No Change/Rejected Top 100 KZ Server

[bry]

Mostly looking for player input as well as general opinion in this thread.

Is there a reason that the top 100 kz server is KZTimer rather than GOKZ? In my opinion, if you are in the top 100 players you are informed as to what GOKZ is and (maybe) its benefits as a kz player over KZTimer.

I would rather this server be GOKZ and not KZTimer, as this would appeal more to the more experienced kz player, which you would need to be to play a top 100 whitelist kz server.

Tell me what you guys think about this idea!

Thanks,

Bryan

 

[sneaK]

I'm personally in favor of GOKZ in just about every scenario over KZTimer as well! It just seems like people still prefer KZTimer for whatever reason.

Pros of GOKZ:

• Modes
• Web Replays

Cons of GOKZ:

• No persistent jumpstats
• No local ranks

Anything I'm really missing?

I'd like to poll Top 100 and get opinions on GOKZ vs KZTimer, but there's really no good way (that I know of) to do that. Also, our GOKZ server sits empty or extremely low population for the majority of the day, so that's something to consider.

Edit: This would also get wonky for local ranks. Top 100 is gathered from our local KZTimer database, so how would that work if we added GOKZ? Players would be required to play KZT public server to maintain their top 100?

 

[bry]

There always seems to be one or two players on the current GOKZ server when I want to grind, when there are none on I am hesitant because I don't want to get rtv'd mid run.

Here is an alternative to switching the current Top 100 KZTimer:

One reason I made this post is that I have people who wished they had a private GOKZ server to play on to play hard maps with ladder checkpoints, and other submodes of kz of course. This includes me as well.

Also, since its creation I have seen players play on the Top 100 server to take local records so they will show on the main server, this is a feature that I like as well. Players also will play on this Top 100 server to increase their server rank since the databases between the main server and the Top 100 server are connected.

It might seem odd that I'm arguing against my original point, but now that I think about it, I kind of like the Top 100 server how it is. So the alternative I had in mind is switching the current GOKZ server to a whitelist system.

In this case, the whitelist would be able to be joined by anyone at request. Other than that it could function as any other server would. This join-at-request whitelist system would eliminate random players searching community servers who join and rtv, but more importantly, it wouldn't be excluding anybody from accessing it.

The reasoning I have behind this is that if you want to play GOKZ, you can. Chances are if you know about and want to play GOKZ, you are aware of the weird kz etiquette of not rtving someone who is grinding/running.

Let me know what you guys think about this alternative.

 

[Ice]

Just a few quick thoughts that I haven’t ever tested:

1. Do you gain KZTimer ‘points’ for completing a map on GOKZ, as long as you use the KZTimer mode?

2. If someone beats a PRO/TP server record on GOKZ, does that carry over to the regular KZ server? (Pretty sure this one is ‘no’.)

3. Piggybacking off of both the above, if people don’t receive points on the KZTimer global database, I assume they also wouldn’t receive points in their sneaK’s KZ profile, and thus wouldn’t be able to go up in ranks. This also means that a player’s map completion % wouldn’t increase either. If either of the above happens that would be a pretty bad negative to changing how things currently work, and most players probably wouldn’t be a big fan of this. I agree that it would benefit people going for global records, but it would not benefit people going for a better map time/increased local rank/increasing their map completion %.

For thoughts on the whitelist, I’m going to probably say I wouldn’t recommend it. Turning it into whitelist would pretty much be equivalent to making a private server, because no random players are going to register and account on a website and apply for waitlist because many other servers already exist that are much easier to access. I get that this is kind of your goal (you don’t want random people to rtv you) but from a server owner’s perspective and from a regular player’s perspective, turning one of your gamemodes into private whitelist only isn’t usually the best way to gain popularity or maintain a consistent player base.

I don’t really have a solution for your random-player-RTV problem, because the only fix to that is to make it a private server. I’m not sure if anyone else in the KZ community has a private GOKZ server, but looking into that would probably be your best bet, or trying to set up one yourself. I can’t speak for sneaK and say that he doesn’t want to make the GOKZ basically private, or maybe even create one for you, but I think he’d agree that it would end up consistently more dead than it already is, which probably isn’t the best way to go about this.

 

[bry]

Here is what I think regarding your negative thoughts on the whitelist, and possible points to consider.

The new kz player, or "random" as you call it, is most likely looking to play generic kz. I doubt the new player would be concerned with which submode he is playing, although if he is, great! Now, if the mindset of the new player is to play GOKZ (there are not a lot of these at all), whats the hassle in linking your steam account to the website? It is pretty efficient in my opinion and you are rewarded with being a part of a community, as well as having access to a server to play the GOKZ submode which you specifically set out to play. I think the word "apply" does not fit the whitelist scenario I envision, I imagine more of a "click here to join whitelist" and it pulls your steam ID from account and adds it to whatever document contains the whitelisted steam IDs.

From the regular players perspective, I don't know what the heck GOKZ is, and if i want to play it i can click a button and do so. From the server owners perspective (see sneaK quote) the GOKZ server is underpopulated as is, and switching it to GOKZ would at least serve a factual existing niche of players rather than the generic public, which back to sneaKs quote isn't pulling in many players.

This is mostly speculation, with some logic/reasoning behind it. It very well might turn out that the points I have made would backfire and the server would still have a minimal amount of players on it daily, but I know this is where I would find myself playing quite frequently.




edit: I tried to quote sneaK saying the server is underpopulated but failed since I am not that experienced in forum usage. The quote I am referring to can be found in the second to last paragraph of his initial response.

 

[Ice]

First paragraph response: I agree that new players probably don’t care which mode they start out with. But, I think you grossly overestimate how far people will go to access a server. There are tons of public GOKZ servers out there, and regular players who aren’t going for global records/a specific community will use whatever they have the easiest access to. For the record, I’m not disagreeing with you in that it’s ridiculously easy to do - just that people are lazy lol. For the record, I don’t know of an easy way to apply and have it be automatically accepted, sneaK would have to work some website magic for that.

An easy analogy is this - if you were a regular player and had the choice between immediately connecting and playing on a server, or having to fill out a form and be waitlisted on another server, which would you choose? Sure, you might be more willing to fill out the form if you’re already involved in the community, but that won’t apply to new players. I don’t see many people going, “Hey, let’s try KZ - oh, I need to send in an app for this specific server, guess I’ll do that and play tomorrow!”

Not trying to be rude with this btw, just trying to say that in the end players are lazy, and unless you’re dedicated to finding a server to practice on, they’ll take the least amount of steps possible to play on another one.

For your second paragraph, if sneaK wants to turn his gokz server into a private one then that would be perfectly fine and be his choice. I just meant that I don’t think he would like that as the best plan, but maybe he can chime in with his opinion.

Anyways, I totally get what you’re aiming for here and why you would love things to work that way. It’s great from a “grinding-globals” type of viewpoint, just not so great from a regular player’s viewpoint. It just depends what type of player base he wants to cater to, and from me just assuming, I figure it would be regular or new players. At the end of the day either method would work - but unfortunately I assume the player count to stay pretty low either way, just due to GOKZ’s nature and low popularity.

 

[sneaK]

I don't have a load of time so I'll try to get to the point and answer a couple questions:

1. Do you gain KZTimer ‘points’ for completing a map on GOKZ, as long as you use the KZTimer mode?

2. If someone beats a PRO/TP server record on GOKZ, does that carry over to the regular KZ server? (Pretty sure this one is ‘no’.)

GOKZ does not have local overall ranks or "points" as it stands, and there is absolutely 0 connection between KZT servers and GOKZ servers, so that should answer your questions.

KZT Global database is only for KZTimer servers and should be deprecated soon imo, as Global API accepts times from KZTimer servers as well as GOKZ servers.

The purpose of the Top 100/VIP server is to allow better players to grind the maps they want, for longer, while rewarding VIP's with the same privilege, as they're the ones that keep our community going monetarily. It seems like you want a whitelist server - who would qualify for said whitelist?

 

[sneaK]

@brayn Is there anything else I can do here or something you'd like to see changed still? Looking to close this out since it's become stale.

Edit: Discussed on discord, seems to be all set for now :emoji_thumbsup: