Helping the worst minority

For our last LFR raid Blizzard prepared a surprise: The new thing is in the top. Despite we have not kicked anyone this week, there was a 2-hours cooldown on kicking that below tank crap. I contacted a GM and it's not a bug.

Of course a goblin always finds his way: However it's a temporary fix. Soon every good or even OK-ish player will be on votekick cooldown and from that point the worthless morons can't be kicked.

Time for whining and pointless posting on forums how bad is it, citing that most players - even if not great - are capable of completing LFR raids (look at the damage meter, only 1 is below the tank and another 4 close to them). Forcing these people to carry the worthless M&S simply doesn't work as they are incapable to. A raid with half OK and half M&S won't complete LFR, we already almost wiped on DW, as we couldn't kick the "i do as i wanna" kiddies who kept attacking the wing, providing us a wonderful tendrils+corruption+bolt combo on the platform of Nozdormu.

It is a conscious decision of Blizzard that they don't simply aim for the averagely bad players, they have a "no moron is left behind" policy, LFD/LFR is open to even the most terrible leech with no limit, not even a very low one.

What can a goblin do who still gears up? Simply use the system as intended. /follow healer and go AFK! In a few hours the raid will complete while you cleaned your room, ate or read a book. Just don't go far from the computer as you have to move every now and then to prevent becoming AFK and above all, you must press need on loot. If they want people to carry 0 DPS players, why not be one of those carried?

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Microtransactions: pay to cheat

In "free to play" microtransaction games, items of power often sold. However people don't consider how strong they are. The reason is self-deceiving: the buyers don't want to believe that they were practically given "God mode" for their money, while the free-players don't want to face that they are nothing but hopeless NPCs in this game.

For these self-deceiving reasons everyone seems to accept that these items give only "slight" buff. In the game World of Tanks the players consider buying gold ammo a "bit lame" but nothing game-breaking. No wonder no one wanted to make a decent analysis. I bought 2500 gold for 10 euros and spent it all on gold ammo in a Hetzer tank. The 2500 gold were burned in mere 53 matches, making this game rather expensive (my total 3500 games would cost 660 euros with gold ammo). Let's see the results of this tank before and after the experiment:

	Without gold ammo	With gold ammo
Win %	60	68
Win % without draws	62	71
Kill / battle	1.14	2.43
Damage / battle	443	827
XP / battle	320	676
Survive %	43.4	39.6

Ouch! The "slight" increase of power given by the item shop doubled my kills, damage and XP gains. My new winrate would place me to world top 100 (out of 500K) if I would start an account and play it with only gold ammo. My decreased survival rate tells that my godlike powers made me reckless so with more disciplined play I could get even more wins and kills.

These results mean two things: one is that any serious player must stay away from microtransaction games. The win depends only on payment and not on player skill or even luck, therefore these are not even games, they are mere "epeen machines": you throw in coin, epeen comes out.

Secondly the fact that such abominations can exist and financially thrive, tells a lot about the players who are finding it fun to massacre totally helpless opponents with their ridiculously overpowered item shop stuff. I mean, they know that they are cheating, where is the fun in winning this way? They are socials who doesn't really play to win, but to amuse (real or imaginary) peers. As long as the game company can upkeep the lie that the item shop stuff are just "quality of life" improvements, the cheater can show up front of peers as "awesome", and this is their source of fun.

PS: In the game they introduced French tanks. The Wiki says "higher tiers are more mobile and carry fast firing, high-penetration guns, which may leave players believing their grind wasn't pointless. However, most high tier French tanks lack armor." It seems a fair tradeoff. However it's just another gift to the pay-to-cheat players. Armor is irrelevant as gold ammo penetrates it. However those who pay more money for the experience conversion to get French tanks fast will get totally overpowered tanks that can easily destroy anything in the field, even tiers above them - with gold ammo. The pay-to-cheat games become more and more unbalanced and messed up with every patch, until they become simply unplayable.

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You call them newbies? I, Object!

Those who don't play World of Tanks can't get the pun, it's about the name of this tank, "Object 704". This is a Tier 9 tank destroyer, there is no bigger than this, this is an endgame tank.

One has to play 1000+ matches to get into the "endgame", the matches of the top tiered tanks, simply because you can't buy experience points in the game (you can only convert them from other tanks, but you must play them). Researching this tank needs researching all its predecessors, which takes about 410000 XP. Since an average player has about 300XP/battle, you need to play about 1300 matches even if you go straightforward to this tank.

No one would call someone after 1300!!! matches a newbie. He has several hundred hours of game experience, he is dedicated and totally a "hardcore". I'm playing with and against the most experienced players of this game. Even if I could massacre lost newbies with my Marder II, no more fooling around here, I'm just an average Joe among these super-experienced pros. Right? Oops? Despite I'm just 1/15 of the team, I can shift the win rate from the average 49% to 60! If we'd exclude draws from the results, I'd have 64% winrate. My average winrate with all tanks is 56%, placing me to the #10.5K spot out of 500K+ players. People with 60% winrate are in the top #2K and if you check the toplists, most of them are "cheating" their rating by playing low tier twink tanks mostly or even exlusively. So, I can get top results among the most experienced players. My girlfriend don't even have an Object 704 yet, so I gained these results all alone (can't wait to see our combined results).

This alone disproves the "newbie" claim, the last of the "he is bad out of his control" ideas. Socials pull this claim when all other excuses are depleted. That guy who we see being an idiot is just a lost new player and it's not his fault, we've all been new. Not anymore! If it would be true, than my superiority would be biggest with small tanks and then would diminish as I'd face better and better players. Except it doesn't. The Jagdtiger drivers are not an inch smarter than those who run around in a Panzerjager I. My winrate with the different tanks is affected only by relative tank strengths. The mid tier tanks often face enemies they can't harm, so no matter how bad the enemy player is, he'll win. Both the Marder II and the Object 704 are capable to destroy anything they face, so I can't get into a situation when I simply can't win. However I'm not overpowered as the enemy team also has equally strong tanks.

"Experience" is like "play time", a lame excuse for simple idiocy and uselessness. No matter how much time a M&S spends in the game, he'll still suck, because he is a moron or a slacker. He can be killed in the same spot 100x without him coming to the conclusion that going there is a bad idea.

So please don't use the terms "newbie", "noob" or even "E-bayer" to bad players. By doing so, you place the sub-conscious assumption that his sucking is out of his control, and by playing more he'll be better. He won't. He is unable or doesn't care to. Use "moron", "idiot" or if you are polite, "baddie". That shows correctly that he is bad, opposed to he is being bad. His real life attitude, the way he approaches the game must be changed to make him be better, giving him ingame items or game time won't help. He doesn't approach a match as a puzzle to solve, he jumps into it without considerations and see how it goes. He comments "lol" or "ffs lag" after he died in some impossible situation without gaining any new insights.

World of Tanks is a good test game for this as here your income can be negative (your repair cost can exceed your reward) and after death you don't respawn, so the usual "he plays for PvP fun" used on WoW AB bridge morons can't stand, as losing credits and watching a "you are dead" screen is surely not fun.

PS: don't ask why I spent credits to paint my tank, it's a moneymaking machine, during the 150 matches I gathered 4M credits and since I'm not planning to buy any more tanks and all my current ones are elite, I simply can't use credits anymore.

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Two suggestions

Please read these suggestions and support them if you find them worthy.

One is Valor point bid by Lyxi. I have to say, this is the first idea that is maybe even better than gold bid.

The other is from me to prevent stupid mispulls in dungeons and raids.

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I was in the hospital FFS

We lost a "wonderful" member. One that told that he has no idea about a boss after he wiped us on it. No, we did not kick him. Then why did he left? Maybe he was lying about being in the hospital. But maybe he was telling the truth. Maybe something out of his control stopped him from coming. If it wasn't his fault, shouldn't we wait for him?

Definitely not. My interest is to raid. If you can't make it in time, too bad, someone else will come. It is maybe not your fault, but nor mine. What our lovely specimen did not notice is that the damage was done and someone had to bear it. He expected us to do it. Well, we won't. Socials might would. Then go and enjoy their company. But when you are waiting for them or when they do below the tank due to "low gear lol", don't forget that they use the very same reasoning: "it's not my fault, others shall bear it".

Taking responsibility for your life is a crucial step in being a mature person, everyone knows that. But there is no recipe how to do it. There is a simple way for that among goblins: you will take responsibility for your life, simply because no one else will. No one will help you out, no one will carry you, no one will say "it's not your fault". At best you get "bad luck dude, will be better next time". When will it be better? When you make it better. It's your life after all, who else could make it better?!

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Changes kill WoW

Everyone has his favorite theory what causes WoW to fall in subscriptions. They all claim that this or change deviated from the "golden age". Surprisingly, all of them are right. Not this or that change is responsible for the decline. Changes in general are.

I was in TB for a fast win to go BH. We lost. I'm not used to lose TB, since we practically owned the place. But we did not go there for long long time. Others told that TB is usually horde controlled nowadays. However we still have queue. I mean the server has 2x more horde than ally but still ally has to wait to get in. Why?

Tol Barad on most servers are often traded. It is its normal state. Then we came and changed it to 5 minute assault wins, 15 mins 100 kill, zero death crazy Slag defenses, so the horde lolkids learned that "TB is no fun". We left long ago and die-hard horde PvP-ers got it back. But the horde lolkids did not return, despite the reason why they left is no longer true. They can't change their mind as they never made a conscious decision. They did not say: "an organized guild runs a TB ownage projects, I have no chance without similar organization so I leave". They simply went there and did not have fun, so they left. They have a bad feeling about TB and it lasts.

Every time Blizzard made a change to WoW it caused bad feeling in people who did not like it and they left. Changing it back did not help. You could go to their house and tell them that "hey, WoW is no longer bad", it wouldn't help. You can't argue feelings.

Those who tried out WoW in Vanilla and TBC and found it "too grindy" or "too hardcore" are lost to WoW. The fact that 2.3 made leveling much faster, did not bring them back. It alienated some who liked leveling. When WotLK changed raiding into "accessible", it did not lure back a single guy who quit in frustration over Lady Vashj, nor the /follow "heroics" did not make those return who couldn't finish Sethekk Halls and left. But lot of people who liked Vashj, Sethekk, Magister's terrace have left in disgust. When 4.0 made the /follow command insufficient to complete a 5-man, these people did not return. But others who liked to get rewards for nothing left in outrage. When Jindo the Groupbraker introduced the dance-based endgame, none of the "i won't farm sres for Mother" people returned. But those who liked building gear left. When DS was no longer a dancefest, it did not get Larísa back, but several "l33t" left because "itz no skill anymore".

In a game, an entertainment feature there are no second chances as people are not forced to play. If my car breaks down I still must travel, so I won't throw it away. But why bother waiting for a game fix?

A change, any change alienates people but don't "un-alienate" a single one. Design a game and stick to it! Vanilla-BC could have 15M if not changed. If WotLK would be published as a new game it could also have 15M. Maybe Firelands-game too. But the "first Vanilla, then WotLK, then Cataclysm" does not have a chance.

Of course I don't say that WoW could live 7 years if it would be still 1.0. Certain addations are welcomed, but please notice that they are not changes. These are:

• Bugfixes, balance issue fixes, graphical updates: the game was always meant to be stable, fair and good looking, these just fix errors.
• Content patches: new flavors of the same type. If you liked questing in the Barrens, you liked Blade Edge too.
• Optional side-fluffs: ponies, pets, Darkmoon and seasonal silliness. They are optional, if you don't like them, you ignore them.

I'm sure several managers and developers are thinking how to make Mists of Pandaria different to make people come back. My advice: don't! Stick to the current model, just give some new content and hope for the best. Don't alienate more people! You still have  8M and if they stay, they might lure some new players.

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Gold bid loot system CREATES casual raiding

I wrote how gold bit fits better to a non-fixed roster (casual) guild than any other. However there is much more here: using gold bid naturally makes your roster more open to players!

To understand why, first we have to recognize that there are 7 different types of armor and everyone wants only one for main spec: cloth, int leather, agi leather, int mail, agi mail, int plate, strength plate. For rings and necklaces there are 3 types, int, agi, str. For weapons there are melee, ranged and caster types. There are sub-types, but I ignore them since reforging allow to "fix" a hit-int item into a healer item which is better than a previous tier healer item.

Let's say that for an average loot you compete with 20% of the raid. This competition is inherent and does not depend on loot system. He rolls against you, he bids against you DKP or gold or the loot council can vote for him against you. The only ways to decrease this competition is to remove them from the raid or making sure to pick the most geared ones who won't need your items.

However the other 80% is not your competitor. Will they want gear or not is not your concern. But wipe count and run speed is. The more geared these players are, the faster the run, so you are still interested to pick the most geared ones. This means that always the same players go raid, even if it's not in the rules. Simple personal interests of the raid members dictate to pick them. Even if the guild is formally casual, a non-core member won't get spot unless core members are missing.

Here comes gold bid: in every other loot system the non-competing classes are loot-irrelevant. If a strength item drops, and you are a cloth caster, you get nothing. It's true for DKP too. You get your DKP for being present in the raid, if the boss would drop nothing at all, you wouldn't get less DKP. While other players bid DKP on the loot, so you get higher on the DKP ranking, it's irrelevant as those players are not your competitors. If you are a caster, you can't care less about the DKP standing of a rogue, as he'll never bid against you.

However in gold bid system you get a share from the pot after the loot you can't use. If the boss drops a strength plate and it sells for 10000G, you just got 1000G. If it would be disenchanted, you'd get 20G (as a shard goes for 200G). So unlike in all other loot systems, you are interested in bringing players who want the loot you don't. If you are a caster, and you go with full geared plate melee, you'll get 20G/str plate. If you go with people who need gear, you'll get much more!

So, if you use gold bid, 80% of the raid members would prefer the undergeared guy over the geared one, assuming he won't make too many wipes. This is the reason why everyone get a chance in our guild on farm raid. The best thing is that if the raid leader is corrupt and wants to maximize his own income, he will bring undergeared people who don't compete with him, so the guild retain a large roster, giving chance to everyone to raid except the competitors of the leader.

Theoretically this benefit could be implemented into a DKP system if it's closed. The raid members get the DKP that someone bids. If all loot is disenchanted, no one gets DKP, if there is a bid war, lot of DKP is distributed. However this has the problem of setting the initial DKP. As no DKP is created, people can't start with 0. OK, let's give 100 DKP to every member when he joins the guild. However it makes the raid open to ninjaing: the guy burns his starter 100DKP and the gquits and goes to another guild. Or simply don't raid more. In gold bid system you bring your gold with you from outside when you join.

If you want your guild to have a large roster, just implement the gold bid system and see the invisible hand handling everything else.

PS: to answer the dumbest comment "people don't need gold": if you use gold bid, gold is loot, so everyone wants it.

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