Call to action - Let's Be Awesome Together

Thanks to everyone for their consideration.

Apologies if I've insulted anyone's talent. I think we have a lot of great content creators of all stripes. I think criticisms of specific casts are unwarranted. They've all been great, and everyone is doing their best to make stuff that they love.

Von Kluge pointed out in a PM that I hadn't mentioned people who do things in the background like organize tournaments and put on contests or those who write guides.

It's all appreciated, and it's all great stuff. We're interested in knowing how we can better highlight that stuff. Something like this is great: http://www.coh2.org/topic/14040/streamer-saturday

We'll give it a shot, and see how it's goes.

We want to help people who are excited about the game share that passion and hopefully this helped open a dialogue for how that could better work going forward.

This isn't going to convince anyone that doesn't like the game to suddenly like it and I didn't expect it to.

Anyway thanks for hearing me out.

Tommy is british and Fatal speaks perfect english. I dont like the cameras. Always imagined krebs differently before he started his videos . Only person i nj seeing with camera was inukii and his panda hat in his old days.

Unfortunately for you, the majority of the people prefer to watch and/or listen to casters and streamers who show themselves and are native speakers. This holds both cross-game and cross-country.

I personally remember posts from Lynx and Tribalbob specifically. Regardless, you're most likely correct about how things went how. Hard to place blame, but frustrating nonetheless, and definitely a big contributing factor in the animosity on display around here these days.

http://www.gamereplays.org/community/index.php?showtopic=902144&st=142

Unfortunately for you, the majority of the people prefer to watch and/or listen to casters and streamers who show themselves and are native speakers. This holds both cross-game and cross-country.

Well im playing a niche game (rts) an niche title (Coh2) and i prefer niche broadcasting (without cameras).

http://www.gamereplays.org/community/index.php?showtopic=902144&st=142

Boy was he wrong.

http://www.gamereplays.org/community/index.php?showtopic=902144&st=142

Hahahaha
Hilarious

And still some people doesn't understand how we can be so negative about CoH2 after these bunch of lies.
Noun, even if you didn't work for Relic back then, your company should be aware that those blatant lies when you were asking for pre-order money could damage your future image.

http://www.gamereplays.org/community/index.php?showtopic=902144&st=142

Wow.

Currently, this community barely has streaming and casting "personalities" that a great number of people would be willing to watch and/or listen to. Relic should not invest time and funds into streamers and casters that will never attract a large croud.

With all due respect for TFN, but it is hardly fair to blame Relic for poor success when you do not even cast with a webcam and/or lack English vocabulary.

We blame relic for poor success of TFN?
Actually TFN has been one of (if not) the fastest growing Youtube channels exclusively casting CoH since, well since CoH: O I think, or maybe even before that, I don't have the numbers prior to that so I can't know for certain.

Also as been said already I'm Swedish, as I don't talk english on an every day basis some days will be better, some will be worse, so far I don't think anyone has ever complained that they didn't understand me, so that part is just an outright incorrect statement, secondly, you know what I really hate when watching shoutcasts of good playstyles, great gameplay and just entertaining matches, someones face right there on a webcam distracting me.
So I molded TFN after what I wanted, this included better HD quality/higher bitrates, editing to improve on the things that was sorely missing from the game itself (dual resources and other various replay features), PiP, sped up capping orders, build orders and a simple thing like an intro/outro.
What was not important was only having British/American/Other native english speakers casting (we had on most of the experts, basically none of which is a native english speaker) and someones face plastered on a webcam.

But you know, some people like that, some people don't, evident by our numbers I think is that we don't blame anyone for our poor success, cause it wasn't poor at all considering the number of people actually watching CoH content, is rather small, and I think we got em all.

Oh, btw, Riddle(r) me this, how does one with such poor vocabulary as me skim your post and find you spelling crowd, croud.

Unfortunately for you, the majority of the people prefer to watch and/or listen to casters and streamers who show themselves and are native speakers. This holds both cross-game and cross-country.

I think that is just your personal opinion and not a fact. Maybe you and your buddies like it that way, which is totally fine and understandable. But, I do not care to see a face or to hear native speakers, as long as the cast or stream is fun and worth my time. If you look at the top streamers and casters, English is not their native tongue.

What we need is for Relic to just come out and state what's now obvious:

1) COH2 is a casual RTS, not a competitive one.
2) The design focus is on "fun" units like the Tiger Ace or IS-2 that any noob can use successfully.
3) New commanders are to keep people interested in the game, not to provide strategic depth.

I know this is still hard to accept for diehards, but if you expect this game, given the faction design and teching system, the insane amounts of RNG, the resource system, the popcap and upkeep systems, to ever have a chance of being better or at least equal to vCOH, you are wrong.

It's a for-fun RTS where you dick around for a bit with infantry but eventually whoever has the best tank micro or lucky arty hits wins. The most strategic element is unit preservation (ie., faster CPM wins).

I was among the diehards. I don't care anymore. It's fun, it's casual, it never stresses me out like vCOH used to, and there's certainly no pressure. If I lose, there was doubtless some element of RNG I can blame it on, and if I win, that's cool, and I'll only be unhappy if I didn't get to play with my Tiger Ace/IS-2/KV-8 because they quit early. It's like that. And it's still a lot of fun. But it's not competitive or serious and you have to stop expecting it to be.

Time for some original content.

What we need is for Relic to just come out and state what's now obvious:

1) COH2 is a casual RTS, not a competitive one.
2) The design focus is on "fun" units like the Tiger Ace or IS-2 that any noob can use successfully.
3) New commanders are to keep people interested in the game, not to provide strategic depth.

I know this is still hard to accept for diehards, but if you expect this game, given the faction design and teching system, the insane amounts of RNG, the resource system, the popcap and upkeep systems, to ever have a chance of being better or at least equal to vCOH, you are wrong.

It's a for-fun RTS where you dick around for a bit with infantry but eventually whoever has the best tank micro or lucky arty hits wins. The most strategic element is unit preservation (ie., faster CPM wins).

I was among the diehards. I don't care anymore. It's fun, it's casual, it never stresses me out like vCOH used to, and there's certainly no pressure. If I lose, there was doubtless some element of RNG I can blame it on, and if I win, that's cool, and I'll only be unhappy if I didn't get to play with my Tiger Ace/IS-2/KV-8 because they quit early. It's like that. And it's still a lot of fun. But it's not competitive or serious and you have to stop expecting it to be.

This has already happened really. All the competitive casters are gone, the only person with tournament success in vCoH that still actively plays CoH2 is Symbiosis, and there really aren't many people filling the gaps. There isn't a single good analytical caster for CoH2 now that Tommy's gone, because there isn't much to analyze. But there was a very strong community built around vCoH, and you'll be hard-pressed to get people to stop trying to make the game better, because so much of what made vCoH successful is being squandered in CoH2.

It's too bad, but at this point the community has done all it can do.

What I don't get, however, is that Relic explored this exact model with Company of Heroes Online. And Company of Heroes Online was a complete and utter failure. So why the hell would you take that experience and try to turn it into your sequel when you knew it hadn't worked before?

What we need is for Relic to just come out and state what's now obvious:

Exactly, we just need to hear it from the horse's mouth.

We blame relic for poor success of TFN?
Actually TFN has been one of (if not) the fastest growing Youtube channels exclusively casting CoH since, well since CoH: O I think, or maybe even before that, I don't have the numbers prior to that so I can't know for certain.

Also as been said already I'm Swedish, as I don't talk english on an every day basis some days will be better, some will be worse, so far I don't think anyone has ever complained that they didn't understand me, so that part is just an outright incorrect statement, secondly, you know what I really hate when watching shoutcasts of good playstyles, great gameplay and just entertaining matches, someones face right there on a webcam distracting me.
So I molded TFN after what I wanted, this included better HD quality/higher bitrates, editing to improve on the things that was sorely missing from the game itself (dual resources and other various replay features), PiP, sped up capping orders, build orders and a simple thing like an intro/outro.
What was not important was only having British/American/Other native english speakers casting (we had on most of the experts, basically none of which is a native english speaker) and someones face plastered on a webcam.

But you know, some people like that, some people don't, evident by our numbers I think is that we don't blame anyone for our poor success, cause it wasn't poor at all considering the number of people actually watching CoH content, is rather small, and I think we got em all.

Oh, btw, Riddle(r) me this, how does one with such poor vocabulary as me skim your post and find you spelling crowd, croud.

This community consistently compares itself to bigger communities/games such as SC2 and Dota 2, for reasons of growth. Succesful casters and streamers in those scenes show themselves and are almost exclusively native speakers. The implicit conclusion drawn from this leads to my previous statement. In addition, the idea is to attract people that are currently not consistently watching CoH content, which is more likely with webcams and native casters, as the implicit preferences point out.

Furthermore, I do not blame you or anyone else for speaking with any kind of accent. I merely pointed out what the majority of viewers implicitely prefers. As for the growth of TFN, it has been diminishing since the release of CoH2, which cannot be good in the light of a sequel which sold quite well.

P.S. Touché on that spelling mistake. However, I specifically mentioned vocabulary, which is, as you clearly did not know, unrelated to the concept of spelling.

Am an active broadcaster since 2010 and during all those years there was exactly no support from Relic. Of course there was no german content creator invited to vancouver, of course none of us was allowed to stream CoH2 while it was still in beta state. I cant even say how many Emails and pm´s i wrote asking for support and I dont even get a single respond. Its the same for all other german CoH YouTuber. If you don´t want to work with us just say it. But ignoring us is rude, disrespectful and unprofessional as we talk about being professional. We advertise for CoH years and i cant even say how many people bought CoH because of our videos. I spend hundred of hours with post editing, organizing events and stuff. And now want to tell us how we have to do our job and blame us for our toxic behavoiur which is the reason why CoH2 and the CoH franchise is in such a bad shape. Thats just ridiculous and it makes no sense and makes me angry like hell.

Yes there was a German fan/content creator by the name of General Mistake a very nice guy who we had the pleasure of hanging out with and hearing his feedback on the game as well. So yes there was a German Content creator invited to Vancouver.

This community consistently compares itself to bigger communities/games such as SC2 and Dota 2, for reasons of growth. Succesful casters and streamers in those scenes show themselves and are almost exclusively native speakers. The implicit conclusion drawn from this leads to my previous statement. In addition, the idea is to attract people that are currently not consistently watching CoH content, which is more likely with webcams and native casters, as the implicit preferences point out.

Furthermore, I do not blame you or anyone else for speaking with any kind of accent. I merely pointed out what the majority of viewers implicitely prefers. As for the growth of TFN, it has been diminishing since the release of CoH2, which cannot be good in the light of a sequel which sold quite well.

P.S. Touché on that spelling mistake. However, I specifically mentioned vocabulary, which is, as you clearly did not know, unrelated to the concept of spelling.

Two of the three casting pairs at The International 3 had non-native English speakers (Wagamama and Lumi). Bruno and Winter are two other casters who are very popular and non-native English speakers. People love watching Homestory Cup, and half the people casting those games are non-native English speakers.

Furthermore, it is largely impractical to have live video of the casters when casting online with multiple people, which is what anybody who isn't doing it for a living is going to be doing. Sure, you can have video before and after games, but it is a hassle and video quality is a major concern. And during games? No way in hell, nobody wants their screen cluttered with a webcam feed. NASL tried that during their inaugural showmatch broadcast and people fucking hated it.

Go back and watch some DotA and Brood War casts from casters who are now working in Dota 2 and SC2. The only one who used a camera at all was Day[9], and his approach is a far cry from traditional gameplay casting. Using a webcam when streaming is one thing, but I really don't think it's necessary to use one when casting a game. The focus in that instance is on the game itself, not you as a player/caster.

I think that is just your personal opinion and not a fact. Maybe you and your buddies like it that way, which is totally fine and understandable. But, I do not care to see a face or to hear native speakers, as long as the cast or stream is fun and worth my time. If you look at the top streamers and casters, English is not their native tongue.

On the contrary, the majority of top streamers and casters of CoH are native English speakers (HelpingHans, Stephenn, Siberian, Inverse, Xcom, AmiPolizeiFunk, Tommy, RnP, A_E, VonIvan etc.). Clearly, every rule has exceptions, but you will find a similar pattern within succesful competitive games.

On the contrary, the majority of top streamers and casters of CoH are native English speakers (HelpingHans, Stephenn, Siberian, Inverse, Xcom, AmiPolizeiFunk, Tommy, RnP, A_E, VonIvan etc.). Clearly, every rule has exceptions, but you will find a similar pattern within succesful competitive games.

That couldn't be further from the truth really. Maybe in CoH the majority is English, but competitive gaming is far more popular in Europe and Asia than it is in America. Most of the popular SC2 and Dota 2 streamers are not native English speakers.

Two of the three casting pairs at The International 3 had non-native English speakers (Wagamama and Lumi). Bruno and Winter are two other casters who are very popular and non-native English speakers. People love watching Homestory Cup, and half the people casting those games are non-native English speakers.

Furthermore, it is largely impractical to have live video of the casters when casting online with multiple people, which is what anybody who isn't doing it for a living is going to be doing. Sure, you can have video before and after games, but it is a hassle and video quality is a major concern. And during games? No way in hell, nobody wants their screen cluttered with a webcam feed. NASL tried that during their inaugural showmatch broadcast and people fucking hated it.

Go back and watch some DotA and Brood War casts from casters who are now working in Dota 2 and SC2. The only one who used a camera at all was Day[9], and his approach is a far cry from traditional gameplay casting. Using a webcam when streaming is one thing, but I really don't think it's necessary to use one when casting a game. The focus in that instance is on the game itself, not you as a player/caster.

Naming a few non-native speakers out of a majority of native commentators over the last decade is not changing the core of my point, at all. Exceptions only enhance it.

Next to that, nowhere have I stated that casters should be visible during the games themselves. Between games, a webcam is preferable to anything else, as implicitely preferred.

Webcams for streamers is straightforward. For example, nearly all top streams on Twitch.tv right now feature the player on a webcam.

That couldn't be further from the truth really. Maybe in CoH the majority is English, but competitive gaming is far more popular in Europe and Asia than it is in America. Most of the popular SC2 and Dota 2 streamers are not native English speakers.

Exactly. This is why my original statement was the following:

Unfortunately for you, the majority of the people prefer to watch and/or listen to casters and streamers who show themselves and are native speakers. This holds both cross-game and cross-country.

If one concludes that CoH has the most popularity in North America and Europe, should one go for native English speakers or native Asian speakers? I think it is straightforward.