Black Shields (BkS) bks bks bks bks bks bks bks bks bks bks bks bks

[The_Troubadour]

Was thinking the same thing about Matchmaking. With all the competitive players exclusively playing on WBMM, there is effectively no gateway for new players to join the competitive scene because there is no contact with current competitive players. There's no way to advertise our tournaments or form new teams sine there is no go to battle server that everyone goes to train on. Hopefully one gets put up soon.

 

[VornOfSwag]

Pub has been dead for a couple months already anyways (what I mean by this, is most "competitive" players do not play pubs anymore)

LIAR, you're referring to tK dooks that played csgo all day

 

[Terrible_Swordsman]

Was thinking the same thing about Matchmaking. With all the competitive players exclusively playing on WBMM, there is effectively no gate way for new players to join the competitive scene. There's no way to advertise our tournaments or form new teams sine there is no go to battle server that everyone goes to train on. Hopefully one gets put up soon.

I've seen more "new" players join our scene at a "meaningful" level in the past few months than my whole career (at least in NA). As everyone liked to point out, warband MP has been on the decline for a good while and I believe that the past couple of months have seen an increase in activity, rather than a decrease. Legit the majority of new guys joining the scene in the past year or so, have been playing the game for years beforehand anyways. Between MM and scramble league I doubt that competitive is going die lol

That all being said, hopefully it dies soon anyways because of bannerlord.

 

[The_Troubadour]

WBMM hasn't been out for months yet. I think in the future it will damage our community.

Don't get me wrong, WBMM is a great client and I love using it, but our community is too small for it to be able to sustain itself without a pub server.

 

[VornOfSwag]

WBMM hasn't been out for months yet. I think in the future it will damage our community.

Don't get me wrong, WBMM is a great client and I love using it, but our community is too small for it to be able to sustain itself without a pub server.

Gotta have both pub battle server and and wbmm, eventually people will want both

 

[Orion]

If we had enough players to sustain both, sure. The problem is that it fundamentally splits the player base unless the WBMM players also pub & tell those not in the know. Unless there's a source of incoming players from pubs that matches or exceeds the loss of players from WBMM it's going to decline. You'll only get them by telling them about it or if they happen to come here & find out themselves, and you can't tell them if you never see them 'cause you only play in WBMM. It's a matter of exposure. Hopefully we don't have this potential problem in Bannerlord, 'cause hopefully we'll have some built-in matchmaking functionality that doesn't depend on word-of-mouth.

 

[Mad_Dawg]

Matchmaking will kill MP / Competitive Warband in NA within six months if no regular pub play is re-established.

Fact.

Qft

 

[Sjaeles]

then do smth about it

 

[grimsight]

If we had enough players to sustain both, sure. The problem is that it fundamentally splits the player base unless the WBMM players also pub & tell those not in the know. Unless there's a source of incoming players from pubs that matches or exceeds the loss of players from WBMM it's going to decline. You'll only get them by telling them about it or if they happen to come here & find out themselves, and you can't tell them if you never see them 'cause you only play in WBMM. It's a matter of exposure. Hopefully we don't have this potential problem in Bannerlord, 'cause hopefully we'll have some built-in matchmaking functionality that doesn't depend on word-of-mouth.

We have some of avenues for advertising (relatively big youtube channels , taleworlds sponsorship). It's just a matter of getting the client full stable and feature packed (clans, duels, ranks, group queuing, QoL upgrades,  etc). At the moment the focus isn't getting new player interest, but it will be soon and we'll do so aggressively.

Bear in mind WBMM was made to facilitate new players entering the scene, and I think it's a MUCH better alternative than playing something like tK_Battlefield if you are serious about the competition. That's what all this is about. Whether it delivers we've yet to see, and I do share some of the same concerns of you guys.

 

[Orion]

Bear in mind WBMM was made to facilitate new players entering the scene, and I think it's a MUCH better alternative than playing something like tK_Battlefield if you are serious about the competition. That's what all this is about. Whether it delivers we've yet to see, and I do share some of the same concerns of you guys.

Well I don't know fully what Rhade meant by it killing MP/competitive, I personally think it's more a paradigm shift. Competitive play stops being the exclusive domain of pre-made clans and teams and becomes accessible to unaffiliated individuals, and if you're adding clan/team matchmaking support then it does so without sacrificing pre-made group play. What I'm concerned about is the pubber that doesn't want to play in that environment and doesn't have a populated pub battle server to play on anymore. The game is dead to him once that happens, and if the pub servers die you lose your most direct access to active players that may be interested in what your platform offers. I'm just worried you'll lose more players than you gain, and if that happens then Rhade's right. Can't have that.

 

[Shemaforash]

not like it matters at this point, most of us don't even touch the game anymore

 

[Orion]

Grim should be recognized for his efforts regardless, it's certainly above & beyond what most have done for the community. Credit where it's due.

 

[Rhade]

I didn't say that to discredit him. What I find frustrating is the lack of foresight by community leaders to allow the shift to happen completely. It is a good compliment to the scene, but it is a blunder to have it be the scene.

You need to think about if from the perspective of the average player, because that's the lifeblood of any community:

It's difficult enough for players to make their way to play an outdated game.
It's difficult enough for players to find the "right" battle server, or even understand game modes.
It's near impossible for the general public to be lured in by competitive play. You're not Rocket League, you're not League of Legends, you're not even ****ing Battlerite. Not even in the same league. That's like GK vs BkS, and this community is GK (or OE or tK or whatever **** tier clan you want to use for the metaphor).
Only a certain percentage of those who try this game are going to stick with it in any meaningful way.

Now, with a public server gone, you're adding in extra steps when random scrublords try to come play Mount and Blade: Warband because they saw a Steam sale and thought it looks cool. They see no server that's populated, and 95% of people these days go, "Game's dead. You guys want to play some CS?" and leave it at that. An extremely small amount of people will actually put in the time to go find this third party program that matches them with people who are light years ahead of them in experience; add to that that the community is already incredibly insular, and you have not created a hospitable environment that is in any way nurturing for new players. **** that, it isn't even that it's not nurturing, it's that it isn't possible -- you are, in effect, cutting off any meaningful possibility of the inwards flow of new players, as this giant barrier to entry has been set on an already small and dying community. The argument that, "Bro, it's cool, our numbers are good" right now is because this just happened recently. The only numbers you have are what you have right now. Once that public server was abandoned by the competitive community and you guys made the dumb-as-**** permanent jump to playing exclusive matchmaking, you took a static, pre-set group that is going to have an extremely low, if not non-existent, rate of addition. In fact, you're going to see that static group experience attrition, as is normal, but there will be no new influx to take the place of the guys who fall away.

In short, you have locked the door to new possibilities, and you will see the set number of players you have now, dwindle. No one will replace them. When you look at our history, you've seen clans come to the top, lose interest, then other groups pop up and take their place. That's why **** clans like OE now have the opportunity to even play in a finals match, with players who used to be on the **** tier teams. This is normal, and this is how the game rolls forward, as you see them playing a lot of new clans with newer names. The community used to have leadership at the top that steered the ship: I did it, Mad Dawg did it, Calamity did it, and it was much more than just posting "dank memes" and bumping your thread. What is NA Warband, now?

• 
  You have slowly shifted the way the game is played away from what the NA identity has long been, because most of you don't have any sense of originality or identity, yourselves.
  You have given into European ideas and metas, map-making trends and server settings. It's virtually identical. You all play the exact same way, and it's pretty ****ing boring.
  You have chased the idea of "eSport," because you see League, SC2, Rocket League, CSGO and these other games do it. Warband will never be an "eSport" on that scale. You've sacrificed so much. What have you gained?
  Finally, you've proven how short-sighted and apathetic you are. Everything has to die, but you just unplugged the majority of machines keeping this scene alive. You'll be okay for a while, but as players start to naturally exit, and with no pathway for them to be replaced, time's going to show you how right Lord Rhade, Commander of the Shields of the Black ****ing is. I'm rarely wrong, small sons.

I'm sure there are inevitable "y u care doe" and childish ****posting coming, and that's another thing entirely. That's what this community is now -- memes, no identity, and it's cool not to care. Frankly, I'm kind of disappointed in you guys. But, the reason I care, is that I've always had a soft spot for this game, and the people that played it. Frustration and boredom made us leave, but that doesn't mean I don't want to see Taleworlds, and, more importantly, this game's community, succeed. Bad decisions, guys.

 

[KaneMaB]

I didn't say that to discredit him. What I find frustrating is the lack of foresight by community leaders to allow the shift to happen completely. It is a good compliment to the scene, but it is a blunder to have it be the scene.

You need to think about if from the perspective of the average player, because that's the lifeblood of any community:

It's difficult enough for players to make their way to play an outdated game.
It's difficult enough for players to find the "right" battle server, or even understand game modes.
It's near impossible for the general public to be lured in by competitive play. You're not Rocket League, you're not League of Legends, you're not even **** Battlerite. Not even in the same league. That's like GK vs BkS, and this community is GK (or OE or tK or whatever **** tier clan you want to use for the metaphor).
Only a certain percentage of those who try this game are going to stick with it in any meaningful way.

Now, with a public server gone, you're adding in extra steps when random scrublords try to come play Mount and Blade: Warband because they saw a Steam sale and thought it looks cool. They see no server that's populated, and 95% of people these days go, "Game's dead. You guys want to play some CS?" and leave it at that. An extremely small amount of people will actually put in the time to go find this third party program that matches them with people who are light years ahead of them in experience; add to that that the community is already incredibly insular, and you have not created a hospitable environment that is in any way nurturing for new players. **** that, it isn't even that it's not nurturing, it's that it isn't possible -- you are, in effect, cutting off any meaningful possibility of the inwards flow of new players, as this giant barrier to entry has been set on an already small and dying community. The argument that, "Bro, it's cool, our numbers are good" right now is because this just happened recently. The only numbers you have are what you have right now. Once that public server was abandoned by the competitive community and you guys made the dumb-as-**** permanent jump to playing exclusive matchmaking, you took a static, pre-set group that is going to have an extremely low, if not non-existent, rate of addition. In fact, you're going to see that static group experience attrition, as is normal, but there will be no new influx to take the place of the guys who fall away.

In short, you have locked the door to new possibilities, and you will see the set number of players you have now, dwindle. No one will replace them. When you look at our history, you've seen clans come to the top, lose interest, then other groups pop up and take their place. That's why **** clans like OE now have the opportunity to even play in a finals match, with players who used to be on the **** tier teams. This is normal, and this is how the game rolls forward, as you see them playing a lot of new clans with newer names. The community used to have leadership at the top that steered the ship: I did it, Mad Dawg did it, Calamity did it, and it was much more than just posting "dank memes" and bumping your thread. What is NA Warband, now?

• 
  You have slowly shifted the way the game is played away from what the NA identity has long been, because most of you don't have any sense of originality or identity, yourselves.
  You have given into European ideas and metas, map-making trends and server settings. It's virtually identical. You all play the exact same way, and it's pretty **** boring.
  You have chased the idea of "eSport," because you see League, SC2, Rocket League, CSGO and these other games do it. Warband will never be an "eSport" on that scale. You've sacrificed so much. What have you gained?
  Finally, you've proven how short-sighted and apathetic you are. Everything has to die, but you just unplugged the majority of machines keeping this scene alive. You'll be okay for a while, but as players start to naturally exit, and with no pathway for them to be replaced, time's going to show you how right Lord Rhade, Commander of the Shields of the Black **** is. I'm rarely wrong, small sons.

I'm sure there are inevitable "y u care doe" and childish ****posting coming, and that's another thing entirely. That's what this community is now -- memes, no identity, and it's cool not to care. Frankly, I'm kind of disappointed in you guys. But, the reason I care, is that I've always had a soft spot for this game, and the people that played it. Frustration and boredom made us leave, but that doesn't mean I don't want to see Taleworlds, and, more importantly, this game's community, succeed. Bad decisions, guys.

K

 

[OurGloriousLeader]

You need to think about if from the perspective of the average player, because that's the lifeblood of any community:

It's difficult enough for players to make their way to play an outdated game.
It's difficult enough for players to find the "right" battle server, or even understand game modes.
It's near impossible for the general public to be lured in by competitive play.

You're right but this a problem with the Warband server system in general. 90% of what people saw prior to WBMM was sh!t servers with people running around with 2handers and 2000 gold, and after it's still what they see. There's very little the warband community can do to make that avenue of access easier, but at least WBMM is a better gateway to competitive than large battle servers.

I agree we need both a decent pub server and WBMM, but we already struggle with the population.

 

[Rhade]

You need to think about if from the perspective of the average player, because that's the lifeblood of any community:

It's difficult enough for players to make their way to play an outdated game.
It's difficult enough for players to find the "right" battle server, or even understand game modes.
It's near impossible for the general public to be lured in by competitive play.

You're right but this a problem with the Warband server system in general. 90% of what people saw prior to WBMM was sh!t servers with people running around with 2handers and 2000 gold, and after it's still what they see. There's very little the warband community can do to make that avenue of access easier, but at least WBMM is a better gateway to competitive than large battle servers.

I agree we need both a decent pub server and WBMM, but we already struggle with the population.

Saying something wasn't ideal previously, does not excuse making it worse. POM and GK servers were up for years, and while the numbers may not be exactly the same as they were, this decision sure-as-**** made it exponentially worse. There's not very little the community can do; they can not make it worse by making stupid ****ing decisions. It isn't a "better gateway to competitive," because that really depends on how you define competitive. Being matched up with a bunch of dudes you haven't played with before, that's not a competitive game. That's a gloried pick-up, and you're exchanging killing the future of the community for it?

There's always been a population shortage, compared to huge games, but that doesn't logically dictate that you should just cut the throat of what's already existing. Again, shortsighted and terrible.

 

[OurGloriousLeader]

I don't agree it has made it worse. Two parts here: 1 yes being matched up with randoms is competitive if the rules are enforced to a competitive standard. This is ranked play in all other competitive games and how those competitive scenes develop. It also means people who play it understand and can support top level competitive play e.g. the strategy and tactics may differ drastically at the top level of CSGO but it's fundamentally the same game mode as if I went and joined a ranked match right now. 2 yes it's bleeding players from more accessible public servers, therefore the solution should be to make it more accessible, not removed and reverting back to crap public servers (or whatever your suggestion actually is?). Ideally no client would be needed and servers would be publicly available, but that would likely requires Taleworlds support and implementation.

 

[Rhade]

I don't agree it has made it worse. Two parts here: 1 yes being matched up with randoms is competitive if the rules are enforced to a competitive standard. This is ranked play in all other competitive games and how those competitive scenes develop. It also means people who play it understand and can support top level competitive play e.g. the strategy and tactics may differ drastically at the top level of CSGO but it's fundamentally the same game mode as if I went and joined a ranked match right now. 2 yes it's bleeding players from more accessible public servers, therefore the solution should be to make it more accessible, not removed and reverting back to crap public servers (or whatever your suggestion actually is?). Ideally no client would be needed and servers would be publicly available, but that would likely requires Taleworlds support and implementation.

To borrow from my boy DTRUMP: Wrong.

You missed the point, then. Has it made things worse today? No. It is a problem that is going to develop. Note my use of the term "short-sighted," and me addressing the point you're making preemptively already.

You also say "all other competitive games." I also addressed that directly, already.

Furthermore, you're confusing "top level competitive play" with pubbing in those types of games. No one practices with randoms. You think Cloud9 and EG practice for tournaments with a bunch of randoms from a pool? **** no, they're playing together, building cohesion, building team-play, and all the other intangibles, that, you know, happen in an actual competitive game.

The solution is not making the mod more accessible. The issue here, is, as I said, identity. This community lost it a long time ago, as is evidenced by a lot of what's happened. But, on a more macro scale, you guys need to innately understand that Mount and Blade: Warband is not CSGO, nor is it Rocket League, League of Legends, Starcraft, or any of the like. You're trying to treat it like something it isn't, and the results you're going to get are like something they don't see, either.

Then again, what do I know, right?

 

[OurGloriousLeader]

Yeah pro teams scrim and this won't change here either, but if you think coherent match-like structure doesn't make competitive more accessible then "wrong" back at you, I can't think of a more literal example of accessibility.

So stop appealing to my warband identity and explain how you'd Make Warband Great Again?

 

[Rhade]

Yeah pro teams scrim and this won't change here either, but if you think coherent match-like structure doesn't make competitive more accessible then "wrong" back at you, I can't think of a more literal example of accessibility.

So stop appealing to my warband identity and explain how you'd Make Warband Great Again?

You missed the point entirely, ignore most of my points, and fail to refute the rest, but that's fine. You're giving up a huge amount that you don't even realize, and implementing a structure that is not sustainable, to be able to scrim with random groups, when we've always been able to scrim, anyway.

It's less about how I'd make it great again, and more about pointing out how you guys are making terrible ****ing decisions, and I've outlined the reasons as to why. Carry on, I'll watch the flames from here in a few months and quote this conversation.