[bf1942] How could DICE agree to this??

[Dave Snodgrass]

Joe wrote:

> Yeah, limit the ranking to the official EA noobfest servers. That'll 
> do a lot of good.

I'm sure the big issue here is security. How do they tell a legit server 
from an illegit server spoofing stats?

>  
> If they lock down earning ranks to EA servers only, do they expect 
> private server admins to honor those ranks in their config files? Hell no!

They think it will somehow increase EA server sales/rentals.

> They should require that the private servers register with them to 
> provide the ranking/stats connection. Register on EA, hell even a 
> small monthly fee for 'maintaince' of their ranking backend would be 
> perfectly fine especially with some of us larger gaming groups.

Bah humbug. They are going to provide the ranking system free of charge 
- They can collate stats from leaf servers free of charge too - Its 
still cheaper than running a server :)
However - I would be willing to bind my servers to a credit card number 
or some other way of indicating a) age b) legitimacy . Possibly even tie 
servers that want to send stat info to EA to my cd-key. If they discover 
spoofed data, i agree to allow my cd key (and therefore any ranked users 
tied to the key) to be destroyed

>
> It's not even like the official EA servers are well moderated........I 
> had high hopes, but all of the news to late is souring that. :(

Well moderated? you should change that to 'Its not like offical ea 
servers are moderated at all'

>     -----Original Message-----
>     *From:* Steven Hartland [mailto:killing at multiplay.co.uk]
>     *Sent:* Wednesday, February 16, 2005 10:32 AM
>     *To:* bf1942 at icculus.org
>     *Subject:* Re: [bf1942] How could DICE agree to this??
>
>     I must say this is concerning. Ranked players is one thing, but
>     only enabling rank building on official services is a sure fire way
>     to kill the community very quickly.
>      
>     From reading this I would suggest the following changes:
>     1. Ranking on all servers or at least "registered" servers.
>     2. The ability to turn off racking totally in the server config.
>     3. The ability to enable all weapons in the server config.
>     4. The ability to limit the max rank in the server config.
>      
>     With the above all quality servers can gain people rank
>     and things like public servers can be a level playing
>     field, with experienced players only benefiting purely
>     from better play and not also getting an unfair advantage
>     making the game inaccessible to the new players.
>      
>         Steve / K
>
>         ----- Original Message -----
>         *From:* Jon Wolberg <mailto:jon at ecgnetwork.com>
>          
>         Did anyone else see this interview?  A former customer of mine
>         showed it to me.
>          
>         http://www.realityfriends.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=573
>          
>          All this sounds great, but a few more details have come out
>         that are of concern:
>         1. Higher ranks get access to exclusive 'unlock' weapons
>         2. Higher ranks are the default choice for 'commander'
>         3. Only EA servers (offical and those rented from EA) will be
>         'ranking' servers (eg: players can only earn rank when playing
>         on EA servers)
>         4. Ranks will still be visible on unranked servers and
>         therefore ranked players can get access to the unlocked
>         weapons on unranked servers (and potentially a factor in
>         determining who is commander)
>         5. Unranked servers can 'turn off' unlockable weapons, but
>         cant universally unlock them for all players
>
>         As you can imagine this creates a series of issues:
>         1. Inbalance between players with access to unlocked weapons
>         and those without (especially for casual gamers or those late
>         to the game)
>         - plus will regular players on unranked (nonEA) servers get
>         have to hand over 'commander mode' to anyone who has a rank
>         (which he carried over from the EA servers)
>
>         2. Inbalance between EA servers and private servers (such as
>         the ECGN public servers or those rented from ECGN)
>         - Are the 'unranked' servers going to become 'ghost towns'?
>
>
>         Personally I think giving ranks anything more than bragging
>         rights is a mistake (eg: special weapons). And I think only
>         providing them on EA servers and EA rented servers is
>         blackmail.  They did this with Americas Army and it didnt work
>         out that well.
>
>         thoughts?
>          
>         Jon
>
>
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