Most desired patch upgrade?

[furtim]

xander's point is that if you have a mechanism for players to kick other players, it will be abused. You know all those guys who quit the game when they're losing? Guess what, now they'll kick the person beating them instead! Get the picture? You're not solving problems with the kick feature, you're just creating new ones.

[starscream]

in game friends list so i can keep track of reliable/unreliable players

[Archinerd]

However, an /ignore command in the chat window would be nice


xander

This, and it would be nice to somehow block people from requesting to join my alliance.
Some players abuse this feature in an attempt to distract or annoy me if I pissed them off with a nasty backstab or slowed the game for a moment to coordinate a strike.
...and other times I don't feel like being part of an alliance, no matter what, and asking me 5 times in a row isn't going to change my mind.

[xander]

--==<snip>==--

Just a note, all of the below is meant to be Socratic in nature. I am not trying to attack any point of view, as I often do, but trying to flesh out my own thoughts on the matter, and ask questions that may clarify matters. Please, don't take any of it personally.

Again, such a feature will be abused. There is no way to stop people from abusing it. If it is implemented, people will use it improperly.

So, the question you must ask is: does the implementation of a kick feature solve more problems that it creates?

In my opinion, it does not. The two problems that it is meant to solve are quieting obnoxious griefers in the chat, and removing people who abuse the time selection feature. I there anything that I am missing? Are there other reasons to kick people?

Again, my opinion is that chat can easily be taken care of -- a /ignore command is needed, but that would fix the problem. If you don't want to hear someone, simply ignore them. If they are ignored, they can't flood your chat window with useless garbage, and you don't have to read what they write. This is a problem that can better be solved with a different solution. People that abuse the time settings, on the other hand, are a real problem. If there were a way of kicking them that could not be abused, I would be more than happy to see such a feature implemented. However, there is no way to keep it from being abused. So, the question is, which is worse: abuse of a kick feature, or abuse of the time settings? As I said above, I believe abuse of a kick function would be worse. Would you care to make an argument to the opposite?

xander

EDIT: Archinerd, you are 98.47% correct. It should be possible to "ban" people from your alliance.

[palehorse864]

Although a votekick feature when there are more than 2 people could do something, I see that giving in to mob rule. Someone actually has a legit reason for slowing down and people kick that person for it. That would not be fun.

However, perhaps a "push to 5" vote could be implemented for griefers? It would require a large vote but would prevent realtime from being used for a certain period of time. I think this would be open to abuse as well so i'm not sure.

[xander]

Although a votekick feature when there are more than 2 people could do something, I see that giving in to mob rule. Someone actually has a legit reason for slowing down and people kick that person for it. That would not be fun.

However, perhaps a "push to 5" vote could be implemented for griefers? It would require a large vote but would prevent realtime from being used for a certain period of time. I think this would be open to abuse as well so i'm not sure.

An anecdote: earlier today, I played a 1v1 game with me as Europe, and the other player as China (randomly assigned). I put all of my silos in a cluster near the Soviet border, three airbases in the Iberian, and one in Norway. RADAR was all to the east, so that I might have some redundancy. As soon as Defcon 1 hit, I destroyed one of his RADAR installations and two silos (they were both close enough to Europe to be visible on RADAR) with bombers that had been in the air for several minutes. The first strike consisted of 12 bombers (four each from the Iberian airbases. My opponent launched all of his silos at about that time. Meanwhile, I was blockading the passage between SA and Africa with all of my carriers and battleships. My subs were working their way south towards Cape Horn, on their way to the Pacific (so as to avoid carriers in the Indian Ocean, and to come from an unexpected place). As his nukes started raining down on me, I ignored all but those that looked like they might hit my silos. By the end of his barrage, the score was 80 or 90 to -40-something. He figured that he had won. Meanwhile, I am slowly taking out his silos, three of his airbases, and RADAR installations. In the end, he had three silos left on the east coast, which I hit hard with subs. After taking out his silos, I launched an all out attack with my silos, and won the game 130-something to negative something.

The entire time we were playing, he insisted that I play faster. I was in realtime to coordinate my first strike, to defend my silos, and to coordinate my later strikes. In game time, the game lasted about 6 hours -- about 2 hours in realtime. I had a legitimate reason to go slow, which I explained at the end of the game (he did figure it out, after I explained). The point is, he didn't know what I was doing. There was no reason for him to see a reason to be in realtime, because he was perfectly happy to go fast. Had there been more players, I probably would have been kicked, because I was trying to micro. This doesn't seem fair to me.

Again, any option to kick will be abused, whether it be at the discression of the host, or by vote. Do the benefits outweigh the cost?

Also, your suggetion that it be possible for people to vote up to a higher speed will be abused. Do the benefits outweigh the cost?

For the sake of discussion, I think that forced speeding is a better solution than kicking, but I still think that the current system is about as good as is possible.

xander

[mxlm]

gain, such a feature will be abused. There is no way to stop people from abusing it. If it is implemented, people will use it improperly.

I'm not at all sure I agree; you don't see people in online FPS games abusing votekicking. I'd mention online RTS games, but i'm not aware of any that allow votekicking.

It may well be that the "one game only" nature of Defcon/RTS games makes it more likely to be abused than votekicking in FPS games is; but that's pure conjecture, as, AFAIK, no RTS has implemented a votekicking feature.

Which may well be the best argument against votekicking, but then, most RTS's don't have the potential to last 6 hours/game, either.

[blackwhitehawk]

gain, such a feature will be abused. There is no way to stop people from abusing it. If it is implemented, people will use it improperly.

I'm not at all sure I agree; you don't see people in online FPS games abusing votekicking. I'd mention online RTS games, but i'm not aware of any that allow votekicking.

It may well be that the "one game only" nature of Defcon/RTS games makes it more likely to be abused than votekicking in FPS games is; but that's pure conjecture, as, AFAIK, no RTS has implemented a votekicking feature.

Which may well be the best argument against votekicking, but then, most RTS's don't have the potential to last 6 hours/game, either.

I do know of one rts that does have vote kicking and admin kicking but its kinda a mod. Warcraft3 tft some of the maps will let you either kick someone or vote kick someone one. This is actally almost never abused sure some people will but most do not.

[palehorse864]

Anyone notice that the poll jumps rather oddly for player matching? It's dormant a while and then jumps by a large number. Or, maybe it's just that I don't check it often enough.

[blackwhitehawk]

I do not like the idea of haveing a player ranking system it could end up like dawn of war. They either kick the high % players or they kick the low% players and as host sometimes i was forced to kick the low% players becasue no one

would click appcet if they were on there team . But then i would also kick that person to .it made it almost imposable to find a game for some people i actally had to remake a account just to play with out hosting my own games.

In less there is going to be a ladder system like warcraft 3 were they only count games like default play. Which are the only ones that should count so people can dedice if they would like to play a rank game or not.

[MrBunsy]

I'm against the idea of a ranking system too, but unfortunatly it seems to be very popular. If it is implemented, we desperatly need a way of playing friendly matches, which don't count towards the ranks, otherwise I think most of the fun will be sucked out of Defcon in one patch.

[xander]

I do not like the idea of haveing a player ranking system it could end up like dawn of war. They either kick the high % players or they kick the low% players and as host sometimes i was forced to kick the low% players becasue no one would click appect if they were on there team :cry: . But then i would also kick that person to :twisted:.it made it almost imposable to find a game for some people i actally had to remake a account just to play with out hosting my own games. In less there is going to be a ladder system like warcraft 3 were they only count games like default play. Which are the only ones that should count so people can dedice if they would like to play a rank game or not.

1) I agree that a ranking system needs to be optional -- if you don't want to be ranked, then you shouldn't play ranked games. However, I think that a ranking system is a valuable thing to have. It can help one to find games that should be fun (rather than a slaughter, one way or the other).
2) Are you a native speaker of English? If so, you really should try to write more clearly. Your creative grammar and misspellings make it very difficult to read what you have written.

xander

[blackwhitehawk]

Very sorry about that xander I will try and improve on that maybe double spaceing will help with people being able to read it more cleary .

on the note of rank games i can almost say that most could be rigged by the sense of strats people can come up with freinds. Even thogh i have noting agaist that I think that will really be a pain to noobies who are just starting out on this game.

I will try to fix my above post.

[flatrick]

When do you reckon they put ranks up, huh?

[xander]

Spacing helps a little, when it doesn't break up sentences, but there is more to it than that. Grammar, punctuation, and spelling are important. For instance, you have combined your first two sentences: "I do not like the idea of haveing[sic] a player ranking system it could end up like dawn of war." You need either a comma or period after system. The entire paragraph should look more like this:

I do not like the idea of having a player ranking system. It could end up like Dawn of War. They either kick the highly ranked players or they kick the low ranked players. As host I was sometimes forced to kick the low ranking players because no one would click accept if they were on their team :cry: . But then i would also kick that person too :twisted:. It made it almost impossible to find a game. I actualy had to remake a account just to play without hosting my own games. Unless there is going to be a ladder system like Warcraft 3, where they only count certain games, like default play. Which are the only ones that should count so people can decide if they would like to play a ranked game or not.

Much as you may not have believed your teachers, proper writing style is very important. People judge you based upon the way in which you write, especially on the internet, which is largely a written medium. Knowing nothing about you, your writing style is similar to that of a 6th grader -- if I had only your writing to go on, I would assume that you were no more than 12 years old.

xander