Planetwars - thoughts and suggestions

Well...nobody there to play with and my gf is asleep next to me anyway...so...done some thinking.

Basis of my thinking is some analysis of the playerbase. There has been lots of suggestions about how to expand playerbase - most of them in fact technical solutions. Since I can`t code shit and lack the time to learn, this way of approaching the small playerbase-issue kinda excludes me from solving it.

But what can be done except "make the game better" (my opinion about that comes in another post)?

We could start with some events. Good promotion (I kinda know a bit about that) starts with having something to tell. The last "event" I remember is planetwars which basically failed due to the small player base. I wouldn`t recommend repeating that since it will likely fail again. Still, the PW idea is amazing, so it`s worth thinking about ways to improve it.

My idea is to make PW more "campaign-like". It could be changed into a mode consisting of a) a lot of smaller campaigns which consist of 3-5 Fights. A campaign would feature 3-5 maps which have to be played in a row (Homemap faction 1, neutral map, homemap faction 2) if(!) it is possible we might even think about a perma-death for commanders - if a com dies, it can not be used again until the end of the campaign. Other features like the ban of certain units for the duration of the campaign ("Sir, there is the virus in our Silencer-Software" might also be nice.
b) this mode could integrate a ranking for teams that fought several times together. This ranking could be simple like "a team that wins a campaign by beating the enemy at his homemap it gets 5 points, if it wins by having more wins on the maps but doesnt manage to conquer homemap it is 3 points, draw is 1 point). This ranking would encourage competitive gameplay. Furthermore it would be something to write on a blog. Teams wouldn`t have to be that static, i would even suggest that each player can join multiple teams and play with them as it suits him/her.

I see several advantages coming with this new way towards events and competitive gameplay.
- it encourages the formation of clans but does not exclude noobs completely. Since we could limit the number of events per week, this will not result in a total seperation of beginners and pros (which I think would be very very bad)
- it hopefully leads to more pros sticking to the game (where the fuck is Klon btw?) since you would have some games with only pros and a high competitive character). Some intense games might be a lot of motivation for some and since its events where people kinda plan on going, you can be sure to have some nice opponents
- the mere existence of a more competitive and cooperative mode might lead to some newbs actually wanting to learn something ;)
- the promotion argument which started it all: It will give us nice stuff to tell on the homepage a visible ranking system showing activity will show there is something going on in ZK. Furthermore we will generate tons of sweet replays of ZK Gameplay at a high-level - maybe we could utilize those for youtube-uploads (maybe somebody wants to create a movie like "battles of the month" showing the sweetest scenes)


For realizing this, there is either a technical or a human solution. Technical solution would be to create an "Events" feature with registration, ranking etc(maybe this could be build using parts of PW)
The good part is: we dont need no technical solution. We just need a moderator/admin who adminsters the whole event. Pre-Registration can be done in the forums. This ranking shit would be sweet - but for now, just having a small event (like 2 teams each 4-5 players) playing 3-5 maps in a row being watched by an admin (who might even tell some "story) would be nice.

I kinda wrote a lot and I have a lot more Details in my head. But maybe we should discuss this "crude" idea. I am kinda curious what you think about it.

BTW: I could adminster one or two events of that kind in the next weeks if there is a demand.

So, split faction into teams/clans of 4/5 players and have them battle the other factions teams for planets. These matches would be planned via the fourms and modorated by a admin. That a good summary?

We have tried having the PW metagame effect the individual games of Zero-K (Free units etc) and all the rest, we've tried a clan-based PW. We've tried 'arranged' matches, IE tournaments that never make it to the final round, planned clan battles where the players don't log on at the assigned time, etc.

The PW metagame is already perfectly well set up for you to arrange planned matches between a group of 5 GBC's vs 5 Mean if you want to, BTW. So I suggest you do that.

You want to grow the playerbase, do what we've always been saying players should do: Tell their friends, post on any forums that they are members of or that they think would be interested that Zero-K is cool and they should come play it, etc (Do it in your owns words and just as you would encouraging someone to play any other game you like- you don't need direction from us here).

I agree milestones and events are the best way to get in players. But we just had an event, 95.0. If it's working well enough, that's a good time for new players to join.