Toribash
Originally Posted by Stone View Post
I feel like a good way to make it more user friendly is that when you load up toribash, there will be a tutorial tab which will lead to the beginner sanctuary in the forums, they log in and there will be this search bar, you type the mod you want. So you search in for example "Judo.tbm" and it will load tutorials of judo from the most upvoted one and then go down or you can change it to "most recent" or even the other way round and if they don't find one, they can ask for someone in the beginner sanctuary to ask for guidance on that mod. I feel it will solve the beginner friendly problem and they know that there is a forum early one which will REALLY help them out. Though it's only my opinion.




This is an extremely good idea, Toribash always needed a more in depth tutorial, I was thinking that instead of just toribash forum tutorials, you can also be hooked up with a good player in each of the official mods ingame. Therefore, new players can learn tips in game with an experienced player.
maybe later
Originally Posted by sir View Post
Better tutorials, challenges they can complete in SP, a range of accessible items & easier access to premade free textures, functioning matchmaking.

Do you agree that bringing Tori-Agents back to sit in beginner servers to communicate with and guide new users is a good idea?

TA's stopped existing after they merged with PT to form GK. GK were supposed to do the job of the TA. Now we've got the ES and this beginner guidance thing isn't on their charter.

Technically, this would fall under the domain of the Help Squad currently (it's not something they do, but it's in their area of responsibility), but they don't have nearly enough members to do this job half-effectively (and they're busy with their other duties).

I think bringing TA back (comprising of some of the more mature members of our community) would go a long way towards retaining new players - At least the ones that manage to make their way to multiplayer.
Last edited by Ele; Feb 8, 2017 at 02:05 PM.
Originally Posted by sir View Post
Better tutorials, challenges they can complete in SP, a range of accessible items & easier access to premade free textures, functioning matchmaking.

Right,

It is only common sense, that, it is pointless driving to add all these features in the hope of attracting players and even advertising, when it is evident the game can't even hold the players long enough for it to be worth it. Before any of this advertising etc. happens, a system needs to be put in place to retain the player base that is expected to join, and the idea of Tori-Agents has already been tried, and worked. So why not bring this back?

There was an attempt to implement them in with the Promo-Team and it failed, the idea of tori-agents was left behind with the development of the Event Squad and as such the same growth is not being achieved. So the problem has been addressed, now what confuses me is why something is not being done about it, the fix is simple, re-implement Tori-Agents. Have a recruitment drive, or privately contact the players that 'tick the boxes' for helping the beginner players, train them up and get the system in full flow as soon as possible.

I'm struggling to see the reason why such an idea should not be implemented; People won't apply? No one will buy into the idea? You have already acknowledged that people are up for the idea, many ex-Tori Agents still play the game, and agree with the idea of this re-implementation, take Ele as an example. Can't get enough people? Add a rewards system, similar to that of the current staff. It doesn't have to ruin the economy, but enough to bring in Tori Agents that are worth having, rather than a rag tag bunch of applicants.

Promote the ethic from the start, and maybe there wouldn't as much of a problem with toxicity and hate in the community... The conclusion seems pretty trivial, I don't understand why this hasn't already happened?
Last edited by Bless; Feb 8, 2017 at 03:53 PM.
Do you agree that bringing Tori-Agents back to sit in beginner servers to communicate with and guide new users is a good idea?

Not really, it's hard to keep people interested in serversitting and not start noob-bashing instead. I mean, the general TA concept is great, but the burnout rate is way too high there. Newcomers are a headache and helping them voluntarily for a long period of time is something only a few people would do. Then again, you have to control them afterwards.
Having a bot stay in all beginner rooms that'd just say basic hints can help though. Will answer most of the typical questions and will be there 24/7. Not as good as a real human in terms of communication but it's less likely to cause problems.

Anyway HS already started covering some of ex-TA's duties, they'll probably recruit more people at some point if it pays off.
Last edited by sir; Feb 8, 2017 at 05:01 PM.
Originally Posted by sir View Post
Not really, it's hard to keep people interested in serversitting and not start noob-bashing instead.

Uh... Just don't hire dickheads? That's pretty simple. Like I said earlier, pick members that are mature.

Originally Posted by sir View Post
I mean, the general TA concept is great, but the burnout rate is way too high there.

Same could be said for many staff groups. That doesn't mean anything.

Originally Posted by sir View Post
Having a bot stay in all beginner rooms that'd just say basic hints can help though. Will answer most of the typical questions and will be there 24/7. Not as good as a real human in terms of communication but it's less likely to cause problems.

Nowhere near as good as a human in terms of communication and helpfulness. What problems? Only problem you listed is that it's a job that requires some effort (like most staff positions) and that the people you hire would start 'noob-bashing'.

By creating a bot all you'll be doing is overcomplicating things to get a shitter end-result.

Originally Posted by sir View Post
Anyway HS already started covering some of ex-TA's duties, they'll probably recruit more people at some point if it pays off.

It's not going to pay off. You've got 5 people in HS. 1 of them has smod duties and another has ES duties. That means you've got 3 people doing this (and be realistic, they're wouldn't do the job as well as a dedicated TA that focuses only on that anyways).
You're not going to get a result. That plan won't work.
Last edited by Ele; Feb 8, 2017 at 06:19 PM.
Uh... Just don't hire dickheads? That's pretty simple. Like I said earlier, pick members that are mature.

Most members who were TAs back in times were considered mature, still caused problems. Also the burnout rate in TA is nowhere close as in any other staff group, even GK/GM/ES - the job isn't fun, beginner tourneys suck ass an so on.
Still not my call whether to bring back TA or not, so these are just my thoughts. Of course it wouldn't hurt to try, but it requires having some top staff member interested in taking over the group - otherwise it'll turn to shit pretty fast.
If nobody steps up, or you can't find anyone, I'll do it. As much as I regularly open myself up to being made fun of, I'm actually a great leader and terrific organiser.

I still don't see maturity being an issue if the TAs are selected properly. I'm not talking about 'mature' 14yr olds here. Talking about people that have been around the block and people who aren't mean-spirited. Nice guys. People similar in character to Phail or Solax, for example. It's unimaginable that people like that would start bashing noobs.

On lessening burnouts, I'd suggest we focus less on beginner tourneys. Perhaps we could have members holding a tourney just once per week, on the weekends. As we sit in servers, we hype up the weekend events and get beginners excited about coming back to play again ("Wow PlayerName, you're kicking butt here in Judo, you should think about participating in the beginner Judo tournament on the weekends").

Server sitting is sort of what you make of it. If you're an introvert and you're not socialising with the players, then yeah, the job would suck and you probably wouldn't be suitable for it. If you're chatting with the new players though, cracking jokes and helping everyone get along, I don't think that'd be boring. Chuck on a podcast or a show in the background and you're golden.

If burnouts remain a problem, then we could experiment with some incentive systems. All we gotta do is make the carrots outweigh the sticks.

Definitely think it's worth and try and I definitely think that if handled properly, we'd see a reduction in the problems you cited.
Last edited by Ele; Feb 9, 2017 at 02:08 AM.
Originally Posted by sir View Post
Advertising. No sense spending money on advertising if retention rate is as low as it is now. May be worth trying when we don't have 60% of people closing the game after less than 1 minute of staying in it. Basically we first need to have stuff from the above implemented, then think about attracting new people with paid ads.

Just wanna address this. Advertisements doesn't have to be paid to be effective and I would argue that you could pull thousands of new players with like 20$ budget, of which some would probably spend their money on the game making it pay off and most likely even increase profit.
I feel for advertisement, you could get a well known youtube gamer to play toribash, the video will get views and enough people will be curious or funny enough to try out this game.
ishi - "I'm Hampa's Bitch Slappin' Hand"
I'm so proud Sparky
Originally Posted by Stone View Post
I feel for advertisement, you could get a well known youtube gamer to play toribash, the video will get views and enough people will be curious or funny enough to try out this game.

The point people have been making is, this has happened before, and a large influx of people do arrive, however it doesn't last as the people often only join and leave as soon as the youtuber does, all the while injecting that little bit more toxicity.

A program of retaining players must first be implemented before it is worth trying to get youtubers to feature the game and get the players in.