I think there is more to the Quickplay issue than just whether or not QP should default to Valve servers or not. QP itself has caused a lot of issues and became the center of controversy ever since it came out in 2011. Though some of the changes that have been added recently are a step in the right direction, there are still many issues with this functionality that need to be addressed and improved upon.
I'm all for wanting change to this functionality for the better to benefit everyone involved, but this petition (and please take no offense) seems a bit too short and vague to actually get the kind of change needed to make Quickplay a beneficial, reasonable, and extensible system for server ops and the community at large. It does not address many of the issues that have ended up creating this current situation we are all in and does not have a list of concerns or changes or anything that could be specifically addressed, it only has a demand and presents a solution that is based on an idea that we as server owners deserve players in our servers, which is the wrong way to go about this. And lets not forget the players, we have to be fair to them as well, regardless of whether or not they will be placed in our servers. We have to show that, as a community, we are worthy of their presence and a worthwhile experience to take the time to be a part of, not the other way around. These days, we seem more like enemies to players than friends/fellow players, given these recent/past developments regarding the community servers. We also have to accept that, while Valve relied on us in the past to put up servers for this game, they have the ability to put up their own now. However, if they wanted to cut us out entirely, they would have done it back in 2011 when Quickplay became a thing. But they allowed us (and still allow us) to use the functionality, giving us every opportunity to prove that we could use it responsibly and in the best interest of the player. Clearly, there were a few who could not do that and thus we were all punished. While, in my opinion, Quickplay was not entirely thought all the way through and I know I and many others have their own opinions about this subject, it does not account for the fact that we as a community were unable, and perhaps unwilling, to police ourselves well enough to ensure we used this functionality responsibly to avoid Valve stepping in and taking the measures it has. Arguably, that isn't our job to police other communities/servers, it never has been, and its not Valve's job either. But someone had to do this in order to put an end to the misuse, which is a sad thing indeed because it should not have come to that. We could go back and forth on who started what and why and all that all day, but bottom line, we are just as much at fault as Valve is for these recent developments that have hurt many community servers. However, what is done is done and we have to move forward now. It is time to stop playing the victim and start attempts in trying to get some meaningful, and dare I say diplomatic, dialogue open between ourselves and Valve for meaningful change, not band-aid solutions and option switching that works in the short term. Community servers are important for this game, they always have been for good number of reasons and they should be treated that way. However, we cannot rely on that reasoning alone to get anything done. We have to prove that the community experience is worth having/supporting, now more than ever before. The burden is on us and we need to work for it again and prove we are ready for the responsibility of owning a server that has players connecting to it utilizing functionality like Quickplay, but not just to Valve, but to the players that play with us on our servers as well. Respect and trust are earned, not given freely, and I don't see anything we have done in recent years to earn that respect/trust from anyone. Sorry if this was too long/came off as offense or rude, I did not mean it to be. I just felt I had to add my 2 cents. On Wed, Feb 26, 2014 at 4:34 AM, Anthony <[email protected]> wrote: > Anyone who believes that petitioning for the default to be community > servers is relying on quickplay traffic far too heavily or using it to i.e > Play Ads. Remember with a good community you won't need quickplay for the > majority of my traffic they actually find the server themselves via the > steam browser from the data I collected. A few even favorite it afterwards > which with the new remember IP (Steam Account) they will always know where > it is. > > The point of community servers is to build a community, sure you can use > quickplay but it is a tool not a way of knowing members. A high majority > will go to valve servers but in recent days I've seen others talk about > 'going to prophunt or dodgeball. In their own Free will. The change to QP > was only positive sure there should be some tweaks but that's for another > topic. > > > > On 26/02/2014 12:09, Robert Paulson wrote: > > > This far from the worst suggestion I've seen. Perhaps aim for a > seemless solution where by "community servers" wasn't even a choice during > the first few hours of gameplay, becomes a choice later, then becomes the > default after it has been selected a couple of times. > > I don't like this modification to my idea. The point of it was to > overcome the huge inertia to simply click play now. They need to be > automatically switched to community servers. > > It is supposed to be a compromise which guarantees players the ability to > learn what plain tf2 is supposed to be without completely screwing over > communities like what's happening now. > > > On Wed, Feb 26, 2014 at 2:30 AM, John Irwin <[email protected]> wrote: > >> >> It would be a more realistic solution to switch quickplay settings >> to community servers after 3-4 hours of playing time. >> >> This far from the worst suggestion I've seen. Perhaps aim for a seemless >> solution where by "community servers" wasn't even a choice during the first >> few hours of gameplay, becomes a choice later, then becomes the default >> after it has been selected a couple of times. >> >> I'm not sure a petition is the right way to go though. Particularly one >> that invites reddit to participate. Valve reads these email strings. A good >> message makes itself heard. >> >> John >> On 26 Feb 2014 08:12, "Robert Paulson" <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> It is not possible unless you did something like switching from fast >>> to instant respawn. In that case we went from 10 to a whopping 30 quickplay >>> connects per day which is hardly worth being pleased about. Official >>> servers are still taking the vast majority of new players who are never >>> exposed to community servers. >>> >>> For those of you who weren't on quickplay this is also bad news for >>> you. Everyone relies on new players since old players quit all the time. >>> Fewer players become aware of community servers because it is too easy to >>> just click play now. >>> >>> If you have a top server you will see more players for now, but these >>> are mostly older players fleeing killed servers who will not be playing >>> forever. The new equilibrium hasn't been reached yet and we will see more >>> servers die as long as Valve continues this. Unfortunately this will be a >>> slow decline with many server owners not realizing they are a few months >>> away from dying as well. >>> >>> I am all for trying a petition but people will not associate with >>> someone who has such a bad reputation. The solution being offered, "provide >>> an option to choose either Valve only servers or Community servers on every >>> quickplay connect" would annoy everyone. It would be a more realistic >>> solution to switch quickplay settings to community servers after 3-4 hours >>> of playing time. >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> On Tue, Feb 25, 2014 at 10:28 PM, Peter Jerde <[email protected]>wrote: >>> >>>> I don't know about you, but our quickplay traffic has more than TRIPLED >>>> since the changes. Seems to have been quite a positive change. >>>> >>>> - Peter >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, >>>> please visit: >>>> https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds >>>> >>> >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, >>> please visit: >>> https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds >>> >>> >> _______________________________________________ >> To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, >> please visit: >> https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds >> >> > > > _______________________________________________ > To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, please > visit:https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds > > > > _______________________________________________ > To unsubscribe, edit your list preferences, or view the list archives, > please visit: > https://list.valvesoftware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/hlds > >
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