Occasionally, I will ask the clan to work together and leverage our advantage in numbers to do stuff. This is typically centered around achievements, but may also be for in-game challenges or other entertaining tasks. I try to make it as fair as possible so that people don't get bored and so that everybody who wants to get the achievement or challenge has the opportunity to do so. I ask you to please be patient, participate, and be a team player, or excuse yourself from the party until we are done. Most of us learned in Kindergarten that sometimes we have to play a game that somebody else chooses, even if it's not our first choice. Please remember that lesson.
- Achievements: There are a handful of achievements in each game that are a lot easier if you have friends to help you boost for them. When those opportunities present themselves, I will generally coordinate the clan to help. If you know we are boosting for achievements, please help, or at a minimum, don't hinder the progress. As an example, an achievement will often require a special kind of kill, so we'll have dummies line up in a configuration to make that a lot easier and have other folks setup to get the easy kill. Unless it's your turn to get the achievement, don't kill the dummies. Definitely don't kill the people trying to get the achievement. If we have enough people, you don't always have to be a dummy if you'd rather do something else, but don't ruin it for others.
- Wins for the Clan: Based on the blog poll, when we have 5-6 folks on-line, people would prefer to be split up into separate 4v4 teams rather than play on the same team in Invasion. If there is a daily challenge requiring a certain number of wins, I will ask those on the other team (1-2 players) to sandbag so that the 4-player clan team can log a win. Because of the skill disparity within the clan, we will typically be matched against random players at a higher skill level than many of the folks playing on clan night, so this is the most efficient way to log wins for the most people. It can be boring to sandbag, and you don't want to get booted for obvious griefing or betrayals, so the standard rule is to allow assassinations only when you're on the other team. This basically makes it a 4v3 or 4v2 game so that the clan team has the best chance of winning, and also gives the sandbagging players something incredibly entertaining to do while they wait. I think we can all agree that it's hilarious to assassinate your friends and then laugh in party chat while you abuse their body. It REALLY sucks if the sandbaggers don't play nice. If AT ANY POINT the 4-player clan team is losing, or winning by less than 10 kills, I will take exception to any sandbaggers that aren't playing nice. That includes:
- Getting kills with guns or grenades
- Punching people in the face
- Working on "assists" (unless there's a challenge, in which case I may allow this on a case-by-case basis)
If you're worried about your K/D ratio, you can go hide in a corner. Getting kills with guns or grenades means you're explicitly not following the clan rules. Punching people in the face is fine if you're following somebody and they turn around at the last second, but don't punch them again in the face for the kill. The proper thing to do is to run away if you can't get behind them -- if you die, you're helping the clan. Assassinations are hard to get. THAT'S THE POINT. When available, I will try to pick games like Slayer Pro where there's no radar to help folks get their assassinations.
Boosting and sandbagging are things we do for the greater good. If we are on different teams, it just makes sense to help the 4 people log a win, at the cost of 1 or 2 people logging a loss. Matchmaking does a decent job at shuffling folks around so you're not always the odd man out. If it's problematic, I will take us into different playlists so people aren't stuck.
As I said above, you always have the option to exclude yourself from the party if you think boosting or sandbagging is lame.
Moving forward, if I have to continually remind somebody to play nicely, I will go ahead and boot/exclude you from the party myself so that you can play a few games on your own. I want this to be a fun environment for everyone.
Posts
