The MTG Magic Workstation league O-Gaming.com is undergoing a much-needed redesign and we're opening up our banner slot to any artist who wants to take a crack at designing it. We have plans to finalize the design in about a month, so we won't need to pick a banner until about then.
What we need: A sharp-looking banner that measures around 600x100 in dimension (feel free to take liberties with the dimension size). Because this is a banner for a Web site and not a forum sig or anything, we need something that doesn't use someone else's copyrighted artwork. If you want to use your own, that's cool.
Design guide: The new site color will be silver (D8D8D8) and white. The banner should incorporate the word "O-Gaming" with a capital O and G. The "dot com" is not necessary. If possible, we'd like to include the slogan "tomorrow's game - today" somewhere.
Deadline: Site operators will pick a winner some time in mid May. We don't have a fixed date, yet, but if you get us your banner on or before May 11, it'll definitely get considered. If you can't make that deadline, feel free to send it in afterward. We usually are behind our projected timeline goals, anyway.
What you get: The winner we choose will get his nifty banner art plastered up on top of O-Gaming.com for all time or until we decide to change designs yet again. You'll get your name and contact info added to our staff page, which means plenty of exposure for your name and your artwork.
I'm not sure what you're trying to get at by the "we were first" thing. I mean, that's fine. All I'm trying to say is that O-Gaming has a lot of technology Magic-League does not. I'm inviting people to come try that technology, along with our user base. I believe the experience is superior to Magic-League, but you can't really know until you try it.
It's not just banning a user for good that's of concern. Banning them temporarily through automation is enough to stop the spam before the person changes their identity enough to get back in, at which point they'll be banned again in about 3 seconds after they spam. It makes it very annoying to persistently spam the channel. Ban evasion is not easy. You also can ban by IP range, which will not hit a whole ISP and will likely just take out your one problem user.
O-Gaming's bots run Peace and Protection. We do not have issues with spammers because the moment one line of spam hits the channel, the player is kick/warned. They do it again and they're banned. We don't even have to watch the channel as operators.
And yes, you can't pick who joins your league. You can pick who stays. We have kicked out a lot of morons and cheaters over the years. You know what they do? They go to Magic-League and stay there.
Yes, Magic-League has constructed tournaments. I play there sometimes because I want to play constructed and there's not enough population going in O-Gaming to get anything started. Beyond constructed, though, Magic-League doesn't have much going for it. The league basically uses a series of separate programs and an easily hackable play module (Apprentice). For serious limited players like myself, that's unacceptable. O-Gaming runs drafts and sealed decks all using the site's PHP and java. The technology is ages ahead of Magic-League in the limited department.
As far as popularity/population meaning a bunch of a-hole users, that's simply not true. I've been with O-Gaming since December 31, 2003. We've been mega popular and down in the dumps and everywhere inbetween. Because of what we expect of players, behavior has always been 10 times better. I will see some of the same people in #magic-league and #o-gaming. Guess which channel they're being prats in? Guess which channel they're using sexual and racist slurs in? It gets pretty horrible sometimes in #magic-league and it's not just one or two problem players. It's a whole slew of gay-hating, mom-joke-making, teenage idiots. People will go as far as you let them, and #magic-league lets folks go pretty far.
Anyway, there's an Extended premier event Sunday. I invite you to come try the league out and see what you think of the players and how things are run. I will even demo a few booster drafts after round two for any mtgsalvation users that would like to see how they work (just /msg me). I promise you'll be impressed.
This is from a post I made over at magicworkstation.com. I came to post it here because I feel it's extremely relevant. I want people to know there's an alternative out there. Feel free to post questions. I will answer as many as I can.
Quote from anthson »
What brevinwannabe was trying to say is the MAIN reason why M-L is popular is because it's popular. It's circular. There's not really any logic to it. I was in the channel the other night and these two guys were spamming the hell out of it. Guess what? No one said/did anything. The users all acted like it was normal. The ops didn't even have Peace & Protection running. I got to see this for about 45 minutes straight:
<agentz> gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex gay sex ga
And then there's the constant begging for minis and individual matches. Someone that wants to play will advertise 2-3 times a minute -- six or seven spams per screen-full. That's not even counting the other lame advertisements for channels and crap. #magic-league is anarchy. This guy came in and spammed this notice about twice a minute. No one said jack:
Who wants to read that? The players are ignorant, the judges are not very well trained, the channel is unpoliced ... the only thing magic-league has going for it is people actually play there. It exists because it exists. The reason it got so popular in the first place I believe has to do with the fact that it used to support ONLY Apprentice, which was every idiot's choice of MTG gaming software. They don't even have that going for them any more seeing as they've switched to MWS for everything but the scarce limited play they offer.
After reading this topic I really tried to give Magic-League a chance. I really tried to play there and be objective, even though I'm very heavily involved in O-Gaming. The spam, the rude players, the disorganized nature of the league ... it is physically a pain to play there. But you know what? You *HAVE* to go through that because it's the only place people play free league Magic online, save for a few spotty tournaments a day at O-Gaming.
My advice? Play at O-Gaming. Sign up to become a judge and start running tournaments. That's the only way the place is going to get any better and start offering prizes, etc. It's the underdog, but it's the best option out there unless you just want to flock where the cows all herd together. In that case, be my guest. Just be wary of all the **** pies.
Is there a primer somewhere for people who have no clue how to use MWS? I'd like to participate, but I've never (successfully) used a program anything like it.
This is the Magic Workstation walkthrough you're wanting. There are also several other good MWS FAQs at O-Gaming like how to get pictures into the client and such. Visit the FAQ page for more info.
I think this is the error that was mentioned before, it's certainly the one I get...
That's not an error, Dracomageat. Apprentice does not descriminate by set. The card "Shock" is just one card if you're playing in Apprentice. If you're using MWS, though, there are several different versions of Shock, just like if you're playing with real cards. Each different version from every set Shock was printed in can have its own art assigned to it.
What MWS is doing is updating your deck by adding set info to it. It's stipulating which expansion each of your deck's cards came from. This is a good thing.
Magic is a very condensed topic. You're right; It's a challenge to keep things in perspective while keeping them funny. I'd like to move to publishing on Wednesday and Saturday instead of just Saturdays, but I'd hate to sacrifice quality for quantity. That's just one of the many changes I've been considering.
Thought I'd let everyone know. Manascrewed went to publishing twice a week on Wednesdays and Fridays. I switched over a few weeks ago and it's been going really well.
Magic is a very condensed topic. You're right; It's a challenge to keep things in perspective while keeping them funny. I'd like to move to publishing on Wednesday and Saturday instead of just Saturdays, but I'd hate to sacrifice quality for quantity. That's just one of the many changes I've been considering.
Thanks for all the awesome feedback. You guys just plain rock.
I run a Magic: The Gathering web comic called Manascrewed. Thought I'd take the time to share some of my work with you guys in hopes you'll tell your friends and visit the site Saturdays when I update.
What we need: A sharp-looking banner that measures around 600x100 in dimension (feel free to take liberties with the dimension size). Because this is a banner for a Web site and not a forum sig or anything, we need something that doesn't use someone else's copyrighted artwork. If you want to use your own, that's cool.
Design guide: The new site color will be silver (D8D8D8) and white. The banner should incorporate the word "O-Gaming" with a capital O and G. The "dot com" is not necessary. If possible, we'd like to include the slogan "tomorrow's game - today" somewhere.
Deadline: Site operators will pick a winner some time in mid May. We don't have a fixed date, yet, but if you get us your banner on or before May 11, it'll definitely get considered. If you can't make that deadline, feel free to send it in afterward. We usually are behind our projected timeline goals, anyway.
What you get: The winner we choose will get his nifty banner art plastered up on top of O-Gaming.com for all time or until we decide to change designs yet again. You'll get your name and contact info added to our staff page, which means plenty of exposure for your name and your artwork.
Send your stuff to janskyfamily[at]gmail(dot)com.
As for channel moderation, look into Peace and Protection: http://pnp.the-i.org/
It's not just banning a user for good that's of concern. Banning them temporarily through automation is enough to stop the spam before the person changes their identity enough to get back in, at which point they'll be banned again in about 3 seconds after they spam. It makes it very annoying to persistently spam the channel. Ban evasion is not easy. You also can ban by IP range, which will not hit a whole ISP and will likely just take out your one problem user.
And yes, you can't pick who joins your league. You can pick who stays. We have kicked out a lot of morons and cheaters over the years. You know what they do? They go to Magic-League and stay there.
Yes, Magic-League has constructed tournaments. I play there sometimes because I want to play constructed and there's not enough population going in O-Gaming to get anything started. Beyond constructed, though, Magic-League doesn't have much going for it. The league basically uses a series of separate programs and an easily hackable play module (Apprentice). For serious limited players like myself, that's unacceptable. O-Gaming runs drafts and sealed decks all using the site's PHP and java. The technology is ages ahead of Magic-League in the limited department.
As far as popularity/population meaning a bunch of a-hole users, that's simply not true. I've been with O-Gaming since December 31, 2003. We've been mega popular and down in the dumps and everywhere inbetween. Because of what we expect of players, behavior has always been 10 times better. I will see some of the same people in #magic-league and #o-gaming. Guess which channel they're being prats in? Guess which channel they're using sexual and racist slurs in? It gets pretty horrible sometimes in #magic-league and it's not just one or two problem players. It's a whole slew of gay-hating, mom-joke-making, teenage idiots. People will go as far as you let them, and #magic-league lets folks go pretty far.
Anyway, there's an Extended premier event Sunday. I invite you to come try the league out and see what you think of the players and how things are run. I will even demo a few booster drafts after round two for any mtgsalvation users that would like to see how they work (just /msg me). I promise you'll be impressed.
This is the Magic Workstation walkthrough you're wanting. There are also several other good MWS FAQs at O-Gaming like how to get pictures into the client and such. Visit the FAQ page for more info.
That's not an error, Dracomageat. Apprentice does not descriminate by set. The card "Shock" is just one card if you're playing in Apprentice. If you're using MWS, though, there are several different versions of Shock, just like if you're playing with real cards. Each different version from every set Shock was printed in can have its own art assigned to it.
What MWS is doing is updating your deck by adding set info to it. It's stipulating which expansion each of your deck's cards came from. This is a good thing.
Thought I'd let everyone know. Manascrewed went to publishing twice a week on Wednesdays and Fridays. I switched over a few weeks ago and it's been going really well.
Thanks for all the awesome feedback. You guys just plain rock.
Comments are welcomed.