So no Dominions 4?

[Kraftwerk]

Gandalf Parker said:
Everything has its pros and cons.
If "the Community" is going to be thrown up then wouldnt we have to take into account the difference between a community of people who can afford a $50 game vs those who would show up just because it became a $30 or $19.99 or $5 game? Our player-base seems to have a tendency to be older, more world-experienced, more educated, longer attention span, etc. (not all, but the general population)

Im not completely sure that I would be happier with more people in the community if cheap game was what it took to get them here. The same goes for many of the more drastic suggestions to change this games play, look, delivery, cost, marketing, forum, etc based on what "all the other games" do.

Just a personal unofficial alternative viewpoint to the argument of "it would get us more community"

Yeah but you also have 20 threads with someone (usually a different person) on the first page of the forums, who is scolding someone for bad english, or not using the correct slang term for something in the game. Theres posts where people tell people to leave the community because they cant form a complete sentence.

If thats the kind of nerd, grognard, elitist community you want, sure, go ahead and let this stay a niche game. But you go to other strategy game forums and you have a much larger, much more diverse community, where the nerds and grognards are put in their place like they should be, instead of in every thread turning away potential community members with their elitism.

I cant possibly understand the thought process that a smaller, older, community, is better, than a larger, younger, thriving community.

If you love the game so much, youd want to see more and more people exposed to this game, and more and more people purchasing it and modding for it. Thats more likely to prompt a dominions 4, or a real developed expansion, instead of just new races occasionally ,that the current mod makers are more than capable of doing themselves.

Its like the guy who owns the record store, who insults all of his customers over their taste in music, thus turning a business into a hangout for a few likeminded elitests.

Im sure that makes those guys feel great about themselves, but their business is going to fail.

I dont forsee Illwinter still being around in 10 years. Just like I didnt forsee Microprose being around in 10 years after Xcom and MoM.

The same thing will happen to this game, that happened to those games. The company will go out of business, the elitist community will disapate, the game will get cracked and hacked all to hell, a few years from now itll reach its peak of popularity, and the developers wont see a cent for it.

Its only a niche game because you force it to be a niche game.

[Kraftwerk]

Theres a real chance for indy developers and "niche" games, to really get out there right now. The PC game community is heralding the end of times, because the new consoles just came out, and sales are down across the board. Add on to that the fact that people are tired of more of the same, and spending 1000s on upgrades every 6 months to play the A+titles, and you have an enviroment where cheaper games, with solid gameplay, with digital distribution and large communities, are going to reign supreme on the PC for some time to come.

PC gamer companies cant compete the same way console game companies do, and they cant compete the way the did just a year ago.

Digital purchasing and downloading of games, episodic content at less than 10 dollars, matchmaking services for multiplayer games, and strong communities are what the PC has to offer that consoles dont. Adapt or die.

Id like to see the people who made this game (and not the people who publish it) make money on this game for the next 20 years. Instead of still playing this game for years to come, while the devs all work at telecom companies to pay the bills, while hackers and pirates, continue to create new content for a game they didnt develop or help support.

Digital distribution is the fastest way to not need a publisher. Then you have more money to spend on an A+ website, instead of something that looks like its an angelfire page from 1995.

[thejeff]

The devs do this part time and have, I believe, teaching jobs fulltime. (At least Kristoffer teaches.) They appear to be content with that. This isn't an attempt to break into the big time gaming world. It's a hobby that's self supporting and brings in some money. You have to understand that to understand the reasons for their attitude.

I fully expect Illwinter to be around, as long as they're both interested in writing games and able to bring in enough money to justify the time. 10 years from now? Why not? Or maybe they'll have moved on to other things.

And for the community point:
I don't know how many threads show on your front page, but it defaults to 50 and I'll bet you can't find more than a couple that are nothing but spelling/grammar flames. Maybe I just gloss over them, so if you'd like to point 20 such threads out...
There are some heated arguments, but very few are just here to troll or flame. The vast majority of people are told to leave are suspected piracy cases and even those are usually just directed to Shrapnel support.
This has always seemed a very friendly supportive community to me. That's largely a function of the type of players the game attracts.

[Edi]

Kraftwerk said:
Yeah but you also have 20 threads with someone (usually a different person) on the first page of the forums, who is scolding someone for bad english, or not using the correct slang term for something in the game. Theres posts where people tell people to leave the community because they cant form a complete sentence.

You'll no doubt have a good handful of examples to point to right off the bat, I trust? Because generally when that sort of behavior starts manifesting, so do the moderators. And the moderator manifestation in those cases tends to be of the "ton of bricks" variety. Browbeating new people on those counts usually nets an immediate warning and message to knock it off here.

Sometimes we may miss such occasions, but when they are pointed to us, swift action is taken. Especially now that there are three recently promoted moderators so that there are more eyes on the forum at any given time.

Kraftwerk said:
If thats the kind of nerd, grognard, elitist community you want, sure, go ahead and let this stay a niche game. But you go to other strategy game forums and you have a much larger, much more diverse community, where the nerds and grognards are put in their place like they should be, instead of in every thread turning away potential community members with their elitism.

I've taken a look at several different strategy gaming forums and compared to those, the cold-shoulder elitism you are talking about is surprisingly absent here. There is, as it is with every strategy game, the division between competitive gamers (usually the MP side) and the sandbox players (often SP players), but that's about it. The lack of hostility and RTFM responses here even to questions covered by the manual and/or the FAQ is surprisingly relevant here.

What does get people riled up and annoyed here is if somebody comes in with an attitude and a chip the size of a tank division on their shoulder and starts lecturing the community. That gets a hostile response and rightly so.

Kraftwerk said:
I cant possibly understand the thought process that a smaller, older, community, is better, than a larger, younger, thriving community.

For the purposes of answering this, it would be nice to know your age for comparison. I can think of several right off the bat. Older, more mature people generally have a MUCH better signal to noise ratio compared to younger ones, they are not so quick to take offense at absolutely everything and they have a better grasp of how to interact with people without causing undue drama. Doesn't mean it is completely absent, I've blown my stack a few times quite spectacularly and I'm a moderator, but compared to the amount of whining, *****ing, wailing, crying and just being an annoying whinger I've seen elsewhere, the Dom3 community again comes through.

Kraftwerk said:
If you love the game so much, youd want to see more and more people exposed to this game, and more and more people purchasing it and modding for it. Thats more likely to prompt a dominions 4, or a real developed expansion, instead of just new races occasionally ,that the current mod makers are more than capable of doing themselves.

Illwinter has repeatedly said that making money out of this is not a primary motivator for them at all. So appealing to that is not going to get you anywhere with the developers. They are also hardly likely to hand their creation over to someone else to develop it as a big production game, because that sort of thing usually requires signing over all sorts of rights that you won't be able to get back and then you can only watch as morons with no grasp whatsoever of it go and assrape the franchise.

Dominions 3 has decent exposure. Its attractions are the depth and uniqueness, as well as its immense moddability, which is going to keep on improving with patches. It is not graphics, which is what most of the big audience always looks at first. They want flash and glitter and if it's not there at first glance, they don't even take a second look, and those who are into this particular genre and are not so superficial will find the game. Could the exposure be greater? Yes. Does it necessarily need to happen according to your formula? No.

Kraftwerk said:
Its like the guy who owns the record store, who insults all of his customers over their taste in music, thus turning a business into a hangout for a few likeminded elitests.

Funny, I haven't seen this behavior from Shrapnel or from Illwinter at all, but perhaps you feel that way because your opinions are not immediately accepted as the gospel you seem to consider them to be? Because you're starting to sound mighty preachy and holier-than-thou there.

Kraftwerk said:
Im sure that makes those guys feel great about themselves, but their business is going to fail.

Presumably you have some hard evidence at hand that the Shrapnel business model is failing? Or that such a thing is even a consideration for Illwinter?

Kraftwerk said:
I dont forsee Illwinter still being around in 10 years. Just like I didnt forsee Microprose being around in 10 years after Xcom and MoM.

You should get a refund for that crystal ball wrt Illwinter. It's broken. Illwinter is KO and JK and it's their hobby project. It's not a regular company, so your analogy to Microprose does not apply.

Kraftwerk said:
The same thing will happen to this game, that happened to those games. The company will go out of business, the elitist community will disapate, the game will get cracked and hacked all to hell, a few years from now itll reach its peak of popularity, and the developers wont see a cent for it.

Illwinter go out of business? Hahahahahahahahahaaaa! Thanks, I needed the laugh. MAking a profit is not much of a consideration for them, they are doing this for fun. Kristoffer Österman has directly stated this in the forums, repeatedly. In the meanwhile, Dom3 continues to be a steady earner for Shrapnel, so you're completely off the mark so far. There will be turnover in the community, but given that I'm seeing same names that were around five years ago for Dom2 and even before that for Dominions PPP, this prediction is also very bold and uncertain in my opinion. As far as Shrapnel going out of business? No signs of that yet, so the community also has a place to stay for the nonce.

Kraftwerk said:
Its only a niche game because you force it to be a niche game.

Do you have anything but sanctimonious preaching to back this assertion up? Because it's not getting any better with repetition.

[HoneyBadger]

Yeah, um, Kraftwerk? have you been to any other forums online? Any at all? Aside from the fact that this is one of the most geographically diverse forums that I've encountered-atleast where real conversations happened about other countries than the USA or Iraq-and that we're both used to dealing with people for whom English is a second language, and pretty friendly about it-I can't think of any (that is, any at all on the whole of the internet in my experience), that is more friendly and welcoming towards new people.

[Tichy]

I can't find a thread on the front page started by a "corporal" or above (my litmus for 'possible veteran') that aims at lambasting or belittling anybody. That's generally reserved for fun in-character posts on the MP board.

In my experience newbs who show up with a question or friendly suggestion are welcomed, listened to and answered. People who show up and their first post is insulting people or demanding things or claiming that "Monkey PD can nevar...." generally receive a less gentle but most festive greeting.

[Leif_-]

Kraftwerk said:If thats the kind of nerd, grognard, elitist community you want, sure, go ahead and let this stay a niche game.

Thank you. We just might, now that we've been given permission.

(Not that it's my decision in any way what to do about Dominions, of course, but when handed a straight line like that, how could I refuse to step up to it?)