The Decline of SS and TW is real

[Ephemeral]

Yes that is exactly what I was saying.

a serial killer will deter tourists.

:\

9^th,
No offense 9^th but you epitomize what is wrong with Pub and the zone. Whomever hired you ought to be fired, your kind of short-term thinking such as “the main thing that annoys me is that everyone has ideas but no one does anything about them. I had an idea recently and instead of complaining on here I just went ahead and did it.” is exactly the opposite of what needs to be done.

The zone, and specifically Pub, is nothing but ‘good ideas’ without a direction or vision. Dumbasses simply implemented them without regard to their impact. Turb has this exactly right, each new person to come on-board simply made a change for the sake of a change. Didn’t matter what the change was, didn’t matter if the change favored experienced players, didn’t matter if the change was utterly the dumbest idea on earth. They are done in a vacuum of common sense and forethought. They were myopic and detached ideas which often did not even fit within the zone’s mission statement. People like you ‘just went ahead and did it’.

Don’t get me wrong, each person thought their idea was a good one and was/is emotionally invested in it. But this is what is so full of shit and contributed to leading the zone into a downward population spiral.

Then you follow up with another post where you want to blame the discussion of what is broken with damaging the zone? Try to think your logic through, you are saying it is better to not tell the town that a serial killer is on the loose. So rather than discuss a 'negative' issue, let people know and save lives, and get it out on the table and resolved quickly, your argument is that it is better to let the killer run around kill off even more people and ignore the problem. Typical short-term thinking.

With every post you lose respect and this reflects poorly on staff. Staff already had ‘image issues’ before you joined, you aren’t helping this.
Eph

[mtine]

Don't even dwelve on 9th, Eph. He is an idiot and he proved this a lot of times...and guess where...in PUB.

Anyways, Eph and and turb made a lot of nice points, but they all've been discussed before. Actually, each year the same story. All talk, no action. I'm not saying talking isn't good, but something really needs to be done. Like, for example, you guys made tons of great ideas. Let's make it happen. Everyone who wants to contribute should write in a separate thread made for that purpose and then we start working together. Even the smaller things are important, such as removing the ?buy system or adding a simple learning area. Believe me, it wouldn't take 3 months to do it, more like a week.

But as far as I know, this won't happen. Why? The ones that cared (dev, helpful noobz such as myself, other ppl who cared about this zone and made maps/small changes) either:
- left and stopped playing/caring
- still play but don't want to help because of TW Staff being idiots and because nothing ever gets done here.

Suggestion: get rid of those idiots in pub who always troll (eg. Tower), remove ?buy system (only allow it for bets in duels and some small changes like fireworks which don't hinder gameplay and give people any advantages), implement a small area for new players (explaining rules, ships, arenas, TWD), market this game already (spend some money for advertising), get rid of TW Staffers who are idiots and don't contribute to TW in any way, but instead hire people (not to TW Staff but just give them another role, like PH- Pub Helper or something and a few basic powers to help players) who will help the zone grow again, like Eph.

There's much to be done, but not a lot of time to do it in. So let's make it happen, else there won't be a 2015 for TW.

[Exalt]

There USED to be pubsquads as far as I remember. At least, there was a ranking list for squads that had the most points in public. I remember this from when I first played in like 2000/2001 something like that. I still remember the list included Onix/British Squad/Wildfire/Paladen/etc and that's how I learned more about dueling and things.

Honestly though, I wish we'd get rid of pub and make an entirely new map. Public is boring, even for new players. I think I left public for elim within a few days of first playing subspace and never really looked back. If public is all I had to look forward to, I never would've kept playing this game. That's just a fact.

I realize there are some pure pubbers that love it for some odd reason, but I highly doubt they are the majority. There's a reason leagues were created and were successful, and it wasn't because public held everyone's interests.

[mtine]

Oh ye, I almost forgot pubsquads. Make it happen, it sounds like a lot of fun. Plus as Exalt suggested, a new pub arena because this one really tends to get boring.

[Turban]

there used to be several squads that were primarily focused on playing in public arenas and attending events, but unfortunately most of them have disappeared over time through the decline of our player base and the growth of our competitive leagues, among with other reasons. they simply couldn't stand the test of time, and one of the biggest contributors for their disappearance is the fact that no one was willing to take that leadership role to keep the squad tradition going for a longer period of time. it will be hard to get that part back to our game, as it requires a lot of effort from the players themselves, which we seem to be severely lacking at the moment. thus, this is not a realistic goal at the moment unless some people with enough spare time are willing to step up to make a contribution.

we should focus on things that can be done with relative ease, and that is restoring the public game play to an acceptable level which would be both simple and easy to learn. often times simpler is better, and this game is no exception to that rule. there are only a few enhancements that would actually be useful in the public arena, and that would be things such as statistics (to give recognition to the top players and squads), timed games to give an objective to work towards and public cash to not upset the players who have worked hard towards amassing their wealth while giving them some options to use this cash on.

i will have time to do my part when TWL ends, but until then i am preoccupied with it, work and life.

[Turban]

There USED to be pubsquads as far as I remember. At least, there was a ranking list for squads that had the most points in public. I remember this from when I first played in like 2000/2001 something like that. I still remember the list included Onix/British Squad/Wildfire/Paladen/etc and that's how I learned more about dueling and things.

Honestly though, I wish we'd get rid of pub and make an entirely new map. Public is boring, even for new players. I think I left public for elim within a few days of first playing subspace and never really looked back. If public is all I had to look forward to, I never would've kept playing this game. That's just a fact.

I realize there are some pure pubbers that love it for some odd reason, but I highly doubt they are the majority. There's a reason leagues were created and were successful, and it wasn't because public held everyone's interests.

public arena serves as a place to teach new players the basics of this game, and when they feel comfortable enough they can test their skills in more advanced things such as events, elimination and competitive leagues. however, most will never reach that point as they will quit within a couple of minutes, whether it is due to trolls or simply the graphics and game play, i don't know.

[Fork]

Lets think here... you've just made pub very simple and easy. Now will this solve the current problem of 0-5 players playing in pub for the 6-8 or so hours we call the inactive period? Common sense screams out no. Make pub simpler if you want (not 100% this will do anything because pub will just get even more boring) but lets focus on actually trying to tempt old players to want to log into pub during the inactive period? I know actual ideas to add incentive to play pub will never happen on tws unfortunately because its too late and staff don't think that way.

A tutorial needs to happen priority but i can't see this happening either because i don't no if anyone knows how to code it in? i cant code it in so its no good telling me to do it- that's pathetic! i can however add an mini arena into pub to show u how i would like it to look like... thats about as good as what i can do. You would need a coder to add the commands for the new player to type.

[Turban]

it is worth noting that all of these changes in our public arena originally had good intentions and were an attempt to increase the overall activity and fun of the zone. however, it was quite opposite of what happened as some of you may see. i see a correlation between the changes in the public and our population which has been spiraling down for quite some time. granted, other areas of the zone have contributed to the population loss, but no one can claim that public is perfectly fine as it is.

we are attempting to make changes that should theoretically speaking please the seasoned public players, but in return it is driving away both our old and new players. we have flawed priorities and it is hurting the zone. instead of giving good players an even greater array of tools to utterly destroy their opponents, we should rather try to give them more friendly options. there are also several players are abusing the items to completely ruin a perfectly running base game. this is wrong, and needs to be fixed promptly.

rather, we should work on things that will encourage our players to play within the rules, in a fair, even playground. there are multiple ways to promote a healthy gaming environment, such as giving recognition to players' efforts through achievements and leaderboards, and keeping the focus on getting a good basing match running with clear objectives to accomplish, timers and rounds. we could use a detailed public squad specific leaderboard, and try to get a few teams up and running. it is important for some players to feel involved, and squad comradery is by far the best option. we could use a simplified tutorial, but it should not mention anything too complicated to the new players. it has to be made fast and concise, to get them started, but rest should be up to the players themselves and our community.

we are currently promoting the wrong play style and behavior. keep it simple and fun.

[Fork]

it is worth noting that all of these changes in our public arena originally had good intentions and were an attempt to increase the overall activity and fun of the zone. however, it was quite opposite of what happened as some of you may see. i see a correlation between the changes in the public and our population which has been spiraling down for quite some time. granted, other areas of the zone have contributed to the population loss, but no one can claim that public is perfectly fine as it is.

we are attempting to make changes that should theoretically speaking please the seasoned public players, but in return it is driving away both our old and new players. we have flawed priorities and it is hurting the zone. instead of giving good players an even greater array of tools to utterly destroy their opponents, we should rather try to give them more friendly options. there are also several players are abusing the items to completely ruin a perfectly running base game. this is wrong, and needs to be fixed promptly.

rather, we should work on things that will encourage our players to play within the rules, in a fair, even playground. there are multiple ways to promote a healthy gaming environment, such as giving recognition to players' efforts through achievements and leaderboards, and keeping the focus on getting a good basing match running with clear objectives to accomplish, timers and rounds. we could use a detailed public squad specific leaderboard, and try to get a few teams up and running. it is important for some players to feel involved, and squad comradery is by far the best option. we could use a simplified tutorial, but it should not mention anything too complicated to the new players. it has to be made fast and concise, to get them started, but rest should be up to the players themselves and our community.

we are currently promoting the wrong play style and behavior. keep it simple and fun.

The way i see it.. even if we didn't add in any changes to pub- the population would have declined exactly the same. The gameplay in pub has always been the same regardless of the changes (You may think the changes have been massive but if you think about it- its been pretty much the same- still the same old boring pub/ same appearance/ same basing game for 3 minutes- with/ without spacebux). I can see how they thought adding spacebux was a good idea but unfortunately not much incentive to spend money on anything decent without affecting game play.

I want all the changes to happen like u say turban, not because i agree with some of them but just so you can see it won't have much effect to the population. You need something special to happen to increase the population now- something that will get players hooked- old and new- but we need to keep both in mind. Even if we had the most genius idea- we won't have anyone to implement it unfortunately.

Regarding this tutorial- if noone can add it in... we might as well forget this. We could think of the perfect tutorial but then we hit a dead end if we cant find anyone who can actually make it happen. This is where donations should come in play.

Can't we just right now... remove all these options to buy supers/ shields/ and things that really hurt basing etc to see what people think? We could start there and work with what the majority of the public want- keep them very happy- then try and make things more addictive for them. Who has control of pub now????


Personally i would get hooked in pub if i could donate my spacebux into my registered TWD squad and try and make my squad the richest. Possibly to buy customized squad home pages/ better options/ possibly chall another squad for spacebux but add a limit to this to prevent a squad getting rich without playing pub. The major problem is preventing players that don't play twd and are super rich to join a squad just to donate all their money- just to make that squad so rich that no squad can compete. Perhaps bots can track how much you actually earn in pub after you joined a twd squad... (but also dueling in pub for money isn't counted too).

[Turban]

there has been both good and bad changes in the past 10 years, but the bad ones stick out like a sore thumb. we only have one option and that is to fix everything that is not working, despite all the efforts given by the developers of that time. it is fine to experiment, but making permanent changes without thinking it through then not reverting them is what drove a lot of the players away.

we are past the point where we can expect natural growth even with changes. we need the help of everyone to bring this game back to life, although first we have to stop the bleeding.

gah, writing phone essays is annoying.

[Fork]

there has been both good and bad changes in the past 10 years, but the bad ones stick out like a sore thumb. we only have one option and that is to fix everything that is not working, despite all the efforts given by the developers of that time. it is fine to experiment, but making permanent changes without thinking it through then not reverting them is what drove a lot of the players away.

we are past the point where we can expect natural growth even with changes. we need the help of everyone to bring this game back to life, although first we have to stop the bleeding.

gah, writing phone essays is annoying.

Not too sure who expected the population to grow naturally... its been known for years and predicted that the population won't grow without any changes- I mean a 10 year old could have predicted that lol. Fix everything thats not working.... then what? what actual plans do we have after this?

And who can actually fix these changes???? atm it looks like we suggest these things but nothing fuckin happens. I want someone to say: right- we are fixing the following changes: _____ _____ _____ - because i'm curious to what you think should happen after pub has been fixed while population is still declining.

[BooBiesYaY]

lets perma ban people for using aliases like ngR and saggiN. this is the best approach to save this game.

Incompetent banning (2pac saga for starters) and/or running the game is the reason why you have one less player for the last year or so, me. Not that the age of the game and/or people's real life schedules aren't factors as well.

Constant meddling with LT's or other settings. WoW (again using it as an example) alienated millions of players by tweaking settings poorly between talents, PVP settings dmg/healing and so on. Makes people lose interest playing something they've familiarized themselves with and/or practiced only to have a total 180 change every 3-4 months again and again.

Its absolutely hilarious how "racism" has been this games concern for so long, when its a ridiculous thing to focus on especially with a couple dozen people playing. In WoW or other MMO games racism is just ignored when you avoid the auto bleeping.

Throw in rampant cheating in the past between both staff and top squads. History and emphasis on not allowing common players to join in on the fun or squads with any potential to play in leagues. Lack of common sense all around in all areas. Aging game yes. All factors really.

In any event, whatever.. lol.

[roxxkatt]

1) finish tutorial arena
2) make sure tutorial arena has large lvz
3) have tutorial bot sit in tutorial arena 24/7
4) have bouncer bot in pub
5) bounce new players to tutorial arena
6) have first lvz image as 'dont want to learn? type ?go'

[Vatican Assassin]

Have it start you in ?tutorial if it is your first time logging on, or have it say "First time playing? Type ?go tutorial to learn how to play!" if that can't be done...

Honestly though, I could go back in all of our post histories to 2008, see the exact same conversations going about the necessity of making tutorials, and at least then we had interested coders. I played pub the other night, it was 20v20v20, and it was pretty fun. I see this game and my tw playing days folding in on themselves, curling back into the fetus position, and just having fun in pub like I did when I first started. The population is a bell curve, and we have gone through the steep degrading curve, and now the game will begin a much more gradual decline with just people having fun in pub.

[Fork]

1) finish tutorial arena
2) make sure tutorial arena has large lvz
3) have tutorial bot sit in tutorial arena 24/7
4) have bouncer bot in pub
5) bounce new players to tutorial arena
6) have first lvz image as 'dont want to learn? type ?go'

I'm not too sure about giving the option to skip a tutorial unless its not very simple +... here's why: i can imagine new players thinking- fuck it- lets see what the games about !skip and they are brought into pub and they quit after a few minutes (like normal) before they know how to attach/ about squads battles/ squad chat etc...

Even with donation money- staff could easily persuade a coder to implement a tutorial into pub... otherwise who is actually going to code this to work?

TBH i would like this tutorial arena to be in pub arena itself... This is why:

1) So other people could see how its working/ see for themselves how many new players are entering in that island of an arena (like the duel areas around pub). It shouldn't just be about staff helping new players- the public should be involved too and will be more involved if they can see these players for themselves.

2) Put yourself in a new players position... You've just completed a tutorial in a separate arena like ?go tutorial... you then have to wait 5 minutes to download pub- its gonna be extra boring now because you've just seen the shit graphics/ started to make judgments already without meeting any players yet- you're more likely to quit. Instead... let the player download pub- they don't know what to expect: so they will wait... they go through tutorial in pub... then instantly warped into action- smartest move if you ask me.

3) They can see this game has other players playing just from the lines of talking... even tho it might be shit if towers typing but hell... in a seperate arena- they may feel no one plays this shit when in reality... us nerds still play it now and again.


Anyway i'm wasting my time as always... up to the big boss's to actually convince people that they can actually get someone to code this in- and maybe people will do the mapping/ lvls. Have a separate thread regarding this- and everyone help out... perhaps someone implement a tutorial area and people comment to say what they like/ don't like etc.