Yes they do need to be reported (privately) however the forums are not game codes and we've been having issue with the forums since earth empires started, we can't even delete messages, and it doesn't help anyone when you decide to lock a thread where you asked what improvements can be made and later on when people point out issues you decide to slap us around with fancy words and walk off....
KoHeartsGPA, can you be specific in what you're saying instead of alluding to some kind of conspiracy in general terms? I don't know what you're talking about. I don't follow politics on the Alliance server. Who is "a guy"?
So you didn't read the post you replied to from Tertius? The "a guy" is TC.
Tertius screwed everyone's trust and is now back in the game and buddy buddy with higher ups? That's news to me...
I'm happy to engage with you on this, but I really need you to explain it in a simple and clear way to me.
Yeah no, maybe you need to communicate with the rest of your team instead of attempting to troll me, have a good day Sir.
KoHeartsGPA, can you be specific in what you're saying instead of alluding to some kind of conspiracy in general terms? I don't know what you're talking about. I don't follow politics on the Alliance server. Who is "a guy"?
So you didn't read the post you replied to from Tertius? The "a guy" is TC.
Life bans on people who are talking smack? Forgiving those who took advantage of their position gained by having close relationships with owners/devs whatever the case was for their projection into being given exclusive access and then using it to cheat seems a bit worse to me, but what do I know, I just play the game
Is your complaint that your friend was treated too harshly or that people in the past weren't treated harshly enough?
I think part of the issue is that in the recent few years, given the small player base, the mod team has tried to be very transparent in what happens - which has been much appreciated. I'm honestly not sure how many friends Chevs has (he is polarizing to say the least, and many of us have had run ins with him on the solo servers that have not always been... ideal). But it's hard to argue that he didn't bring some new life to the game, even when the first iteration of ClanGDI removed a lot of the inherent interactions. The videos and forum activity were certainly something worth talking about, and even the opposing team seemed to enjoy it and provided their own video (I won't criticize it, because you won't see me creating any videos, but Chevs quality has certainly been unmatched).
I think given all of that, this is a strict departure - there's zero transparency, and to your question here: it seems inconsistent given the nature of what's been shared for the reasoning. Based on what others have mentioned on the forums, it seems like Chevs is willing to make whatever public, because he honestly doesn't know what this decade plus ban is for. Certainly sanctions were likely based around him, but given those were pulled back - and TC of all people, has returned with qz publicly stating in discord that 10 years seems enough, it's hard to imagine what sort of action would match this punishment so long after.
You've stated you don't need the forums to approve of your decision - and you're right, you're the administrator and developer of the game, but I just wanted to explain why so many people push back at this. There's so few people left, any sort of lifetime ban has a relatively large impact on the remaining teams, and Chevs - whether you like him or not - is pushing the game to have more people involved than it did, which seems like the point of these threads.
Allow me to share a perspective as an admin: Alliance Talk exists as a forum for players to lie to each other. Some players have literal decades of experience in spinning information to paint themselves or their clan in the best possible light. Do you know how many players private messaged me concerned about Chev's ban and asking for more details?
Zero.
I'm not saying that this applies to everyone who commented on it, but I suspect that most of the participants fall into two main camps. The first is just a group of players looking to be entertained by it. I recall someone making a supreme court analogy that I thought was pretty funny. The second group are his co-conspirators who already know exactly why he was banned. In fact, they probably know better than I do why he deserved to be banned. They celebrated and participated in the behavior that got him banned in the first place. Asking fake questions here is just another way to stir up trouble. No matter what evidence is presented, they will never publicly admit that banning Chevs was justified. Why would they? This is AT.
Because transparency is important, especially in a community where the majority of us have been here for decades, because the game is a dying breed, because we're all very small community, because Chevs is one of the mods public enemy #1 and is SUS AF he got banned for so long especially when a guy that screwed everyone's trust is now back in the game and buddy buddy with higher ups.
Yeah you don't owe an explanation but at the same time you should shine a light, who did he verbally murder?
I'll be a bit argumentative again. When exactly was this golden age of player to player interaction? I first played on alliance around 2004. I remember alliances heavily pacting out and most countries doing all-X or only hitting untagged countries. I also remember land:land becoming the standard retal policy. Players themselves are the ones who were always pushing for less interaction. Just look at what happened to the team server. The last time I looked there was essentially zero landgrabs. Some clans even boasted about their 1:kill policies.
We aren't advertising because we don't have a good enough product yet. A few folks were kind enough to answer my question about what makes the alliance server special and they said that playing with friends is fun. But that's just a property of the server. Nearly any multiplayer team-based game will have that feature. No one said "it's fun to play with your friends to compete for average NW", "it's fun to win a war with your friends", or "it's fun to create a new clan with your friends and to politically outmaneuver other clans". That's a big problem in terms of player retention.
I think that when players advocate for chaos, they imagine themselves being on the giving end of chaos and other players being on the receiving end of it. In many cases that's only going to be fun for one party.
IMHO, the golden age was probably 1998-2003ish. The game saw several changes during that period as did the player base. The culture on the server started changing around 2002 with many wanting a heavy focus on netting and by this time every major alliance had turn by turn strats that proliferated throughout the community.
It was fun to be a part of an alliance, help it grow and help teach and protect the members
It was fun to make a landgrab and message the untagged country to join your alliance
It was fun to check the retal boards
It was fun to be a part of kill runs
It was fun to try different things while building your country, not quite knowing how it would turn out
It was fun to hunt multi's
It was fun to diplomatically interact
It was fun to build a better site than your competing alliances
It was fun to war for a cause, to die and restart as quickly as you could
It was probably fun to hit the top ten =)
Oh and it was fun to spam the AT boards
Fast forward to today and many of those things either don't apply or have been minimized. Time "in-game" has always been pretty minimal, especially after start up in peace-time. Maybe 20 mins a day if your researching bots to hit, likely no more than 10 min to run your turns. I'm sure we spend more time on our Discords, clan sites and the AT than we actually spend in-game.
I still enjoy the alliance server, mostly for the interaction with my alliance mates. I've found myself bored after using up my turns and played FFA server to fill in the gap. I use the express server to try out new builds and strats to use on alliance. 1A is a unique server, with aspects I don't think you can really get on the other servers. Some of the changes have been for neccessity due to the dwindling player base, some have been cultural made by the player base and some things haven't really changed for 25 years (for example, I use a strat from 2001 that works pretty well with just a few minor tweaks).
From the dev's point of view I'm sure the question is how do we drive more traffic to the site? If the "game" only takes 10 mins a day to play how much more traffic are you going to get even if you double or triple the current player base. Incorporating the tools, clan hosting and additional functions into the game will likely drive more traffic to the server AND as a result more players. If recruiting emails pointed them to join at clanx.earthempires.com vs , or checking stats at an earthempires link vs eestats.com, how much more traffic could be driven to the site.
I think you're on the right track, keep asking the questions. We are NOT ready to let this game die
The elephant in the room......
We have strayed from the original Earth 2025 and with each passing change (intended to increase player base), the player base has declined.
I am not into this whole community thing. I just come here to play a game. How are we supposed to recruit new players into a community that just wants to spend a few minutes/day hitting bots. I have recruited folks that won't stay for more than a day or two. They say it is too boring. Even online Chess matches require strategy. Chess requires offense and defense and sometimes you lose.....but like EE, you get to restart.
Make a server that leans on the original Earth 2025 and let's see what happens. Too many of you old folks no longer want to play that style of game. Real Life keeps you busy. Changes made to fit your current style of play will only result in the same old players from set to set.
Think aboout it.....old timers only return for war then leave when it goes back to just hitting bots.
Yeah, Cumorah didn't realize who he farmed last round, I know the guy running the LF Developers country and he's an old school war monger, this war will go on all set and probably more sets to come 😂
Today I had blood work done at the cancer institute and visit with my primary oncologist and she went over my results and what the battle plan is going forward, so this cancer I've got is one of those very aggressive and sneaky so the way we're going to monitor it is by doing periodic scans and lumbar punctures, meanwhile I'll be seen by a cardiologist to address my heart and start treatment for it, I've got a PET scan scheduled for the 12th of April and lumbar puncture hopefully in May.
This cancer has a very high percentage of return and it happens in the first 3 to 6 months in the majority of cases diminishing til the six months period, after that the percentages of it returning are extremely slim, my last chemo was on January 11th so that means the window of highest risk closes July 11th, if and if it does come back then I'll immediately be in the hands of OHSU again to get the CAR-T treatment done to once and for all kill this thing.
My other injuries sustained by the cancer won't be addressed until after we are out of the woods, I'll need a couple surgeries in my spine for sure since the two vertebraes that look like jigsaw puzzles have not healed on their own, fortunately those are easy procedures that don't even require me to be opened up like when they removed the tumors from my vertebraes in my lower back, so hopefully this coming fall I can be back to work and living a normal life again!
Just got back home from OHSU and phase 2 of the treatment isn't going to happen, I've been getting all kinds of tests done in the past 3 weeks in preparation for the stem cell transplant and unfortunately last week's test didn't fair well for me...
My heart is very weak after enduring 12 chemos, in particular the 6 RCHOP treatments is the one who weakened the ol ticker, my heart is between 35 and 40% and the the threshold is 55%, significantly weaker than the last time it was checked in November and June before I started the chemos.
My lungs are also damaged and this was most likely the pneumonia I caught during treatment that sent me to the ER, my lungs are only processing 55% of the oxygen and the threshold is 80%.
What's next? Well since my body won't survive the stem cell transplant that's off the table, right now the focus is healing my heart and lungs so I'll be referred to a cardiologist for that, so I asked the Oncologist "so what now? Heal and try again later this summer?" He said no, the Lymphoma if it comes back it happens between 3 to 6 months after the last treatment, if it doesn't come back then you're good to go, if it does come back then we will do CAR-T and kill it with that, also CAR-T is no risk and it doesn't matter if your heart and lungs haven't healed yet, so I asked why can't we do that now? And he said the cancer has to be present in your system in order to do that treatment.
Confused yet? LOL So now it's a waiting game with more tests and see what the cardiologist recommends I do to fix my heart, according to the oncologist it'll be medications witch I'm not fond of because as we all know, side effects can be worse than the disease lol.
For now I'm going to focus on healing my body and repairing as much damage possible that was done by this nasty cancer, I'm not safe yet so I will not let my guard down and keep pushing through, I can almost walk normal now without a walker, still difficult to do any normal human activities all day, it is what it is, I still have hella fight in me!
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, or checking stats at an earthempires link vs eestats.com, how much more traffic could be driven to the site.