you in any position to moderate the forums or make the rules here.
[*]Were you in the group I attempted to gather, and did you even read the first section of the OP?
-This I am guilty of though. I'm sorry spamming that group. However, I did so because I kinda felt offended by being called into an "emergency situation" when it's really not that big of a deal. It's like someone pulling the tornado alarm when it's just barely raining outside.
Now, for those of you who haven't taken pre-law classes as a college course, or may not have gotten to that lesson in social studies, allow me to define to you the term Argumentum ad populum , as described in my pre-law coursebook:
-I have a question for YOU. Have you taken any rhetoric classes as a college course? You want to appeal to your target audience, not belittle them, challenge their logic, and dismiss their questions/criticism. If this weren't the case, people here wouldn't be posting angry responses that become more and more of a tl;dr every time.
Do you want to see a dead community? THIS is a dead community, Ran! (http://www.atlanteanarmy.com/forums/index.php)
lockity lock lock :cool:
I came here to play Mega Man, not some meme characters hastily thrown together.
How many times had I proposed having classic characters only (does anybody acknowledge Scrooge McDuck) or to at least pull out all the meme/Valve bosses (and non-game related bosses, if Slenderman's concept is to stay, be it in a wallmaster/floormaster combo.)