Of course playing with people that do these things would be the most
efficient way, but playing against them doesn't teach a whole lot.
From another corp perspective, all you really see is a fleet of ships
getting built faster than your own. If you're lucky enough to stumble
onto one of their trading areas then maybe learn some stuff that way,
but the odds of that are small until you figure out better ways of
hunting and gridding and managing your turns.

I don't think anybody is asking to have their hand held "all the time."
Just someone to go over the stuff and say "Ok, this is what this is...
this is how we use it, here are some things to consider." I got lucky
and found a few people (on this forum, you know who you are, thanks!)
that were willing to do that and now I'm finally surviving more than a
week in most games. But there's a lot of other players that don't get
that and end up leaving or moving to slower games.

The alternative is spending a year or more hashing stuff out and getting
things down. That's fine, and I'll probably do that to some degree, but
I do understand why a lot of other players don't (it's a huge time
commitment, real life does get in the way) and why the creativity or
atleast breadth of techniques used has decreased as the older players
retire and nobody has yet to fill their shoes.

One can read a glossary and charts and graphs all day long, but until
someone says "Ok, if you surround a ship first it can't flee... so use
this, assign it to a macro in your term, and then attack to kill." most
of it doesn't translate.

quote:Originally posted by Harley Nuss (teamEIS)

I know with me personally the reason I don't make writeups on how to do stuff isn't because I want some advantage, it's just because I'm too lazy to take the time It takes hours to do a detailed walkthrough on a fairly limited area. As you increase the possible outcomes and difficulties that may arise, the time needed increases exponentially.
Harley, you have this wonderful way of making HUGE understatements. The MCIC section of my site represents a coupla hundred hours of testing alone. It's not that you are lazy, it's that I'm insane.

I must have about 10 unfinished projects/guides just idling there on my site, waiting for me to get the motivation to finish them. It's a ton of work, and I'm discovering that some of what's on my site is out of date. What worked well 2-4 years ago, doesn't work as well today. So, in addition to the unfinished projects, I'm looking at doing some serious rewrites to several areas. And once you DO write something, you have to get it edited by several people at varying skill levels, to be sure that 1) everyone can understand it, and 2) that it's accurate.

And then, to top it all off, even when you do everything right, the general consensus it that the info is both accurate and understandable, you still get tons of people who don't read it, don't get it, or don't do it.

"but playing against them doesn't teach a whole lot."

incorrect.
if i am playing someone better than me... i have to be at the top of my game to stay alive i have been forced many a time to be very creative, to think outside my limited box, and to be lightning at keys.
if i had been playin people with *no* skill, i could be sloppy and uncaring and still win without learning.
also, if you get capped, or see an enemy do something you don't know how they did it... ask.
i answer 100% of the time.
if i see someone make a mistake, or do something poorly, and i take advantage of it, i will inform that person (if they are not #sd# yet, heh) of their mistake.
some people are reseptive and are like "wow... never thought of that, thanks! see u next game!"
others are like "you jerk! i hate you! leave us newbs alone! blah blah blah"
guess which ones become better players?

heh, I find that most players anymore want to call me smug, conceited, and other worse names when I point out that they're doing something poorly.

Well, slim, you know enough to be able to raise your play a level.
And to some extent you can pick things up watching others play,
but the experience of putting knowledge into play is not something
you can learn from the sidelines. Besides, winners want the ball.

Yes, some new players are rude. Heck, some old players are rude.
But some of us new folks aren't and would just like to learn the
game. Yes after getting beaten (if you're not completely dead)
then you can ask the people that beat you where you went wrong.
And lord knows I've done my share of that, but all I'm asking is
to take a minute and recognize that when dealing with a sense
of reduced skill among new players in general, that road is a
two-way street.

No kidding what is all this harassment and instant capping of new players anyways, are the elites actually worried that if they let their guard down or give even the slightest degree of lee-way, the newbian's will actually end up winning? As if, heh! [:O]

" No kidding what is all this harassment and instant capping of new players anyways, are the elites actually worried that if they let their guard down or give even the slightest degree of lee-way, the newbian's will actually end up winning? As if, heh! "

i pwn n00bs


"heh, I find that most players anymore want to call me smug, conceited, and other worse names when I point out that they're doing something poorly."

harley, i say it out of love
hehe

Singularity has it right on.
It is a two-way street. But first you have to want to learn. If this is not priority 1 then whenever you get podded or #SD# and your first reaction is Darn I got killed I think I'll move on your not learning anything.

Kemp can back me up I fscked up TCW2 by not hitting the correct keys and I got called on the carpet for it. For this I went and whined because I thought it wasn't "MY" fault. It was my fault; and I was wrong to go and whine but I did learn something. Thanks to Psi and Speed Demon for pointing out the errors of my ways. I listened and think I am a better player for it. But at the heat of the moment I whined and said the infamous line "I hit the wrong key(s)" . I don't like making mistakes that hurt someone else so I try and minimize my mistakes, therefore I put forth the effort to not make the same mistakes but it seems that there are others that aren't putting the same effort into improving themselves.

Yes I am lazy and want to be spoonfed the elaborate details of each and every edit there is, but because I am lazy I want someone else to do it for me. IMHO this applies to probably 75-95% of the players here. We all want to reap the rewards but and don't want to do the work.

IMHO that is what is wrong with TradeWars the elite do the work and the wannabe's want to take the work and call themselves superior to those that are truly noobs.

A Noob is someone that is playing by trial and error and whining when they get ptorped or #SD# without realizing that there are people more dedicated to learning the idiosyncrocies of the game.

Maniac (permanent Noob) potential Noob++ because I have learned that you last longer in games if you apply what you learn.

Caution this post was written while poster was under the influence of a legal drug and may cause blindness, hairy palms, irregular heartbeat, skin rashes and an inability to get an erection.

"IMHO that is what is wrong with TradeWars the elite do the work and the wannabe's want to take the work and call themselves superior to those that are truly noobs."

shhh, u are letting my secret out

If you have hairy palms and the inability to get an erection, you are
doing something wrong. =)

I would say 85% of the game maybe more to becoming as good player is learning to read the edits.

if you can't read edits, you will lose everygame (unless you play by yourself)

Sinularity, I am alittle past on reading these posts so this might have aliready been said by someone else up ahead of what I have yet to read, But I will say this half the time the newbs or newer players are getting beat or outcashed in place of asking how or why they whine and complain and quit the game instead of asking on here or in the game for that matter, K3 has always answered my icq's with a question might take him 6 hrs heh but I get a reply and he always explains to me what I asked, It's not a matter of not knowing it's a matter of not asking the right questions to learn what you do not know.

heh, I normally respond right away if I'm actually here when I get a message.

quote:Originally posted by Slim Shady

u are starting in the correct place.
read tw-cabal
after that, get into games with good players (on your corp, and on opposing corps) and just spend a buncha time at keys watching and learning.


As much as it bothers me to ever agree with Slim....he is correct. TW like any other game I have ever played requires time and study to be good. I spent hours reading, watching, and asking questions. My ICQ is in my profile, and plenty of people ICQ me with game mechanics questions, and I'm happy to answer. I'm sure there are many others who would do the same. Back in the day when Space Tyrants played, I often contacted them or K3 when I had questions. While I don't play TW really, I could still tell you the calculations behind most of the TW cashing / gridding / etc methods used today.

If you want to get better, read and ask questions, if you don't, well I guess that is your choice. I would say play on a PvE server, but that wouldn't make much sense to people

- Jhereg