We are talking about the past, granted - but the past is all we have to go on, this is the point. The present sucks. And while there are sometimes cases of rose-tinted glasses in many discussions of NW, I think I'm honest in saying I loved NW during those periods as much as I say I do now, and a lot of people feel the same - that's why hundreds of people kept turning up to those big battles.Originally Posted by Pafpuf
I don't disagree with a lot you've said here. Although I will defend NW as a great expansion and a prolonger of the game's life (while I admit FC could have and should have done more with it) I do know what you're talking about with the decade of hypocrisy, propaganda, and egos. That was just part and parcel of the drama that came with NW, I suppose. You and I are probably good examples of the tit-for-tat that comes with NW faction rivalry.. and as much as those discussions descended into retardation, I still thought the rivalry was what made the game!
90% is just a pie-in-the-sky number. All I'm saying is that, over the years you've taken a keen interest in talking about NW and that now it seems rich for you to try and devalue it as an element of the game. As for bashing FC for neglect, well, fair play.
It's not that I don't agree with greifing. Tactical greifing was a great tool of lowering the other side of morale, but you can't honestly say that the aimless and hopeless task of greifing nowadays (when Clan on a mass scale clearly have no gas left in the tank to even profit from a decent greifing campaign) is anything compared to what it used to be. I'm all for greifing and would like to think I was a pioneer of making it as effective as possible. All I'm saying is that what's happening nowadays, is almost too pathetic to even be called greifing (we're talking at the main TL7 level of course... obviously TL1-5 bases being exchanged does not change anything) Nowadays it's just a collection of individuals trying to annoy the defenders because there's nothing better to do, but they have no hope of an outcome to it. There's no hope it will materialise into anything, Clan don't even have a NW structure, let alone the population to be able to build one.
Obviously I can't speak for anyone but myself, but I found that the group of friends I played with, on both sides, played for pride - NW was all about pride. No NW addict really cares about side-xp for its numerical value, although seeing a much higher number (for example 18% vs the opposition's 3%) was always satisfying, but again that comes down to pride. And Tower bonuses were decent, but they were just that... a bonus. It is only the PvMers or people who don't care about NW, in fact, that actually attach more importance to those things. PvPers have always lived without side-xp or tower bonuses quite fine and dandy. So no, there's actually nothing material ingame that truly represents the significance of owning towers - it is all about the pride, and the feeling of winning and dominating, the comradery of a successful campaign and watching the other side fall apart - this is what drove people like Marxgorm, Foobar, Stromm etc. to do well. And yes, it is about ego, and flair, and glory - but those sorts of feelings are essentially why the majority of people play videogames isn't it?
Then we can agree to disagree - no one expects Tara and NW mass PvP to be for enjoyable for all. But there were deeper factors at work there which you either cannot see or refuse to pay attention to, and yes Tarasque dungeon as a place had a lot of flaws and it was never improved, but it was intrinsic to the game of morale when it came to NW and, without fail, the NW dominating side also reaped the rewards from Tara - it was a tradition of the game, for all its flaws. Going back to the mechanics of battling there, I will use a very unbiased example, that of a Tara lead by Ixiaan at around 3am European time in 2010 was one of the best Omni performances I've ever seen. IIRC, about 30 omnis wiped double the amount of clans, having a better profession mix, using expert calling (which was an art in itself), doc healing (another art (lord knows the majority of Clan docs were terrible in the later years)), and good movement by the raiders - Ixi had managed to get 30 people in tangent to sit in the middle of the lair and dance in and out of LOS while assisting key targets, and it destroyed the lame duck that was Clan which just stood there mashing on assist like you said. There was skill in leading Tara, and there was a distinction between good and poor efforts by raiders, and I could write a novel on examples of when the higher number of raiders did not /assist mash their way to victory. But again, I'm not trying to convince you to like it, it's not for you, that's fine - but you can't devalue it for everyone else and you can't simplify it to blob vs blob, because if you do that, you take away something from great leaders (who I would also call *******s) some of which were in your organisation!
To be fair, I and many others are as tongue-in-cheek as you when it comes to forums. I don't hate you, or anyone else from AO at all, to be honest. It's a bit like MdR, someone on clanside once said to me "don't you just hate those MdR morons?" and I was like, well, no, because without them the game would be boring. If we all got on and liked each other, then there really would be no point to NW! When we're arguing on the forums, I'm as much just poking a stick as you are.
I don't put 2006 down to Clan quitting PRIOR to the takeover, and I apologise if my post seemed to suggest that - I see many clan quit as a result of the takeover which is entirely different. And this is a bit of what you mentioned earlier, both sides are hypocritical, and there are similar people on Omniside who would suggest that every Omni victory is due to tactics and genius, while every Clan victory is due to Omni quitting. Actually, it's somewhere in between and I like to credit both sides where credit is due. But it's true to say that 06-09 was barely ever contested, in between the 2 takeovers at the beginning and end of this era, while 2009 onwards, it was always contested - I put that down to Omni never giving up. When Omni lost towers, they didn't sit down like other sides have in the past. But I'm also complimenting Clan for being so resilient in defence and despite having to work hard on a daily to keep their towers, managing to do so for the most part. That's all. My recollection of both sides is more balanced that it might have appeared at first.
I actually don't know the details of the events which lead to the last major takeover, or the exact individuals involved, though I know Foob was a key part of that (its not surprising, he's been central to Omni efforts since I was Omni myself) but I just think that no one can blame the little Clan that were left for not wanting to compete under current conditions. For the same reason that a cyclist wouldn't have wanted to race against Armstrong in the 90s, knowing what they know now. Yes, Armstrong was clever, his operation was freaking genius, but it was outright cheating and that's all there is to it. There's no victory in cheating. As for other people using 3rd party programs, well, 2 wrongs don't make a right and I know both sides have done it, but the sploits of the past pale into the shade of 1 man being able to control multiple characters.
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