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United States43646 Posts
(With apologies to GGTemplar for posting)
I think the lack of automatchmaking and other features is not a big detractor in terms of just having fun on Shield Battery. It has the feel and nostalgia of mid 2000s Battlenet, you hang out in a central channel, chat with the regulars, obs each other play games, play games, make rivalries, talk shit, etc etc. Speaking for myself only that was when I had most fun with starcraft. Years later, when I started to mass game on private ladder servers, although I got much better as a player I lost a large part of the social element of the game. I kept the friends I'd made on the Blizzard servers who migrated with me but I'd still go back and forth between them because I wanted to see my friends in Brood War GBR-1 and "/f m dudes, check out this replay from this great game I just played". I didn't make too many new friends on iccup, it was join game, see high lag, guess Peruvian, block cheese, easy points, easy life, go again.
Now maybe I'd feel differently if I didn't have that history from basing out of a social chat channel. Maybe I'd feel differently if I started with SC2 rather than bw, I know I certainly didn't feel the same social element in SC2 and that's probably why it never stuck with me. So maybe I can't speak for everyone with this. But speaking for myself only, I just don't give a shit about automatchmaking. Worrying about it when we have a dozen active players online is just silly, I know where I stand with those dozen people, I've played them all before, I can matchmake myself with that. What I want is more regulars and more ability to socialize with the regulars. I want obs maps (>2 obs per game). I want multiplayer replay functionality. I want scrollable chat in game (if you press up/down arrows after pressing enter it recalls the last chat message, then the one before etc). And most of all I just want more people on the server.
I do understand the legitimate fear that if you let people into the beta before AMM is in and they instaleave and never come back then the server may not recover. But for a lot of people like myself those features aren't what the server is missing. It's people. I don't play bw to hone my skills and be the best I can be. That's still super important to me but I know in my heart I'll never be as good as I was in 2009. I think the younger generation who feel today like I did then will be playing other, newer, games. BW is for the old nostalgic crowd sharing a drink and talking about their glory days.
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On November 29 2016 05:52 Bareleon wrote:
Are you guys planning a future feature where there is a separate phone app for just the chat channels?
I'd like this, I use the Fish app all the time
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On November 29 2016 07:18 notgayDragon wrote:Show nested quote +On November 29 2016 05:52 Bareleon wrote:
Are you guys planning a future feature where there is a separate phone app for just the chat channels? I'd like this, I use the Fish app all the time
How many people are on there?
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On November 29 2016 07:28 Bareleon wrote:Show nested quote +On November 29 2016 07:18 notgayDragon wrote:On November 29 2016 05:52 Bareleon wrote:
Are you guys planning a future feature where there is a separate phone app for just the chat channels? I'd like this, I use the Fish app all the time How many people are on there?
Everyone on Fish in a clan uses the app at least once a week to stay in touch at school or work or something.
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@Kwark @Ty2: If more people is what you want then wouldn't it make more sense to wait for the moment when user retention would be at its peak? I get that you want people NOW but like a kid who wants his cookie before dinner, perhaps the more sensible thing is to forego immediate gratification for a more stable and rewarding future. If SB in its current form can only retain a couple dozen of active users from what is still a largely veteran and dedicated population, what makes you think that future newcomers would be any different? Now that hosting has been greatly repaired by mca 1.2.2 and at least in my experience the major portion of the social aspect is handled by Skype and Discord, SB's "everyone can host" appeal has met competition and the lack of pings and sound notifications put it at a disadvantage against these other platforms. It is nice to reminisce about 2009 and drink a beer with other old school players but to aid the longevity of both BW and SB we need to cater to new audiences as BW is proving its resilience in the Korean scene.
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I cannot host, even with mca, and also I cannot play with more than 1 person.
I can do both in SB. I have played 2v2, race wars and team melee.
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On November 29 2016 09:16 ArcTimes wrote:
I cannot host, even with mca, and also I cannot play with more than 1 person.
I can do both in SB. I have played 2v2, race wars and team melee.
I said greatly repaired, not solved. It has fixed the situation for MANY people. For that majority, SB's and mca's functionality now overlaps much more, with mca having the benefit of audio notifications and being used on two servers with a competitive ladder. My point stands.
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On November 29 2016 06:13 KwarK wrote:
(With apologies to GGTemplar for posting)
I think the lack of automatchmaking and other features is not a big detractor in terms of just having fun on Shield Battery. It has the feel and nostalgia of mid 2000s Battlenet, you hang out in a central channel, chat with the regulars, obs each other play games, play games, make rivalries, talk shit, etc etc. Speaking for myself only that was when I had most fun with starcraft. Years later, when I started to mass game on private ladder servers, although I got much better as a player I lost a large part of the social element of the game. I kept the friends I'd made on the Blizzard servers who migrated with me but I'd still go back and forth between them because I wanted to see my friends in Brood War GBR-1 and "/f m dudes, check out this replay from this great game I just played". I didn't make too many new friends on iccup, it was join game, see high lag, guess Peruvian, block cheese, easy points, easy life, go again.
Now maybe I'd feel differently if I didn't have that history from basing out of a social chat channel. Maybe I'd feel differently if I started with SC2 rather than bw, I know I certainly didn't feel the same social element in SC2 and that's probably why it never stuck with me. So maybe I can't speak for everyone with this. But speaking for myself only, I just don't give a shit about automatchmaking. Worrying about it when we have a dozen active players online is just silly, I know where I stand with those dozen people, I've played them all before, I can matchmake myself with that. What I want is more regulars and more ability to socialize with the regulars. I want obs maps (>2 obs per game). I want multiplayer replay functionality. I want scrollable chat in game (if you press up/down arrows after pressing enter it recalls the last chat message, then the one before etc). And most of all I just want more people on the server.
I do understand the legitimate fear that if you let people into the beta before AMM is in and they instaleave and never come back then the server may not recover. But for a lot of people like myself those features aren't what the server is missing. It's people. I don't play bw to hone my skills and be the best I can be. That's still super important to me but I know in my heart I'll never be as good as I was in 2009. I think the younger generation who feel today like I did then will be playing other, newer, games. BW is for the old nostalgic crowd sharing a drink and talking about their glory days.
I thought SB could be more than just a club for the "old nostalgic crowd". BW has a legendary status as the "perfect RTS" and can still draw in new players. But they expect automatchmaking from a competitive game at this point in time.
Yes it takes away from the social experience but for a new player it's a bit like going to a Smash Tournament without actual Smash experience. People will be friendly and play games with you and there's camaraderie and a good vibe, but you still get stomped 100 times in a row if you even stay that long. After that, only the very most dedicated would go the next tournament and get their next 100 losses until they eventually can close the gap.
With automatchmaking at least you can hope to find other new players (or very bad old players) eventually because those don't show up at tournaments or social channels for the same reasons. And unless you have a dedicated mentor that actively teaches you the game, opponents on your level are the only way to get better, because you learn so few things from a roflestomp that you might as well could've played against the AI.
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Croatia9530 Posts
On November 29 2016 20:29 shin ken wrote:Show nested quote +On November 29 2016 06:13 KwarK wrote:
(With apologies to GGTemplar for posting)
I think the lack of automatchmaking and other features is not a big detractor in terms of just having fun on Shield Battery. It has the feel and nostalgia of mid 2000s Battlenet, you hang out in a central channel, chat with the regulars, obs each other play games, play games, make rivalries, talk shit, etc etc. Speaking for myself only that was when I had most fun with starcraft. Years later, when I started to mass game on private ladder servers, although I got much better as a player I lost a large part of the social element of the game. I kept the friends I'd made on the Blizzard servers who migrated with me but I'd still go back and forth between them because I wanted to see my friends in Brood War GBR-1 and "/f m dudes, check out this replay from this great game I just played". I didn't make too many new friends on iccup, it was join game, see high lag, guess Peruvian, block cheese, easy points, easy life, go again.
Now maybe I'd feel differently if I didn't have that history from basing out of a social chat channel. Maybe I'd feel differently if I started with SC2 rather than bw, I know I certainly didn't feel the same social element in SC2 and that's probably why it never stuck with me. So maybe I can't speak for everyone with this. But speaking for myself only, I just don't give a shit about automatchmaking. Worrying about it when we have a dozen active players online is just silly, I know where I stand with those dozen people, I've played them all before, I can matchmake myself with that. What I want is more regulars and more ability to socialize with the regulars. I want obs maps (>2 obs per game). I want multiplayer replay functionality. I want scrollable chat in game (if you press up/down arrows after pressing enter it recalls the last chat message, then the one before etc). And most of all I just want more people on the server.
I do understand the legitimate fear that if you let people into the beta before AMM is in and they instaleave and never come back then the server may not recover. But for a lot of people like myself those features aren't what the server is missing. It's people. I don't play bw to hone my skills and be the best I can be. That's still super important to me but I know in my heart I'll never be as good as I was in 2009. I think the younger generation who feel today like I did then will be playing other, newer, games. BW is for the old nostalgic crowd sharing a drink and talking about their glory days. I thought SB could be more than just a club for the "old nostalgic crowd". BW has a legendary status as the "perfect RTS" and can still draw in new players. But they expect automatchmaking from a competitive game at this point in time. Yes it takes away from the social experience but for a new player it's a bit like going to a Smash Tournament without actual Smash experience. People will be friendly and play games with you and there's camaraderie and a good vibe, but you still get stomped 100 times in a row if you even stay that long. After that, only the very most dedicated would go the next tournament and get their next 100 losses until they eventually can close the gap. With automatchmaking at least you can hope to find other new players (or very bad old players) eventually because those don't show up at tournaments or social channels for the same reasons. And unless you have a dedicated mentor that actively teaches you the game, opponents on your level are the only way to get better, because you learn so few things from a roflestomp that you might as well could've played against the AI.
The idea of the ShieldBattery project is to try to do both; cater to the "old nostalgic crowd" with all the features/feelings that they grew up with in BW (chat channels, community), while also trying to attract new players with all the modern features (matchmaking etc.).
Will we succeed in that? Not sure, only time will tell.
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People don't get on to games to chat. Chat is just a side thing. People want to get on and play the game asap especially now since time seems more valuable than ever. At least for me. Matchmaking would be a must if you're planning on doing this.
Without it we might as well be in just a chat room without the game.
Atm, it think we need matchmaking. Maybe even consider closing the beta until matchmaking is ready.
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Hyrule19193 Posts
Why? There are plenty of people in the beta who don't need matchmaking, why shut them all out just because you don't have 1 feature?
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On November 29 2016 06:13 KwarK wrote:
BW is for the old nostalgic crowd sharing a drink and talking about their glory days.
Or maybe just for people who with all honesty believe it's a better game, and no nostalgia factor has anything in common with it.
Edit: but TBH I left the game long ago, but I'm eager to watch the vods and streams of good players.
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On November 29 2016 22:49 tofucake wrote:
Why? There are plenty of people in the beta who don't need matchmaking, why shut them all out just because you don't have 1 feature?
Not to mention losing sources of bugreports and experience-based feedback from an established group of participants.
Yea, this idea makes no sense at all to me o_Oa
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On November 29 2016 22:49 tofucake wrote:
Why? There are plenty of people in the beta who don't need matchmaking, why shut them all out just because you don't have 1 feature?
It's not about me. It's about killing the hype. "plenty of people" is an exaggeration. There are like 5 people ACTIVELY playing or less every day and that is putting it nicely.
Rest just sit AFK 24/7.
The people want matchmaking. Just read the comments. I don't need to explain it to you. It might possibly be the most requested feature. So, no, it's not just for me, it's for the fans.
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Hyrule19193 Posts
You mean the fans that are you, and not the people playing without matchmaking? You do realize that you can achieve the same result by just not using the service, right? And by doing that, you don't prevent a bunch of other people from having fun.
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TLADT24920 Posts
On November 30 2016 13:42 Cheesefome wrote:Show nested quote +On November 29 2016 22:49 tofucake wrote:
Why? There are plenty of people in the beta who don't need matchmaking, why shut them all out just because you don't have 1 feature? It's not about me. It's about killing the hype. "plenty of people" is an exaggeration. There are like 5 people ACTIVELY playing or less every day and that is putting it nicely. Rest just sit AFK 24/7. The people want matchmaking. Just read the comments. I don't need to explain it to you. It might possibly be the most requested feature. So, no, it's not just for me, it's for the fans.
I agree with what tofucake wrote and I trust tec's decision to keep the server as closed beta atm. Doesn't make sense to close the server to all because not all the features are currently available especially when there are plenty of folks who enjoy the server working as is atm with features on the way.
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I'm probably in the minority, but I'd like to see 16 : 9 support (854x480) further down the line, not just for spectators. Of course map visibility is a part of gameplay but I don't think 107 additional pixels on each side will have a huge impact on how you play.
This of course leads to a discussion of how close you want to stay to vanilla BW and how much you want to modernize it, but it seems like ShieldBattery will already change it up by allowing customizable hotkeys (?) in the future.
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On November 30 2016 16:04 BossPurple wrote:
I'm probably in the minority, but I'd like to see 16 : 9 support (854x480) further down the line, not just for spectators. Of course map visibility is a part of gameplay but I don't think 107 additional pixels on each side will have a huge impact on how you play.
This of course leads to a discussion of how close you want to stay to vanilla BW and how much you want to modernize it, but it seems like ShieldBattery will already change it up by allowing customizable hotkeys (?) in the future.
I agree that you're probably in the minority on this because I honestly feel like that is a huge game changer in a lot of positional situations. If I may ask, why do you think this would be a good addition to Brood War?
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I check this thread every now and then to see how SB is comming along. When it was announced.... 9? Months ago it sounded like matchmaking was just around the corner.
Still nothing. Seems to me like the development is at a stand still. But hey, all you can do is hope 
I really really hope it finishes and that it contains matchmaking. I just wanted to add one more person contributing that match making is much needed.
Good job so far with shield batteri. Please continue
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EPT
