Ok,
You all know who you are.

Just about every new/returning player for the last 4 years has come here and had the same complaint: "There is no comprehensive guide!?!"

Every time we say the same Darn thing: "Go read http://www.tw-cabal.com. If you still have a question, do a search in these forums, if you can't find the answer here, then ask us. If the answer is known, it will be answered. If it's not known, someone will do the research and get back to you eventually. (Unless your question is silly) If you can't handle that, then either do your own research, or go away. If you do your own research, please share, but if you don't, nobody will hold it against you."

But, most importantly, we tell people to pair up with someone experienced! Because that encourages people to form teams and play against other teams. It creates new friendships (and new enemies, heh), and it's the best way to learn how to play. You can't learn to play modern TW from a Darn book. I know because I wrote it, and it's not even complete. If you are so socially inept that you can't make a few friends, then maybe we don't want you playing here anyway. I will help out even my most hated enemies when they have game questions. So will Harley. Heck, 99% of this community will. We all learn from each other's mistakes and successes. And we share them. Sometimes you don't get to find out about a new tactic till you are #SD#, but that's called inovation and smart playing, not concealing information.

But you complaining about a situation that isn't going to change isn't going to win you ANY friends here. Unless YOU do some actual work, nobody will take you seriously.

What Akor was doing recently in the tw school forum is a perfect example of what people should do. I applaud his efforts. Someone who took some initiative. Some of it was even new content. And I'll incorporate it into my site soon.

My site (tw-cabal) represents thousands of man hours of trial and error testing by various Trade Warriors. Plus hundreds (thousands counting the times I left an experiment running overnight) of hours of my personal testing, plus hundreds of hours of proofreading and editing and fixing mistakes. And dozens of flame wars that got sparked because I had one tiny thing wrong, or it was out of date, or they disagreed with me, or whatever. There are very few here who have any clue what kind of personal toll tw-cabal has taken on me over the years.

When you complain about the lack of documentation, whether you realize it or not, you are pissing folks like Harley and me off. What documentation there is was made by the us the, the community of players, and paid for with our blood, sweat and tears. I didn't do it for people like you! Be ****ing grateful that it's there at all.

If you want to complain, then complain to JP directly about the lack of documentation. However, before you send off a flame, realize that JP can't do it because JP doesn't even ****ing play. Nor does he have ****ing time. He's working on the NEXT version. So don't ****ing bug him!

You're stuck with us. Deal.
quote:Originally posted by Harley
However, there have been projects to do just that [make documentation for TW] for longer than I've been playing this game, and they always fail when the authors realize the scope of what they're trying to do. I sincerely hope you achieve success in it, but I am going to remain skeptical until I actually see it.
Harley sums it up my feelings pretty well here. I've seen dozens of sites come and go. Some had good content, some had bad. Some plagerized my essays on my site WORD for ****ing WORD, without giving me credit. But eventually, they realize how difficult it really is and they quietly let their domain expire. If you really want better documentation, then feel free to do it yourself. Nobody here is going to stop you. We might even be willing to help. We'll certainly tell you where you have things wrong. Heh. I'd love nothing more than to make tw-cabal and the info contained therein SOMEONE ELSES PROBLEM. I just really don't trust that anyone currently playing is in it for the long haul, or has the time needed to do it right. I almost gave it to Harley not too long ago. And I still might, assuming people like you don't drive him away.

I KNOW how hard it is to put everything that needs to be put in the instructions. I've started that task several times. Finally I just put in a few lines, on my personal server, near the beginning of the twgs\game\twinstr.doc file, right after the "http://www.eisonline.com":

~1 For more current help and player guides, visit:
~1 http://www.tw-cabal.com
~1 If you still have questions, go visit the EIS forums at:
~1 http://www.eisonline.com/twforum/forum.asp?group=1

If every sysop put that in their twinstr.doc, it would save a lot of people a lot of grief. I won't ask JP to put that in, though I wish he would. But there isn't anything stopping the sysops from doing that to their files. (Close the editor once you are done, before you try to look at them, or you will get file not found when you try to read them. heh. Best to make the change while the server is down. The ~1 in front makes it Lt. Blue, so it shows up better in the help file. The forums here don't do it any justice. On my personal server, I put in leading ~1's on all the lines in the file, so it's easier to read. That dark green makes my eyes hurt. heh.)

Oh, one more thing, how did I know what to change? I EXPERIMENTED.

I've printed out the Glossary of turns and have it and the tips in a note book , lives on my computer desk.It has been a great help and has made a world of difference in my playing. Traitor has done a great job with this and other information on his site . I believe about two weeks ago k3 wrote a great article on the differnt types/styles of gridding. There is a world of info out there both at tw-cabal and in the forums. Plus I've learned a lot by corping with other players. (notice I didn't leave myself open by saying " playing with other players" ). One thin I learned is dont' page k3 in the middle of the nite no matter how bad stockton is ripping up the grid

I can't speak for the others, but I can for myself. Thank you for the all hard work you've put into this community. Your site was the first I found after returning, and while I'm still one of the biggest newbs on the planet (going to take a while to solve that one)... I'd have been lost without it (and you in general, you've always been willing to help out on other problems too).

I do suspect that there's a lot of people here, a silent majority across the spectrum of skills, that truely appreciates the work you (and others, Harley, EP, and many many others) do. And altho we're (atleast I am) bad at showing it, I just hope you don't let the occasional criticism drive you away.

Heh. Last thing I want is this thread to become a circle-jerk of praise. That distracts from the message.

Thanks tho! heh.

ah, nothing like a good circle jerk of praise...
heh
traitor, who are you referring to? i must have missed that post in the 153 active posts that i skipped reading, heh.
also, get on icq foo

quote:Originally posted by Traitor

Heh. Last thing I want is this thread to become a circle-jerk of praise. That distracts from the message.

Thanks tho! heh.


k, then:

Noobs, do not go to TW-Cabal.com and read the information there. It will just make your head hurt with what you are reading.

Do not ask players for information - makes you look like a noob.

If information is offered, do just the opposite to show whoever gave the information that you really know what you are doing.

Do not corp with more experienced players who might try and teach you the evil ways of the red.

If you do the above, you will be able to play in a lot more games over a shorter period of time. Of course, you will only play in a game for one day and then have to wait and come back the next day but what the heck - you made someone happy.

Also, if you took the above items seriously, you just may be a true noob.

               / Promethius / Enigma / Wolfen /

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

Promethius does that mean it ok to page k3??

quote:Originally posted by kilroy

Promethius does that mean it ok to page k3??


Kil you crack me up![:D] I like your humor, it is refreshing too! Kinda reminds me of my energizer bunny posts. Heheh.

My freakin head hurts anyway... pass me an advil and keep your Butt away from my pod

quote:Originally posted by kilroy

Promethius does that mean it ok to page k3??


Only if you use an autopager that can page in excess of 10 times per hour between the hours of 2 AM and 6 AM....

               / Promethius / Enigma / Wolfen /

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

systemscript
:top
# Blah...

:wait
killalltriggers
send "'k3 page*"
setDelayTrigger delay :wait 600000
pause