Insights Archive Past views from a seasoned veteran

Views From The WEDGE

|The Haves and the Have-Nots|September 14, 1999

When I first started my TFC server, it simply had the VALVe maps in its rotation.  My server has a decent connection, so it was consistently full, which made it very difficult to get connected.  I learned to live with that – GameSpy and the nifty “busy server retry” was a godsend.  It was nice to see my creation being used so much.

So then I decided to add some of my favorite user created maps into the rotation.  This actually helped my connection problem.  About every 30 minutes, the server would clear out, as people would not want to wait around to download the custom map. So, from a player wanting to get connected point-of-view, this was pretty cool. But, from a server admin point-of-view, it was not so.

After a raucous game of 2fort everyone would drop off when a custom map came up in the rotation. And there I would be. Alone or with 1 or 2 others waiting for the precious few downloaders to finish. Usually the time limit would hit shortly after they finished and we would never really get a good game played. That had to be frustrating for the downloaders. Not to mention a long and boring ordeal for the few people waiting for them.

After a few weeks of this, my server had built up a following of players, and it was actually pretty common to get a really good game on a custom map. But then the opposite problem presented itself. When the server switched to a VALVe map, a bunch of gren-spamming heavies, frag-counting snipers and scouts, and generally non-communicating players would join. Although the game was fast, furious and big it was far from satisfying. Teamwork is what TFC game is based on, and quite frankly,that does not happen with this crowd.

So, I modified my server again and took all VALVe maps out of the rotation.  My server is quieter these days, but I’ve noticed that with about 4 players on the server (not hard to find with ICQ and other nifty ways to organize games with friends) others would quickly join. And before the map changed twice, it would be full to the brim of Team Oriented players! And we’d have the best battles I can ever remember on public servers.

With all respect to VALVe for the game they’ve created, I don’t like their maps.   Now, some of you might say it’s the old-timer in me, as I was sick of 2fort4, well6, canalzone and rock2 a LONG time ago. But I think the “dislike” for VALVe maps stems from the people who play these maps exclusively.

We are faced with a community divided. There are “haves” and “have-nots”.   Those that “have” custom maps and those that “have-not” any custom maps.  There is a very real distinction between the playing style and team orientation of these two groups. And it saddens me to realize that I have no desire to play TFC with the “have-nots”.

I do not have a good resolution. The only way I’ve discovered to get a decent TEAM game of TFC is to exclude the “have-nots” by keeping VALVe maps out of the rotation. And this isn’t conducive to a well-formed TFC community. I’m still looking for a way to get those “have-nots” to download the maps!

What do you think?

Peace,

Wedge

There will be a forum on this site shortly, for a place to respond, comment and generally raise a stink about what I’ve written here.