Return of TDL?

[Cassius Gaius Maximius]

Thing is, Napoleon-player just said that Jake and Kalamere were talking about how much they missed TDL/IFL. I personally get the sense that we needed a hiatus, but I also get the sense that the necessity for such a hiatus has passed. We're doing better in terms of participation now than we were at the time that TDL and IFL closed.

I think we should "ease" back into it, personally. A tag-team league of a league with three members on each team could be an idea, or a truncated TDL/IFL style league. Also, Maria-player is correct in that the websites for TDL and IFL were a vast undertaking...but perhaps we could have simple Standings posted on this site?

Just throwing ideas out there.

[Tasslehofl Momus]

My question is.. where would these matches be held? Cause, you do have to remember that no everyone has AIM/AOL these days.

[Cassius Gaius Maximius]

During IFL season, the RoH people created a chat room for IFL in the FC.

[Michiko]

And again I have a FC available as well.

[Napoleon Bonarat]

We (all three of us) don't miss the scheduling headaches and attitudes. Jake and Kalamere like doing programming, so it was less about TDL/IFL and more about coding/putting something together. I miss very little about the administrative side of things (was a huge source of stress for me) but I do miss the dueling and the roleplay. For IFL and DoS Madness, I LOVED the programs Kalamere put together for Fantasy IFL and Madness pools.

I am more in favor of seeing something new come out and seeing if Jake and Kalamere have any interest lending their vast expertise toward database automation and all the technical/coding stuff that goes into something like that. Michiko's suggestion of a tag team is good, as well as the world league that ran a few years ago between TDL seasons. World League involved all three sports. Two duels were DoS, one was DoF, one was DoM, the last was captain's pick (I think home team captain).

Flash chat is an option, but how can you have individual arenas with the ability for a screen name to be in more than one room at a time? This was a necessity during TDL so we could have (a) our own themed arenas, and (b) a person could call in one room while still being able to cheer/duel in another room. It's a drag having to create different screen names just to be able to hang out in multiple rooms. And trying to run more than one arena theme in the same room would get very confusing.

Not having AIM is easy enough to fix. It's such easy software to install.

[Joex Rodlain]

The world league sounds like an interesting idea. Jake and Kala's help would also greatly assist whatever effort we undertake. In terms of difficulty with administrative tasks, however, if we're able to have a few people do it - i.e. one for each match each week or something - maybe that would lighten the load so no one gets frustrated or burned out. That said I don't know all that much about what's involved - would that be something that's feasible?

[Napoleon Bonarat]

We tried division managers one year where if there was a problem the div manager of the home team had to handle the dispute unless there was a conflict of interest that week (captaining/dueling for either team), but it didn't really work. Maybe that would work this time though with a smaller league as long as the people who take on the role are committed and easy to get a hold of when there's a no show.

We can talk more in the email that you sent. We need to talk among ourselves first to see where we stand and what involvement we want to have if you do actual TDL.

For some reason I'm not getting notifications when replies are posted even though I have it checked.

[G. Iulius Fortis]

I'd really like to see the World League get off the ground - I had been toying with the idea of having a tournament on Fight Night along that line, and I'd be willing to start the World League in, say, January, if there was interest.

[Kalamere]

The timing on this thread is eerie. We really were just talking about TDL on Friday and this pops up the next day.

I can't speak for Jake & Lexa so, therefore, can't speak to circumstances under which we would re-launch TDL. They're my partners in crime and we have to be on the same page for it to work. We'll talk about it and come to some consensus in the next week or so most likely

That said, I'll throw out a couple things on my mind.

* 4 teams isn't enough to make things interesting. The fewest number of teams a TDL season ever ran with was 10 (514 and 525). Just from doing things like Fantasy Football, my experience is that 4 teams gets monotonous. I suppose 8 could be an option, 6 would be pushing it.. but 4 just wouldn't be worth it.

* The 2 character limit per player would have to stay in place and there's a requirement of 7 duelists per team (with an 8th being optional). Assume for purposes of discussion we would run an 8 team league. That requires a minimum of 28 players. ((8teams*7duelists)/2duelists per player). Realistically, you want at least 35-40.

* AIM is free and I hate flash chat. IFL ran in the flash rooms 'cause it was Chairman's call. TDL lives on AIM. I think that the last season we ran there were a couple teams that used the flash chat rooms and that's fine. Any TDL Arena duels though (eg: TDL Cup final, All Stars) would be on AIM chat for sure, with a preference for all duels to be that way unless both captains agreed otherwise. Point being.. if TDL were to be alive you would need an AIM screen name to register.

* Something new would be cool. Whether it's a tag team thing or something as yet un-thought of. You don't need to be bound to our TDL rules or the histories.. you could involve all the active players to come up with a team game and rules system that interests them and then launch something that everyone has some investment in. I, and probably Jake, would be happy to help you stand up a website and automation to support whatever it is. You just need whoever leads the effort to rent some webspace and trust us with the access. That was our role in IFL.. purely as tech geeks and advisory staff. We're not bad at that =) I'll also keep my hands off your rules unless you want some input.

* Lastly.. I see a couple "no" votes. I'd be really interested to hear why those were cast. That's honestly not an attempt to call anyone out. A year ago I'd have voted no myself. I'm curious of the reasoning though and to see if it's something I might agree with.

~Kal
aka: Brandon Fox, TDL Commissioner

[Cassius Gaius Maximius]

"* The 2 character limit per player would have to stay in place and there's a requirement of 7 duelists per team (with an 8th being optional). Assume for purposes of discussion we would run an 8 team league. That requires a minimum of 28 players. ((8teams*7duelists)/2duelists per player). Realistically, you want at least 35-40. "

When we ran this year's incarnation of DoS Madness, it was during a period when activity in the forum was considerably less than where it stands now, there was a decent amount of people in the active/semi-active pool of duelists at the time who just didn't enter(for example..the current OL, the OL before that, half of the Baronial Council at the time, and the last two Madness winners all didn't enter), and the lack of TDL definitely cut off contact from some people who had entered the previous two. And we still managed to field a roster that was roughly as large as what you suggest is realistically needed. So it can definitely be done.

"* AIM is free and I hate flash chat. IFL ran in the flash rooms 'cause it was Chairman's call. TDL lives on AIM. I think that the last season we ran there were a couple teams that used the flash chat rooms and that's fine. Any TDL Arena duels though (eg: TDL Cup final, All Stars) would be on AIM chat for sure, with a preference for all duels to be that way unless both captains agreed otherwise. Point being.. if TDL were to be alive you would need an AIM screen name to register. "

This personally isn't an issue for me...but I'm going to warn you, insistence on AOL/AIM will probably turn a few people away. Yes, it's free and it's easy to install....but some people have hangups about it.

"* Lastly.. I see a couple "no" votes. I'd be really interested to hear why those were cast. That's honestly not an attempt to call anyone out. A year ago I'd have voted no myself. I'm curious of the reasoning though and to see if it's something I might agree with. "

There are only two no votes, first off. The positive response as evidenced by the poll has been overwhelming. Secondly, if I had to take a guess...I would say that it's a matter of scheduling conflicts. That said...I don't want to start a flame war, but I'm going to address the elephant in the room...there are a couple people in these forums(no names will be named or even hinted at) who have the type of attitude where they just like to be difficult and may have voted "no" to be dicks. Secondly(and again, no names), there are also a couple of people here with hangups about TDL.

[Michiko]

On the Con side for AIM

It has been notoriously unreliable for some people. I know I have days I want to gut the program.

[Wyheree]

I'd like to see TDL restored in some form. I personally enjoyed it much more as a straight dueler, as opposed to a team captain (but that could very well stem from the fact I took on too much that season). I may also be interested in officiating for TDL again.

AIM isn't an issue for me - as some know, I practically live there when I'm at the computer. It has its quirks, yes, but then so does the Flashchat. It's 6 of one, half a dozen of the other from my perspective.

[Joex Rodlain]

I too have no preference between flash and AIM. I also agree with Cass that finding 35-40 people shouldn't be an issue as I can think of 3-4 newer folks who I've never seen on the boards who would probably be up for this. The idea that we would need 8 teams though makes sense to me and I think with enough lead time (a month or two) we could easily find that kind of involvement.

As far as my commitment goes, as I've already stated I'd be happy to assist in whatever way to the administration of the league. Later on, I'd also be more than willing to call (and obviously to participate myself).

All in all, I'm just glad to see so many folks intersted in this in one capacity or another.

[Neo Eternity]

For the longest time, I thought TDL was a multi-venue affair. I was a young teenager when TDL was still around, so I couldn't participate due to school, and I didn't know much about it. Unless my source is wrong, I have now found out that it's Swords only. I would not retract my "yes" vote, though, with this newfound knowledge.

Take this as you will, but if I had to pick between TDL and World League, I'd rather do World League. I haven't really thought in-depth about the pros and cons of WL vs. TDL. I'd like to see more unity between the three venues. The FireStar/Dockside double challenge last night was a great step toward that, and I think WL would help too. One con that does come to mind though, is that it might force duelists into venues they're not comfortable with.

Anyways, if we ended up having TDL instead of WL (or even alongside it, though that might be kind of insane), I'd definitely still want to participate.

[G]

TDL has always been swords only. There was a period of time where the admins of TDL ran a World League that had all the duels involved in it. It was enjoyable and was mostly done as a test run with two "seasons."

TDL will always be my favorite. But I'm not opposed to a WDL type of thing, either.