(22 Jun 14, 08:03PM)1Cap Wrote: Public servers are keeping the game alive!
Public servers keep a dead game alive. If you want sustainable community growth then you should place greater emphasis on the competitive side of the game. The reason why similar types of games (I'm talking about ones based off of the cube engine, although ofc larger games apply too) are still very much alive is because they are centered around the competitive community. I bet anyone would be hard pressed to find a game which places public gameplay over competitive gameplay that isn't dying a slow, horrible death.
Of course there will be experienced public players that will immediately notice a difference if there were to be a change in the weapon balance, but the vast majority of public players probably wouldn't notice or even care. If you balance the weapons to suit competitive play, public games can adapt with little to no trouble. If you balance the weapons to suit public gameplay, you're killing competitive games.