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Dear TW Community,
I know we haven't talked much, but I think its about time we had a little chat. I'm Apocalypse WOW! and a lot of you probably don't know me and that's ok because I probably don't know you either. Now judging by the rest of the threads in these forums, I expect half you to not actually take me seriously - which is also ok because I'm venting my frustrations about a little online internet game which may or may not be a serious endeavor at all. But then again, you're all looking at these forums so I reckon you must be sort of interested in this game.
I've been a happy pubber since '00 under various names and a fairly dedicated baser since last year -- all in all I think I kind of fit into the TW "average joe" player and community category. I was on TeKs, which was nice for me because I made a lot of friends on it but I'm sure most of you don't really care, which is ok because I don't really care what squad you're on or have been on either. I think its fair to say that I've got a good handle on this game and a lot of the players in it.
TW Community, I'm getting frustrated with you. I'm not frustrated with the ship settings or the tile sets or how TWD or leagues and things are set up. I'm not frustrated that I was on a squad that didn't win a lot, but didn't lose a lot either. I'm not frustrated with the way mods host events. Really I think its rather nice that some people have taken their time to make such an enjoyable little game free. No I'm not frustrated with these things, TW Community, I'm frustrated with you.
I'm sure every once in a while I'm sure one of these threads pops up, but I feel that its my duty as an average joe TW Community member to say my piece. TW Community, the things you are doing are making me not want to play this game that I enjoy anymore. Recently there's been a lot of talk about doing things to help increase TW population and a neat proposal system has been introduced to help innovation. I think this is great, but I think you guys are missing the forest for the trees when it comes to solving TW's problems.
When I randomly play in pub, its usually a fair bet that if I get shot, somebody's going to say "ez" or something like that. Its also usually a fair bet that I'm playing on a team with 10 of the best javs to ever have graced this game with their holy presence - except for the 10 javs on the other team who could surely "pwn" God Himself should He decide to pub it hardcore - but whatever. The amount of trash talk and insults exchanged in pub are staggering. The amount of civility between players tends towards nonexistance.
Now, I don't pub much anymore since I discovered real basing in ?go base, where usually only 1 of those best javs ever gets to grace each team. I'm not much of a jav or wb player so I don't really do those elim arenas - but they're all veritable meeting places for TWD squad players and the principle is the same - more challenging gameplay.
I've become something of a regular shark in ?go base, which seems to be largely regarded as the equivalent of a janitor who pushes things around a lot. Thats ok because believe it or not, I enjoy playing that big fat ship because I think it takes a degree of skill that most players don't realize. I like my ship because it is much more than counting to 4 and pressing "shift control" a lot, I'm in a "helping" ship that sometimes gets to make stuff blow up which is always cool, but I digress.
As a regular shark, it is rare that a game goes by where I don't get told "omg rep" or "SHARKS WTF!!?!?" even when it clearly isn't my fault. Without fail, a shark will be yelled at or insulted for single mistakes, also without fail, a well sharked game is rarely acknowledged and is taken for granted. If other ships make errors, they don't generally get called out on it, unless the spiders as a whole are sucking big time, the jav is tking, or the terr is spinning around or whatever. Civility is not a priority between players at these moments I've noticed. As a shark, nothing less than perfection is demanded, and even the best of us make mistakes - I try to own up to mine as much as possible, which I think is a good lesson for life in general.
Sometimes when I'm captaining for base, I'll want to put players into spiders, because spiders are important when you want to win a basing match. Often I find myself in the presence of the most ultimately awesome javelin players ever who absolutely refuse to not play their most awesome javelins or whatever. Heaven forbid I sub you out for refusing to spid, I don't tend to take orders very well from little lines of internet text. These players also tend to have very nimble fingers, and tend to be in the squads that win lots of their matches.
Now let me be clear: I'm not saying that I should never refuse to shark, because sharking all the time does get tiring. I'm not saying that a regular player of some sort of ship should have to be that ship in base. I'm not saying that a lot of those players with really nimble fingers should have to play with people who have not as nimble fingers in their go base scrimmages. I'm saying that if you would not like to be a sort of ship you should ask the captain politely and not demand it because you've won OMG THIS MANY TWL TITLES. I'm saying I have noticed something along the lines of rampant and arrogant elitism and a complete lack of civility for many of your "average joe" TW players.
TW Community, your complete lack of civility is driving me away. Everyone takes for granted that one person can say utterly demeaning things to another person because its OMG ANONYMOUS TEXT MESSAGES. Come on. I think one of the things that is affecting TW quality and population is the utter indifference players have towards actually building some sense of community here beyond their squads or special chats. We all have our friends and nemeses and that does keep things interesting. But TW Community, you seem to be taking it for granted that it is ok for people to treat others like absolute dirt.
Here is a place where I do think that TW staff and <er>s and <zh>s have dropped the ball completely. By simply ignoring this sort of rampant behavior you are not only encouraging this problem but are allowing the degradation of TW as a community. It is that community that you want to try and build just as much as you are trying to make cool new tilesets and ship settings and arenas, because it is that community that will ensure the longevity of this zone and this game. I guess I'm just trying to get some dialogue about this going and to vent my frustrations. I guess I just expect a little bit more from a gaming experience where we see a lot of the same players consistently.
I'm sure a lot of you will be say something along the lines of "yeah well this is how things are and you are unrealistic in your expectations" or "apoc you are a weak minded idealogue" or "be very quiet you player who is new to trench wars" or "this is too long and I didn't read it because I'm an internet superstar" or "laugh out loud". To these, and similar comments that lack conversational merit, I imply something along the lines of "please go initiate sexual pleasure with yourself" or "attain puberty please" etc because this is what I think so I'm saying it.
Yeah so in a nutshell, try and stop being complete douches to each other.
Yours truly,
Apocalypse WOW!
P.S. Spastic, you guys should recruit Sarger because he is Icelandic and you are probably lacking in the Icelandic department.
P.P.S. Up to this point I have a wordcount of 1416 which is probably a longer essay than most of you have ever written and thus implies that I am a gigantic nerd but that's ok because I'm happy with me.
I know we haven't talked much, but I think its about time we had a little chat. I'm Apocalypse WOW! and a lot of you probably don't know me and that's ok because I probably don't know you either. Now judging by the rest of the threads in these forums, I expect half you to not actually take me seriously - which is also ok because I'm venting my frustrations about a little online internet game which may or may not be a serious endeavor at all. But then again, you're all looking at these forums so I reckon you must be sort of interested in this game.
I've been a happy pubber since '00 under various names and a fairly dedicated baser since last year -- all in all I think I kind of fit into the TW "average joe" player and community category. I was on TeKs, which was nice for me because I made a lot of friends on it but I'm sure most of you don't really care, which is ok because I don't really care what squad you're on or have been on either. I think its fair to say that I've got a good handle on this game and a lot of the players in it.
TW Community, I'm getting frustrated with you. I'm not frustrated with the ship settings or the tile sets or how TWD or leagues and things are set up. I'm not frustrated that I was on a squad that didn't win a lot, but didn't lose a lot either. I'm not frustrated with the way mods host events. Really I think its rather nice that some people have taken their time to make such an enjoyable little game free. No I'm not frustrated with these things, TW Community, I'm frustrated with you.
I'm sure every once in a while I'm sure one of these threads pops up, but I feel that its my duty as an average joe TW Community member to say my piece. TW Community, the things you are doing are making me not want to play this game that I enjoy anymore. Recently there's been a lot of talk about doing things to help increase TW population and a neat proposal system has been introduced to help innovation. I think this is great, but I think you guys are missing the forest for the trees when it comes to solving TW's problems.
When I randomly play in pub, its usually a fair bet that if I get shot, somebody's going to say "ez" or something like that. Its also usually a fair bet that I'm playing on a team with 10 of the best javs to ever have graced this game with their holy presence - except for the 10 javs on the other team who could surely "pwn" God Himself should He decide to pub it hardcore - but whatever. The amount of trash talk and insults exchanged in pub are staggering. The amount of civility between players tends towards nonexistance.
Now, I don't pub much anymore since I discovered real basing in ?go base, where usually only 1 of those best javs ever gets to grace each team. I'm not much of a jav or wb player so I don't really do those elim arenas - but they're all veritable meeting places for TWD squad players and the principle is the same - more challenging gameplay.
I've become something of a regular shark in ?go base, which seems to be largely regarded as the equivalent of a janitor who pushes things around a lot. Thats ok because believe it or not, I enjoy playing that big fat ship because I think it takes a degree of skill that most players don't realize. I like my ship because it is much more than counting to 4 and pressing "shift control" a lot, I'm in a "helping" ship that sometimes gets to make stuff blow up which is always cool, but I digress.
As a regular shark, it is rare that a game goes by where I don't get told "omg rep" or "SHARKS WTF!!?!?" even when it clearly isn't my fault. Without fail, a shark will be yelled at or insulted for single mistakes, also without fail, a well sharked game is rarely acknowledged and is taken for granted. If other ships make errors, they don't generally get called out on it, unless the spiders as a whole are sucking big time, the jav is tking, or the terr is spinning around or whatever. Civility is not a priority between players at these moments I've noticed. As a shark, nothing less than perfection is demanded, and even the best of us make mistakes - I try to own up to mine as much as possible, which I think is a good lesson for life in general.
Sometimes when I'm captaining for base, I'll want to put players into spiders, because spiders are important when you want to win a basing match. Often I find myself in the presence of the most ultimately awesome javelin players ever who absolutely refuse to not play their most awesome javelins or whatever. Heaven forbid I sub you out for refusing to spid, I don't tend to take orders very well from little lines of internet text. These players also tend to have very nimble fingers, and tend to be in the squads that win lots of their matches.
Now let me be clear: I'm not saying that I should never refuse to shark, because sharking all the time does get tiring. I'm not saying that a regular player of some sort of ship should have to be that ship in base. I'm not saying that a lot of those players with really nimble fingers should have to play with people who have not as nimble fingers in their go base scrimmages. I'm saying that if you would not like to be a sort of ship you should ask the captain politely and not demand it because you've won OMG THIS MANY TWL TITLES. I'm saying I have noticed something along the lines of rampant and arrogant elitism and a complete lack of civility for many of your "average joe" TW players.
TW Community, your complete lack of civility is driving me away. Everyone takes for granted that one person can say utterly demeaning things to another person because its OMG ANONYMOUS TEXT MESSAGES. Come on. I think one of the things that is affecting TW quality and population is the utter indifference players have towards actually building some sense of community here beyond their squads or special chats. We all have our friends and nemeses and that does keep things interesting. But TW Community, you seem to be taking it for granted that it is ok for people to treat others like absolute dirt.
Here is a place where I do think that TW staff and <er>s and <zh>s have dropped the ball completely. By simply ignoring this sort of rampant behavior you are not only encouraging this problem but are allowing the degradation of TW as a community. It is that community that you want to try and build just as much as you are trying to make cool new tilesets and ship settings and arenas, because it is that community that will ensure the longevity of this zone and this game. I guess I'm just trying to get some dialogue about this going and to vent my frustrations. I guess I just expect a little bit more from a gaming experience where we see a lot of the same players consistently.
I'm sure a lot of you will be say something along the lines of "yeah well this is how things are and you are unrealistic in your expectations" or "apoc you are a weak minded idealogue" or "be very quiet you player who is new to trench wars" or "this is too long and I didn't read it because I'm an internet superstar" or "laugh out loud". To these, and similar comments that lack conversational merit, I imply something along the lines of "please go initiate sexual pleasure with yourself" or "attain puberty please" etc because this is what I think so I'm saying it.
Yeah so in a nutshell, try and stop being complete douches to each other.
Yours truly,
Apocalypse WOW!
P.S. Spastic, you guys should recruit Sarger because he is Icelandic and you are probably lacking in the Icelandic department.
P.P.S. Up to this point I have a wordcount of 1416 which is probably a longer essay than most of you have ever written and thus implies that I am a gigantic nerd but that's ok because I'm happy with me.
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