I'm tired of repeating myself to people who only read the last email written. So I will address the most common arguments in one post that can be copy and pasted every time.
1) TF2 has fewer players after community servers were removed by default on January 28th. Player count is the most unbiased measure and the facts show more was lost than was gained. Your one personal experience isn't going to change that. http://www.steamgraph.net/index.php?action=graph&jstime=1&appid=440&from=1388563200000&to=End+Time 2) Community servers are provably better than official servers. When community servers competed equally with official servers, there was not a single official server in the top 200. Now official servers dominate the list because of the monopoly on new players. http://www.gametracker.com/search/tf2/?query=srcds&searchipp=50 3) Many detractors like Phillip Vector are blatantly lying, saying servers were running ads when the custom tabs was around. I also remember there was another detractor that sold pay-to-win perks on CSS zombiefest. 4) Common Argument: "My own server is doing better than ever, and if your server is dying you are doing something wrong" See #2. Unless you are one of the top 30 servers, official servers now have more players than you and it is going to get worse. Over time your older players will quit while the trickle of new players that bother to use the browser will not be enough to replace them.. 5) Common Argument: "I only have custom servers" All new players are being conditioned to only use quickplay. Many will never be aware there are custom servers the way TF2 is designed now. Very few people change quickplay options. 6) Common Argument: "Why can't you build a community without quickplay like before?" Quickplay did not exist before, and it siphons an estimated 30% of all users, including nearly all new players. We predict this percentage will increase as older players quit. 7) Common Argument: "This was better for players" No one is going to argue servers like bets.tf needed to be removed, but Valve should have removed them without killing every other community. According to statistics in #1, there was not much of a benefit gained. When I advocated an official server option, I did not say it should be enabled by default. If you personally dislike unofficial servers, you should be able to opt-out, but it should not be default. On Wed, Feb 26, 2014 at 6:41 PM, dan <needa...@ntlworld.com> wrote: > On 25/02/2014 02:24, Weasels Lair wrote: > >> Actually, if you plot that over the last 12 months, and throw some other >> games in for comparison ... it doesn't look related at all. >> > > That's unsurprising since it's been previous related to every other time > he's posted saying > the game is dying in the past. > > The irony is, he suggested Valve add the checkbox on 2/11/2011, not once > but twice :- > > 1. Add a check-box for Valve-only/Favorites-only Quickplay servers. >> > > > 1. Allowing players the option to select only Valve Quickplay servers >> would >> > end the player complaints for those that cannot tolerate any modifications. > > > -- > Dan. > > > _______________________________________________ > To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, > please visit: > https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds_linux > _______________________________________________ To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please visit: https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds_linux
