When will Valve realize was a bad decision? Player counts haven't been this low since last year, and there is no new FPS game.
For those people claiming player counts get lower until summer vacation, they didn't drop as much as last year. After the change, the weekly high dropped by 5000. Compare to last year in the same time frame there is barely a 1000 player difference. How much more obvious does it need to get? 2014 http://i.imgur.com/xoUEHbr.png 2013 http://i.imgur.com/Rp9y2kD.png data from steamcharts.com On Mon, Mar 24, 2014 at 9:18 PM, E. Olsen <ceo.eol...@gmail.com> wrote: > I think the issue here, is...there really is no longer any reason for > valve servers to be the "default" servers once a player has 8-12 hours in > the game. > > The minority of players who only want those random pub games on valve > servers now have that option - but the players who stick around in the > long-term will be the ones that find a "home" server/group of servers, not > those looking for the "x-box live" experience of random games with random > people every time. Honestly, if the TF2 team could see the chaos and lack > of teamwork that valve servers actually seem to encourage, I think they > would take a step back and realize that it really doesn't do the game any > justice. There is a reason some of the newer players have taken to calling > community servers "pubstomp" servers - it's because community servers are > where they fist come up against actual, cohesive teamwork - and they're > used to a bunch of random players just doing they're own thing. > > Frankly - I firmly believe the long-term health of the game rests with > community servers who provide diversity, supervision (to get rid of the > plethora of hackers/griefers, etc.), and a much better experience overall > (not to mention higher skill levels). > > In short - I agree with Mr. Paulson - give the new players a a few hours > of "mandatory" play on valve's servers to get their feet wet in the game, > and then open quickplay up to "all servers" by default and allow them to > see all the diversity that's out there. You've given the players the > "option" of going back to "valve-only" if they should want it, now lets > rollback the "mass punishment" (that was really killing a mosquito with a > sledgehammer), and give the server operators a fair shake again. > > > On Mon, Mar 24, 2014 at 11:14 PM, Chris Oryschak <ch...@oryschak.com>wrote: > >> It would be really nice to get some input on this from Valve. Since the >> change every day gets worse and worse for player activity on my servers >> thanks to the QP changes and lack of new players having the ability to find >> my servers. >> You can view the beautiful downward trend caused by these changes: >> >> http://i.imgur.com/uvlq056.png >> >> If anyone else is running the Player Analytics plugin just edit >> "data/sessions.php" and change "30 DAY" to "90 DAY". >> I'd love to see the same trends from other communities to help reinforce >> this bad change for all server ops. >> >> >> >> >> >> On Mon, Mar 24, 2014 at 9:09 PM, Robert Paulson <thepauls...@gmail.com>wrote: >> >>> As I said before, the problem is not that the official servers only >>> option exists, the problem is that it is on by default. People too lazy to >>> use the browser are too lazy to use options. >>> >>> Again I would like to suggest automatically un-checking the official >>> servers only after 4-5 hours of play. Anything that requires manual >>> intervention will not solve the problem. >>> >>> For anyone arguing community servers are inferior again, I refer you to >>> this post. >>> >>> >>> https://www.mail-archive.com/hlds_linux@list.valvesoftware.com/msg74795.html >>> >>> >>> On Mon, Mar 24, 2014 at 5:03 PM, 1nsane <1nsane...@gmail.com> wrote: >>> >>>> What about something similar like before where valve servers had an >>>> advantage over community servers with new players being sent to them (due >>>> to the valve server score boost)? >>>> >>>> Except this time just make it so all new players get sent to valve >>>> servers by default. And then after a certain amount of hours played it >>>> either defaults to all servers or pops up a message asking if community >>>> servers should be included and explaining a little bit about the other >>>> quickplay options and how to access them. >>>> >>>> I talked to plenty of players who weren't aware that quickplay search >>>> can be customized or that you need to click on the gear icon to bring up >>>> advanced search options. There's plenty of people who hate crits or default >>>> respawn times and yet they're not even aware of this functionality being >>>> part of quickplay. Or perhaps that's on purpose and maybe that's the reason >>>> why the icon is so tiny... >>>> >>>> >>>> On Thu, Mar 20, 2014 at 7:31 PM, Jason Tango <jtrun...@outlook.com>wrote: >>>> >>>>> As we approach the 2-month mark since Valve's servers were made the >>>>> "default" servers for all quickplay players, can the TF2 team give us a >>>>> time frame when they will return the system to a "level playing field" for >>>>> all servers? >>>>> >>>>> As it stands, the players who want to avoid all community servers now >>>>> have the ability to do so simply by clicking the "Official Server Only" >>>>> button, so is it really necessary to keep driving nearly all quickplay >>>>> traffic away from community servers? >>>>> >>>>> In fact, a better question would probably be - is it in TF2's best >>>>> (long-term) interest to do so? Helping players find a "home" server where >>>>> they become a "regular" creates long-term players, and since so much >>>>> emphasis (in the design of the UI) has been placed on guiding players to >>>>> use quickplay, the longer that community servers are effectively excluded >>>>> from that traffic, the more long-term players the game will likely lose. >>>>> >>>>> The players that only want random games with random people on Valve >>>>> servers now have the option to make sure that's all they get, but >>>>> preventing the rest of the player base from experiencing all the diversity >>>>> that the TF2 community can provide is both unnecessary and unfair to those >>>>> of us who have never broken any rules, or violated any policies. >>>>> >>>>> With that in mind, please consider leveling the playing field again >>>>> asap by including all community servers by default, and let the players >>>>> decide for themselves if they don't want to be a part of that community. >>>>> >>>>> Thanks, guys. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> _______________________________________________ >>>>> To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, >>>>> please visit: >>>>> https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds >>>>> >>>>> >>>> >>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, >>>> please visit: >>>> https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds >>>> >>>> >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, >>> please visit: >>> https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds >>> >>> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, >> please visit: >> https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds >> >> > > _______________________________________________ > To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, > please visit: > https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds > >
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