Manacube Factions Should Be Removed

[awesomeboy__]

Note: Before you read this post and think it's a hate post, it's not. I truly believe that factions is hurting Manacube and it's playerbase, I know staff are trying their best, but there is simply no hope for Manacube factions. Everything I say in this post is backed up with evidence that I have seen myself.

I have a suggestion! Remove factions! There are SO many other gamemodes that more than 50 people will play that there would be more staff for and would just be overall better for Manacube. At the moment, factions usually gets around 100 players, but only around 15 are actually playing. Almost every player is an alt afking a farm or just a normal account afking.

The hopes of an actually good factions staff member to come up with Manacube experience is something that has a little to no chance to happen. From the one season I played factions, there are only a few staff members just don't have time to watch chat/report bugs/ban hackers all at once. Not only are most of the 4 current factions staff (and factions SrMods) inactive, but they have little to no factions experience.

Why don't people apply? People have applied, and they are applying. But a lot of people don't understand that being a Manacube staff member doesn't only mean you have to have factions knowledge, but it means you have to have Manacube and Manacube factions knowledge. What I mean by this is that normal factions and Manacube factions are very different. Manacube factions has the weirdest rules along with how many things is missing from Manacube factions itself. And like I said before, a person with both Manacube and Factions knowledge combined is very hard to come across.

There are so many things that need to be worked on and fixed that the 4 staff members can't report all of it. And even if it does get reported, there's only so many admins that can be working on these things. Factions gets a TON of effort put into it by admins and devs, but sadly there's just too much to be fixed and it being so understaffed doesn't help. If the effort that gets put into factions gets replaced with fixing the bugs on every other server, all the other servers would be a lot better because they don't suffer from being understaffed.

So far I've only focused on why Factions is bad, but here are some arguments some people may bring up to say why it should stay:

Argument 1: It opens up room for the playerbase to increase to allow more players to be on the server.

While this is true, people only stay for a short amount of time while starting on facs with the rare occasion of people trying out other gamemodes on Manacube. If random players join Manacube, and the first server they click is factions, after maining it for a few weeks they will recognize that it isn't the best because of how understaffed it is. Then their reputation on Manacube is that it's understaffed.

Secondly, factions is just like any other game on Manacube. What I mean by this is that Manacube is an overall grindy server. With everything needing to be grinded, theres not a lot of games where you can just play and chill. Having a gamemode like Skywars or Bedwars would open up Manacube to a lot more players than it is currently getting.

Argument 2: Not as toxic as other Factions servers

If people want to start Factions, Manacube is not the place to start. With almost nothing in common with other factions servers, after players try learning stuff on Manacube and try out another server, they'll realize that the factions on Manacube compared to another server has a huge difference in rules and playstyle.

What can Manacube do if they want to keep factions?

1. Work on the bugs and improve the server in between seasons.

Yes bugs are fixed and things are improved in between every season, but if there's a one month gap in between ss9+ss10 that would give admins a lot of time working on bugs and improving the playing experience.

2. Better plugins

If Mana truly wants Factions to continue, they should really look into more plugins to maintain tps and other server stuff like that. Currently, the server cannot handle 1 cannon and 1 counter cannon running at the same time, because it just blows the cannons up. If there are two raids happening at once, the server just decides to die. Better plugins would really help out the server because it would allow players to actually cannon without having to worry that it'll blow up every 2 seconds.

3. More staff

Like I said before, this is more of a wish than something Mana has control over. But we just gotta hope good people apply and hopefully Factions will become a better place

 

[LiLKayla]

Howdy Howdy!

First, I would like to say that I really appreciate how positive you remained during this post. It is really nice to see someone offering strong suggestions rather than throwing mish mash insults at the staff team and the player base. There are a few things I would like to acknowledge to maybe give you some peace of mind.

As a factions moderator I don't think factions is going anywhere soon- and as your post says- you could consider me "inactive" for the in game portion of factions. However, please realize that every member of the factions staff team takes part in handling reports, appeals, tickets, season changes, and more. I can only speak purely for myself but, at the moment I am a working college student. I also staff multiple servers. Currently my main in game activity time is dedicated to events because I am an event coordinator. However, you are always welcome to talk to me here, on the forms or on discord. My discord is lilkayla#4435. I will do my best to solve your issue or get you someone who can help you solve your issue regarding factions.

I do agree that manacube factions has some problems, when you bring up how different we are from other factions servers this is something that I honestly appreciate. Our chat is very tame compared to others. You might view it as a downfall but us have global chat rules at a relatively pg-13 level it allows us to be more accepting and safe for our players who may be younger or in a minority., etc... Our factions server will not have it's chat rules changed. This is something we stand by.

We recently got a new admin level dev. His name is Cullan! We also have a new factions manager, her name is abbie. Please give us more time to work towards fixing and changing our severs! I hope my reply has added some needed context to this conversation and i'm sorry that our factions server has left this impression on you and others.

best, kayla

 

[abbie<3]

hi,

i just wanted to start this by saying that i’m crying into my slushie cup rn not cool : (

all jokes aside, every staff member involved in the factions game mode work extremely hard, and are literally always looking for ways to improve (other than deleting it all together). i’m gonna do my best to address your points <3 hope it clears up some stuff.

kayla lowkey summed up everything else i was going to say, but we are all genuinely doing our best. we are also literally always accepting and reviewing staff applications.

if you have specific suggestions or feedback, you are free to start a conversation with me on the forums <3

pog ok ty,
abbie

 

[Tas]

Wow, that was a really well-written piece. I'm impressed by how concise, mature, and clear-headed you present yourself in this post. As a Parkour player who knows next to nothing about factions, let alone Manacube's factions server (you blow up peoples' bases, right?), this post has helped me to understand the underlying issues that factions faces much more clearly than other "factions has issues" posts that pop up every couple weeks on the forums.

I'm a former moderator and a member of Manacube's largest community, so I can understand the fundamental problem of being under-staffed. The point you make about needing a combination of Factions experience and Manacube experience is strong. The solution to a lack of personnel is not to pull existing staff members from other servers. We saw this with KitPvP and how a staff member's "second server" would be hard pressed to be as frequented as the one they initially applied for. It's wonderful that moderators feel compelled to contribute to servers other than their own, but this is not sustainable.

I'm very happy that you mentioned the fact that Factions is a large focus for the admin team and the developers. Many people who post rants about factions don't recognize this. The sheer amount of commitment a factions server inherently requires makes it seem like it's being neglected, but in fact factions is prioritized over many of the smaller servers Manacube offers.

Your solution of abandoning factions for the sake of the other servers is very compelling for a non-factions player. I often see the factions bug fixes on #updates and wonder why the other servers don't get this treatment. I do know why, though: Many of these bugs are game breaking, and need to be fixed or else major exploits can happen. The bug fixes that we'd like to see on Creative or Skyblock are minor, and naturally take a back seat.

But why is factions prioritized month after month, season after season? As you have, I'd invite the folks in charge to consider the cost benefit analysis of devoting themselves to factions. Factions is the newcomer here, and some might argue it doesn't mesh with the rest of the gamemodes Manacube offers. There's a reason successful servers don't typically have a prison, a parkour, a skyblock, a survival, a creative, a kitpvp, and a factions server. That's a lot, and I'd like to see more balance.

I realize that many of the servers are more self-sustaining than factions is. It requires frequent resets, and constant monitoring. Maybe, considering the pros versus the cons, factions could be dropped for the sake of other, more unique, more "Manacube" gamemodes? There are other servers that have made factions work better, and for much longer. Is this the route that Manacube plans to take into the future? For in the process of keeping factions from collapsing, Manacube's other (older) servers are on the brink.