What I Notice about GoIO and Why its Population has Been Decreasing

[Barujin]

I'm conviced that this game is just too complicated for the general public. I just had a guy who didn't realize that the mortar could do medium range by simply aiming high. He tried to argue that I should just get closer. The next thing that happened was that we got rushed and rammed to death. Too many people just don't understand how the weapons work because they just want to jump into multiplayer. Muse has a very intelligent game here, but the public are too lazy to learn the game. I think the only way to actually play well and enjoy the game is to have a clan or good friends. That leaves random play out completely as an option. Talk about a bad first impression of the game for newbies.

[Imagine]

I'm conviced that this game is just too complicated for the general public. I just had a guy who didn't realize that the mortar could do medium range by simply aiming high. He tried to argue that I should just get closer. The next thing that happened was that we got rushed and rammed to death. Too many people just don't understand how the weapons work because they just want to jump into multiplayer. Muse has a very intelligent game here, but the public are too lazy to learn the game. I think the only way to actually play well and enjoy the game is to have a clan or good friends. That leaves random play out completely as an option. Talk about a bad first impression of the game for newbies.

Not really. I personally joined this game, played by myself and thoroughly enjoyed it, only joining a team very recently (got the game back around Christmas).

You do however have to have the WANT to learn how things work, otherwise it will be hard, certainly. That's generally the nature of the beast in multiplayer games though.

[QKO]

Trolls aren't exactly known for their intelligence.

There once was a troll in my game speaking with an obviously fake Indian accent. He was picking the wrong classes and jumping around the lobby.

He ended up on my ship, much to my dismay.
Unable to kick him, I decided to deal with him.
I played along with his stupid joke ("So, what part of India are you from?"), and actually ended up having a good laugh or two.

He realized that he was also having a bit of fun, and returned the favor by being a good crewman.

We even ended up playing a few more games together.

TL;DR, kicking is the easy way out. Find a way to deal with trolls socially. That's what this game's all about.

That isn't proper trolling what he was doing. Kicking is an easy way out, certainly. But it's still civil. If you don't implement kicking, you WILL eventually end up with a community like DotA2s where flaming and verbal abuse is common. Simply because players will lack the means to rid themselves of unbeneficial teammates; and like I said, fighting the verbal abuse itself will only raise the frustration of the players.

What you had was just a minor incident. I've had tons of people on whom I've exhausted all my abilities to manipulate on without success.  This includes, but is not limited to, blackmail, request to uninstall the game, verbal violence, begging, rationalizing, threatening etc. And if the player just doesn't give two fucks, it just won't work. I'm talking worst of the worst here, there aren't a lot of those in this community right now. But that will change eventually; and if players cannot be arsed to respect their captain, that captain is going to take a lot of heat because he cannot control his crew.

And yes, I think positive measures should be available for the willing. I'm not a dick that just kicks people because they perform badly. I'm usually one of the guys that can make bad players perform well if they are prepared to listen. It's the players that refuse to listen or explicitly refuse to take orders from the captain that will do nothing but cause frustration and severely hurt the captain's patience. Again, those players aren't the problem now, but they will be in the future.

[James T. Kirk]

Well, one of the problems with DoTa2 is Steam gives that game away quite often.

Seriously. I got 5 copies for no reason, and I'm sure many of you did too.

People aren't going to spend 15 bucks on the game thinking to themselves "I'm gonna go piss everyone off!" And even if they did, they would probably buy a more populated game.

Trolls in this game usually were interested at some point, but found the game too hard or had no proper teacher and decided that pissing everyone off was the only way they could get their money's worth.

9 times out of 10, I've found that simply tolerating a troll and politely asking them to do simple tasks will result in them doing that task. Praising them for doing that simple task often results in them doing more simple tasks.

As for that other time?
Report 'em, block 'em, and follow RomanKar's advice: Kick yourself.

[Squidslinger Gilder]

Tarcide till the troll leaves. If they have no guns to shoot and nothing to do but stand around in a black cloud, they leave. Take away their minimal means of enjoyment and you take away their desire to troll the match. Its simple, it works. They have no way to take the captain's wheel to relieve themselves so without guns they leave to find other targets.

[QKO]

Well, one of the problems with DoTa2 is Steam gives that game away quite often.

Seriously. I got 5 copies for no reason, and I'm sure many of you did too.

People aren't going to spend 15 bucks on the game thinking to themselves "I'm gonna go piss everyone off!" And even if they did, they would probably buy a more populated game.

Trolls in this game usually were interested at some point, but found the game too hard or had no proper teacher and decided that pissing everyone off was the only way they could get their money's worth.

9 times out of 10, I've found that simply tolerating a troll and politely asking them to do simple tasks will result in them doing that task. Praising them for doing that simple task often results in them doing more simple tasks.

As for that other time?
Report 'em, block 'em, and follow RomanKar's advice: Kick yourself.

That's what the HoN community also said. First it was "Matchmaking will fix this"; it didn't. Then it was "Retail will fix this" and again it just didn't. While anyone here knows that the high from winning a difficult game is much higher than just messing around (this kind of high: http://www.destructoid.com/two-hours-of-gaming-doing-a-line-of-coke-174520.phtml), there's a ton of younger players that just want to fuck around and you will suffer for it.

[RomanKar]

The prediction that this game will even approach the trollness of LOL or Dota 2 is absolutely false.

As I've stated before, this game is not about teamwork as much as it's about cooperation -- real cooperation.  Those that can cooperate and act civilly and not be assholes will thrive.  Those that can't do those things, which almost no game out there encourages much less mandates like GOIO, will stop playing, quickly. 

In short, it takes a different kind of player to enjoy and have success in this game. 

I will go even further and say that a kick feature would actually cause the community, and therefore the game, to suffer.  I mean, God forbid we actually make people somewhat get along and talk about stuff like real live human beings.

In GOIO you are on a crew, not a team.  Crews have to work together.  Teams don't, see baseball, LOL, Dota 2, COD, etc, etc, etc.

[Calico Jack]

I think Muse has the right approach to how a multiplayer game should be - the player base is exceptional and it is encouraged to be that way by the game mechanics, hence why games that reward players for individual efforts whilst being teamed tend to have horrendous predatory player bases.

Personally speaking I've only personally been witness to 3 troll events, all in the last 4 weeks or so and in all 3 cases the trollage was stopped quickly either by the report mechanism, or through intervention of CAs. Players are given the chance to be responsible, and 99% step up to that, it is good  to see. I'd almost given up on multiplayer games.

[Charon]

Hey guys, what's going on in here?

[Gambrill]

Everyone is talking about an insta-kick feature and how it could be abused. why not have a VOTE-to-kick feature. everyone decides how the person is behaving and wether or not its worthy of a kick? almost all the players i've met are clever individuals with a sensible manner and do not seem like they would be prone to abusing such a power.

[RomanKar]

Everyone is talking about an insta-kick feature and how it could be abused. why not have a VOTE-to-kick feature. everyone decides how the person is behaving and wether or not its worthy of a kick? almost all the players i've met are clever individuals with a sensible manner and do not seem like they would be prone to abusing such a power.

This is a bad idea for the reasons I stated above.  The vote to kick would only promote cliques and non-communication with outsiders.  I can't even say how many times last night a person was asked to move to make room for someone's friend or crew mate.  In every single case the person who was asked just moved.

It's not just a matter of efficiency.  Vote kicking, or just a kick button is certainly efficient, but it is contrary to the very nature and design of the game.  It would change the player base for the worse, imo. 

Besides, as others have stated, there are always Devs and CA's on to help with any problem.  For example, last night there was a bit of some spamming in regional chat.  Someone in our lobby mentioned  that it was getting a little annoying.  Keyvias just so happened to be in our lobby, so he asked for the spamming to stop.

How easy and beautiful is that. 

[Calico Jack]

so you have a ship and 3 trolls spawn in and kick you off - wacha gonna do?
 

[James T. Kirk]

Vote to kick still doesn't solve the aspect of dealing with the kick-ie first.

I know most to all of us here would use vote to kick as a last-resort thing, but what of the other players?
The only way kicking could ever be implemented is if there was some way to make sure that there was an attempt to communicate first.

Also, new players. We don't want those willing to learn to be kicked only because the 3 new guys that jumped on ship before hand weren't.

[Charon]

Do you guys remember those other threads about kick function implementation? Pepperidge Farm remembers.

[QKO]

Everyone is talking about an insta-kick feature and how it could be abused. why not have a VOTE-to-kick feature. everyone decides how the person is behaving and wether or not its worthy of a kick? almost all the players i've met are clever individuals with a sensible manner and do not seem like they would be prone to abusing such a power.

This is a bad idea for the reasons I stated above.  The vote to kick would only promote cliques and non-communication with outsiders.  I can't even say how many times last night a person was asked to move to make room for someone's friend or crew mate.  In every single case the person who was asked just moved.

It's not just a matter of efficiency.  Vote kicking, or just a kick button is certainly efficient, but it is contrary to the very nature and design of the game.  It would change the player base for the worse, imo. 

Besides, as others have stated, there are always Devs and CA's on to help with any problem.  For example, last night there was a bit of some spamming in regional chat.  Someone in our lobby mentioned  that it was getting a little annoying.  Keyvias just so happened to be in our lobby, so he asked for the spamming to stop.

How easy and beautiful is that.

Noone came to my rescue when I needed some troll removed from my team yesterday. CAs couldn't kick him and Muse wasn't even online.  Furthermore, people are not inclined to kick when the person they want moved or removed is friendly and communicative. Kicks are not your primary form of communication, they are there at the end of the line when all other manipulative tools have been exhausted. Then if kicking doesn't work, then a CA or Dev needs to step in.