The Newb Effort

[BooBiesYaY]

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Get called out RaCka.

Honestly though, I think there was a time when your argument was relevant, but not anymore. If we're going to be calling out players for cheating. I could easily say I am a primary witness to the fact the guy NowYouDie cheats and/or cheated. Guy used to be so bubbly in ?go javs. Then he met the "CE crowd" (revolt, vys, mythril, ria, melon etc), and guy turned into a fucking asshole and started dropping 20-10's after getting axed from Wingmasters for his 3-10's.

Melon was another example. If you think "lag cheating" is ruining the game now, you should have seen this guy. You would straight bomb him in the face directly, and he'd rush through it and facial you. Now THAT's ruining the game.

I think most of us are at a point now where we just don't give enough of a fuck to cheat. And if there are those manipulating, I can't even tell. So how can we expect a newbie to tell?

cheating in-game is always relevant so long as the game still exists. it is even MORE relevant when people start asking questions like "why cant we get new people into dd's etc, they get pissed going 2-10", as resaq was describing.

its certainly not just racka, i just pulled him as an example because he was so blatant probably more blatant as the others you describe. its more than that though, most of these blatant cheaters, past or present, mingle uncomfortably with staff or mods, and/or become them. certainly, all or most of staff knew of it and let it continue, lol. that is a certainty. after 12 years of sporadic abuse, its a moot issue now because it will never stop in its entirety, the game is too weak to care at this point (ie TWL is just the same people as last season and so on, no new players), and it might not even be viable to police or crack down on it, only hardcore techies would know for sure, and its likely most collaberate to allow it.

its beyond absurd to expect to attract new people to the game, tell them to participate in a contest or TWL/DD, then if they appear to be better than you, rig the game against them. cheating still goes on, i can tell easily, but im exactly like you i dont even give two fvcks if it goes on or not because i stopped caring many years ago.

To answer your question, even if a newbie "cant tell" the fact that hes further oppressed to go 2-10 instead of 5-10 perhaps without the cheating, is a further deterrent at the very least. Not to mention it entirely discredits the structure of TW's "staff" or operators, fairness of competitions or games, and so on. Assuming the newbies stay a year or two, they will "be able to tell" at that point.

I didn't mean to make this an entire discussion on the abuses in TW, but rather it is defintiely a contributory factor to TW's troubles. But like you said, at this point who cares. The time to stop this was years ago.

in the end, its "their" game, its free, they can run it how they want. if they want cheaters and collaborate with cheaters and make bad decisions, their player base has and will suffer, obviously. we can certainly discuss it since this forum is about TW's problems, but i have no desire to waste my time or energy protesting what is, in essence, a free game run by generous individuals who allocate time and energy to the game. i simply tend to avoid those aspects of the game which are overrun with potential abuse/cheating and so on.

[Money]

if i understood it correctly, there was a distension zone that wasnt able to support a large enough population. try not to derail this thread.

it did for a while, but the zone started about 2 years after tw mismanaged it and most of its players quit the game entirely

So far I have only seen like five retards who want distension zone back or quit because of it, glad most of them quit to be honest.

LOL I WAS BEING SARCASTIC

[Money]

and no one cheats quit whining pub noop

[BooBiesYaY]

and no one cheats quit whining pub noop

yeah yeah, sell your bs to someone who cares what you have to say..

ps. outside of pub, popluation is full of bots and afkers, at least when i quit a few weeks ago and all before that. so "pub noop [or noob]" is the best you can come up with? really money?

is your theme song weird al's "whatever you like" because something tells me thats the extent of your "money".. hahaha

[ogron]

again, like everyone is saying, it comes down to other human beings passing the knowledge of how to play and do things, since the game is hard and complicated and convoluted.

we need to make the Tenure model much more accessible to get people involved and engaged with other humans who will encourage them to stay and show them the ropes.

like that guy said, you have about ONE MINUTE to win people over, you need the bot identifying new people as they come in, instantly assign them to 1 of 2 newbie squads (that only play each other or something) with volunteer caps immediately alerted to a new player and talking to them and making that human connection and explaining that this game is awesome and has cool squad battles and teamwork and chats and leagues and elim and pub, but that it has a steep learning curve but they have a support group in that newbie squad willing to help them out and show them the ropes.

you can have all the practice arenas and bots and new systems you want, but the number one tool for recruiting newbies is the human connection. someone saying "hey, stick it out. yes the 2d graphics suck, yes its complicated, but it will pay off and a bunch of us are here to help you out and teach you clan battles vs. other newbs". you'll still lose a ton of new players, but the retention level will be significantly higher.

im willing to help any way i can, i just dont have any programming skills.

[Supreme]

I've gone over this issue many many times in the past. As a part of staff this is primarily what I worked on. Any zone has to have someone innovating from the top at all times. And, one single person can't do it forever, because people move on in their lives. Think back to the innovators in this game. Where are they now? Most have moved on or have become too involved in their day to day lives to help this game innovate anymore.

When I was sysop my focus was not to innovate, because I think I've become too much of a businessman and let my creativity dwindle over the years. Instead, I found the people in this game who were the big innovators, and I supported them in such a way that they felt comfortable bringing their best to the game.

Through all of those changes though, I never let the group lose sight of the singular vision. It was my job to listen to everyone, decide on a vision, and make sure that everyone was working toward that vision and not in a direction that was taking us away from it.

Trench Wars is no longer like it use to be. It's not about good ideas, and good ideas really aren't fostered anymore. That's why, after the public arena finally stagnated long enough, staff asked the public what to do about pub. Innovators don't do that. Innovators see what needs to happen next and they make it happen. That kind of thinking is shunned in TW from the top down, and that's why it will fail without major changes. I know that the changes we made to pub could never be permanent, but it wasn't their purpose to be permanent. It was supposed to keep evolving, because THAT brings NEW PLAYERS. What happened was, after I left, it stagnated until people couldn't stand it anymore. And now, what??? We are back to the old 1990's tileset??? Are you serious???

If we're going to bring back Subspace for the newcomers, it isn't going to be about bringing back Alpha. It is going to be about bringing every zone up to 2012 standards for gaming. The server is capable. The client is capable. I know lots of people think they're not, but they just don't have the vision. Successful new games are about two things: Graphics and Social features. The graphics have to be updated. The chat system needs to be expanded upon (smartphone clients etc...) The ships have to be refined for a new generation of players. Things have to be CONSOLIDATED when zone populations drop, and EXPANDED when zone populations grow. My vision was for all elim'ing and dueling to become part of TW's pub. That's why the little duel arenas are there. Why? Because our zone was shrinking and our player base needed to consolidate in order to stay in touch with each other and not become a handful of fragmented cliques. So what do we have now? Elim, Duel, WbDuel, JavDuel, SpidDuel..... I appreciate the effort but it's not the right vision.

Vision will save the game, a lack of vision will bury it. Innovators and their ideas have to be recognized and fostered in such a way that their work leads the zone toward a vision of the future.

I'll finish with a quote from Dock>...
DoCk>: The toughest job is trying to figure out what is good for the public, and not what is public demand. Sometimes decisions can be extremely unpopular but then grown to be accepted later on. This is a fact of life of being Sysop, and every little change or move, simply because of the size of this zone, causes a lot of heat to be turned on the zone's staff.

If TW and Subspace in general are to survive, we need people at the top who understand the above line and aren't afraid to make or break a zone with revolutionary thinking. I was never afraid to destroy Trench Wars with my actions, but I was always aware that it was possible. I trusted that I was smart enough and had brilliant people around me that the changes we were making would improve things. And what was my number one focus? Not the levi players, not the duelers, not twd or twl, it was the NEWCOMERS. Because without them, the rest of us will finally get tired of shooting each other and go away. Imagine if YOU were just now discovering this game as it currently is. How long would you stay? What would the game need to be like instead for you to hang around? THAT is the future if this game is to survive.

I've moved on in my life and lack the ability to contribute much anymore, but I love the fact that people are talking about this and I do hope that you can take this thing to the next level.

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