My online gaming history

           

On this page a summary of my gamer story divided into some chapters. I did not want to mention any names, but I will never forget my travel companions of this wonderful adventure called game, I will always be deeply grateful to those who have boarded my spaceship called =ER^b=.

 

 

*The beginning*

From my first day on AA2 I discovered the existence of clans and their activity, I immediately dreamed of joining one of them and putting the clan tag in front of my nick, but I was in difficulty because the English studied at school many years ago was now forgotten, so curbed of my fears I was hoping for an invitation from some clan that I never actually received, so I invented a clan tag that I had added to my nick. About my nick, being a fan of reading linked to Napoleon, his army and especially his Old Guard belonging to his Imperial Guard, I started playing with the nick GardeImperiale. Later, inspired by the Ridley Scott film "The Duellists" set in the Napoleonic period and an Iron Maiden song that I particularly love of the same title, I changed the name to GardeTheDuellist. For a short time I adopted a fake clan tag, it was inspired by the Napoleonic Imperial Guard, my nick had become =G^I= TheDuellist, where GI meant Imperial Garde, while =^= was the imperial eagle used in battle by the Napoleonic troops in a stylized version. During this long clan-free period I met many players, I also got kicks from the clans' gameservers to make room for their members, I sometimes had to accept against my will to play in the team he was defending when instead I always liked to play in attack, but these were the contraindications of playing from alone.
So, after 4 years alone I finally decided it was time to try to join a clan.

 

*In a voice channel finally (period in the former clan)*

I remember that before asking to join that clan where I already knew all the players I was held back by my fear of not being able to understand anything of what I would have heard in the voice channel, in fact the language was English but I was only far away you remember what I learned in school and never spoke English to anyone anyway. During a game in Border where one of the leaders of that clan was in play, I asked him if there was a place in their clan for me too. So he said to me: "Are you interested in playing with us?" I fearfully replied yes, and he invited me to join their voice channel, the Teamspeak which was the most used by the clans at that time. With great emotion I downloaded and installed the Teamspeak, I had never used it before, I finally understand where to enter the address and pw and enter the clan channel. In the Teamspeak there was at that moment only one of the 4 leaders of that clan, I could hear his voice calling me but I could not communicate with him, I was again in trouble with the voice channel settings, finally I fix everything and start shyly try to talk to him. Then the other players arrived, and all those names I had played with also had a voice. I was excited but also very happy, I was discovering a new world of playing games. Joining the Teamspeak of a clan did not yet mean being part of the clan, in fact, friends of the clan also entered the voice channel. One of the things I immediately noticed was the difference in English pronunciation according to the countries of origin, this increased the difficulty of understanding what everyone was saying, but slowly I began to get used to it.
Joining a clan meant having passed the trial period with the relative modalities established by each single clan.
 

*You are in (period in the former clan)*

After a few days playing with the clan members and getting familiar with the environment I was told by one of the four clan leaders who had talked to the other leaders about my request to join the clan, then he said "Duel you are in". Happy with the news, I immediately went to put the clan tag and adjusted the name to the maximum character size allowed by the game. After the clan tag my name was TheDuellist, changed after a couple of weeks to GardeTheDuel.

 

*Clan life (period in the former clan)*

I was proud to finally play in a clan, with the real clan tag, in the voice channel, access to the forum as a member and with all the discussions where I could finally express my opinion, guaranteed access to the gameserver of the clan and often of friendly clans, training and the possibility to play the long-awaited clan war. Another of the interesting aspects of being in a clan is to get to know the players better, therefore not only for the performances in the game, but also from the character and real life side. Another important aspect was not only being accepted to join a clan, but knowing and respecting the hierarchies and rules once inside, because if it was almost easy to join a clan, it was just as easy to be kicked. In this clan there were 4 leaders, another player placed among the leaders and members, he had obtained that position thanks to his ability to manage servers and computer language. The rules weren't written anywhere, but they were obvious. The clan had a website, forum,
gameserver and Teamspeak. The financial aspect was essential to support the costs of the clan or all the endowments a use to keep it active.

 

*Tactics and clan war (period in the former clan)*

The day came when it was announced that we would play a clan war, the opponents were a German language clan, we already knew all their players, many were gaming friends. In the Teamspeak but above all in the forum the topic concerning tactics was introduced, a topic dear to me as my Napoleonic readings made me passionate about strategies and tactics. To tell the truth, only one of the leaders spoke in any way about tactics, more than anything else he indicated the roles and members to whom to entrust the tasks at stake, but that for me was very little, it did not reflect my thought of a tactic, indeed in my opinion it was not at all, so I presented in the forum the map in which we would have played indicating the starting positions of the players and the possible subsequent development of the maneuver considering any losses and replacements by a team that would have followed the maneuvers from a distance and ready for any variations. I immediately received the compliments of that leader who previously indicated his tactics, and I want to remember that in real life he was a real soldier who had carried out war missions around the world, so an important opinion for me. Another opinion and suggestion came from another member, while from all the other leaders and players there was absolute silence. The day of the clan war had arrived, tactics hadn't been talked about anymore, so we would play with the orders given at the time. The clan war begins, I was very tense but that tension has always helped me in life, I was more reactive than ever. I don't remember how many rounds we played, for sure the real soldier leader gave the tactics in the first rounds and then another leader gave them, unfortunately the opposing clan kept winning the rounds, in the penultimate round I was allowed to lead the tactics, finally I could express my ideas and my way of communicating them to the players, that round we were in defense and it was the only one we won, then a last round was played always guided by my tactics but our last player, one of clan leaders did not want to follow my last indications and therefore from an advantageous position he made us lose the round. At the end of the clan war I realized that I was the only one who had clear ideas and that most of our members were not able to follow orders especially when they are given continuously in order to adapt the maneuver to the situation that in that moment presented itself. I was satisfied with what I had done but deeply disappointed by the leaders unable to understand how to manage the clan wars.

 

*Financial management (period in the former clan)*

The financial aspect of a clan was important in those periods. While the forum and website could be obtained for free, it was a different matter to rent the voice channel and even more so for the gameserver. The gameserver was expensive, the voice channel much cheaper but it was necessary to raise money from members to be able to rent what was needed. In general, among all the clans, the collection of money to pay the rents was collected on spontaneous offers without a defined amount between the various members who agreed to pay their own money to support the costs of the clan, while there were other members who they participated sporadically or you didn't want to pay anything. My cash contributions had also given me the rights of administrator of the gameserver like our clan leaders and another member who had paid a share of the money. The management of the financial side of the clan was another very disappointing situation for me. Considering that the donations were voluntary but the management of the gameserver and Teamspeak did not correspond to what was proportionally paid, I expected greater attention, balance and participation from the leaders, I had complained about this in the forum, but also this time there was silence from them. During my 3 months of stay in the clan I covered almost 50% of the costs, one leader even covered only 3%, the managing member of the servers considered like the leaders never paid any money, the other 3 leaders covered 36% and 11%, but all managed all the structures of the clan and lead it in the same way, so absolutely unacceptable to me.

 

*Climbing up the clan hierarchy (period in the former clan)*

 

During my first month in the clan my substantial spontaneous participation in maintaining the costs of the clan coupled with my active participation in all other activities in the clan had earned me places in the hierarchy, I had been placed on equal terms with 2 leaders and that skilled member in the management of the servers, in front of me there were only 2 founders of the clan.

 

*Time for consideration and an eye to the future (period in the former clan)*

The dissatisfaction about the management of the clan were not only mine, in fact a teammate of mine said that he would not be willing to stay there anymore. He had much more experience than me in clans, before this he had already played in some other clans, so he proposed me to try to build a new one. The idea of creating a clan fascinated me for a long time but not having had previous experience and not knowing how a clan was structured I had never taken the initiative, but this time I could take advantage of the experience of my teammate as well as my short experience in this clan where I had already understood
what I wanted and what I did not want.

 

*=ER^b= project (period in the former clan)*

Already in September, then after only one month of stay in the clan I had started to work on the project of a new clan supported by my teammate and with the same friend who made me discover online games. The main points were to be the same rules for everyone, manage the structures of the clan in proportion to the money that is donated, a single leader who must also be the largest donor of money, a clear internal hierarchy, no discrimination of any kind, friendly environment, priority to real life. While I was working to create the rules I had already begun to work around what was necessary to give a clear identity to the project. Taking my cue from my reading of Napoleon and especially his army, I chose the name of my clan EAGLE'S REVENGE brigade, its clan tag =ER^b=, fonts, colors and clan logo. At the beginning of October almost everything was already established, in this phase we started to look for the necessary facilities, so forums, where to create the website, rent TS3 and gameserver. One more problem was to learn how to configure all those structures, with a little patience
I managed to figure out how to do it except for the gameserver that was a mystery to me until then. In mid-October I informed the clan leadership of my desire to create my own clan and the possibility of a partnership with their clan. My words were received favorably, besides my dissatisfaction with their management of the clan I must admit that I have always found cordiality towards me. Very important for me the collaboration had from one of the leaders of the clan in fact of configuration of the gameserver. However, he never taught me how to configure it myself, and that meant not being completely independent, but luckily I never gave up and I managed to learn how to do it by myself. We arrived in November, now almost everything was ready, the players were missing. I sent messages to those players also friends of game without clan to be part of my project, I contacted about ten of them, they were in 5 to accept and they joined me, my clanmate and my friend.
 

*More dissatisfaction from the clan (period in the former clan)*

A few days before my new adventure I found myself in an unexpected situation in the clan, the leaders decided to take away my admin rights from gameserver because I was leaving the clan. My protests were useless since I was always the biggest contributor of money to their clan. From their side they told me that once I started with my clan they would still give me the rights of shared administrator with them of the gameserver of their clan on the condition that one of their leaders was administrator of the gameserver of my clan. Obviously I accepted despite myself since they did not contribute money to my gameserver, but I was already thinking about the future when they would no longer have money to have a gameserver while I would go on with my own, with them unaware that I had already figured out how to configure the gameserver as well, so no longer dependent on them. Last but not least I had provided them with the list of my players, unfortunately one of them was vetoed by one of the leaders of my former clan, personal issues, he told me that if I did not exclude that player from the list I would no longer have any support from my former clan and the friendship would fall. Even in this case I had to accept in spite of myself and I had to tell that player that he would not be part of my clan.
 

23 november 2010, EAGLE's REVENGE brigade started its own adventure

Finally my dream comes true on November 23, 2010 at 18:30 I and my 7 fellow adventurers enter our gameserver that has our name, and we with the clan tag, i became =ER^b=TheDuellist. How much emotion, it was a pity that AA2 was losing so many players because of so many new games that had come out in the meantime but also because it had become a dated game. We played until 23.00.
 

=ER^b= group grows and the time of reckoning also arrives

As the days go by, my clan's group of players grows, other gaming friends also arrive who were initially unsure about joining the clan. And the moment of satisfaction also arrives, for example among the players who became part of my clan there were some chased uselessly by my former clan. And then comes the moment of reckoning with my former clan because the expected moment arrives, in fact, having no more money available, they no longer had their gameserver, this meant that they had the administrator rights of my gameserver but they had nothing in exchange for me. Obviously, an agreement based on a reciprocal exchange comes to an end when one of the parties can no longer trust the agreement and therefore cannot claim to obtain the same thing without giving anything in return. With great satisfaction I do what they (unfairly) did to me, I had removed their administrator rights from my gameserver. How do you think the leaders of my former clan reacted? They weren't expecting my move, they didn't know that I had learned alone how to configure the gameserver, they got angry and told me it was an abuse to take away the admin rights of my gameserver from them. I replied that they had done the same with me, only that I had paid them almost all of their gameserver while they had never paid any money for my gameserver, also shortly after other 2 of their members left their clan to enter mine with the same reasons that made me leave, and therefore the end of a friendship that I had already understood was not really sincere.

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=ER^b= on AA2

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Our stay in AA2 was conditioned by the fact that the new games just released had taken many players away from AA2, it was clear that the game was going to shut down. However, our group had expanded, many friends played in our gameserver and often entered our TS3. We also managed to play our first clan war, the management of tactics was so perfect that we won all the games on our map and some on that of the opposite clan.

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=ER^b= first meeting

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Our clan had become above all a group of friends, the serene environment without pressure led us to take other steps forward that went beyond the game, in fact from TS3 we went to visit us in a group on Skype, even in the company of friends outside. of our clan. But from Skype there was an even bigger step, we started talking about meeting in real life, and in a few months we organized a meeting. It was August 2011, finally the dream becomes reality, with those with whom it was possible to leave at the same time we met in Italy, it was memorable days, one of the most beautiful life experiences ever had before and an indelible memory for me.

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=ER^b= on BC2, BF3 and BF4

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On july 2011 we started our adventure on Bad Company 2 with 5 players from AA2, It was a short experience to prepare our clan to join Battlefield 3. On october 2011 we started our adventure on Battlefield 3, this time with 6 players, they are same guys from AA2. On october 2013 on BF4 with 9 players from BF3.  With each game change some players are lost along the way, but new ones are found later. The period of BF3 and BF4 was very intense, in our favorite mode, which is the same that we play today on Cod mobile and which is called Search & Destroy, new training modes have been applied, of communication between players, all this has given further cohesion in our group and excellent results in all matches played together. Also during this moment the group that from AA2 continued to play together was fundamental for the cohesion between everyone, even when there were internal disputes fueled by players who had a different perspective on living the clan, that is to separate into two groups, the pro ones for the clan war and the less skilled ones who would not have found space except in normal games. My idea of ​​a clan has always been that of not discriminating against anyone, therefore for me space for everyone in clan war, no internal division, the strong cohesion and friendship between the historical components of the clan rejected the idea of ​​a division, following the failed idea the "separatists" left the clan, by the way we saw many clans, even among the largest ones, have crumbled and extinguished thanks to internal divisions, I could never have allowed the destruction of my creature.  In the =ER^b= friendship has always counted more than anything. We also had 2 other meetings. We have a YouTube channel now.

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=ER^b= on AAPG

 

On november 2015 we joined America's Army Prowing Grounds which was the sequel to AA3 whose game we had tested but was not deemed adequate to our story, but above all it was the sequel to AA2, which for us meant a return to the roots. From 2010 to 2015 the game had changed a lot, undoubtedly improved but we couldn't find a real inheritance with our roots. Some enthusiasts had converted some old AA2 maps to be playable in AAPG, among these maps was our much loved Border, so we immediately rented a server, very expensive I would say, at least as much as I was personally forced to pay, given the failure participation in the costs that had previously been confirmed by one of our members and in order not to burden the amount already paid by other members, I preferred to shoulder the missing money. Unfortunately Border had some bugs but above all it did not find the interest of the other players and not even among all the former AA2 players found on AAPG. Unfortunately, a failed investment, and the loss of other members of the clan that I preferred not to remedy, now the dream of playing on Border as many years ago had failed and I realized that the preferences of the players of that period combined with a sort of change in the way of playing and experiencing the game without forgetting that there were many more games available and on different platforms they led me to reconsider a different management of the clan. The different management of the clan provided first of all the abolition of the use of the forum that no longer interested anyone, interrupting the rules for the recruitment of new players, thus having a more dynamic change in entry and exit from the clan, the cancellation of any cost related to the clan therefore the uselessness of renting a gameserver, and with regard to the voice channel, use the free Discord platform. All this required a different research for the choice of the new official games of the clan.

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=ER^b= on Black Squad and Real Racing 3

 

Following the reflections and considerations matured at the end of our stay in AAPG, on september 2017 the choice for the new official game fell on Black Squad, a free game that did not include the use of its own game servers but which relied on those of the same game, therefore a positive news. Even this game, however, did not give the same satisfactions as those of the past, the historical group of the clan increasingly reduced even if the friendship with the other old players remained strong even outside the game. New generations of gamers were clearly different in the way of living all the perspectives that were the prerogatives of the first online games. After only 3 months, so in December 2017 a radical change was attempted in the choice of games, from the FPS we moved on to RR3, a game in which to drive the cars on the track after appropriate bodywork and mechanics elaboration, without a doubt something different, the decision to adopt for this game the choice to consider it a second division of the clan, the name is ERB5 racing team. RR3 did not require particular requirements or difficulties for the entry or exit of the members, in fact the team had a fast development that allowed to expel the members who were less performing without thinking twice, but this thing gave more the feeling that everything was disposable, there was nothing left of what had been the good past of my clan and not even the historical players whose friendship has never been lacking outside the games except for a single player who has followed almost all the steps between in game and the other, he is always the same one who made me discover the games online.

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=ER^b= on CoD mobile

 

The further enhancements of my pc, the desire to return to FPS games supported by the full knowledge of the different way of experiencing online games, led to a selection among the free online games available led to the choice of CoD mobile, which is a game created for smartphones and immediately usable on a PC thanks to the Android emulators, which means a huge audience of players from all over the world. On november 2019 start the adventure on CoD mobile, After having tested the various game modes, the main one of the clan becomes Search & Destroy, a game that collects the legacy since the first game of the clan. The great opportunities of the game include space dedicated to the creation of own clans, own temporary gameservers, voice channel in the game and text messages. Everything that this game contains made me rediscover the pleasure of playing FPS, as well as being able to develop the clan again as in the past, taking into account how today's gamers had changed. A new group of members has been recreated, the same spirit of cohesion and friendship of the early years of this clan, the language barriers are removed thanks to the translators. I have adapted the rules to the current times by considering the players fully active from everyone else. Our clan has reached a high number of members never reached before. This is undoubtedly the second generation of the clan. We also have a Twitch channel now and sometimes we play on live streaming.

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Nowdays
 

I am always on the track, in CoD mobile now and still leading a spaceship called =ER^b=.

 

During these years I have met many players, I have found many friends in all parts of the world, some of them I have also met in real life and with some I have stayed in contact even if we no longer play together. I am happy to have embarked on the adventure of my clan, I am sure I have made a wonderful choice, I have always enjoyed myself and I think all those players who are part of =ER^b= are and are enjoying themselves. I will always be grateful to all my fellow adventurers, even with those players from other clans with whom we have made friends and often played together.

And the adventure continues ...