Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 6:55 pm
Follow-up of http://www.freeallegiance.org/forums/index...showtopic=32903 + a more global view.
The need for a community core.
Facts & History:
98% (if not more) of games are played on the same core. Currently this is DN. See http://asgs.alleg.net/asgsnet/factionstats.aspx for last 30 days.
Alleg has a steep learning curve that draw off many newbies. Add to this the way they're treated by some vets. Then add the confusion generated by having many different cores.
Most of these cores as all based on the original MSR core (zone_core): they're not , like in other games, what we could call 'mods'. Only one core so far can be viewed as a mod: the SW core.
So the only reason for all these cores is that, historically, some individuals couldnt work together as a TEAM.
This lead to what we called the 'Cores War'. The peak of this war was the absurd A+/DN fight.
Eventually one side gave up and today DN is the 'de facto' standard core.
But he has numerous balance issues, it's maintened by only person (Noir) who , like everybody else, have other priorities in real live.
On top of that Noir claims some IP/Copyright on DN. This doesnt fit well with the game which fall under a pseudo open source restrictive license (MSR Shared
Source license agreement).
I acknowledge all the work Noir did for this game. Was this all benefit for the game ? Some would say definitly yes, some would say definitly no. I'll say: let's move on and not repeat history.
Status of game
So where are we today? The community is still holding thanks to the "housekeepers" (Thal, Pook and many others involved in running the community).
The players base isnt really getting bigger nor it is getting smaller.
Why ? mainly because most newbies dont stay and the few who stay compensate the few vets who leave or stop playing for a while.
So the player base is some how 'turning in circle'. In fact, it's the whole community that is "turning in circle" for many years now.
Some people are happy with this. Some dont.
Why is this happening ?
There are many reasons of course.
1st, like said earlier, the steep learning curve is the "big wall at the entry where many newbies crash on".
Then there is the quality of the games. Mainly "pickup games" suffer from this. Some vets even only play squad games because of this.
The quality is linked to 2 main factors which are:
1. the fairness of game
This is about skill and game knowledge. This is about 'stacking' and playing with "newbies". This is about 'matching commanders'.
To help solve this, ranks has been introduced.
Ranks movitate a lot of players because it's permanent datas linked to their account. Ranks should give an indication of a player skill and game knowledge but given the game complexity ranks fail to achieve this. So basically ranks only give an information about how long a player has been playing this game, nothing more. So it's only the human knowledge of "who is worth what" that really give players valid information about the fairness of a game.
So it is the IDENTITY of the players which define their potential value not their ranks. But this again is distorted because of the existence of HIDERS.
On top of that, whatever the fairness of the game, the scores will count if it has enough players both side.
Once again this is "turing in circle", the changes made to help with fairness just add more to unfairness because it becomes visible.
2. the balance of the core
Game quality is also greatly affected by balance.
The rare times a "fair game" is setup, it often degenerate to unfair because of choosen factions/tech paths.
This is completly related to the balance of the core and can be solved by wise changes to the core.
This requires extremly good game knowledge from the core developper(s) as well as great availability and response time.
Some would say that only the best commanders and pilots should be involved in the balance.
This is certainly not a 'one man job' but it requires at some point a 'one man decision'.
Other thing that either keep people away or draw off people is the age of the game, that is "it looks old".
This mainly a technical issue that will eventually be solved in time (not 2 weeks ™ for sure /smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile.gif" /> )
Solutions
Given all we've just discussed. Here are some proposal to help improve the game:
S1. Remove all hiders. 1 account = 1 callsign = 1 rank. Change the behavior of the 'boot' and 'ban' commands to avoid be 'locked out' of a game after a ban.
Only admins and '@alleg' should be able to definitly ban someone from a game.
S2. Enforce AutoBalance (AB) to be on for game scores to count. Disallow to turn off AB once the game has started.
S3. Review and change the way stats and ranks are computed. Some people already proposed alternative. There are plenty room here for optimization and accuracy. For instance, a rank 20 player getting 50 kills on (0) and (1) shouldnt get any point at all for these kills.
S4. choose 'one core to rule them all': the "community core" defined like this:
A. the one and only core for which games stats are collected and ranks computed from these stats.
B. the one and only core set on the permanent newbie server(s)
C. the one and only core inline documentation (F1) describes
D. the one and only core CDT & ACS teaching sessions will talk about
E. the one and only core official squad games will use
F. a ZoneLeader (ZL) will be appointed by the community to maintain it and have final word on changes. This ZL can appoint assitants or a full team if he wants. This ZL will also co-decide with the Dev ZL (Dogbones) on code changes that affect balance.
G. no copyright or IP of any kind will be placed on this core
Of course, other cores can still exist and be played on but they should be viewed as 'mods' and treated so.
I mean let's get real here: When you're playing on DN/A+/RPS/God/PC, you're playing the same game.
It's just different balance and a few fatures just because of 'egos/clans/lobby' conflicts.
90% of the players dont care about the core: They want quality not quantity or choice.
Would you like to have 5 versions of ASGS, 5 versions of Allegiance.exe because the dev team couldnt come up with a single solution ?
This madness must end now. It's hurting the game.
The need for a community core.
Facts & History:
98% (if not more) of games are played on the same core. Currently this is DN. See http://asgs.alleg.net/asgsnet/factionstats.aspx for last 30 days.
Alleg has a steep learning curve that draw off many newbies. Add to this the way they're treated by some vets. Then add the confusion generated by having many different cores.
Most of these cores as all based on the original MSR core (zone_core): they're not , like in other games, what we could call 'mods'. Only one core so far can be viewed as a mod: the SW core.
So the only reason for all these cores is that, historically, some individuals couldnt work together as a TEAM.
This lead to what we called the 'Cores War'. The peak of this war was the absurd A+/DN fight.
Eventually one side gave up and today DN is the 'de facto' standard core.
But he has numerous balance issues, it's maintened by only person (Noir) who , like everybody else, have other priorities in real live.
On top of that Noir claims some IP/Copyright on DN. This doesnt fit well with the game which fall under a pseudo open source restrictive license (MSR Shared
Source license agreement).
I acknowledge all the work Noir did for this game. Was this all benefit for the game ? Some would say definitly yes, some would say definitly no. I'll say: let's move on and not repeat history.
Status of game
So where are we today? The community is still holding thanks to the "housekeepers" (Thal, Pook and many others involved in running the community).
The players base isnt really getting bigger nor it is getting smaller.
Why ? mainly because most newbies dont stay and the few who stay compensate the few vets who leave or stop playing for a while.
So the player base is some how 'turning in circle'. In fact, it's the whole community that is "turning in circle" for many years now.
Some people are happy with this. Some dont.
Why is this happening ?
There are many reasons of course.
1st, like said earlier, the steep learning curve is the "big wall at the entry where many newbies crash on".
Then there is the quality of the games. Mainly "pickup games" suffer from this. Some vets even only play squad games because of this.
The quality is linked to 2 main factors which are:
1. the fairness of game
This is about skill and game knowledge. This is about 'stacking' and playing with "newbies". This is about 'matching commanders'.
To help solve this, ranks has been introduced.
Ranks movitate a lot of players because it's permanent datas linked to their account. Ranks should give an indication of a player skill and game knowledge but given the game complexity ranks fail to achieve this. So basically ranks only give an information about how long a player has been playing this game, nothing more. So it's only the human knowledge of "who is worth what" that really give players valid information about the fairness of a game.
So it is the IDENTITY of the players which define their potential value not their ranks. But this again is distorted because of the existence of HIDERS.
On top of that, whatever the fairness of the game, the scores will count if it has enough players both side.
Once again this is "turing in circle", the changes made to help with fairness just add more to unfairness because it becomes visible.
2. the balance of the core
Game quality is also greatly affected by balance.
The rare times a "fair game" is setup, it often degenerate to unfair because of choosen factions/tech paths.
This is completly related to the balance of the core and can be solved by wise changes to the core.
This requires extremly good game knowledge from the core developper(s) as well as great availability and response time.
Some would say that only the best commanders and pilots should be involved in the balance.
This is certainly not a 'one man job' but it requires at some point a 'one man decision'.
Other thing that either keep people away or draw off people is the age of the game, that is "it looks old".
This mainly a technical issue that will eventually be solved in time (not 2 weeks ™ for sure /smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile.gif" /> )
Solutions
Given all we've just discussed. Here are some proposal to help improve the game:
S1. Remove all hiders. 1 account = 1 callsign = 1 rank. Change the behavior of the 'boot' and 'ban' commands to avoid be 'locked out' of a game after a ban.
Only admins and '@alleg' should be able to definitly ban someone from a game.
S2. Enforce AutoBalance (AB) to be on for game scores to count. Disallow to turn off AB once the game has started.
S3. Review and change the way stats and ranks are computed. Some people already proposed alternative. There are plenty room here for optimization and accuracy. For instance, a rank 20 player getting 50 kills on (0) and (1) shouldnt get any point at all for these kills.
S4. choose 'one core to rule them all': the "community core" defined like this:
A. the one and only core for which games stats are collected and ranks computed from these stats.
B. the one and only core set on the permanent newbie server(s)
C. the one and only core inline documentation (F1) describes
D. the one and only core CDT & ACS teaching sessions will talk about
E. the one and only core official squad games will use
F. a ZoneLeader (ZL) will be appointed by the community to maintain it and have final word on changes. This ZL can appoint assitants or a full team if he wants. This ZL will also co-decide with the Dev ZL (Dogbones) on code changes that affect balance.
G. no copyright or IP of any kind will be placed on this core
Of course, other cores can still exist and be played on but they should be viewed as 'mods' and treated so.
I mean let's get real here: When you're playing on DN/A+/RPS/God/PC, you're playing the same game.
It's just different balance and a few fatures just because of 'egos/clans/lobby' conflicts.
90% of the players dont care about the core: They want quality not quantity or choice.
Would you like to have 5 versions of ASGS, 5 versions of Allegiance.exe because the dev team couldnt come up with a single solution ?
This madness must end now. It's hurting the game.