Firstly, Robert, you seem to be confusing the application of zero sum game and the way it was intended. I refer to it in the context of, “Someone who prefers and frequents Valve servers, probably won’t play on privately run servers that often.” And the opposite is also true, “Someone who prefers and frequents privately run servers, won’t usually go near Valve servers, though obviously there are incentives for them to do so from time to time.” And also “If someone has found a community they like, they rarely venture outside of that community providing the community hosts the types of things they’re interested in.” The zero-sum-game argument is about where people play, that is all, and it is reflective of the fact that we are all creatures of habit.
Secondly, I would surmise that Valve have allowed the continuation community servers in their diminished form as they don’t consider it a threat to the enjoyment of their product or revenue model and that the removal of said servers would only serve to create PR issues – whereas relegating them to the background is far easier and has far less consequences. The fact is, players by default are steered to official servers, which protects them from the shenanigans exclusive to privately run servers and ensures that players are exposed to things like contracts etc. (Campaign coins of which are paid). Ergo, Valve gets their money Thirdly, it would behove of Robert not to guestimate the experience of other contributors to this mailing list when he does not know to whom he speaks. My experience is that custom game modes are doing just fine and I’m not alone in this regard. Perhaps some introspection might reveal why Robert has a different experience? Fourthly, the Minecraft argument is not a valid argument due to the fact that Mojang, despite offering server hosting services via Minecraft Realms, is not directly involved in hosting and managing “Official Servers” – That is servers run and managed by Mojang, for Mojang, under the Mojang name. There is a world of difference between Mojang providing server hosting to third-parties and Valve hosting servers for themselves – including a difference of motives. I think everyone on this mailing list understands the difference and what it means from a business perspective even if that is beyond Robert‘s comprehension. The distinction is who's managing the resultant game server and whether or not one is hoping to simply host privately-managed servers or replace the importance of privately-managed servers. Fifthly, I don’t recall Valve ever marketing Team Fortress 2 as a game where private server operators were guaranteed a “level” environment or that private servers were guaranteed. Dedicated servers, maybe. Privately-managed servers, no. The fact that it had the latter feature at release is, in my view, incidental. Furthermore, I would note that Valve’s EULA reserves it the right to make changes to the product however they wish. So perhaps it would be prudent for Robert to take out the emotive entitlement argument. Sixthly, screwing over players the second it becomes profitable seemed to work well for Overkill, who recently exited its own micro-transaction scandal mostly unscathed. Hell! It even worked well for Valve with the conversion to free-to-play and the implementation of Mannconomy so long ago. And let us not forget the screwing over of attachments all in the name of securing Valve’s monopoly and profit on hats. Perhaps you should brush up on your history before commenting further, Robert? On Fri, Dec 18, 2015 at 11:15 PM, Robert Paulson <thepauls...@gmail.com> wrote: > Your understanding is flawed then. Everything you've been saying is > logically flawed and it just seems like you are just trying to be as troll > as possible. > > If hosting servers was a zero sum game, then why would the would Valve let > people do it? Use your brain and think. They do it because it is NOT a zero > sum game. We get something out of it and they get something out of it. > > It doesn't matter if they were on quickplay.I don't know how many times I > have to repeat myself. My point is that even servers that aren't eligible > for quickplay were negatively affected because most players are now never > even aware that community servers exist given the tiny button that browse > servers have. If you ever ran a saxton/ff server you would know what I am > talking about, but you obvious don't have any experience in this matter. > There used to be dozens of custom servers populated 24/7 and now there are > maybe 3-4. > > Why is minecraft not a valid argument? You know that there is an official > minecraft host called minecraft realms? And they don't plaster them all > over the top of the main menu. Why does the game mode even matter? Again, > wrong on all points. > > And why do the lack of complaints flooding reddit mean that Valve should > ignore the issue? As Henry Ford famously said, "If I had asked people what > they wanted, they would have said faster horses". If people don't know > there's something better, they won't ask for it. The community players > didn't complain about it right away because it was a slow change and it was > hard to figure out that Valve was at fault for killing off their server > because they never use quickplay. > > And yes Valve does owe something to communities *who also happen to be > their players and customers* not to break crucial features that were sold > on release such as being able to host the game and have a fair chance to > get players. It doesn't matter if people shuda wuda cuda shifted to custom > game modes which are actually deader than regular tf2. > > If you ever release a game or marketplace, please tell everyone you are > going to screw them over as soon as it is more profitable for them. Let's > see how well that works out for you. > > @rd, I think someone was complaining here about your stop the tank being > on quickplay several months ago. > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > 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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