STW and WE are not the same game

**Puzz3D** · 03-01-2009, 23:44

I advocate for STW v1.12 over Warlords Edition v1.02 in the Sword Dojo. I got this PM today from Sasaki Kojiro:

"The Sword Dojo is a place where people who like the game shogun come to post about it. It's not a venting ground for one patron to describe what he doesn't like about the game over and over in every post he makes. Such posts are off topic (bordering on spam) and deleted."

**Sasaki Kojiro** · 03-02-2009, 01:01

Hi Puzz. As expressed in the pm, the dojo is not your personal venting ground. I don't remember the last time I saw you make a post that wasn't expressing dislike for WE, 1.02, CA's method of beta testing, or the MP community at the time. You have a habit of responding to someone saying in their campaign AAR "I just tried guns for the first time, powerful units" with a three paragraph diatribe about the balance of muskets in the 1.02 patch. It's off topic and negative spam.

Usually I just let it be, I don't think I've removed one of your posts before this, but I judged this to be a enough of a thread derail (the thread was started by Monk to encourage people to try shogun if they haven't) to warrant deletion:

Originally Posted by Puzz3D

Don't try to laugh it off. That's what I figured you'd do. There is nothing funny about it. It's a disservice to the patrons of the org to point them to that one particular version of the game here in the forum, and on the front page of this site when the original is still available. I don't care if you like that version better. The org never used to be a place that existed to serve a moderator's personal interest, but now it does?

**Togakure** · 03-02-2009, 02:06

Do you still have the post that led to this? Was yours the only post deleted?

Hmm ... I'd like to know more about this. It doesn't seem like a good thing. Deleting posts ... were they offensive? Did they blatantly break Org rules? Or did they simply offer an opinion (again) that was irritating to some (again)--but this time, annoy someone with "power?"

"The Sword Dojo is a place where people who like the game shogun come to post about it. It's not a venting ground for one patron to describe what he doesn't like about the game over and over in every post he makes. Such posts are off topic (bordering on spam) and deleted."

Emphasis mine. Yeah, this reads like reaction after slow burn. I smelled smoke when I saw the post with a link to another comparison thread, but don't know if that was posted before or after this action was taken.

I think there was context to justify Puzz's (repeated) input on this subject. I and others offered counter-opinions. Opinions are what discussions are all about. Those of us that have been around have heard them before, but some who are new, haven't. I'm not seeing why the thread and Puzz's posts are such a problem to warrant this ... and I'm surprised because the staff taking action has generally had a "hands-off" approach to moderating.

Consider the contributions that this patron has made over the years--I can think of few individuals who have spent as much time, thought and energy on forwarding TW here at the org or elsewhere, aside from the game-makers themselves. Yeah, this is a private forum, and those in power can do anything they want. Ultimately, only their judgment matters when it comes to what happens or doesn't happen on this board. But I would hope in cases like this, there would be some due diligence.

What's up?

Edit: insert this before Sasaki's post--was writing this and didn't see his response until after.

Edit2: Ah ... now I can see the post in question. No further comments here.

**InsaneApache** · 03-02-2009, 11:27

He's right though. The muskets were overpowered before the patch.

It is a long time ago, I'm surprised that it still winds you up.

**R'as al Ghul** · 03-02-2009, 21:55

Originally Posted by Masamune

I think there was context to justify Puzz's (repeated) input on this subject. I and others offered counter-opinions. Opinions are what discussions are all about. Those of us that have been around have heard them before, but some who are new, haven't. I'm not seeing why the thread and Puzz's posts are such a problem to warrant this ... and I'm surprised because the staff taking action has generally had a "hands-off" approach to moderating.

Consider the contributions that this patron has made over the years--I can think of few individuals who have spent as much time, thought and energy on forwarding TW here at the org or elsewhere, aside from the game-makers themselves.

Exactly. I second that. And for the same reason I'm still quite irritated that his posts were deleted.

Sasaki, how could you consider Puzz3D's posts as spam? He posts his opinion about Shogun in the Sword dojo at totalwar.org. Isn't this the right place?

Originally Posted by Sasaki

I don't remember the last time I saw you make a post that wasn't expressing dislike for WE, 1.02, CA's method of beta testing, or the MP community at the time.

Just because you don't remember or don't care doesn't mean it is true.
Frankly, the tone in your post comes across as patronising and arrogant. Maybe that is becuase I'm not a native speaker but I doubt so. "Usually I just let it be"?
You could've done better as a moderator in my opinion.
I still think that deleting his posts was wrong and would like to see them restored.

Originally Posted by TosaInu

Voicing your opinion about products is fine, but grant each other some air. Some like STW 1.0, others like RTW 1.3, others look forward to ETW 1.0 or the expansionpack for that.

As Tosa says, it's perfectly valid to offer an opinion about a certain title.
If you, as a moderator, think it's getting off topic, there are a lot of things you can do. It should be the last action as a moderator to delete a post, not the first.
I you, as a member of this board, are of a different opinion or are annoyed by Puzz3D then you can always skip his posts.

R'as

**Sasaki Kojiro** · 03-02-2009, 23:25

Originally Posted by R'as al Ghul

Exactly. I second that. And for the same reason I'm still quite irritated that his posts were deleted.

Sasaki, how could you consider Puzz3D's posts as spam? He posts his opinion about Shogun in the Sword dojo at totalwar.org. Isn't this the right place?

The sword dojo is not a personal venting ground. Any posts not deleted are things that are ok to post. The post that was deleted was enough of a crusade that it is outside the parameters of the forum, and would more properly be placed in the thread that I linked to for discussing which game is the best.

Originally Posted by Puzz3D

Don't try to laugh it off. That's what I figured you'd do. There is nothing funny about it. It's a disservice to the patrons of the org to point them to that one particular version of the game here in the forum, and on the front page of this site when the original is still available. I don't care if you like that version better. The org never used to be a place that existed to serve a moderator's personal interest, but now it does?

The tone is obviously upset and a thread derail seemed likely, so the post was removed.

Discussing the merits of one version versus the other is fine, the key word in my pm is "venting". Anger or emotion in posts discussing a version of a game that came out 8 years ago have no place here. Most of Puzz's posts appear to be venting, but I go for a more hands off style so I just let it be. However, the purpose of this particular thread was to encourage people to try a classic, not, as I've said, for venting.

**Puzz3D** · 03-03-2009, 19:31

Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro

Hi Puzz. As expressed in the pm, the dojo is not your personal venting ground. I don't remember the last time I saw you make a post that wasn't expressing dislike for WE, 1.02, CA's method of beta testing, or the MP community at the time. You have a habit of responding to someone saying in their campaign AAR "I just tried guns for the first time, powerful units" with a three paragraph diatribe about the balance of muskets in the 1.02 patch. It's off topic and negative spam.

I point out a legitimate problem in Warlords to players who are unaware of it, and I try to give my reasons. The v1.02 units stats were not approved by 7 of the 8 members of that community rebalance beta team. CA took the stat submitted to them believing that it had been approved by the majority of the team. Even if you eliminate the two players who basically quit the team near the end, that still leaves 5 of 6 players not approving the stat. When you add in Erado San, who was the community liason and didn't participate in the testing, that still leaves 5 of 7 not approving. CA rejected the team's request to fix the problems in v1.02 with another rebalance effort. To this day CA labels that patch as a beta, but somehow it became incorporated into STW Gold which comes up as version v1.0. It's very misleading to new players who think that it's an officially approved stat. The problem shouldn't be glossed over in the Sword Dojo of all places.

The other major problem is that LongJohn, the designer of the battle field AI, did not work on the Mongol Invasion add-on. This resulted in stat choices that didn't fit the combat engine. For instance, the guns were given power = 16, but this parameter saturates at power = 8. Clearly, whoever was making the stat choices didn't know how the combat engine worked. This is why CA sought out a community based rebalance team. CA didn't have anyone who could do it. Unfortunately, the community beta team tried to change too many parameters instead of returning the parameters of the original Sengoku units to the values used in original STW and balancing the new units in MI to those. Also, the original ranged unit parameters were unknown to the beta team, and CA never did provide them despite requests to do so. Only much later with extensive testing on a LAN did I figure out the original ranged unit parameters.