TSTO Race to the Finish. The Race is ON! (Wish us luck.)

I've been through this exercise once with my B-town. Well sort of. No RL money. The stacking glitch had been fixed. etc

But why the rule of no taking advantage of glitches? From other things you've said it seems you are trying to reproduce the experience of a player who doesn't even use the various TSTO sites at all! Yet you are not willing to give up walkthroughs. My point is that if you have access to walkthroughs then you have access to people who can share glitch info. Even addicts talks about the glitches (eventually).

LOL. I figured it would take some newbie pressure to get anyone to play.

Well, what the heck. I'll change the topic. We'll see how many we can get to sign-up and then get this race started.


I'd like some input on whether to use the walkthroughs. I agree that it makes it MUCH more realistic. Terrifying. But realistic. And it WAS, I suppose, my original intent. To see what the new player experiences without all the advantages we've had. Then I chickened out and thought well, maybe we could just see what the new forum-reading player experiences without advantages other than the advice and walkthroughs. (Which amount to -- ya' gotta admit -- a LOT of advantages.)

Do we want to play this as if we were just some poor clueless person out there trying to figure out this game? Or do we want to play WITH the help of the forum?

So the question might be how many of us are up for a REAL challenge, and how many won't play without Cliff Notes.

Hmmm. Maybe I'll make this a sign-up thread and put a poll in the first post to see whether people who sign up want the No-Walkthrough challenge.

Give me a little time to fix that first post. :)

I would love to join in on this but come September I wouldn't have enough time to keep two games going. Is there any possibility of doing it for two months and at the end see who's the farthest? Or maybe do the first to level 20 wins.

annettemarc wrote:
LOL. I figured it would take some newbie pressure to get anyone to play.

Well, what the heck. I'll change the topic. We'll see how many we can get to sign-up and then get this race started.


I'd like some input on whether to use the walkthroughs. I agree that it makes it MUCH more realistic. Terrifying. But realistic. And it WAS, I suppose, my original intent. To see what the new player experiences without all the advantages we've had. Then I chickened out and thought well, maybe we could just see what the new forum-reading player experiences without advantages other than the advice and walkthroughs. (Which amount to -- ya' gotta admit -- a LOT of advantages.)

Do we want to play this as if we were just some poor clueless person out there trying to figure out this game? Or do we want to play WITH the help of the forum?

So the question might be how many of us are up for a REAL challenge, and how many won't play without Cliff Notes.

Hmmm. Maybe I'll make this a sign-up thread and put a poll in the first post to see whether people who sign up want the No-Walkthrough challenge.

Give me a little time to fix that first post. :)

lmao!

Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son. - Animal House

Neither is playing TSTO like a noob. :mrgreen:

Neglecterino wrote:
I've been through this exercise once with my B-town. Well sort of. No RL money. The stacking glitch had been fixed. etc

But why the rule of no taking advantage of glitches? From other things you've said it seems you are trying to reproduce the experience of a player who doesn't even use the various TSTO sites at all! Yet you are not willing to give up walkthroughs. My point is that if you have access to walkthroughs then you have access to people who can share glitch info. Even addicts talks about the glitches (eventually).

Excellent point. On the issue of glitches ... obviously, if we find out about them somehow, we could (and probably would) use those in our main towns, so it's not as though we won't know about them. I mean, we WILL be on the forum for insider-information.

My point was to discipline ourselves to play our NEW towns without taking advantage of them. More like a new player who DOES come to the forum to get advice but comes along at a time that they've missed playing glitches, and have to earn money the old-fashioned way. Like, I keep hearing old-timers say "I can't imagine what it would have been like without the stackable handshakes". I also wonder how it would have affected me if I knew I wasn't eventually going to get that houseboat I wanted. I knew I was going to get it because I had the Endless Bob tactic, so the stress of that event was MUCH less for me.

In this challenge, I meant to have us experience the frustrations, and to hear the posts of "don't worry. Just keep playing the event regularly and you'll get all the prizes." (That is, the ones that didn't always fully appreciate the role "luck" was playing in their own achievement.)

This would have to be hybrid. Do we use-every-bit-of-much-insider-information-as-the-forum-gives-us? Or do we use the insider information that a player will have access to even if they start the game a year from now and play the game to its completion during a period that happens to be glitch-free? What would THAT be like?

Thoughts?

aidx1054 wrote:
I would love to join in on this but come September I wouldn't have enough time to keep two games going. Is there any possibility of doing it for two months and at the end see who's the farthest? Or maybe do the first to level 20 wins.

If you were doing the questline with no town designing, do you think you could manage your second town for a while? Some of the later levels are the much more challenging ones to manage, especially if there are events adding pressure and stress. (Like, not having Edna Krabappel at the start of the Terwilliger event was so stressful for players who were still struggling.)

We could see who is at the top as of the end of each month, though. So if someone has to drop out midway, they could still have some recognition for what they'd accomplished so far. How does that sound?

Since we're all mutual neighbors in this challenge, our levels would be visible to all. Maybe periodic screencapping? We can make up rules as we go along. (Sort of like Homer in Tap-ball) :)

annettemarc wrote:

Neglecterino wrote:
I've been through this exercise once with my B-town. Well sort of. No RL money. The stacking glitch had been fixed. etc

But why the rule of no taking advantage of glitches? From other things you've said it seems you are trying to reproduce the experience of a player who doesn't even use the various TSTO sites at all! Yet you are not willing to give up walkthroughs. My point is that if you have access to walkthroughs then you have access to people who can share glitch info. Even addicts talks about the glitches (eventually).

Excellent point. On the issue of glitches ... obviously, if we find out about them somehow, we could (and probably would) use those in our main towns, so it's not as though we won't know about them. I mean, we WILL be on the forum for insider-information.

My point was to discipline ourselves to play our NEW towns without taking advantage of them. More like a new player who DOES come to the forum to get advice but comes along at a time that they've missed playing glitches, and have to earn money the old-fashioned way. Like, I keep hearing old-timers say "I can't imagine what it would have been like without the stackable handshakes". I also wonder how it would have affected me if I knew I wasn't eventually going to get that houseboat I wanted. I knew I was going to get it because I had the Endless Bob tactic, so the stress of that event was MUCH less for me.

In this challenge, I meant to have us experience the frustrations, and to hear the posts of "don't worry. Just keep playing the event regularly and you'll get all the prizes." (That is, the ones that didn't always fully appreciate the role "luck" was playing in their own achievement.)

This would have to be hybrid. Do we use-every-bit-of-much-insider-information-as-the-forum-gives-us? Or do we use the insider information that a player will have access to even if they start the game a year from now and play the game to its completion during a period that happens to be glitch-free? What would THAT be like?

Thoughts?

You cannot go back in time. I already knew what I was doing when I started my B-town. I knew I'd win the events. I did have more to juggle. For example at one point I had 20+ quests going at once during an event! I had to hurry to get Burns because he was needed. I didn't have the Flander's kids right away for Halloween. etc. I still won the events. I know the frustrations newbies have because I was once a newbie; playing without looking at the TSTO sites. One of the reasons I'm here on the forum is to encourage and help the new players.

Soooo, I think the point of this exercise would be to see how fast you can level up as a freemium player with access to anything you can do in the game and all information you can get off the forum and other sites.

annettemarc wrote:

aidx1054 wrote:
I would love to join in on this but come September I wouldn't have enough time to keep two games going. Is there any possibility of doing it for two months and at the end see who's the farthest? Or maybe do the first to level 20 wins.

If you were doing the questline with no town designing, do you think you could manage your second town for a while? Some of the later levels are the much more challenging ones to manage, especially if there are events adding pressure and stress. (Like, not having Edna Krabappel at the start of the Terwilliger event was so stressful for players who were still struggling.)

We could see who is at the top as of the end of each month, though. So if someone has to drop out midway, they could still have some recognition for what they'd accomplished so far. How does that sound?

Since we're all mutual neighbors in this challenge, our levels would be visible to all. Maybe periodic screencapping? We can make up rules as we go along. (Sort of like Homer in Tap-ball) :)

Well, count me in so, I won't win but it sounds fun.
One question though, you say no real life money but are we still allowed use the free donuts we earn? I would presume so because they're available to everyone, new, old or premium

aidx1054 wrote:

annettemarc wrote:

aidx1054 wrote:
I would love to join in on this but come September I wouldn't have enough time to keep two games going. Is there any possibility of doing it for two months and at the end see who's the farthest? Or maybe do the first to level 20 wins.

If you were doing the questline with no town designing, do you think you could manage your second town for a while? Some of the later levels are the much more challenging ones to manage, especially if there are events adding pressure and stress. (Like, not having Edna Krabappel at the start of the Terwilliger event was so stressful for players who were still struggling.)

We could see who is at the top as of the end of each month, though. So if someone has to drop out midway, they could still have some recognition for what they'd accomplished so far. How does that sound?

Since we're all mutual neighbors in this challenge, our levels would be visible to all. Maybe periodic screencapping? We can make up rules as we go along. (Sort of like Homer in Tap-ball) :)

Well, count me in so, I won't win but it sounds fun.
One question though, you say no real life money but are we still allowed use the free donuts we earn? I would presume so because they're available to everyone, new, old or premium

Yes, any donuts you win in the game are allowed. (You will need to choose wisely when to use them, of course.)

I'm willing to try it, although I missed both the stackable handshakes and Endless Bob (but by the second of those I was already at the max level).

One question. My son started TSTO a year or so ago and then abandoned it without creating a username. Now, everytime I don't log on, it gives me that half-finished game, which I think is around Level 5 or so. How can I "erase" it so that I can start over at the beginning?