gametechmods
Off-Topic => Off-Topic Discussion => Topic started by: Hoppin on August 30, 2019, 09:43:19 PM
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Yo.
Just know, there's gonna be the occasional name drop. **** you, enjoy
Tournaments
I think the tournament scene is getting more and more restrictive, and in my honest opinion I see it resulting in not only a downgrade in robots, but also fights.
The rulesets of tournaments are looking to purely limit the "problem" components, however can quite easily be abused, intentionally or not. (Example of this is: Thanatos Redeemer. Because it doesnt use the "problem" components it was unable to slip under the radar with 8 beaters and 4 matidas. Which is more DPS than what was setout to prevent). In regards to quality, people are just gonna be building to the limit then chucking armour on it however, I recognise this is not 100% true, I see it being a problem for the less good builders. But without some kinda of quality control rule, imo will lead to lazy builds. This last part leads into the discords and the splits in communities.
In terms of fight quality, because of everything having a reduction in DPS, I can fully see a meta in which gutripping becomes even more prevelant than it currently is. This will be boring. Sorry folks, you suck.
Now, I don't think this is the fault of a single tournament. It's people being to stupid to create a new ruleset or a heavily modify version of another. They just copy paste the text into their own thread of whatever.
Modding
Everyone thinks they can fix DSL.
They can't.
Every time I see a discussion over this ****ing game, I see people saying things like "We need to change X components" or "We should nerf X tooth". Please understand you cannot just make a small change to this game to fix it all, nor add X components. You will just make another tooth the "problem component". You would need to rebalance the entire game and even then, with a game that uses pure component related statistics people will just use the formula to calculate the best component. I'd rather see a variety of colourful components than some dog sh** balance changes. Bildschirm is making progress on this, and it's something I'll give him credit on. Along with Geice's recent changes to the download section, I hope we can compile all of the sh** together for a true DSL 2.2 CE. I think like Geice mentioned, we should be looking once a month or so to make changes to CE with what gets removed, updated or added.
The naming system right now for the versions is pretty dog sh** too if I might add. Legit just keep it 2.2 please. I beg. There's nothing truly significant to warrant a 2.3, even the actual 2.3 that fotepx made wasn't, albeit closer than what Bildschirm has been doing
Discord and other places
Right then, time to smack talk the discords.
I think we at this point are aware of the relationship between the three/four main communities of Ra2. GTM, OW, MS2 & PWS and the relationship each discord/community has with each other. Both with GTM are dog sh** and I want to break down each community from my understanding. I've been a mod in most of the Ra2 communities, so I know who does what, and what everyone actually thinks of each other for the most part.
GTM. I'm gonna start off with my hometown as it were. Boomer country. The forum is the main place of Ra2 still, due to housing the resources for the game and all of the add-ons needed. However, anything outside that and RR2 is pretty scarce. You'll probably get the odd tournament post or showcase bump. This discord has realistically been the odd pop-ups in other chats or a fairly consistant one in the "controversial" not retard chat.
The relationship I have seen unfold with new members and the common users is that, we tend to sh** on what people would regard as "dumbass" behaviour, it's a wild west of a place, I must say. Forums less so. However, I have seen a quicker increase in building skills, etc when new members have a consistent interaction with the "toxic" members of GTM. Code Red is a pretty good example of this imo, he showcase the difference between getting "toxic" feedback vs the nice feedback over on other discords.
MS2, now I'm not familiar with Mike's discord but I do know it's not just Ra2, it's his youtube. So I can't rag on it too bad. But I will say that if Code and Billy are the "most experienced" active users there, you're in the wrong server. Sorry guys, whilst your advice is pretty bog standard, it's not particularly ground breaking or expansive. It's all I can really say about the server other than it contains all the new guys we've seen the influx of, and whilst they suck. They'll get better.
OW. This is really, the big one. The facebook of Ra2. Right, now I think the Orcs Wars discord is a lot of "We're nice to keep a collective of people together". Those with conflicting opinions are just brushed away in my opinion, it's an opinion of the forum I've discussed with some people and I think it's a shared opinion. Now, of course I think have a community, you want the general idea to be similar, but OW brings a level which imo is unsettling. Personally I don't believe it too be a fault of staff or owner, more just a general vibe I get. Staff are another issue I have with OW, with only 1 mod active, it's not where it should be and the GM team comprises of mostly near unbearable users, it really does make me think. I'm aware of Orc's stance on moderating and having trust in his team, but I think that by having a mod team, you should be ready to put that trust on the line for the sake of finding the right team, it's a job in itself and it should be viewed that way.
In regards to the user base there, I think the community works in the opposite to GTM, in which it's very inviting to new members, but with interactions purely with members exclusive to that discord, it results in slow learning and creating general excuses to not improve. I'll be using Mr BK and PrimevalBrony as an example of this.
PWS, it doesnt give the Mods enough control to handle situations. It's really stupid. Overall, it's really a mix of the above mentioned
Overall, I'm aware that discords are what the community future is at, I just don't think I like it. It's good as a consistent chat room, but idk.
Zoomers
Zoomers are currently the oddest group of this community. I enjoy the determination that you all possess and the eagerness to jump into the advanced stuff. However, most of you are yikes. The mentality of the zoomers can range from crap on all with no excuse, which I believe to be a copy or myself and roboteer. Superbomb has demonstrated this imo the most. The other is to do the full 180 of this, in which you shut down anything which can be perceived as offensive. But all of you find a way to circle jerk over some old boomer (Badger and Badnik) and how they got slammed in X, Y, Z tournament. :V
Garfie
Why not :)
TL:DR
-You can't fix the game
-Discord is full of tards.
-I hate you all
-I hope you copypasta this, it'll be epic
-Thanks
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Yo.
09 was originally gonna make this post about GTM dying n all, but I said I'll do it. (Plus I get to rag on what I hate about Ra2 people).
???????? What
dnt try to send the zoomers after me smh
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I have no idea where I stand in this, but I will say I enjoyed the read.
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You cant fix RA2 unless you rebuild it from the ground up with the source code, which will never happen.
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Tournaments
mentioned this in my competitive irl thread (https://gametechmods.com/forums/discussion/the-problem-with-competitive-irl-in-ra2/msg749017/#msg749017) but it's just a problem of the irl meta as a whole. you can't build for looks and combat effectiveness with ra2. you gotta pick one or the other. if ra2 was a game where a real life design was just as effective ingame then you could but it isn't. the old standard rules barely had this issue but standard builds take away a lot of what many people enjoy about the game and i realize this. there isn't an easy solution.
Modding
dsl was always crappily balanced, just back in 2008 no one really bothered that hard to infomine and figure out all the efficiencies until 123stw. which led to the great efficiency race which had its own pros and cons. which led to ironforge which is still the only ra2 version I would consider overall balanced. use DSL to build artbots and IF to build bots you fight with. doesn't seem like a big deal to me.
Discord and other places
gtm is old. older than many members, seriously. as someone who might seem incredibly ancient to newbies i can say that a big reason for the decline is a combination of culture shift away from forums and just ra2 being squeezed out of every drop of innovation that can be. it's just old, man. for a crappy budget game it's a miracle it's still around at all.
there is also a huge shift away from tight engineering into art bots. not bad or good, but the pretty bots today are nowhere near as well designed on the whole as from the pros of yesteryear when it comes to actual battles. i'm also aware this high standard scared a lot of people away.
the main problem with discords is they have no way to look back at old posts. very shortsighted, great for chat but they do not provide a substitute for a forum. they're made for different things.
Zoomers
if you act stupid then you'll be treated as such. been this way since the dawn of time. just be kind and respectful to others.
fyi badnik is a newbie and i don't really know who any of the people hoppin mentioned by name are including hoppin.
tldr; yes but its always been that way
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nobody wants to use a forum in 2019, and nobody wants to use anything with the letters 'GTM' in the name. there's a reason gtm gets next to no new users nowadays while all the other communities bring them in by the bundle
most of y'all already realise how trash gtm's rep is in the robot combat community by now, and more than likely we're going to take it to the grave
i think ra2 actually has a decent future ahead of it, but i don't see it being with gtm as the main community. most of the ra2 player base already either doesn't use gtm, or if they do, then it's very rarley
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nobody wants to use a forum in 2019, and nobody wants to use anything with the letters 'GTM' in the name. there's a reason gtm gets next to no new users nowadays while all the other communities bring them in by the bundle
most of y'all already realise how trash gtm's rep is in the robot combat community by now, and more than likely we're going to take it to the grave
i think can ra2 actually has a decent future ahead of it, but i don't see it being with gtm as the main community
the irony is a bit stunning. you do realize constantly complaining about a forum sucking without adding helpful feedback is exactly the problem that causes a forum to be bad right
not criticizing any admin work you do, just saying that these constant snide comments is hardly being the change you wanna see. and if you don't wanna see change then that's another problem.
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Wew lad. Gotta say I agree with reier.
Not sure how this type of attitude helps. Not to mention, from what I've seen, the 4chan style of ironic sh**posting was pretty much fostered by you guys in disco.
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Thats why we need me as an admin, we need that forum hierarchy
Fr tho, i do have gripes with ow server, mainly a person that bends his knee for the wrong reason
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not gonna disagree with anything said so far, none of us have a very optimistic view on gtm, but i'm pretty sure hoppin was primarily referring to the discord ra2 communities with most of his points (unless they explicitly mentioned gtm)
and yes, a lot of gtm's bad rep comes from the discord sh**posting. a lot of it also comes from people who are more than happy to share their experience of how they got ran off the forums years ago by the vets when they were kids
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Tbh I'm kinda new so I missed out on the peak of GTMs popularity when there were more people here but I can see why this place isn't as appealing to newer people especially when there are people who will try and shut down newer people who want to start getting into the game ( not saying I'm not part of the problem because I do it a lot ) people either not giving good advice or no advice at all is just kinda sad and won't help this place grow or help users develop. Robo does a great job at giving advice but giving advice I think is better suited to discord with thr only advantage I see from forums being that finding previous information is easier.
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Thats why we need me as an admin, we need that forum hierarchy
yeah hard no
if someone like orc, sev, or killer wants to run the community then i have 0 issues
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Thats why we need me as an admin, we need that forum hierarchy
yeah hard no
dude wtf riged
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PWS, it doesnt give the Mods enough control to handle situations. It's really stupid. Overall, it's really a mix of the above mentioned
before i start just gonna say i dont really care about anything in hops post but i'd just like to give my views on the PWS bit because i sort of have a little bit of interest for it
So first off the Parsec World Series server is specifically for Parsec World Series and any of its spinoffs, I certainly wouldn't say it is revolved around the community.
I have the server so it is easy for people to enter, compete and ask about Parsec World Series, it also stops me from flooding other Discords with videos or announcements, apart from the cheeky advertising paragraph every few months or so.
I know the Mod team for PWS is slim but in my eyes the server really doesn't require one. I feel I can solve any arguments fairly quickly and that having too many mouths in the mix (especially with moderating power) just makes situations worse 9 times out of 10.
I was all for having the old mod team of Robo, Killer and Hop but constantly seeing @'s for GMOD in the announcements and overall irrelevant subjects began to get frustrating and therefore I revoked the moderator role from Hop and Killer, now dont be fooled I honestly am all for having a laugh or posting a meme but I just saw them at the time as too common with too little benefit to the community being like 1/20 people play GMOD, Robo is still on the mod team simply because I see him as the most qualified to keep everybody in line if I am not available despite how Robo sees it himself.
I am perfectly aware I can change permissions of my Moderator role on Discord to counter this but in all honesty I have 0 ****ing clue how to use roles on Discord properly as most of the changes I do make to permissions or channels just end up not working or broken, the Moderator roles are purely for resolving conflicts as they are extremely common in the RA2 community as a whole but really any standard user in PWS has the capabilities to resolve an argument without just throwing full caps keyboard warrior insults around instead of trying to resolve the issue despite how little you like the person who is causing it.
Again the server is simply there for ease of access to PWS information, I am well aware however the ruleset and organization of the server is well overdue for refurbishment so I will attend to that soon.
Talk about this behind my back or to my face as much as you please the latter would be much preferred because then it helps me learn and improve.
Thankyou for attending my TED Talk, I'll see you all on Monday for the World Counting Backwards Championship.
xx
p.s - cant wait to blow you at AWS hop you 4ft piece of ****.
p.s to the p.s - lol i probably didnt structure this right either oh well, sorry gtm mods. heck
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Right then...so first of all, Hop discussed bits of this with me about bits last night so I'm happy to see his thoughts in full. Time for a big essay but for the record, TLDR: I mostly agree with everything Hop has said.
Tournaments
Right, I do feel this is mainly my fault. "It's not a evil intent thing" as Hop said to me last night. You wanna try and make things fairer and more equal but you end up causing more issues (like Thanatos Redeemer which is still a ****ing massive derp on my part). While I have seen tournaments using elements of the OW rulesets and that is an honour(?), the beauty of GTM/RA2 tournaments is that every tournament should be different or FEEL different. Back when I joined GTM, I think Annihilation Nation had just ended, Banter Wars was ongoing and there was a lot more variety. Different arenas, different rulesets, different weightclasses. I feel we're heavily lacking that today. In terms of OW: while I'm working on OW4 atm, I am going to be heavily tinkering on the ruleset for the future so it isn't as limiting.
Modding
I 100% agree with Hop here. Heck if I trusted anyone to "fix" or "patch" RA2 then it would be Geice as he has imo the most sense out of any of us. However, that is his choice and no-one elses.
Discords
Might come as a shock to a lot but I agree wholeheartedly again. I do feel there is a stigma against GTM/RA2 in general. In recent terms, I've been seeing people coming to the GTM homepage, seeing topics like the "seagulls" topic and going "Yeah, this is GTM alright". After heavy self-reflection, I don't feel my introduction to GTM was the best. My showcase was recieved well which was great and encouraged me to keep building but the Discords are where things started to get a bit rough. When I was looking after the AHOL discord, I was being told "Don't invite them, they're from GTM etc etc" I think that started an unhealthy mindset that has persisted all this time, not proud of that. I do feel we need to mend the relationships we have with other communities but only if they're game to do so. I know RA2 doesn't have the best standing with ARC/Garry's Wars from what I've seen/heard so we can only try and improve if they want to do the same.
As for OW, yeah I agree. I do think that the people who don't listen to feedback or complain about making changes that then say "Why are they being mean to me, they're so toxic, do something" need to toughen up a bit while I do feel that the other side of the coin generally mean well but can come across very harsh at times then it does appear a bit borderline. Yup, the comment about my trust is true and after some heavy thinking, I'm gonna be reshuffling the Discord roles and taking some chances.
Basically, if you want to improve, you'll listen. If you don't and go up in arms about making changes or "THAT'LL TAKE FOREVERRRRRR" then you'll keep having issues.
Zoomers
I guess I accidentally talked about this in the previous part but yeah, can see where Hop is coming from. You can also be in both teams at the same time as some people have showed! :P
Garfie
Erm...you whut?
if someone like orc, sev, or killer wants to run the community then i have 0 issues
I'm sorry but no. I haven't done a good job of running OW (something that I'm trying to improve as I've hopefully shown I want to do via this wall) and believe the community would be better run by someone else.
Again, I'll repeat at the end:
TLDR: I mostly agree with everything Hop has said.
Hoping we can make the future of RA2, however long it lasts, a brighter one.
P.S: Hoppin is still a twit but he loves OW and that's all that matters :heart_smiley:
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I agree that GTM's relationship with others is and always has been a key issue. I tried really hard to reach out to all the different communities last summer to make connections and mend fences, and was mostly ignored/mocked for my efforts. I felt that despite the reputation of the community, most people had a level of respect for me. I was mostly proven wrong. If someone else could succeed where I failed, I would be wholly impressed.
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That explains part of the reason why GTM is so quiet now. You all have mostly moved to Discord but scattered it seems?
Hopefully the place still continues for years to come.
I've personally moved to Reddit and other places under a new name.
I miss the activity here when I joined back in 2011. Very lively.
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I agree that GTM's relationship with others is and always has been a key issue. I tried really hard to reach out to all the different communities last summer to make connections and mend fences, and was mostly ignored/mocked for my efforts. I felt that despite the reputation of the community, most people had a level of respect for me. I was mostly proven wrong. If someone else could succeed where I failed, I would be wholly impressed.
Personally I think people outside of GTM get along well with us on an individual level. Just dont like the branding we're associated
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I agree that GTM's relationship with others is and always has been a key issue. I tried really hard to reach out to all the different communities last summer to make connections and mend fences, and was mostly ignored/mocked for my efforts. I felt that despite the reputation of the community, most people had a level of respect for me. I was mostly proven wrong. If someone else could succeed where I failed, I would be wholly impressed.
Personally I think people outside of GTM get along well with us on an individual level. Just dont like the branding we're associated
So a brand change in order?
Then it's settled. From now on we're GeeseTriggersMrstrsyko.
On a serious note, though. This is an issue that isn't easily fixed without either more discipline, or a more friendly image.
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Here for my baby boomer hot takes since I've been here 11 years now. The RA2/GTM is dying bitchposts have been a thing since the moment I got here. It just didn't used to be from the admins. I agree with Reier. I also agree that building/tournaments is nothing like what it used to be. Whether that is for better or for worse is up to the reader's opinions, but people will always build to win. If anything, you could milk a couple good years out of standard tournaments just because the bar is so low now that it'll take years for Stock/DSL-S to get back to where it once was.
You're never going to get a million people on here, especially for a 16 year old game. And some people's feelings are going to be hurt, because that's the nature of a forum. People these days aren't used to the fact that the dimmest bulb burns just as bright on a forum. Stupid is as visible as smart, and speaks from the same platform. The key is that there needs to be admins/mods that rise above it and can help guide the ship and keep people in line.
I think it's worth it to just maintain the community you have and let its longevity and resources attract folks. Other communities have always come and gone and these new ones will go too once the people shepherding them lose interest. Everything mentioned here is based around a single person running the show, and is therefore on a timer. GTM seems to be the only place that has properly handed over the keys of power into multiple successions of admins/mods. People will come once it is the only playground to play in once again.
GTM was my creative outlet for robots for years, and filled a niche when I couldn't build in the real world. I think it has the potential to serve that purpose for people still. But it's tougher since it seems like the site as a whole is now apathetic with regards to real combat bots, or at least is discussing them on other platforms. The jump from virtual to real isn't encouraged anymore. There used to be a much more thriving community here of people discussing the latest episodes of all the shows, or past/live events. The more people who make that jump, the better the outside's view of this community will be.
Thank you for coming to my TED talk.
tl;dr: life sucks, and the opinions of sad zoomers are irrelevant, even if they're just as loud. Don't be an admin unless you care, and go build a real beetleweight. It's like $300 and you'll learn a lot.
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ra2 is boring and hella ****ing stale and thats why i dipped from the ra2 discords i was in yesterday because i cant bring myself to play the game while watching it slowly spiral to its death.
ai tournaments are dead. period. redace is killing it with deathmatch but its the same old routine. you can tell whos going to win just by looking at the splash and picking the bot that can win most easily by driving forward and gut ripping whatever comes its way. multiplayer is the wave but the game is so broken that skill is hardly rewarded, especially since the main online tournament going on seems to prefer number of entries over actually arranging a proper fight schedule. ive voiced my concerns over on pws several times and they seem to have fallen on deaf ears.
the existence of gtm as a community going forward has to hinge on rr2 and how robust of a robot fighting sim it can be. ra2 thrived when the community played to its strengths and worked to optimize the sh** out of unrealistic murder machines, and that ship sailed once hax mode came out and everyone that played the "standard" metas realized there were no further horizons to pursue.
gtm would also do better as a whole if the main discord wasn't run by total sh**posters who seem to not care theyre controlling the figurehead of the entire ra2 community, and i think it gives the rest of the groups sort of a bad reputation when it comes to spreading out and roping in new blood
also orc's "if you have an argument youre a bad person and need to go away" moderating style is the worst thing about him and is probably the reason that discord has the problems hop mentioned
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Reading this thread is so depressing. I think RA2 is a good game, but we just dont have enough members in the community.
Combine that with ARC being better than us (Embarrassingly), then GTM is left here to die.
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Reading this thread is so depressing. I think RA2 is a good game, but we just dont have enough members in the community.
Combine that with ARC being better than us (Embarrassingly), then GTM is left here to die.
the ra2 community is still relatively large, it's just not entirely concentrated on gtm nowadays. iirc, OW4 has around 64 unique entrants, which is an extremely good turnout for a tournament in 2019, and i believe pws6 had somewhere in the 50s??
and yes the gtm discord is sh**. we've removed all invite links to it and revoked invite privileges for that reason. that being said, even if it wasn't, i don't see people actually using it besides boomers who haven't played the game in years. active builders are just going to stick to PWS or OW as those are more active and have a larger active userbase, and it would just end up like the rwl or ahol discords (no offense to the owners)
maybe staff just see's things differently. we really don't look at the community as just gtm anymore, but more so the greater ra2 community at large since like 9/10th of our userbase is also active on pws/ow/oota/ms2/whatever server is hip. it's not as simple as it used to be in 2009 where this was your only option for ra2. without trying to sound like a condescending prick, i don't think people understand the situation of where gtm sits if this is your only community that you're a part of.
if people want, we'll completely restructure staff to be more 'gtm' focused. i really don't mind stepping down and neither does 09. also, ive talked with people somewhat recently about making a serious open ra2 discord to replace the gtm one. it wouldn't necessarily be a 'gtm' focused server, but it would serve as a good starting point i feel
on an unrelated note in regards to modding: we really need to just update the CE with the most commonly used mods and call it 2.3 cause rn to be up to date with the irl scene you need to download an additional 5+ files. i've been posting some minor updates in the ow discord (new collision meshes, updated .pys, etc), and i know that bild and kix have also done a few things done as well. realistically this would probably be the best time to add them without making compatibility a total nightmare
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Is there anything we as individuals can do to help this community? I’ve only been with you guys for about 4 months, so I’ve never seen y’all in your hay day, but I feel slightly responsible to do whatever I can to get GTM back on track. I really don’t want to see it go to sh**, so please, if there’s anything I could do to help, I’ll do my best to do it.
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I guess i have to drop my feedback on stuff:
TOURNAMENTS:
I agree on what has been said, They are all completely the same
Interesting ones seem to have terrible hosts, bad meta noone plays or just never finish
The OW ruleset is a bit yikes, and orc himself said that he is not proud of it
MODDING:
Idk what to say bout DSL, if they improve it, good job i guess. I dont see that this will be done for few years. Heck i'd mod stuff but
A: Apparently my wheels are sh** and that is making me feel epic
B: Modding would mean motivation, and i dont have enough motivation to even play ra2
Geese is making ra2 better and i wish him luck, but a one man job is not good, look at 2.3
DISCORDS:
GTM - I have no feelings for that server, i honestly am there for CS
OW - Now that is currently the best RA2 server, the talking variety is there, but i do have some gripes
1. Where is the goddamn option to change my nickname
2. Mods - GM's do nothing that im aware of, maybe a secret judging channel or something, but Main moderators consist of: Toxic Hop, Sev, and Somene i dont have much respect about as i dont really know him. He became a mod as soon as he joined
PWS - Its PWS, talk is mostly pws related, and Sev is doing a good job of moderating
ZOOMERS:
Zoomers are zoomers, we all were zoomers one we joined, some change, some dont
GARFIE:
Garfie is a god
tl:dr Ill miss Toxic Hops red letters
This has been my TED talk
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Is there anything we as individuals can do to help this community? I’ve only been with you guys for about 4 months, so I’ve never seen y’all in your hay day, but I feel slightly responsible to do whatever I can to get GTM back on track. I really don’t want to see it go to sh**, so please, if there’s anything I could do to help, I’ll do my best to do it.
just actually use it. the biggest issue gtm has is that people only hang out in their discords and they never feel the need to use the forums.
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OW - Now that is currently the best RA2 server, the talking variety is there, but i do have some gripes
1. Where is the goddamn option to change my nickname
2. Mods - GM's do nothing that im aware of, maybe a secret judging channel or something, but Main moderators consist of: Toxic Hop, Sev, and Somene i dont have much respect about as i dont really know him. He became a mod as soon as he joined
Aye, the GMs help out with decisions and episode matchcards! Hop and BSRaven were given promotions in wake of this post/Mine and Hop's talks (Hop for GTM representation, Rabe for OW representation, Sev for PWS/neutral representation and me overlooking it all) and I hope we can bash our heads together and start making good changes not just for OW but for RA2 overall.
Yes my previous attitude/bending knee/pov wasn't the best but as I've addressed in my previous comment, I'm hoping these changes alongside personal changes for myself and the future help as well. I'm here to try and help make things better and I know some people may doubt that but I'm hoping to prove it. I appreciate the feedback a lot Kix and thanks for your words yesterday. :heart_smiley:
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From what everyone has listed about the problems with RA2 and GTM so far, it something that I do agree with. Most of these reasons were why I stopped playing RA2, not just because I didn't have the time or effort to put into the game, but also from being happening over the forums. One point I would make is around tournaments gtm and why I don't participate in tournaments that much: all the tournaments hosted on the site have all been using the DSL-IRL meta, every other meta include stock and ironforge is dead. In turn, every time someone tries to host a tournament which runs on any of the dead metas or attempting to revive said meta, barely anyone jumps to the gun when sign-ups are open.
I've nothing against the DSL-IRL meta even if it's not my cup of tea, since there are plenty good bots and tournaments, but I'm just pointing about that because the tournaments on GTM have been doing nothing but DSL-IRL. This may be because DSL-IRL is very easy to get into from a new player's pov since you just design a robot like what you see on shows like Battlebots and Robot Wars, with having to follow key rules including no part intersection etc. Stock and Ironforge on the other hand is different, while there is no restrictions, but the level of requirement for both this metas including glitches and building a bot for effectiveness over looks, is enough to put off any new comers to the meta and thus cause a general decline in users enter such tournaments.
In turn and would sound stupid: I do feel that gtm should do more with using the dead metas in tournaments to gather interest from new users, and possibly try a see a new bloom instead of concluding that meta is dead, and we should just focus on DSL-IRL for the next two or more years.
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From what everyone has listed about the problems with RA2 and GTM so far, it something that I do agree with. Most of these reasons were why I stopped playing RA2, not just because I didn't have the time or effort to put into the game, but also from being happening over the forums. One point I would make is around tournaments gtm and why I don't participate in tournaments that much: all the tournaments hosted on the site have all been using the DSL-IRL meta, every other meta include stock and ironforge is dead. In turn, every time someone tries to host a tournament which runs on any of the dead metas or attempting to revive said meta, barely anyone jumps to the gun when sign-ups are open.
I've nothing against the DSL-IRL meta even if it's not my cup of tea, since there are plenty good bots and tournaments, but I'm just pointing about that because the tournaments on GTM have been doing nothing but DSL-IRL. This may be because DSL-IRL is very easy to get into from a new player's pov since you just design a robot like what you see on shows like Battlebots and Robot Wars, with having to follow key rules including no part intersection etc. Stock and Ironforge on the other hand is different, while there is no restrictions, but the level of requirement for both this metas including glitches and building a bot for effectiveness over looks, is enough to put off any new comers to the meta and thus cause a general decline in users enter such tournaments.
In turn and would sound stupid: I do feel that gtm should do more with using the dead metas in tournaments to gather interest from new users, and possibly try a see a new bloom instead of concluding that meta is dead, and we should just focus on DSL-IRL for the next two or more years.
Nobody plays stock, IF, DSL-S etc because none of the advocates for it are actually active enough to push any newbie towards it.
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Nobody plays stock, IF, DSL-S etc because none of the advocates for it are actually active enough to push any newbie towards it.
imo the reason nobody plays builds it is because there is no room left for innovation since everything has become so well optimized so unless you are doing PVP you can basically bet 1/2 to 3/4ths of the enteries to a tourney are gonna follow the same basically formula since you gotta if you want to win.
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WTFL:DETTR
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From what everyone has listed about the problems with RA2 and GTM so far, it something that I do agree with. Most of these reasons were why I stopped playing RA2, not just because I didn't have the time or effort to put into the game, but also from being happening over the forums. One point I would make is around tournaments gtm and why I don't participate in tournaments that much: all the tournaments hosted on the site have all been using the DSL-IRL meta, every other meta include stock and ironforge is dead. In turn, every time someone tries to host a tournament which runs on any of the dead metas or attempting to revive said meta, barely anyone jumps to the gun when sign-ups are open.
I've nothing against the DSL-IRL meta even if it's not my cup of tea, since there are plenty good bots and tournaments, but I'm just pointing about that because the tournaments on GTM have been doing nothing but DSL-IRL. This may be because DSL-IRL is very easy to get into from a new player's pov since you just design a robot like what you see on shows like Battlebots and Robot Wars, with having to follow key rules including no part intersection etc. Stock and Ironforge on the other hand is different, while there is no restrictions, but the level of requirement for both this metas including glitches and building a bot for effectiveness over looks, is enough to put off any new comers to the meta and thus cause a general decline in users enter such tournaments.
In turn and would sound stupid: I do feel that gtm should do more with using the dead metas in tournaments to gather interest from new users, and possibly try a see a new bloom instead of concluding that meta is dead, and we should just focus on DSL-IRL for the next two or more years.
Nobody plays stock, IF, DSL-S etc because none of the advocates for it are actually active enough to push any newbie towards it.
That's the point. Since every other meta including Stock, IF, DSl-S is dead, then tournament hosts would just assume "Why bother setting my tournament meta to something like Stock etc. if no one is going to enter?" Therefore the majority of tournament hosts would go and focus on the most active meta which happens to be DSL-IRL, in turn continues the complacent syndrome, encouraging users to continue focusing on the DSL-IRL meta, no one would want to play any of the other meta, and soon they're considered dead by the community.
imo the reason nobody plays builds it is because there is no room left for innovation since everything has become so well optimized so unless you are doing PVP you can basically bet 1/2 to 3/4ths of the enteries to a tourney are gonna follow the same basically formula since you gotta if you want to win.
There is no innovation left in stock, everyone knows that all tournament entries in stock are going to either be tri-bar spinners or pop-ups. It still doesn't stop users from trying hence RedAlert, even if we did shoot him down for his "discoveries". As for Ironforge, it's the same story with DSL-S since both metas follow the same paths in designs, expect with componment changes. But I also believe that DSL-IRL is guilty of this as well, and I'm ready to be booed upon for this. But when thinking about it, you may some innovation for something like cooler vertical spinner that's on an axle bot chassis that you made with drums, but to the core it's still a vertical spinner, it's nothing really new it's done before. Once you see one vertical spinner, you've seen them all. I know they are all different, but that's how I see the meta really.
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From what everyone has listed about the problems with RA2 and GTM so far, it something that I do agree with. Most of these reasons were why I stopped playing RA2, not just because I didn't have the time or effort to put into the game, but also from being happening over the forums. One point I would make is around tournaments gtm and why I don't participate in tournaments that much: all the tournaments hosted on the site have all been using the DSL-IRL meta, every other meta include stock and ironforge is dead. In turn, every time someone tries to host a tournament which runs on any of the dead metas or attempting to revive said meta, barely anyone jumps to the gun when sign-ups are open.
I've nothing against the DSL-IRL meta even if it's not my cup of tea, since there are plenty good bots and tournaments, but I'm just pointing about that because the tournaments on GTM have been doing nothing but DSL-IRL. This may be because DSL-IRL is very easy to get into from a new player's pov since you just design a robot like what you see on shows like Battlebots and Robot Wars, with having to follow key rules including no part intersection etc. Stock and Ironforge on the other hand is different, while there is no restrictions, but the level of requirement for both this metas including glitches and building a bot for effectiveness over looks, is enough to put off any new comers to the meta and thus cause a general decline in users enter such tournaments.
In turn and would sound stupid: I do feel that gtm should do more with using the dead metas in tournaments to gather interest from new users, and possibly try a see a new bloom instead of concluding that meta is dead, and we should just focus on DSL-IRL for the next two or more years.
Nobody plays stock, IF, DSL-S etc because none of the advocates for it are actually active enough to push any newbie towards it.
That's the point. Since every other meta including Stock, IF, DSl-S is dead, then tournament hosts would just assume "Why bother setting my tournament meta to something like Stock etc. if no one is going to enter?" Therefore the majority of tournament hosts would go and focus on the most active meta which happens to be DSL-IRL, in turn continues the complacent syndrome, encouraging users to continue focusing on the DSL-IRL meta, no one would want to play any of the other meta, and soon they're considered dead by the community.
I think the onus is on the people who want DSL-S and unrealistic to make a comeback to encourage newbies to try it, rather than on the people who are fine with IRL to do so.
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I’ve been losing interest in RA2 for awhile now, don’t like Ironforge, Stock is only good for making reps, don’t care about DSL-S, and have gotten tired of the IRL meta.
I would really like to see RA2 get better with mods or a completely new version but I doubt anyone can without using the same engine.
overall while GTM is basically dead discord is the next best thing and has help the community grow recently and I like this community and I do want to see it grow.
I really want to quit RA2, leave GTM, and just stick to gmod, I’ve ran out of ideas and don’t want to just make unoriginal sh*t anymore, GTM is now a wasteland filled with more RR2 then RA2
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While it's true that we've been winding down for a long time here, and folks have been preaching the end is upon us for nearly a decade now, I can't help but feel a little bit responsible for for all of this. I tried my ass off to make those connections with other communities, and for whatever reason I failed. And that pretty much killed my mojo, so I left. I was the guy who always kept grinding, and always kept pushing forward. I always had that small glimmer of hope that we could survive. And then I was gone. And I didn't even really explain why. I didn't even tell anyone I had left. I didn't exactly leave you all with the best odds going forward.
Geice and 09 do (did?) care. They did a ton of work with me to try and make the most of what we had left. Not everything we did worked, but I would say that a lot of it did, at least for a while. And then I abandoned you all, and they got a job they never wanted. This is a thankless job, like being a kicker in american football. Nobody gives a **** until something is going wrong. I don't blame anybody on the staff at this point for being worn out. The fact that anyone is still here at all, with all the negativity going around, is insane.
(Side note, apanx is a saint for keeping things running behind the scenes, and we wouldn't even be here with the opportunity to complain about our lives without him)
I actually agree that a central RA2 discord hub would be one of the best things going forward, but it would be extremely difficult to do. People in power from all those communities would have to want that. We tried to bring staff in from all the different places when we rebuilt the discord, but few wanted any part of it and even fewer stuck around. Removing the GTM brand from the top of the server would be a step in the right direction, but that's only one variable. There would need to be a ton of planning on how that space was shared by all the different communities, how it would be staffed, what purposes does it intend to serve. I'm willing to throw my hat into the ring one more time to help, but the first time around I wasn't even allowed to visit half of the servers because of where I was coming from.
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RA2's main issue, strictly as a game, is how ****ing boring everything has gotten, the efficiency oriented metas all have been explored to their breaking point, and no-one can be assed anymore to try making an alternate environment for it to try to make it interesting again (something like using unorthodox arenas like Mars Base, or having some odd requirement/restriction like Scrapheap Challenge for examples), and IRL's entire existence is a conflict of interest, because on one end you wanna make something cool cause that's the point of the IRL style of building, and on the other hand the entire tournament side of things is just "okay, from this roster, who is the biggest scum who abused how busted RA2 is the most ?"
Parsec was kinda cool for a bit cause it was new and cause online fights's always gonna be better than a braindead AI, but even then you still can't avoid all the problems IRL has relying on a busted af 16 year old game to realistically simulate things
the reason why i was so interested in RACCOON, is tying into the point i'm making, it was a new and different take on IRL from what we do here, it wasn't the same IRL that has flooded tournaments since years now
TL:DR try to make something different so stuff isn't the same boring and stale af things we see over and over and over
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GTM already welcomes RR2 even in alpha condition so i dont see the forum dying soon
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I think as well talking about RA2 is that we all managed to make this admittedly extremely niche game alive for 17-18 years. This community is as older than YouTube, Reddit and most other communities and social media. We should be proud of ourselves for that. All of us no matter how much we visit here or played the game have kept it alive for this long. It's now how to continue its life of both game and community since times have greatly changed. I've moved on to other ventures personally as I've lost interest in RA2 years ago and now graphic design, anime, other games and creative writing took over for me.
Still I greatly valued the time here and was a pillar of my life when I was going through uncertainty back in 2011.
We've exhausted the game to hell in all sides. Outside of the low chance of the source code being obtained there's not much we can do. RR2 seems to be a closest thing to a direction here for the community.
Like I said I've moved on and I'm residing on Reddit under a new name. I'm here just to provide vocal support after seeing this. You guys can't give up.
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Nobody plays stock, IF, DSL-S etc because none of the advocates for it are actually active enough to push any newbie towards it.
imo the reason nobody plays builds it is because there is no room left for innovation since everything has become so well optimized so unless you are doing PVP you can basically bet 1/2 to 3/4ths of the enteries to a tourney are gonna follow the same basically formula since you gotta if you want to win.
that only really applies to the boomers, zoomers just flat out have 0 interest and think the metas look disgusting. they just view them as skillless weapon spam fests
also doesn't help that it seems the preffered method of encouraging people to branch out to other metas is bashing on irl
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RE weapon balancing: It's so difficult to perfectly balance weapons, it not just a linear weight:damage scale you can adhere to. The mesh is such a big deal, and it's effect on balancing is unquantifiable, so you can't solve the balancing issue with spreadsheets unless you feel like removing a load of components to make a tiny mesh pool like IF.
Btw thanks for this iteration of the bi-yearly doompost. Let me know if there's a rota for it or something.
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potentially what you can do, is have a small selection of components, but each component has several visual models with the same hitbox, that way, you have an easier time balancing it cause there's still factually 20 or so components (random number obviously), but since each component has several "skins" you have variety for making cool looking stuff
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how could i resist a thread title like this...
first off: kill, you were the best and did the best you possibly could. problem was the community undermining you constantly with sh**posting across the internet. i cared about this community even after i stopped caring about the game (hop's right btw, nobody will ever 'fix' it, but it can still be fun), but didn't feel welcome here anymore. and that's become synonymous with the brand of gtm - a place where outsiders of a certain clique feel unwelcome. i don't know who, if anyone, is to blame. but that's not the point. i pop through every now and then out of nostalgia but haven't played the game in a long time and have no real desire to.
bridges are burned between this place and, let's be real, most others. it's either time to move on, or time to let someone come through and really shake this place up in the biggest way possible.
but yeah tl;dr go build a robot and idk slowly you start realising gtm ra2 whatever... don't matter...
bye xo
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yeah tl;dr go build a robot and idk slowly you start realising gtm ra2 whatever... don't matter...
bye xo
You got it heck
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it's either time to move on, or time to let someone come through and really shake this place up in the biggest way possible.
I've said it before, but if someone wants to take over running gtm then none of us have really any issues with it
one thing i really wanted was a more diverse leadership in regards to community representation (as in somebody from pws,ow, and whatever else the other big servers are). obviously I don't want to force taking an administration position on anyone, but I think it could be a step I'm the right direction
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it's either time to move on, or time to let someone come through and really shake this place up in the biggest way possible.
I've said it before, but if someone wants to take over running gtm then none of us have really any issues with it
one thing i really wanted was a more diverse leadership in regards to community representation (as in somebody from pws,ow, and whatever else the other big servers are). obviously I don't want to force taking an administration position on anyone, but I think it could be a step I'm the right direction
This is whats been happening in the OW discord. So thats a start
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here's my hot take as i was told to post one:
1. Like it or not, forums themselves are a dying breed this day in age, which I assume in a way has to do with just how the internet has changed back in the decade. Pretty much all of us """boomers""" on this forum got introduced to the internet before the real rise of reddit/social media/discord/etc over the past decade (going from slightly under 1 billion users in 2010 to over 3 billion users this year) and back then if you wanted to have a discussion about it you had to join a forum, there was no facebook group/discord/reddit/whatever for something. Now that there is other platforms that conveniently with also host all other communities in one place as a central hub there just really isn't any reason to go even look up and find a forum.
2. RA2 itself is just an old old old game with not much left in it (at least for me). Any sort of "competitive" meta (Stock & and DSL-S) really isn't fun to me anymore as everything has been perfected and there's nothing more I can do with them, at least in an AI based tournament. Meanwhile IRL at least has some creative draw but the fights themselves with how the bots have become are either a curbstomp or just constantly havok restarts until someone gettings pitted or something just because of how dumb the AI is. I honestly cannot stand watching AI fights for IRL tournaments because it's just so awfully boring and you see the AI literally kill itself so often. I rather have a tournament where just 2 people drive all the bots since I know PvP is a bitch to organize than have the AI do it because it at least adds some sort of human element to it and makes it feel less artificial and dull.
3. As others have said GTM users have had a uh, "unique" style of posting that isn't the most welcoming. I won't even say it's a recent thing, because I honestly saw way worst sh** when I joined back in the day (if you don't believe me he's one of the countless threads I can pull up lol) (https://gametechmods.com/forums/discussion/aceuplink-survivors/msg43079/#msg43079), but people now have options as GTM isn't the only RA2 community around. I also again feel like it has to do with just how the internet itself has changed over the last decade and how things how our lives online have become more increasingly interconnected with our personal lives, how literally half of us know each other on a first name basis and could probably pull up someones facebook profile easily if they wanted to so there's no really screen name to hide behind when you wanna talk sh**. Then you got the fact pretty much all the robotic communities are interconnected now and how other people will literally look down on people for even associating with the "sh**posters on gtm" (which to me is pretty messed up, but whatever, I can't be the moral police) and you got a reason why people don't wanna join and why people who have moved onto IRL robotics will want to distance themselves from this place.
4. As for the future of GTM itself, what I mainly see is it just being a resource for RA2 files (like it always has been, since there site was started to literally to host the DSL mod) and potential just a place to advertising their tournaments as a central hub or something since as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me :dumb)
5. Echoing what Somebody said, at the end of the day even if it truly does "die", this place has lived a hella of a long time for one community considering it basically ended up being a continuity of the original RA2 forums that came around in 2002 and closed in 2008 (GTM itself being around since 2004). It's funny to think this website itself is actually older than some of the people that use it, lol. The fact it's still alive even though it's on life support at this point is pretty amazing considering the amount of different admins/mods/users/etc that have passed thru over the years. Yeah it's probably my fault why it's even more sh**ty now due to coming under the same amazing apathetic state of mind to it that basically ever past mod and admin has went into when they realized there's not much they can "fix" about this community without getting sh**ted on by someone.
tl;dr this is probably somehow my fault and i apologize and i am a bad person sorry guys and if theres is someone thats wants to be admin please raise your hand
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ra2 is on life support, go outside and let it die
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Would it be helpful to adjust the visual presentation of GTM? You know, make it look more "modern". I mean, it still has that 2009 vibe to it. Personally, GTM kinda looks like a place that'll give your computer a virus(No offense).
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hey kids since every old farts coming out of the woods for this thread why not add to it
i guess is should preface this by saying i dont give a sh** about ra2 and haven't given one for it since about 2017. i only kick around because of folks like chris, geese, matt, and a few others are fun to chat with in discord.
anyway- i think it's fairly remarkable that gtm's still around even though it's a shell of itself. (and this has been a slow decline thats been going on since ~2013, if you don't believe me, look at post statistics by posts/year and the fukken drop they take around then)
even though i dont really know any of the kids that still play this gay game it's honestly flooring that there are people that still care about it, and i'm not sure whether that's sad or something admirable to say for the site and the users of it.
i've been using the internet as a means of sh**posting since the early 2000s when a was a lil boy and i've seen dozens of forums that i've been apart of come and go within years of starting up, and the staying power thru sheer autism that gtm has had is remarkable. and especially one thats for a ****ing 15 year old robot combat simulator that has a sh**ty physics engine and graphics from 1998.
i guess i'm (maybe) part of why gtm turns people off since i'm a culprit for sh**posting but honestly that's just the attitude i have about the internet; take everything you see with a grain of salt and don't get mad at it because its ultimately just text on a screen, i don't believe in "toxicity", if people don't like sh**posting and can't take joke than that sounds pretty boring to me.
so why you should read anything that i'm saying? you shouldn't, my impact on this site is minimal, i've done nothing to innovate on this site, and the only noteworthy thing i have about me on here is that i've been internet-buddies with the mods for years.
instead of worrying about gay sh** like this, go outside, go for a walk, enjoy life people.
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Thanks, boomer
Honestly Kill was right when he tried to make GTM more of a hugbox. Maybe the best idea would be to move all the RA2 (or just IRL?) stuff to a new/different community that's more friendly and not stuck on an archaic communication format. The splintering of communities is already an issue (cheers Orc), if GTM isn't a suitable hub for everything RA2 anymore, for whatever reasons, then maybe a new one is needed. Having everything decentralised is bad for almost everyone, and it feels like GTM has become toxic or at least nonessential to the continuation of RA2.
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Was there ever an idea of moving the community to Reddit? Keeping here as resource website.
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Reddit will bring in even more toxic people than we could handle.
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Reddit will bring in even more toxic people than we could handle.
I've seen my fair share. So would be risky?
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Reddit will bring in even more toxic people than we could handle.
I've seen my fair share. So would be risky?
Most likely.
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Would it be helpful to adjust the visual presentation of GTM? You know, make it look more "modern". I mean, it still has that 2009 vibe to it. Personally, GTM kinda looks like a place that'll give your computer a virus(No offense).
WHAT, I will have you know I spent hours making this look like the original 2001 site! .... so it has very historic vibe to it!
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Would it be helpful to adjust the visual presentation of GTM? You know, make it look more "modern". I mean, it still has that 2009 vibe to it. Personally, GTM kinda looks like a place that'll give your computer a virus(No offense).
WHAT, I will have you know I spent hours making this look like the original 2001 site! .... so it has very historic vibe to it!
Looks better than anything by Google, I can admit that much. Do think the logo needs a bit of colour.
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as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me
****ing this
I wouldn't mind if GTM weren't the only place to go for RA2 if I didn't have to go on a scavenger hunt to find the other ones. I swear the OW and PWS servers aren't public and they're apparently the most thriving places for RA2. I could be wrong by now (since I last checked) but I just can't be arsed to check and go on said scavenger hunt. I don't know how the current community puts up with it.
kinda off-topic but
I know RA2 doesn't have the best standing with ARC/Garry's Wars from what I've seen/heard so we can only try and improve if they want to do the same.
Hi, GWars representative/admin here. Just saying that, whenever anyone bashes GTM/RA2 in our community, I always defend them because we'd be nowhere without the GTM members that founded it. I'm pretty sure RoboBowler (the owner) thinks the same way as well. Just getting that out there. Sadly there are some people in the server that hate RA2 with a passion but I'd like to think they'd get over it if they had to.
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Good to see ya around, yugi
as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me
****ing this
I wouldn't mind if GTM weren't the only place to go for RA2 if I didn't have to go on a scavenger hunt to find the other ones. I swear the OW and PWS servers aren't public and they're apparently the most thriving places for RA2. I could be wrong by now (since I last checked) but I just can't be arsed to check and go on said scavenger hunt. I don't know how the current community puts up with it.
qft
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as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me
****ing this
I wouldn't mind if GTM weren't the only place to go for RA2 if I didn't have to go on a scavenger hunt to find the other ones. I swear the OW and PWS servers aren't public and they're apparently the most thriving places for RA2. I could be wrong by now (since I last checked) but I just can't be arsed to check and go on said scavenger hunt. I don't know how the current community puts up with it.
pretty much anyone who is remotely active and not a complete idiot/reject/boomer is on those servers (which tbh theres only like 2 or 3 major ones)
i think there's an argument that invite only policies hurt the community in the long run, but i don't see this changing anytime soon as most people support them as a necessary evil to keep the community somewhat sane (which i tend to agree with to an extent)
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as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me
****ing this
I wouldn't mind if GTM weren't the only place to go for RA2 if I didn't have to go on a scavenger hunt to find the other ones. I swear the OW and PWS servers aren't public and they're apparently the most thriving places for RA2. I could be wrong by now (since I last checked) but I just can't be arsed to check and go on said scavenger hunt. I don't know how the current community puts up with it.
pretty much anyone who is remotely active and not a complete idiot/reject/boomer is on those servers (which tbh theres only like 2 or 3 major ones)
Doesn't make it much better. It's also not great for newbs that stumble upon GTM, only to find a super quiet forum and maybe a dead discord server link.
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as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me
****ing this
I wouldn't mind if GTM weren't the only place to go for RA2 if I didn't have to go on a scavenger hunt to find the other ones. I swear the OW and PWS servers aren't public and they're apparently the most thriving places for RA2. I could be wrong by now (since I last checked) but I just can't be arsed to check and go on said scavenger hunt. I don't know how the current community puts up with it.
pretty much anyone who is remotely active and not a complete idiot/reject/boomer is on those servers (which tbh theres only like 2 or 3 major ones)
Doesn't make it much better. It's also not great for newbs that stumble upon GTM, only to find a super quiet forum and maybe a dead discord server link.
what he said
When you say remotely active, all you mean is active as these communities started popping up. Imagine if I or any other older member wanted to genuinely come back in this environment. They wouldn't know where to begin. Honestly, whenever the myriad of RA2 groups and their abbreviations are mentioned, I really cringe.
i think there's an argument that invite only policies hurt the community in the long run, but i don't see this changing anytime soon as most people support them as a necessary evil to keep the community somewhat sane (which i tend to agree with to an extent)
What do you mean? All people have to do is ban minges if they join a public discord and start causing a fuss. It's like these little splinter groups have broken off from GTM because they think it's an elitist/sh**posting clique just to make their own. In fact, I'd say that this new 'culture' of loads of fringe, invite-only RA2 communities on Discord has made RA2 way more unapproachable than GTM's reputation ever did
I don't think this actually has anything to do with the fact that GTM has bad rep or it's a forum. When I joined in 2014, GTM had gone through a **** ton of drama and forums weren't exactly hip and happening, yet I'd say there was a lot of activity. Obviously not compared to the older days I weren't around for but, nevertheless, it was way more active than it is now and I felt it was in a good place. I just think Discord has allowed people to incredibly easily make their own private forums and it's escalated to this.
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as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me
****ing this
I wouldn't mind if GTM weren't the only place to go for RA2 if I didn't have to go on a scavenger hunt to find the other ones. I swear the OW and PWS servers aren't public and they're apparently the most thriving places for RA2. I could be wrong by now (since I last checked) but I just can't be arsed to check and go on said scavenger hunt. I don't know how the current community puts up with it.
As geice said, pretty much everyone actively playing the game who isn't a raging arsehole gets invited to these servers. You don't play the game, or at least haven't shown any evidence of it, so you aren't in them. Newbies who show up do play the game, and most of them are in these discords as a result. If you really want to get in, legit all you have to do is play the game, and if you aren't interested in doing that then there's probably very little in the discords for you anyway.
I think it's pretty funny how people who have shown 0 interest in doing any of the things that ACTUALLY keep this community alive (posting in showcases, giving feedback, entering BOTM et cetera) are suddenly so concerned about GTM dying. If you're really that concerned, start showing more activity than simply coming out of the woodwork to complain that the forum isn't the same as it was back in 2011/12/whatever year
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as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me
****ing this
I wouldn't mind if GTM weren't the only place to go for RA2 if I didn't have to go on a scavenger hunt to find the other ones. I swear the OW and PWS servers aren't public and they're apparently the most thriving places for RA2. I could be wrong by now (since I last checked) but I just can't be arsed to check and go on said scavenger hunt. I don't know how the current community puts up with it.
As geice said, pretty much everyone actively playing the game who isn't a raging arsehole gets invited to these servers. You don't play the game, or at least haven't shown any evidence of it, so you aren't in them. Newbies who show up do play the game, and most of them are in these discords as a result. If you really want to get in, legit all you have to do is play the game, and if you aren't interested in doing that then there's probably very little in the discords for you anyway.
but how will new guys know to start being active on GTM in order to get invited to these more active splinter groups? As Badger said, all they see, on the surface, is a relatively dead forum. What kind of incentive is that? You say all one has to do is play RA2 but it really isn't that simple. And what's meant to happen, literally every new person gets PM'd 3 discord links when they post a showcase? Sounds pretty pointless to me.
I think it's pretty funny how people who have shown 0 interest in doing any of the things that ACTUALLY keep this community alive (posting in showcases, giving feedback, entering BOTM et cetera) are suddenly so concerned about GTM dying. If you're really that concerned, start showing more activity than simply coming out of the woodwork to complain that the forum isn't the same as it was back in 2011/12/whatever year
No-one is obligated to play RA2 in order to give their 2 cents. People can still care about how a community conducts themselves even if they're no longer active in it. I mean, I had to check GTM to get here. Doesn't mean I (or any other oldie in the woodwork) have to still actively participate in it
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as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me
****ing this
I wouldn't mind if GTM weren't the only place to go for RA2 if I didn't have to go on a scavenger hunt to find the other ones. I swear the OW and PWS servers aren't public and they're apparently the most thriving places for RA2. I could be wrong by now (since I last checked) but I just can't be arsed to check and go on said scavenger hunt. I don't know how the current community puts up with it.
As geice said, pretty much everyone actively playing the game who isn't a raging arsehole gets invited to these servers. You don't play the game, or at least haven't shown any evidence of it, so you aren't in them. Newbies who show up do play the game, and most of them are in these discords as a result. If you really want to get in, legit all you have to do is play the game, and if you aren't interested in doing that then there's probably very little in the discords for you anyway.
but how will new guys know to start being active on GTM in order to get invited to these more active splinter groups? As Badger said, all they see, on the surface, is a relatively dead forum. What kind of incentive is that? You say all one has to do is play RA2 but it really isn't that simple. And what's meant to happen, literally every new person gets PM'd 3 discord links when they post a showcase? Sounds pretty pointless to me.
Notice this new KupaTec guy? He's been here only for a week or two, but he shows that he cares about the game, and genuinely wants to play it. Thus, he was invited to the Orc's Wars server.
It's all really basic. This is where you get started with your building, and the discords are when you want to get involved.
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as a """boomer"""" I hate the fact I have to join a new discord server for like every god damn tournament to know whats even going on but that's just me
****ing this
I wouldn't mind if GTM weren't the only place to go for RA2 if I didn't have to go on a scavenger hunt to find the other ones. I swear the OW and PWS servers aren't public and they're apparently the most thriving places for RA2. I could be wrong by now (since I last checked) but I just can't be arsed to check and go on said scavenger hunt. I don't know how the current community puts up with it.
As geice said, pretty much everyone actively playing the game who isn't a raging arsehole gets invited to these servers. You don't play the game, or at least haven't shown any evidence of it, so you aren't in them. Newbies who show up do play the game, and most of them are in these discords as a result. If you really want to get in, legit all you have to do is play the game, and if you aren't interested in doing that then there's probably very little in the discords for you anyway.
but how will new guys know to start being active on GTM in order to get invited to these more active splinter groups? As Badger said, all they see, on the surface, is a relatively dead forum. What kind of incentive is that? You say all one has to do is play RA2 but it really isn't that simple. And what's meant to happen, literally every new person gets PM'd 3 discord links when they post a showcase? Sounds pretty pointless to me.
Literally any activity, anywhere suffices. Shocking as it maybe, GTM isn't the centre of the RA2 universe anymore, in fact I'd say the vast majority of newbies into the discords never even visit GTM other than to download the game. RA2 is alive and well outside of GTM and most people in the discords come from discovering the tournaments that are being created by these discords, not from GTM. In fact, most newbies who DO turn up on GTM have been directed there by people in the discords, who, believe it or not, also don't want to see GTM die.
No-one is obligated to play RA2 in order to give their 2 cents. People can still care about how a community conducts themselves even if they're no longer active in it. I mean, I had to check GTM to get here. Doesn't mean I (or any other oldie in the woodwork) have to still actively participate in it
I think complaining about the demise of a forum while simultaneously contributing to that demise through inaction is pretty rich personally. No sh** the forum is dying when such a large contingent of its users literally only shows up to oppose any attempt to make changes that might encourage people to use it, before disappearing back into inactivity as soon as the prospect of actually using the forum for its intended purpose comes up
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No-one is obligated to play RA2 in order to give their 2 cents. People can still care about how a community conducts themselves even if they're no longer active in it. I mean, I had to check GTM to get here. Doesn't mean I (or any other oldie in the woodwork) have to still actively participate in it
I think complaining about the demise of a forum while simultaneously contributing to that demise through inaction is pretty rich personally. No sh** the forum is dying when such a large contingent of its users literally only shows up to oppose any attempt to make changes that might encourage people to use it, before disappearing back into inactivity as soon as the prospect of actually using the forum for its intended purpose comes up
No-one can be forced to play a game they have no desire to play. It doesn't stop people from wanting to still have input in the community, tho. I think it's a bit grandiose to say that inaction, in this case, is equivalent to harmful action. You literally can't force someone to play a game and people like me that aren't playing the game atm have nothing to do with the state that it's in now. If all the RA2 activity taking place in all these discords were instead taking place on the forum, it would still be as active as 2014.
Literally any activity, anywhere suffices. Shocking as it maybe, GTM isn't the centre of the RA2 universe anymore, in fact I'd say the vast majority of newbies into the discords never even visit GTM other than to download the game. RA2 is alive and well outside of GTM and most people in the discords come from discovering the tournaments that are being created by these discords, not from GTM. In fact, most newbies who DO turn up on GTM have been directed there by people in the discords, who, believe it or not, also don't want to see GTM die.
Of course I realise GTM isn't the centre of the RA2 universe... it's the basis of the discussion we're having now. But why is it not? Everything currently being done in a wide variety of discords could be done on GTM and it would bring everyone playing RA2 together under 1 umbrella and create a larger community. To me, it just seems like all these groups have their own discord just because they can. I wanna come back and start hosting some tournaments again just so I can make a new discord for each one.
Surely you must see how such a fragmented community for such a small playerbase is stupid, right? It's needlessly complex. Even if one got invited to all the groups and had every avenue open to them, where do they post their bots? Who gives them advice? Is it everywhere or just one place? If it's the former, that's a lot of hassle, posting the same thing to 5 different discords. If it's the latter, how do they know they're getting the best advice and feedback on their robot? And not everyone interested in RA2 would see they bot if they're not in all the discords.
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No-one is obligated to play RA2 in order to give their 2 cents. People can still care about how a community conducts themselves even if they're no longer active in it. I mean, I had to check GTM to get here. Doesn't mean I (or any other oldie in the woodwork) have to still actively participate in it
I legitimately do not see how you can possibly think it is reasonable that GTM should beholden to a group of people who don't even use it. If you care about GTM, good for you, but the people who actually use the forums are the ones whose concerns should be listened to. Either that or we should be tailoring the forum towards those newbies who are on the discords but currently avoid GTM. Just so happens that what the boomers want is pretty much exactly opposite to what most newbies want. That is why the boomers who show up in threads like these to bitch and moan are harmful to GTM.
Of course I realise GTM isn't the centre of the RA2 universe... it's the basis of the discussion we're having now. But why is it not? Everything currently being done in a wide variety of discords could be done on GTM and it would bring everyone playing RA2 together under 1 umbrella and create a larger community. To me, it just seems like all these groups have their own discord just because they can. I wanna come back and start hosting some tournaments again just so I can make a new discord for each one.
GTM isn't the centre of the RA2 universe for a variety of reasons. Forums in general are a dying breed to begin with, but outside of that there's the fact that in a discord you can get immediate feedback, and feedback during the building of a bot. There's also GTM's niche humour to address. I don't have any problem with it, in fact I oftentimes find it pretty funny, but a lot of newbies, especially younger kids, do, and obviously every time someone tries to do something about it the boomers all emerge to reminisce about the 'good old days' when you could flame some newbie and call them a retard because they didn't use the right drive motors.
Surely you must see how such a fragmented community for such a small playerbase is stupid, right? It's needlessly complex. Even if one got invited to all the groups and had every avenue open to them, where do they post their bots? Who gives them advice? Is it everywhere or just one place? If it's the former, that's a lot of hassle, posting the same thing to 5 different discords. If it's the latter, how do they know they're getting the best advice and feedback on their robot? And not everyone interested in RA2 would see they bot if they're not in all the discords.
Maybe you'd have a point here if the feedback and advice on GTM wasn't total dogsh**. It has been for years now. The like system killed any last remnants of decent advice on the forums. Go and look through the showcase section and you'll see what I mean. On a discord you can get pretty much immediate feedback, in fact many people post bots that they're midway through building in order to get advice on what to do next. The great thing too is that on a discord you're pretty much guaranteed that someone will see your bot and give some feedback to it, where on GTM it'll often get buried by some boomers arguing about how their opinions on a forum they don't use need to be respected heck
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No-one is obligated to play RA2 in order to give their 2 cents. People can still care about how a community conducts themselves even if they're no longer active in it. I mean, I had to check GTM to get here. Doesn't mean I (or any other oldie in the woodwork) have to still actively participate in it
I legitimately do not see how you can possibly think it is reasonable that GTM should beholden to a group of people who don't even use it. If you care about GTM, good for you, but the people who actually use the forums are the ones whose concerns should be listened to. Either that or we should be tailoring the forum towards those newbies who are on the discords but currently avoid GTM. Just so happens that what the boomers want is pretty much exactly opposite to what most newbies want. That is why the boomers who show up in threads like these to bitch and moan are harmful to GTM.
I'm not saying you should bend to our every whim and demand or anything like that. But just because we don't actively participate doesn't mean we shouldn't be heard or we don't have valid complaints/arguments.
Either way, I've lost track of the bigger picture. I just think the bottom line is that the RA2 community as a whole is really gonna suffer due to how it's currently organised and I'm giving my outsider perspective on the situation. 2014 me was new to GTM and RA2 but was excited to start hosting some tournaments and interact with the community. 2019 me, even after all this discussion, wouldn't know where to begin
Edit:
If you really want to get in, legit all you have to do is play the game, and if you aren't interested in doing that then there's probably very little in the discords for you anyway.
Another thing on this point; I think there's an overemphasis on actively playing the game in order to simply observe the community. Literally all I ever did when I was active was host tournaments and lurk the rest of the time. And I got AU. Now I have to play the game to even see what other people are doing and start lurking again? No thanks. That's why a lot of veterans usually come out of the woodwork for this stuff, because they become lurkers and still actually like watching the community do their thing, in the background. It's forcing people to dance to your tune and creates the clique that branched off from the clique that I was talking about. Like I said, I wouldn't even mind if GTM weren't the sole hub for RA2 stuff if I could simply access the rest
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No-one is obligated to play RA2 in order to give their 2 cents. People can still care about how a community conducts themselves even if they're no longer active in it. I mean, I had to check GTM to get here. Doesn't mean I (or any other oldie in the woodwork) have to still actively participate in it
I legitimately do not see how you can possibly think it is reasonable that GTM should beholden to a group of people who don't even use it. If you care about GTM, good for you, but the people who actually use the forums are the ones whose concerns should be listened to. Either that or we should be tailoring the forum towards those newbies who are on the discords but currently avoid GTM. Just so happens that what the boomers want is pretty much exactly opposite to what most newbies want. That is why the boomers who show up in threads like these to bitch and moan are harmful to GTM.
2019 me, even after all this discussion, wouldn't know where to begin
Build and post an RA2 bot pretty much anywhere, leave a comment on one of the many tournament videos on Youtube, post on reddit or any other community asking about a robot combat game. Basically show pretty much any interest in RA2. Shockingly if you aren't interested in the game, you probably won't get invited to communities that revolve around that game. If that's somehow unreasonable to you then I don't know what to say
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No-one is obligated to play RA2 in order to give their 2 cents. People can still care about how a community conducts themselves even if they're no longer active in it. I mean, I had to check GTM to get here. Doesn't mean I (or any other oldie in the woodwork) have to still actively participate in it
I legitimately do not see how you can possibly think it is reasonable that GTM should beholden to a group of people who don't even use it. If you care about GTM, good for you, but the people who actually use the forums are the ones whose concerns should be listened to. Either that or we should be tailoring the forum towards those newbies who are on the discords but currently avoid GTM. Just so happens that what the boomers want is pretty much exactly opposite to what most newbies want. That is why the boomers who show up in threads like these to bitch and moan are harmful to GTM.
2019 me, even after all this discussion, wouldn't know where to begin
Build and post an RA2 bot pretty much anywhere, leave a comment on one of the many tournament videos on Youtube, post on reddit or any other community asking about a robot combat game. Basically show pretty much any interest in RA2. Shockingly if you aren't interested in the game, you probably won't get invited to communities that revolve around that game. If that's somehow unreasonable to you then I don't know what to say
I'm saying it's unreasonable for the community to not be completely public when it has been for so long up until now. There really is no good reason for it
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No-one is obligated to play RA2 in order to give their 2 cents. People can still care about how a community conducts themselves even if they're no longer active in it. I mean, I had to check GTM to get here. Doesn't mean I (or any other oldie in the woodwork) have to still actively participate in it
I legitimately do not see how you can possibly think it is reasonable that GTM should beholden to a group of people who don't even use it. If you care about GTM, good for you, but the people who actually use the forums are the ones whose concerns should be listened to. Either that or we should be tailoring the forum towards those newbies who are on the discords but currently avoid GTM. Just so happens that what the boomers want is pretty much exactly opposite to what most newbies want. That is why the boomers who show up in threads like these to bitch and moan are harmful to GTM.
2019 me, even after all this discussion, wouldn't know where to begin
Build and post an RA2 bot pretty much anywhere, leave a comment on one of the many tournament videos on Youtube, post on reddit or any other community asking about a robot combat game. Basically show pretty much any interest in RA2. Shockingly if you aren't interested in the game, you probably won't get invited to communities that revolve around that game. If that's somehow unreasonable to you then I don't know what to say
I'm saying it's unreasonable for the community to not be completely public when it has been for so long up until now. There really is no good reason for it
When you curate your community so that only people who are actually interested in the game are included it makes for a much better atmosphere. I'm sure as an outsider looking in it's probably a bit alienating but GTM is public, and exists, and you didn't feel the need to post on here so I doubt it's that concerning to you. I think it's quite telling that the people who actually play the game and keep up to date with the community are mostly fine with the situation, though most don't want to see GTM die. If you haven't been active since 2016, drop in and see how much things have changed, you're naturally gonna be opposed to it, but that doesn't automatically mean that the changes are for the worse.
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i wanna drop into the invite only thing. If the servers werent private, we would get a bunch of people like kermitnicky or plutonium, which we dont want, nobody does
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just wanna say, you guys should consider yourselves blessed that you haven't met mr plutonium, sephy, or vox
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just wanna say, you guys should consider yourselves blessed that you haven't met mr plutonium, sephy, or vox
Ive beaten vox so idm
And posted a video where i raped plutonium's bots
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I'm actually glad I don't come here that often anymore. Or that I'm not on the GTM or any of the other discord servers. There is and was so much toxic behaviour that turned me off and at this point I don't feel too connected to anything ra2 related anymore.
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pretty much everything yugi said was dead on and pretty much everything roboteer said was super condescending and dumb made me want to give him the biggest wedgie of his life.
first of all, yea, having this fractured community is a real pain in the neck and is the main reason it's dying. second, i guarantee you that showcases are dying on all these other discords. don't get me wrong they may be super active, but they are dying because it's non-sustainable in the long term. forums are just so far out of the league of discord/reddit/twitter because they archive information and don't bury it. losing all that info is like burning books man i'm serious. how on earth are newbies supposed to learn if they can't lurk because they 1) can't find the dang channel and 2) can't view bots that other people built for longer than 5 min. it's just so bad. not that I think forums are the king of the hill by any means, but discord doesn't even do this better. immediate feedback? sure. a record of all post? abysmal. but that's the point of a community. saying forums are obsolete because of discord is like saying books are obsolete because texting was invented. that doesn't even make sense.
for GTM i feel like our discord should be deleted. it's such a cesspool and only serves to further divide the community for no reason. obviously stuff like OW and PWS can't be given that same treatment nor should they, but they are still a major cause of the community fracturing. i was never invited to a lot of these communities because i don't know the secret handshake and i'm not sure I would want to if I did because i like to showcase bots? i'm not sure if there is a solution to this mess as a whole. i do think having leadership you can look up to would go a long ways to making this a better environment but i'm not sure who that would be either. I still doubt I would want to do it.
'cultural/technological progression' is only a small part of this despite people seeming to think it's most of the problem. a huge reason why gtm is dying is that no one showcases anymore because people are too busy throwing their bots in the trash to immediately get buried on other fractured platforms instead. it's really depressing knowing that none of those bots will be remembered in 10 years. do you think anyone would remember this (https://gametechmods.com/forums/tournament-archives/n00b-warz-match-videos/) in ten years on discord? yeah right. but there is a guest reading it here right now.
I don't think this actually has anything to do with the fact that GTM has bad rep or it's a forum. When I joined in 2014, GTM had gone through a **** ton of drama and forums weren't exactly hip and happening, yet I'd say there was a lot of activity. Obviously not compared to the older days I weren't around for but, nevertheless, it was way more active than it is now and I felt it was in a good place. I just think Discord has allowed people to incredibly easily make their own private forums and it's escalated to this.
this is exactly it. it also blows my mind that pretty much all of the people posting on this topic about why GTM is awful and should fail are pretty much the exact members causing it in the first place.
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for GTM i feel like our discord should be deleted.
if only this happened
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pretty much everything yugi said was dead on and pretty much everything roboteer said was super condescending and dumb made me want to give him the biggest wedgie of his life.
first of all, yea, having this fractured community is a real pain in the neck and is the main reason it's dying. second, i guarantee you that showcases are dying on all these other discords. don't get me wrong they may be super active, but they are dying because it's non-sustainable in the long term. forums are just so far out of the league of discord/reddit/twitter because they archive information and don't bury it. losing all that info is like burning books man i'm serious. how on earth are newbies supposed to learn if they can't lurk because they 1) can't find the dang channel and 2) can't view bots that other people built for longer than 5 min. it's just so bad. not that I think forums are the king of the hill by any means, but discord doesn't even do this better. immediate feedback? sure. a record of all post? abysmal. but that's the point of a community. saying forums are obsolete because of discord is like saying books are obsolete because texting was invented. that doesn't even make sense.
for GTM i feel like our discord should be deleted. it's such a cesspool and only serves to further divide the community for no reason. obviously stuff like OW and PWS can't be given that same treatment nor should they, but they are still a major cause of the community fracturing. i was never invited to a lot of these communities because i don't know the secret handshake and i'm not sure I would want to if I did because i like to showcase bots? i'm not sure if there is a solution to this mess as a whole. i do think having leadership you can look up to would go a long ways to making this a better environment but i'm not sure who that would be either. I still doubt I would want to do it.
'cultural/technological progression' is only a small part of this despite people seeming to think it's most of the problem. a huge reason why gtm is dying is that no one showcases anymore because people are too busy throwing their bots in the trash to immediately get buried on other fractured platforms instead. it's really depressing knowing that none of those bots will be remembered in 10 years. do you think anyone would remember this (https://gametechmods.com/forums/tournament-archives/n00b-warz-match-videos/) in ten years on discord? yeah right. but there is a guest reading it here right now.
I don't think this actually has anything to do with the fact that GTM has bad rep or it's a forum. When I joined in 2014, GTM had gone through a **** ton of drama and forums weren't exactly hip and happening, yet I'd say there was a lot of activity. Obviously not compared to the older days I weren't around for but, nevertheless, it was way more active than it is now and I felt it was in a good place. I just think Discord has allowed people to incredibly easily make their own private forums and it's escalated to this.
this is exactly it. it also blows my mind that pretty much all of the people posting on this topic about why GTM is awful and should fail are pretty much the exact members causing it in the first place.
centauri has a discord, no?
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centauri has a discord, no?
yes. and it is not a replacement for a forum and is only used to coordinate people during the tournament so it doesn't overlap
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obviously stuff like OW and PWS can't be given that same treatment nor should they
dunno bout that one chief, they should've been the first ones to go screw the discord zoomers
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Other people with purple names have posted so I feel like I should too.
I still love RA2. I don't play it anymore because there isn't anything worth my time building for. Of course I'm nostalgic for the good old days where I could get home from school, see a new tournament thread for DSL-S or even stock, go look through showcases and figure out what to build, spend hours perfecting something and send it off. I would check the forums every day waiting for updates and be so excited when splashes and brackets were posted.
But I get it. Times changes and people move on. I don't have nearly as much time as I used to and I imagine it's the same story for a lot of my generation.
Should we do something? I don't know tbh. I really hope GTM sticks around at least as an archive of what we have achieved in this game over the years. We can't force people to be active and I don't think we should.
I know at this point I just show up in these rant threads but I kind of enjoy the discussion even if it gets a bit heated. Good to see that people still care enough to at least check up on things now and again.
Now if only Badger had finished whatever that DSL-S tournament was...
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Now if only Badger had finished whatever that DSL-S tournament was...
:really_makes_you_think:
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Frankly you should have left it at the title, if you were that bent on trying to teal deer the whole OP.