Spacebux: Why Spacebux is Broken, and Why It's Killing the Zone (WARNING: LONG ESSAY)

[Ephemeral]

Rewards? TW has never rewarded what I think it should be rewarding but I am old school (as in old man). I have previously suggested that typing anything in ought to cost something (energy, pub bucks, etc.) but that got about as much traction as Downfall gets every Friday night with women.

The best argument against pub bucks is simple, TW is supposed be about teamwork (see TW web site Objectives/mission statement) and pub bucks has the opposite effect. But TW is also run by a bunch of volunteers, and like volunteers everywhere they can quickly become jaded, burned out, and lose perspective. (Hell, even when you pay coders really well they can easily get lost in the ‘hey, look what I can do’ functionality and lose sight of what real purpose of a project is.)
TW is clearly towards the end of its life cycle and shows all the signs of it, it’s not time to be high brow and think that if we put it back on the right track it would take off. The end-of-life for it was sealed years ago when the client code got locked down, if there were any hope I would have bought the stupid thing and done something with it. Bottom line, these guys are going to grope for anything that will breathe a bit of life into it and we should just deal with it.
eph

[paradise!]

Rewards? TW has never rewarded what I think it should be rewarding but I am old school (as in old man). I have previously suggested that typing anything in ought to cost something (energy, pub bucks, etc.) but that got about as much traction as Downfall gets every Friday night with women.

The best argument against pub bucks is simple, TW is supposed be about teamwork (see TW web site Objectives/mission statement) and pub bucks has the opposite effect. But TW is also run by a bunch of volunteers, and like volunteers everywhere they can quickly become jaded, burned out, and lose perspective. (Hell, even when you pay coders really well they can easily get lost in the ‘hey, look what I can do’ functionality and lose sight of what real purpose of a project is.)
TW is clearly towards the end of its life cycle and shows all the signs of it, it’s not time to be high brow and think that if we put it back on the right track it would take off. The end-of-life for it was sealed years ago when the client code got locked down, if there were any hope I would have bought the stupid thing and done something with it. Bottom line, these guys are going to grope for anything that will breathe a bit of life into it and we should just deal with it.
eph

Eph's approach makes sense. Most of us here have been playing this game for at least 5 years, and remember some of the Golden Days of TW.

A majority of people who do remember the Golden Days, would rather we revert back to the old pub and sit back and wait for the fat lady to sing. Which, I respect and have even suggested.

But, you have the pubbers, who obviously love this spacebux shit. It was implemented to give a jolt to the dying pub arenas, not for vets.

In the end the real question remains: Do we want to sort of be sell-outs with the pubbux thing and keep this game alive like some demented terry schiavo deja vu or do we want to switch back to the Golden-Era settings and likely watch the game die honorably?

Lets caucus and decide, because it looked cool in Iowa.

[Zeebu]

why the fuck would you use caucus as a verb on an internet spaceship forum.

go away sally

[Multipass]

I think the momentum of the new pub needs to keep moving forward. The changes were great ideas that became successful reality. The majority of players enjoy pubbux and the specials and everyone loves the named awards at the end of each match. Lets keep ideas coming to enhance it and move forward. For example, there is a hunt game in pub that hasn't exactly gotten tweeked to work that great yet, lets finish that and get it going! Also another idea is having a pub tornyment once a month or something. Idea came from when skyman's used to come on and have consistant duels for sometimes over an hour, and a lot of players got involved with it either by trying to win or betting on his matches and the banter in pub chat was hilarious.
There could be a cost for entry in the tournyment which would utilize the pubbux system.

[Izor]

I dont think I've ever said I'm opposed to the whole pub bucks system its pretty fun being able to thor people and such but as it stands now i have a pretty limitless supply of thors because the prices are all wrong and things were done with no consideration to the effect they have. A fullcharge is 50 spacebucks and you can buy it like every 5 seconds. A slowdown is only 1000, but the relatively useless blindness is 4k. Immunity costs money for some reason even though people on streaks should be immune by default. Think about it, if you're an LT the terr isnt going to be on a streak so people will be buying it the slowdowns and such. The solo freq players shouldnt be able to be targeted when they have that much bounty. That said, anti/fc is still too cheap to buy. Fix the prices to reflect how horribly balanced the tw economy is overall and we'll be in good shape

[Dabram]

i pretty much stopped playing before spacebucks got introduced i think, but nevertheless when i read about spacebucks it's almost like i'm reading about an entirely different game than i had played for over 10 years.

i think (in this game) it's ridiculous to give rewards that makes your ship stronger than that of the next guy. giving rewards that change the gameplay, especially when earned by 'playing for a longer time' or the even worse 'being willing to spend extra real cash on a game' is something i despise, especially in games which only work so well because of a well balanced gameplay, which simply becomes disrupted by a reward-system like that.

in this game the only way your ship/team should become stronger is because you as a player/or group of players get a better grasp of the gameplay. and that's the only reward this game really ever needs, put in (hours of) practise and you'll learn to master the game. not put in mind-dumbing hours and you can upgrade your ship to become one of the most feared (loathed) players.

the only rewards pub could do with is a good mvp system for those basing rounds (if the current one is working well, keep that) also just do simple stuff like promote ppl/squads that play a lot; if you're building a fancy new website, just make a small column on the mainpage with 'weekly pub leader', 'monthly winner', for players/squads. (i'd say based on points / and maybe kill-death difference.. just something simple. people love to gawk over stats and see their name pop up..?


just my 2 cents for what it's worth, though maybe this just isn't my game any longer

[Soup du Jour]

I used to love playing pub but a while back I was playing when the new pubbux was implemented and I noticed that my attentionn could not be kept for more than like 5 minnutes at a time.

With the ombination of assholes tryig to win kill-o-thnos and the lack of basing from endless hors and nukes and warps and whatever, I was sick of it.

Where are the good basing games that tw was bult upon. I don't give a uck if wbs are spawning because i am 6 grids above them trying to CTF. now i have to deal with mother fuckers thorring me at essentially no cost (because they have 1mil) fuck that.

[Downfall]

It's all about satisfying as many people as you can, the older generation people may dislike it, but they still play pub minimally so their opinion is valued less. 24 said that pure pubbers of this time mostly agreed to liking spacebux, so thats who we need to satisfy.

But I think the main thing that would satisfy everyone in this thread is fixing up the spacebux prices and some additions (such as delay etc.) which make it less likely abuse will occur.

[BooBiesYaY]

i pretty much stopped playing before spacebucks got introduced i think, but nevertheless when i read about spacebucks it's almost like i'm reading about an entirely different game than i had played for over 10 years.

i think (in this game) it's ridiculous to give rewards that makes your ship stronger than that of the next guy. giving rewards that change the gameplay, especially when earned by 'playing for a longer time' or the even worse 'being willing to spend extra real cash on a game' is something i despise, especially in games which only work so well because of a well balanced gameplay, which simply becomes disrupted by a reward-system like that.

in this game the only way your ship/team should become stronger is because you as a player/or group of players get a better grasp of the gameplay. and that's the only reward this game really ever needs, put in (hours of) practise and you'll learn to master the game. not put in mind-dumbing hours and you can upgrade your ship to become one of the most feared (loathed) players.

the only rewards pub could do with is a good mvp system for those basing rounds (if the current one is working well, keep that) also just do simple stuff like promote ppl/squads that play a lot; if you're building a fancy new website, just make a small column on the mainpage with 'weekly pub leader', 'monthly winner', for players/squads. (i'd say based on points / and maybe kill-death difference.. just something simple. people love to gawk over stats and see their name pop up..?


just my 2 cents for what it's worth, though maybe this just isn't my game any longer

Well, I agree somewhat with what you say but on the whole I have to disagree. Most zones have some form of currency system and it makes things more fun in general. Lets be honest, TW has ALWAYS had a point system and put a little trophy on the highest point player did they not? Should that reward also not be given? Should they disband the point system as well? lol.

Generally, the !buy system added some much needed excitement or revitilization to the game. It rewards people for try hard, basing or playing longer and adds the added surprise of a possible game changer at any second.

Abuses HAVE been taking place, small granted, but abuses nonetheless. As I highlighted in my other post on levs, a huge immediate fix would be to add a longer "cooldown" to items such as baseblast or epidemic or what have you. Perhaps you can only buy one every 10 minutes and each of the 3 major share this "cooldown". So if you buy an epidemic you cant buy baseblast or anything for 10 minutes.

Population is also an issue and the main reason pub is more volatile, not the money system. Lack of population and instability in freq's is hurting basing more, for instance a 5v5 or 8v6 game instead of a 12v12 game back in the day in like 4 different pubs. Population is lumpy and sporadic throughout any given day..

I dont know who was smoking what to increase a "fullcharge" to $1000 from $30 or a epidemic from $4000 to $20000 but id love to smoke some of that sheeet lol. The only thing this accomplished is alienating any new players or casual players who cant play 3 hours of rounds to have some fun with the buy system etc.

jmho.

[Zeebu]

make a reasonable spending limit in hte form of spacebucks per hour or something. for a very high fee (something to somewhat counter inflation) allow a person to buy out of that for a period of time (a few hours, a day, whatever)

that allows people to use their high dollar items without being able to spam them. if they do choose to spam them their total amount gets to see a significat hit. and, make it a significat hit. have that rule only target the people who are hoarding millions.

[LF]

I have so many opinions I don't even know where to start. Hopefully as an ex smod my thoughts may still carry some weight. On that note...

I am well aware of the criticism staff gets every hour of every day in nearly every aspect of the zone, and that you will never ever make everyone happy, but what the hell are you doing to the pubs? Take a smod (or appoint a new one) like mootland farmer used to do and put them in charge of the public arenas. That way the people have somebody to bring their concerns to and that person can/will keep the public updated on changes that will/are taking place. I would have gladly done this job considering I actually play pub before Dezmond used an entire box of tissues to get me removed from staff for disagreeing with him.

Like boobies above me posted, how the hell did a fullcharge go from $30 to $1000 without any sort of notice that a change was made? Bursts and portals also went from $60 to $500. My problem isn't the change itself, I'm all for experimenting, but that nobody knew about the change until I pointed it out while playing this morning. I managed to go through my entire 30k in about 15 minutes, most while playing killothon in a terr when I should have still had 29k left. I understand the need to increase prices (For obnoxious faggots like this wildblood123 guy) but jesus christ, tell us when it happens.

My last note, this pure pub basing was the best pubbing I've seen in years. I've only been back for 5 days and I'm upwards of 3000 kills. The limited !buy menu was fantastic as well. I'd say bring that back as the 2nd pub (opposite of this past weekend) and see if it can maintain the same momentum, then you will see which arena the people prefer, or if they will just stay in whatever pub is the 1st pub because they are newbies.

I'm not going to call anybody out, but given my experience in staff its fairly obvious to me who made the bot changes and increased prices (I thought you didn't want to touch aro's pubsystem?) But somebody had to give him the directive to do it, which is also obvious to me as well. Why didn't either of you announce that a change would be taking place? That's really my only sincere gripe

[Supreme]

Yeap, if you're smart you just edit the welcome bot to also say prices have been increased due to abuse and voila you're done.

[Twenty Four]

WOW, the prices were changed? $1000 for a full charge? Are you insane? Whoever did this needs to pm me in game. Don't make changes like this on your own.

-24

[MegamanEXE]

Okay, I've left this thread on its own for a while, but I came here to say this:

The basing under the pure pub system this weekend was by far the best basing in Trench Wars pub in a long time. I participated in a 15 v 15 game at one point. The basing was the liveliest that I have seen it an a long time; people were actually PASSIONATE about basing and taking the flag instead of just spawnkilling for Killothon or LTing. I also took screenshots of things I haven't seen since Spacebux was instituted: people discussing in friendly terms about how to take the flagroom, and a terrier having to set macros. The terr macro part was what really got to me, as I haven't seen a terrier use any macros for a long time, and it showed that the terr was so focused on taking the flagroom that he was going to create some macros to tell his teammates his status and when to attach. That kind of passion for the game disappeared when Spacebux was instituted, because that passion only arises when TEAMWORK is required by the game instead of INDIVIDUAL WORK.

The pure pub system needs to come back, as it's obviously much better than the Spacebux system.

[Twenty Four]

Lol. The PASSION! You honestly made my day w/ that post.

-24