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On a positive note though, this game was truly a wonder. All the fun games, clan wars, rivalries, banter and drama from people all around the world - all facilitated by 2 risk enthusiast brothers who put this game together as a hobby.

I have lots of love and nostalgia for this game and always will, even if I am no longer welcome around here.

The 2014-2016 era was peak for me. But then the likes of sphinx, boywind, 4nic and witchdoctor came along and injected another burst of life into the game for another few years. I'd even really began to enjoy scenarios and that side of the community. I'd easily still be playing this game if I could and pestering all the oldtimers to come back even if only for 1 game.

Alas all good things come to an end. Thanks Ivan and Amok, thanks Waffel, thanks mk, illy, aristo, enigma, epic-clan, thanks scenario community and most of all, thank you Croat.

Ciao.

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:41

Escrito por Palmitas, 16.03.2025 at 18:42

I always said this: I believe that people change. People can sometimes see that they fucked up, and correct it. I believe Dave can change mistakes he did in the past.

As for profits, it is a very tough spot indeed, but you can increase activity by just unbanning people, its a no brainer to atleast start from that and give it a shot.

The only mistake I've made with atWar was actually caring TOO much about the community and what other people think. It caused me to waste too much time talking to people trying to make them see my position. Nobody cares. Waffel is the perfect example. I spent HOURS talking with that dude, listening to his concerns, telling him mine, and trying to reach understanding. Then he goes off and posts things which only show me that he absolutely did not understand anything I said. The lesson I've learned: people are gonna bitch no matter what. Nothing I say will change their minds. Just do what you need to do for the best interests of the game and ignore the noise.

If I had it to do over, I would have banned people faster and not wasted so much time explaining why. Activity was already declining before, and continued declining after.... banning a few toxic people who needed to go didn't do anything to change the course the game was already on. In other words: no great loss. The upshot: somewhat less moderation issues to have to deal with. The trade-off was and is worth it.

It does irritate me however when people say I "don't care" about atWar. It's easy for people to sit back and make accusations when they don't have the real life responsibilities to deal with like I do. I know better than to expect any sympathy or understanding from this community. But I do keep atWar running and deal with the emergencies when things break, no matter how busy I am with other things. Is that the act of someone who doesn't care?

Toxic? You know I'd never been called toxic in my life until I met you.

I had my account of 8 years erased because i criticized how you ran things. You told lies to the community about why i was banned and censored every post made in my defense by both myself and by others. You and Sid decided you'd enact your 1984 fantasy on dozens of players. Who's the toxic one here Dave?

I can't hop on and play a world game with my old friends because of you.

I can't go have a nostalgic clan war vs mk or Aristo because of you.

I can't hop on to the forums and have a laugh with Waffel without using VPNs and different devices because of you.

I can't go burn some hours on a scenario because of you.

Who's the toxic one here?

And stop whining about your real life responsibilities. We all have them. I know in your mind we are all lifeless incels who sit around all day moving pixels around on a browser. But we are actually real people with lives, jobs, partners, wives, kids and responsibilities of our own. I guess dehumanising us makes it easier for you to treat people like disposable garbage eh?

Like I said in the other thread, fuck you Dave. I've earned the right to say that with how you've treated me. You don't get to call me toxic.

Escrito por Tribune Aquila, 22.02.2025 at 01:31

The world has CHANGED.

Ukraine lost 20% of its own LAND. Russia OWNS Crimrea. Russia OWNS Luhansk. Russia OWNS the coastline.

It is OUTRAGEOUS that the world map has not been updated already. Peace negotiations are ALMOST DONE. These borders are obviously NOT changing.

This proposal should be expedited because it is hurting the dignity of millions of Russians who play this game.

Add Kosovo as well, then.

Escrito por nutt, 26.02.2025 at 21:30

There should be a downvote option on forums

YouTube Rewind 2018 would repeat.

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:14

Escrito por b2spirit, 17.03.2025 at 00:15

When the fuck are you going to fix map editor

Nice necropost

Necropost? It was never fixed.

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:10

Still good years later, well done

You banned over half the people in the videos.

Sphinx.

[Dave]:
Not here to placate waffels 300th goodbye post or stir up past grievances. First, Dave I owe you a small apology for 2022. I never had any grievances with you and still don't to this day. I'm grateful you bought this place and kept the lights on, even if it didn't make financial sense from an IRR perspective. I've long known you've had deranged, resentful communist types in your ear whispering about their grandiose game plans in which you MUST purge players, that just so happen to align with their petty, decade long inferiority complexes. I've never held that against you. More on that later. I've never blame you once for anything that happened here and you have my gratitude. I know I'll take some shit from ole lao for saying this, but who cares, I've always been my own player.

[Nostalgia fagging, can skip]:
Of all of the years I played this game, I'd say 2017-2018 was my favorite, with the covid season being a close second. 2017-18 era was peak competition, aristrocrats, mk, illyria, peaky blinders, amigos and more. I remember I was invited to aristo by Klevis, as probably the only developed rank 7 at the time. Days later, Klevis never logged in again, so I was in search for a new clan. I remember looking at Illyria, one of the three great clans and wanting in. I was hungry for knowledge and Laochra, who I consider the most complete player ever, was who I wanted to learn from. I joined. It was dead. A dusty hall of old legends who hadn't really competed in years. Lao was occasionally dueling but there was no one to clanwar with. I invited 4nic my best friend and 2v2 partner. We began dominating and slowly the clan began to stir back to life. Lao integrated us well, acq became active again, dbacks too, khal for a season or two before he ran off to get married. Chill ran a tight ship, nero was our cheerleader and syrian depressingly wandered the halls, I was in love. I got my friends boywind and witch-doctor to join. We dominated the clan war scene for a year straight with decisive season wins. We had such a stacked squad that our second string could've probably won seasons alone. Everyone hated us, except for us. We had a monopoly on talent, with the personalities to go with it We were a tightly knit clique that other clans tried to emulate, but could never. Total Illyrian Nationalism. This lead to a resentful out group, more on this later.

Covid was a fun season where everyone came back and we had the most active, most competitive season to date. The gameplay was sketchier and more unconventional, but at the end of the day, it was an amazing way to spend the pandemic and have one last dance with familiar friends and foes. And I am grateful.

[The elephant in the room]:
When Dave bought this game there was a power vacuum and extreme information asymmetry from a player to owner standpoint. Asymmetric information occurs when one party has more superior information than another. In this case Dave, who hadn't wasted years of his life on this wonderful game like us, was at a disadvantage. He was brutally taken advantage of by Sid, to no fault of his own. When buying the game, Dave was not aware of the extremely nuanced player caste system, who to listen to, who to avoid, who to trust. it would've been impossible. He was taken advantage of by a resentful player who pretended to have altruistic and unbiased narratives but used the unaware dave as a bludgeon against all of his in-game opponents.

[Mini history lesson]
Mods typically were a combination of player votes and an inner mod conclusive vote. Mods consisted of many well respected, top players with freakish outliers like sultan, google chrome, and a younger version of cold case (he's cool now). Sid was not voted by players nor elected by mods. He spent his time sucking off Sun Tzu, the admin at the time, in a similar way he did to Dave. Sid was quietly and unilaterally promoted by the now disgraced Sun Tzu days before he was demoted for taking bribes from a player to complete a task. Players mostly didn't mind because he remained quiet and reasonable. Years later, during covid, Brian announced he wouldn't have internet for awhile (lol), so Sid was "temporarily" elevated to community manager with a red badge. To no ones surprise, he never stepped down and became some sort of authoritarian right hand admin, who never ever mentioned any of this. During this time he elevated fellow apparatchiks to modship who wouldn't question him. NPCs like lelouch, mobster, dire and others who have came and went. It was a total shit show. There was no longer diversity of thought or opinion, it was a one man regime, with dissenters being demoted or banned.

[The boil-over]
After years of wearing the mask, in 2022 Sid went mask off. Banning waffel and laochra, setting of the 2022 "crisis" events, and despite essentially the whole player base and 80% of the mods telling him to step down, he held on for dear life. Anyone in the "cool kids club" was nuked, players deleted, quit, lashed out. Sure, maybe this game was in decline, but that certainly was a shot of morphine into the artery of atwar. Atwar is like a tree of life, a few established players leave and it causes ripples that lead to many others stepping away. Sid resented Laochra and others on a personal level for his failure to fit in the competitive ingroup. He didn't have the skill to compete or the personality to entertain and instead of doing his own thing like a normal person he harbored that resentment for years until he could go scorched earth.

The end-game
A resentful, freakish, inferior freak tried to convince dave to essentially corporatize AtWar. I look at Sids awful plan like Bolshevism. In 1918, communist freaks murdered the Russian Royal Romanov family in their basement. Tsar Nicholas II, his wife, and their 5 children, the youngest child being 13, were brutally murdered. The bolsheviks killed the children too because they knew that if they left even one alive, the people would be able to cling onto an heir of the throne and it threatened their one party communist rule. You may be thinking, wtf Sphinks has gone insane, stay with me here. Like the bolsheviks, Sid wanted to eradicate all atwar history, as he had never taken part in it. He wanted to dismantle players clans, hierarchies, the competitive system as a whole. These were words out of his mouth. He wanted to flatten this whole game, start anew and be the glorious leader of "hundreds of thousands" of braindead bots, who had no notion of what "Mortal Kombat was, or what a 3v3 Europe game was". I am not exaggerating this plan, he wanted to raze this place for a monetized botfarm. This is sheer resentment of someone who has never won a clan war season, never played a game with the season on the line, climbed the duel rank charts. They wanted it ALL GONE. All of you who spent years contributing to this community were nothing but cattle, replaceable, expendable. During the peak of being high on his own supply he even mentioned that "AtWar would be his retirement plan" once it went mainstream. These are verifiable facts. Once that plan seemed unattainable he just disappeared, leaving a path of ruin and bans in his wake.

[The whitepill]
It's not all doom and gloom. I know for a fact this game isn't near the top of priorities in Daves busy life, especially in this volatile economic climate. But there are many talented, genius individuals here who would love to help you fix this place up and perhaps monetize it better. But thats a conversation for another time. This place is one of a kind, and there are ways to increase revenue and player-count with it becoming a soulless slop-fest. And I appreciate you for at least keeping the lights on for now.

[Final Thoughts]
At the end of the day, AtWar is more than just a game, it's a living, breathing community built by the blood, sweat, and rivalries of its players. Dave, you've kept this chaotic, beautiful mess alive, and for that, we owe you. The scars of the past, won't fade easily, but they're a testament to what this place once was and could be again. There's still life in these halls, still talent willing to step up, and still a chance to turn this into something sustainable without losing its soul. Let's not let resentment or apathy write the final chapter.

Everybody rank 9 and up except for woojoo*

Wait a second. Before taking any step, we should clarify who is considered pro and who is not. I say everybody level 9 and up.

Pros, I will never be considered a pro lol.

Jobber... same i am jobber also

Join the discord: https://discord.gg/qYMQxHZ6

we plan casual game scenarios on the discord
i have a job now so i can only play casual...
i need people to join so we can fill more games...

I remember the curiousity that rich and wide community and game styles such as 2011-2012 could invoke. So many different players and views, so many game styles. Every night to stay awake was well worth it.

I remember the small and well known community that late 2010s atwar used to be. I remember what a broken soul I had and how important it was to have that corner.

That being said, afterwind and atwar will only have meaning, and continue to exist only if we'd be wise to learn from what we enjoyed and were riviliged to experience. 1000 more eu+/wwi games would not change it, and no matter if we were called rats/cockroaches by the late time mods.

Despite all the jealously and the bad blood, after this game shuts down, remember that you still have that friend Roai, who remembers you and wishes all the best for you.

Escrito por Nero, 02.04.2025 at 18:54

---

Holy shit is this actually Nero

But the fact that a former Mod says this speaks volumes of the problems AW is facing and faced. Dave, if its not clear by now, you can atleast start by unbanning those from the 2021 stuff. And probably Bugs too, I doubt he would cheat again. and besides, Pavle cheats and he is head supporter and unbanned, so I think its only fair.

Atwar has given me rushes I crave for to this day, playing cws for hours and carrying lategame, losing in incredible fashion (thanks tungston and others) or the rush of being someone who I've been trying to beat for months to years. Discussing strategy in this game is fun and incredibly captivating. Trolling low ranks is the equivalent to true happiness, training them is impossible but also a fun thing to try and do.

Helping people get premium, being toxic as hell, im sure most people have had similar experiences when they were low ranks getting dogged on but being able to talk to the vast community. it's been years but I literally remember hundreds maybe a thousand different players even from all the few but valuable years I was able to play. The past is far behind us but I know I',m not just feeling nostalgia, those were great times for not just me but for countless people.

It's easy to blame in hindsight but people move on and this game definitely suffered after people lost the thing that made this game so great : the people who were part of the diverse culture of atwar. Shameful to see this put on blast here and have to relive the sad state of affairs put together by all the players and mods, 99% of people know what the problem is, and I think personally only half or less of the blame can be put on the owner, But rather his advantageous sidekick who swayed him in the wrong direction. Much love to keeping the game running and forums accessible, and thanks to the original devs for designing this work of art.

Hi I am Nero

I have to post in this before it gets locked, and I'm surprised it hasn't been already. Like many others, this game was my childhood. Other kids had RuneScape or WoW, I had Afterwind. I have years of fond memories, and even served as a mod for a time.

With that out of the way, it speaks volumes alone that the forum is full of the same complaints over 3 years later. It also just so happens that that's about the only activity the forum really gets, maybe new players are put off by the hour loading time that has been present since day 1.

I remember Dave saying he bought the game because he loved it, he saw a future for it. That's why, instead of modernizing some features, he started an anti-toxicity crusade against some of the most established players. And what good did that do? Over 3 years later, the most activity this game gets is transient guests. And yet, here I am posting in a thread made by Waffel. Why would we come to post this after not playing for years? Because WE LOVE THE GAME TOO!

Maybe the administration and I have different views of community, but there has been no benefit to ANY community on this game. All I see now is a barren safe space for no one. People play games for fun, so when you ban or chase out the players having fun, no one will want to play. That's what happened to me, and I'm sure many others. And now that the toxic players and all their buddies are gone, you get no scenarios, no clan wars, no tournaments, and a dead forum. Just the fact that it took a thread from Waffel to revitalize the forums should tell you what you need to know.

I think it's time to admit that a few trolls aren't the worst thing about this game, and that a certain owner took poor advice. That scary toxic community is here years later wishing this game was playable, while the anti-toxicity crusaders have disappeared and left the game in shambles.

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:41

The only mistake I've made with atWar was actually caring TOO much about the community and what other people think. It caused me to waste too much time talking to people trying to make them see my position. Nobody cares. Waffel is the perfect example. I spent HOURS talking with that dude, listening to his concerns, telling him mine, and trying to reach understanding. Then he goes off and posts things which only show me that he absolutely did not understand anything I said. The lesson I've learned: people are gonna bitch no matter what. Nothing I say will change their minds. Just do what you need to do for the best interests of the game and ignore the noise.

You know what Dave, even after you've wiped off my account from this game and along with me many other accounts of players that spoke up, I ALWAYS remained respectful towards you and reached out to you (like many times before). I remained hopeful that we would be able to work things out and fix all of the mess that was created, if we were able to just speak to each other, for the sake of the game. Many of the players that got banned, like Mauzer, Jugers, osix, Laochra, and more, made fun of me at the time for being so naive and willing to talk with a stubborn guy like you, but I did anyways.

Up until now in my recent postings, I have refrained from mentioning certain people their names and actions and pointing out the things they did, but reading your post, and seeing how you're still trying to claim to be the reasonable guy in all of this and actually pretending to be the victim many years later, really leaves me speachless. So I guess from now on i'll be even more specific on certain matters, because apparently its YOU that did not understand any of the things I've posted on both my main as this account, when many people apparently did (just look at the comments above me).

You claim that you've spend hours talking with me, listening to my concerns, and trying to understand all of it, but that is just a blatant lie. After you've banned me I reached out to you within days (maybe even hours), trying to find out why on earth you decided to ban and delete the account of not just mine, but a lot of other players as well, and most importantly for something that you've allowed all of us to do: to freely share our mind, our opinons and discuss the matter I brought forth in those threads. I reached out to you on discord (after I had already reached out to you in game multiple times, prior to the ban), and wanted to talk to you about it, but it was you that wasn't available to talk, and we actually never talked ever again:

Screenshots of our (last and only conversation on discord):
- https://prnt.sc/ONEkPTaDcsNA
- https://prnt.sc/VdSyBrUM6bmy
- https://prnt.sc/9-Zwm1F6DyHc

-------
Before I go into further details of what happend in november 2021, I would like to point out what started all of this. Back in early 2021, somewhere in march, I got banned by Sid for calling him incompetent, something he had been called before by numerous of other players and mods (and even back then a lot of people and still to this day, agreed upon). After my ban a lot of people spoke out against it, claiming it to be harsh, saying that it was petty to ban someone for something like that, that he overstepped, that the game's regime started to get similarities with Chinese and Russian regimes (those same regimes you seemed to be against, but somehow enforce in your own game, which is kind of ironic). Sid was doing this not only to me, but to some other people as well, like Trystane, and people that also criticized him for certain actions and expressions about the whole Laochra-situation. You however, instead of taking the control over your own game and your staffteam, you created a precedent by allowing these kind of bans taking place, resulting in admins, mostly mods, and supporters abusing the powers they got and eliminating players left and right they had beef with in the past. Players like Kaska and Croat, players very well known for their own absurd amount of toxic behaviours, banning/muting people they disliked and had problems with, with unjustified reasonings and chatlogs from many years ago as reason. Not only did you allow this to happen, you even supported and defended it, making your close friends within the staffteam basically unvulnerable without any accountability whatsoever. This went on for months, and a lot of threads about the issue were brought up, but all got silenced, locked, deleted, people got muted in game, people got banned over stuff. This led to people leaving the game as well, because the game was starting to become a very dictator-ish run game, where not complying with the status-quo was almost reason enough to get banned/muted/silenced for.
-------

Before you decided to ban all of us and delete all our accounts, you and I did however talk in the game but not in a way you're describing here. We talked about a thread that I created at the start of november 2021 where I stated my concerns about the state of the game and certain regimes within the game and its staffteam as I mentioned before. The thread in question got locked/archived/deleted straight away by Sid (who else, of course?) when he noticed it, but at the time plenty of people had already upvoted, supported, and started the discussion. We talked about the things that had happened over the past months prior to that thread, and the state of the game and the problems it faced with the staffteam. I asked you to allow open dialogue, and at first you did. You allowed us to speak our mind and even unlocked/unarchived/undeleted the thread in question, you allowed people to share their displeasures and after a couple of days, when more people started to support it and the sentiment within the community started to grow, Sid however decided to lock/archive/delete the thread once again, claiming that the thread served it's purpose and dictated, once again, the subject and discussion of the matter. That's when the second thread got opened by Jugers, basically stating that we wanted to continue discussing the matter, as it wasn't done yet, it had barely even begun. You, once again, allowed open dialogue, and even more people started commenting on it, even your own moderators and supporters, most of it as response to the other thread being locked/deleted/archived, which only made more people within the community very angry. The thread received support from all over the community, allowed everyone to express their opinions and concerns without being afraid of getting banned/muted/lynched by members of the staffteam, as that's what was happening for months prior to the threads. I think as the days went by, Kaska, Croat and Sid all were mentioned by a lot of players, which eventually resulted in I think Kaska resigning under pressure and shortly after that Croat was considering to resign as well. Before Croat could do that, it got leaked that Croat was resigning, and it resulted in a very manic mentalbreakdown in both the forums and discords/external chats, which eventually led to the ''Thank you Croat'' video/comments, and you banning/deleting all of the players, because you got fed up with it.

Only a couple days after our conversation on discord (see screenshots above), I received screenshots of chats of you and Sid (and others) talking shit about all of us (the banned players), how we instigated this 'rebellion', how you never intend to let any of us back on to the game because of the public outcry it caused, how much trouble we caused for exposing the overly moderating that happened at the time, how much better the game would be with us out of the picture, because according to you (Sid, mostly), we were all the root problem of everything that was wrong with this game, and we were just a bunch of useless players to you whom had no constructive contribution to this game. You and Sid decided to delete all the threads, every comment, every topic, mute every player that even as much mentioned any of this, hoping that it would fade away like it never happened. However, that did not happen, quite the opposite happened.

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:41

If I had it to do over, I would have banned people faster and not wasted so much time explaining why. Activity was already declining before, and continued declining after.... banning a few toxic people who needed to go didn't do anything to change the course the game was already on. In other words: no great loss. The upshot: somewhat less moderation issues to have to deal with. The trade-off was and is worth it.

The banning and deleting of accounts led to a lot of important clans disbanding, leading to a lesser active competitive scene overall, which resulted in the current activity in this game we have right now. The fact that you even say something like this, really tells me how little you understand about this game and the core of this community (what's left of it anyways). Over the years you've claimed that the competitive community was never an important one anyways, you claimed that it was just a loud minority dictating things and that banning us would have no effect what so ever. Yet, even after all these years, with all the lousy updates, endless bugs, bad mechanics and strategies, lack of advertising, the restrictions that are put on new players/guest accounts, numerous of exploits from many players (even those within the staffteam themselves, and who seem to have influential positions within your staffteam, like head of supporters), most of the current active remaining players are mostly those from the competitive scene, which really should tell you something about the importance of a competitive community within a game. The fact that you mention the less moderation issues as a pro for banning people and that it was worth the trade-off, really shows me that you're either in a lot of denial of the consequences of your own actions or that you're willing to sacrifice a game, a community that's been thriving for over 15 years, and your own investments for personal beliefs and issues you or your friends may have or had with certain players that got banned. It looks to me that you've actually selfdestructed this game solely to please the complaints of some of the players that were/are close friends of you at the time, such as Croat, Kaska and Sid. All 3 of them were heavily criticised at the time by most of the players within the community as the biggest sources of problems with the staffteam and the community and a lot of people demanded resignation/demotion of all 3 of the players. You however was against all of that. And the thing that shocks me the most, is that you're even willing to promote one of them back into your staff/moderation team, after all the chaos and shit all 3 of them were involved with. And now two of those players are nowhere to be found after the mess they've created within the game, and yet here you are, still as stubborn as always claiming that you did nothing wrong and it's all our fault.

Not to mention that the players that you're refering to as ''no great loss'', were players that have contributed a shit ton on this game, into making this game a better place, some of them were well respected moderators and/or supporters within the game and played and supported this game for over 10 years, and yet you just toss them out like it's nothing. That says more about you as an owner and the way you look at your playerbase.

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:41

It does irritate me however when people say I "don't care" about atWar. It's easy for people to sit back and make accusations when they don't have the real life responsibilities to deal with like I do. I know better than to expect any sympathy or understanding from this community. But I do keep atWar running and deal with the emergencies when things break, no matter how busy I am with other things. Is that the act of someone who doesn't care?

I think it's really sad that even after all these years, with the declining and unhappy playerbase, the same threads and topics every year about the state of the game, the lack of players, lack of upgrades, lack of basically everything, unbanning people, it looks to me that we, the players that love(d) this game, apparently care more about the game than you do Dave. Because instead of realizing and accepting that the way you've been going for the last couple of years has been nothing but destructive for both the game and its community, you're actually saying that you regret not banning people faster and enforcing more strictness, which eventually led to the current state of this game.

Like I explained in my first post on this account, the whole reason this game lasted for so many years was not just because of the niche gameplay and mechanics, but it was because of a community-feel like atmosphere, that made you log in day after day, spending hours on here, something that you experienced as well in your early months in 2018/2019. Unfortunately you let bad influence cloud your judgement and forced certain things upon the community.

I really think you, as an entrepeneur/business man, should be able to know how to deal with constructive criticism and other opinions, instead of banning/deleting/muting anything you don't like, and tearing up a whole community because you or your friends didn't feel like fitting in.


It saddens me to see that after all this time being banned for no good reason and some of us still took their time to express their concerns and opinions about certains things within the game and its administration, because we actually care about this game and always have, you still seem to be this stubborn person that doesn't see anything wrong in his own actions and decisions and just keeps on blaming others for the current state of affairs. I think at some point you have to accept that maybe the game is better of with a new owner, or at least someone that understands, or tries to understand the way this game and it's community works.


Waffel

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:41

Escrito por Palmitas, 16.03.2025 at 18:42

I always said this: I believe that people change. People can sometimes see that they fucked up, and correct it. I believe Dave can change mistakes he did in the past.

As for profits, it is a very tough spot indeed, but you can increase activity by just unbanning people, its a no brainer to atleast start from that and give it a shot.

The only mistake I've made with atWar was actually caring TOO much about the community and what other people think. It caused me to waste too much time talking to people trying to make them see my position. Nobody cares. Waffel is the perfect example. I spent HOURS talking with that dude, listening to his concerns, telling him mine, and trying to reach understanding. Then he goes off and posts things which only show me that he absolutely did not understand anything I said. The lesson I've learned: people are gonna bitch no matter what. Nothing I say will change their minds. Just do what you need to do for the best interests of the game and ignore the noise.

If I had it to do over, I would have banned people faster and not wasted so much time explaining why. Activity was already declining before, and continued declining after.... banning a few toxic people who needed to go didn't do anything to change the course the game was already on. In other words: no great loss. The upshot: somewhat less moderation issues to have to deal with. The trade-off was and is worth it.

It does irritate me however when people say I "don't care" about atWar. It's easy for people to sit back and make accusations when they don't have the real life responsibilities to deal with like I do. I know better than to expect any sympathy or understanding from this community. But I do keep atWar running and deal with the emergencies when things break, no matter how busy I am with other things. Is that the act of someone who doesn't care?

Dave, do you mind spending few minutes to write your plans for this game and everything? Its means a lot to some of us to hear what is happening with this game and future plans for it? When i say future plans, i mean in this year. Thanks in advance.

Escrito por Lev Davidovic, 02.04.2025 at 11:14

..

Its true, its pointless to talk with some people. As palm said its pointless to talk with SOME people, not all of them. If a bunch of people says they will play if some guy like Lion or whatever would be unbanned, whats the issue about it? Unbann and see what happens. People keep playing? Fine. They bother you? Bann them again. Indeed not much chatting-caring-hours needed.

..

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:41

The only mistake I've made with atWar was actually caring TOO much about the community and what other people think. It caused me to waste too much time talking to people trying to make them see my position. Nobody cares. Waffel is the perfect example. I spent HOURS talking with that dude, listening to his concerns, telling him mine, and trying to reach understanding. Then he goes off and posts things which only show me that he absolutely did not understand anything I said. The lesson I've learned: people are gonna bitch no matter what. Nothing I say will change their minds. Just do what you need to do for the best interests of the game and ignore the noise.

If I had it to do over, I would have banned people faster and not wasted so much time explaining why. Activity was already declining before, and continued declining after.... banning a few toxic people who needed to go didn't do anything to change the course the game was already on. In other words: no great loss. The upshot: somewhat less moderation issues to have to deal with. The trade-off was and is worth it.

It does irritate me however when people say I "don't care" about atWar. It's easy for people to sit back and make accusations when they don't have the real life responsibilities to deal with like I do. I know better than to expect any sympathy or understanding from this community. But I do keep atWar running and deal with the emergencies when things break, no matter how busy I am with other things. Is that the act of someone who doesn't care?

Reacting to your message

Being a leader (of atwar in this case) will inevitably result in people lashing out at you occasionally, regardless of what you do. Trust me when I say that the players in here - who possess an IQ higher than 90 - are well aware of you caring about atwar and nurturing it throughout the years. They are also aware of what you've got right and wrong though, that's better to keep in mind.

It's good to see you finally admitting that community management is not your task. Let a community manager do it instead. Moderation is not your task either. Let moderators do it. If you meant "caring too much" in this sense, you are right.

Palm also said this... I will reiterate. Players are good at identifying problems, but horrible at solving them. Do not listen to anyone, put their feedbacks in a bag and conclude yourself what should be done. Polls sometimes don't work in your favor either because players don't know what they really want, they don't understand game development.


Comparing AW to other games

One thing is certain... atWar is not moving forward for a decade. Rome: Total War is a strategy game that had been released back in 2004, 21 years ago. It has 1000 players daily on steamcharts and a small but loyal fanbase/community playing it together and modding it ever since. This is similar to what you have in atWar with map makers and the competitive players. It is natural that every other kind of player abandoned this game (scenario players for instance).

The key difference is evidently that there's a new Total War game every 3 years or so in a continuous development cycle, which keeps hooking in more and more people, refreshing the core playerbase over time. In fact, the Total War games probably have a couple thousand people playing them world wide, not accounting for the hundreds of thousands who play around a new one's launch as newbies or game tourists. AtWar could easily have this too if it had bots, maybe a seasonal design (gameplay wise, not only CWs).


My suggestion which you may or may not ignore

I'm basically a nobody (to you) so I doubt you'd take my advice, but I'd still recommend you something in retrospect (perhaps does not matter anymore) -> focus on improving/developing the game itself, maybe even outsource that and focus on the management of it (depending on how much more money you'd like to throw at the game after all). Implement some of the suggestions that people keep pushing in a feedback format for years. Adding bots for instance - I know it is a huge challenge programming wise.

Let's say you take my advice and start implementing those things in your free time, or hire someone to do it. Well, the first question that comes to mind is... "OK, if I change so many things deeply embedded into the game for years, or add a lot of new crap, will the very few remaining players also leave?". The answer to that is very tricky. Most likely, yes, most of them will, but you also get the chance to push advertisements and experiment to get a higher retention rate. Alternatively, you could keep the existing IP and make atWar 2. That way, the core legacy playerbase (veterans) could stay here and enjoy the game until they (or you) see fit.


Current situation and the "atwar is dying" spam

Game development is not easy, at all. Especially when software associated with it keeps aging and aging... However, the stagnation we have right now is the absolute worst thing we can have. In the name of the few remaining players, please do something other than that, and keep us updated on what is happening (currently - for years - basically nothing).

People are complaining a lot lately that the game is dying, which is not true, but it's certainly not alive and thriving. It reached a point of stagnation where it slowly crawls towards abandonment. You can change that Dave. Only you. Sell atwar... make atwar 2... hire a dev and lock him up in a basement... get on a remote island in the pacific for a month and sell your soul coding 24/7 to improve the game... appoint waffel as the dictator of atwar with a pink shield as a late April's fools joke... just do something, we beg. A major shift in decision making is needed for the few of us and potentially future players.

So yes, most players don't actually mean the game is dying, they just feel that we are moving towards abandonment, because that's what is happening pretty much in front of our eyes. Even if you insist you'll keep it up and running, what's the point of that if you have 10 people remaining in the lobby and no games running? I also think you don't mean that seriously because it sounds kind of evil and disrespectful to let a game die, then keep it running blank, carrying it as a shield saying "see? I did not shut it down". I would love to think that you have more respect for us and yourself, only saying that as a PR stunt to calm us down among the atwar is dying spam.


About banning people... briefly

I honestly support both you and most other people in this thread. If a person severly breaks the guidelines of a platform, they should be banned. That's it.

On the other hand, I can also agree with Palm for example, that banning 10 veteran players in a game with ~100 active players daily is essentially like shooting yourself in the foot. You have to see that.

In reality, your opinion regarding those bans would be completely valid and I would support you in it, if the game was actually being gradually improved over time, aside from that.


Thanks for reading all that, in case you did.

I know very little about the past and i am very much not entitled to speak about what happened about the banned people and why. But, beeing active between 2020 and now, i can certainly point out that is foolish to ignore the correlation between all those banned people and the declining activity of the game (espetially competitive, and clearly the absence of competitive scene is logically related to the "less retention problem", even if that was already an issue it is clearly not helpfull banning expert people).

Its true, its pointless to talk with some people. As palm said its pointless to talk with SOME people, not all of them. If a bunch of people says they will play if some guy like Lion or whatever would be unbanned, whats the issue about it? Unbann and see what happens. People keep playing? Fine. They bother you? Bann them again. Indeed not much chatting-caring-hours needed.

As Hine said, we are just a bunch of guys willing to play a game we like, and this is all feedback for you man. I never spoke with you Dave, it is true, it is pointless to talk with some people, dont be one of those.

Escrito por El Serbio, 02.04.2025 at 09:29

I just wanna play again, is that too much to ask for? Dave, this is business, so please treat it like one.. Does Mark Zuckerberg care what people talk about him on facebook or instagram and goes to ban people? NO.. Its a fucking business and he should do things that will make him money, not argue with cockroaches on forums like an old grandma.. Who cares what we think and speak about you? Just do your best to make this business better. You get money, we get fun by playing our game, win-win, is that hard?

Would be true if only AtWar generated a good profits, not to even mention that has no community feedback, active development, team letters, active discord server with daily and seasonal events, Q&A, etc.
The list could go on, but I will keep it short.

I just wanna play again, is that too much to ask for? Dave, this is business, so please treat it like one.. Does Mark Zuckerberg care what people talk about him on facebook or instagram and goes to ban people? NO.. Its a fucking business and he should do things that will make him money, not argue with cockroaches on forums like an old grandma.. Who cares what we think and speak about you? Just do your best to make this business better. You get money, we get fun by playing our game, win-win, is that hard?

I don't care what Dave says now, I just want Lion unbanned, and by extension the rest of the players.

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:06

You know, if everyone who posted on this cry thread actually joined a game.....

Turns out we manage different timezones and shit. And we are also busy. I had to stop playing casual because I could not guarantee having time every 2 days to play my casual turns. Imagine.

Escrito por Dave, 01.04.2025 at 23:41

Escrito por Palmitas, 16.03.2025 at 18:42

I always said this: I believe that people change. People can sometimes see that they fucked up, and correct it. I believe Dave can change mistakes he did in the past.

As for profits, it is a very tough spot indeed, but you can increase activity by just unbanning people, its a no brainer to atleast start from that and give it a shot.

---

Im gonna dissect your answer into parts.

"The only mistake I've made with atWar was actually caring TOO much about the community and what other people think." Thats truly debatable to be honest. I have seen people in Discord completly disagree with this, I do think you did care, until you didn't. Keep in mind im a 2019 player, and I remember that at one point you gave away 1 week premium to everyone because of server issues, I know you did in fact care, until you didn't.

"Waffel is the perfect example. I spent HOURS talking with that dude, listening to his concerns, telling him mine, and trying to reach understanding." There my friend, you did the mistake of listening to Waffel. He says 5% correct things 95% retarded stuff. It's not worth it to listen to every single person, you need to listen to the correct person.

"The lesson I've learned: people are gonna bitch no matter what. Nothing I say will change their minds. Just do what you need to do for the best interests of the game and ignore the noise." Some people yes, but putting all in the same box is stupid. Im gonna be honest to you, if Bugs is unbanned I doubt he would cheat again. did he cheat with the 10000 alts he made? he didn't. He just wants to keep playing the game. Keeping him banned is just affecting the activity of the competitive scene: which is probably annoying to you, I get it, we are annoying as fuck sometimes. But that is because we genuinely care about the game. Waffel is an idiot most times, and at this point he doesn't even wanna get unbanned, I know it. However, banning so many people was NOT in the interests of the game. So many people were banned that probably didn't need to be banned on that November 2021 fiasco, that it slowly killed competitive I still don't know why Trystane (Augustus Caesar) was banned. I will not get it. So many people deleted because they were angry that it makes you think. Mesopotamia and Alois were key people in the community and one was head supporter. Makes you think why they deleted aswell.
I was talking to my clanmate Tiger the other day, who is a newbie rank 8, and he told me "The only thing I want is for the game to be more active to be able to cw more" which pains me a lot because in 2019 there was daily cws. It was something normal that I was brought up into. Banning people WAS NOT in the best interests of the game. Banning some? sure. But there is nothing more pointless, as an example, than Osix's ban. He deserved some kind of punishment for being toxic? 1000%. But permaban is insane, considering the person that permabanned him was even more toxic than him. Also, just because people disagree with you doesn't mean you gotta ban them, Waffel could be shouting that he hates you, but imo, as someone that loves stuff like the American 1st amendment, as long as you are not being threateaned, I doubt you should ban them.

"If I had it to do over, I would have banned people faster and not wasted so much time explaining why. Activity was already declining before, and continued declining after.... banning a few toxic people who needed to go didn't do anything to change the course the game was already on. In other words: no great loss. The upshot: somewhat less moderation issues to have to deal with. The trade-off was and is worth it." That would be true if the people were being toxic as fuck, but most of them weren't. You didn't back down of something that basically killed comp, and because of that night in November 2021, the competitive scene is currently what it is. Let's not even start with the head supporter, that used a fucking range bug in a cw vs me, and was previously banned because of a rangebug (which, to be honest, should warrant a removal of the role, and is more deserving of a permaban than other people that YOU or the Admin team banned) Activity kept declining because of what? in Comp because you banned key people in the playerbase and most people deleted their accounts because of that. But, also besides that, WHY THE FUCK ARE THE TUTORIALS COMING SOON SINCE I HAVE MEMORY? Atwar's problem was always retention, you would think the best thing to work would be to try and retain more players, but nope, tutorials are still always coming soon. what a fucking dissapointment, not gonna lie. and there was a great loss, let's not lie to ourselves. Atleast from a comp perspective, that killed comp x3 faster than it would have. Also, always that you have less players the moderation will be less. it's retarded as fuck to say that was an upshot. "If less people vote, there are less votes to count" No shit sherlock.

"It does irritate me however when people say I "don't care" about atWar. It's easy for people to sit back and make accusations when they don't have the real life responsibilities to deal with like I do." Dave, I said this to you once, I'll say it again. IF YOU DON'T HAVE TIME TO DEAL WITH ATWAR, SELL IT. The game is in a state of limbo because nothing happens. Everyone could agree to stop playing the game until you sell it and you prob wouldn't care. I also do not understand why don't you sell the game, considering it's surely in the red.

"I know better than to expect any sympathy or understanding from this community. But I do keep atWar running and deal with the emergencies when things break, no matter how busy I am with other things. Is that the act of someone who doesn't care?" David, thats the fucking minimum, thats what we expect from someone who is the owner, its the minimum thing that he should do. The fact that you even mention this is an embarrassment, I really need to say that.

In 2022 this topic by Waffel would have been insta-archived. What changed? Sascha is the only mod. No other mod is active. Lelouch is no longer active like he was 2 months ago, but even then he did no mod tasks. Dire doesn't even look in the forums, but I don't even know if he is active anymore, considering the current state of the game. Dave, I would seriously consider selling the game, Im not the right person to tell you this, sure. But the game is in the red and you don't have time to deal with it. That should be enough to guarantee a sale from your part. And most of the community at this point hates you, some say it and others don't. Im not trying to be a fucking idiot like Waffel, ok?

Also, you spent a lot of time in world map 2.0 just to result in a huge failure. Why? Maybe because... you need premium to make a game in world map 2.0. I'm not even joking. Make non-prems be able to make that map and put it a 150% sp increase and watch how everyone will play it.

Just my thoughts.

PS: Waffel's post has 26 likes. There is a reason for this. And let's not forget it took you 1 month to answer to this.

Escrito por Palmitas, 16.03.2025 at 18:42

I always said this: I believe that people change. People can sometimes see that they fucked up, and correct it. I believe Dave can change mistakes he did in the past.

As for profits, it is a very tough spot indeed, but you can increase activity by just unbanning people, its a no brainer to atleast start from that and give it a shot.

The only mistake I've made with atWar was actually caring TOO much about the community and what other people think. It caused me to waste too much time talking to people trying to make them see my position. Nobody cares. Waffel is the perfect example. I spent HOURS talking with that dude, listening to his concerns, telling him mine, and trying to reach understanding. Then he goes off and posts things which only show me that he absolutely did not understand anything I said. The lesson I've learned: people are gonna bitch no matter what. Nothing I say will change their minds. Just do what you need to do for the best interests of the game and ignore the noise.

If I had it to do over, I would have banned people faster and not wasted so much time explaining why. Activity was already declining before, and continued declining after.... banning a few toxic people who needed to go didn't do anything to change the course the game was already on. In other words: no great loss. The upshot: somewhat less moderation issues to have to deal with. The trade-off was and is worth it.

It does irritate me however when people say I "don't care" about atWar. It's easy for people to sit back and make accusations when they don't have the real life responsibilities to deal with like I do. I know better than to expect any sympathy or understanding from this community. But I do keep atWar running and deal with the emergencies when things break, no matter how busy I am with other things. Is that the act of someone who doesn't care?

Escrito por b2spirit, 17.03.2025 at 00:15

When the fuck are you going to fix map editor

Nice necropost