A collective response to TWD

[Shadowmere]

Lately there's been a baffling amount of negative public feedback on certain issues with TWD.
Some are taking things out of context and blindly blaming a cause for a certain item or change that is recent.

So here's some thoughts from my head; facts, issues we have to tackle, things to consider and what I wish to happen.

First off, none of the TWD changes I make out of the blue, solo, without long and thorough consideration.

TWD Roster Limit was in my mind since December when I came back. The longer I held it off, the more I had players asking me for it. A few captains and TWD Staff to name some.
I made some calculations back then with a very strict (original idea for the limit) cap of 20 players for each squad:



With the current cap of 30 players, and even before, some expressed the need for an "inactive roster". I upped the original 20 to 30 with that in mind...
I'm not opposed to, if we absolutely feel it neccessary, to up the limit to 35.

However - here's a little ball to you players - with the amount of people saying how there's just not enough good captains to run squads, why aren't you supporting that cause? A couple of you have said how you're starting new squads and then left them after 2 days. Have some patience and will to see things through.
With the few "inactives" that come online once a week and want to play a game, create a junior squad for them and the ones who can't fit your primary team. Play it like a junior and primary league of sports. Those inactives do not after all affect your squad's total activity.
I know for a fact Lego has 3 active captains and a couple more in their ranks capable and willing to captain that squad. Especially when Lego has announced a legit concern of not being able to fit out-of-zone players (EGers) to their roster with the cap.

Now you can call it pride or whatever, but a 3 week testing with other distractions like TWL being announced isn't enough to see if things work out.
There is now finally a squad coming again who is picking the "rejects" and other free players. With TWL squads dropping those who don't fit in, it just might bring some more TWD squads around.

TWD resolution limit was tested for 2-3 weeks in the years past, and was reversed due to the loud minority. But as things stand now with the change, it hasn't affected player scores, and while it's not a 100 more players playing TWDD, it is a few who didn't before.
Yes, it might change the gameplay, and that was something noted in the poll itself. We're still following closely what all the changes result in.


I've bounced the idea of double squadding back and forth for a long time now. But it's something that if we go for, we'll never be able to come back from without massive issues.
It's next to impossible to modify the current system to allow 1 player name on 2 rosters. That would be the optimal.
And if we allow 1 player to register 2 names, if we were to ever come back from that, it'd require tens of hours of work from TWD staff to reset the doubles.
Or another choice which would make things even worse was that we'd completely reset TWD registrations. Which meant we'd most likely never get most of the players back to TWD at all.
BUT -- The idea of player borrowing, which I agreed was a good idea on April 3rd is being looked at. Unfortunately there's only 2 people who can make it happen, and they're also concentrating on about 127 other projects in Trench Wars.
Player borrowing has none of double squadding's downsides, nor not nearly as many.

Regarding what I considered the priority since the start of the year, TWD Ratings, I've been waiting just as you all have. It needs to be tested, and the only good time for that is once TWL starts. With the uncertainty of TWL throughout the last few months, we've been able to do nothing.
Once it's in and working right, asap, we'll work towards incentive for active playing.

Whatever "zone squads" some fantasize about, no one's stopping you from making that happen. But staff changing the current TWD (the squads) for such an ultimate end-of-times desperation move isn't in the radar yet. Not with the effort we've been putting to other things that aren't out yet.

At the end of the day, there's a massive amount of things players can do themselves, that have a huge impact on how things will look in the future.

[mtine]

That has to be the most useless thread I have ever read in my life.

Tl;dr Staff sux, players should do all the work for them.

[Turban]

the vast majority of our player base consists of casual players who log in once a blue moon to play games with their friends. this category of players includes both veteran and new players alike, and thus most squads tend to only have a small pool of active players on their roster while the inactive ones act as pillars of support to ensure the squad still gets a steady flow of games on a daily or weekly basis. these players actually add up a significant amount of extra games per month, thus prolonging the longevity of squads and boosting the satisfaction levels of all the players.

Cobra as an example has been trying to balance out the new talents while being considerate towards the veteran players who have been loyal and supportive to the squad for years, and this mentality has definitely affected us in a negative way when considering the overall squad activity. it simply doesn't feel right to remove old players from the roster simply because they are inactive and only log in few times a month. unfortunately that has made us lose on the opportunity of playing a TWBD match several times in the past month due to not having enough players on the roster despite the chat being littered with players from other zones wanting to play the game. it's a sorry situation to be in.

we all understand that the goal of roster limits is to ultimately create more squads, and thus it acts as an added incentive for players to create more squads with the excess players. unfortunately it's a deep-rooted problem and not easily solved. i can't help but to feel that you rushed the decision by not including a means for squads to remain active after the roster limits were put in place. there should have been a contiguity plan of sorts to ensure that the teams still get the necessary games in all divisions in order to stay happy. ideally there would have been additional roster slots for legacy players or additional roster slots for new talent to be trained. this would have solved all the issues if released on the same day as roster limits. player borrowing would have also been a great option to include before creating the roster limits even though it does take away from the squad integrity which is fine given the current state of the game. i'm not the biggest fan of the double squadding option and feel it should only be used as last resort when everything else fails.

you can't really ask the squads to create a farm squad unless you are willing to allow the entire team to double squad on a different name and squad tag, and that is already a huge hassle to deal with for all the players and staff alike.

the players who get removed from squads are most of the time the inactive kind, thus you can't rely on those players to create more squads. you either need the community to step up to create more squads that last for a long time, or alternatively you can assign your TWD operator team the job of forming more squads to boost the activity.

[Voth]

should remove roster cap all together

honestly, game is dying and death will not be reversed. it is at the point where we should just enjoy whatever time is left.





choo choo

[Jones]

TWD resolution limit was tested for 2-3 weeks in the years past, and was reversed due to the loud minority.

I'd like to point out that people in favor of the resolution cap has always been in the majority in the past if you look at polls anyway. it has just been recently that people are more in favor of the removal because:
1. new(ish) monitors have become cheaper
2. the twlj/twlb resolution cap was taken off
3. players overall becoming increasingly inactive. (entire rosters of qs, heavy, sweet etc. with a few notable exceptions who were for the cap have quit or just rarely log on)

as for the junior squads, how about just use the twl roster limit as your main team and remove limits in twd. there's your inactive/other zone players(junior squad) playing twd and your active core/greats playing twl. mix and match them together and people can prac without splitting players up causing headaches when you want to bd but only got 4.

[Voth]

as for the junior squads, how about just use the twl roster limit as your main team and remove limits in twd. there's your inactive/other zone players(junior squad) playing twd and your active core/greats playing twl. mix and match them together and people can prac without splitting players up causing headaches when you want to bd but only got 4.

this

[mtine]

Nicely put Jones but I think Shadow just won't listen to reason anymore because, let's be honest here, he just doesn't care anymore.

[Jones]

Nicely put Jones but I think Shadow just won't listen to reason anymore because, let's be honest here, he just doesn't care anymore.

I don't think he would put that kind of effort in his post if he didn't care. though there are less than 30 people per squad active (usually the active core is about half of that) I mean people that play everyday. I don't think captains want to split their focus into 2 squads. especially not now when twl is about to start. the cold hard fact here is that if 1 twd game == food then squads are slowly but surely starving to death.

The goal here is to make twd active. by any means necessary. squad captains and others have empirical and statistical evidence of roster-limits not working.

Let's make TW great again!

[Turban]

in a dream world every squad would have 30 active players logging on every day, and we would never run out of the games to play. unfortunately that dream will never turn into reality. the truth is that most players are not committing much of their free time into this game, and thus are rightfully labelled as inactive players with their sporadical login times. most squads do not have a super active core of players and members, thus they need the support of a bigger roster with multiple inactive members in order to remain active and happy.

what we need to do is get rid of that deluded thought process where you somehow assume that every player is actively playing this game on a day-to-day basis. it simply is not the case.

[Dreamwin]

+1 to every post by turban.

Appreciate ur time and efforts "trying" to make game better but it isnt working and It is quite obvious. Is there even one other person atm who supports the limit in twd?

For Twl/twdt it is easy to succesfully have strict limits because games are scheduled to one specific date and time. Twd needs those inactive fillers who are the crucial 1/2 players when squads are trying to find enough for games.

The times have changed, the player base has aged and people still play but not as actively as in 2010.

Admit the mistake and bring to twd back to life.

[Crescent Seal]

Admit the mistake and bring to twd back to life.

his ego is too high to do such a thing. like i said in another thread:

1. remove twd roster limits
2. put a res cap back in arenas twdd and twdd2, keep twdd3 without a cap
3. revert back to the old spawn system for twdd
4. allow dsing or atleast experiment with letting players play MORE by not being restricted to 1 squad
5. implement scores above radar in everything

[forwards]

[QUOTE=mtine;899324]Tl;dr Staff sux, players should do all the work for them./QUOTE]
Players should do all the work for ourselves.
We the players, For the players, By the players.

[mtine]

Yes, for the players. But we are restricted. We can barely breathe. Like, you toss an idea out there that's kinda good and the majority of players likes it, but if 1 staffer doesn't we are doomed. That's TW democracy for you.

[forwards]

+1

Preach.

[kthx]

The problem is this dipshit has always had a dream about how twd should be. In years past as jones so eloquently put people who werent dipshits were here to make sure that dipshit x and y werent in charge and didnt have the power to make dipshit decisions. Anyways, now dipshit y kissed enough ass on staff to be able to do these things and is shocked his dipshit ideas dont work. Even though intelligent players told him for years they wouldnt work. The point is nobody was there to tell staff they were dipshits, they axed anyone with balls and now twd operator shadowmere and the rest of staff can ride the rainbow terrier into this games final sunset. And instead of a happy ending it will be a trail of tears as they still try to force retarded fucking changes like it will help anything. Best bet is like was said before let people do what the fuck they want while the game dies, and shadowmere, apply for the ss council and may you live forever.