I thank all the kind people who helped keep our FA firearms side going and for those who didnt and had no compassion think again we would help u if it was u in a rut! And I cant believe TA Would not support another fellow clan. hmmm But those who did in ur clan help out, I want to give my deeepst thanks and reguards to ur support! We like TA, are trying to commit to a family clan and an area for kids to have fun it just so happend I lost my Job and thats not my fault!

 

I have alot of TAC members who come to our server to play we give them the same respect as UR guys gave to ME! But here in the forums I feel a bit hurt! I guess I will let u figure that one out! We are not in a power fight with u TA and dont want one! And we wont lock any of ur topics nor ur request for HELP!

 

I had a young man not more then 14 years of age do this for his clan and it was a hell of a shock to me he did this I my self said that this was not a way for things to be done. But reguardless he had done so because he like many of your own loves to keep playing for a team he believes in! Yet u cut his throat in ways! This confounds me as to some of TA's real ethics! or is it u haven't been to our site and seen what we are trying to do along with u guys!

Come on people we are trying to Keep FA alive and not let it die! And as u well know, runnning servers is not easy and if I am correct just as our server has its donation area so does urs.... WHY? To keep the game going or to fill a pocket! Ours is for the game not for us! So please be kind and unlock grits postings for our clan to come say thanks to those who were in ur site and came helped us! Because we are THANKFUL FOR THE HELP WE GOT from them! even if ur are not. And even though u guys never requested anything from our site we still have a link to ur site because we respected u guys! http://stars.thenetgamer.com/modules.php?name=Web_Links&l_op=viewlink&cid=9&min=20&orderby=titleA&show=10

 

So in my final words "R u going to lock this post as well?" becasue I am saying Thanks to those who helped or are u going to grab what glory u can out of it cause it made u guys look better! Once again we are not out for a power struggle!

 

AlphaStarOmega AKA WhiteLion

OK - I'm not really in the mood for a long winded post, but after reading the past few threads that led up to this, I feel that I need to make a comment.No offense to any team in financial trouble, but this is a little pathetic. EVERY crew that goes through the trouble of setting up a site and hosting a server knows what it is getting itself into and needs to figure out ways to keep it running or bust.Everyone does it differently - we for example have a monthly budget and we solicit contributions from our members. If the contributions don't come, we close up shop and go home. It's that simple.I would rather gnaw off my right arm before going to another clansite to ask their members for contributions to MY team. It's simple economics.This whole liberal "redistribution of wealth" concept makes my ears bleed. Bottom line, if you like the services that TA has to offer and you see yourself devoting a large amount of your FA time freeloading off of their server, and you feel compelled to make a contribution - then do so. You would never see me or Gator ask a single guest for a donation. He simply puts up the link as an option - as do we. If you honestly depend on external funding to keep your server running, then you've already lost the battle. Server rent is a month to month engagement. Are you seriously asking for a monthly commitment? A single donation may only help keep you alive for another month. What happens next month?What your team needs is a sound financial plan under which it can continue operations. Divide your operating expenses by the amount of users you have. If each individual contribution is more than what they can provide you have several options:1) find a sponsor2) get more members to lower the individual contribution3) find a cheaper server4) close up shopYour best option is probably a combination of (2) and (3).I truely wish you and your team the best of luck getting this problem managed. Please just ease up on the posts that treat FA like the last virgin that needs preserving. Trust me - the lifecycle of FA will not be impacted by the success or failure of your ability to continue operations. Your situation may just be a side-effect which is indicitive of what is going on with the mod overall. Think about it...

OK - I'm not really in the mood for a long winded post, but after reading the past few threads that led up to this, I feel that I need to make a comment.

 

No offense to any team in financial trouble, but this is a little pathetic. EVERY crew that goes through the trouble of setting up a site and hosting a server knows what it is getting itself into and needs to figure out ways to keep it running or bust.

 

Everyone does it differently - we for example have a monthly budget and we solicit contributions from our members. If the contributions don't come, we close up shop and go home. It's that simple.

 

I would rather gnaw off my right arm before going to another clansite to ask their members for contributions to MY team. It's simple economics.

 

This whole liberal "redistribution of wealth" concept makes my ears bleed.

 

Bottom line, if you like the services that TA has to offer and you see yourself devoting a large amount of your FA time freeloading off of their server, and you feel compelled to make a contribution - then do so.

 

You would never see me or Gator ask a single guest for a donation. He simply puts up the link as an option - as do we. If you honestly depend on external funding to keep your server running, then you've already lost the battle. Server rent is a month to month engagement. Are you seriously asking for a monthly commitment? A single donation may only help keep you alive for another month. What happens next month?

 

What your team needs is a sound financial plan under which it can continue operations. Divide your operating expenses by the amount of users you have. If each individual contribution is more than what they can provide you have several options:

 

1) find a sponsor

2) get more members to lower the individual contribution

3) find a cheaper server

4) close up shop

 

Your best option is probably a combination of (2) and (3).

 

I truely wish you and your team the best of luck getting this problem managed. Please just ease up on the posts that treat FA like the last virgin that needs preserving. Trust me - the lifecycle of FA will not be impacted by the success or failure of your ability to continue operations. Your situation may just be a side-effect which is indicitive of what is going on with the mod overall. Think about it...

AMEN !

while replies are not meant for people to coppy and paste or quote others and say your right, thats what needs to be done. camp is 100% right. you need to find other ways that do not include what i would call spam, going to other sites and asking for money. thats rather low and if this game has driven you to it then calm down host it off your conenction and say "i did my part" servers and sites require a large finacial commitment as well as active admins. im sorry to hear about your loss and wish you the best of luck but i would say just save a few dollars here and there for a while and get some friends to help then open when you can pay for at least a three month term.

Nice set of helpfull people we have here playing firearms.A friend in need is a bloody pest,,,,,that about fits it I think

maybe it wasn´t the best way to ask at TA site! But i think most of us understand it and most or nearly all of us like the [*]-clan, so don´t argue about a failure one single member made but just be glad that the stars are here and that we can keep more members to FA_COMMUNITY!!!

 

PEACE!!!

Nice set of helpfull people we have here playing firearms.

 

A friend in need is a bloody pest,,,,,that about fits it I think

You're missing my point. A friend in need is never a pest, but that's not what this is about.

This isn't a friend asking you to help change a flat tire. - this is a neighbor going around the neighborhood asking people to pay their mortgage. I would hope you can see the difference. Sure - if it's a family member you may offer them a room in YOUR house... but let's not get off on a tangent here.

 

The fact remains that a single donation will not solve their problems. What they are looking for is a sponsor - or someone willing to send them money EACH MONTH. Well I'm sure ou realize that this will not work.

 

I gave pointers on how to fix the situation. That's how we did it and that's how plenty of other clans do it.

 

Another pointer:

 

Find a clan that is looking for a server and have them contribute a share to help cover the cost.

 

Give a person a fish and feed em once, or teach em how to fish and let em feed themselves

 

 

j/k - GL [*]STARS[*]!!

Quote

 

Give a person a fish and feed em once, or teach em how to fish and let em feed themselves

 

j/k - GL [*]STARS[*]!!

 

Advice is free and easy to give and you can appear to be very wise with hindsight but advice no matter how good will not help in the short term,thats for when the immediate situation is resolved and I'm sure it is appreciated.

 

Seeing as analogys are popular

 

How are these guys supposed to catch fish without a rod and just advice on technique?

 

FFS, WILL EVERYONE STOP TRYING TO JUSTIFY BEING TIGHT BASTARDS AND PUT THEIR HANDS IN THEIR POCKETS TO HELP

 

Most of the people on here I consider as friends

Tell ya what - I'll make an offer. If Stars loses their server due to insufficient funds, I'll let them train on the FA BATTLEZONE once a week gratis for a month, so they can stay together as a team, and they have time to get their act together financially. I'm sure a couple of server providers may be able to pitch in an evening or two for them.How's that for helpful? Cause I really want to make it onto your "friends" list today

Tell ya what -

 

I'll make an offer. If Stars loses their server due to insufficient funds, I'll let them train on the FA BATTLEZONE once a week gratis for a month, so they can stay together as a team, and they have time to get their act together financially. I'm sure a couple of server providers may be able to pitch in an evening or two for them.

 

How's that for helpful? Cause I really want to make it onto your "friends" list today

Thats what I mean

 

I'll help as long as it costs me nothing attitude.

 

And your wit is as bad as your generosity

Tell ya what -

 

I'll make an offer. If Stars loses their server due to insufficient funds, I'll let them train on the FA BATTLEZONE once a week gratis for a month, so they can stay together as a team, and they have time to get their act together financially. I'm sure a couple of server providers may be able to pitch in an evening or two for them.

 

How's that for helpful? Cause I really want to make it onto your "friends" list today

Thank u for ur offer but we will survive now thanks to a few people with good hearts!

 

Alpha

Thats what I mean

 

I'll help as long as it costs me nothing attitude.

 

And your wit is as bad as your generosity

Ok - take me off your Christmas Card list. You are apparantly not as smart as I initially thought you were.

 

You think our servers are free? DW's monthly operating expense exceeds $250 dollars and our infrastructure spans 2 continents. Giving up time on our server to benefit another clan - for FREE none the less - would normally not be considered "bad generosity".

 

(sigh) :roll:

 

This is like talking to a dimmwhitted stepchild. I'm done here.

And to the starving in Africa??????? A very expensive beautifully bound book on how to grow crops

And to the starving in Africa???????

A very expensive beautifully bound book on how to grow crops

Your analogy sucks for shit. He's giving them the server, once a week, for free. DW pays quite alot of cash a month to operate the server, and they can use it once a week. for free. That isn't like giving the starving in africa a expensive bound book on how to grow crops, that's like giving them bread and meat, and telling them they need to get their act together ASAP. And to be honest, At this point in FA"s life if another server dies, it's not that big of a change to anything. Theres plenty of FA servers that go on, unused by the majority of the community. It's a shame; and if you really, truely needed a server to use for awhile...many of those server owners wouldn't give a damn if you had limited access to the server. However, going to another clans site, asking them to pay for you and your server, is really....Really bad. If you can't afford the server month-to-month, perhaps you shouldn't have gotten it in the first place. IMO you should make sure you've got enough money for 6 months for the server before you even consider renting one out.

Wow, I am stunned.Someone makes a a offer and a nice one I might add and it gets thrown right back at them, like its not good enough. So Campy cant send you money because he has his own bills to pay he offers to share what he has and its not good enough because its not cash.Considering money dont grow on trees and we all have to pay for our own servers and we dont have enough money to help others pay for their own we can not offer help?Campy offered good advice a decent person would have seen right off that he couldnt help with money only advice and a offer of support by sharing his server, would have said Thank you for your generious offers. Instead he gets flammed....As for your starving in Africa Im sure if campy was there he would share his food, WAIT STOP THE PRESS!!! You dont want them to have food, only CASH to buy the food.So much for trying to help another FA clan out, making offers that you can afford to do isnt good enough, what a shame.

Sir Camp, a fellow Conservative! I second your opinion!WhiteLion, I have to admit I also feel slighted as I felt this post was made on our forums to generate revenue for your server. I understand you want to keep your server alive but we as well as DW have to pick up the tab if we do not have enough money coming in for a month. You have to ask yourself if your server is not doing enough business to generate donation is it really worth keeping open anyway? I don't think anyone running these server are making money I know we don't I see the statement from incoming money and outgoing money and we are usually having to kick in a good bit to keep ours open also. I suggest working on your site and keeping it to the level of TA and DW and with a little luck you can keep your head above water. You should really listen to Sir Camp

Seeing as what i had to say was already said by StateCop and SirCampalotI will Second StateCop & SirCampalot

Im going to have to agree with camp on this one. If your really in THAT BAD of a need for a server then get members to swap the duty of hosting a small passworded server just for your clan. I mean, you dont need a super computer to host a server :wink:

What is that story.Give the mouse a cookie and he'll ask for a glass of milk.I will not pay for someones mortage as Sir Camp stated. I will put them up for a night or two but having things given to you is no way to learn how to succeed in life. There is always a way. I suggest you have your members commit more money till a new income is found.

Or perhaps just cut back on the server for a bit, you don't really NEED it.Then again, all we need is food and water.

I tried to keep this as short as I could, but it may be a little long. Anyway, here we go

 

I thank all the kind people who helped keep our FA firearms side going and for those who didnt and had no compassion think again we would help u if it was u in a rut! And I cant believe TA Would not support another fellow clan. hmmm But those who did in ur clan help out, I want to give my deeepst thanks and reguards to ur support! We like TA, are trying to commit to a family clan and an area for kids to have fun it just so happend I lost my Job and thats not my fault!

Answer: You say you like TA, but yet your paragraph reflects nothing but dislike and discontent. I will this one alone

 

I have alot of TAC members who come to our server to play we give them the same respect as UR guys gave to ME! But here in the forums I feel a bit hurt! I guess I will let u figure that one out! We are not in a power fight with u TA and dont want one! And we wont lock any of ur topics nor ur request for HELP!

Answer: You shouldn't feel hurt? because I asked you nicely to stop soliciting funds for your privately? owned/rented server in our forums. As far the issue concerning the "locking" of Grits forum post, well, I'm not sure which Admin locked it, but I can say it was an appropriate action given the circumstances and nature of your request.

 

Let me give you some insight. Just a few months ago, although not publicized, The Armory server, website, and clan was about to come to an end after 2 long years of dedicated service to the FA community. I posted a message in our TAC Senior Counsil? section and informed all the SC members that I was growing tired of maintaining the servers, the website, and all finances, and that I would like to handover the TAC operations to someone else, or close down our operations altogether.

 

At the time, it seemed I was spending more time administrating all of the various facets of the clan, server, and website. I suddenly realized I was spending less and less time to enjoy playing the game I so loved. It was becoming more of a business than a pleasure, and when the pleasure is gone.

 

I also told them that I would be unable to continue renting the server because our funds were depleted, and I could not justify paying for all the services by myself, as their past donations were the financial backbone of our existence.

 

They responded quickly and made substantial donations to keep the server afloat. They also asked me to stay on in my present capacity as clan administrator (as we have a Senior Counsel rather than a clan leader), and to take the lead in keeping things together. In addition to donating their hard earned personal funds, they also offered to help me with maintaining both sever and website.

 

I had a young man not more then 14 years of age do this for his clan and it was a hell of a shock to me he did this I my self said that this was not a way for things to be done. But reguardless he had done so because he like many of your own loves to keep playing for a team he believes in! Yet u cut his throat in ways!

 

Answer: I haven't a clue what you are talking about here, so I will let this one go

 

This confounds me as to some of TA's real ethics! or is it u haven't been to our site and seen what we are trying to do along with u guys!

 

Answer: Well, to be quite honest, I didn't even know you had a server, or a website for that matter. I don't routinely visit other clan websites, because I barley have enough time to visit ours. What are our ethics you ask? We routinely maintain the highest standards in everything we do, whether it is our No foul language policy, or the fact that we remove Llamas from the server who disrupt gamplay. We always strive to do our best to keep the server clean, friendly, and enjoyable to all those who visit us.

 

When our Senior Counsel makes decisions concerning the clan, server, or website, we review them thoroughly, collectively, and impartially. As soon as a decision is made, however, we immediately make it known to public, and most importantly we stick by our decision(s). We do not have any hidden agendas here at TAC, and we are willing to listen to anyone's suggestion or complaint.

 

Come on people we are trying to Keep FA alive and not let it die! And as u well know, runnning servers is not easy and if I am correct just as our server has its donation area so does urs.... WHY? To keep the game going or to fill a pocket!

 

Answer: The existence of your server has absolutely no impact on keeping FA alive, nor would the absence of The Armory server for that matter. There are many empty FA servers out there in the www. Those server owners/renters would just love to have their servers populated with players, but unfortunately that's not the case. There are many reasons for this, but I won't elaborate because I don't want to get off topic here.

 

If you are trying to infer that we try to fill a pocket for The Armory server, I must tell you that you are ABSOLUTELY WRONG. We are not the Microsoft of Firearms, and we DO NOT have an endless cash flow to pay for things. We have a small cash flow that takes us from month to month, just as case with most other clan servers.

 

The link on our site called Like to Donate? brings in approximately 3 % of the total funds used to pay for our current services. Approximately 97% of the donated money comes directly from our adult TAC clan members, and without them, the Armory would not be alive today. With the exception of a few small donations, the link is primarily used as a gateway by the adult TAC clan members to make monthly server, website, and Ventrilo payments.

 

Ours is for the game not for us! So please be kind and unlock grits postings for our clan to come say thanks to those who were in ur site and came helped us! Because we are THANKFUL FOR THE HELP WE GOT from them! even if ur are not. And even though u guys never requested anything from our site we still have a link to ur site because we respected u guys! http://stars.thenetgamer.com/modules.php?name=Web_Links&l_op=viewlink&cid=9&min=20&orderby=titleA&show=10

 

Answer: You have your own website to ask for donations, and you also have the Firearms forums as well (As I suggested in Grit's post). It is simply inappropriate for you to ask for donations on a clan site that also relies on donations itself. That's just downright unethical and just plain silly.

 

So in my final words "R u going to lock this post as well?" because I am saying Thanks to those who helped or are u going to grab what glory u can out of it cause it made u guys look better! Once again we are not out for a power struggle!

Answer: No, I am not going to lock this post

 

Now, for my closing comments:

 

Let me give you a little history of the Armory server here. The very first PC game I ever played in my life was a game called Firearms, and I started playing that about 3 years ago. The reason I started The Armory server is kind of a long story, but I will try to briefly tell you what led to it's conception.

 

When I started to play Firearms, I would enter various FA servers where I found players and Admins chastising me for using the Aug. I guess I was a Newb, but I didn't know any better. I figured I paid for the damn game, why are they telling me how to play it. Apparently, and as I found out later, the AUG was banned on many servers at the time, so I switched to the M-16/203 to stop all of the verbal abuse I was receiving from them.

 

One day I was playing on a server where ps_street was the map. I shot the M203 in the middle hallway and wiped out about 3-4 players (very cool by the way). The next thing you know I was verbally abused for using it. They said the M-79/M203 was not allowed to be used indoors on their server, but was allowed to be used outdoors. I thought to myself, what kind of server dictates where weapons are used. They called me every nasty name they could, and then they banned me. Hence: Two days later, The Armory server was born.

 

It seems only yesterday, but I had recently been discharged from the United States military after serving 24 years of honorable service. I really wanted to play FA because I found it so interesting and fun to play, so I started looking around for a game server. It was then I realized they were all very expensive to rent.

 

After a few days of searching the web, I found a new company that was offering a 20-player FA server for $60 a month, so I rented it. I knew I could not afford to keep paying that much money for an extended period of time, but I just wanted a few months of playing on a server where weapons were not banned, and the little adolescent punks would not verbally abuse myself or other players.

 

Well, I finally retuned home from my new civilian job one day, and quickly got to work on setting up the server. I started reading about how to setup and use a Half-Life server using a tool called AdminMod, because at the time I did not have a clue.

 

Once I got this things set up, I suddenly realized something...there were no players playing on the server. My daughter, at the time, did not like to play Firearms, so I purchased another copy of HL and installed it on her system. I told her to enter the game just move around to make it look like there were two players playing in the server. It seemed to work, because as days passed, players started to show up regularly on the server.

 

Once the server gained popularity, I no longer needed her to help me jumpstart the server. I noticed that people had uniformed tags in front of their name, so I came up the [TA]-, mainly to show visiting players that I was a part of the server. After time, we started to get many regulars to the server. They liked the rules and complemented me on having a nice place to play with a great ping. That in itself motivated me to keep things running longer.

 

When I thought all was well, they started to ask me if they could join the clan. I told them there was not a clan, but if they played here a lot, they were welcome to display the [TA]- tag.

 

More time passed, and one of the regular players (using the [TA] tag) asked about making TA an official clan, so I did some investigating and signed us up. Sounds easy? I can tell you it wasn't for me anyway. To qualify as an official FA clan, the clans were required to have a website, so we used MSN freebee at first to get us by. As time went on, I later learned how to create a website on my own, but it took me on a long journey to get there.

 

I thought, omg, now I have to fork out money for a website that I really didn't have at the time. After we were officially an "FA clan"?, and sometime later, one of the clan members suggested placing a "PayPal"? donation link on the main website. The rest, as you know, is TA history.

 

I'm giving you this brief insight as to how The Armory came about, and some of the growing pains of starting a server, clan and website. Each clan is on their own, and it is not a community of giving to each other's clan. It doesn't work that way.

 

Regards,

 

Gator

Cool, you should put a link called TA history for that

Yeah, Gator made a nice story about how THE ARMORY got started. There was a part 1 but part 2 hasn't been released yet. 8) That little post had some extra history. Strangely, it didn't seem long or boring. That's a funny idea of using someone to run around and pretend like something is going on.

I found a way to fix your server problems and generate revenue for you or any other clan needing money.

 

 

 

If you are interested in money for your game server this is a must read...click here

Gator that was an excellent post. By far the longest in this forum's history, at least from what I have heard. You should write an official history of the TAC clan. It was difficult in stopping myself from quoting your post Gator, it would have made for a good spam thread starter.