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30:jul//2K - why the community board shouldn't be missed

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30-07-2K: Today (or yesterday evening, I'm not quite sure) the Community Board finally took the break it needed, but unlike its master it shouldn't be missed. Where as the The Allotment was perhaps the finest thing ever to come from the Worms Community, the message board that it spawned was a big mess up.

I'm sure many of you remember what the board was like back before Worms: Armageddon arrived, for the most part it was somewhere that could be relied upon for intelligent conversation and debate, of course they was still the odd post slagging people off etc. but in general is was a great place to visit. Add to that the fact that it actually was frequented by Team17 staff members, who would listen to suggestions and post responses made it even better.

When Worms: Armageddon was released things started to change, although at first it wasn't as bad it is now, you could see that things were starting to go wrong. I remember a case in which I was involved regarding the Full Wormage - at that time you couldn't download it, it had to be earned and many people thought that was the way it should stay.However, I felt differently and once I had earned it for myself I used Jon Skeet's excellent back-up program to get the Full Wormage into a file that could be distributed. I then offered that file to the community (at this time I wasn't called AGi, rather Paranoid Android) and being the first to do so, it generated a bit of controversy.

Some people congratulated me on it and others slagged me off, which I expected but when someone asked me to give me them the file and they they took it, altered and then offered to to the community claiming to be the first to offer it for download, that pissed me off a great deal. The seeds of what we have today were sown back then.

With the advent of WormNET most of the decent debate left the board and was replaced by people moaning about disconnectors and generally just slagging everybody off. Am I the only person who thinks this is unwarranted? If you have a problem with someone you sort it out privately, unless they choose to make it public, and you certainly don't need to slag anyone off.

The treatment of Newbies was also shameful, these people are new to the game - it takes time to learn all the protocols that the community abides by. There is no need to lambaste them for being ignorant, experienced Wormers should be helping the new comers, not making them feel unwelcome. Finally we have the treatment handed out to Team17, of course there are things wrong with the game, things you want to see but the way to put suggestions across is constructive criticism, not slagging off their work and using abusive language towards them.

It came as no surprise when it was announced that Team17 had decided that the Allotment board should no longer be the official board. Sniper had a great idea when the Community board was set up - bring everybody together in a general message board that can be linked to and provides links to other Worms sites.

It didn't quite turn out the way he imagined - it did provide a focal point, but for abuse and not very much else. The slagging, impersonation, and general scumy behavior shown on the board has dragged what was once a cornerstone of the community down to the level of a "ghetto". I wouldn't have been surprised if it were at all possible, to see drive by shootings and drug dealing going on there. The fact that Sniper very rarely posted and that most of the established players visited infrequently kinda shows exactly what the board had become.

Everyone has let themselves down, it doesn't have to be like that and I hope that whatever comes along to replace the Community Board (and when the board comes back) is treated with more respect or sooner or later the people who run these sites will say to hell with you, shut up shop and leave you with nothing.

This is a time to ring in the changes, use it wisely because it may be the last chance you get.

AGi.

 

The above is a personal opinion and should not be taken as that of WM.V2 or any of its other staff.

//agi. [agi@fsmail.net]