Tactics For Gaining New Players.

[Karen Wilder]

Game-oriented players are highly competitive more often than not, and being down 0-3 on the first night can kill a player's interest when they realize that they're going to have to win 5 duels in a row to make it to a higher rank. Everyone who's gotten to Warlord has likely struggled through such a situation or worse, but game-oriented players tend to be more impatient and set higher standards on themselves from the get-go, thus getting overly worried about stuff like WoL and becoming susceptible to succumbing to early frustration.

This becomes even worse if the new players aren't given the matrices to start out with. In particular, DoM is very difficult for the newbie without a complete matrix (though easier than when perfect defense was being abused), as the bulk of rounds are basic 8 vs. basic 8 and therefore it takes a VERY long time to figure out how to defend against the advanced spells that the higher ranks inevitably use on you.

This is specifically why anyone who doesn't have a positive WoL record at the end of the cycle has their record zeroed out.

If they didn't... then my first character, Drakewyn, would never have made it past Commoner. I think at one point I was more than 70 LoW in one cycle. Then I got serious, started really paying attention and got a little help and zipped my way up to Warlord.

The point is, as long as people realize that their first batch of duels doesn't have to count (unless they do really well), I think they won't have any problem with it.

[Xenograg]

I can tell you that there is a great potential in game-theory-oriented players in terms of creating a larger "newbie hose" for RoH. I should know; I'm one of them.

As the "inventor" of DoS scouting, I am also a game-theory-oriented player.

I've heard more than once from players in RoH that they don't like dueling people who don't RP during the duel

When I first started dueling, I did not RP at all during the match. I do now, but then I am no longer obsessed with winning ( ::grin::) . Personally, I would rather see the duel request RPed than the actions within the match. We are a game + RP forum, but asking everyone to do both at the same time is unreasonable (IMO).

As I said earlier, RoH has come a long way since then, but I still find it hard to deny that it takes some experience with RPing to become comfortable in an RoH chatroom, and starting out with none means an uphill battle largely without support (unless you have a patron in one of the regular players, and even then...) that quite a few won't bother taking.

I must say that I want to see the duel request RPed. That will likely make me ignore new players until they get their RP established. Looks like I need to review my own assumption here. ( ::smile:: )

...the real killer of game-oriented players is that there is no chance to practice against human opponents; once you start dueling, all your duels are ranked.

That is exactly what the old dueling schools were for. Upon finding a teacher (difficulty of doing so varied over time), you really joined a RP group of duelists. You acquired game knowledge, tactics, but also comrades and RP foils. The teacher and fellow students helped the new player acclimate to the RoH style of RP.

Dueling schools were started by players for players.

This becomes even worse if the new players aren't given the matrices to start out with....

Another place the dueling schools helped new players, especially the "impatient game-theorists." Either through sparring or discussion with the other school members, you could fill in your matrix.

In his own words, this was partly due to the fact that he felt he was "too far in the hole" to make it out of negative WoL, and didn't want to wait a couple of months for the standings to reset him back to 0.

The point is, as long as people realize that their first batch of duels doesn't have to count (unless they do really well), I think they won't have any problem with it.

AOL DoS standings cycles were two months rather than three. Perhaps those extra weeks are too long to make new players wait. :: makes note to discuss cycle length with Billy ::

An excellent post, Random. Thank you.

[Amaltea]

Amal has expressed interest in doing something "Oracle"-like on the RoH forums with the content being drawn from DZN. (There is already a mini-feed on the RoH front page that will list the headlines of articles posted within the last 30 days.)

And, since that leads nicely into a solicitation...

I'd love to get more contributors for DZN. I'm only one orc and it's hard to write all or most of the content while working other dueling projects.

You heard it guys, we are hiring reporters. Not just dueling reporters, but also regular news. If you ever wanted to write a news article, this is the time.

[Jake]

2) Though I spent a good deal of space talking about the intimidation factor of RP, the real killer of game-oriented players is that there is no chance to practice against human opponents; once you start dueling, all your duels are ranked.

I remember when I got started dueling, it was not uncommon for people to ask for/offer "spars". Duels that would not count for standings purposes.

I always thought that was a great way to get in duels, especially during the early times when you were still learning the matrix, to get a feel for what it was all about. Not every player will agree to a spar, but I certainly wouldn't mind seeing them come back.

Also, we used to see unofficial duels called "after-hours" sometimes by players who just hadn't enough dueling yet. It was another good way to get in a few duels that "don't count".

[Elijah]

I can't believe I am saying this considering the past, but I do believe we need to integrate the RDI and RoH more. The current scenario of doing that seems to be working and should continue to develop more over time. The problem before is the RDI on AOL had a lot of players, though many seemed undesireable to associate with then. Like the RoH now, the RDI has a solid base of quality regulars that have supported it through the transition to the web off AOL. But like the RoH, the RDI has a limited set of players to draw from to be interested in the duels which will plateau out the influx of players from that source.

I believe advertising on Myspace.com would be a huge mistake and have a similar vastly negative effect that AOL's change to monthly flat rate pricing did on the FFGF and the duels. Yes, it may generate huge quanity of numbers checking us out, but the tidal wave of potential idiots could ruin what we have here now. If we do advertise I think it should be to the type of sites Rakeesh's player suggested. Atleast in initial attempts at advertising outside the extended old FFGF communities. Find similiar targetted communities as ours to see if we can attract somewhat likeminded gameing players.

If we do advertise we should advertise all the dueling aspects as a unified front to give people more variations of the dueling community to intially explore. That is why I think the Dueling Zone should be our public face to others to first show since it offers a taste of everything and a way to get to every aspect of the dueling community easily right at the first page. Some might like the prospect of league dueling more than what RoH offers and vice versa. The goal is to get them to taste anything that sparks their interest and then hopefully they get hooked and explore more.

The point though is to offer many choices of variation of the same in an easy starting format that is led to by route of similar interests.

[Billy]

AOL DoS standings cycles were two months rather than three. Perhaps those extra weeks are too long to make new players wait. :: makes note to discuss cycle length with Billy ::

Just a little sidenote to the discussion:

The first time a cycle is mentioned on the DoS standings is 4/1/93 and it did indeed run two monnths. The cycle was switched to a three month period on 6/1/98. That occurred as a result of the rules overhaul that gave us the neutral alignment as well as the 10-13th rings. And that's your history lesson for the day, kids.

[Xenograg]

The cycle was switched to a three month period on 6/1/98. That occurred as a result of the rules overhaul that gave us the neutral alignment as well as the 10-13th rings. And that's your history lesson for the day, kids.

Thanks!

Is still on list of things to discuss for the future of DoS.