Official Soldat Forums
Official Content => News => Topic started by: jrgp on December 16, 2010, 09:28:31 am
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Hello Soldat Forums,
I am here to unveil a project MM and I have been working on for several months now: The Official Soldat Web Gather.
This is much like current IRC gathers, such as the ones in #sna.gather and #soldat.mapping, except instead of relying on IRC, this gather is in your web browser utilizing AJAX and Javascript.
For those who are unfamiliar with the concept of gathering: a gather is where a game with a certain number of rounds of Soldat is organized and prepared on the fly, as opposed to pubs. This is sort of like clanwars, except without the clans.
http://soldat.thd.vg/en/gather
The in-game commands are:
!p/!pause - Pause the game
!up/!unpause - Unpause a paused game
!map MAPNAME - Change the map of the current round
!r/!restart - Restart the current round
!unbanlast - unban last banned player
How it works:
- First, go here to login: http://soldat.thd.vg/en/login
- Then go to gather page: http://soldat.thd.vg/en/gather
- At all times there is a queue for non-running gathers.
- When you join a queue, you are not allowed to join a queue for any other gather.
- When the queue you are in fills up, the web browser of each member of the party emits a beep followed by a join game link.
- The game lasts for the number of rounds specified by the website.
- When the gather ends, you are all kicked, the server shuts down, and the queue for this gather is then emptied and ready to be filled up again.
Additionally:
- If you are in a queue that has not yet filled up and close your browser window/tab, in 30 seconds of not returning to the page you will be removed from the queue.
- http://soldat.thd.vg has a friends system where you can add people to your buddy list (assuming they accept your request). When one of your friends are in a gather, their name turns cyan.
- In order to use the gather, you must be logged in. http://soldat.thd.vg uses the exact same accounts that the SoldatForums use so just use your normal username and password
What will be added in the near future:
- Player statistics (largely just involves me copying over code from my U13 rentals panel and tweaking it slightly)
- Possibly more in-game commands
- Web chat (as soon as I get parts of it working efficiently)
- More gather servers, such as ones like Realistic Inf, HTF, Rambo, and others. The way I have the logic set up, adding more gather servers is extremely easy.
- IE support. It should currently work great in Firefox, Opera, Chrome, Safari, etc
Thanks to:
- Myself for writing all the code :D
- MM for the idea and development encouragement
- Furai (aka Wookash) for really useful suggestions on the gather's usability and pascal scripting logic
- FliesLikeABrick for hosting and suggestions on the efficient way of doing things behind the scenes
- The people/organizations behind PHP, Ruby, Python, Apache, Bash, MySQL, Javascript, DOM, & JSON since they are the tools I'm using
Talk to us:
- The discussion and alpha/beta testing for the gather has been in #jrgp @ quakenet. Join the channel to chat with us live
- Please post suggestions/ideas/bugs/etc in this thread
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Mmm great use of ajax. Thanks jrgp :)
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Great idea (even if there was Webchat before, this is far better)! I'll definetly use it!
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Excellent! This is precisely what Soldat needed.
- MM for the idea and development encouragement
please elaborate
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- MM for the idea and development encouragement
please elaborate
I took my sweet ass time and kept procrastinating. Last week I was like "fuck it, I'm finishing it already" and rewrote the ~3k lines of Python I had in Ruby (required much less code, obviously) and got it in mostly a working state in around 3 days. Since then it's been mostly polishing the code and grinding off the bugs.
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Excellent! This is precisely what Soldat needed.
- MM for the idea and development encouragement
please elaborate
If he'd just encouraged himself to develop something connected to soldat last 3 years.
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- MM for the idea and development encouragement
please elaborate
I took my sweet ass time and kept procrastinating. Last week I was like "f**k it, I'm finishing it already" and rewrote the ~3k lines of Python I had in Ruby (required much less code, obviously) and got it in mostly a working state in around 3 days. Since then it's been mostly polishing the code and grinding off the bugs.
in what manner did the encouragement take place
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- MM for the idea and development encouragement
please elaborate
I took my sweet ass time and kept procrastinating. Last week I was like "f**k it, I'm finishing it already" and rewrote the ~3k lines of Python I had in Ruby (required much less code, obviously) and got it in mostly a working state in around 3 days. Since then it's been mostly polishing the code and grinding off the bugs.
in what manner did the encouragement take place
Him asking every now and then how it was going.
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#2Wai.soldat @ quakenet.org Soldat's heaven
Where we are all lol'ing at this.
Best of luck with this I suppose but I'm not sure it is really needed. And how did MM work on this with you if it was just encouragement.
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Sounds good,time too test this (myself).Join me
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There should be some kind of counter of on-line ppl and mini-chat.
Also join / leave buttons should be bigger and more noticeable.
Also also after you join it shouldn't hide join buttons for other gathers, instead it should delete you from previous gather if you are joining some new one.
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SoldatX.com released the first WebGather (?):
http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=36297.0
http://www.soldatx.com/webgather/
I will try it =)
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SoldatX.com released the first WebGather (?):
http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=36297.0
http://www.soldatx.com/webgather/
I will try it =)
Comptetition is important.
Thanks for the suggestions, vtt.
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I take it you'd need to register in Soldat forums to be able to use this.
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I take it you'd need to register in Soldat forums to be able to use this.
Yes, which gains you your unified account that works here, on the linkdead forums, mm's blog, soldat.thd.vg, link-dead.thd.vg, and all upcoming sites for mm's projects.
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And I thought I finally had a chance to stop using 'freestyler' and use 'fri' instead. ._.
There should be some notice that you can use your SF account. I wouldn't know if it wasn't for this thread. And the error messages shouldn't be written in red text on brown background.
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It's so kindly to show user's e-mails on account details pages. Example: http://soldat.thd.vg/en/user/jrgp
I thought it depends on "Allow users to email you?" from SF account settings, but it doesn't...
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It's so kindly to show user's e-mails on account details pages. Example: http://soldat.thd.vg/en/user/jrgp
I thought it depends on "Allow users to email you?" from SF account settings, but it doesn't...
I'll get to that soon.
There should be some notice that you can use your SF account. I wouldn't know if it wasn't for this thread. And the error messages shouldn't be written in red text on brown background.
Yeah I'll get to that too.
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And how did MM work on this with you if it was just encouragement.
Just saw this. He did mockups in powerpoint and told me how it should work, look, and kept telling me what to do at each stage during its development.
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This is useless, we have our whole soldat community gathering in IRC...
Such thing should be implented in soldat and not some browser...
I bet 90% of the gather players use IRC
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We have something really awesome and new here, what does it matter what part I took in it? jrgp is the main man here and all applause goes to him.
Such thing should be implented in soldat and not some browser...
No, because nobody has time to sit with the game turned on. Everybody uses browsers and it is easiest and most convenient to wait for others while you're browsing your daily porn or whatever you do on the internet.
I bet 90% of the gather players use IRC
No problem, let them use IRC. This is a Gather for 90% of the population that doesn't even know what IRC is and doesn't intend on using it.
Good luck playing the gathers!
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There should be some notice that you can use your SF account. I wouldn't know if it wasn't for this thread. And the error messages shouldn't be written in red text on brown background.
Yeah I'll get to that too.
Done.
And email addresses on profile pages aren't shown at all now. I'm going to hold off until I get that setting in SMF sync'd with LDAP so the unified site can see it.
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Having no way to sub or perm/temp ban players significantly hampers the quality of the gather. Even on regular gathers there are issues with excessive pausing/leaving without getting a sub/hacking, and that carries actual penalties.
IRC can be accessed in a web browser as well, so the only conclusion I can make is you're planning to get this integrated into Soldat. Hooray I guess, but you're reinventing the wheel when there's an established community that could be accessed instead.
Also, don't assign the teams on hitting join, it allows for team stacking. Also also, put MSAC on there.
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Well, nobody's forcing players to stop using IRC if they like it better. Right now to me this gather seems like something in-between a pub and an IRC gather. It works like a gather, but is more user-friendly than IRC.
Plus, with time it might have all the features it's missing right now and will become a full-fledged gather system.
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Gratz.
U guys should try to implement the interface on the client, next release. As like the failed IRC client, which would winz if eC had allow to connect on Qnet.
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Well, nobody's forcing players to stop using IRC if they like it better. Right now to me this gather seems like something in-between a pub and an IRC gather. It works like a gather, but is more user-friendly than IRC.
Plus, with time it might have all the features it's missing right now and will become a full-fledged gather system.
But IRC is really, really simple. If you have the ability to type in your nickname and the names of channels (which are all over the place) into http://webchat.quakenet.org/, congrats, you can use IRC.
The learning curve isn't so much a curve as a mole hill that people like make mountains out of.
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Well, nobody's forcing players to stop using IRC if they like it better. Right now to me this gather seems like something in-between a pub and an IRC gather. It works like a gather, but is more user-friendly than IRC.
Plus, with time it might have all the features it's missing right now and will become a full-fledged gather system.
But IRC is really, really simple. If you have the ability to type in your nickname and the names of channels (which are all over the place) into http://webchat.quakenet.org/, congrats, you can use IRC.
The learning curve isn't so much a curve as a mole hill that people like make mountains out of.
Setting up IRC wasn't as easy for me. I have a plenty of experience with computers, but even I had trouble figuring out how IRC works when I tried it the first time. I remember seeing other people complain about that too.
http://webchat.quakenet.org/ <-- this is nice and simple. But up until now I didn't know it existed.
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Lol, guys you're really funny. jrgp makes some great announcement and you start b***hing right from the beginning. Give it a chance and if you don't like it post your criticism, wait for the suggested improvements or just gtfo to your lovely IRC.
First of all: Good job, jrgp! And gratz for being in the "official" dev-team now.
Didn't try a gather on it yet but still some comments:- Good take to finally make more use of Soldat's website. We definitely could use some more visitors there - at the moment it's most used feature is only the download-area and maybe the online-serverlist. So putting a gather-app on it (and maybe also using the news-area as a dev-log like I suggested here (http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=39242.msg480180#msg480180)) is a good idea.
And MM is absolutely right with his comment on the suggestion to implement this in the client: Noone will wait till the gather starts with Soldat open in the background. I want to press "join" and surf the web till I get the notice that the gather starts. And since we have no Portal in Soldat yet it also would be impossible to perm-ban some hackers. - We'll need more promotion for it (of course only after you made some more improvements to it). Is there any newsletter currently? Maybe send the news per mail to any registered user on Soldatforums. Or you could at least use the ad which which shows up before you start an unregistered copy of Soldat (I don't know - is it still there?). The best would be an ingame-news system of course. That's how we could get in touch with all the players who never ever surfed any forum, used IRC or registered the game, who just downloaded the game and plays it since then. Something like the one MM already implemented in Link-Dead. So we would notice a new announcement which would point us to soldat.pl. We would then surf there, read the news on it and start the gathering.
- Where are the gameservers located? And who hosts them? How many are there at the moment? 4? It would be nice to add some more information to the servers, like if it has MSAC on it, where it is located, etc.
Ways to handle the location-problem:
- Add the location of the gather-servers to the website (gather = server, right? Or is the server chosen afterwards when enough players joined the gather-match on the website?) so you know the location beforehand and have no right to whine afterwards when you have high ping.
- Let the players add some location-info ("Europe", "North-America", "South-America", "Australia" and "Asia" would be enough) to their "User Info"-page (because it's hard to find out the right location of all the users who joined some gather-match if some of them use proxies while surfing or only surf with vpn-enabled). Right before the gather starts it will decide which server to choose depending on the locations of the players. - There is some old information on my user-info page which I want to delete. But I can't since I already deleted the information here on the forums months ago and there is no page on soldat.pl to change it directly.
Once again I say: Good job.
We have new developers for Soldat who hopefully will post some "welcome!-here-we-are-and-this-is-what-we-are-planning-to-do"-message soon. Leads to less bugs.
We have a new anti-cheat module which hopefully will be robust and lightweight enough to add it to the Soldat-installer. Leads to less hackers.
We have an online-gather system now which somehow connects the IRC-boys with the public-players. If you add the addresses to the common IRC gathers on the online-gather website you'll will have more and more active players because that's how after some time they find out about the big Soldat-world on the IRC. They will be surprised, stay active a bit longer and maybe even join a clan. Leads to more activity / a more wider Soldat-experience.
Together with the Portal-thingy which gives us not only a friend-system but also the "perm"-ban possiblity on the public-world I see a bright future for Soldat. You "just" need to bring all the things together, use the Soldat-website and make more promotion.
@Veritas: Maybe it's simple for you. But you aren't the majority. The majority is the dude who's called noob. He wants to play with his friends (he made on the several forums or some public-servers) and other guys but has no server, no idea how to host one and doesn't want to register to Quakenet or other stuff. He never ever heard of IRC. He just wants to try the new "gathering". Which system will he choose?
The one where he needs to download and configure some client-software (yes, he could also use the online-version, but how to configure a bouncer there?), then needs to register with quakenet, then needs to join a specific channel, then needs to understand all the strange commands (!overkill??) to finally join a gather and have some fun? Then afterwards he has to struggle with the fact that his IRC-name is not fixed, so he needs to look for some bouncer if he really wants it.
Or the other solution where he just logins on the official soldat-website with his forum-nick and passwort and has a nice flashy-gui to directly have the fun he seeks for?
Think about it a moment. And use the perspective of those people who never ever tried IRC. With all the suggestions we already posted (and which will come) and the roadmap jrgp has posted there won't be much differences in the future between IRC-gather and online-gather.
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Who the **** is going to read that whole thing!?!
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Who the **** is going to read that whole thing!?!
People who want to be convinced of the usefulness of a browser program?
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Who the **** is going to read that whole thing!?!
Consider this your first warning for spamming.
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where are the servers located? And wouldn't a larger DM be funner? This is one of the gamemodes that is lacking in gathers ?
Its a great idea in a sense, yet I feel that if you want to play gathers and become a better player: then IRC is the place to be. Anyhows, until some form of admining can be put in place... a penalty reporting system? think ill stay clear of this gather! Needs MASC for one and i can see it becoming a retard/hack fest!
But as has been mentioned... IRC community is really a fun place to be i'd suggest it too anyone! Really it isn't difficult to get on...
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Servers are located in Chicago, USA. They are hosted by FLAB as it is mentioned in the first post.
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Servers are located in Chicago, USA. They are hosted by FLAB as it is mentioned in the first post.
I would suggest writing this in the actual gather. eg CTF #1 NA
A vast majority of EU soldat players are extreme haters of lag and I think you will find numerous players will just leave once they see their ping.
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This will definitely come in handy when we start reviving Soldat on the community level, well done.
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@Veritas: Maybe it's simple for you. But you aren't the majority. The majority is the dude who's called noob. He wants to play with his friends (he made on the several forums or some public-servers) and other guys but has no server, no idea how to host one and doesn't want to register to Quakenet or other stuff. He never ever heard of IRC. He just wants to try the new "gathering". Which system will he choose?
The one where he needs to download and configure some client-software (yes, he could also use the online-version, but how to configure a bouncer there?), then needs to register with quakenet, then needs to join a specific channel, then needs to understand all the strange commands (!overkill??) to finally join a gather and have some fun? Then afterwards he has to struggle with the fact that his IRC-name is not fixed, so he needs to look for some bouncer if he really wants it.
Or the other solution where he just logins on the official soldat-website with his forum-nick and passwort and has a nice flashy-gui to directly have the fun he seeks for?
You don't need a bouncer, so I don't know why that matters. The rest, again, isn't actually difficult. IRC looks (and is) archaic, but there are a number of tutorials showing how, in pants-on-head-retard terms, to connect to IRC, register your nick, as well as people willing to help you out on the forums and in the gathers themselves. Yes, people may have to read some words + pictures and then comprehend them, but I feel like we can make that work.
People like to complain for the sake of complaining, and that's the only real reason that people whine about getting started with IRC.
there won't be much differences in the future between IRC-gather and online-gather.
Then why bother? Why not put up a nice looking GUI on top of IRC?
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I am glad to finally see this. Hopefully this will increase popularity in the future, and have support for irc players to play along-side with those who use the website gather. Maybe a possibility for them to even chat together, having a little lobby (seemless irc client). I do hope to see, though, a possibility to play realistic, or realistic/survival, do encourage people to try other things.. maybe have a "unique fridays" where special / non-standard or non-common modes are played ^_^ just some thoughts
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there won't be much differences in the future between IRC-gather and online-gather.
Then why bother? Why not put up a nice looking GUI on top of IRC?
Because the online-gather is already done, simple as that. Do you really want jrgp to throw all the code away? Why not giving it a try first? Let's see how it evolves.
You still have time to rant about it if it won't become popular or won't been used after some while. :-*
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Ok...since i cant join the gather could someone explain me where to put what,ip,port,pass.
I got this: soldat://outcry.u13 - five numbers - four numbers-
I entered it this way: /\ip /\port /\pass
And i get:Could not download files
Please help
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there won't be much differences in the future between IRC-gather and online-gather.
Then why bother? Why not put up a nice looking GUI on top of IRC?
Because the online-gather is already done, simple as that. Do you really want jrgp to throw all the code away? Why not giving it a try first? Let's see how it evolves.
You still have time to rant about it if it won't become popular or won't been used after some while. :-*
You should be pretty used to throwing code away as a programmer.
My beef with it isn't in what it does (gathers are awesome and should be encouraged) but that we currently have an active gather community that desperately needs new blood, and this seems to only serve to splinter groups more.
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I got this: soldat://outcry.u13 - five numbers - four numbers-
I entered it this way: /\ip /\port /\pass
Afaik it's like this:
IP: outcry.u13.net
port: [five digits]
password: [whatever]
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Ok,i will try it.Thanks
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Soldat link looks like this: soldat://<IP>:<Port>/<Password>
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hurry up and add realistic rawr
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Just played my first gather there.
Comments:
- We need some solution for people who don't join the match in time. The 1on1-gather started, I joined the server and then waited for about 3min till the other player joined. Not that this would be too long, but there should be some time limit of about 5min. After this timelimit every player who is too late should get some "warning". If one gets three of them he should get banned for 1-2 weeks from the online-gather or something like that. See how the IRC-gathers handle this.
- So after he joined he chose the first map by using "!map [mapname]". (Actually the server should randomly decide whose map will be played first. So after you join, there should be some message on the server like "[Playername] choses the first map" and only this player is allowed to use the "!map"-command.)
- After I won the first map ([retard]), the server started the next round and suddenly displayed the message "Round 1 of 2 rounds starts now!" (or something like that). So the server didn't get that the first round actually started after my enemy used the "!map"-command. So we just played the next (my) map and after I won that too ([retard][retard]) we just left the server, because the match was actually over, even if the server just displayed "Round 2 of 2 rounds starts now!".
So, jrgp, you need to look this up.
I'm actually not quite sure how hard you want to handle misbehaviour on this online-gather. How strict will you be? Will there be any "warnings" at all? So we would need some reporting system. What to do for example when someone leaves a match in the middle of round. Or doesn't even join the gather. Or camps a lot. Or flames at his enemy. Or even uses hax (add MSAC). Whatever. We would need some forum or system where we could report these things. Thinking of that, we need rules which include all these points. So rules for the several gamemodes and how you should and shouldn't behave.
But this sounds more like a ladder...I don't know how you will do it. Since you will have statistics you could really build up a ladder (at least for the 1on1s).
We need a more clear definition how strict this gather will be handled and if there will be consequences for misbehaviour.
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Without punishments it's just a pub that you join by doing !add. The whole "meaning" of a gather game is that you HAVE to join if you add and you HAVE to be there until it ends. At irc you get banned if you don't join or you leave a gather without a good reason.
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I already suggested this idea for jrgp but wanna see if you guys give some more pros for it. If it's just coding possible, I'd sync webgather and irc gather, (completely new irc gather or alliance with already existing one). For web add you use forums account and for irc add you use your irc nick/auth.
That way you can reduce gather waiting times and waiting about players who have forgotten they've added.
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Ok...since i cant join the gather could someone explain me where to put what,ip,port,pass.
I got this: soldat://outcry.u13 - five numbers - four numbers-
I entered it this way: /\ip /\port /\pass
And i get:Could not download files
Please help
Just copy that soldat:// link to address bar of your browser, then enter. tadaaa you are in game.
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dds is by far the better and most used on games
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Would be cool if you made a gather based on your soldat account. (beta ftw)
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dds is by far the better and most used on games
What is that?
Would be cool if you made a gather based on your soldat account. (beta ftw)
The original intention of the soldat portal stuff was that it was going to be linked to the unified account system (which I mentioned above) but enesce didn't feel like it.
Without punishments it's just a pub that you join by doing !add. The whole "meaning" of a gather game is that you HAVE to join if you add and you HAVE to be there until it ends. At irc you get banned if you don't join or you leave a gather without a good reason.
Yes, I'm going to make it so you specify your in-game nick in the online gather site and if that nick doesn't join the game you're banned for a week or something similar. That sound reasonable? I'll also add msac once MM confirms.
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dds is by far the better and most used on games
What is that?
mistaken awnser. suposed to psot on the image files topic, mah bad
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Yes, I'm going to make it so you specify your in-game nick in the online gather site and if that nick doesn't join the game you're banned for a week or something similar. That sound reasonable? I'll also add msac once MM confirms.
You might want to give some room for "accidents" though - let's say, give warnings first, and only ban if it happens more than one or two times a week.
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This is perfect can't wait to try it out and join a game! I'm glad I don't have to learn how to use IRC now. I never understood IRC or why people still use it... there are so may simpler options like this one. It's all part of making Soldat user friendly; now newbies (like me) can start using gathers.
Yes, I'm going to make it so you specify your in-game nick in the online gather site and if that nick doesn't join the game you're banned for a week or something similar. That sound reasonable? I'll also add msac once MM confirms.
You might want to give some room for "accidents" though - let's say, give warnings first, and only ban if it happens more than one or two times a week.
yeah I agree because I know I'm going to be one of those people xD
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Yes, I'm going to make it so you specify your in-game nick in the online gather site and if that nick doesn't join the game you're banned for a week or something similar. That sound reasonable? I'll also add msac once MM confirms.
You might want to give some room for "accidents" though - let's say, give warnings first, and only ban if it happens more than one or two times a week.
hmm okay maybe a "strikes" system, where if a player doesn't join 3 times in a row he's banned for a week?
Also I just added some servers:
- Realistic CTF
- 6 Player DM
- Realistic INF
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Would be cool if you made a gather based on your soldat account. (beta ftw)
The original intention of the soldat portal stuff was that it was going to be linked to the unified account system (which I mentioned above) but enesce didn't feel like it.
Agreed with PQ - a proper account system where the game, the gather and the forums are linked, would be a very nice feature to add.
Could help combat hackers too if account creation was limited and ban-able by IP or the like?.
@jrgp: It's gotta be done - strikes definitely seem the most user-friendly option
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Agreed with PQ - a proper account system where the game, the gather and the forums are linked, would be a very nice feature to add.
Could help combat hackers too if account creation was limited and ban-able by IP or the like?.
If enesce had followed the plan 2 or so years ago that's the situation we'd be in. :P
- After I won the first map ([retard]), the server started the next round and suddenly displayed the message "Round 1 of 2 rounds starts now!" (or something like that). So the server didn't get that the first round actually started after my enemy used the "!map"-command. So we just played the next (my) map and after I won that too ([retard][retard]) we just left the server, because the match was actually over, even if the server just displayed "Round 2 of 2 rounds starts now!".
So, jrgp, you need to look this up.
That should be fixed. I'm considering the rest of the stuff you said. I'm really appreciating your contributions to this thread. :)
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Now, what I need are:
- Recommended maps for each server
- Should I make a command like !mapFromTMS mapname where it snags and installs a map from my TMS and plays it on the fly?
- Other suggestions
- What information about each gather/server should I have on the site? Should it mention all the details like enabled weapons, mapslist, etc?
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hey guys, any1 worried about enesce having the code? ;>
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Yes, I'm going to make it so you specify your in-game nick in the online gather site and if that nick doesn't join the game you're banned for a week or something similar. That sound reasonable? I'll also add msac once MM confirms.
You might want to give some room for "accidents" though - let's say, give warnings first, and only ban if it happens more than one or two times a week.
hmm okay maybe a "strikes" system, where if a player doesn't join 3 times in a row he's banned for a week?
Don't forget leaving without getting a sub, excessive pausing, hacking, nick stealing, and not playing seriously.
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Don't forget leaving without getting a sub, excessive pausing, hacking, nick stealing, and not playing seriously.
"Not playing seriously" is something for players to decide, I think. They can just votekick that player if he's that troublesome.
hmm okay maybe a "strikes" system, where if a player doesn't join 3 times in a row he's banned for a week?
What if he doesn't join 2 times in a row, then joins, then doesn't join again? I think it should be a little more strict (ban if player doesn't join 3 times during a single week, but not in a row. After a week of last "didn't-join" the strikes are reset)
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Ok,im ready to try now. Someone for some INF?
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Okay also, when I implement server stats, should the player stats be for all the servers together or one set of stats for each?
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for each would be better.
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How about three separate stats:
-CTF
-INF
-DM
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I still don't know if gather = server, but I would do it like this:
For every category/type there should be one statistic. So we would have six different stats now, namely:
- CTF (normal)
- CTF (realistic)
- INF (normal)
- INF (realistic)
- DM (1on1)
- DM (6slot)
I would add TDM (2on2).
So if there are for example three servers of the type "CTF (normal)" they should have the same statistics. So it doesn't matter on which "CTF (normal)"-server I play, in the end I have one stats of this type one my player account.
The 6slot-DM-server will make problems if you wanna have a ladder. It's not that easy to determine who really won the gather because it's over three rounds (which I think is too much). So, does the player with the most kills in all the three rounds win? Or the one who won the most rounds? (<-- that one would suck because there could three players who all won one round) What would it actually mean if you "win" the 6slot-DM-gather? Does the first one gain some points (and the second and third also but less)? And the ladders sorts the player by points you gained in the gather? Or does it sort by how often you have won the specific gather?
Actually, should there be any "winning" in this type of gather? In any other gather there is a battle between two players (DM 1on1) or two groups of players (CTF & INF). 6slot-DM-gather is different here because everyone playes against each other. Without the "winning" it would be more like a standard public server.
So you could differ between four kinds of stats:
- player stats: shows which gathers he played, which weapons he used most, which map he played most, which position he is on every ladder, etc.
- gather stats: all the stats which belongs to this certain gather; so the players who participated, which maps were played, the standings after every map, who (player/team) won this specific gather, etc.
- server stats: contains all the stats of the gathers which were played on this specific server (not really necessary imo)
- gathertype stats: the stats for a specific gather-type; so (as said above) it would contain the stats of all the servers with that gathertype; this could actually also contain a ladder (only for 1on1 or "bloodbath"-gathertype since you would need teams/clans for any other type which would transform this whole gather into the next SCTFL which we don't want)
Stats, stats, stats... ;D
Question is if they would be interesting enough for the players but it's always nice to have.
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Okay, *what* is a ladder?
I'll get to adding the TDM soon.
As for "gather stats" so far the players in and the date of each gather is recorded. I'll get to having it also record the maps played and other stuff too.
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*POSSIBLE BUG* I've selected to 'stay logged in' - and now I've tried several methods to log out, and they aint working.
Ok... I've got a few thoughts generally about the Gather page and the stats thing.
There definitely should be a couple of CTF 3v3 servers(just been implemented), and have the same stats/ladder idea implemented on them.
I also agree with Illuminatus that there should be different areas for stats, it makes sense to have several areas for stats.
I would add TDM (2on2).
Some sort of 2vs2 is needed. Either TDM or CTF even.
The 6slot-DM-server will make problems if you wanna have a ladder. It's not that easy to determine who really won the gather because it's over three rounds (which I think is too much). So, does the player with the most kills in all the three rounds win? Or the one who won the most rounds? (<-- that one would suck because there could three players who all won one round) What would it actually mean if you "win" the 6slot-DM-gather? Does the first one gain some points (and the second and third also but less)? And the ladders sorts the player by points you gained in the gather? Or does it sort by how often you have won the specific gather?
Actually, should there be any "winning" in this type of gather? In any other gather there is a battle between two players (DM 1on1) or two groups of players (CTF & INF). 6slot-DM-gather is different here because everyone playes against each other. Without the "winning" it would be more like a standard public server.
When I saw the 6-player DM I did wonder why it was there, since that's what pub's are for. Though because you're implementing stats, it becomes a bit more interesting...
Three rounds of DM is definitely too much - gathers should be fairly quick, two rounds at most.
Maybe the ladder could resemble something like a sortable table - where different ways of sorting could be made on a single game mode.
Take a look at the attachment. In the 'Filter by' there could be several options, some specific to certain gather-types...
Some ideas for this: (generally speaking - so each gather type could have these applied to it)
- Average points per game: {All points from games} / {Amount of games played}. You would probably need to set a lower limit on this to prevent it from being ridiculous - e.g. player must have played at least 5 games or something. This would make for a pretty dynamic ladder
- Kill gain - Instead of KD ratio, perhaps more like {kills} - {deaths}, which would be the kills gained overall. After each round, this would be calculated and added to a person's tally and would be accumulative. This treats the camper that hardly kills or dies, and the kamakazi guy who kills alot but dies a fair few times differently, and fairer in my opinion.
- *CTF Capper - People who have capped the most
- *Ultimate CTF score - Use the Kill gain idea to get point score, then add some extra points for capping. This again could be accumulative.
- *Survivor score - Kill streak.
- Top scores - Simple idea for potentially all game modes. When sorting it on the 6-playerDM, 3vs3CTF and INF, it would assign points for 1st, less for 2nd and less for 3rd. For 1vs1 DM, it would simply see who won and add a single point onto their tally (this would essentially be a Most Wins leaderboard for 1vs1)
The * denotes mode-specific filters
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*POSSIBLE BUG* I've selected to 'stay logged in' - and now I've tried several methods to log out, and they aint working.
Should be fixed and won't happen again. In the mean time, clear your cookies.
Ok... I've got a few thoughts generally about the Gather page and the stats thing.
There definitely should be a couple of CTF 3v3 servers(just been implemented), and have the same stats/ladder idea implemented on them.
I also agree with Illuminatus that there should be different areas for stats, it makes sense to have several areas for stats.
I would add TDM (2on2).
Some sort of 2vs2 is needed. Either TDM or CTF even.
The 6slot-DM-server will make problems if you wanna have a ladder. It's not that easy to determine who really won the gather because it's over three rounds (which I think is too much). So, does the player with the most kills in all the three rounds win? Or the one who won the most rounds? (<-- that one would suck because there could three players who all won one round) What would it actually mean if you "win" the 6slot-DM-gather? Does the first one gain some points (and the second and third also but less)? And the ladders sorts the player by points you gained in the gather? Or does it sort by how often you have won the specific gather?
Actually, should there be any "winning" in this type of gather? In any other gather there is a battle between two players (DM 1on1) or two groups of players (CTF & INF). 6slot-DM-gather is different here because everyone playes against each other. Without the "winning" it would be more like a standard public server.
When I saw the 6-player DM I did wonder why it was there, since that's what pub's are for. Though because you're implementing stats, it becomes a bit more interesting...
Three rounds of DM is definitely too much - gathers should be fairly quick, two rounds at most.
Maybe the ladder could resemble something like a sortable table - where different ways of sorting could be made on a single game mode.
Take a look at the attachment. In the 'Filter by' there could be several options, some specific to certain gather-types...
Some ideas for this: (generally speaking - so each gather type could have these applied to it)
- Average points per game: {All points from games} / {Amount of games played}. You would probably need to set a lower limit on this to prevent it from being ridiculous - e.g. player must have played at least 5 games or something. This would make for a pretty dynamic ladder
- Kill gain - Instead of KD ratio, perhaps more like {kills} - {deaths}, which would be the kills gained overall. After each round, this would be calculated and added to a person's tally and would be accumulative. This treats the camper that hardly kills or dies, and the kamakazi guy who kills alot but dies a fair few times differently, and fairer in my opinion.
- *CTF Capper - People who have capped the most
- *Ultimate CTF score - Use the Kill gain idea to get point score, then add some extra points for capping. This again could be accumulative.
- *Survivor score - Kill streak.
- Top scores - Simple idea for potentially all game modes. When sorting it on the 6-playerDM, 3vs3CTF and INF, it would assign points for 1st, less for 2nd and less for 3rd. For 1vs1 DM, it would simply see who won and add a single point onto their tally (this would essentially be a Most Wins leaderboard for 1vs1)
The * denotes mode-specific filters
That all really seems interesting, but you still haven't explained to me exactly how ladders work. I've never been part of the competitive Soldat community at all and much of the terminology kinda confuses me.
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It is fixed - thanks.
Ah ok, I'll reword...
My thoughts are about multiple leaderboards for each gather-type.
Currently, looking at the gather page, the gather types (currently) are:
CTF 3v3, (even though there are several servers for 3vs3 CTF, we would want them all to count to the same leaderboard category)
INF 3v3,
DM 1vs1,
DM 6-Player,
CTF 3vs3 (realistic)
and INF 3vs3 (realistic).
My idea involves each gather-type having different leaderboards to score under.
Some gather-types would have the same concepts for leaderboards (e.g. Every gather-type could have a leaderboard for who gets 1st ingame, 2nd and 3rd and assign points to players for achieving that).
However, some gather-types would need different leaderboards because they are different game-modes! 1vs1 DM would need to be treated differently to 3vs3 CTF..
UPDATE:
Take a look at the attachment. These are 3 separate league tables.
I've created theoretical ideas for leaguetables: Points (gained from winning games), and Caps.
Table 1:
Gather-type is 3vs3 CTF.
The leaderboard for this is based on points.
The example I've given is awarding 10 points for coming 1st, 7 for 2nd, and 4 for 3rd.
Table 2:
This leaderboard is also based on points, but using the results from the gather-type DM 6-Player.
Again, 10 points for 1st, 7 for 2nd and 4 for 3rd.
Table 3:
Gather-type is 3vs3 CTF again.
This leaderboard is based on data about caps.
Bob has the most caps, Bill is second.
I've added a tacky turquoise triangle on the column headings - the idea being that you could sort this table by either 'who has the highest total caps' or 'who has the most caps per game'.
And in this case, you can see that Bob actually has a lower caps per game, so he would be second and Bill would be first when ordered by average caps.
Tables 1&2: This is what I mean by having the 'same concepts'. They both calculate in the same way, but for different gather-types.
Table 3: This one is gather-type specific (as its pretty obvious that a deathmatch of any kind couldn't have a caps leaguetable!).
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Okay I'm starting to implement a built in webchat. It currently might be very buggy, but we'll see.
It is fixed - thanks.
Ah ok, I'll reword...
My thoughts are about multiple leaderboards for each gather-type.
Currently, looking at the gather page, the gather types (currently) are:
CTF 3v3, (even though there are several servers for 3vs3 CTF, we would want them all to count to the same leaderboard category)
INF 3v3,
DM 1vs1,
DM 6-Player,
CTF 3vs3 (realistic)
and INF 3vs3 (realistic).
My idea involves each gather-type having different leaderboards to score under.
Some gather-types would have the same concepts for leaderboards (e.g. Every gather-type could have a leaderboard for who gets 1st ingame, 2nd and 3rd and assign points to players for achieving that).
However, some gather-types would need different leaderboards because they are different game-modes! 1vs1 DM would need to be treated differently to 3vs3 CTF..
Thanks for the info
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Ah yea I see... a box has appeared.
Check my update ^ hopefully a bit clearer xD
I'll try and use the gather chat, though so far its displaying your messages, but not mine.... and upon refreshing they disappear.
When I press Enter, it comes up with that little loading bar but then doesn't do anything...
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I'll try and use the gather chat, though so far its displaying your messages, but not mine.... and upon refreshing they disappear.
When I press Enter, it comes up with that little loading bar but then doesn't do anything...
Yes it needs a lot of work and there isn't scrollback (viewing previous messages). Think of it like IRC with logging turned off.
The loading bar is actually the gather statuses being refreshed every 5 seconds.
edit: okay this chat is by far the buggiest thing I've ever created ever.
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Ahh I see. xD
Are you able to see your own messages when you post them?
I've seen a few of yours but none of mine... is it the other way around at your end?
EDIT: Ok... it worked... for a few seconds... until I tried refreshing the page.
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Ahh I see. xD
Are you able to see your own messages when you post them?
I've seen a few of yours but none of mine... is it the other way around at your end?
It's somewhat random.
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It had lag on showing my new messages, none of yours came up, then when it got to the bottom of the page, the typing box just... vanished xD
I have a few minute delay updating all the messages...
EDIT: Are you still posting, or are you just gonna leave it as is for the moment
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EDIT: Are you still posting, or are you just gonna leave it as is for the moment
I am still posting and I'm recoding part of it. The vanishing box thing should be gone.
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Attachments...
Seems when you enter enough text to fill it, it seems too wide for the page to stay as it is...
(I'm using Chrome btw)
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Attachments...
Seems when you enter enough text to fill it, it seems too wide for the page to stay as it is...
(I'm using Chrome btw)
hmm that's a chrome thing. Firefox seems extremely instant and it doesn't move when you add a ridiculous amount of text. (I just tested chrome and it did what you described)
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As you can see from the scrot, firefox and chrome were started around the same time and chrome gets the weird horizontal thing and skips messages. No idea why and I'm looking into it.
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Chrome really does something wierd to it all...
FF: No page shifting or message overflow outside the box
Chrome: Page shifting and messages can exceed the boundaries
IE: Page shifting, but not overflow
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Maybe its no bug,but just looks different
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Maybe its no bug,but just looks different
You've got stuff cached beyond all belief. Do control + shift + r a few times
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Ok,second one
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Okay status update:
- Gather webchat (combination of ajax and iframe comet (https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Comet_(programming))) apparently mostly works
- I've implemented an online users list
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Soo... what's next?
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Soo... what's next?
haha the rest of the giant posts before you and I hijacked this thread with testing the chat.
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Ya. We shoulda made a new thread... ah well.
So, back to leaderboards?
My thoughts are about multiple leaderboards for each gather-type.
Currently, looking at the gather page, the gather types (currently) are:
CTF 3v3, (even though there are several servers for 3vs3 CTF, we would want them all to count to the same leaderboard category)
INF 3v3,
DM 1vs1,
DM 6-Player,
CTF 3vs3 (realistic)
and INF 3vs3 (realistic).
My idea involves each gather-type having different leaderboards to score under.
Some gather-types would have the same concepts for leaderboards (e.g. Every gather-type could have a leaderboard for who gets 1st ingame, 2nd and 3rd and assign points to players for achieving that).
However, some gather-types would need different leaderboards because they are different game-modes! 1vs1 DM would need to be treated differently to 3vs3 CTF..
UPDATE:
Take a look at the attachment. These are 3 separate league tables.
I've created theoretical ideas for leaguetables: Points (gained from winning games), and Caps.
Table 1:
Gather-type is 3vs3 CTF.
The leaderboard for this is based on points.
The example I've given is awarding 10 points for coming 1st, 7 for 2nd, and 4 for 3rd.
Table 2:
This leaderboard is also based on points, but using the results from the gather-type DM 6-Player.
Again, 10 points for 1st, 7 for 2nd and 4 for 3rd.
Table 3:
Gather-type is 3vs3 CTF again.
This leaderboard is based on data about caps.
Bob has the most caps, Bill is second.
I've added a tacky turquoise triangle on the column headings - the idea being that you could sort this table by either 'who has the highest total caps' or 'who has the most caps per game'.
And in this case, you can see that Bob actually has a lower caps per game, so he would be second and Bill would be first when ordered by average caps.
Tables 1&2: This is what I mean by having the 'same concepts'. They both calculate in the same way, but for different gather-types.
Table 3: This one is gather-type specific (as its pretty obvious that a deathmatch of any kind couldn't have a caps leaguetable!).
From: December 20, 2010, 03:46:22 pm
Chat not working :S IE just makes constant clicking...
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take this (http://www.soldatladder.net/1on1.php) as an example for a great implementation of a ladder. it just sorts the best players who took part in the 1on1-gathers. so for example:
- you wanna play a 1on1-gather, so you login, press "join" and wait for another one joining
- the gather starts: you play two maps
- if one of the players wins both, the gather is over
- if not: another map is played to determine who wins the gather
- the players either gain some points for every map they have won (you'll for example gain more if you win one match 20:5 than just 20:17)
- or you do the more simple approach: the player who won two maps (and so the whole gather) will gain one "win"-point (<-- this sux because you will for example have 3 players who all won 5 gathers, who is the first now, who the second, ...?)
- you can now check the ladder, compare yourself with other players and yell out that you're the best 1on1-player on the web-gather (which is fun!)
but I would (at least for now) only add a ladder for 1on1-gathers. on other gather-types where you have to create a team you will come up with various problem and difficulties:
- you need to make a new page for teams. all the players of this team must be included there.
- if team A plays a 3on3 CTF-gather against team B you have to check that all the players really belong to their team, you need to make sure that no player is in two teams at the same time or maybe officially only is in one team but actually also plays for another team and helps them out...
this feels more like a league like the SCTFL (http://sctfl.soldat.nl/) where clans (a team with a fixed number of players) play on watched servers and have to report any game they played together with screenshots and stuff.
this doesn't really fit for a gather where you just want to play with some random people. you don't want to create a team, there is the IRC for this...
if you still want to add a ladder on a gather with more than 2 players you could get rid of the "teams"-idea and just let 3 randomeople play against the other 3 random people (if it's a 3on3 CTF-gather). there is no "winning" on this gather as a team (so no teamstatistics) but just for every player.
so everytime you play in some 3on3 CTF-gather you (as a player) gain points for winning a map. the more flags you capture, the more kills you do, etc. the higher the points you gain for the certain map. either only the first player (according to F1) gains some points or only the players of the "team" which won the map gain points.
in the end you could watch the ladder and see which player is the best 3on3-CTF-player.
which is uneccessary/uninteresting in my opinion. I don't really care how I played a 3on3-CTF-gather - I just play, have fun and forget it afterwards.
wereso to bring it back to wat I said above: only implement a ladder for 1on1. decide for the rest later. and don't mix up "stats" and "ladder". we still want stats for every gather which has been played (it's just fun to see which weapons were played most, which maps the least, etc.).
but talking about all this stuff - it actually would be much easier if you would ask the author of the soldatladder (http://www.soldatladder.net/) to use the same code or even bring both gathers together. you would then need to synchronize your web-gather-gui to the IRC-gather so that everyone sees who just joined a gather and stuff.
but.......aaaaahh...it's so complicated to find the perfect solution because you have different accounts everywhere:
- one account on the IRC (at least for quakenet)
- one account for the forum and the web-gather
if we could bind all these to your Portal-account together with your Soldat-registration it would be so much easier to have the "one-and-only-solution". but whatever...
I hope I didn't confuse you too much. :(
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Whoa. You're right that a 1vs1 table is certainly the easiest one to implement.
- the players either gain some points for every map they have won (you'll for example gain more if you win one match 20:5 than just 20:17)
- The 'win' points is easy, but I think that calculating points from how much a player won by is better, as it's obvious that a guy that won 20-5 is a much better player at 1vs1 than another guy who only beat him 20-19.
- or you do the more simple approach: the player who won two maps (and so the whole gather) will gain one "win"-point (<-- this sux because you will for example have 3 players who all won 5 gathers, who is the first now, who the second, ...?)
- In the case of one 'win' point and 'several people with equal win points' - look at the http://www.soldatladder.net/1on1.php again.
Although they have multiple ways of calculating points it seems, they have extra columns such as Kill/Death Ratio which could be used to sort between two players of the same points.
However, I would be inclined to do as the #soldatladder have done, and calculate it some other way.
I noticed that even if you don't win, you still get points (as seen here: 968 | 0%. 968 points, 0% Win-ratio).
I was just writing a list of things you could calculate it by - but I think that #soldatladder's system works, is fair and would contain all that information anyway.
As for the ladder-by-team, I think that would get pretty complex and confusing..
Even though you'd be playing with random people I still feel that you can have ladders for individual players in team games.
on other gather-types where you have to create a team you will come up with various problem and difficulties:
- you need to make a new page for teams. all the players of this team must be included there.
- if team A plays a 3on3 CTF-gather against team B you have to check that all the players really belong to their team, you need to make sure that no player is in two teams at the same time or maybe officially only is in one team but actually also plays for another team and helps them out...
this feels more like a league like the SCTFL (http://sctfl.soldat.nl/) where clans (a team with a fixed number of players) play on watched servers and have to report any game they played together with screenshots and stuff.
this doesn't really fit for a gather where you just want to play with some random people. you don't want to create a team, there is the IRC for this...
Exactly. It should be random - not pre-organised teams. I think all these problems aren't problems when you look at an individuals score rather than that of a team.
if you still want to add a ladder on a gather with more than 2 players you could get rid of the "teams"-idea and just let 3 randomeople play against the other 3 random people (if it's a 3on3 CTF-gather). there is no "winning" on this gather as a team (so no teamstatistics) but just for every player.
Yees!
so everytime you play in some 3on3 CTF-gather you (as a player) gain points for winning a map. the more flags you capture, the more kills you do, etc. the higher the points you gain for the certain map. either only the first player (according to F1) gains some points or only the players of the "team" which won the map gain points.
I would see that as going against what would make the ladder for CTF interesting... The ladder would show who excelled in the game. If you happen to be put with a naff team, you still might be able to come top on the F1 list, yet still lose the game. The people who did this would receive no recognition even though they were the best player on the map.
I would be tempted to say it might be better to order it from the F1 list - 1st gains some points, 2nd gains less, 3rd less again.
in the end you could watch the ladder and see which player is the best 3on3-CTF-player.
which is uneccessary/uninteresting in my opinion. I don't really care how I played a 3on3-CTF-gather - I just play, have fun and forget it afterwards.
I get what you mean.. I disagree however... Ladders are all about who is the best out there - I'd be interested to see that.
wereso to bring it back to wat I said above: only implement a ladder for 1on1. decide for the rest later. and don't mix up "stats" and "ladder". we still want stats for every gather which has been played (it's just fun to see which weapons were played most, which maps the least, etc.).
Stats are a definite yes, would be interesting to see the trends unfold.
Ladders are less important, however I do agree that 1vs1 is the easiest and probably most fun/useful ladder to have and should be the first to implement.
but talking about all this stuff - it actually would be much easier if you would ask the author of the soldatladder (http://www.soldatladder.net/) to use the same code
I think using the same code is a good idea. Makes developer's life easier :L
or even bring both gathers together.
Hmm, not to sure about that idea.. This web gather is really good idea, partially because it's designed separate to the old IRC and it will have a whole different range of players.. also because:
you would then need to synchronize your web-gather-gui to the IRC-gather so that everyone sees who just joined a gather and stuff.
but.......aaaaahh...it's so complicated to find the perfect solution because you have different accounts everywhere:
- one account on the IRC (at least for quakenet)
- one account for the forum and the web-gather
From: December 21, 2010, 12:09:10 pm
- Gather webchat (combination of ajax and iframe comet (https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Comet_(programming))) apparently mostly works
Chat box is working again, but experiencing baad lag issues. ¬.¬
EDIT: If you get these lag issues, switch to Firefox. No issues with lag there.
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I'm working on a lot of stuff but I decided to play with the layout a bit in firebug. Does this look better?
I zoomed out so it'll mostly all fit in the screenshot.
and heh you can also see my workspace
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The chat is a much better size. Better layout indeed.
From: December 21, 2010, 04:24:17 pm
Are you purposefully spamming the chat with .'s? :L Or can't you see my replies?
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Are you purposefully spamming the chat with .'s? :L Or can't you see my replies?
Yes it's broken for me right now.
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Heh. I did wonder. Firebug playing up?
From: December 21, 2010, 04:40:02 pm
*nvm
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Heh. I did wonder. Firebug playing up?
nah it was the random lag that did it. Seems to work now.
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Do the servers running the gather have a limit on how many people inside...?
e.g. SPECTATOR feature :D
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Do the servers running the gather have a limit on how many people inside...?
e.g. SPECTATOR feature :D
Yeah the player limit is the same that's mentioned on the site. I'm still debating how I should have specs work.
I'd really appreciate feedback on the screen shot in this post:I'm working on a lot of stuff but I decided to play with the layout a bit in firebug. Does this look better?
I zoomed out so it'll mostly all fit in the screenshot.
edit: I just implemented uniquely colored nicks.
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I got an idea. I'm not sure how hte site looks once a gather has started, but it could be possible to have it so that once a gather started, a little "running gathers" category (or something) is at the top / bottom, and w/ list of pplz in it (and possibly more info in the future) with a "spectate" button or something. lets say 1v1 gather. while they are playing 1v1, others can play 1v1 kuz the old "lobby 1v1" is cleared. (creates a new soldat server instance if one does not exist i guess)
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Yes, when a gather starts, put some extra info in its box, same place where you join - stuff like time played, caps, current map etc.
Also being able to start filling it up with new players while it is in progress would be really cool.
If you get this thing to have a slick interface, I can see it really taking off. I'm getting really pissed off having to deal with noobs on my team in inf RAGEEEEE
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Yeah the player limit is the same that's mentioned on the site. I'm still debating how I should have specs work.
Alrighty - but as people have just said, it would be a nice feature.
I'd really appreciate feedback on the screen shot
OK, I'm just playing around with it in Firebug myself...
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This is a good Idea, but have you thought about the players who skip gathers? If there some kind of Sub system being created? There also needs to be banning for those players who break the rules in gathers, such as constant pausing, torrenting, hacking.. etc Anyways you see what I'm saying.
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So apparently clicking on that (really visually annoying) refreshing bar up the top right disables auto-refresh (which is also like a little minigame - gonna make it easier/more intuitive, I only found out by accident), so maybe you want to make it less obtrusive, and add an auto refresh on/off switch. Is there even a way to turn it back on without refreshing the page?
Also some funky temp storage of the chat would be nice so that you don't lose track of conversations on refresh.
Also chat can not handle ಠ_ಠ.
ಠ_ಠ
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Chat can also not handle + but he knows the problem with characters already.
Attached is my workings so far.
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Seems like a pain how the page is spread so much vertically, and so much horizontal space is being wasted. Unfortunately the whole design is like that, so it could take a lot of work to change unless the gather was the only different page.
Unless there were some notifications in the chat, having to scroll up and down to check how many people are joined etc. would also be annoying.
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I agree.
Apart from moving the 'who's online' and 'in-game commands' to underneath the nav bar, the vertical spread is the least I can make it really.
Although it's nice having the gather page within the style and size of the site, practically it's not so good.
I would vote for having a separate page for the gather - bigger and thus more practical.
From: December 22, 2010, 07:03:56 am
Chat's down again...
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Chat's down again...
The chat server crashed. I just added a cronjob that kills/restarts it every half hour so this shouldn't be an issue again.
Apart from moving the 'who's online' and 'in-game commands' to underneath the nav bar, the vertical spread is the least I can make it really.
I don't really want to put anything outside the content body part of the site since that wouldn't look very well.
So apparently clicking on that (really visually annoying) refreshing bar up the top right disables auto-refresh (which is also like a little minigame - gonna make it easier/more intuitive, I only found out by accident), so maybe you want to make it less obtrusive, and add an auto refresh on/off switch. Is there even a way to turn it back on without refreshing the page?
Also some funky temp storage of the chat would be nice so that you don't lose track of conversations on refresh.
Also chat can not handle ಠ_ಠ.
ಠ_ಠ
The turning off auto reload was more of an easter egg than anything else, and I wanted to see if anyone would notice or not. I haven't really decided if I should temporarily store chats or not. How it currently works is sorta like IRC but without logging anywhere. It's definitely something I need to think about.
Oh, also, the gather page seems to work 100% in IE8 (when the chat server is running correctly).
edit: Now works in chrome. Probably also works in safari too.
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I think that we either have to have the minorly impractical layout as shown in mine and jrgp's firebug mockups, or have a completely separate page for the gather. This seems the general vibes from people I've talked to..
I think the former should be implemented now, and the latter implemented later.
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I've added current gather in game status. By that I mean when a gather has started the website updates itself with time left, current map, and current round.
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Good job, jrgp. Keep it up. After Thursday I'll have more time for testing and feedback.
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A couple of ideas:
(1) Gathers that have people in it (but have not started) will appear up top, so you can see them first right away (same order though if theres multiple ones). I'm not sure if this actually good to do or not.
(2) Clicking on the TEAM_NAME value changes the team name to the next available team. In CTF, Alpha -> Bravo -> Alpha; in DM, no teams ^_^; in TDM, Alpha -> Bravo -> Charlie -> Delta -> Alpha (skips one if the team is full)
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I've added current gather in game status. By that I mean when a gather has started the website updates itself with time left, current map, and current round.
Nice :D
I'll throw a few more ideas out here...
Spec feature
Order of events:
- People join the gather list
- Gather full, IP/Pass sent to all in the list
- All those people join the game
- Now that people have joined, a 'Spec' button appears alongside the ingame stats
- People who decide to watch click the button and are sent the same IP/Pass link
- Server forces anyone who then joins the game to be a spectator. make sure the spectators cannot do the ingame commands! xD
The amount of people able to click the Spec button should be limited, to maybe 4 or something.
Simple version of Spec button over.
Now to complicate things (some ideas that might influence the working of the above :L):
As soon as a gather list is full in the browser, it should display 'launching' or something, and not go straight into stats. (see why in a minute)....
When the people have received and followed the link to the server, a blank map is what they encounter (see lobbyexample.png attached).
The server displays a countdown as people join. (e.g. "1 player in, waiting for 5 more").
Only when the countdown is complete, and everyone is in, a member of alpha (for 1vs1DM, player one chooses, or for bloodbath DM just any random player) can choose the first map using the ingame !map MAPNAME command.
At this point, when the map changes to the chosen one, 'launching' changes to all the stats and the spec button appears.
The game is played.
Once this first game is over, players are transfered back to the blank map. (the stats in browser could change to 'transferring' or something).
Then, a member of bravo (or player two in 1vs1DM, or any random player in bloodbathDM) can then choose the next map.
Map changes to the chosen one, stats in browser start for round 2.
Round 2 is played.
If there are clear winners overall, players are then transferred back to the blank map, the server displays a message "congratulations %s for winning the game overall" or something (and then kick the players after like 20 seconds?).
IF there's a draw overall in CTF/INF/?1vs1?, the server takes them to a specified tie-breaker map and displays a message 'The teams are drawn, the tie-breaker has been activated'.
The teams play, and the winner is decided. Teams are taken back to the blank map, the winner is announced by a script, and players informed to get out or be kicked in 20 seconds :L
The whole idea of this is to make sure players dont play half a game, and the people in browser know exactly when its starting and where the game's at.
EDIT: I've added a very quick map in Polyworks (image attached) which just shows a better idea of the lobby. I would probably split the map into the top conjoined boxes as the DM lobby, and the two bigger alpha/bravo ones for CTF/INF.
From: December 22, 2010, 01:04:49 pm
(1) Gathers that have people in it (but have not started) will appear up top, so you can see them first right away (same order though if theres multiple ones). I'm not sure if this actually good to do or not.
The idea is nice in some ways... however I think that it might throw the order of the gather in their list atm.
The 'whos online' list has been implemented and that shows who's around straight away, also its kinda a lazymans thing aint it? ;)
(2) Clicking on the TEAM_NAME value changes the team name to the next available team. In CTF, Alpha -> Bravo -> Alpha; in DM, no teams ^_^; in TDM, Alpha -> Bravo -> Charlie -> Delta -> Alpha (skips one if the team is full)
Again, I like the idea of this one, but gathers are meant to be randomly selected really. CW's are for people who want to arrange a specific match. Otherwise, clans might take the gather over to organise their own wars.
I like both the ideas... but I can see some problems too.
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(2) Clicking on the TEAM_NAME value changes the team name to the next available team. In CTF, Alpha -> Bravo -> Alpha; in DM, no teams ^_^; in TDM, Alpha -> Bravo -> Charlie -> Delta -> Alpha (skips one if the team is full)
Again, I like the idea of this one, but gathers are meant to be randomly selected really. CW's are for people who want to arrange a specific match. Otherwise, clans might take the gather over to organise their own wars.
The current setup is not random (I mean it is, but it is easily avoided). The first person who joined is automatically set to a team. A person can easily rejoin to change teams, so essentially a harder version of what I just said. In order to have a truly random one, the teams must be set on the start of the gather (on join when in the "lobby" map (using your idea), a script can display the teams).
In regards to everything else you said, I support.
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The current setup is not random (I mean it is, but it is easily avoided). The first person who joined is automatically set to a team. A person can easily rejoin to change teams, so essentially a harder version of what I just said. In order to have a truly random one, the teams must be set on the start of the gather (on join when in the "lobby" map (using your idea), a script can display the teams).
Agreed.
Using the lobby map to set teams is probably the most random (good) idea to solve that.
Once everyone is inside, the server could relay the teams back to the browser to display... I think that sounds reasonable.
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The current setup is not random (I mean it is, but it is easily avoided). The first person who joined is automatically set to a team. A person can easily rejoin to change teams, so essentially a harder version of what I just said. In order to have a truly random one, the teams must be set on the start of the gather (on join when in the "lobby" map (using your idea), a script can display the teams).
Agreed.
Using the lobby map to set teams is probably the most random (good) idea to solve that.
Once everyone is inside, the server could relay the teams back to the browser to display... I think that sounds reasonable.
Yes, I will implement a lobby. Wraithlike has agreed to make me a custom cool lobby map.
I also just added unique nickname regging, to be used with stats and possibly also ingame recognition, depending on how appropriate it is.
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Awesome. On both accounts. I look forward to seeing what Wraithlike comes up with :D
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@thegrandmaster: If you want a lobby map, try this: link (http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=34705.0)
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F12 to this. Forever.
Can't wait for it.
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@thegrandmaster: If you want a lobby map, try this: link (http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=34705.0)
It's not up to me to choose xD
But that map is a very gooood example of a lobby, just the sort of thing I was thinking of! - I like it.
Much better than my quick example ;)
All a lobby needs to be is a glorified/professional looking nothing/uselessness!
From: December 23, 2010, 08:36:52 am
Noticed something else.. under a player's profile (e.g. mine), it says I have played in 3 gathers when I have only actually joined the server twice and the third was me and you (jrgp) testing the launch of the ingame stats thing.
I would advise that once the rest of the player stats are implemented, the server should record when a player joins a server rather than recording when you're part of a full list in the browser?
From: December 23, 2010, 04:52:38 pm
The colours seem to have gone a bit wild... *screenshot*
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Just thought I'd let you guys know that I'll be completely gone starting tomorrow morning through tuesday morning. During that time I won't have computer access and obviously won't be able to work on anything.
I have very deeply appreciated all the suggestions posted in this thread and welcome more. Hopefully next week I'll get more work done.
jrgp out
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The gather chat is working perfect with Safari but the page appears as if it is always loading...
Anyways, good job jrgp and merry christmas!
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The gather chat is working perfect with Safari but the page appears as if it is always loading...
Anyways, good job jrgp and merry christmas!
Yeah really good job with it all! Have a good time.
The page is constantly loading, that's the way the chat works.
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Totally pointless imo, i wonder how many gathers already were played.
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Totally pointless imo, i wonder how many gathers already were played.
I disagree. Admittedly, it's not extremely lively currently, however it has only been available for the last week and a half?
I've seen people come and go, and as more people do so they'll join and people will play more and more.
I think it's a step in the right direction.
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Totally pointless imo, i wonder how many gathers already were played.
I disagree. Admittedly, it's not extremely lively currently, however it has only been available for the last week and a half?
I've seen people come and go, and as more people do so they'll join and people will play more and more.
I think it's a step in the right direction.
I would agree with you, buth then we'd be both wrong. It will never work since we have irc gathers. When i red that both mm and jrgp were working on it several months, i just thought: oh come on, that time should be spent on soldat 1.5.1 / coding / fixing bugs, watever. Altough, like you said, its new, it wont work as it should.
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No no Guer, It's extremely good thing, but we need to announce it more to rest of world! It's not much used now, but things can change!
Everyone hop hop to Gather!
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It works. Features will be added that make it better for the user to use, make it better, easier, and simpler than IRC.
People don't currently use it because most dont know about it.
1.5.1 coding etc is being handled. The Devs are working to make soldat and the community surrounding it better.
jrgp (and MM) have been working on this for a lil while, but once it's fully equipped, it'll be awesome!
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Okay, lets say it actually works. What skill level can players expect? What target group the gathers aims?
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After some testing I believe the 3 CTF servers should be changed to one 4v4, one 3v3 and one 2v2 server. You'll have the same capacity for players and it's possible to play without a load of players. After the gather match ended, stats for the players and teams should be displayed and players should have 15 seconds until they get kicked. Right now it's rather sudden and people complained about matches which weren't finished yet (which actually were).
Also, a gather match should end once someone leaves, or you cannot join another match after you left the game.
The limit for the Bloodbath DM server should be increased to 30, because 20 seems a little bit low for a 4 players game.
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To fix a bit- Just those who leaved from gather should stop that, those who didn't -they stay there to play. Otherwise fully agreed with DC.
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After some testing I believe the 3 CTF servers should be changed to one 4v4, one 3v3 and one 2v2 server.
You'll have the same capacity for players and it's possible to play without a load of players.
I agree in a 2vs2 server. 4vs4... yes I suppose so, but not right now since 3vs3 doesn't fill currently.
After the gather match ended, stats for the players and teams should be displayed and players should have 15 seconds until they get kicked. Right now it's rather sudden and people complained about matches which weren't finished yet (which actually were).
Also agreed, though I have suggested the lobby idea, which since it uses the lobby map, should resolve that:
As soon as a gather list is full in the browser, it should display 'launching' or something, and not go straight into stats. (see why in a minute)....
When the people have received and followed the link to the server, a blank map is what they encounter.
The server displays a countdown as people join. (e.g. "1 player in, waiting for 5 more").
Only when the countdown is complete, and everyone is in, a member of alpha (for 1vs1DM, player one chooses, or for bloodbath DM just any random player) can choose the first map using the ingame !map MAPNAME command.
At this point, when the map changes to the chosen one, 'launching' changes to all the stats and the spec button appears.
The game is played.
Once this first game is over, players are transfered back to the blank map. (the stats in browser could change to 'transferring' or something).
Then, a member of bravo (or player two in 1vs1DM, or any random player in bloodbathDM) can then choose the next map.
Map changes to the chosen one, stats in browser start for round 2.
Round 2 is played.
If there are clear winners overall, players are then transferred back to the blank map, the server displays a message "congratulations %s for winning the game overall" or something (and then kick the players after like 20 seconds?).
IF there's a draw overall in CTF/INF/?1vs1?, the server takes them to a specified tie-breaker map and displays a message 'The teams are drawn, the tie-breaker has been activated'.
The teams play, and the winner is decided. Teams are taken back to the blank map, the winner is announced by a script, and players informed to get out or be kicked in 20 seconds :L
The whole idea of this is to make sure players dont play half a game, and the people in browser know exactly when its starting and where the game's at.
To which jrgp said:
Yes, I will implement a lobby. Wraithlike has agreed to make me a custom cool lobby map.
Also, a gather match should end once someone leaves, or you cannot join another match after you left the game.
If the spec feature is introduced, then we could have subs possibly?
Working that out with ladders and stats will be slightly harder but achievable.
When a person leaves, the game could pause (and a message appear in browser - see attached for an example). If a sub is not found within 30 seconds, the server would save the stats of the people who are still there and then return everyone back to the lobby map. If a sub is found, then the game continues however the sub's scores should not be saved into his stats.
The limit for the Bloodbath DM server should be increased to 30, because 20 seems a little bit low for a 4 players game.
Yes, agreed, at LEAST 30.
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Got some stuff done today:
- In-game !info
- overall gather stats on site (under nickchanger)
- more ingame stats stuff on site for currently running gathers
- if a gather server was joined by a player, and then everyone leaves, the server shuts down and that gather queue is reopened
- Until wraithlike is done with his current lobby map we'll use this (http://tms.jrgp.org/2010/?map=1230). I hope to fully implement the lobby functionality tomorrow.
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Woo :D awesome work, I'm liking all the new features!
The lobby will help the gameplay/workings of it much smoother :)
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Okay now nick recognition is in effect. Your ingame nick (changable on the site) must match your ingame nick, otherwise you are turned into a spectator.
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Yay, goodjob. You're making good progress.
I will post some more suggestions when I find the time.
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Yay, goodjob. You're making good progress.
I will post some more suggestions when I find the time.
Thanks, and sorry for the slow pace. I guess I'm getting it done in a bunch of relatively small coding chunks. Hopefully I'll have it all done by next month or so.
edit: Just added nick highlighting in the webchat. If someone says your username the site will beep and the highlighted message will be bold. (case insensitive)
edit again: you can use the up and down arrow keys while in the webchat message box to scroll through your previous messages (up to 5), like in irc
edit again (x2): added "most popular gathers" list to the page so you can see which gathers are being played the most
edit again (x3): Should I make it so typing !add in the chat adds you to the queue of the most populated gather server queue and !del removes you from the queue you are currently in, if any?
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I like the beeping... could use with 5 or 10 second cooldown for the beeps however... xD
!add and !del.... maybe, I mean it's only one lil click away that I don't believe it'd be worth it.
Makes it very IRC-ish... would be nice to have advanced options for the people who knew how to use them though.
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!add and !del.... maybe, I mean it's only one lil click away that I don't believe it'd be worth it.
Makes it very IRC-ish... would be nice to have advanced options for the people who knew how to use them though.
I really feel like adding as many bells and whistles as possible.
As requested, just added Realistic 1v1 DM btw.
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As requested, just added Realistic 1v1 DM btw.
(http://i127.photobucket.com/albums/p124/flyingpeanuts/sexygirl.jpg)
now it needs chat logs. ^^
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haha.
Add moar stats! :D
One thing I think would be nice to see is this...
Make the list of gathers played (on your personal profile) into a clickable thing which shows the F1 score of that gather.
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Okay you can now add as spectator.
Make the list of gathers played (on your personal profile) into a clickable thing which shows the F1 score of that gather.
That's one of the things up next.
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Okay you can now add as spectator.
Awesome :)
Make the list of gathers played (on your personal profile) into a clickable thing which shows the F1 score of that gather.
That's one of the things up next.
Yeeah! :D
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Yay, great job, jrgp!
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jrgp the pro active guy
ima scared thinking on what more u can develop by a simple idea to a complex one, basing on real-time feedback. Is that you motivation, isnt it?
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jrgp the pro active guy
ima scared thinking on what more u can develop by a simple idea to a complex one, basing on real-time feedback. Is that you motivation, isnt it?
Feedback is the primary motivator, so yeah.
Yay, great job, jrgp!
Thanks
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You said you want more bells and whistles, so...
- change the palette of nick colors on the list (some of them are unreadable)
- add 'afk' marker to the list (and if you post something on chat it turns off automaticaly)
- load a few last lines that were posted on chat before one's join
- add timestamps to chat (switchable)
- allow bloodbath dm to be played with 3 players, if they all are for it. other players might be able to join while those three are still playing, thus filling the server. there's threesome dm already
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Please fix the issues users have with Google Chrome (namely not being able to change the in game nickname).
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Just added Threesome DM (normal mode, 3 players, 3 rounds).
You said you want more bells and whistles, so...
- change the palette of nick colors on the list (some of them are unreadable)
- add 'afk' marker to the list (and if you post something on chat it turns off automaticaly)
- load a few last lines that were posted on chat before one's join
- add timestamps to chat (switchable)
- allow bloodbath dm to be played with 3 players, if they all are for it. other players might be able to join while those three are still playing, thus filling the server.
Thanks
Please fix the issues users have with Google Chrome (namely not being able to change the in game nickname).
I'll look into it.
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Ok...
so...
I have not read all the topic, since it's pointless to read all 'how great web gather is' and 'what a great job has been done'.
Let me state the facts:
The game is dying, because it's buggy and has no updates; less and less people play it.
Someone who does not know what is happening here could say: "I'm sure the main developers are working hard to make this game better, they know that there are fewer players than before, thus they must be doing some hard coding and debugging, they probably don't even sleep, I hope they will finish it soon!"
But what are the main developers really doing? Instead of fixing bugs, rewriting bad written code, they are creating next useless ****ing gather. Wait, I forgot, this is an *OFFICIAL* gather! This must be something exciting, because this is an *OFFICIAL* gather! Really? Now will I be able to play on an *OFFICIAL* gather? No, I can't believe it, I played many games and most of them didn't have one, but in soldat... YES! I do have an *OFFICIAL* gather! An *OFFICIAL* gather must bring lots of new players! Woah!
There are LOTS of gathers we can play on, many of them are often empty, because there are too many of them. Only #soldat.gather has 6 servers while there r usually 2, maybe 3 running at the same time. Who the hell needs another one for such a small community?
Maybe the new developer wanted to show that he is not that useless and is going to make something for this community? Sure, web gather is something that community can use. Maybe add customized skins? How love we shiny and colourful skins! It also lacks some music playing in the background, because while waiting for a gather I WANT TO HEAR MUSIC!
Please, close notepad++, give up server-side scripting for some time, and do some REAL coding.
Good job, keep following EnEsCe...
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Ok...
so...
I have not read all the topic, since it's pointless to read all 'how great web gather is' and 'what a great job has been done'.
Let me state the facts:
The game is dying, because it's buggy and has no updates; less and less people play it.
Someone who does not know what is happening here could say: "I'm sure the main developers are working hard to make this game better, they know that there are fewer players than before, thus they must be doing some hard coding and debugging, they probably don't even sleep, I hope they will finish it soon!"
But what are the main developers really doing? Instead of fixing bugs, rewriting bad written code, they are creating next useless ****ing gather. Wait, I forgot, this is an *OFFICIAL* gather! This must be something exciting, because this is an *OFFICIAL* gather! Really? Now will I be able to play on an *OFFICIAL* gather? No, I can't believe it, I played many games and most of them didn't have one, but in soldat... YES! I do have an *OFFICIAL* gather! An *OFFICIAL* gather must bring lots of new players! Woah!
There are LOTS of gathers we can play on, many of them are often empty, because there are too many of them. Only #soldat.gather has 6 servers while there r usually 2, maybe 3 running at the same time. Who the hell needs another one for such a small community?
Maybe the new developer wanted to show that he is not that useless and is going to make something for this community? Sure, web gather is something that community can use. Maybe add customized skins? How love we shiny and colourful skins! It also lacks some music playing in the background, because while waiting for a gather I WANT TO HEAR MUSIC!
Please, close notepad++, give up server-side scripting for some time, and do some REAL coding.
Good job, keep following EnEsCe...
You should really read all posts and threads...you know nothing about what's going on around here.
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jrgp the pro active guy
ima scared thinking on what more u can develop by a simple idea to a complex one, basing on real-time feedback. Is that you motivation, isnt it?
A new gather! A new *OFFICIAL* gather! Can you believe it!?
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What Wookash said. And now stop trolling.
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Vtg, you could have at least read the first post. I made this because MM wanted me to. I wouldn't have otherwise. :P
Oh, and all of this is written from scratch in Vim (attaching a screenshot since I doubt you'll believe me) over ssh. Notepad++ wasn't used at all. :-\
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Vtg, you could have at least read the first post. I made this because MM wanted me to. I wouldn't have otherwise. :P
I don't think we're still at a point where what MM wants is seen as what's best for this game because it's MM.
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Am I the only one thinking Vtg is Veritas?
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Am I the only one thinking Vtg is Veritas?
you aren't, somehow.
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What Wookash said. And now stop trolling.
Huh,
I am trolling? Is my message extraneous or what? Is anything besides replies like 'good job man' and so a trolling? Ach, I know, this is not kind of topic you like...
Vtg, you could have at least read the first post. I made this because MM wanted me to. I wouldn't have otherwise. :P
Oh, and all of this is written from scratch in Vim over ssh. Notepad++ wasn't used at all. :-\
I understand... the idea of creating next gather is so stupid itself that only MM could think of it, my apologies.
I think you have something to say as a developer and contributor, haven't you? You should really not waste time.
From: December 30, 2010, 03:47:40 pm
Yes, after seeing your screenshot, I do believe now.
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I think you have something to say as a developer and contributor, haven't you? You should really not waste time.
so it's like "everything but improving soldat is waste of time"?
I am trolling? Is my message extraneous or what? Is anything besides replies like 'good job man' and so a trolling? Ach, I know, this is not kind of topic you like...
you should have at least read teh thread, and tried teh gathah.
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Am I the only one thinking Vtg is Veritas?
Surely everyone who doesn't participate in groupthink is the same person.
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Vtg, what is it you want me to say/do?
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so it's like "everything but improving soldat is waste of time"?
Taking into consideration time and effort which jrgp has put in it and the current situation of soldat as well as number of players in the gathers, I need to state that this kind of "improving" game is a waste of time.
you should have at least read teh thread, and tried teh gathah.
What's so special in this gather? I've look through the topic, there are some commands for map change, pause, unpause, unban, what can one need more? Hm... maybe a stable game?
There is only one reason to try it, which comes to my mind atm: this is a superior *OFFICIAL* gather.
From: December 30, 2010, 03:59:48 pm
Vtg, what is it you want me to say/do?
The question should be "Vtg, what is it you want me NOT to do?"
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The question should be "Vtg, what is it you want me NOT to do?"
Alright, Vtg, what is it you want me NOT to do?
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Taking into consideration time and effort which jrgp has put in it and the current situation of soldat as well as number of players in the gathers, I need to state that this kind of "improving" game is a waste of time.
Like nothing else is being improved. Seriously.
What's so special in this gather? I've look through the topic, there are some commands for map change, pause, unpause, unban, what can one need more? Hm... maybe a stable game?
The fact that you don't need IRC to play and keep track of your stats. Many players don't understand how they can use IRC, so they just don't play gathers. This way everyone can play gathermatches.
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The question should be "Vtg, what is it you want me NOT to do?"
Alright, Vtg, what is it you want me NOT to do?
My answer was supposed to change the question in such a way, that you will guess the answer. If you still do not know what the anwer is, it is: the official gather.
From: December 30, 2010, 04:12:37 pm
What's so special in this gather? I've look through the topic, there are some commands for map change, pause, unpause, unban, what can one need more? Hm... maybe a stable game?
The fact that you don't need IRC to play and keep track of your stats. Many players don't understand how they can use IRC, so they just don't play gathers. This way everyone can play gathermatches.
I'm one of those brilliant players who know how to use IRC, so it's not special for me.
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If it's nothing special for you, it is nothing special at all. I mean, everyone's supposed to be like you. You are teh coolest betch around.
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Ehm, dude, stop the trolling. Did you read those two topics? *clickly* (http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=39242.0) *click* (http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=39312.0)
Now stop the ranting and think for one second. There are developers who are focusing on other stuff than the *OFFICIAL* gather. This is their roadmap:
* No portal.
* May be hardwareIds instead of the tagId from portal but its lowpriority.
* Bugfixes, we are focusing on stuff like map load times, fps issues, netcode issues and such.
I have no idea if these things make you happy or not because you only jumped in here and started the flaming without giving any suggestion what to do to improve the "bad bad" situation (You wrote "Instead of fixing bugs, rewriting bad written code". Now read the roadmap again).
It just seems like jrgp is the guy responsible for the forum and website stuff. Maybe he will also join the client-development lateron but at the moment he focuses on the web-gather. He already started developing this gather some time ago - why should he stop and "close notepad++" only because of some troll who doesn't like the web-gather-idea and is not able to read the announcements?
sorry for the slow pace. I guess I'm getting it done in a bunch of relatively small coding chunks. Hopefully I'll have it all done by next month or so.
What slow pace?? You announced this only 15 days ago and see where you are now. Take your time, don't push yourself too much. There was no irony when I said "you're making good progress". :)
And it doesn't need to be done next month. I don't think we'll have a new Soldat-version before 2 months so no need to hurry (because the release would be a great promotion and would eventually bring the masses to the web-gather).
Wishing you all a happy New Year btw! :)
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I agree with Illuminatus. Vtg, you cried about low ppl playing soldat. Well, this is the best thing to newcomers! They think what to do and many even can't do backflip. And oh yeah, it's an *OFFICIAL* gather, so if they don't just *click* download, and go away, gather is a place they can go and get some informations. So they can get smoother income, and they don't go immediatly soldat is closed to ''add and remove programs'' (I don't know what's it in english, but well we call it to ''Lisää ja poista ohjelmia'' lol) Well, I'm not good at making points so I just say, that It's a *GOOD* thing at least and being developed, as other stuff too.
(You wrote "Instead of fixing bugs, rewriting bad written code". Now read the roadmap again).
It just seems like jrgp is the guy responsible for the forum and website stuff. Maybe he will also join the client-development lateron but at the moment he focuses on the web-gather. He already started developing this gather some time ago - why should he stop and "close notepad++"
So, read *EVERYTHING* and *THEN* come back to *WHINE* If there is that much kicking.
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It's funny to see "stop trolling" at the beginning of a post that has more than 1500 characters. By writing such a long reply you admit that he trolled you. :)
btw. chat magically stops working when a gather starts (all slots full). It looks like it happens only when I'm participating in that gather, so it might be connected with displaying server address or beeping sound. I'm using Opera. afaik DorkeyDear said that on Opera it malfunctioned for him too.
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There are developers who are focusing on other stuff than the *OFFICIAL* gather. This is their roadmap:
* No portal.
* May be hardwareIds instead of the tagId from portal but its lowpriority.
* Bugfixes, we are focusing on stuff like map load times, fps issues, netcode issues and such.
The fact that there are developers does not mean there are enough developers. I have stop caring about annoucements, since I noticed they don't do what they say. I am looking at what have already been done, not what is actually written in roadmap. They say the bug fixing is the priority, so why am I seeing yet another gather, instead of a game update? How much time has passed?
I have no idea if these things make you happy or not because you only jumped in here and started the flaming without giving any suggestion what to do to improve the "bad bad" situation (You wrote "Instead of fixing bugs, rewriting bad written code". Now read the roadmap again).
Oh, there was a long discussion (2 annoucements back) about what should be done, yet before shoooza joined the team, I am not going to start this again, if you want to know, read it:
http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=39129.msg479569#msg479569
It just seems like jrgp is the guy responsible for the forum and website stuff. Maybe he will also join the client-development lateron but at the moment he focuses on the web-gather. He already started developing this gather some time ago - why should he stop and "close notepad++" only because of some troll who doesn't like the web-gather-idea and is not able to read the announcements?
Where did I say I don't like the web-gather idea? It's just a waste of time for game developers to care about such a thing now. Just look at the team... 5 programmers... I ask one more time - where are the RESULTS then? I know it will take some time before all the bugs are fixed, but the more developers work on it the better.
Maybe jrgp has just not enough knowledge about Delphi or no experience at this (I'm sure he has, since Delphi is pretty easy, especially for someone who has already programmed in a few languages)? But if so: WHY did he join the development team then?
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The fact that there are developers does not mean there are enough developers. I have stop caring about annoucements, since I noticed they don't do what they say. I am looking at what have already been done, not what is actually written in roadmap. They say the bug fixing is the priority, so why am I seeing yet another gather, instead of a game update? How much time has passed?
Game updates take time. These guys are doing their very best to make soldat and the community that surrounds it a better place. Whether it's by fixing game bugs and working on new updates, or this online gather which imo is a great thing for soldat - it'll allow players from an array of skill, from brilliant to ok people, to have the gather experience and improve - it's an awesome tool to have!.
MM made the decision to select the people he has because otherwise soldat was going down a completely different path. He did what in our minds was the best thing to do for soldat's future, and I believe these guys are already making an impact and the gather is sign of great things.
Where did I say I don't like the web-gather idea? It's just a waste of time for game developers to care about such a thing now. Just look at the team... 5 programmers... I ask one more time - where are the RESULTS then? I know it will take some time before all the bugs are fixed, but the more developers work on it the better.
It is no waste. jrgp is working to improve the community at the moment by creating this thing from SCRATCH!.
It'll be great fun and a nice place to meet and play the people here on the forums. It's also a much friendlier place to introduce new players to.
What the heck do you think all the other developers are doing? Twiddling their thumbs??
I don't know for sure, but jrgp will probably help the others once the gather reaches where he and we want it to be.
Maybe jrgp has just not enough knowledge about Delphi or no experience at this (I'm sure he has, since Delphi is pretty easy, especially for someone who has already programmed in a few languages)? But if so: WHY did he join the development team then?
Because MM saw that he could help improve soldat. And that he has.
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I agree with Illuminatus. Vtg, you cried about low ppl playing soldat. Well, this is the best thing to newcomers! They think what to do and many even can't do backflip. And oh yeah, it's an *OFFICIAL* gather, so if they don't just *click* download, and go away, gather is a place they can go and get some informations. So they can get smoother income, and they don't go immediatly soldat is closed to ''add and remove programs'' (I don't know what's it in english, but well we call it to ''Lisää ja poista ohjelmia'' lol) Well, I'm not good at making points so I just say, that It's a *GOOD* thing at least and being developed, as other stuff too.
It will probably fail (as the integrated chat did), because it's nothing new. We already have chat clients, we already have gathers.
1. You need to be registered on soldat forums to play (yes, I've just entered soldat site). Someone who has just installed soldat will PROBABLY turn it on instead of registering at some unknown forum. Then he might forget about something like an *OFFICIAL* gather.
2. For older players this is just another gather like many others and I think they will keep playing their own ones.
3. It's not integrated into soldat. Maybe that's good, cuz it might fail as the chat did.
4. If and only if it is supposed to be integrated into soldat, I'd see it better as a gather client, so you can select an _existing_ gather in-game, add to it, keep playing public servers, and when gather starts it will immediately redirect, something like on Leo's servers. Newcomers would see it everytime they turn on the game and older players could play their own old gathers. It would require cooperation with gather admins (I think it's better than fighting them).
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I'm pretty sure it's easier for a new Soldat player to register here than getting started with IRC. If you only care about old players, our community will decrease in number even faster. If we want new players, and we sure want, we must move on to new things and this gather is one possibility.
Why can't you stop ranting about it? jrgp is not the main developer, and since a team is working on Soldat, the rest can make good progress while jrgp works on the gather.
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New idea: There should be 'Sign in' link in request of profile and pass.
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I'm pretty sure it's easier for a new Soldat player to register here than getting started with IRC. If you only care about old players, our community will decrease in number even faster. If we want new players, and we sure want, we must move on to new things and this gather is one possibility.
It's easier indeed, but it's about whether they will do it or not.
People don't join community right after game has installed, don't you think?
Why can't you stop ranting about it? jrgp is not the main developer, and since a team is working on Soldat, the rest can make good progress while jrgp works on the gather.
Read:
I am here to unveil a project MM and I have been working on for several months now: The Official Soldat Web Gather.
SEVERAL months. Imagine what he would have known if he had been analysing soldat code for such an amount of time (or at least since EnEsCe resigned) He would already been able to help shoozza probably. There are other fans who can write gather tools. Are there other fans who can code soldat?
New idea: There should be 'Sign in' link in request of profile and pass.
Definately. Who will bother searching some forums while can already run the game?
From: December 31, 2010, 10:01:22 am
I do not know why I keep replying to this DarkCrusade, I do not know who he is, but it is like talking to a rock. He keeps saying the same bullshit all the time, instead of posting rational counter-arguments.
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Do you want to tell jrgp what he has to do? As I stated already - something you have completly ignored - there is a team working on Soldat. If EnEsCe was still the only developer I would totally agree with you. But the way things are, I don't.
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Do you want to tell jrgp what he has to do? As I stated already - something you have completly ignored - there is a team working on Soldat. If EnEsCe was still the only developer I would totally agree with you. But the way things are, I don't.
Ok, now you have convinced me that you are a rock...
Please read my messages or simply stay quiet.
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First of all - jrgp signed CLA about 2 weeks ago. He didn't see the code of soldat till that time. He joined the dev team cause he's helping maintaining servers and doing web stuff. It was MM's initiative to add him to dev team.
Rest of the devs were announced about month ago. It took them another week to sign the CLA as they and MM live in different time zones. So we can say they are working on soldat's code for 2 weeks now (Shoozza a bit longer) and they are actually doing something. I've been talking to them.
Edit: You can't forget also that they had to have some time to get used to the code.
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@vtg: You're expressing your opinion on something that hasn't even happened yet. Stop being a jackass, just be quiet and wait. When things actually happen - then you can complain all you want.
P.S. Insulting others won't make your point stronger. Don't try it.
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@vtg: You're expressing your opinion on something that hasn't even happened yet. Stop being a jackass, just be quiet and wait. When things actually happen - then you can complain all you want.
P.S. Insulting others won't make your point stronger. Don't try it.
Hasn't happened? Hasn't gather already been created?
P.S. But he proofed himself to be a rock, I'm sorry.
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@vtg: You're expressing your opinion on something that hasn't even happened yet. Stop being a jackass, just be quiet and wait. When things actually happen - then you can complain all you want.
P.S. Insulting others won't make your point stronger. Don't try it.
Hasn't happened? Hasn't gather already been created?
From what I see, you're complaining about this gather not being useful, not because it was created. And my point was that it's too early to judge whether it's useless or not.
P.S. But he proofed himself to be a rock, I'm sorry.
*sigh* You've just proven that you're not mature enough to be taken seriously.
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From what I see, you're complaining about this gather not being useful, not because it was created. And my point was that it's too early to judge whether it's useless or not.
Ahhh this is called prediction, a great gift from God, we humans have, that enables us to prevent making mistakes.
Hm... maybe I'm really not serious... :/
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If everyone who's not convinced of your arguments is a rock, you must hate a lot of people and a lot of people must hate you.
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Hm, only those who do not read carefully or do not answer.
And I love rocks!!!
Off-topic (right now I'm trolling):
Happy new year everyone!!! (rocks too) !
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I'm pretty sure it's easier for a new Soldat player to register here than getting started with IRC. If you only care about old players, our community will decrease in number even faster. If we want new players, and we sure want, we must move on to new things and this gather is one possibility.
See the trick is to care about both old and new players, as we need them both.
The idea that this particular gather will attract any more new people is pretty ridiculous. A person who is already visits this forum already has plenty of information on how to get on IRC and play a gather. A person who doesn't rarely visits soldat.pl anyway, so how does this attract them? Why do you think they'll blindly stumble onto the gather and actually play one when it's so inactive? And it sure as hell does nothing for the people on IRC, who already have an active gather community.
If you plan on integrating this into Soldat, great, but do it in a manner that accesses the current, active gather community. All integrated chat needs is to be pointed at Quakenet for it to actually attract people, to repeat the same mistake twice is just aggravating.
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DarkCrusade, they're not trolling. They have good points; Vtg just isn't being as polite as he could be. As for the current work on Soldat itself, the other developers are getting real stuff done at a steady pace. Once I have the gather largely done (so the people in this thread contributing suggestions are fully happy with it), I'll then devote all of my Soldat related efforts towards the game.
As for integrating the gather functionality into the game itself, I think it's an option the other devs are interested in for later on down the line.
First of all - jrgp signed CLA about 2 weeks ago. He didn't see the code of soldat till that time. He joined the dev team cause he's helping maintaining servers and doing web stuff. It was MM's initiative to add him to dev team.
I just feel like clarifying: It wasn't MM's initiative to add me to the team--he had no idea I was interested in being part of the team at all. I asked him and he approved.
Anyway, I'm disappointed to come back to my computer and read the stuff I've missed just to see you all arguing while I'm trying to enjoy this fine glass of sparkling wine. Happy new years!
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Ok...
so...
I have not read all the topic, since it's pointless to read all 'how great web gather is' and 'what a great job has been done'.
Let me state the facts:
The game is dying, because it's buggy and has no updates; less and less people play it.
Someone who does not know what is happening here could say: "I'm sure the main developers are working hard to make this game better, they know that there are fewer players than before, thus they must be doing some hard coding and debugging, they probably don't even sleep, I hope they will finish it soon!"
But what are the main developers really doing? Instead of fixing bugs, rewriting bad written code, they are creating next useless ****ing gather. Wait, I forgot, this is an *OFFICIAL* gather! This must be something exciting, because this is an *OFFICIAL* gather! Really? Now will I be able to play on an *OFFICIAL* gather? No, I can't believe it, I played many games and most of them didn't have one, but in soldat... YES! I do have an *OFFICIAL* gather! An *OFFICIAL* gather must bring lots of new players! Woah!
There are LOTS of gathers we can play on, many of them are often empty, because there are too many of them. Only #soldat.gather has 6 servers while there r usually 2, maybe 3 running at the same time. Who the hell needs another one for such a small community?
Maybe the new developer wanted to show that he is not that useless and is going to make something for this community? Sure, web gather is something that community can use. Maybe add customized skins? How love we shiny and colourful skins! It also lacks some music playing in the background, because while waiting for a gather I WANT TO HEAR MUSIC!
Please, close notepad++, give up server-side scripting for some time, and do some REAL coding.
Good job, keep following EnEsCe...
Completely agree. This is such a niche feature it's nearly useless.
I will give them time, but really, stuff like this is a waste of time. Instead of focusing on the current community, they should be focusing on expanding the game to a new player base so that it doesn't die!
I'd also like to say that new players are very unlikely to be playing in gathers, IMO. The majority also aren't going to regularly be on the forums (the "community" for many here).
The majority of Soldat players (at least when Soldat was healthy) probably spent little to no time here at all.
While it may seem like a good idea to add a feature like this, I really think that all of the time and resources should be put toward fixing the game itself.
Good luck to the dev team though.
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People don't join community right after game has installed, don't you think?
No, they don't. I wouldn't do either. But no one said so. Of course you will play the game in the standard modes first, try some bots, get used to the online gameplay and if you still have fun playing the game you will explore the area. You talk to other players, you search the interwebs for forums or information about the game, you maybe watch some videos about it, you perhaps even start to try mods or just replace some weapon-graphics...and eventually you will also find the webgather. And maybe you will like it and have fun or you somehow find out about the IRC-gather and play there.
Both ways are acceptable and there is no real reason to rant about it.
The idea that this particular gather will attract any more new people is pretty ridiculous.
I don't think that this is the (main) purpose why he made it. I don't think either that it will attract new people but it will maybe make some people play it longer.
A person who is already visits this forum already has plenty of information on how to get on IRC and play a gather.
I know how to go on the IRC and play a gather there. I regularly did some time ago. But still I would prefer the webgather to the IRC-gather. Just because of the simplicity. I don't want to work in myself to get used to the IRC again. I don't want to download, install and configure a new programm, register to quakenet (because I lost my old auth-information) just to play a sort-of "organized" game with some fellow strangers. With the web-gather I can simply login, choose the gather I want and have fun. Since I don't use the IRC for any other purpose I see absolutely no reason to get there if I can get the same fun on the web-gather.
It's not like old and experienced players always want something complicated if there also is a easier way. Having a forum-account doesn't mean I have to prefer the IRC-gather.
A person who doesn't rarely visits soldat.pl anyway, so how does this attract them? Why do you think they'll blindly stumble onto the gather and actually play one when it's so inactive?
What usually happend when a new Soldat version was release? People somehow changed to the new version although there was no update-notification ingame or some newsletter or whatever. It just happend and after some time most of them were playing the new version. Strange, huh? It's called word-of-mouth recommendation. If more and more people play the web-gather it will automatically become known. You could also advertise it with every new Soldat-version. And btw, it is "so inactive" because it got announced just 2 1/2 weeks ago and still is heavely being worked on. Give it some time!
And it sure as hell does nothing for the people on IRC, who already have an active gather community.
Once again, it's not for them. Get it.
If you plan on integrating this into Soldat, great,
I'm just quoting MM here:
Such thing should be implented in soldat and not some browser...
No, because nobody has time to sit with the game turned on. Everybody uses browsers and it is easiest and most convenient to wait for others while you're browsing your daily porn or whatever you do on the internet.
I bet 90% of the gather players use IRC
No problem, let them use IRC. This is a Gather for 90% of the population that doesn't even know what IRC is and doesn't intend on using it.
Instead of focusing on the current community, they should be focusing on expanding the game to a new player base so that it doesn't die!
So pls tell us you almighty what you would do to "expand the game to a new player base"?
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Good job. Not need to install anything. just Join a gather and play it. Just servers are laggy. It might be cause USA Servers. If you want i can host 24/7 EU Server just give me the scripts and thats it. :)
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So pls tell us you almighty what you would do to "expand the game to a new player base"?
Do the logical thing.
Put all of your time and resources toward releasing a new version of Soldat. Fix the bugs. Add new features where they're needed (possible account-based system, anticheat, auto-update, etc). After you're done with this, possible focus on updating Soldat's engine to allow for better visuals. I must say that one of the things that puts people off about this game when I show them it is the lackluster visuals. Not sure if this is realistic as I'm not a programmer, but that would certainly help.
But mostly, completely focus all of your efforts on ironing out bugs. That means diverting any resources being put toward niche features toward a bug fixing effort. Anything added to the game that is not focused on attracting new players should be ignored.
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I don't want to download, install and configure a new programm, register to quakenet (because I lost my old auth-information) just to play a sort-of "organized" game with some fellow strangers.
You took longer to write this post than it would to complete said actions. Once you get your client setup, it takes just as long to open up a webpage as it does to open up an IRC program. The perceived simplicity is great and all, but it isn't there in practice.
A person who doesn't rarely visits soldat.pl anyway, so how does this attract them? Why do you think they'll blindly stumble onto the gather and actually play one when it's so inactive?
What usually happend when a new Soldat version was release? People somehow changed to the new version although there was no update-notification ingame or some newsletter or whatever.
There's a notification when you try and join a server that's running a different version, dip.
And it sure as hell does nothing for the people on IRC, who already have an active gather community.
Once again, it's not for them. Get it.
I completely get it. I am in absolute understanding, and I am trying to help. The difference between a new gather being successful and a new gather being played a couple of times and then petering out is having enough people to give it momentum. You don't have people. Your audience may or may not even exist. To say "oh it will be popular because it's so EASY" is overly optimistic and I don't care if it rains on your personal parade to point that out.
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And it sure as hell does nothing for the people on IRC, who already have an active gather community.
Once again, it's not for them. Get it.
I completely get it. I am in absolute understanding, and I am trying to help. The difference between a new gather being successful and a new gather being played a couple of times and then petering out is having enough people to give it momentum. You don't have people. Your audience may or may not even exist. To say "oh it will be popular because it's so EASY" is overly optimistic and I don't care if it rains on your personal parade to point that out.
once the new version is out, there should be a flow of new players who are not as experienced with IRC (which is quite old and most kids these days don't even know if it's a type of food or a pokemon). So i guess there is a point, if everything goes as planned
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google mIRC
find a tutorial set it up
done in less then 5minutes
play the gather
yeah that was hard
less qq more pew pew guys
Adding crap stuf to a game that already isn't popular will make it only worse.
go advertise or something make ads what the fuck
anyway beside that fix the game first then get people.
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google mIRC
find a tutorial set it up
done in less then 5minutes
If following a tutorial was that easy - we wouldn't have that discussion in the first place. You need to actually understand what's going on in the tutorial, not just blindly follow the steps (which don't even match for some people, or aren't clear enough).
That means you have to read all of that (http://wiki.soldat.nl/IRC_tutorial) and try to make sense of it. Personally, I'd rather spend time playing, not trying to set up some weird-looking program.
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google mIRC
find a tutorial set it up
done in less then 5minutes
If following a tutorial was that easy - we wouldn't have that discussion in the first place. You need to actually understand what's going on in the tutorial, not just blindly follow the steps (which don't even match for some people, or aren't clear enough).
That means you have to read all of that (http://wiki.soldat.nl/IRC_tutorial) and try to make sense of it. Personally, I'd rather spend time playing, not trying to set up some weird-looking program.
Heaven forfend someone has to read words and comprehend them. The very idea is insanity.
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I think this project should definately continue. It is so much easier from a new-to-gathers player to get started with.
Compare
1. Go to soldat.thd.vg/en/gather
2. Click join in a gather
To
1. Download MIRC (Why all the guides recommend this, I find the webchat so much easier, oh well noobs wouldn't know)
2. Install MIRC
3. Setup MIRC
4. Join a channel
5. Say !add
Seriously, how intuitive is using IRC? With all the dumbf**ks running around these days, how many of them could find it in themselves to go the IRC way.
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(Why all the guides recommend this, I find the webchat so much easier, oh well noobs wouldn't know)
With webchat versions of irc you can't auto send commands, there isn't scripting, and there isn't any chatlogging.
I don't know how popular the webgather is or if it'll get used or not; I don't really care. It's MM's project and I'm doing it for him regardless.
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You don't need to auto send commands, use scripting or chatlogging to join a gather though.
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You don't need to auto send commands, use scripting or chatlogging to join a gather though.
That's right; I'm just saying they're IRC features myself and others are very much used to and have grown to appreciate.
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Just so we are clear: your target audience is the people too dumb to install mIRC. These are the people you are planning on joining your gather and being able to comprehend the rules of. These are the people you want to play with.
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Just so we are clear: your target audience is the people too dumb to install mIRC. These are the people you are planning on joining your gather and being able to comprehend the rules of. These are the people you want to play with.
Correct. Or just people who want something different.
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Just so we are clear: your target audience is the people too dumb to install mIRC. These are the people you are planning on joining your gather and being able to comprehend the rules of. These are the people you want to play with.
Correct. Or just people who want something different.
Yeah - the webgather is aimed at a different audience.
Though it's not just for the idiots who can't install IRC and set it up.
I have IRC and played in some gathers. I'm not that used to the pace of them and so having something that is not so elite is a nice place to be.
I'd prefer playing in the webgather with people I recognise from the forum than playing with people who take it all very very seriously.
It's the middle ground between pubs and the elite IRC. For me, doing gathers was a big change from the pubs and having this tool with some good people in, is great imo!
I don't know why people are getting so aggravated about it. To me it shows progress, that the Soldat community here and others can enjoy.
I think the only problem is advertising. 95% of people ingame just don't know about it.
How to solve this? Well, I'll be advertising it in servers I go in. I'm pretty sure that when people know that it exists, it'll be used alot more. Maybe the new version could have a link to it somewhere?
A side note:
Another idea entirely is to encorporate the gathering system into the game, and link it to this new online gather. I remember hearing that it was not considered to implement it ingame because most people would want to be doing other things while waiting for a gather to fill?
Just sync the two together - problem solved?
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Just so we are clear: your target audience is the people too dumb to install mIRC. These are the people you are planning on joining your gather and being able to comprehend the rules of. These are the people you want to play with.
Quick question--have you ever heard of the idea of mindshare? It says that your product/idea is actually indirectly competing with many other things.
For instance, the DS is not only competing with the PSP, it is competing with new TVs, it is competing with new toys, and anything else which may take up a person's time.
IRC and this gather are one step past what most people would do. Are you that blind to think that IRC isn't a niche activity? People aren't going to waste their time going through a freaking tutorial for a game they most likely have just downloaded and know nothing about. Why would you put that much work into learning/understanding how to set up such complex things as this when you could have already played so many other freeware games, or better yet, just gone on to the Soldat lobby itself! If you're foolish enough to think that IRC is so simple and everyone will take time to learn how to use it, then I'm sorry but you're sorely mistaken. In my opinion, the life force of this game is the public lobby.
jrgp, if MM asked you to do this then I guess it's good that you did it. I will say that it is much more simple than setting up/getting into the IRC gather (although, like someone else said, there really isn't an audience for it right now).
Sorry for the salty posts but I really want this game to do well. I'm getting tired of players that think they're "elite" and that seem to be hostile to new players--they're just as much poison to this game as anything else.
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Just so we are clear: your target audience is the people too dumb to install mIRC. These are the people you are planning on joining your gather and being able to comprehend the rules of. These are the people you want to play with.
Correct. Or just people who want something different.
What difference exactly?
This isn't me being snarky -- when you create something, you need to know who your audience is and how your creation targets them. Is it supposed to be the middle ground between pubs and IRC? Great, fine, but you're going to need some sort of incentive for people to come to the gather from pubs, and some way of indicating IRC is the next step if they want a higher level of play. Right now all you have is a gather that is easier to use than IRC without any of the benefits of IRC.
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This isn't me being snarky -- when you create something, you need to know who your audience is and how your creation targets them.
I did not take any of that into consideration during the development. MM asked: "Joe, I'd like a web gather for Soldat. Can you make me one?" I said, "Sure." I didn't question him and I thought the project would be fun. I didn't put any thought to its reception.
And quite frankly I'm tired of your incessant b***hing.
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I don't get why you're still complaining about this!?
It's OVER. It has been MADE and made to a good standard.
If people find that it's there, it will become popular. I would have most certainly used it if a guy ingame said "hey, there's now an official webgather! Check soldat.pl".
There's no real need to think too much of a target audience. The fact that it is NOT IRC and the fact that it is NOT a public server automatically creates the perfect middle-ground.
If you'd be so kind to help the game out by getting some people interested in playing, then use it and tell people on servers.
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There's a difference between criticism and bitching/complaining. Don't go into the professional world if you view handle the former.
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There's a difference between criticism and b***hing/complaining. Don't go into the professional world if you view handle the former.
Not really when the criticism doesn't stop or change.
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Right now all you have is a gather that is easier to use than IRC without any of the benefits of IRC.
Mind pointing out these benifits?
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Right now all you have is a gather that is easier to use than IRC without any of the benefits of IRC.
Mind pointing out these benifits?
Logging, scripting, bouncers, lightweight, plaintext, choice between a bunch of clients, and others.
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Those are benefits? meh
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Those are benefits? meh
For power users, yes.
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There's a difference between criticism and b***hing/complaining. Don't go into the professional world if you view handle the former.
Not really when the criticism doesn't stop or change.
What do you expect if you, the developer, don't address it?
Right now all you have is a gather that is easier to use than IRC without any of the benefits of IRC.
Mind pointing out these benifits?
Logging, scripting, bouncers, lightweight, plaintext, choice between a bunch of clients, and others.
I wasn't thinking of client related benefits, rather: large userbase, ability to get clan wars, multiple channels to socialize in, quality control via ops, and miscellaneous gatherbot features.
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There's a difference between criticism and b***hing/complaining. Don't go into the professional world if you view handle the former.
Not really when the criticism doesn't stop or change.
What do you expect if you, the developer, don't address it?
It's a developer's choice to address or to not address certain things (that's exactly the reason why vehicles, weapon attachments and laser swords haven't made it into Soldat). And when same "criticism" is being repeated over and over and over again despite the fact that the answer has already been given multiple times - thats called b***hing/whining.
There's nothing new here to say, Veritas. You've made your point, we read it, we didn't agree, EOD. So how about you just accept things, go play IRC gathers and leave jrgp alone?
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There's a difference between criticism and b***hing/complaining. Don't go into the professional world if you view handle the former.
Not really when the criticism doesn't stop or change.
What do you expect if you, the developer, don't address it?
It's a developer's choice to address or to not address certain things (that's exactly the reason why vehicles, weapon attachments and laser swords haven't made it into Soldat).
All of these are explicitly addressed here? (http://forums.soldat.pl/index.php?topic=7292.0) ???
Address doesn't mean add, dogg.
And when same "criticism" is being repeated over and over and over again despite the fact that the answer has already been given multiple times - thats called b***hing/whining.
What answer?
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Right now all you have is a gather that is easier to use than IRC without any of the benefits of IRC.
Mind pointing out these benifits?
Logging, scripting, bouncers, lightweight, plaintext, choice between a bunch of clients, and others.
I wasn't thinking of client related benefits, rather: large userbase, ability to get clan wars, multiple channels to socialize in, quality control via ops, and miscellaneous gatherbot features.
Right
- Large userbase: this system is new, it will take time before enough people know about and use it for it to be good.
- Ability to get clan wars: this can be implemented, in fact, I recommend that it is implemented.
- Multiple channels: needs to be implemented, right now all the servers are in NA? I would like to see AUS servers and i'm sure there are people who would want EU servers.
- Quality control: I'm sure that as this thing grows, there will be admins/ops on.
- Misc. bot features: Not sure what you mean, all !add etc is done through the web UI.
tl;dr: You say this thing is a waste of time, but all your reasons can be adressed, rather than saying it's useless, stop now, tell us what is useless/missing so it can be fixed up to your standard.
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Well 'misc bot features' include subbing and other features that should be added sometime soon.
There's a difference between criticism and b***hing/complaining. Don't go into the professional world if you view handle the former.
Not really when the criticism doesn't stop or change.
What do you expect if you, the developer, don't address it
The only ways I can think of addressing your criticism is to drop the project, which isn't happening, or put it into the soldat client, which might happen way down the road.
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You say this thing is a waste of time [...] rather than saying it's useless
You've got me confused with someone else man.
My beef with it isn't in what it does (gathers are awesome and should be encouraged)
The only ways I can think of addressing your criticism is to drop the project, which isn't happening, or put it into the soldat client, which might happen way down the road.
My main criticism is that you're not reaching your target audience (and that the audience isn't well defined in the first place), and that's the only way you get figure out how to address it?
I'm perfectly willing to help with ideas here, but you're going to have to be more specific in what you're looking to accomplish than "a gather for people don't want to get on or can't set up IRC." That's too small an audience to cater to, let alone create an official gather for.
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You say this thing is a waste of time [...] rather than saying it's useless
You've got me confused with someone else man.
My beef with it isn't in what it does (gathers are awesome and should be encouraged)
The only ways I can think of addressing your criticism is to drop the project, which isn't happening, or put it into the soldat client, which might happen way down the road.
My main criticism is that you're not reaching your target audience (and that the audience isn't well defined in the first place), and that's the only way you get figure out how to address it?
I'm perfectly willing to help with ideas here, but you're going to have to be more specific in what you're looking to accomplish than "a gather for people don't want to get on or can't set up IRC." That's too small an audience to cater to, let alone create an official gather for.
Exactly.
Also, thank you for ignoring my posts, gentlemen.
If you weren't expecting criticism then I don't know. I want this game to do as well as possible.
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I'm perfectly willing to help with ideas here, but you're going to have to be more specific in what you're looking to accomplish than "a gather for people don't want to get on or can't set up IRC." That's too small an audience to cater to, let alone create an official gather for.
Okay, how about a gather that has all the features of the best IRC gathers and more, just from a web perspective?
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I don't know why you care so much about an audience. The fact its not in IRC and not an ordinary public server makes it fit into a different category.
The audience is also predefined in its existence. It's for the people here at SF, it's for the public server people, and for those who found IRC gathers hard to step into and use.
The people in IRC gathers will largely still play in IRC, because this webgather is bound to have a generally lower level of players, since its audience is more for the pub-players that want a step-up.
Also, this online gather will probably be more fun and community thing than IRC. If you join an IRC gather and you're *not quite* as good, they are so elitest and scorn you from coming from pub servs.
Soldat is meant to be a fun community thing and this webgather is an awesome idea to help that.
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I'm perfectly willing to help with ideas here, but you're going to have to be more specific in what you're looking to accomplish than "a gather for people don't want to get on or can't set up IRC." That's too small an audience to cater to, let alone create an official gather for.
Okay, how about a gather that has all the features of the best IRC gathers and more, just from a web perspective?
It will still be the same shit gather. Just add a possibility to join it via IRC.
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There's a difference between criticism and b***hing/complaining. Don't go into the professional world if you view handle the former.
Not really when the criticism doesn't stop or change.
when the point of the criticism is missed so many times, how can you reinforce the point without clarification of what it is, apart from repeatedly stating the same point?
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jrgp, great job! Can you also add support of Knife Only Private servers?
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Its a good idea, just poorly executed. Soldat's community, both competitive and public is dying, no denying that. But what this gather does, is break up the community even more. There's already to many gathers out there, and not enough players, there is absolutely no need for another. What should have happened, is a sort of partnership, with sna.gather, nasoldat, or soldat.gather.
With that you would of guaranteed a descent player base with a slightly simpler system. However, even then I don't think it would of caught on.
If you really wanted something successful, you would need to hardcode in a gather system into soldat itself, adding a new tab, ect.
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theres no point creating a webgather if they dont implement that on netx version
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Yeah it should be there with gather button. I find gather all the time empty, plz visit there at least sometimes.
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How about providing some kind of desktop widget that is capable of tracking this gather? Keeping certain web page opened in browser and checking it all the time is somewhat not comfortable. Ppl open that page, see nobody there and close it. So it's empty all the time. This widget will allow ppl so stay online and monitor gather status without any disturbing.
I remember lobby monitoring widget by Aquarius - it was really helpful.
Also isn't number of various game modes a bit too high? I thought a single CTF and a single DM server for duels would be enough.
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Also isn't number of various game modes a bit too high? I thought a single CTF and a single DM server for duels would be enough.
People wanted more, and I'm not going to just say "no" to them.
How about providing some kind of desktop widget that is capable of tracking this gather? Keeping certain web page opened in browser and checking it all the time is somewhat not comfortable. Ppl open that page, see nobody there and close it. So it's empty all the time. This widget will allow ppl so stay online and monitor gather status without any disturbing.
Could be interesting.
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Is it just me, or is no one ever online?
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I'm actually a bit usually, but I am there for five minutes, no on is there, I leave.