Fix your server.
I'm going to run through a list of problems which occurs on a day-to-day basis on MCSG which has been bugging more considering non of it is getting fixed. And before you ask me "You have the tenacity to say all this, yet you can't do better?", Yes I do have the tenacity to say this and I wish I could run a server and do better, as difficult as it probably is.
The staff -
Your staff seem good. I haven't even seen staff breaking any rules. I've seen them being respectful to new people in the hub, answering questions in the hub. discussing topics in the hub and having a tea party in the hub. The hub, not in the actual games, the hub. I honestly think your mods should loosen up on the spammers in the HUB and try going into games and looking out for the real pollution of the server: the hackers. Now, I'm not saying the mods don't do this or the mods shouldn't be able to have lives and moderate 24/7, but when the mods are in the hub, stopping spammers and answering obvious questions from people who can't put 2 and 2 together, that time should be spent into moderating the games. The staff are brilliant at what they do, but they need to prioritize.
The EU cleansweep -
I'm an EU player. I play on their around everyday. Not once have I had a session on EU MCSG without spotting over 10 hackers, 5 on short sessions. The cleansweep worked alright, not brilliant considering for every hacker you ban you have the new noob who will get their client on and take their place, but still, it was effective. That was when I was impressed with the mods, I saw them more on games, still not a lot, but it was a start. I think with all this cleansweep bs, you guys need to realize you won't eliminate hackers. It's impossible. But there are always ways to eliminate more. First of all, get better anticheat. There is a certain server, not going to say the real name because I'll get jumped by forum people, where you can practice PvP. That server has a brilliant anti-cheat that works a lot of the time. It's known to make mistakes, but everyone and everything is. Try do something about the anticheat plugin now, make it better so people can't bypass it with their crazy "I'm going to kill 17 people in 3 hits" hacks. Not bad for a start, but still didn't fix the problem. By the way, I know EU nests most of the hackers on MCSG, but you can't forget about the other ones. More people play US, so think about who you will be affecting in the majority, then focus on the minority.
Teams -
Ah, the bane of every solo players existence. I read the format, saying they aren't going to get rid of teams and that isn't the problem. The size of the teams needs to be limited like another rivaling SG server has done. I have seen 6, 7 teams and I'm not the only one because crazy wizards have recorded themselves killing 6 or 7 teams on Youtube. Everyone has teamed before, even the people who throw their fist at their dead dogs grave because they got rekt by a 2 team. It's annoying yes, but limit the teams to 3 or 4. It gets a bit ridiculous and obnoxious after that. I understand you care about "creating bonds" even though most of the community is throwing insults at each other anyway, but lets be real here, you and I both know that isn't a valid reason. Most of the people who team are probably skype teams who have good enough bonds to trust their mates not to DDoS them anyway.
I think every one at deathmatch has experienced this and wanted to punt a pigeon in the face for what happened. You're standing there, the countdown from 10 is going down and then.. The guy to the left of you blocks his sword, and the other guy nods, crouches, blocks his sword and rushes you at 0 and you get annihilated because you have no room to fight with in a tight arena. Ban this. You're not gonna be making any bonds when you get a randy to do the work for your team mate and you stab them in the back after they take care of you.
Either that or just make a completely new game where it's standard SG but it's solo only. We can have new stats for that too, considering you lied about it before.
1.7 -> 1.8 -
MCSG has done stupid things. Everyone can agree to that whether they like it or not. But dropping a ton of players to another server (not gonna say which, but lets just say Huahwi plays his UHC's there) but switching from 1.7 to 1.8 when it wasn't even forced? Why would you EVER do that? Ever? Why? Why? Why? What the bunnies? I honestly have no idea why it happened. I literally can't even go into detail, blunt and stupid was that decision. Great server, bad decisions.
I think that concludes my long ass rant. Props on the disguise plugin, ngl, you did a good job on that. Try use those skills on anti-cheat. MCSG, you have constructed the perfect SG server. The actual game itself (the tiering system, maps etc.) I wouldn't change a thing. Kudos to you for that, incredible. Just some tweaks you have to make.
It's quite appreciated that you took the time, courage, and effort to explain the issues you have been experiencing within the MCGamer network, because it will certainly help to the understanding of the flaws that are around within our community. Furthermore, letting us understand a little more accurately on what the problem could be, and how we could fix it. In addition to that, we are grateful that you actually complimented, heck, even mentioned the good parts about MCGamer. There aren't many people who actually look at the whole picture when it comes to the network, thus making them blatantly flaming on the staff team because they had one small issue with a two team. However, despite this, the thread itself is usually another opinion that bases around the flaws of MCGamer, so it generally means that most of the suggestions and views were already stated before.
The staff team certainly is an incredible team, and to be entirely honest, not a single individual who took time off their other activities in real life to help regulate a whole community deserve to be treated unfairly or with disrespect. Because day by day, each and every single one of them actually put lots and lots of effort in to making the community a little brighter for us all, they were thoroughly hand-picked by the Senior staff, and also taken under strict measures of application an interview. Hence quite a small portion of many applicants actually get to the interview stage itself. To add to this, what makes the staff team absolutely incredible is that the people who work day by day to help the community worked hard to even gain privilege of being called a moderator. I, as an individual, have been declined twice now (Although it doesn't fully justify my point) in the interview stage, despite the fact that many of the members were looking up to me even getting accepted at all. Also, in both occasions, I left the interview room with a bright smile on my face because of the kindness and tolerance the Senior staff had. Showing how well the staff team worked, in addition to that, all of my other waiting buddies have actually gotten accepted. Which reinforces my point of how they deserve the position because of how much potential, and how kind they are.
You have stated that many staff members reside within the hub of MCGamer, which of course is essential. Because firstly, chat is global for most of the time, so they get to see what goes on within the server in all different hubs that people can join, so it helps regulation become much more easy. Secondly, as Lively had previously stated, we need moderators in hub because it would be easy for them to be closer to the community, furthermore allowing players to contact them on what is going on and so they can check if there are reports of people hacking or being abusive. And perhaps you could be right on the fact that some need to prioritize, but yet again, there were less hacker reports now than last year because of the efforts staff members have made with banning hackers. I would also like to clarify that it is essential to also help anyone, regardless of who they are, with any inquiries they may potentially have. And they can simply stay in hub until a hacker report comes in for them. It is a matter of "first come, first serve". So they should have the privilege to answer people's questions if there isn't any suspicion of anyone hacking. Finally, time
is spent on moderating. The definition of moderation is the avoidance of excess or extremes, especially in one's behavior or beliefs. Meaning that they are still doing their job even when in hub. Furthermore, as Scott stated, there are moderators who do watch games, meaning that practically all the parts of MCGamer are thoroughly moderated, even when people do not know if they are in action.
Continuing on what you have stated about the Cleansweeps... It does generally depend on when was the most recent times you have actually played, because quite a few months back, the network was practically flooded with hackers, or so people say. And through these cleansweeps, we found many people who were quite illegitimate, and thus we appropriately took care of the situation more appropriately. However, you were definitely correct on the fact that there would be new players curious enough to test out their own hacks, thus making up a higher population of rule-breakers. Furthermore, the people who were banned temporarily came back and hacked even more, thus making a pretty big situation for everyone else, especially staff members. Yet again, the staff team recently introduced the permanent ban rule, to which hackers who have been caught will get permanently banned. This rule had resulted in a vast drop of rule-breakers, because they did not have to wait to hack again. So they cannot hack again. I will admit that you are completely right on the case to which it would be practically impossible to remove every single hacker from the network, because more curious people will succumb to hacks, or already banned users will find a way to evade their bans and torment the network more.
The Cleansweeps have made quite the impact in the community, and I would like to reiterate that the Cleansweeps did decrease the amount of hackers, as you can see from the results of each week from the Winter cleansweeps have proved to us that the community actually did a decent job at decreasing the amount of hackers from these times. The statistics shown in each of the results justifies that, and I will provide you the links to the weekly results to show that I am not lying:
This evidence also shows the the amount of bans began increasing by the time it was at the fourth week. However, it began decreasing until the 7th week, henceforth proving that the Cleansweeps were effective, and did help with maintaining a decent portion of the network's order. And still, you are correct on the matter that we cannot remove all of the hackers from the server. But just imagine if these Cleansweeps were never hosted. Yes, of course they aren't extremely efficient, things go on, mistakes occur, but if it weren't for theses sweeps, then there would be a network of people where we see who has the best hacks, and not the best statistics (Over-exaggeration, I suppose).
About the anti-cheat, I do strongly feel as if this statement was bluntly brought up. "Get better anticheat", the developers can't just simply "get" an anticheat that will efficiently, and truthfully ban hackers right off the bat. Coding, and implementing this feature certainly takes time, and it is most probable that they are still working on the anti-cheat as we speak. And yes, perhaps you could be right on the fact that they would need to focus more on developing the anti-cheat. Yet again, they are paying more attention to it than probably most of the other things that were implemented in MCGamer. Furthermore, no examples were given on which aspects they apparently focused more than the actual anti-cheat, thus it does not fully justify your statement. Also, about that specific server you have mentioned, perhaps it could potentially have an adequate anti-cheat. But the fact remains that you have stated "It's known to make mistakes, but everyone and everything is.", this self-contradicts the paragraph on the anti-cheat. Also making it a hypocritical statement. Everything is "known to make mistakes", so of course MCGamer may hit some blunt spots, but it does not mean no other server does either. That specific server has its flaws while MCGamer has theirs, so comparing both of the would only lead to understanding that they both have flaws and good aspects, furthermore, portraying false superiority over MCGamer.
And yes, EU does supposedly nest the most hackers, and we should focus more on the minority networks, where there are less hackers. Saying that we should focus more on the other networks only defeats the purpose of our moderators. I would like to reiterate that they were specifically hand-picked because they were suitable for the job. In addition to this last statement, they come from all across the world, meaning that many different moderators are entirely capable on going to all the different regions they are able to go to, and deal with any problems that happen there. I would also like to clarify that the network is currently under-going CA/US cleansweeps as well, therefore only proving that they do focus on the other networks. Also, Cleansweeps are usually performed when the situation with hackers get far too out of hand, thus excluding AU from cleansweeps. However, making Cleansweeps for AU are taken under discussion as well. I will also provide you the link to justify my point:
http://www.minecraftsurvivalgames.com/threads/us-ca-operation-cleansweep.167666/
Getting on to your points of teaming... There will be no day that teaming will prohibited, and no, it's not specifically because of how it "creates bonds". But instead, it's another tactical method to having someone to win, also, as you stated, so that people can simply have fun. Take this as an analogy, in the Hunger games, there is something known as careers. And at most times, they would have teams of 6, district 1, 2, and 3 form a truce for this. Imagine limiting the amount of teams to around three or four, it practically ruins the purpose of the actual Hunger games. In addition to this, there are clans out there, and in various occasions, clan wars usually have one individual who is not associated with any of the clans whatsoever, therefore would potentially be killed quite early in the game because they are caught under the gunfire between clans. Of course it is frustrating, but this is something that will be allowed, because it was practically organized by both clans, so it gives them the privilege to actually do a clan war within our servers. And limiting team counts would practically mean taking away clans. And throwing insults at one another, if matters get worse to the extent that there are threats or abuse against one another, then it's up to somebody to actually report this matter to a staff member and stop the flame.
Randy teams do occur quite often, and I do certainly agree with you on the point that it can get very frustrating to which you die very easily, without a fighting chance. But yet again, there is realistically nothing wrong with having people to team right on the spot when it comes to death-match. "Randy teaming" is yet another tactic/strategy used for people to successfully win a game of Survival games, taking that away as well will only defeat the actual purpose of having fun with your own tactics, and will only benefit solo-players such as yourself, and such update would be done for your personal gain. We must understand that such teams would usually make playing the game more difficult for you, but we mustn't forget the actual purpose of the game. It is to have fun, not to win. I would like to state that of course one individual will kill the team-mate they have made with last minute for death-match. If it came to the circumstances to which there would only be two of them would only mean that they would have to kill one another for someone to win, even if it means "cleaning up". Lastly about this matter, I have made one of my best internet friends, just by randy-teaming in-game. Although it is a statement that doesn't fully justify my paragraphs for teaming, it still proves that bonds are formed by randy teaming as well. So it is only a matter of tolerance, randy teams are certainly obnoxious, teams in general can be nerve-wrecking. But getting to frustrated over deaths in a video game only shows that we would be too competitive over this matter. The only problem there really is with teams are only if they start acting arrogant and begin to look all high and mighty. Otherwise, we should simply learn to tolerate such circumstances, and understandably, it is difficult.
And about adding a solo-survival games server would only lead to more stress for our developers. It's somewhat like stating that they need to add another server with a whole new set of leaderboards, right after you have stated that they need to focus more on the anti-cheat. It's like piling up more and more work and stress for them when unnecessary, and if they're going to make a new leaderboard for the new solo SG like you suggested. And as you've stated "We can have new stats for that too, considering you lied about it before.", this practically contradicts your final statement, because if they've apparently lied about the leaderboard updates, what would make us think they will promise your final suggestion to be added?
Last but not least, the 1.8 update. I'm actually quite grateful that we have even updated to 1.8, because we get to experience the new features added, and additionally have opportunities to learn more about knowing how to develop the server as a whole, which the developers are most probably doing. And yes, this update didn't necessarily have to be forced, but we did it because of the opportunities it could potentially give us, for example, like I said, improving the network as a whole. And if, hypothetically speaking, one of your reasons for disliking 1.8 is because of how it could be a disadvantage for PvP, then I understand that it could be a frustration. However, this 1.8 update was not specifically for PvP. Not every update is specifically designed to suit people's PvP standards, but instead update Minecraft as a whole. Now that new blocks have been added, we can also use it for our Creative server. Yes, it is under maintenance, and has been for a long time, but it will be out for us sooner or later. This 1.8 update would easily allow ambitious players to build an even bigger variety of structures with the new blocks that were added.
Generally speaking, if you do not have much to say, or elaborate in detail about your opinion on the 1.8 update, then it would only seem as if it is bashing on the decisions made by the MCGamer network. Doing this without proper justification will only make matters seemingly worse than it should be. Their decision on updating, however, was decently justified, and if you still do not like such terms, then nobody is forcing you to stay in MCGamer. If you don't appreciate MCGamer's updates, then I see it redundant to actually bashing on the decisions made, especially without elaboration. Perhaps it could have been more convenient to only state the suggestions instead, because I strongly feel as if this thread was revolved around bashing on the staff team for their decisions.
And I do admire your ambition for hosting your own community as well, and if it comes to the day to which you will be the owner of that server and make it successful, then I pray you understand what it is like hosting such a large community. Also, thank you again for understanding the mistake of not adding further justification in your thread, furthermore the amount of people you could potentially have angered.
