oki, after taking a 2 week "hiatus" from mons, I've had a lot of time to reflect and look at why I'm actually here right now. Why am I still playing Pokémon, why am I still playing NU and why do I not "disappear" more.
Quite frankly, the fun I've had in these past 2 weeks have really kinda of changed my perspective on mons. I've realised that, its only a past time for me, not the be all end all thing I thought it was. Mons is a game with faults, but our community is the main one.
I don't think the "problem" with this community is the new players. New players are everywhere, in every tier, in every competitive scene, everywhere. Now, let's say NewNUPlayer1234 comes into the NU Room for the first time. What does he see? He sees several moderators, probably a room owner, several voices and constantly talking chat that will literally chat about anything. NewNUPlayer1234 decides to go and make his first ever NU team. He spends a good few hours perfecting it to his likeing, adding a personal touch to each of his sets as he goes, becoming ever attached to each Mon he uses. He decides to ladder for the first time, and does well. He is unbeaten in 3 games. NewNUPlayer1234 then decides he is gonna talk in the NU chat about his favourite Mon, Spinda, which has put in work for several games previous. He talks, wow, this Spinda is a God, you all should try it.
This is where it all goes wrong.
Instead of being ushered into a sense where he is given direct proof that Spinda is an outclassed pokemon, he is instead shouted out, made fun of, and laughed at in the full presence of the NU Room, which often has more than 100 users, which can be intimidating for somebody new. In an ideal world, we could all follow
Kiyo 's idea, where a new user would lurk around more before he either begins to post in the NU Room or the Forums if he is more serious. He would gain experience by entering b101, looking at badged users posts and learning the meta. But in reality, this is impossible. Not everyone who plays NU lurks on the Forums, and in the NU Room people expect a place where they can bounce ideas with one another the general topic discussion of the NU tier.
The problem lies here, in the fundamentals of the tier. NewNUPlayer1234 now doesn't like the NU tier because of how a moderator or driver abused him for his lack of knowledge.
People don't know better. I'm sure if people knew that what they were using is wrong and outclassed, they would stop using it. But, instead, what happens is that they are attacked by other people who think they know better than him, which they probably do. It's human nature to defend his corner, and as a result gets muted. Never plays NU again. New players are kinda like children. You nurture them, guide them, in the hope that one day they turn into a responsible adult someday and make a living for themselves. A bad parent would be one that abuses their children, doesn't develop them, and the child doesn't turn into this ideal responsible person. This exact same analogy could be used when describing new NU players and the moderators of the NU Room / Tier. If you imagine the new players as the children and the moderators of the NU Room as the parents, and the development process as the nurturing. If, as a community, we decide that we want to nurture these new players in the hope that they will develop into good players who are respected amongst the community, a fee things have to change.
1.) Our Attitude towards new players
- I for one don't like it when a person of higher authority calls out a user who is in the NU Room for the first time. It kinda just seems you are abusing your superior mental power to help you in that scenario to just grill the living daylights out of said new users. Have a little empathy, have a little hindsight. These people might not be well educated in the tier, and it is your job as authority or regular users (doesn't really matter ngl) to make new users feel like they are welcome. This is the first step to achieving the ideal goal of them lurking more and contributing high quality posts.
2.) Our Attitude towards each other
- This part honestly gets me. Every. Single. Time. And it usually happens after one user haxes another. If guy wins via hax and has a little gloat, it seems in recent times the fashion is to just kick this person to the sideline. Pay no attention to him, and sever all ties. It's fucking Pokémon. This spawns from natural human hatred of bullshit events, but quite frankly, Pokémon would be nowhere nearly as fun without the hax. Hax is the part of Pokémon that means it isn't a chess game, where every second is a predictable one. In mons, one crit changes it all if your lucky. But, for some reason. People take being haxed as some sort of offense towards them(?). I, for one, have haxed players to no end. Good and Bad. But there are two ways people often react to being haxed. One is the ideal way, "daww that was unfortuante", " mons is mons", "ahh mons strikes again xd". Or the other way. "I hope you die", " kys", "cancer comment". Simply put, if we just took less offense from getting haxed, it would be so much easier to get along with 99.9% of the community.
3.) Our Morals.
- This is quite a touchy topic so I won't spend too long explaining myself and ask for whoever is still reading to ask themselves, am I really a percieved good user? Do I ever alieniate people after an "event" has happened? Do I laugh and troll new users? We need to ALL take a serious look at ourselves in the mirror and think, what could we, what could I, do better to better contribute to this community. Just asking yourself this question every day after you've finished will help solve so many problems in the community.
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I also want to talk about this "clique" that goes on in the NU community. It is quite frankly, disgusting. The fact you would segment yourselves from the community and act all "I know everything hurrdurr" at anyone that crosses your path is what annoys me. I honestly don't think the "clique" should exist. Having a group between friends on Skype is one thing, having about half the community in a group and saying that anyone else outside of it is essentially ass isnt what the tier wants nor needs. We need to take a more "just" approach about how we handle power, where is it deserved as apposed to who's been my best friend the past couple weeks. At times, I honestly think this is how some people got promotions. Not through talent, or activity, or contributions.
I'll finish up my point on the clique; it shouldnt exist. Dont EVER let the community get segmented, since people who THINK they know better, don't often know what's ACTUALLY best for this tier.
If we are real, let's be honest. We will never ever get the 'perfect' tier. There will always be something wrong, something to work on, something to change. But if we look at the NU tier rn, I feel like the meta is at a point where it is enjoyable to play. What's letting it down is the "community" aspect. We are hardly cohesive, responsible or even fun to play with at this point. Myself included. If we all work together, we can achieve some kind of success, as frens, and as a community.
tl;dr, don't blame the new players, they don't know any better.
try to act kinder to a new user who doesn't know better
try to act kinder to each other, despite "mons being mons"
make moral decisions, be a more moral person, for the sake of making the community more welcoming and less toxic.
fuck the clique
we are all frens at heart, let's make it so that people know this.
come on guys, let's do this. For NU.