Warlords Team Democracy Game?

[Paddy]

Originally posted by nugog


Umm - I am in both games.

The SPDG is still trucking along nicely.

The Team DG - is moving along, and we can debate the pace of it 'till the cows come home, but the pace still will not change IMHO.

The ISDG is also moving along nicely as well - I'm playing in that as well.

So before you say - how can you play in three and want a fourth and give them the attention they deserve.

Simple - I am currently Pres in the SPDG - that gets a fair amount of my attention - but I play that with OTHER people who have their own strengths and we farm out the duties.

The Team DG - well, I am new in the team, so I have my say, but again the team has people in it with lots of strengths.

The ISDG - well lets just say this - that game has some very, very knowledgeable players, so again I put my two cents in, listen to others opinions and we go from there.

That leaves me plenty of time for this wee exercise in mayhem.

hehe indeed

and why not have many civ games being played at a civ game site

struth we got forums here for so so many things that are non-civ



Game On...

[Locutus]

Here's the thing. We want this to happen and we want this to succeed, but we also don't want this to harm the rest of the community. Some experienced DGers have come forward and expressed their concerns, we take that seriously -- just as we take you guys seriously when you want to start a new game (you've brought up some compelling arguments as well).

The thing is, 19 players isn't a whole lot, especially considering that it took you going on 4 weeks to get that number and past precedence shows that at least 50% of the people who sign up end up doing little to nothing for the game. I don't doubt people like Paddy, Zoid, nunog, etc will be active but there are enough unknowns -- even if people have the best intentions sh*t happens. In fact, every DG I've been involved in or have followed with that low a number of players ended up being abandoned despite the players' best intentions. Of course, that's not necessarily a reason not to allow this: even if it gives a few people 6 months of entertainment before it dies out, that's still 6 months of entertainment. But compared to 19 players 4 or 5 people offering objections is a big percentage. And they do make a valid point: I would find it highly surprising if this didn't end up hurting the other DGs at least to some degree. Again, not necessarily a bad thing as those games might be on life support anyway, but those games do involve considerably more people than this one does so far.

So for now we feel we just don't have enough information to make a decision. To map better how people feel about this issue, I've started a poll in the Team-Democracy Game forum here to find out exactly how other DGers feel about this -- that is after all the democratic thing to do Please go there to vote and explain your viewpoint if you haven't already and we'll see where it goes. Also feel free to promote the thread among other DGers to get as many people as possible involved in the vote/discussion (I'll do my share of promoting as well). Rest assured that we'll be following that thread very closely and base our decision on its outcome (though we will be the ones interpreting the outcome). Again, I stress that we do want this to happen, as long as it doesn't hurt other DGs too much.

[fed1943]

Ladies, Gentlemen and Mr. Locutus

Just read the post of Mr.Locutus, that tells I need the authorization

of some "experienced DGers" and some "notables" (are they the

same?) to play a game.

That is too much for me.

I will say nothing about the argued damage I would cause to don't

know who by playing said game.

Not even I want to say anything about damage that the post I

answer to can do.

I just want to let you all know that right now I interrupt my

participation in any game in this site.

And I wait a word from the gentlemen owners of this site to

make my mind if I must, or not, keep my current position

concerning said site.

I present you all my best regards,

[Kuciwalker]

I'm trying understand that... I think he said he was threatening to stop posting if we didn't create the forum? Errr, ok, go ahead.

[ChrisiusMaximus]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
I'm trying understand that... I think he said he was threatening to stop posting if we didn't create the forum? Errr, ok, go ahead.

How very friendly of you, he is superb bloke a very important player in the SPDG, English is not his first language and so his posts need to be carefully considered sometimes to fully understand a point he tries to make.

A fair few people at this site have great respect for Fed myself included but you come in here and oh so kindly say ok go away se if we care, well some of us do !

Best thing of all is your not even signed up to play this when Fed is, I think that means his post is far more topic related than yours is or will ever be !

[ChrisiusMaximus]

Hey Zoid I reckon CGN would be very happy to host this game for you

[E_T]

O.k., here is my take on this. For one thing, I agree with Klor, Tass, Snoop & Krill on various points. Here is my take on this:

1) For one thing, the C4DG is not dying nor is it (Currently) in any danger of dying. Save turn around has actually been speeding up (I know, because I play them alot of the time for my team). Filing the reports, for the other team members, IMHO is the biggest time hog, for the turnplayer.

Granted, there has been lack of public postings in the main forum, due to the fact that the Continents that some of the teams are on don't have Contact AND the various teams seem to want to refrain from public discussion that until contact is made. But that doesn't mean that there isn't things going on behind the various "locked doors" in the private team forums.

But, the game is still in it's early stages. We have just completed turn 53 and are going strong. IIRC, there is only one team that isn't taking any new members, but the remaining teams all will welcome new people.

The Purpose of a DG is to learn from each other. And new people always bring in new ideas, no matter if dealing with Military Units, National Economy, Diplomatic exchanges or just to help play the turn in a timely fashion. There is always a need for new people, because RL does happen and people's participation levels do change. Beleave it or not, sometimes a fresh perspective can make a huge difference in the direction of some teams.

For instance, in the C3CDG, Team Babylon's Diplomatic people were starting to have some RL issues AND just general burnout. We were well into the game and had Golden Bear join our team. He jumped into the diplo role with huge gusto and brought a level of humor to our team, when it was greatly needed. Hehe, we even named our Golden Age after Him (the Age of the Golden Bear we called it, IIRC).

So, even in a game that is much further along, new people can and do contribute and are welcome. They learn from us, amd we learn from them. They even point out our mistakes.... But that's how you sometimes learn...

Remember, even in a "fast paced" game, your still looking at a minimum of 1 year of gameplay. From someone who knows, that's a significant contribution in time. Time away from studies. Time away from Family, Time away from things that you should or need to do. Time away from those you love (or would like to love). And things change over that time span.


2) If this Team DG to be started, you should make sure that it's as fully pached as possible. This allows you to play the best way that you can play. Also, if you want to apply things that you might learn in SP/MP play, but it's from something that was changed in a later patch (the Chop issue comes to mind as a good example of this), then you can't use that tactic, because it's not properly supported in the game that you had started too soon.

And, you will also have to do some form of Dual Install, so that you can still play (or keep up with) the older version. Granted, that's not too much of an issue, with multi-Gig HD's, but then, if you also want a lot of MP3, etc on that HD, then you'll soon find that that vast HD is now filling up and you've got this Dual Install that would be taking up only 1/2 of the space, if the game was started after it was fully patched.

Also, waiting for the patch(s) allows further interest for the game to grow. So that, when your ready for the game to start, you'll have people who are ready to play. Who knows what will happen before then in the other games that are running.



Interest in these DG's wax and wain, due to the amount of things that each member has going on. In other games and in RL. Each and every team member only has a limited time to split between all of the different things.

I was present in the old C3SPDG when PTW hit the shelves and know for a fact about the level of participation dropping in that game. Then, while with the PTWDG1, the advent of the first ISDG hit that game fairly good. And the PTWDG2 started before the end of the first one and almost killed both games. The only thing that really saved the first game was it's conclusion around the time that C3C had come out.

If the C3CDG hadn't had been halted, it too would have suffered with the advent of CIV and the DG's that are currently underway.

Sure, DG's are good for the Gaming Community, but there is a point when too many can also do harm to that same community. If anything, it's all about timing. Joining the games currently going, now, WILL help those game to keep going WHEN the Warlords DG is finally started, because the people who do go fully over to the other game will still leave a good core in the older game to carry on without them.

E_T

[Nugog]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
I'm trying understand that... I think he said he was threatening to stop posting if we didn't create the forum? Errr, ok, go ahead.

[proviisori]

wise words, E_T

[Paddy]

if 5 people want to play, or 100 people want to play, the main point is people want to play

that they come to Apolyton to play civ together should be notable enough

that some people that do not want to play have the ability to see that a civ related game does not get an opportunity to be played certainly is notable indeed

[Locutus]

Fed (et al),

You most certainly do not need authorisation to play any game. However, you (or people representing you) are asking us as Apolyton administration to go out of our way to create forums and civgroups and support the game you want to play. It requires an active involvement and dedication of resources on our part. Surely we should be allowed some say in to what extent we actually want to do this?

Normally we are of course always happy to do help you guys with this, that is our raison d'etre after all. But in this case it creates a conflict. It's like football: we only have one stadium and if several teams want to play matches on the same field, they can't all play at the same time. As much as we would like to let everyone play, we'll have to make a choice of who gets to use the field when.

This situation with multiple DGs running concurrently is not exactly the same but it's similar: the more DGs are running, the less people will be active for each game. People who have been playing DGs for many years including myself have seen this happen over and over again. People always say in advance it won't happen but it always does. Maybe this time is different, but maybe it's not. We have to take the possibility into account because you can bet that people will be blaming us if it does happen.

We want to make everyone happy, but if we give you your game we make E_T, Tass, Klor, etc unhappy and if we don't we make you, Paddy, Zoid, etc unhappy. So we as Apolyton administration lose either way. This is why we haven't made a decision yet, we want to hear as many opinions as possible before doing so, so that hopefully we will make the best one, or maybe find a compromise that works for everyone. Going for a cutthroat 1-vs-1 game instead of a regular multi-team game is a step towards compromise, but there may be other options to explore. Again I say that we *do* want to see this game happen, but if it ends up killing other DGs it's something that not in anyone's interest and we have to protect our community against that (including you guys yourself, it will hurt this game as well -- you don't know when you overstretch yourself until it's too late).

Either way, we will follow the will of the community, but the community on Apolyton is more than 19 people. If 19 people want to see this happen but 70 others are adamantly opposed to it because it hurts them, we have to take their opinion into account. This thread is very biased: it's basically a poll to see who is in favour but it doesn't measure who isn't, so that's why I started a new thread in a new location: it will attract the attention of more people and it will measure more accurately how people feel about this, without bias (hopefully): it allows us to track who's in favour, who's opposed and who's indifferent.

Of course, if we do decide that we can't support this game on Apolyton at this time because it is too damaging to all our games (including this one) you are welcome to go to CGN or CFC or some other site to set up or join a game there if you disagree, but in that case we hope that that is no reason to abandon Apolyton's other games and to not join an Apolyton Warlords DG when it *is* created later, that would be a grave loss for our entire community. But let's not get ahead of things and first try and find a solution for the current situation. As said, we *do* want this game to happen, but not at the expense of everything.

[Zoid]

Ok, if Poly won´t host it. I´m sure some other site will. I´m contacting the admins at CGN to see if they can host it. Frankly I´m amazed and very sad at the hostility and mean pettiness shown here by other DG´ers and staff. I´ve been a loyal member of this community for almost 5 years and I´ve only had good experiences. It´s not so anymore... This hurts! It really does...

Anyone interested in coming with us to CGN can PM me, I´ll try to pick up the pieces and put them together there...

[Zoid]

Locutus, don´t bother with the poll man... Since when has Poly been a democracy? Don´t try to give this crap a veneer of democracy and justice, We both know it´s a play for the galleries...

[Metaliturtle]

Sad sad sad, to lose Zoid over a game...

and for someone to insult a player who brought a lot of insightful analysis to this struggling community...

I met a bunch of the people here at Apolycon06, you were all great people, why the sudden hostility?

[Zoid]

You won´t lose me turtle, I still have some pbems going and stuff. I´m just very, very, disappointed at the moment...