Why is the community population declining?

[ryoken]

Well 1 big reason now will be the DDOS attacks. Many cannot get on, so they will go elsewhere, and decide not to come back.

Yes, that is really unfortunate. I honestly wonder who is behind it. That is probably the 1 thing we have no control over, at this point-- a compulsive and malicious outsider.

To bad there is no way to find the person, and beat the snot out of him/her. Maybe carve DISCO across his forehead.

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[nOmnomnOm]

Well 1 big reason now will be the DDOS attacks. Many cannot get on, so they will go elsewhere, and decide not to come back.

Yes, that is really unfortunate. I honestly wonder who is behind it. That is probably the 1 thing we have no control over, at this point-- a compulsive and malicious outsider.

To bad there is no way to find the person, and beat the snot out of him/her. Maybe carve DISCO across his forehead.

>.>
<.<
dont anger him/her!

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[ryoken]

Well 1 big reason now will be the DDOS attacks. Many cannot get on, so they will go elsewhere, and decide not to come back.

Yes, that is really unfortunate. I honestly wonder who is behind it. That is probably the 1 thing we have no control over, at this point-- a compulsive and malicious outsider.

To bad there is no way to find the person, and beat the snot out of him/her. Maybe carve DISCO across his forehead.

>.>
<.<
dont anger him/her!

I have no fear of angering some little punk who has to DDOS an entire player base to get his/her jolly's. I would love to face these little punks. I do not fear 6'6" 300 pound truck drivers, and bikers, so why would i fear some pimply littlle 90 pound twirp who rages on the interweb when he cannot get his way?
I would love to see police around the world nab these little punks, and throw then into jail with the "REAL" tough guy criminals and see how they do. That would be real justice to me. After they got out i bet they would not be wanting to "SIT" in a computer chair. LOL

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[lIceColon]

Well 1 big reason now will be the DDOS attacks. Many cannot get on, so they will go elsewhere, and decide not to come back.

Is it possible to sync/ mirror the game server on several backup servers so that if one goes down another can continue the task?

I have no fear of angering some little punk who has to DDOS an entire player base to get his/her jolly's. I would love to face these little punks. I do not fear 6'6" 300 pound truck drivers, and bikers, so why would i fear some pimply littlle 90 pound twirp who rages on the interweb when he cannot get his way?
I would love to see police around the world nab these little punks, and throw then into jail with the "REAL" tough guy criminals and see how they do. That would be real justice to me. After they got out i bet they would not be wanting to "SIT" in a computer chair. LOL

Clearly I don't understand a thing about networks when I say this, but is it possible to track the somabitcch's IP address?

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No atmosphere? GTFO.
The propeller is the greatest invention of all time.

[Crackpunch]

Clearly I don't understand a thing about networks when I say this, but is it possible to track the somabitcch's IP address?

The keyword in DDOS is distributed. Meaning the attack comes from multiple computers.

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[Leo]

I can give you an idea of why people leave.

One is the already discussed age of Freelancer. Let's face facts, Freelancer is a decade old this year. In fact this month it turned 10. Yes, it may be the only game left that is a great space sim, but it's graphics are old. Plus, we've pretty much modded it out as much as we can. FLHook will only go so far.

Second, a lot of players don't even RP as much, or they Godmod (control others characters in RP). I experienced this just last night by flying through Leeds and someone tried RPing that my character did something that I didn't control. Not only that, people constantly rule lawyer, even though they're not supposed to. If anyone sneezes they get reported for something silly. I'm not sure on that though, just from what I've experienced here over my five year stay here.

A lot of people are just bored I think, there's not any new influx of things besides ships and systems and the occasional new player station. A lot of things in Freelancer take time. It takes time to build credits to do anything fun and the act of getting it, in my opinion, is worse than dailies on World of Warcraft. That's why I smuggle with a 500 cargo hold freighter, because I find it more fun. I may not make nearly as much credits as someone in a Slave Liner (which I also have, but hate how slow it is), but at least I'm enjoying myself.

These are just opinions from my point of view and are in no way true blue reasons why Discovery is losing it's members. So don't flame me. Personally, I believe a large part of it is just that Freelancer is really becoming dated now, and even though it's modifiable...we're finally hitting the limits of what we can do with it without having the source code to go any further.

~Leo

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[Pavel]

Well, yes, it IS old space shooter, we cannot deny that obvious fact we'll rather be losing players with time than getting new ones. Discovery has nice RP aureola, but don't make it discovery's idol. This game is about getting/avoiding blue after all, quoting Spazzy "RP is excuse for pews".

Perhaps /conn command was a mistake, every evening you can find players from all factions in Connecticut, corsairs, hessians, police, pirates, outcasts, colonials, etc etc... Players who normally would be looking for fights in inRP systems, and by the way RPing before engagement. More or less but vast majority of them would be, even if it's just few lines.

Another issue is grinding POBs by players, at the moment we have 87 bases according to the list, and only few is right outside BA/FOW source, like Krupp or Itabashi, usually bases are placed at least few jumps away from cheap BA source, and only few factions like IMG supply their bases in a right way, engaging all members in it. Normally it's 2-3 players doing it, as I heard it's pain in ass to supply base in Omicrons, 300k under the plane. Why people build bases in such places, instead of getting legal extremally easy to supply base right outside capital planet, I don't know. Once it's well supplied shielded core 2 you can stop worry won't base get destroyed in a few hours while you sleep or are at work/school, local lawfuls will also defend it.

[The Joker]

Why is the community population declining?
The crucial changes should have been done at this community's peak, which was, in my humble opinion, 1,5-2 years ago.

And now, speaking for myself...

Perhaps I'd jump in sometimes for an hour or two but by now I guess that thousands-of-hours-of-flight-&-RPing chars are gone. Personally, I'm glad that I don't play anymore. Still, there are some friends around and I surely miss all the laughs and good times. That's just too bad. It really is.

Had some cool ideas and several progressing stages that could stretch over the next couple years even. But ever-changing Admin team and their constant 3-years denial of (my) terrorist ID, possession of which would have granted me further development of the Joker character, conclusively led me to believe that I'm just ONE of the MANY who were obstructed in having and providing fun to this community. I stand firmly behind this statement.

And more similar examples will follow until this community is filled with veterans that only visit forum and never and/or rarely enter to play the actual game. When you realize that that happened, no -- you're not gonna remember these words of mine. Simply -- you'll regret that it ever came to that.

Some of you will say that I'm dramatizing. Well, perhaps I am. But that's just because I enjoyed hanging around this place while it was worth hanging around. I enjoyed interacting with some very interesting folk that dwell near all those endless trade lanes. I even enjoyed interacting with those who disliked me for some reason. Why not? Everyone had and has a right to be here as long as he's creative or something. That's worth exploring, it always was.

I guess I've become too sentimental over losing (cyber) friends/acquaintances. I proudly admit that so you can pin that on me right away. Remaining gift of this very special community, how else to call it.

Finally, whether you're leaving or staying, don't let all the epic Disco community's RP posts, events, encounters and battles be forgotten

Stay happy and healthy, if possible.

J

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[SMGSterlin]

Holy crap, it's Joker.

You need to come back, Disco is much less fun without you.

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[atom]

Oh heck the worst nightmare for my trader is back, nice to see you Joker. (Drover) Grin.