Why do you play dominions?

[LDiCesare]

Originally Posted by parone

i asked if there was room to play more then one way(ie, not always entirely to win). things like testing an unconventional build. or maybe just fighting an early war for that "fist fight on a burning ship" type of feel. i think these things can be fun.

i have tried stuff like this and gotten battered in the in game threads as someone who is stupid and doesn't know how to play the game 'right'.

Testing builds for yourself in a MP game is ok. You take a risk, which may or may not pay. Fighting an early war with someone else for your own fun means the target of your early war may have his whole game spoiled in order for you to have your own fun. Since that player has no way of guessing that you're not playing the same game as the other players, you effectively ruin his game. That's very bad. When rules are posted in a thread, which include house rules (no lab filling, etc.), you should play the game by these rules. You can't expect people to respect house rules you make up. The real point is if you come to a game with different expectations from other players, you will ruin the game for you or (some of) the others. So don't do that.

[tenuki]

Originally Posted by parone

i asked if there was room to play more then one way(ie, not always entirely to win). things like testing an unconventional build. or maybe just fighting an early war for that "fist fight on a burning ship" type of feel. i think these things can be fun.

And you're free to do stuff like that in any game you care to play in. Just as others are free to unceremoniously remove you from the map for interfering with their plans without having the clout to back up your aggression.

Originally Posted by parone

i have tried stuff like this and gotten battered in the in game threads as someone who is stupid and doesn't know how to play the game 'right'.

In the game threads I'm familiar with, you got slapped for binge moaning and resorting to ad-homs when the consequences of your erratic playstyle were pointed out to you in a calm and rational way.

[Gandalf Parker]

Originally Posted by Fantomen

First that people have been trying to enforce a certain way of playing, which isn't true. And second that the forming of dom3mods was a consequence of different attitudes towards how to play the game, which isn't true. Those are lies.

I couldn't care less about where you advertise your games, as long as it is in the appropriate subforum and non-intrusive. But I don't like outright lies.

What I said was that some playing groups bled off to their own forums. Multiple. Plural. Im well aware of the creation of Dom3Mods and I have been all support of it since its beginning. YOU seem to be the one trying to make everything about dom3mods. To be truthful, of the dozen or so forums that I frequent for dom3 conversations dom3mods is the last one I think of. It isnt that big a deal to me.

After some false starts at posting this I think I have my customer support hat back on. Wording helps so let me try again. We did used to have people who would offer helpful expert advice in new mp threads on why strange game settings, or quirky maps, or extreme variations should not be played. Especially if they gave new players a wrong impression of the games they would be playing later. They often did not then play in those games but did drop in to provide helpful leadership in the games setup. Many of our experts seem to have migrated. That is of course a loss to this forum.

[tenuki]

Originally Posted by Gandalf Parker

It is not the first time that a group or forum or channel has been charged as elite or having limited parameters of an acceptable Dom3 game.

I understand that somebody complaining about another forum is right up your well-lubed alley, but please do some checking of facts before spewing this insidious nonsense.

When you get in a high commitment game, as the OP did, you can expect some serious competition. That's the point of these games. It's been stated clearly from the outset, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with any reasonable notion of 'elite', which by the way is a word that only a moron would use as a derogative.

Nobody is being forced to play in these games, and dom3mods has lots of casual games as well. A majority of games, as a matter of fact, so it's not an issue of venue.

Similarly, if you get in an everybody just creatively doodles around in their sandbox until everybody is surprised that someone actually won it kind of game, you expect something else. These games have their own set of limited parameters. Like you're not expected to compete too hard.

What's not acceptable is if you take the premises of the latter and apply them to the former, then complain about people not listening to your complaints about being walked over.

Which is the root of this thread.

[Fantomen]

Originally Posted by Gandalf Parker

What I said was that some playing groups bled off to their own forums. Multiple. Plural. Im well aware of the creation of Dom3Mods and I have been all support of it since its beginning. YOU seem to be the one trying to make everything about dom3mods. To be truthful, of the dozen or so forums that I frequent for dom3 conversations dom3mods is the last one I think of. It isnt that big a deal to me.

Liar liar, pants on fire.

Disclaimer: Or maybe you can tell us about those other "dozen or so" forums that these multiple (plural) groups of "former experts" with "different attitudes" have "bled off" to? Also please give examples of how anyone of them has tried to "kill this forum" as you also claimed in the previous post, as a clear reference to the migrated groups in question. You can of course do your usual weaseling out by claiming all dozen groups to be secret, lest I and my gang of ruffians go destroy these fragile beautiful creatures like a rabid Richard Dawkins on a new age convent.

[Soyweiser]

@fant, tbh, some of the old dom3 people have gone to the gaming den.

Of course those people have not been well respected by some dom3mods regulars. So labelling those as experts would be hotly contested.

These dom3 vets did migrate before the creation of dom3mods. iirc.

[Fantomen]

The claim was:

A couple of particular attitude groups bled off and formed their own forums swearing that this one would die off. Sometimes they come back to tell us again, tell everyone to come to their forum, how much better theirs is, and generally seeming to make an effort to make this one die off.

Does the gaming den qualify for that description? And was it the intended reference?

I understand there is various smaller groups playing on other forums, that's not the issue at all. It's irrelevant because I'm not questioning the existence of Dom3 activity on other forums. It's the claim that they are coming here to advertise and try to make this forum die in favor of their own that i'm questioning, since that is insulting if it's not true, and hardly seems to be the case.

Since Gandalf says he didn't mean dom3mods in the above quote, but that he instead is referring to the "dozen or so" other forums with dom3 activity, I suppose that means the above description fits all these forums. I wonder if they are aware of his opinion about them?

[Soyweiser]

It just was the only group I could think of. But it was not in that context. Only the
"What I said was that some playing groups bled off to their own forums." context.

[Edi]

Some groups have also always existed in their own forums and had little to do with this place even in its heyday. Quarter to Three and Something Awful come to mind.

As far as interest in other communities goes, you can start by taking a look here. Those are the ones known to me (by name only, most of them).

It should be noted that there seems to be relatively more community cross pollination at this time, with folks from all over wandering to the Desura forum and some traffic going the other way too.

Each of these communities has its place, its own preferences and each is the preferred haunt of someone for whatever reason. For example, I'm a moderator of this community, run the one on Desura and am a member of both Dom3Mods and Qt3. Doubtless there are other communities not on that list that I've never heard of, but that's neither here nor there.

As long as everyone adheres to the rule of keeping the business of one forum the business of that forum and doesn't bring baggage with them, there is no reason to kick a fuss over it. We (Dominions players in general) are a small enough community collectively that we don't need to borrow trouble.

Of all the communities I've seen, I've not seen attempts at killing off the others, as if that were possible in the first place. The most conflict has come out of some of the differences between this forum and some of its current and former members due to disagreements over certain policies of Shrapnel Games.

That horse has been well and truly beaten to death, resurrected, beaten to death again, the corpse reanimated and then once more beaten back down, so I'd appreciate it if was left to lie where it's fallen. There is absolutely zero reason to bring those things up again and up until now these old issues have been remarkably quiescent. Please let them be.

[Fantomen]

For the record, and if anyone thinks I'm just being anal or pursuing a personal vendetta, the reason I react here is because I think these vaguely insulting posts about other forums and people is really harmful to the community. It is also not the first time Gandalf does it.

In fact, the vagueness makes it worse and more insulting. If you really have to insult or post your own biased description of someone else, then at least spell out your target directly so he/she/they has a reasonable chance to answer for themself. You are being MORE inflammatory and insulting when doing it indirectly or with lack of clarity.

I maintain that Gandalfs post was framed in a way that made it look like a decription of dom3mods, and a very insulting one. Especially since it was made in a thread that started with a misplaced whine about dom3mods it was the most logical interpreteation. I don't really care if there was some other intention also, because it should be perfectly simple to make posts that does not have these vibes about them.

This type of posts, both Parones and Gandalfs, brings the various strands of our community further apart and creates false images of big attitude differencies and polarized opinions that just aren't there in reality.

I wan't the community to get stronger and also less divided, because with a less divided community we could have so much more high end content going like for example official tournaments, a dedicated user friendly blitz server, automated score tracking and solid HoF statistics and so on and so forth. I actively work for these things and since I feel this nonsense and spreading of stupid rumors undermines the possibility to get there, it just pisses me the **** off.

I'm might a hot headed ***** with a big foul mouth and maybe I wen't too far in this thread, but I'd rather be a bit blunt than silent. Parone may be excused by having actually taken a beating here, but It's simply not ok for an influential long time member of the community to go on like that.