17 replies to this topic

[Swarm of Locusts I]

Does anyone know why I can not start any topics? This is stupid did they put a cap on actually starting a thread for new people? Are they not part of the "community"? I have never seen a forum do this.

Edited by Swarm of Locusts I, 25 July 2014 - 09:46 AM.

[Eximar]

It would appear that you can start a topic.

[Redshift2k5]

http://mwomercs.com/...35289-recruits/

As a "recruit" you only have access to the new player help and various patch feedback forums, so you can both seek help/advice and report issues. When you complete 25 matches you will have full forum access.

This greatly cuts down on spam, sock puppets, troll accounts, and people generating multiple accounts to "agree" with their opinions.

[Swarm of Locusts I]

Only here smart ass. This is a legitimate question, no where but here and my hardware section can I start a new thread. Why would they put a cap on anyone new to the game even being able to interact with the "community"?

[Mechteric]

Swarm of Locusts I, on 25 July 2014 - 09:50 AM, said:

Only here smart ass. This is a legitimate question, no where but here and my hardware section can I start a new thread. Why would they put a cap on anyone new to the game even being able to interact with the "community"?

They allow you to post in new player help, that's for new players, such as yourself. Makes sense to me.


As to why? Because people were abusing the ability to create a new account easily for harassment purposes.

Edited by CapperDeluxe, 25 July 2014 - 09:53 AM.

[Swarm of Locusts I]

Wow. And PGI wonders why they have such a low retention rate of new players. They are the most new player unfriendly company and game I have ever encountered.

As an aside thank you for answering my question redshift. I guess I will go and complete my "25" matches.

[TheCaptainJZ]

How is that unfriendly to new players? What's unfriendly is when people with an ax to grind make several alt accounts to make it look like the majority of players agree with their complaints. That's why the system works the way it does. It's hardly that big of a deal. Most new players don't have the experience with the game to contribute much to the other areas anyway. You can't discuss the meta without understanding what the meta is first.

[Wintersdark]

Swarm of Locusts I, on 25 July 2014 - 09:54 AM, said:

Wow. And PGI wonders why they have such a low retention rate of new players. They are the most new player unfriendly company and game I have ever encountered.

As an aside thank you for answering my question redshift. I guess I will go and complete my "25" matches.

It might seem that way, but it cuts down a lot of forum toxicity, which is good for new players.

PGI is certainly not unfriendly to new players, though the game itself certainly has a steep learning curve. Ultimately, when you're brand new (first 25 matches) you're not going to have much to contribute outside of the New Player forum anyways. Chat here, learn the ropes, get your first 25 matches in and it's all good. Until then, you're basically limited to posting in the best part of the forum where people tend to be the most helpful anyways, so there's certainly no harm done.

This greatly reduces the amount of random spam in other forums - it made a huge difference, in fact.

[Pekiti]

Swarm of Locusts I, on 25 July 2014 - 09:50 AM, said:

Only here smart ass. This is a legitimate question, no where but here and my hardware section can I start a new thread. Why would they put a cap on anyone new to the game even being able to interact with the "community"?

Classy, especially that 'help me, smart ass' attitude. I think you just answered your own question, by behaving in exactly the fashion they want to filter from the rest of the forums.

Welcome to MWO. Perhaps later, after your 25 matches, you can tell us all about how PGI works, and what they are really thinking. Because I don't think they wonder about their low retention rate among new players, actually.

[Swarm of Locusts I]

I should clarify some things and why I felt that way. First off I am not a new player, this is an alt account I made to poll interest in a possible community driven tournament. I made an alt just to separate anything related to that as opposed to mixing in my main accounts stuff, not to troll or anything stupid like that.

I also totally understand the reasons, even though I do not post almost at all on my main account I do read the forums occasionally and get it.

I was just putting myself in a new players shoes so to speak. I also understand it would be an illusion of unfriendliness with the learning curve of the game, etc. etc. It is just that the illusion IS there. And I personally thin PGI has done great lately with trying to mitigate that illusion.

I suppose it just kind of felt unfriendly, and I was just surprised as I really haven't ever seen that before and I have been a part of ALOT of forum communities. I was not angry by the way, just surprised, a bit frustrated, and then I imagined what someone new would feel like.

Edit- That reply was a smart ass reply to my legitimate question Pekiti. Instead of actually answering why I could not, he implied was I stupid because I "already" was. Compare that to Winters answer and Cappers answer. If I was new that answer alone is not very friendly to a new person in this community.

Edited by Swarm of Locusts I, 25 July 2014 - 10:56 AM.

[Modo44]

Swarm of Locusts I, on 25 July 2014 - 10:51 AM, said:

I was just putting myself in a new players shoes so to speak.

While assuming to have all the recognition of a long-time veteran, and access of a 26 matches green player. Try harder. It makes sense, but only after you think about it.

[Eximar]

Swarm of Locusts I, on 25 July 2014 - 10:51 AM, said:

Edit- That reply was a smart ass reply to my legitimate question Pekiti. Instead of actually answering why I could not, he implied was I stupid because I "already" was. Compare that to Winters answer and Cappers answer. If I was new that answer alone is not very friendly to a new person in this community.

There was nothing smart ass about my reply.

If I had wanted to imply you were stupid, I would have mentioned that, even after starting a topic, you edited your post and still asked whether you could start a topic. You never asked about starting a topic in another forum.

[Mechteric]

Swarm of Locusts I, on 25 July 2014 - 10:51 AM, said:

I should clarify some things and why I felt that way. First off I am not a new player, this is an alt account I made to poll interest in a possible community driven tournament. I made an alt just to separate anything related to that as opposed to mixing in my main accounts stuff, not to troll or anything stupid like that.

You didn't need to make an alt for that. Thats just silly.

[Wintersdark]

Swarm of Locusts I, on 25 July 2014 - 10:51 AM, said:

I should clarify some things and why I felt that way. First off I am not a new player, this is an alt account I made to poll interest in a possible community driven tournament. I made an alt just to separate anything related to that as opposed to mixing in my main accounts stuff, not to troll or anything stupid like that.

I also totally understand the reasons, even though I do not post almost at all on my main account I do read the forums occasionally and get it.

I was just putting myself in a new players shoes so to speak. I also understand it would be an illusion of unfriendliness with the learning curve of the game, etc. etc. It is just that the illusion IS there. And I personally thin PGI has done great lately with trying to mitigate that illusion.

I suppose it just kind of felt unfriendly, and I was just surprised as I really haven't ever seen that before and I have been a part of ALOT of forum communities. I was not angry by the way, just surprised, a bit frustrated, and then I imagined what someone new would feel like.

Edit- That reply was a smart ass reply to my legitimate question Pekiti. Instead of actually answering why I could not, he implied was I stupid because I "already" was. Compare that to Winters answer and Cappers answer. If I was new that answer alone is not very friendly to a new person in this community.

In all honesty, this is one of the reasons that policy is in place, though, to prevent people from making alt accounts to post things. Not saying your post is bad, but rather that people should feel comfortable posting whatever it is they wish to under their own account, and if not, perhaps it shouldn't be posted at all.

[Swarm of Locusts I]

That is not silly Capper. There is a limit on how many friends any account can have first off. With 10 teams you are looking at a block of 100-120 people. And a tournament is not fun with just a couple teams. You should have minimum like 10 if not more. I am already almost maxed on my main account for friends. Add to that it would require premium time. On two accounts to be able to make a custom game. I was planning on using two alt accounts both loaded with premium time, out of my own pocket, so anyone who wanted to participate would not have to have premium time. I was trying to make something fun for the community for free to further the game and community, if there was any interest in it.

Obviously I do not want go to a lot of trouble, time, and money if no one is interested. It is also ALOT more easy to manage something like that with an alt as opposed to my main account. I play the game. I like the game, when I am playing for my own for fun I do not want to be bombarded with messages etc etc when I am playing with friends, family, unit etc etc.

There was no troll account or hidden agenda here. I have been playing since closed beta ended. I was not aware of ay changes. I just asked a question out of frustration and legitimate concern. I was trying do something for the community and the game.

After I posted and redshift actually answered my question, I went to grinding my 25 matches. The fist match I had someone on our team tells to all "whelp my team is full of derps! you guys should just rush us and get it over with" just because we had 5 (c) mechs on our team. I understand they are new and they do silly things. I understand to someone experienced with the game they can be a handicap. But wow is that bad for retaining new players. The derp team stomped them by the way 12-3. All of it together seriously to me it seems unfriendly.

Winters- I just saw your post, I am now on my last one for the day. Like I said I get it, I do understand. I am not complaining about it actually, especially now that I know why and that it is in fact in place.

[Pekiti]

Sorry, I have to call BS.

You came into the New Player Help area of the forums, posted as a New Player (three times actually), and when someone called you on it, it turns out you're an alt and you had some kind of convoluted plan for using the alt account to post things your (apparently well known and loved) main account couldn't do?

If you were only trying to use the alt account to increase your potential audience (for your tournament) then the logical thing would have been to state that up front, in your first post. "Hey guys, this is an alt of XXXX, but for some reason I can't access the rest of the forums, anyone know why?" Your question would have been answered promptly and without any drama.

But...you tried to pass yourself off as a new player, until your fourth post in the thread.

(shrug)

I dunno, you just come across as fishy. And that's why so many people spoke up about it.

[Thorn Hallis]

Swarm of Locusts I, on 25 July 2014 - 10:51 AM, said:

this is an alt account

There you have your answer on the "why".

[Redshift2k5]

Swarm of Locusts I, on 25 July 2014 - 12:07 PM, said:

That is not silly Capper. There is a limit on how many friends any account can have first off. With 10 teams you are looking at a block of 100-120 people. And a tournament is not fun with just a couple teams. You should have minimum like 10 if not more. I am already almost maxed on my main account for friends. Add to that it would require premium time. On two accounts to be able to make a custom game. I was planning on using two alt accounts both loaded with premium time, out of my own pocket, so anyone who wanted to participate would not have to have premium time. I was trying to make something fun for the community for free to further the game and community, if there was any interest in it.

Even for a tournament, you do not need every player added as a friend. In the lobby system you can invite a player directly by name without needing to be friends. If you are pulling in a premade group, you only need to invite their group leader and it will pull their entire group into the lobby. Very handy for pulling in two premade teams into one lobby!

Having two alts with premium time running is, however, the most direct way you can personally guarantee there will be 2 accounts available with premium time to form lobbies of less than 24 players.

The Code of conduct is very specific about using multiple forum accounts, especially using them to bend or break other rules in the CoC (although you do not seem to be in direct violation of any codes of conduct since you are not using your alt to prop up your own arguments or anything like that), but it does allow multiple game accounts.

Your second post is more than a little inflammatory and I don't think that's the kind of attitude you want to project if you're trying to build a community event, hmm?

Edited by Redshift2k5, 25 July 2014 - 04:13 PM.