Is Pitboss 18 Killing RB?

[pindicator]

Okay, so perhaps the title is a tad sensational. But I've heard some rumblings that lurker participation has been waning as of late. One of the special things about this place is how much of a community has been built around playing a game that's nearing 10 years of this planet. It stands to reason that if everybody is playing in the same game than lurker participation will be lower -- or perhaps it's that people are out enjoying the summer (this is a mostly northern hemisphere crowd after all), or doing other things with their time?

So I just wanted to throw it out there to discussing what they thought about participation of late. Is having such a large game having adverse affects on the community as a whole? Is there an over-saturation point of games where people are spending all their time playing and reporting but nobody has time to read and offer feedback? Or do you want to tell me how this is just all nonsense and you have no idea why I would think such a thing?

(Personally, between work and classes, I don't have the time I did three months ago. I wish I did; I know there are lots of wonderful stories being told right now and I try to read little bits here and there as I get the time.)

[Gaspar]

Mostly I think that the move towards Pitboss as the primary form of competition away from PBEM made them feel less special. Up until maybe PB8 or so I think you could have talked to anyone on the site and they'd know exactly what you meant if you referenced an incident from them. The PBs were the main event and there was rarely more than two going at once - usually just one - and as such, everyone lurked them. Lurker participation in the PBEMs was more spotty, some folks read all the games but a lot just read threads based on who was playing or if word of mouth spread that game X was really entertaining.

Since there are comparatively many Pitbosses, I think there's less of an "everybody lurks this game" factor to a Pitboss game and now we treat them more like the PBEMs. "Oh, this is a greens game, I'm going to skip it." "Oh this game uses a mod I don't like/doesn't use a mod I do like, I'll skip it." And so on. So you'll never see a repeat of the PB2 or PB4 or PB7 lurker participation rates in that situation.

There's other reasons as well, of course, but I think that's the biggest one.

[Jowy]

PB13 was up there with the other epic ones.

Now that you mention it, I haven't actually followed a game since PB16, which ended half a year ago. Huh.

Gaspar is right about the quantity of Pitboss games being a factor. There are five games on-going! If I wasn't playing in any of them, I'd still only lurk max 1-2. I think it's great that we can still run big games for Civ4. When I came back to play in PB9 it was because I thought the Civ4 community was going to die soon and I won't ever get another chance. You could say that lurker participation is down, but player participation is up

Lurker threads would probably be more active if someone can get the ball rolling with gameplay discussion. Most of the comments are about drama (whether an in-game war declaration or a meta-game double move dispute) and they come in bursts.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Ha. Has Commodore been whispering in your ear recruiting for PB22?

I think PB18 is bad for lurking PB18 because so many of our active posters can't comment publicly due to playing in the game. And, since so many people are playing in games, it isn't surprising if there is less time to post and/or lurk other games. I think the time of year is another factor. At least for me, this is my busiest time of year at work and I know some of our players have enjoyed summer time off, etc.

Please don't let this thread kill PB18.

[Mardoc]

Mountain out of a molehill. 12 other civ games (+2 recuiting), the LoL, MoM, Moo, and Diablo forums all have active discussions going, the Gaming table is hopping. This is what dying looks like?

It's true, there's not really any single main event anymore. I think that's because of the growth we've had - there's just too much going on for a person to be interested in all of it.

[SevenSpirits]

We seem to have more and bigger games being played than ever. Because of this, no individual game is being lurked as heavily. It's also off-season in the summer, as you can tell by the number of people who have been needing subs.

Personally I'm ambivalent to PB18's existence, but some people seem to be enjoying it and I don't think it's hurting anything. Also, personally, I'm lurking less in general than I used to, but it's unrelated to PB18.

[Cheater Hater]

In addition to people's lack of time due to life/playing, there's a couple reasons I can think of why people aren't lurking as much (or at least, why I'm not interacting as much):

• The big one is that people are global lurking more, and global lurkers are discouraged from saying anything in player threads--even traditional lurker posts like "more war!" have been cracked down upon due to the fear of leaking information. This effect has been aggravated as we reduce the amount of diplo in the game little by little, first by moving to AI diplo (or AW) almost exclusively, then cracking down on the types of diplo available (removing coded messages, banning city trades). On a related note, the global lurker threads have become relatively toxic in games with reporting, and empty in games without.
  
• Good reporting tends to lead to good lurking, but report quality (and quantity) has dwindled recently. Of course, this is chicken and egg: people are less likely to report unless they know someone will read it.
  
• The smurfing controversy (and in a similar vein, the private organization of PB19) probably had an effect on lurker participation--I'm not sure what that was, but it was certainly a turning point in RB history.
  

[GermanJoey]

In addition to people's lack of time due to life/playing, there's a couple reasons I can think of why people aren't lurking as much (or at least, why I'm not interacting as much):

• The big one is that people are global lurking more, and global lurkers are discouraged from saying anything in player threads--even traditional lurker posts like "more war!" have been cracked down upon due to the fear of leaking information. This effect has been aggravated as we reduce the amount of diplo in the game little by little, first by moving to AI diplo (or AW) almost exclusively, then cracking down on the types of diplo available (removing coded messages, banning city trades). On a related note, the global lurker threads have become relatively toxic in games with reporting, and empty in games without.
  
• Good reporting tends to lead to good lurking, but report quality (and quantity) has dwindled recently. Of course, this is chicken and egg: people are less likely to report unless they know someone will read it.
  

I think this has gotta be the main factor. If you go back and read the PB1 and PB2 player threads, lurkers tend to be pretty active, both with questions, suggestions, and stirring up diplo drama. Now, however, any sort of interference is considered verboten. So, there's only so much to say, except for generic go-gettum-tiger style jeering. That makes reporting harder; if nobody besides yourself posts in your thread for 4, 5 weeks at a time, then you start to wonder if anyone is reading.

I also don't think PBEM is the solution here. At least with PB, I can look at the thread index and see that other people are writing to their diaries too, even if I'm not getting any lurker posts in my thread. That's at least a little motivation to keep going, as it'll be fun to read their threads when the game is over. OTOH, in the one PBEM I'm playing (PBEM59) I haven't seen any other player besides myself and retap (another sub) update their threads since I took over I think 3 months ago now. PBEM51 didn't have any reports for at least 6 months, if not more, until Commodore took over for Oxy.

[GermanJoey]

On a more personal note, if it wasn't for the gentlemanly lurking of Dr. Ceiliazul I might have given up on reporting PB18 months ago.

[pindicator]

On a more personal note, if it wasn't for the gentlemanly lurking of Dr. Ceiliazul I might have given up on reporting PB18 months ago.

+1

Ceiliazul has been an amazing lurker.
It's very possible to ask questions that aren't leading, but it craftily is more difficult.