Message from the Fist

Hello DJB. Relatively short report this month. No new supported games to talk about. No nerfs. Just a couple of quick highlights, some stats, a discussion on retirement of games (with a list of games on the chopping block), competition links, and the normal Pendant of Blood distribution.

Let’s dive into it.

Gaming Statistics (Oh look, a chart!)

On Gaming Competitions

I want to highlight something I’ve noticed over the past few months in regards to gaming competitions. As you are all aware, competitions are an essential part of the lifeblood for activity in this club. When Howie says “do all the things”, these are the things he’s normally talking about.

What I am a bit concerned with is the number of gaming competitions (generally part of clan or house series events) I see that have only one or two members taking part in them. It’s no secret that competitions yield credits, and are tracked as activities on the promotion assessment tracker.

I’d ask all of you to look at the volume of competitions you are running. If an competition doesn’t have a lot of participants, extend it. If a series doesn’t have a lot of participants in specific child competitions, don’t re-run them again.

Finally, if you are running an event, hype it in your clan chats or in DB Gaming if it is open to the club at large. If nobody knows you are running an event, or if they don’t check the site every single day, they might be missing out on the activity you are trying to provide.

Retirement of Games

It’s a fact of life that sometimes, games become old and lose the interest of our member base. We try to keep the gaming community moving forward, and sometimes that means letting go of a game we enjoyed a few years past. When considering games to retire, I look at the last time a game was played. If it’s been six or more months since a game showed any activity, I’ll bring it up in either DB Gaming or on a report to see if anyone is still interested in playing it. If not, it will be marked for retirement.

There was a discussion in DB Gaming a few days ago on whether or not to retire Star Wars games or not. Valid points were made on both sides of the aisle, and strangely enough, a couple of Star Wars games suddenly saw activity (I’m staring at you, Empire at War and Republic Commando). This is a great thing. Keep playing them, and they’ll never go away. It’s that simple.

With that, here’s the list of games that I am considering for retirement. At the end of the month (that’s the ENTIRE month of May), any games on this list that do not see any activity will be retired. This is your chance to play these games before they become one with the Force.

Member vs. Member Category

• Halo Series
• Killzone Series
• Resistance Series

Look at that. No Star Wars games on the list!

FIST Sponsored Gaming Competitions

[FIST]1st Annual Flash Gaming

[FIST] 2nd Annual Mobile Gaming

[FIST] GMRG Gorefest 2017

[FIST] Quarterly Gaming Challenge Q2 2017 This goes live soon! Get those submissions in for the Q1 Competitions and prepare for the next round!

[FIST] Galaxy of Heroes Quarterly Squad Arena( Apr-Jun 2017 A friendly reminder: this competition will NO LONGER provide a weekly crescent. The overall winners for the quarter will earn first-level crescents.

[FIST] Diablo 3 Season 10 Greater Rift Ladder Remember these? Bringing them back due to popular demand. Pay attention to the competition details here!

[FIST] Diablo 3 Season 10 Greater Rift Solo Tier How good are you? Test yourself in the highest possible solo Greater Rift you can complete. Highest tier completed wins!!!

April Weekly and Saturday Pendant of Blood Awardees

Congratulations to the following individuals on earning Pendants of Blood for the highest overall PvP score for the weeks/Saturdays listed!

Weekly PoBs

• 26-31 March Rulvak Qurroc

• 2-7 April: Silent

• 9-14 April: Aurora Ta’var

• 16-21 April: Aurora Ta’var

• 23-28 April: Rasilvenaira Isatri’Zara StormRaven

Saturday PoBs

• 1 April: Nijalah

• 8 April: Aurora Ta’var

• 15 April: No matches played

• 25 April: Ranarr Kul

• 29 April: Aurora Ta’var

Ask the Fist

I answered a few questions in Telegram, but a couple made me switch on my brain so I could put some real thought behind them.

Q: Justinios asks: Do you feel there are any gaps in our slate of supported games (IE: missing a popular sub genre or type of game)?

A: Excluding the fact that there’s a deep lack of new Star Wars games, no. I think we’ve got a really great library of supported platforms and genres for our community to enjoy. One area that I think do think suffers is the MMO genre. I know a lot of our SWTOR players are frustrated with the direction the game has taken, and I truly empathize with them. I do wonder if we would see a revitalization if the game ported over to console, since a good chunk of our community is console-focused. I’ve only played one true MMO on a console, and that proved very difficult without a keyboard.

Q: Turel Asks: what role do you see traditional pvp playing in the GJW and future club events?

A: Good one. It’s no secret that gaming appears to be moving away from traditional PvP of the early to mid 2000s to more team-based gameplay. I personally don’t find 1v1 events fun, and I get a lot more enjoyment out of taking out a team of random people with my DB friends than I do getting ROFL-stomped by a 13 year old.

As far as the GJW goes, I’ve got some thoughts on how to shake things up a bit in terms of how we conduct our gaming activities. I’m playing these ideas close to the chest for now, but I will tell you that I want to try and run gaming events that encompass the full depth of what we currently offer. Cluster races are easy to run, but those are beginning to become somewhat repetitive. I’m really hoping that what I have planned will give everyone an opportunity to win a gaming-related Nova, as well as be fun for everyone in the club.

Q: Atra Asks: Shall we ever see competitive team style seasons with playoffs in the Brotherhood? I often enjoy watching competitive CoD scrims and a similar small team vs small team league within the Brotherhood would be relevant to my interests. (Could also incorporate shoutcasting and going all esports about it)

A: I have toyed with how to do this. I’d love try running a team-based gaming bracket at some point in the future. Creating a team-based PvP event has some challenges, most notably the ‘getting the whole team online at the same time’ issue. Additionally, we have to consider the platform the bracket will utilize.

Example: If I run an Overwatch Bracket, the whole club can play the game (it’s on PC, Xbox, and PS4), but the teams can’t necessarily play against each other (cross-platform doesn’t exist). If I run it as a ‘groups agree on the platform’ event, there will be arguments on which platform the teams choose.

And of course, I can’t let a team that is filled with console players wind up bracketed against a team that is comprised of PC players. So there’s a lot of logistical considerations to iron out before something like this could become a reality.

Helpful Links

• [DB Gaming on Telegram - Log in to view join link] on Telegram. Come be part of the discussion in the one and only official gaming channel of the Dark Jedi BRotherhood!

• Ask the Fist Google Form. Post a question here anytime, day or night, and either I or a member of my staff will try to answer it for you.

• Send us an email at [Log in to view e-mail addresses]

TL;DR

1) Gaming stats! Heroes of the Storm is proving to be very popular. What happened to Star Conflict?

2) Notes on Gaming Competitions. Please avoid competition spam. Extend if necessary. Hype your events!

3) Games up for retirement. Play them and they stay. No Star Wars games in the mix!

4) PoB Winners again!

5) There are still FIST-run competitions! Do them!

I mention this every month, but words can’t express how pleased I am with the state of our gaming community. The DB Gaming channel on telegram is filled with some great discussions on how we can continually improve, and the supportive nature of our community is something that is remarkable to behold. Watching you all game together, laugh, and enjoy what the club has to offer is the single best part of this job. That, and watching you all claw your way up the leaderboard for a chance to beat Warp.

Until next month, keep on gaming!

-Drac