Dementia's "farewell"

(I have posted this same thing on the Eclipse Squadron forums.)

On Friday, after some comments in GSF chat (most notably by Steelwind) and in voice chat by various of the Jung Ma guys, I sent Dementia an in-game mail asking if it would be possible for her group to tone down the crushing defeats they've been inflicting, fly something other than bomber/gunship, and maybe let the noobs actually hit them a few times, all in the interests of keeping GSF fun for the majority of the people that play it and explanding the playerbase.

This is the response I received. I requested permission to repost it; she (he? I dunno, I'll go with "she" until told otherwise) granted it with the request that I not say it came from her because she didn't want to be dealing with whining and "trolls" on the SWTOR forums. Well, 1) too late, I already was talking about the gist of it in GSF chat, 2) too late, it's obvious from the text who it's from. However the request to keep it off the SWTOR forums is reasonable so I'd ask people to abide by that.

(Note: it seems they are still queueing to get at least the dailies on TEH, so this message is somewhat deceptive.)

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We (as a group) aren't going to queue regularly here anymore. There really is no solid competition and the reactions we've been getting from an RP-style community don't make playing here very fun. We play these ships to gain requisition on them, not easily destroy teams (which we can do in any ship). Asking us to be kind to newer players is fair, but so far we've had to deal with a number of things
1) People come over on new alts to curse and complain to us (really? how childish is that? one could just do what you have done, which is perfectly appropriate)
2) People create alts and self-destruct repeatedly in our games (which we still win by a large margin)
3) Prominent members (including Nemarus) have insulted our members, some of which have never done a thing wrong (like Drakolich)
4) Biggest one: Everyone complains to each other instead of to us.
The biggest problem here is that we are competitive and this server (being an RP server) doesn't really mesh well in that it doesn't strive for strong competition and avoids portions of the game. That is fine. But the community reaction to us is very mixed. So we're going to continue playing most of our games on The Bastion, where the community (believe it or not) is extremely healthy and very competitive.

I wish you the best, I may still be around from time to time.

-Stasie

P.S.: Thanks for actually bringing it up with one of us instead of moaning about it elsewhere (forums, other players) and attacking us verbally. It shows more maturity than much of the rest of this server.

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In her response to me in the SWTOR forum messaging she mentioned she'd welcome further input from "someone who acts respectful and isn't an outright troll". Below is what I wrote back.

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Well, since you ask.

1) You're absolutely right about people bitching to each other instead of coming to you. That's part of why I sent the mail, because I saw people bitching a lot and said "just go talk to Dementia about it and see what she says" and nobody seemed to like that idea.

2) I don't know what you mean about community leaders "including Nemarus" insulting Drakolich. Knowing Nemarus, if he had a complaint it probably had some substance to it, and I'd like to know what it was (I haven't had a chance to talk with him yet about this) - and I say that knowing full well that Drak has been a perfect gentleman in every interaction I've had with him and I have trouble believing he could do anything outside of a match to make someone angry.

3) You're right that a lot of the matches aren't competitive. I don't really know why you expect them to be. The GSF playerbase (on Ebon Hawk at least, and TEH seems to be one of the healthier GSF servers) is just not big enough to have enough people queued at the same time to get reasonably even matches on a regular basis. When we DO get them, they are awesome - but even we know there's ace premades queueing on both sides it can be pretty hit or miss as to whether the matchmaker does something reasonable. The only way this will get better is if we get cross server queueing (not holding my breath), or if a large proportion of people queueing at any one time are good at the game; and the only way to get THAT is to give people practice and the opportunity to want to get better.

It's the difference between inspiring someone to play better and inspiring someone to stop playing. Everything you guys do is calculated to get people to stop playing. I can totally understand how people up against your team feel like throwing their keyboards at the wall. I also would honestly expect you to be aware without needing to be told that you are eliciting that reaction. How many times can you run the bomber game and see 3-shippers completely unable to handle it and not see the pattern? What exactly are you winning by doing this? What does it gain you?

T2 scouts, T1 gunships, and minelayers are the best way to deliver super-concentrated "FUCK YOU" to new players.

That is the ONLY thing you and your team have been doing on Ebon Hawk.

I have never seen any of you in any other ship. I've seen a lot of people complaining about that sort of thing in matches I haven't personally been in as well. If people are mad at you, I really don't see that that's anything but thoroughly deserved. If you were deliberately trying to ruin the game experience for everyone on our server the only thing you've left undone would be mining the spawn points.

Now, I'm not yet convinced you ARE trying to ruin anything. You and Drakolich and Vailx/Verain are absolutely great teammates to fly with and interesting to talk with. I do think you're too focused on your own little group and whether you're having fun and not really caring about whether the people you play WITH are having fun. In which case ... you really don't have any right to complain about people cursing at you and trying to sabotage you, because you're deliberately not being a good sport. GSF is a team game, and the people on the other team are willing participants in creating content for you. They help create your fun. Taking their preferences and their reactions to your actions into account is just part of being a good sport. (The 8 bomber game would've been fine if people actually liked you. As it is, you're just reinforcing the impression that you're saying "FUCK YOU" to everybody not in your group, all over again. Yes, having what is acceptable depend on people liking you might seem unreasonable, but it's how human beings work.)

I'm willing to take the challenge you guys present. (I might queue some on Bastion during the double req time and see what things are like.) I'm absolutely sure that with some of the better TEH pilots on my team and the whole team knowing what the basic strategy needs to be and capable of implementing it, you're entirely beatable - and WITHOUT resorting to all bombers all the time (I've proven to myself that, at a minimum, T2 strikes and command scouts make excellent bomber killers, and one-on-one without help, too). The problem is that matches where that is even possible is a rarity, yet you fly every single one as ruthlessly as you possibly can, no exceptions, and then are surprised when people react badly. The problem is not first and foremost with the people angry at you, the problem is with your perception of what is reasonable behavior. They wouldn't be angry if you didn't go out of your way to get them there.

In the thousands of matches I've played, I have never once - not ONCE - received an angry comment afterward, from anyone; and quite a few excited and enthused whispers about how much fun that was even though they lost.

As a final request: if you're going to stop queueing, then stop queueing - completely. If you don't like how TEH reacts to you, then go away. If you want to keep queueing on TEH, then please show people you actually like being here and like the people you're flying with, instead of going out of your way to look like jerks every chance you get. If that's not something you can handle then I really don't know why you persist.

That about sums it up nicely - it's a good perspective on why noobstomping is not a good tactic.

I guess I'm kind of glad I stopped queueing for GSF as much, people are stilll...

I'm sorry I never felt any need to go easy on anybody. Never will. I never thought it taught people to get better and learn how to do things by going easy on them. That shouldn't be a surprise, I said as much to Nemarus many, many times.

I've been messing around on Imp side in an unupgraded t1 strike and having fun and doing fine, but you can bet your ass I'll be buying my t2 scout asap and upgrading my ion guns on my t1 gunship asap too. Why? Because the t1 gunship is a bomber-killer, and the t2 scout is just fun. I'm not going to adjust my playstyle or stop playing/flying a ship that's good just because other people don't like it or think it's harsh.

Premades doing stupid things together is part of the fun of playing with friends. I remember being in my stupid bomber (which I hate) and coordinating with Nis and Nailin and a couple others in voice chat in gunships waiting for people to come fly at me so they could zap them to death from 15km away. It was pretty hilarious.

I dunno though, I got so many hate tells back when I was playing Jinks full-time, and every single one of them made me laugh. The hate that gets poured down on you for refusing to not purposely play worse just to make other people feel better is astounding.


Though, keep in mind - I generally just flew around blowing people up and keeping them from ever getting to their objective points, I never really griefed anyone for kicks unless you count like, chasing certain people across the map to nail them with burst cannons cause I knew they'd feed my amusement with their tears...

I'm of the opinion they were worthless scrubs personally, and the only way they would win was through bomber stacking. I've played quite a few matches against those guys since I came back and they really just aren't that good.

They aren't bad pilots really, but I've flown against a ton better it seems.

Fair or not I'm probably going to always consider bombers GSF crutches.

They kind of are, I never could get mine fully upgraded. I really wanted to just for the achievement, but then I decided not to since I think I would have felt super-lame :p

I always feel though, that there is a difference between being good and playing what you like/what is best for the situation, and being a scrub and using crutches/overpowered things as the only way you can win. I know I can do just fine in a strike fighter and decently in a t1 scout, I just prefer my FF more

Highjinks, your argument boils down to two points. The first is that taking it easy on less capable players doesn't motivate or teach them to get better (and implying that going all-out does). The second is that you just don't want to.

The first one has been experimentally disproven and very clearly so, which is why your impatience with the opposing view is of absolutely no significance whatsoever (especially considering you don't bother to play the game anymore and are just #bittervet). Impside GSF on TEH was largely dead for a while - in part thanks to all those unhittable evasion Flashfires going on rampages all over the place. The whole reason I started queueing impside was because I noticed the matches were completely one-sided nearly every single time, and I hated it - and I have to mention that Saberwing played a not-inconsiderable role in creating that situation and definitely deserves part of the blame.

What fixed this was the combination of bombers and various pubside veterans queueing on imp alts to provide some backbone for otherwise hapless teams. Now there is a reasonably large and experienced and healthy imp pilot pool, but it's not made up of hardcore imp patriots who queue no matter the odds just to stick to to the republic. I've seen quite a few of the better known and capable imp pilots just drop matches and log if things are too one-sided in too many matches in a row.

And you know what? By your own argument, they're absolutely right to do so. They should do what they find fun, the same way you fly your Flashfire. They don't find repeated crushing defeats fun. So they don't play them. There's enough people like that in both factions that the hardcore need to take it into account if they want regular matches.

At this point we're getting back to points I made in my OP above, which you completely failed to address in any way.

Your second basic point amounts to a six-year-old kicking and screaming because someone has said no more candy. Ok, you don't want to, but that's not an actual argument, and it doesn't disprove anything I said, and it won't change the consequences if everybody acts like you say they should.

As for crutches - nobody who flies primarily Flashfire has any right to talk about other people's crutches - especially considering that Verain is absolutely right about one thing, the best thing bombers brought to the game was to drive out the battle scout elitists by being a perfect tactical counter to them. If you want to claim a Flashfire is not a crutch for racking up exorbitant kill counts, you are simply wrong, and you can argue with me when you put yourself in your targets' shoes by proving you can reliably suppress and kill those ships in something else. (Not a bomber, either, since they're so crutchy.)

But you're not going to do that, because you don't want to.

As for Dementia et al being "they're not that good! they're not that good!"

Yeah?

Then why is it they keep winning games?

OF COURSE they're good. OF COURSE they're easily a match for the best of any Ebon Hawk pilots. The fact that they use ships and tactics you don't like is completely irrelevant - within the tools the game provides, they are better than nearly all of us. That's why I've been real reluctant to tell them to get out - because they ARE good and they ARE a challenge and beating them really means something. That's why I honestly would WANT them to fit in a bit better with TEH, and to have a good reason to stay, and to have the rest of us like having them here - because they absolutely can teach us to be better - better at teamwork, better at using the ships that synergize well together instead of the solo gimmick-mobiles, better at doing things the rest of us just haven't thought of or haven't tried.

That's not necessarily the game you want to play. But I think a lot of the rest of us might like it a lot.

I hope that anti Flashfire rant want directed my way

And no they aren't actually all that great.

Edit: I should probably clarify that there have probably only been 10 pilots that I would consider were great the entire lifespan of GSF thus far. And not all of them play any more.

Highjinks, your argument boils down to two points. The first is that taking it easy on less capable players doesn't motivate or teach them to get better (and implying that going all-out does). The second is that you just don't want to.

The first one has been experimentally disproven and very clearly so, which is why your impatience with the opposing view is of absolutely no significance whatsoever (especially considering you don't bother to play the game anymore and are just #bittervet)

Okay, first of all, just because you don't see me doesn't mean I'm not playing. I have TWENTY toons, and I have always primarily been Imperial. I may not be queuing non stop for GSF, but I am queuing. And I DO believe thats how you get better, by taking your lickings and improving until you can dish it out just as well as you can take it.

As for crutches - nobody who flies primarily Flashfire has any right to talk about other people's crutches - especially considering that Verain is absolutely right about one thing, the best thing bombers brought to the game was to drive out the battle scout elitists by being a perfect tactical counter to them. If you want to claim a Flashfire is not a crutch for racking up exorbitant kill counts, you are simply wrong, and you can argue with me when you put yourself in your targets' shoes by proving you can reliably suppress and kill those ships in something else. (Not a bomber, either, since they're so crutchy.)

But you're not going to do that, because you don't want to.

Now see here, you prove that you don't know a damn thing about me.

My very first mastered ship was a Pike, on my sage. I flew that thing from the beginning of GSF for the first couple months before I even rolled Highjinks and decided I was going to try and level a toon entirely through GSF. I chose a Flashfire for Jinks because I'm a roleplayer at heart, and the FF fits Jinks - it fits her as a smuggler, and it fits her attitude as a person.

However - I also mastered Jinks's t1 Gunship because it's a perfect bomber-counter. I fly the Flashfire in matches that aren't bomber heavy, and the gunship in matches where the aoe ion cannon is needed for clears. You see, I play whatever fits the situation best, and I REFUSE to be made to feel like shit for wanting to go in a game, do my best, and WIN. You cannot make me feel bad for that, no matter how hard you try. You don't know this - because you don't know me. I go out to do something, I give it my all - I do nothing halfway. I refuse to lessen myself to make other people feel happy.

Jinks is also the proud owner of a mastered Pike, a nearly-mastered Star Guard, and a bomber that I couldn't bring myself to level past t3 upgrades because it's just too boring. Her NovaDive is close to being mastered as well, but doesn't have the engine power my Flashfire does and honestly, I just prefer the A-wing design.

Empire side, I have two toons with halfway mastered Rycers, and am currently alternating between the Rycer SF and the t1 Gunship as I level up yet another alt on Impside. And you know what? I'm taking my lickings and watching my team get 3 capped and just playing MY best and doing what *I* can, because I know that the more I play with a certain ship, the better I'm going to get at it. I have few upgrades since I'm saving up to get... you guessed it, a t2 battle scout. Then I'll have the t1 gunship, the t1 SF, and the t2 scout in my arsenal to level up so that I can fly whatever fits the situation.


So basically what I'm saying is - don't attack someone you don't know anything about. You just make yourself look like an ass. I am fully qualified to have an opinion on whatever the hell I want about GSF.

I find that flying against superior pilots makes me want to be superior. Kvikorma and Andern/Nailin were a source of inspiration for me even if they were beating my ass - which they love/loved to do. It's like when I first saw an 8 man elite pvp guild in another game take out 60 people. The first thing I said was "Damn, I want to be in THAT group." I didn't whine and cry about how I just got my face pushed in. I practiced, I played, I got better - and then I was not only IN one of those elite pvp guilds for six years - I was its GM.

In other words, I believe conflict breeds strength, which is one reason I primarily have always been Imperial.


Mind you, this is MY opinion and may or may not be shared by others here. I really don't care if people share my opinion or not. I can fully accept that other people disagree with me - they need to accept that they are not going to change this Mandalorian's mind. You don't need to agree with my opinion, but I am fully entitled to voice it.

I hope that anti Flashfire rant want directed my way

And no they aren't actually all that great.

Edit: I should probably clarify that there have probably only been 10 pilots that I would consider were great the entire lifespan of GSF thus far. And not all of them play any more.

Pretty sure that was directed at me :p

And I'm not even in your list of 10 pilots /sadface

You'll always be my number 1 inspiration!

I hope that anti Flashfire rant want directed my way

And no they aren't actually all that great.

Edit: I should probably clarify that there have probably only been 10 pilots that I would consider were great the entire lifespan of GSF thus far. And not all of them play any more.

I miss you too Nis!

I'll freely admit that I flew a FF early on, but there's a reason I loved me my Starguard. And there wasn't a person that was flying a T2 Scout that I couldn't out dogfight. /arrogant bugger

And I'll tell you right now why I quit. I hate Bombers. They're boring, they do nothing but provide a crutch to folks who can't fly anything else.

I know I couldn't kill you (easily), that's for sure. I think I only got you maybe a total of 3 or 4 times in the entire time we flew together/against each other. You, on the other hand, got me probably 5 times in one game with that damn Starguard :p

I know I couldn't kill you (easily), that's for sure. I think I only got you maybe a total of 3 or 4 times in the entire time we flew together/against each other. You, on the other hand, got me probably 5 times in one game with that damn Starguard :p

Oh I sure wasn't invincible but yeah, that 'tank' build for the SG was surprisingly effective. Always funny to watch the T2 scouts freak out when you kill them in the span of 3-4 seconds.

And hey, to be fair it was usually Nis and I flying with each other... and when we did... bad things happened.

Oh I sure wasn't invincible but yeah, that 'tank' build for the SG was surprisingly effective. Always funny to watch the T2 scouts freak out when you kill them in the span of 3-4 seconds.

And hey, to be fair it was usually Nis and I flying with each other... and when we did... bad things happened.

I liked it when all 3 of us flew together :p

I miss you too Nis!

I'll freely admit that I flew a FF early on, but there's a reason I loved me my Starguard. And there wasn't a person that was flying a T2 Scout that I couldn't out dogfight. /arrogant bugger

And I'll tell you right now why I quit. I hate Bombers. They're boring, they do nothing but provide a crutch to folks who can't fly anything else.

I know a scout pilot that could take you head to head.

Got a name?