I have a suggestion for future versions of tw. Through the years the biggest complaint I've had from new players is stardock blockades. My suggestion is to extend fed space sectors to 17 including the sectors immediately surrounding the stardock. Either that or make the other 2 class 0 port into full fledged stardocks also and include them as fed space sectors. No fighter deployement another words. Maybe this will be to complicated to do, but I think this would really relieve the problem of stardock blockades.
Waiting for input...

quote:Originally posted by Big_D

I have a suggestion for future versions of tw. Through the years the biggest complaint I've had from new players is stardock blockades. My suggestion is to extend fed space sectors to 17 including the sectors immediately surrounding the stardock. Either that or make the other 2 class 0 port into full fledged stardocks also and include them as fed space sectors. No fighter deployement another words. Maybe this will be to complicated to do, but I think this would really relieve the problem of stardock blockades.
Waiting for input...


I'm not sure if I understand you right or not, but it would appear that it would simply take more fighters/time to create the blockade due to the additional sectors.

               / Promethius / Enigma / Wolfen /

"A man who has no skills can be taught, a man who has no honor has nothing."

Well, Prome... can't drop figs in fedspace. Laff, I think that's what he's saying.

Part of getting into stardock is learning how to time or coordinate things w/ your corpies. No blockade is 100% effective, the best you can hope to do is prevent access to dock for a certain amount of time (like blowing dock, for instance) and convert that time advantage into something better. I'm not a fan of the "change the game to coddle inexperienced players" approach. By the time a serious blockade is up, the game is probably closed to new players anyway. No amount of play @ stardock can degrid the universe or disable a player's CIM.

Reading:
http://tw-cabal.com/strategy/blockade.html

If a player can't be futz'd to sit and read a few pages of how-to, no amount of changing the game is ever going to help them.

If a sysop wants to build a universe that prevents fig blockades of stardock then they are free to do so by moving dock adj to fedspace. Of course that won't stop haz blockades, so sysops need to give their new players enough ftrs to survive that experience too. Also helps to make starter ships greater than 1.3 def odds so they can survive some offensive ftrs on the way out of dock. While you're at it disable photons and make lv6's take an eternity to develop. Then hope you can get enough decent players to think that kind of play is "fun."

I guess where I'm going with this is: It's the player's responsibility to get better at the game, not the game designer's to make the game easier. Sysops are in the middle, with the ability to make changes based on their personal tastes... but even then, blockades can never be 100% effective nor can they ever be 100% eliminated. There's always a way to blockade something, always a way around it for the determined.

If, as a more experienced player, you want to help these newer players out... you are free to do so. You can recommend to sysops certain changes in the edit or map. You can recommend rules. You can
recommend boosting the strength of stardock and the class 0s. You can provide reading to new players as they come in or provide links to useful scripts to help them get better.

quote:Originally posted by Promethius

quote:Originally posted by Big_D

I have a suggestion for future versions of tw. Through the years the biggest complaint I've had from new players is stardock blockades. My suggestion is to extend fed space sectors to 17 including the sectors immediately surrounding the stardock. Either that or make the other 2 class 0 port into full fledged stardocks also and include them as fed space sectors. No fighter deployement another words. Maybe this will be to complicated to do, but I think this would really relieve the problem of stardock blockades.
Waiting for input...


I'm not sure if I understand you right or not, but it would appear that it would simply take more fighters/time to create the blockade due to the additional sectors.

What I'm saying is that they couldn't block 1 sector (the backdoor) and sit at the stardock and get them adjacent. More sectors to protect means harder stardock blockades. Plus all the sectors would be cleared at extern. Or like I said, turn the other 2 class 0's into fed space and stardocks also. Would be hard to be in 3 places at 1 time.

quote:Originally posted by Singularity

Well, Prome... can't drop figs in fedspace. Laff, I think that's what he's saying.

Part of getting into stardock is learning how to time or coordinate things w/ your corpies. No blockade is 100% effective, the best you can hope to do is prevent access to dock for a certain amount of time (like blowing dock, for instance) and convert that time advantage into something better. I'm not a fan of the "change the game to coddle inexperienced players" approach. By the time a serious blockade is up, the game is probably closed to new players anyway. No amount of play @ stardock can degrid the universe or disable a player's CIM.

Reading:
http://tw-cabal.com/strategy/blockade.html

If a player can't be futz'd to sit and read a few pages of how-to, no amount of changing the game is ever going to help them.

If a sysop wants to build a universe that prevents fig blockades of stardock then they are free to do so by moving dock adj to fedspace. Of course that won't stop haz blockades, so sysops need to give their new players enough ftrs to survive that experience too. Also helps to make starter ships greater than 1.3 def odds so they can survive some offensive ftrs on the way out of dock. While you're at it disable photons and make lv6's take an eternity to develop. Then hope you can get enough decent players to think that kind of play is "fun."

I guess where I'm going with this is: It's the player's responsibility to get better at the game, not the game designer's to make the game easier. Sysops are in the middle, with the ability to make changes based on their personal tastes... but even then, blockades can never be 100% effective nor can they ever be 100% eliminated. There's always a way to blockade something, always a way around it for the determined.

If, as a more experienced player, you want to help these newer players out... you are free to do so. You can recommend to sysops certain changes in the edit or map. You can recommend rules. You can
recommend boosting the strength of stardock and the class 0s. You can provide reading to new players as they come in or provide links to useful scripts to help them get better.



I'm talking as a sysop. I think that a new player comes in, doesn't know anyone to corp with, and goes for the stardock 3 days straight and gets killed, he might decide right off the bat that this game isn't for him. As far as edits by sysops, most of the sysops don't have time to edit each game for newbs every time. Some barely have time to bang the game. I'm saying it would help out a lot if the game was organized to help the sysops out some in this case. Your right, a player needs to learn the game, but most won't even make the effort is they find they don't have a chance at all. Oh well, I guess the game has enough players?

quote:Oh well, I guess the game has enough players?

*rolls eyes* Drama queen. Most people don't get chased off because
they get killed once and decide to quit, if that was the case nobody
would be playing today. I reject that argument on it's face. If
you're so worried about new players quitting then corp w/ them and
show them what to do.

quote:
As far as edits by sysops, most of the sysops don't have time to edit each game for newbs every time.


Or they could just use a .TWA file and import the settings. You don't
think edits are all done by hand do you?

quote:Would be hard to be in 3 places at 1 time.

No it's not. Warp-n-torp. By the time someone knows how to
lawnmow they know how to watch out for a blockade... well,
atleast they should.

quote:Originally posted by Singularity

quote:Oh well, I guess the game has enough players?

*rolls eyes* Drama queen. Most people don't get chased off because
they get killed once and decide to quit, if that was the case nobody
would be playing today. I reject that argument on it's face. If
you're so worried about new players quitting then corp w/ them and
show them what to do.

quote:
As far as edits by sysops, most of the sysops don't have time to edit each game for newbs every time.


Or they could just use a .TWA file and import the settings. You don't
think edits are all done by hand do you?

quote:Would be hard to be in 3 places at 1 time.

No it's not. Warp-n-torp. By the time someone knows how to
lawnmow they know how to watch out for a blockade... well,
atleast they should.


The 1st post I made was basically for JP and the EIS developers directly involved with making game changes. If you're not directly involved and you have a suggestion, please direct it toward the people that it should be directed toward. Thanks but no thanks.

quote:Originally posted by Big_D


Waiting for input...



.. you didnt say from who, so next time maybe you should say "Waiting for input from JP..."

quote:Originally posted by LoCuTiS

quote:Originally posted by Big_D


Waiting for input...



.. you didnt say from who, so next time maybe you should say "Waiting for input from JP..."


Actually I thought this was the section of the forum that was for registered owners of twgs and tw code. Meant for just making suggestions and reporting bugs to EIS and other registered owners. Didn't know it was general discussion. Maybe I read it wrong.

you made a suggestion, they added on to your suggestion with suggestions

quote:Originally posted by LoCuTiS

what if we are registered owners of twgs.. then can we comment on a post not directed at any one person?

If you are a registered owner, then I would say this section of the forum was meant for you also. I don't think the forum was meant for anyone to sit around waiting on someone to post a suggestion so it can be belittled tho. I'm not going to continue this in this section, so this will be my last post on this.

Well Big_D, I am a registered owner of a TWGS server, gold codes and the whole package, so I guess my opinion can matter here. Laff. Why mess w/ the server to add a feature that sysops can already do thru existing features?

I think that's the most relevant question. Why would a sysop need this feature? Why should JP and crew take their time to add it when it already exists au natural? I suppose a TWA flag that says "Put SD near fedspace automatically" could be useful for edit designers, but adding 7 more fedspace sectors just seems like a messy way of doing it.

quote:Originally posted by Singularity

quote:Oh well, I guess the game has enough players?

*rolls eyes* Drama queen. Most people don't get chased off because
they get killed once and decide to quit, if that was the case nobody
would be playing today. I reject that argument on it's face. If
you're so worried about new players quitting then corp w/ them and
show them what to do.


Well this is not true I have had countless icq, emails etc on players that come in and try to p[lay and are alone and they die 1 or many times but yes some learn and come back but Many leave. A lot of scripts are available but until u learn how to use them or how to macro in sometimes they get fustratred and leave. But on a lot of blockades pings make a big difference on what u can and can not do and if u have to wait for help or to join a corp to get to sd or wait tell extern then game could be pretty much overnot sur emore fed space would be an answer but things do need to change or people will keep leaving or not start playing.

River Rat

quote:Originally posted by River Rat

quote:Originally posted by Singularity

quote:Oh well, I guess the game has enough players?

*rolls eyes* Drama queen. Most people don't get chased off because
they get killed once and decide to quit, if that was the case nobody
would be playing today. I reject that argument on it's face. If
you're so worried about new players quitting then corp w/ them and
show them what to do.


Well this is not true I have had countless icq, emails etc on players that come in and try to p[lay and are alone and they die 1 or many times but yes some learn and come back but Many leave. A lot of scripts are available but until u learn how to use them or how to macro in sometimes they get fustratred and leave. But on a lot of blockades pings make a big difference on what u can and can not do and if u have to wait for help or to join a corp to get to sd or wait tell extern then game could be pretty much overnot sur emore fed space would be an answer but things do need to change or people will keep leaving or not start playing.

River Rat


Yeah What RR said, I am a sysop as well, and things do need some change so as to draw more people to the game. Maybe sysops all should have at least one Newbie game on the server, and post the rules, and enforce them on the newb games. Just a thought for all. I plan on putting back up, my Newbie Training grounds on my server again.

quote:Originally posted by Singularity

Well Big_D, I am a registered owner of a TWGS server, gold codes and the whole package, so I guess my opinion can matter here. Laff. Why mess w/ the server to add a feature that sysops can already do thru existing features?

I think that's the most relevant question. Why would a sysop need this feature? Why should JP and crew take their time to add it when it already exists au natural? I suppose a TWA flag that says "Put SD near fedspace automatically" could be useful for edit designers, but adding 7 more fedspace sectors just seems like a messy way of doing it.



Putting the stardock next to fed space is one answer, but then again, if not done right, it will create black holes, screw up ztm's, and cause all sort of problems. If there were a feature that would bang the SD next to fed space without problems, maybe that would work. Not all sysops know these things.