Where did player ethics go?

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Dr Robotnik
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Where did player ethics go?

Post by Dr Robotnik »

I find myself asking this more and more. But, I have been forced to write about it now. I must make a point.
Today, on a certain map I will not name, the fight was 10 to 4. We were being spawn-killed and camped to the point that the team could not do anything. Most of the red team left. Green players said in reply, lol and continued to spam the helpless team. I left, making it 10-3. Great.

My point is, that players are not playing with quality anymore, not concerned with team score, but their own mega 100. Players are teamkilling even more. I dont see any teamwork anymore. Players insult each-other on servers where it is not allowed. Teams dont play fair. I understand this is why many people look to the leauges, as it is indeed getting worse on public servers.
Feel free to add your horror stories to this post. I am sure many people have seen the general decline in play quality. On a side note, I tried BZFlag 3 Alpha, the new bullets and flags look great!
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mrapple
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by mrapple »

Dr Robotnik wrote:Players are teamkilling even more.
Probably noobs who don't know what they're doing.

The other most likely reason you had been getting "teamkiled more" was because your teammates were trying to kill the spawkillers but missing the mark.
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SkillDude
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by SkillDude »

This has always been an issue, but more so in this day. The problem is the players that do not want to communicate, as you stated and just want to score for themselves. You may recall my BZSoccer map where players work as a team to try and cap a flag or my Battle Combat Strategy map, where there is one seer flag and many stealth and the seer has to let players know how to plan their strategies. It is very difficult if you cannot defend each other and work together and know when to cover, when to attack, and when to defend your flag. Although I tend to ignore these things, the best thing to do if you do not like it is just leaving, but then it ruins the fun for you.

It's maps such as Planet Mofo's Free for All that may attribute to this (Basically, any FFA) as this focuses on you just moving around killing anything in your path (Except your teammates, which don't matter too much in them other than for genociders). The problem is, when people go to CTFs, the rules change and this is where you get a lot of "unfair"ness and "spawnkilling" can occur. Teams are very important in this gameplay style, and the influence of FFAs especially end up causing these problems in the first place, but the maps aren't the issue, it's still the players.

The biggest thing, is players have to know when they work as a team, and when they go off on their own. Score may be important in an FFA, but a CTF is all about the flag captures. This is why people have suggested rewards for capping, and penalties for not capping. This is also why people tried to develop FairCTF and suggested a fairCTF plugin that bases on skills of players (And kill ratios) for balancing instead of just simply player count. All us "fair players" can do now is be by our lonesome and stick together to try to enforce such things, but doing so in public environments where players do not wish to incorporate it does not work too well. If only they were given some very clear motivation to cap, such as getting a point for every tank that you cap from would probably suffice. This has been discussed often in the past, and it's just something you're going to have to deal with. That's people for you.
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Dr Robotnik
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by Dr Robotnik »

"The biggest thing, is players have to know when they work as a team"
Indeed, on CTF whenever people start coordinating things together, the team score and thus your score goes up. It makes the game enjoyable.
I have seen FairCTF before, it should be rolled directly into BZFlag Server stock for CTF. Great plugin.
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by dereliction of duty »

been doing this for over 10 yrs now, nothing new.
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by ahs3 »

Dr Robotnik wrote:"The biggest thing, is players have to know when they work as a team"
Indeed, on CTF whenever people start coordinating things together, the team score and thus your score goes up. It makes the game enjoyable.
I have seen FairCTF before, it should be rolled directly into BZFlag Server stock for CTF. Great plugin.
fairctf is great, i agree. But I've seen it many times, right before a cap players will leave so you can't. After tons of work to get that cap while teams were even, and now you can't.
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by Bullet Catcher »

That's the thing about FairCTF: it is completely impartial and implements the will of the server operator cleanly and consistently. It also announces when teams are even enough to capture again, giving you a reasonable chance to complete the capture when that occurs.

On the pillbox map in particular, this makes it possible to play a decent CTF game on a public server even as players come and go randomly.
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Knox
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by Knox »

Agreed, but what do you want to do? Giving ethic-lessons? This is a shooting-game, and as usual it attracts kid's, like 10 to 15 years old, and what do these kidies know about fairness and ethics? Sure, there are exceptions, but don't be too hopeful.
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Knox
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by Knox »

Just an idea, but what do you think about a "code of conduct" or "code of ethics"?
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by joevano »

Knox wrote:Just an idea, but what do you think about a "code of conduct" or "code of ethics"?
It would require server owners to enforce it. Each server is run independently. It would not work... nor do many of the players ever come here, so they would never see it.
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Knox
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by Knox »

I remember having a similar discussion. However.

This code of conduct would be more a guideline, than anything else. Something that guides cops and admins for ban and kick issues.
Any Serverowner can put the guideline into his server message and instruct his cops to incorporate them into their decisions.
After all, we can't force any owners, so these guideline would be voluntary.

I'd like to hear a server owners opinion.
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Re: Where did player ethics go?

Post by blast »

You already did hear a server owner's opinion. And here's another one. Server owners can already put up rules and guidelines on their server. It is their choice what to allow. A set of guidelines posted here would be pointless.
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