I think one of the things that most inspired me to write this post is reading some facts about other communities and how much they've experienced growth in game and on their forums since the F2P update. Communities like Drunken Brawl have added nearly 50% of their original population in the last few weeks.

So maybe it's time for a refresher on what we need to be doing to ensure Badwater is always here for those who want to play it, any time of day. It's also time for a reminder on what we can be doing to see our internal community grow, and see the ATG tag spread further and further.

Keep in mind when you're going to read this that I'm really not trying to chastise anyone; I've slipped up a lot too, and haven't brought as many faces to the forums as I should have.

One of the hugest things that originally brought me to ATG was how much of a family we all seemed to be. After switching from XFG, I was able to play with ATG during the glory days. If you missed out on those times, I really feel sorry for you. Those were some of the most fun hours I've ever had playing video games. I'm sure I knew pretendica, jane doe, and bioghost all before they knew me. And that was what kept me coming back: A constantly growing friendship between new people and seasoned veterans.

So I want to ask you this, how many people who aren't ATG registered users do you have fun with on a daily basis? How many do you say, wow that guy did something really cool, or strike up a conversation with someone? I know I experience this at least once a day in Badwater. Yet I've failed to invite most/all of them to the forums, where I can expand upon our friendship and possibly bring someone into the community as a regular and as a contributor.

Is it that difficult for us to say, "Hey is this your first time playing here?" or "Man, you're pretty good." and follow it up by asking them to visit or forums, and make sure they come back to the server and that you enjoyed playing with them.

The last little bit I want to touch on is Server Etiquette. I think we all struggle with this and we probably do some small things that we don't even notice that potentially hurt the duration the server is full/running.

First thing I want to touch on is this, if you're in a badwater server and it's not ours and you're with SEVERAL ATG regulars, PLEASE try and start OUR badwater instead. I know we all want to play a full game, but a 10 minute sacrifice could mean a full server for the rest of the day. Just ask the people you see in the server if they'd like to start badwater with you, and send out PMs. It's not too difficult.

Next, and something that's very subtle is this: If you're a good player, and you constantly support your team, chances are most of the people in the server will know who you are. Even first timers may recognize that you are doing work. This leads me to two very important points. A. If you're going to have to leave the server in a shortly, make sure you try and disconnect at an opportune time. Try to quit when the teams are relatively balanced, and losing you won't cause a massive rage quit and server failure. and B. Ask on admin/friends chat if any other admins/friends are leaving at the same time. If you can stagger your disconnects, the server will look more appealing to new joiners, as they'll see a more consistent 22/24 or 21/24 then 16/24 because of quits.

I'm really trying to be sincere here, and I'm sure there's many things I missed. But if you want this community to last for as long as I do, I'm sure you'll not only follow what I said, but think of more things too.

Here's to the long life of our community. We're over 2 years old. There's something to be said for that.

Yeah, it's caught my attention a few times, too, when I see a bunch of ATG regulars playing together on someone else's server--especially when most of them are admins. Also, I've met a few people at school who play TF2 and have expressed interest in joining the community so I'll see what I can do to get them to follow through.

I think everyone who is part of the community should try to put the [ATG] tag in front of their name when on the server as well. I think it will help show it isn't just a PUB server but a ATG community server.

Good suggestion Newman. What I'm wondering, though, if we could install the name changer mod to list registered steam ids *aka our community* to auto-tag

That's a thought.

Das did some really cool stuff to me last nite. The conversation I wanted to have with him was mainly with my middle finger.

I'll do what I can, mainly not so much bfbc2. Also I think it'll be a good idea to help out the f2p players rather than make fun of them. We were them 2 years ago...well maybe just me.

It can take much longer than 10 to start the server, many times it doesn't get going at all and the few that joined leave. Often I only have 30 minutes or an hour to play so I'd rather not spend most of that time alt tabbed waiting for people when I could be missing easy airshots on another server.

I've noticed people cry and leave because they die too much to something, usually krtiz. Unless there are a lot of regulars on I usually don't play heavy with a medic anymore because people quit, its a joke. I'm not trying to brag at all but that's how it is now. Server Clearing Minigun living up to it's name

Also some of the quits could be because of team makeup. 90% of the time I end up playing medic because there isn't one on the team when I join, I'd rather play another class but if that's what it takes to win... I do it. Me, Serrabella, Pre, Marcus and Das are for the most part the only ones that play medic a lot. Play medic more damn it.

Wearing the ATG tag would help a lot, people will see that players that play here are regulars and have played for a while. I would play more, but I only have 30-60 minutes to play on the week so I can't really hang around too long to populate the server.

I agree with Hulk, we shouldn't bash too much on the F2P players, we should help them become better players overall so that they come back to play. I remember when I first started to play 2 years ago, what made me come back was the help that I got from regular players. I got better (well I think) and have way more fun here on ATG servers than the other pub servers. The other thing with ATG is the way the community plays the game, we here play as a Team, unlike pub servers where people play an individual game and just care about themselves and end up never capping or getting rolled.

This brings me to the other issue in TF2, there are some players out there that just join the game and don't play as a team (help each other, heal people on the team, taking the engineer's metal, not spy checking if they are pyros) and that creates a lot of frustration to any seasoned player. I remember a player last week where I a regular on the server just told the engi to move his stuff up and build a tele as fast as possible (repeated over a 5 minutes) and the player said that it wasn't of the regular's business to tell him what to do. I really hated that attitude and I think that the player should realize that we play TF2 a bit differently than on pub servers.

I sometimes really wished that new players would realize also that The Medic is a very important and even crucial player in the game, no team should ever go without one. That's why I play medic often if there isn't one (+400h!). I agree with Skon, people plz play more medic!

Anyways that's my 2 cents on it.

I think atg should get rid of class limits

honestly, even I get told to fuck off if I ask to have the slot back - which is extremely discouraging

Yeah. I totally agree. If we claim to be the best at this map, which I think we want that claim. Then we should be able to handle an engi stack, or when there's a useless sniper or spy stack. And as the pro's of this map, we should know how to counter said stacks...

This is a bit off-topic, but what's the idea behind the F2P tags?

Good thread Magus.

1. I have to agree, class limits are very annoying, especially where they are set. The other server I play on has no class limits, and the advantages of each class can be countered by another class.

Even 7 engies on a single team of a 32 person server don't rule...we had that one time on that server. And a single spy sapped and killed all but one sentry, including the dispensers and teleports, followed by their whole team descending and taking out the engies. My sentry was the only one that survived, mainly because mine was placed off to the side pointed at the other sentries to protect them from close range attacks.

Class limits do two things, the first is piss people off when they can't play the class they want to, and the second is piss people off when they get kicked from the class they were playing by an admin/donor who joined that class.


2. The second thing I think is hurting our server IS the F2P tag. We are essentially lumping about 1/3rd of the people that come to our server in a ridiculed group, simply because they are new. Rather than helping them and making them feel part of the community, we are saying: "haha!"

This is opposite what I felt the community of ATG was about when I joined, and I first started coming very late (last summer) due to the Mac version of the game coming only just then coming out. If I had been on a server that labeled me "Newbie" every time I joined, I would not return. We essentially are saying that everyone who is new to the game is unwelcome. Meanwhile we are struggling to keep our existing players coming back due to changing interests. The result is a shrinking TF2 community.

The biggest server killers I see are when the server is not fully populated, say 5vs5 and someone goes medic with someone else who is really good or having a lvl3 sentry with 3vs3 or 4vs4. The other team doesn't really have a chance, and the server usually empties out before the round is over. Is there a mod that would maybe disable medic or only allow quick fix medic if there is less then 6vs6. Same thing with engineer if there is less then 4vs4 or only allowing chinese mini-sentries?

I do support class limits however on spy and sniper. All the other classes I don't really care. I hate looking at my team make up and seeing 6+ snipers & spies combined.

I'm definitely pro class limits, and I don't like people with stupidly high voices...

That said, more up-time on Badwater would be nice. I used to try to help get it going but it seemed like we'd play fluctuating between 3v3 and 5v5 for hours and the server would never fill and people just gave up. Now I play elsewhere until it's full. For example, over the next 4 days I'll be working 48 hours, when I get to play I want to actually play... not seed.