Sunday, December 28th, 2008
Issue: 106   Editor: NyxxieIn3D


What Does it Take to Keep Players? MrMiser
The amount of people the game seems to be losing is at an astronomical level. We lose HDO's, moderators, and most importantly, players.

The question in most peoples mind is, why? It seems on the forums people talk about the old days with smile on their face. As if the early days were a lot more fun.

I think they probably were more fun. And there are a few reasons for that. First, power meant being in a crew. The friends you had, and the abilities to 'revenge' yourself.

Today Bootleggers is a different monster. Today, you have Nation Don, and State Don's that cause the community of bootleggers to fear for their account with no way to revenge a death, unless they have a major stock hold of points. And in the same breath, the State and Nation Don feature is not balanced.

Its not impossible to get to the spot, but its damn near impossible to keep it for any length of time, because though the state don and nation don feature is supposed to be for the player, if the player in question is not protected by either an underground crew or a regular crew, it will die before getting a chance to wipe a crew, or do one big shoot.

However, either way, the most a nation don or state don can hope for is their 15 minutes of fame, before the removal of all the hard work they have put in to get to that spot in the first place.

The other reason its different these days verses the 'old days' is the feature bootcrews. with the invite to bootcrews, you can track a persons money, a crews members, and with it, you can find everything from the shooters a crew lets in to give bullets, to a persons dupe banker, if you know how to research a little.

With these changes, it has made bootleggers a different game than when bootleggers first started, it doesn't make it a worse game, it only proves that the staff have a lot more work to do before the game has been fixed.

Adjustments are needed to not only make nation and state dons more approachable, but also to bring back the integrity that the crew spot used to have. Ask any old crew, they will tell you that the only way to be a factor on the game is to be "underground" in this writers personal opinion, that's a folly in the programming.

The crew used to be a goal that every player used to have. Everyone at one point or another wanted to be a crew owner, or at least, wanted to get into a crew. Now its the opposite. The only way to survive is to stay crewless and to keep your head down, so you don't catch the wrath of the state, or nation don.

There needs to be more protection on both the nation and state don, as well as protection of the crew. A crew should be able to remove a nation or state don as easily as a state or nation don removing a crew. That balance, as well as extra protection against crew shootings are needed.

Giving the respectability back to the crew is imperative in this game. the back and forth of crews "negotiating" and the threat that a crew used to have was what once made this game great, and I think ultimately whats ruined the game at this point.

People will keep leaving as long as there is no hope of winning the game. When dupes are the strength in the game and the regular player has no hope of making it to state don, and has no protection for themselves or their friends, they really have no point to play. The old players tend to leave first, because they remember the balance that was lost. But new players see the imbalance and get equally as tired, even if they don't know the reason why.

To this writer, it's just like any thing else a person tries, if there is no hope in winning, why do it?

In this article I plead to the staff, don't remove the nation or state don feature. Fix it. Don't make them easier to kill, make it harder for a dupe to take the position. It's been said before that giving state and nation don's a crew would solve a lot of the issues, I agree. If making it to nation don caused you to create a crew, it would be a lot harder to fill that crew if no one knew you.

In the same breath, please, bring back the integrity of crews. Give crews a defense! Even in the old days, you had to find each player and kill them as if the player was not in a crew at all.

With the addition of establishments, you have the ability to make crews harder to shoot, while making them easier to defend, bringing back the might of a STAT's crew, verses underground. Give them all bullet banks, give the option to donate bullets to the crew, give them a defense for when a state or nation don shoots at them. Give them the ability to protect their crew by make a crew spot an actual establishment that a crew can hold and maintain. Give them a spot to DEFEND. make the game better by evening the playing field.

So from one player to the staff, I humbly suggest, make the game fun again, not JUST for the player, but for the group, which is what all of the old timers complain about. We played together, because we were stronger in a group than alone. The addition of the state and nation don changed all of that, because now, we're no longer safe no matter what we do.