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Hello there, since there is already an ongoing discussion regarding this issue. i would like to distinguish my post from the existing ones by clarifying that it is not addressed to Geriatrix. Nor is it intended to serve as a compilation of incidents (such evidence should not be necessary anymore). My focus is on finding a way to effectively deal with the ongoing issues surrounding his conditions. My goal is not to bully anyone, but rather to look for a solution to this recurring problem, as it significantly diminishes my enjoyment of playing 0 A.D. The creation of "smurf" accounts, while undeniably frustrating, is unfortunately a common practice in 0 A.D. Some players are known for engaging in this behavior more frequently than others (e.g., Sniper, Yeka, Geri, etc.). This practice disrupts gameplay by undermining team balance, excessively targeting one player instead of supporting the team, pausing or rage-quitting mid-game, and, overall, detracting from the gaming experience. Personally, these actions greatly reduce my enjoyment of the game. Additionally, Geriatrix appears to have a peculiar dynamic with some of us for no discernible reason. While some might suggest simply ignoring this behavior, it is more challenging for certain players, including myself. Geriatrix frequently hosts what are referred to as "OP games" and excludes me and others from participating. As a result, I am less able to engage in community interactions, as he creates a hermetic space for his friends. I am always banned from these games, both as a spectator and as a player. I have often sought to approach him with kindness and a spirit of reconciliation, yet I find myself time and again the target of hostility. It seems that, despite the moderators being aware of the issue and committed to addressing it, they are ultimately unable to take effective action to prevent this behavior. I have two key questions: Why do players continue to join games hosted by his fake accounts? Are they aware these accounts belong to him? How can this issue be effectively addressed? Should there be stricter measures to prevent such behavior? Would making it more difficult to create new accounts be a viable solution? I appreciate any advice or insights you can offer. Thank you, Meister

historical mod, i dont think geratrix is there yet its mostly only played by small group of known players.. I have more thoughts on this topic in general and will add later if i remember.

This is exactly what happens to me, people ignore me because Geriatrix only selectively target people he dislike and people like us don't want to insult others too, so they think they are different and immune, when they see me in trouble they have tendency to ignore the affected person and pretend there is no problem and some people go beyond that they even mock me for having a problem there are big examples and big names but I don't want to fight everyone in the gaming community. so silently suffering, if the community was big like we are playing 10 20 TGs a day we can ignore people and don't join their games but right now to get a challenging game we need these people, I am considering moving to other games like AOE2 and AOE4 and learning it slowly, but I like 0AD more because it's build by people without big corporate money.

Yes it is a big deal, since as i mentioned before there is other players like Sniper (and also Decger and others) that continue to bomb games by joining, pretending to be nub, having good boom and killing the game with 50 champs. This is something very frustrating indeed. However, it reflects a broader reality in society: those who are not directly affected often choose to look the other way. I’ve had similar discussions with my friends who play 0 A.D., and I’ve even faced criticism for raising the issue or for giving it too much attention. But since the individuals are online in lobby almost every time i am, i think it is worth and necessary discussing. Just yesterday, I asked @Atrik why he continues to play with Geriatrix. His response was, "I don’t hate him." (To be clear, I am by no means suggesting that Atrik—or anyone—should harbor hatred.) Nevertheless, looking away or ignoring such behavior reflects a failure to exercise the normative control that a community should provide. One might even invoke Popper's Paradox here.

Ginnungagap christmas special 2024 Day 17 Games between - 17.12.2024 - 19:00 UTC and 21:00 UTC - WFG-Lobby-A26 - Host: Ginnungagap Islands Map settings:

Mod updated(0.6.0) More details with screenshots described in 1 post. In the mod integrated Bot Petra Expert(Volatile Market). Added new technologies. Rebalance units and structures. To activate units and structures requires selecting a game scenario(branches of technology in the Civ Center).

Hmmm--- This might require some brainstorming. There's probably another topic for that, but another idea is the game Team Fortress has a kind of premium mode where you get better stuff if you buy a skin or something (Or soI've heard. Again I play very little online) could we do something like that except instead of paying require a forum link of some kind? You can give it a whirl, but you only get special features if you're verified. I don't know what the features would be, but it'd need to incentivize normal people creating a forum account. Another idea is requiring an email for the lobby, just to make it a little harder. I think the cool open source game Veloren was having some problems with bots recently, and that might've fixed it. (Bots are different from smurfs, but it's a little bit of an extra step) We could also talk to administrators for Minetest Servers and other open source games to see what they do. If a lot of them have the same problems, maybe we could pool our the brightest minds, and they could come up with some kind of open source method to help mitigate/ remove the problem. I think the ultimate solution is if we had a TON of players, then if there's one or two bad eggs nobody would notice.

Nuclear energy is the future. Germany shut down its nuclear power and made Russian gas more expensive. Now Germany, the locomotive of Europe, is sinking. Solar panels and windmills are not going to save them from that. They destroy large natural environments for this. And worse... if they are damaged, they are not recyclable.

and the vast amount of underpaid workers from developing countries

Fair point. I took the liberty to rename the thread to "The toxic player Issue".

The problem is that people tend to whitewash the behavior of players like Geriatrix because he plays very well, while ignoring or harassing people like me. This issue has an easy fix: well-regarded players in the community need to take a stand against individuals who cause trouble. I’m referring to respected players like @Player of 0AD, @Havran, @Aslan , and @MarcusAureliu#s, who are equally admired by both sides. Unfortunately, they don’t take that stand. Instead, they often form alliances with Geriatrix in one way or another and attempt to demean or discredit moderators who are genuinely trying to help. For instance, @Norse_Harold put in significant effort to resolve the situation in a way that avoided harming either side, yet his efforts were met with a campaign to mock him. If I were to echo the same complaints that Geriatrix sings against moderators and developers of the community mod, I would be seen as a “good person” in Geriatrix's eyes—just like the "well-respected players" mentioned here. But I choose to stand on the side of truth and justice, even if that makes me a bad person in your eyes. I've almost stopped complaining about Geriatrix because the attitude of many so-called OP players toward me made me question whether I am the problem here. However, I can see now that I am not the only one affected.

well we want to make spamming accounts more difficult, but not at the expense of first time account creators. Having to register an account here to play multiplayer would probably stop lots of ppl from trying multiplayer.

I'm pretty sure you could kick something out, because when I prompted it (again this is Microsoft's AI which isn't premier) - this was 1 of the 4 it pushed out: I'm trying not to push the matter, but for you non-artists (speaking as one who made a whole lot of artwork for this game), art is built off of art. I didn't sit down with oil and paints and canvas to make the celtic building texture you still see in this game - as illustrated here: Sure, I made some from scratch (the thatched roof texture - I drew with a pencil, scanned, brought into PSP and colorized it, found some leaves and cut & pasted them onto it), but others aspects (the wad and dabble, the stone) I utilized art resources from "other sources". My thought at the time was, if you modify it enough it becomes yours. I remind you all that WFS (aka WFG) was born out of the modding community. We modified existing game art. Modifying art incorporates elements from the original work in a transformative way, adding new meaning, interpretation, and in a distinct 0 A.D. artistic style. What you are essentially doing is using the previous art as a starting point for a new creative expression. Honestly, this practice was a great way to learn. You have no idea how many games I tore apart to look at their art assets to see how they were doing something, achieving a certain look, or be efficient in polygons (back when that was important). Think of it also from a programmers perspective. Just because you use libraries to accelerate development vs. writing all the low level code from the binary all the way up certainly doesn't cheapen the work that you do. You are standing on the shoulders of giants. I'm not suggesting you use AI art to replace or change the entire look of the game, I'm just saying if you are struggling to push the final aspects of the game over the finish line that you have been laboring at for years now... this might be a lift in the upward direction. You are still going to have to artistically manipulate its output anyway because it is never going to be perfect. You wouldn't use art that it kicks out that looks like cartoons or hyper realistic. Your art lead should be able to hold together the cohesive look of the game. I also don't think anyone would force you as an artist to use AI either if it doesn't give you any pleasure in the creative process. I just think you should consider it as a tool to put in your toolbox. For example (of a final push), take this thread. I didn't read the whole thing, I'm not sure if this list has been completed. I'm assuming not, otherwise why keep it pinned? But, if you need help - maybe something like this would help: https://elevenlabs.io/sound-effects I get the glory/honor of doing things from scratch - and I respect that. But at the same time I'm thinking... 25 years in development? I hope this thing gets to beta before I die Again, I respect the team's choice however you decide. I see the merit from both perspectives. Sorry for playing devils advocate on this, I just see this as a tool to succeed and I want you all to succeed

Get me a normal map for this and we got a stew goin.

This is a very important topic in my opinion. I fully support the team's decision. I believe it's right to resist the temptation of the potential development boost it could provide. It'll prove to be the right decision in the long run. @Itms worded it really well. Part of what I find makes 0ad so great is the fact that so many talented individuals from all around the world got together and invested so many selfless hours of work to create an awesome game for anyone to play completely for free. 0ad's value goes far beyond the software and gameplay experience. Imagine a future where projects whose development was assisted by generative AI (to any extent - be it just a few textures) are required to be explicitly labelled as such. Most AI-generated content online is already frowned upon. A small label like this could significantly (terrifyingly) devalue the reputation and history of the game. And that would be incredibly sad, and simply irresponsible towards this great legacy. Generative AI is a fascinating, and really capable technology, I'd be the last one to deny that. But I think it's a bit ... pointless. Creating something impressive is supposed to take effort. That's what makes it impressive in the first place, no? Regarding the encyclopedia, I therefore share @ShadowOfHassen's views; we shouldn't and won't use generative AI for texts or images at all.

I'm not an artist but I'm amazed by what they can create and very proud of participating to a project that is so visually appealing. I would be very sad to see this work from humans replaced by generated contents copied over from someone else's work (because "generative" AI creates from plagiarized content, for now). Jason, the content you sent is beautiful, but knowing that no one spent time on it, demonstrating their skills through it, removes all the value in my eyes. I'm on 0 A.D. to do something selfless, spend much time on something for the love of it. The end result is not by far my main metric of satisfaction. Similarly, genAI could generate documentation and increase our metrics on this front... but without real added value. If an AI can deduce what the code does, maybe documentation was not absolutely necessary at this place. Worse, it can generate low-quality comments which mask the need for detailed information written by competent developers. And, my main concern, regardless of the very personal input I'm giving above, is the carbon footprint of these tools, which is ridiculous. If we're accelerating the catastrophe just to splash shiny images on a hobbyist game, we're being very careless. That also includes using genAI for inspiration.

It is odd because it is "artificially" intelligent. You have to "teach it" with instructions to craft what you want. Here was my prompt: "A video game wall texture that has large granite blocks at the bottom, transitioning into vertical wooden boards, with a window looking into a dark room illuminated by a candle. Include some wear and tear so that it looks aged, and also some climbing ivy." That was it's first draft (one of 4 images it gave me) with no follow-up instructions. I'm not saying you all need to use this, I'm just saying it is a tool that could be used and could be explored further for use to assist the art department. And like I said before, art is just one facet of its capabilities... many more possibilities exist. I'm aware it could feel threatening like it is going to "take someone's job", but if you need work done and you don't have people in the position you need - and this could help... seems like a no-brainer to me. But, I'm not developing the game anymore, so it doesn't really matter to me what you guys want to do with this. I just wanted you all to be aware of the possibilities. :peace:

multimedia specialists at my company may swear against AI in many occasions, but also use AI all the time. It can produce results good enough for our company needs and it can surely produce results good enough for beeing in 0AD. Tech icons are one thing that you can do well with AI, and of course code too. Encyclopedia articles are harder, but not impossible. People who do this stuff know this already.

Splat.

Alright, here it is: https://gitea.wildfiregames.com/0ad/0ad/pulls/7189 I decided to place the buttons and text outside of the image to keep a constant brightness difference to the background. Quick showcase: