Player Slot and Game Census

[Vi]

While I agree entirely with your hate for people who do not post accurate lists of people who are alive in the first post, I'm not sure what you're researching here.

[Vi]

The why is a little more difficult to answer as it kind of has a lot of answers and just one: I was curious.

That's as good a reason as any

Actually, the 230 player slots active in Large Theme games reminds me of a theory someone had that I was talking about a while ago... actually... that was with you.

Never mind me then (>")>

Actually, what would be really cool is some measurement of how long game Days are on average in different types of games. It might be easier to measure that directly, though.

[Vi]

An assumption that is obviously incorrect as I'd imagine there are only a few people who would like to moderate a game at all times.

Only a few?

[Vi]

Obviously we're still recovering from the crash, especially in the case of large normals (although % of slots playing large themes is actually up).

But a couple of things that REALLY stand out: Opens are way, way up (in fact the only category that has more slots now than in October). I attribute this to the far better game selection and Hoopla's influence there. The other is that Mini-Themes are way, way down. I don't know how to account for this. It's been enough months that nearly all mini-themes should be post-crash.

So I'm not sure what's causing this except maybe a shift in tastes, possibly brought on by well known mods running fewer mini-themes and more large themes, and a better selection of interesting open games as an alternative to minis.

My occasionally-correct rumor mill says that the Mini Themes these days have been kind of lame.

Also renumbering players as they die is horrible because each number is supposed to represent a player slot (e.g. "Slot 4 is being played by Vi"). Alive/Dead counts at the top are fine but not really relevant over the course of the game as you should be mentioning how many players are alive in each vote count.

[Vi]

It could also just be that there aren't a lot of people with good ideas for modding L.Themes.

[Vi]

It could also just be that there aren't a lot of people with good ideas for modding L.Themes.

when has this ever stopped anyone? <_<

Well

some

of them know when to quit.

[Vi]

mind screw 6 anyone?

I've had Mind Screw 6 in the works since before Mind Screw III.

...I'm not even kidding.

[Vi]

well, that seems to lend credence to the idea that we don't have enough qualified mods.

I'm not sure I agree.

To get an estimate of how many L.Theme-qualified mods there are, what about counting the last six months' worth of L.Normal and M.Theme mods, and then adding a few for the people who have run two Opens, etc.?

[Vi]

well does the absolute number matter? if we're not getting enough games, we don't have enough mods.

But we're answering why there aren't enough mods.

[Vi]

but your response is essentially that there are a lot of qualified mods out there but they aren't modding, correct?

Essentially. And I see how that leads to your point; whether the answer is "overhaul the system so we can have more mods" is something different.

[Vi]

yes. it's the experience requirement combined with the fact that micros don't provide experience.

If we have a lot of mods who are eligible to run games that just aren't for some reason, that doesn't mean the experience requirement is a problem.

[Vi]

Also @zoraster: I'm modding a L.Theme right now. Where's yours?

[Vi]

yes. it's the experience requirement combined with the fact that micros don't provide experience.

If we have a lot of mods who are eligible to run games that just aren't for some reason, that doesn't mean the experience requirement is a problem.

Actually, it does. If we had more people with experience, we'd have more large themes. If the % of qualified mods who run a large theme has reduced from 5% to 2%, you still get more mods by increasing the raw number qualified even if the % stays low (which it would not necessarily, since it's possible that newer mods will be more excited and fresh).

True. But does that mean that our system is broken? is that something we

should

do? I don't see this as a crisis.

Also @zoraster: I'm modding a L.Theme right now. Where's yours?

Forthcoming! But I have things to talk to you about first.

But you see my point.

[Vi]

Now, running a theme game is obviously a lot more difficult than an Open/Normal and a lot more depends on you as the game designer, as you aren't given a pre-approved setup and a review panel to help you out, and this should be taken into consideration when setting limits. But our general agreement was that running an Open Game or a Mini Normal isn't going to improve your credentials when trying to make a good Mini Theme, and the best learning comes from time spent playing in games.

I don't think a modded game should be a prerequisite for Large Normals/Mini Themes when it isn't required for Mini Normals/Opens (presuming it's roughly equally easy to run any of those four types of games).

From a design perspective I don't really agree with either of these.

And zor how often does someone join the site and not sign up for a game the same or next day?

*does otter imitation* It's not too uncommon. Also, alts, etc.

[Vi]

prescient.

:vi:

Can you expand on this? Which part of the quote are you disagreeing with and why?

I don't agree that playing onsite, by itself, will give you the ability to mod a good half-complex game - that actually takes experience running a game, and doing something that's at least

kind of

easy will set you on your way there. In addition, it probably won't stop people from bringing their offsite everyone's-a-broken-power-role games here.