Current state of FFA....

[Seksi]

We all love FFA.  We all want FFA to stick around and be active.  We all know, however, that the community is starting to dwindle (again).

We need to take the steps to keep it going strong.  First and foremost, the season 13 final needs to be played.  The longer it goes on without being played the less players and fans are even interested.  If the championship game continues to be on a "TBA" status that only loses interest in FFA as a whole.  Seriously, put a time limit on it to schedule again.  If one player still cannot play then give the spot to another deserving.

Starting the next season was a good move.  Now we need to raise awareness once again.  There are three ways I can think of to do that.

One, reach out to friends or people you play with and try to get them interested in the game type.  I have been doing this and will continue to.  Have them check out some replays and advertise the websites.  Bring new people to the community, players and fans alike.

Two, simply play the game!  We need more activity from those that are able to play.  Keep playing in all three venues, Northrend Ladder, Azeroth Ladder, and Garena games. 

The most active times to search are:
Northrend = (10 AM EST - 5 PM EST)
Azeroth = ( 5 PM EST - 12 AM EST)

You should be able to find a game on either server depending on the time.  Northrend is already pretty active, but not with a lot of FML players.  We can improve that and also vastly improve activity on the Azeroth ladder.  On BNet, be sure to list the two websites in your profile.

Three, make your presence known.  Post replays on FFAReplays.com and comment on other replays.  Make threads and comment on threads on this website.  When you want to play, make it known and post times, availability etc.  Let's get a lot more in-house games (Garena or BNet bot) and commented replays.  We need to play a lot more then only the scheduled FML games. 

The kickoff of Season 14 will help the cause, but we have to take action to ensure a good season let alone enough participants to make it happen in the first place.  The future of FFA may depend on our actions now...

[Camp_and_Spank]

well said! i would like to se more reps now when slack is back up!

I could post some myself but everyone would just bitch about the huge amount of noobishness XD

[DarKNeSSCaLLs]

Azeroth FFA activity is pretty bad, even with 0-0 record and during primetime it took me 30 mins to find a game and get 1-0 a couple weeks back, and I had to beat preteamers to do it (crappy preteamers, but nonetheless...). I tried to find a game after 1-0 but gave up after close to an hour.

Just saying, I would not consider playing on Azeroth if you want to seriously ladder or enjoy the FFA gametype. Maybe a game there every now and then, but basically almost no one searches there anymore and it's extremely difficult to find a game. (it's been already over a month and not even the full 50 pages of ladder have filled up yet for the gametype). I would suggest Northrend and Garena. It's also a bit sad that full game listings is now completely broken and probably won't ever be fixed 

We should be happy IMO that FFA (not to mention, War3) has been surviving as long as it has. 10+ years for a game is no small feat. Ladder dies a little more with each passing year (in all gametypes), but it's good to see that FML is still going strong.

[Lightweight!]

It is a typical issue when games get older. When a game is 1-2 years old the activity is high and even more players may buy it. No new players start playing wc3 anymore. Kids prefer to buy starcraft2, because everybody plays sc2 when it comes down to a realtime strategy game and i dont even blame them.. I noticed that a year ago on sunday wc3 tft was at around 45000 users in peak times. Nowadays it doesnt reach 30000 anymore. Cant do much about it. Moreover if somebody would buy wc3 and tries playing in battle.net he will lose the fun at it fast unlike us old veterans that are familiar with maphacks/dischacks/lossbot. We could only survive these circumstances for so long because wc3 is still the best game in it genre.

[Camp_and_Spank]

i find it still pretty easy to find games on northerend, it has always been hard if you get good stats