I have followed this thread with interest, for what I hope is obvious reasons, but I don't understand this one. What J-Mod communities are you thinking of that we are trying to replace clan communities with?
-Mod Matthe
Respectfully, your "following this thread for obvious reasons" is a tad vague, at least to me.
This thread has the potential to be a powder keg - there are some trenchant views on both sides and a lot of anger or resentment about some of the things being discussed. As a moderator I keep my eyes on this kind of thread.
But the *actual* reason I have been following this thread is because both Mod Maz and myself care deeply about Clans. Sometimes we have nothing to add that will further the discussion but we never ignore them.
Mod MattHe |
Former Community Manager, now in Events & occasional Lore Monkey
Scret
said
:
They have also damaged clans in a more indirect way by allowing PVP to be in the state that it is in atm, PVP clans use to be thriving in RSC and early runescape now we just dont see many of them.
Its come to the point where the list of improvements are so so many, leaves me banging my head on the table trying to understand why.
When there's time to create a new game but no time to improve the current game, I think there's just a bad management team. I felt pretty mad when I saw DarkScape is getting the Legacy combat updates RS3 players have been asking for since Legacy came out. It feels they have given up on RuneScape 3 PvP.
As Matthe has stated, this thread can and will be a powder keg. We want to be here to give input on things, and help create updates to help clans further--maybe not large updates that break the game--but updates that keep clans in the modern time. One prime example would be new plots to accommodate any future skills, because it will turn into a problem soon, maybe not now but soon. I realize the difficulty in many updates due to code, engine work, etc. But we can only be turned down and shut down so many times before we tire of it. Which as you can see is already happening. I, and if I may say, we know you care about clans but we aren't seeing anything of it. It has been years since the year of the clans and all we got is a new cooldown system that divided us further. We need something more than empty promises, and excuses. We need results of our efforts in this thread while representing the clans we lead.
~Andras
Owner Of
Prestige Legion
A high level bossing clan without the elitism
Fire Hawk154
said
:
Scret
said
:
They have also damaged clans in a more indirect way by allowing PVP to be in the state that it is in atm, PVP clans use to be thriving in RSC and early runescape now we just dont see many of them.
Its come to the point where the list of improvements are so so many, leaves me banging my head on the table trying to understand why.
When there's time to create a new game but no time to improve the current game, I think there's just a bad management team. I felt pretty mad when I saw DarkScape is getting the Legacy combat updates RS3 players have been asking for since Legacy came out. It feels they have given up on RuneScape 3 PvP.
Agreed. Darkscape is a complete backhander to the main game and the fact Jagex dont realise that or want to acknowledge that for me is terrible.
A big part of the sommunity will be torn from the main game this includes PVP clans, i for one dont wanna see the clan community become even more diminished. But you know what its too late, the damage is already done and to many resources are being spent and used trying to fix a mess.
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SKILL SCHOOL
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19-Oct-2015 17:21:32
- Last edited on
19-Oct-2015 17:27:25
by
Scret
So after reading all the posts up until this point here are my two cents about the issue, this is mainly aimed at all of those people who may want some clarification about the work that is going into clans in general.
Being a Runescape player for the last 10 years on this account, and a clan leader for the last 7 years (My clan was a friendchat clan before it was a actual clan chat) I can say that everyone is forgetting what a clan really is.
A clan is just a group of people who have similar idea's and who fit well together and often what to achieve a common goal.
When I started my friends chat for the Soulwars minigame, I recruited people who were interested in Soulwars and that's all we did in the friends chat. We were not worried about other things like citadels or tracking our XP gains, or wanting to know who has the Avatar or all the other issues that are rampant as problems in our modern clans.
Jagex gave us these things to further improve our interaction however Jagex has never said that we start treating these features as the ultimate do all end all. Clans were always meant to be a tool in which to help players engage in other activities or participate in other activities as a group, it's only over the last few years have clans turned into a entity of their own.
The thing about clans and Runescape is, your clan will only be as interesting as you make it, Jagex has already given us the foundations to work on and I understand there are some things that we are unhappy with, but when in life does everyone get everything they want?At the end of the day lets step back and look at everything from Jagex's point of view.
Flatly said Jagex is still a business and has a commitment to keep their players happy. But we really have to look at how many players are kept happy when focusing solely on clans? We all know the issues, time, resources that Jagex has to spend to do a clan rework.
If your a business and you weigh up the Pro's and the Con's of working on a project you need to take into account everything. For example if the NXT client takes the same amount of code rework/time/effort as clans, of course the NXT client will take priority over things like clan projects.
Don't forget even though clans are important, how important are the new features going to be as compared to a new bit of content that brings more players into Runescape or gives the old time players something to look forward too or redesigns the way in which we interact with Runescape every day? For example how many people will be happy if a few more skills are added in the citadel, even though there are better ways to train the skill?
Even if Jagex wanted to work on the clans we keep forgetting they need to firstly work on projects that are for the greater good for Runescape and not targeting just small communities of people. Even if we did have all these extra features what good would they be if we can't offer the same levels of enjoyment that other content can bring to players? I know that there are some players who only live and breath for clans but Jagex always need to work on new and engaging content that keeps players happy.
If Jagex really wanted too make a impact on clans they could always redesign the whole clan system and build it from scratch, give clans a totally new role in the world of Runescape rather then keep making fixes to the existing clan system to cater to this "We are our own entity" mentality.
Clans have always been designed with the purpose of be used to play content in groups and as an extra tool to the social aspect of Runescape, not be an bit of content in themselves that people need to be interacting with.
I really think both Mod Matthe and Maz are doing the best that they can given the fact Jagex only gives them the ability to do much, they are still employees and they don't call the shots.
I understand that in other games clans do play a bigger role and there are some very valid points that have been made how Jagex has made false promises and that they are forgetting the usefulness of clans. Also how clans serve the same importance as other content, but the thing is in most other games clans have been designed side by side with the game and are an integral part of the game design.
In Runescape from what I can tell and heard clans were added as bit of an afterthought and using technology that was out of date and coding that was a bit odd (Hence why it's so hard to rework it all now). Now in other games where clans play a much bigger role is because there is specific game play content that depends on clans and your interaction with them (Maybe particular rewards, access to particular areas, clan specific mounts/armours/badges) I can understand why focus is given to clan updates in those games.
Runescape is not one of those games, in Runescape nothing is "Forced" on you and people decide what types of groups they want to join th types of people they want to hang out with and content they want to play. Again this all goes back to the "Purpose" of clans and why they are in Runescape in the first place? If we strip back everything and look at why a clan gains or looses members we can only point to one thing, which is the people that are in the clans or how interesting the activity the clan is performing is.
Why are all the biggest clans mostly skilling or PVM clans? The reason for this is because those are clans which encourage like minded people to come together to do something, for example kill a boss often in those clans other "Clan" issues are not even discussed or payed attention too unless your in a skilling clan I guess in which you may need to know where the avatar is?
If you guys are scared about loosing members due to the changes in Runescape then it is up to all of you to band together as a community and work to fight these changes.
If you want to keep players then show the players that if they have a good reason to continue playing Runescape it's because of your clan. Everyone talks about the tools that we need to make clans better, I say those tools can be DIY'd or worked around.
Back in the day when I was at soulwars we had a dedicated (IRC) channel in which we all use to sit and there were scripts that players made to do things like "Combat checks" this where a players name would be typed into the IRC chat and their entire skill set would show up including their combat level and any rival clans they were in. The reason for this is because we did not want lower combat people joining so we assigned a few people to do these regular checks for us.
We didn't go to Jagex and say "We need a system that doesn't allow XYZ people to join the friends chat". I am sure that all of you people have heard of clan websites right, well use things like that to make your clan more exiting and engaging, develop your own features to may your clan STAND OUT, from the rest of the clans, make your DIY (Do it yourself) tools to the things that you think are missing.
The makers of the "Runeclan" put together this awesome system that let us check who left the clan or who changed their RSN and when they did it and things like XP trackers and cools things like that. Did Jagex make all of these things for us? No? The community made the things because it thought that it needed them. If you guys are worried you need to always know where the Avatar is why not develop something that helps you keep track of where the Ava is?
What I am mainly trying to say is we as the community need to band together to make clans a better place for all for the future and not rely on Jagex to do this for us.
We are a talented community and I am sure all of you have your own strengths, why doesn't someone make the thread "2016: Clans Designed By Players" make a set of goals and objectives the CLF want to achieve and lets try work on that together.
I know there are many things we would like to see done with clans, but let's stop talking about how much Jagex sucks at helping us why don't we outline the things WE ARE UNHAPPY WITH and then post our own SOLUTIONS to those problems and then work on them throughout 2016?
-If your good at coding/scripting offer your time to try and make some tools that will benefit the clans in terms of offsite support (maybe even get Maz to help if she can)?
-If your good at event planning why not make combined events Calendar with other clans or interact with each other so clans can do things together?
-If you are a small clan and are dying out fast why not get together with another clan to discuss a merger or something of that sort?
-If your a clan that's focused on PVP why not join forced with other PVP clans to host regular PVP event's like a mini clan CUP?
-If your a minigame clan then just have a "Minigame Crawl" or something of the sort every few days and collaborate with other clans to do it and develop new ways to get competitive with those Minigames?
-If you are concerned about recruiting and the way recruiting works in Runescape then think of new and improved ways to get your clan in the spotlight?
Those are just some random idea's I am throwing out, but the point I am trying to make is how much do we really need from Jagex to help ourselves as I know there are many things we can sort out for ourselves without the need for Jagex to be involved. Players have always been on the forefront of doing things before Jagex does (RuneWiki, RuneHQ, Runeradio, Swiftkit, OSBUDDY) so WHY CANT WE, and maybe Jagex will get some idea's along the way as well.
@Mod Matthe: Thank-you very much for elaborating for me (and others) Matthe.
@L0ne Druid: A very new take on the discussion, and an outstanding one. I enjoyed reading your post(s), and there are points that should certainly be kept in mind.
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Shamk
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5,000+ PK's
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Maxed - 1.7b xp.
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going for 120's
20-Oct-2015 02:57:36
- Last edited on
20-Oct-2015 07:39:11
by
Shamk