I didnt see a thread for Warzone in here, so i added it <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':yahoo:' />



This weekend in the Chaos zone Warzone event you'll only be able to use the original 4 ships <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/good.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':yahoo:' /> ..... (warbird, levi, spider, javelin ... for you ppl who may not know which those are <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/shok.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':nea:' /> )

Hopefully the settings will also be the same as the original. (ex: Levi currently has a gazillion shrap when greened up .... as if L3 bombs werent bad enough without the advantage of excessive shrap <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/fool.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':unknw:' /> ).



Some of the newer ships really changed the game of warzone. You dont have the same open spaces you would in other games. You capture flags, and maybe safeguard them within a base, and then you defend/attack these enclosed bases. But nowadays, the terrier floods enclosed spaces with guns, the lancaster lobs bombs around corners, the weasel freezes you, and as mentioned even the levi is now supercharged. Specials like rockets and portals also changed the game alot <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />

The game was fine with its simplicity.

Now that all the freqs are random 'publics' instead of privates, its pretty intense as it is <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/happy.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':p' /> ..... and you cant even count on a random pub to complicate things for the other 'pvts' <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':drinks:' />



Im never entirely sure if i can be around for a game, but im actually looking forward to this week <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/yahoo.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='8)' />



<img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/ohmy.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':o' /> Itd be awesome if we could use one of the old maps too <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/clapping.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':clapping:' /> The combs/castle map ? <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/drinks.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':drinks:' />

Bonuses. A specific function introduced into Chaos Zone. I believe the original bot line about it advised that to learn about the Bonus system, was to learn how to own.



There are clear problems with the Bonus system. Lame play loves bonuses <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':yahoo:' /> They are too easy to use, and can too easily turn the tables mid-fight. The player who is killing the most is racking them up, further expanding the gap between newbie and vet. While a winning player should indeed garner success, the gap is a bit too broad.



There are some current suggestions for changes to the Bonus system. I wanted to mention them here to see what thoughts were from the proles <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':p' /> (says me with my 1:8 w/l ratio!).



I invite your input. Are these great ideas, or crap ideas, but you have to say WHY. If possible, take both sides, the more "although, of course" statements, the more valuable your contributions can be.



I also invite you to add your own ideas. "How about if ..." will help make sense of it all. Again, try to take both sides. "I suppose however that ..." again would be of great value.



So, here it is. I hope I've got this right:



Price Hike

Its been suggested to make the stuff we buy with bonuses, more expensive. I don't know the details, but to make stuff up, imagine that a Booster cost 6 or 10 bonus, instead of, what is it currently? 3?

I've personally only ever bought three things with Bonus points; Booster (3), Defense (thought it was 9, someone said 10), and Rabbit (10, I think). The rep seems pretty expensive as it is. The Rabbit could probably be higher. The Booster is dirt cheap and really should be much more expensive. You get three bursts and three thors ffs, 1 of each should probably be worth 3 Bonus points alone.



So the intention is to increase the cost of use.

My vote: I like this one. You should have to carefully consider your bonus stocks any time you want to pick up some goodies.



Use In Safe

The concept is to restrict use of Bonuses to be available only if you are in a safe zone. Too often a player turns tables on a duel mid-fight by grabbing a Booster, or a Speed to rocket them away from a concerted effort to trap a high bounty. if these could only be used while in safe, it can kind of make the fight a bit more 'honest'.

This might annoy a lot of people. Both the high bounty and the people professional chasing it can be reliant on their bonuses. Speed is vital to the suicide weasel, err, hunter. I fear this one mightn't be too popular.

My vote: I *generally* agree with this one. I agree it *does* attend to some lame use of Bonus Points, I'm just afraid it might create a spate of Safe Hugging.





So those are the two items on the table.



I have two more ideas, but I'm not sure if they are even implementable. Maybe the game coding won't allow them:

1. Can't use bonuses until you're greened to 100. My intention here is to prevent suicidal hunters performing sneak attacks, especially those coming straight out of spec where they've determined your location a moment beforehand.

I really can't see any downside to this as an idea, but as I say, it mightn't be possible to implement.

2. Can't use bonuses if below full energy. I may not have thought this one through completely, but its just an idea. Again, not sure if possible.

Don't worry, you can use the things you've bonused, but you can't bonus new ones, until you're at full energy. If you are going to make a mistake and fly into a corner where someone's shooting at you, then you shouldn't have the opportunity to bonus bursts AND use them. Think ahead, bonus earlier. If you're gonna get hit with stuff and rocket away, you shouldn't have the right to save your Bonus points to the last moment. Commit to buying Speed before you enter into the fight. Being able to Bonus at last moment and use those specials within a millisecond, well its like having a caddy.



So I'd like to suggest those as well.







Open to all discussion, let everybody know what your thoughts are! Can someone in play today (my time zone sucks) bring attention to this thread 'cause its likely to interest a few people.

Round 1 Results:



3/20 3:48 pm Sterling def Llamas 12-8 log

3/20 3:47 pm Rebels def LSF 12-2 log

3/20 3:44 pm The Dark def StarFire Elite 12-6 log

3/20 2:50 pm Assassins def Happy Mob 12-5 log

3/20 2:29 pm Nguyens def !norating 12-3 log



3 out of 4 Sterling players ended up with 5 FR. Penguin was horrible and only got 3 <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />

Gato pulled a 4-0 with 7 FR vs. LSF. Speaking of whom, should recruit more players. By the standard rules they shouldn't be in, but they're better than a BYE round as long as they don't do anything stupid like show up with 3 javelins and run.

Happy Mob kept their game vs. Assassins, who look to be more in it to win it this season, 4v4 for 30 minutes or so. Then mindriot's spaceship exploded. After which the Mopping up took 4 more minutes.



All in all it looks like 53 names appear on the league stats list.



Standings after round 1:

1 Rebels 1-0 10 0

2 Nguyens 1-0 9 0

3 Assassins 1-0 7 0

4 The Dark 1-0 6 0

5 Sterling 1-0 4 0

6 Llamas 0-1 -4 0

7 StarFire Elite 0-1 -6 0

8 Happy Mob 0-1 -7 0

9 !norating 0-1 -9 0

10 LSF 0-1 -10 0



Round 2 schedule - at least Finland fiddles with their clocks on Sunday, don't know about the rest of europe. But if you fail you'll only show up an hour early.:



EDIT: Sterling and Llamas cannot play each other by gap rule.



3pm:

StarFire Elite vs. Sterling

!norating vs. LSF

Assassins vs. The Dark



4pm:

Rebels vs. Nguyens

Happy Mob vs. Llamas

[size="2"]People are revamping the ssgn site and they'd like an updated zone description. Marketing materials always can be improved, so I'm soliciting community input. Here's the page it will go on:[/size]

[url="http://www.ssgn.net/flared/zoneinformation.php"][size="2"][color="#000000"]http://www.ssgn.net/flared/zoneinformation.php[/color][/size][/url]



[size="2"]Here's the current description on the Chaos Site:[/size]



[size="2"]

Quote:Chaos Zone is the oldest zone in Continuum and it is still standing strong today, with many players who have been dedicated to the zone for over 10 years and some who have joined just days ago. The absolute best players in subspace play in the 4v4 league hosted in the zone.



The zone is a simple kill as many people as possible game play, some go for win loss ratio, some hunt bounties, some play for points, there is a playing style for everyone. The zone resets scores every two weeks and the top five scores of each of the four categories get put on the map for everyone to see. So come on in and blow something up real good!

let's just face it: there aren't enough players to support the traditional model of greening in chaos anymore. starting with 0 or 30 or even 50 bounty was fine when there were 30-100 players in the arena and you had teams of up to 7 helping you green and getting you ready to fight. there was action enough for everybody in those days, whether they wanted to green or not - and what's important is that the promise of that action meant players were willing to green up and make it a little more high-stakes when they did make it to the fight.



forcing players to green was fine when there were *always* other pilots in; that's simply not the case anymore. a substantial portion of the time, the zone is empty. THIS IS A TERRIBLE THING. when there are no other pilots in the zone, or only 1 or 2, the fact that you have to spend 2-4 minutes greening up before you can fight on an even keel is a huge barrier to entry for most people.



we want to ENCOURAGE people to unspec. making them green up before they can fight DISCOURAGES THEM from doing so. worse, it discourages them from dying. this leads, eventually, to the kind of play that drives most league players away from chaos pub in disgust. you guys know who i'm talking about.



* IT'S NOT CHAOS PUB WITHOUT GREENING. okay - i accept that. but chaos pub, to make sense, always depended on a bigger population of players than it has now. we need some sort of hybrid - a zone where greening is still a part of play, but one that also immediately encourages players to unspec and jump in the action right away.



we can have this zone. start players with a full ship - full energy, full weapons, full ?status. those who want the traditional chaos flavor (mine repping, lobbing blueberries from afar and repping anybody who comes close) can green for their specials - for reps, bursts, bricks, whatever. you can even make people green for antiwarp, stealth, x-radar, and cloak. but don't make people green just to be able to play - you can't afford it anymore.



please, chime in. we need a discussion.

We need limit of items per ship and league ship settings

Ok so the 2nd round of preseason featured 10 squads. Solar Hydro is contemplating breaking his 11 people a game showing SFE back into SFE and SFA. This might be stupid, cause it'd create a BYE Round. Now, I know for a fact that Ra might be able to pull us some PB/DSB players to make that an even 12, but we'll see.



From last season's squads, Morph and NW are out at the beginning. Like everyone else, they have until round 6 to join as a squad. All missed matches are 0-12.



The squads in league: !norating Assassins Happy Mob Llamas LSF Nguyens Rebels StarFire Elite Sterling The Dark

Rosters are now locked for editing, additions will be handled by staff. I'll check for double squadders soon. LSF and !norating need to add a player (or two) to even hit the minimum player count of 8.

---

Some issues with the website/scheduling system, surprise surprise. The rosters on bot are season 9 / preseason ones. The rosters on website are very very empty. UL has been informed with a few question marks.



Either way, schedule for R1 will be posted here in a few days. Please note the effects of daylight savings on game times.



Hallucination played the role of lady luck, by pairing up numbers from 1-10 with each other after I had assigned a random number to each squad.

The schedule using such an advance method is:



3pm:

!norating vs. Nguyens

Assassins vs. Happy Mob



4pm:

Llamas vs. Sterling

LSF vs. Rebels

StarFire Elite vs. The Dark

If anyone is interested I may consider putting the server back up.



email me or something.. jonathan@xpressamerica.net

I'm afraid we'll go for another round of preseason for a few reason, which in my head make sense.

1. Some squads that are active in league were just notified about season start this Sunday. This means Assassins and Rebels. I'd rather they know we're in season now than after one no-show loss.

2. One, or possibly two, new squads have yet to build their roster.

3. I want to see if Nightwatch is coming back, if anyone knows anyone from the squad, poke them. Unhallowed announced they would not be returning.



3pm:

!norating vs. Happy Mob

Sterling vs. Nightwatch or The Dark - Nightwatch, if they show. TD if NW doesn't and TD does.



4pm:

Rebels vs. StarFire Elite

Llamas vs. Morph

Nguyens vs. Assassins



That should be all the squads. We had a total of 3 matches last weekend I believe. In case of two no-shows a timeslot, we can rearrange for the squads that have no opponents to play each other. Or we can use BYE Round as a random scrub squad, but that's pretty much like a prac <img src='http://www.subspace.co/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/blum.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':clapping:' />

Wondering how ppl like the current version of the rabbit flag... It has upgrades (obvious) and downgrades (maybe not so obvious, but potent). Any guesses on what the downgrades are?



--hallu