i fell like i don't belong and everyone is collectively ghosting me all the time.

[SkeletronMK666]

hello, skeletronMK here. every time i enter into a community that is ran by high ranking profile people from the doom community, there are always locked and invisible channels in their discord, every time i ask someone to be my friend in these discords, or even for help, or ask to join in a project I'm on, or playtesting, or really  anything, I'm ghosted, ignored, and rejected it seems. Look i get it, i suffer form a mood disorder and schizophrenia, i might be weird, But listen, this community is a MAJOR source of life purpose and meaning for me, it's a creative outlet and it's immensely important to me. I'm sorry if i've offended someone in the past or weirded out someone. I think i need a reset or something because everywhere i go, i seem like a social outcast. My mods are getting better, im getting better at game design, graphics, decorate, and mapping- But it seems people Gatekeeping me has taken priority over allowing me to participate. Maybe I'm wrong here, maybe I'm miss guided, maybe I should just actively participate in more Community Projects instead of sitting on my soap box here and complaining, however I have to say SOMETHING and address the elephant in the room. I can't sit by and let things go out with a whimper. Maybe someone can give me reassurance that I'm wrong, right?

[Metal_Slayer]

Hi, Doomworld doesn't have an official Discord server, none of the subforums here are locked and all kinds of tools for modding are available on the internet. Besides, private servers only make a small part of the overall community and their rules are entirely decided by their administrators, if this has been bothering you then perhaps you should either talk to them directly or avoid those places. Doomworld is free and public so you should take advantage of it rather than a place like Discord.

[SkeletronMK666]

22 minutes ago, Metal_Slayer said:

Hi, Doomworld doesn't have an official Discord server, none of the subforums here are locked and all kinds of tools for modding are available on the internet. Besides, private servers only make a small part of the overall community and their rules are entirely decided by their administrators, if this has been bothering you then perhaps you should either talk to them directly or avoid those places. Doomworld is free and public so you should take advantage of it rather than a place like Discord.

that's completely fair. also i mentioned this in my post and also someone i know mentioned it to me that i should join more community projects.

[Gentlepoke]

Communities in general can be quite cliquey in design. In the communities you want to contribute / be a part of, best thing to do is to take it steady, and not rush into things. If you let your input be gradual, more people will take notice and you'll likely get a better reaction / more opportunities for collaboration. 

[Decay]

Just make maps dude who gives a shit.

[Gentlepoke]

Just now, Decay said:

Just make maps dude who gives a shit.

Also honestly, this is pretty accurate.

[SkeletronMK666]

14 minutes ago, Decay said:

Just make maps dude who gives a shit.

true.

[Dark Pulse]

There are plenty of newbie-friendly mapping projects out there. DavidN runs RAMP every year, and it welcomes mappers of all skills.

 

Don't worry about it too much. There's a place here for you.

[DNSKILL5]

A lot of people in these communities have shit social communication skills so don’t let the “ghosting” get to you. 

[HLRaven]

7 hours ago, Decay said:

Just make maps dude who gives a shit.

This and the feeling of joy and confidence when you finish one of your projects is why you should never be let down by weird encounters on public discord servers. My experience with public discord servers have always been extremely random and strange by giving me opportunities to meet some of my most strong bonds between my friends and then having one of the weirdest yucky experiences on the internet

in short just keep doing what you do and you will get lucky!

[LadyMistDragon]

3 hours ago, DNSKILL5 said:

A lot of people in these communities have shit social communication skills so don’t let the “ghosting” get to you. 

don't I fucking know IT....but it definitely can get a bit tiresome to at the least, not get a prompt response for a rather simple query. That said, just carry on doing your thing and either you'll get recognition or you won't. There's no set formula to accomplish that.

[Major Arlene]

I want to mention, Skeletron, the last interaction I had with you about a question you had, you then pinged me back just 3 hours later when you didn't get a reply back from the person I directed you to. I think part of the issue, genuinely, is that you're impatient. Even in larger Discords, there's people with full time jobs, people in different time zones, people who have certain roles/servers muted altogether, etc. even though it's an IM service, the replies will not always be instant for all of those reasons or more.

 

I genuinely mean no ill will toward you, but I want to contextualize the experience I had with you recently to maybe give you some understanding as to what the problem may be. I do also find it somewhat strange, but I guess unsurprising given how some people in the larger Doom community act, that you assume there's some weird conspiracy to keep your mods from doing well like... locking some random channel behind some illusive wall. almost every Discord has random locked channels that may disappear for no other reason other than... archiving an old channel that's no longer in use and no one wants to look at it and have it in their list anymore. As an admin in at least two Discords, I'd love to not see those, but I still do!

 

Just make what you love, stop worrying about the rest, although I realize that advice is probably not the best to give, because you can't help it. But hopefully an explanation of a couple of your concerns is helpful.

[kevansevans]

Every Discord server has a secret cool kids channel/server, and sometimes the cool kids make the cooler kids club, and repeat ad nauseam.

 

Anecdotally, I've been trying to participate in the "at large" Doom community for the last 15 years, and only 4 years ago did I fall into a niche cool kids room I've actually felt welcome in (and I've helped run the *official* Doom Discord for the last 8 years). As everyone here has said, worry more about what you make and keep making things you love. Birds of a feather flock together.

[Ludi]

You should try joining some community projects. I met a LOT of cool people working on Hardfest 1 like 2 years ago, a sizeable amount of which I still talk to every day. 

 

There's tons of great public discords (hi meowgi) as well. If anything, I recommend joining the PUSS discord because that's a speedrun to finding people who like making maps with wacky themes. Both meowgi's server and the PUSS server are public so you can easily join them :)

 

I would argue making long lasting connections is as important as making maps, long term. 

[OliveTree]

frankly the only approval that matters on this webbed site is mine and its kind of reserved for approving of myself so sorry friend

[A Handsome Fridge]

I don't see anyone in the Doom community or Discord servers as "high ranking", we're all just dumbass humans around here (even the fridges are). People *will* help you if you ask for help but don't expect them to answer within the minute, or within hours. Discord\forums are slow mediums, not a chat. Also people are busy and live in different time zones, so activity is spread throughout the day. Also also it takes time for people to get get to know each other, either online or IRL, and that's fine. No one is deliberately ignoring anyone, just don't expect anything until something happens. Like this thread for example ;)

So yes, keep on showing us what you've got, or want to get at and what makes you feel good :D And give feedback on other peoples work if you have something to say. It might work out eventually.

[SkeletronMK666]

so basically what the most im hearing here is, join more community projects, and keep mapping- :)

[Redneckerz]

14 minutes ago, SkeletronMK666 said:

so basically what the most im hearing here is, join more community projects, and keep mapping- :)

Basically, and what @Major Arlene told you.

 

In fact i think you should take that message even more to heart. Because when you do, joining community projects will be much more of a breeze :)

[Li'l devil]

If you're worrying about not being invited to some "cool" "VIP" invite-only channels or servers, then you're missing nothing of value. I've been "lucky" to be a part of some of these exclusive channels/servers and, from my experience, most of the time people there just shittalk everyone they dislike from the open communities. Pretty much all interesting Doom-related things happen in public anyway. And if you want to know more about people around you, DM them. Just don't be intrusive, since some people just don't want to talk much, especially to people they don't know yet. If someone doesn't respond to you, it's best to not bother them anymore, unless it's something very important.

[xScavengerWolfx]

21 hours ago, Decay said:

Just make maps dude who gives a shit.

Right! Making maps is better then therapy. 

[purist]

I chose my avatar because there was a time where I felt like I was invisible on the forum. Like most communities, the more you put into Doomworld, the more you'll get out of it. Be cool and gradually get more involved and I am sure you will begin to feel less this way.

[OliveTree]

hey yknow i must say, im sorry you feel excluded or invisible. I've been there and it's hard, and it's hard too to struggle with the question of if you're really being mistreated or if you're overly sensitive. In any case, I think there's nothing to take personally, here. You seem like a talented and perfectly interesting user. If there are elite cliques or tastemakers excluding you, I'm sorry. But there's also nothing material to gain in trying to be Doom-Famous, and I can assure you nobody has a vendetta against you. It can be hard to socialize safely online, so I encourage you to be careful and to be earnest. It will be okay <3

[SkeletronMK666]

thanks for the reassurance, guys! I'll definitely will be joining some community projects after I I'm done with my 3 big projects that i will be putting into definitive versions. honestly when I entered into certain discords i felt so uncomfortable that i was too afraid to post anything for the most part. definitely, you guys will be seeing more from me on the forums and discords in the future, with ever growing skill and more confidence. I feel like a weight has lifted off of my shoulders.

[Decay]

16 hours ago, Major Arlene said:

I want to mention, Skeletron, the last interaction I had with you...

So since this was brought up I'm going to echo on this a bit, since this was my only interaction with you, was you asking for feedback on a map, I provided it, and you said "thanks for the feedback, it was pretty gay happy pride month LMFAO", I asked if you actually found that funny and you said sure. Personally I have zero interest in dealing with you based on my first impressions, nor do I have any sympathy for this topic/feeling you are having.

 

So you might want to also think about your actions and attitudes when you're trying to "fit in" or be the cool kid.

Edited March 26 by Decay

[Xaser]

Just to add on to Arlene and Decay's posts: your reputation isn't Bad Forever(tm) because of any of these things; simply apologize, move on, and do better, and you'll build it back up in no time. Many of us regulars started out as spammy bad posters -- if I can recover from that, so can you. ;)

 

Another thing worth mentioning: joining an existing "in crowd" is by no means the only (or even best) way to "fit in" to a community -- plenty of community fixtures  here got their start by forming their own team (with blackjack and hookers), networking with other relative newcomers and collaborating together to crank out some absolute gold (e.g. Squonker Team). Some folks just went solo, made some great content on their own, and got a "following" that way (MtPain comes to mind; Arlene got her start on YouTube before joining DW, etc).

 

"Success" in the Doom community is kinda what you define it -- just hanging around and having fun is totally a noble goal on its own -- but nah, you don't need to "infiltrate" some upper echelon to be accepted 'round here.

Edited March 31 by Xaser

[bioshockfan90]

Far more accessible than it was 8 years ago when I joined - I got sent to Post Hell because I was spamming memes in a thread for a Discord I made. Just me being a weirdo that didn't understand forum etiquette. Before Doomer Boards, there was a sort of running theme of this "Doominati" existing heckling the newbies behind their backs - it happens today still, but a lot of the old guard is a lot more chill nowadays and there's less of a status quo I feel. It's one of those things where you just have to stick around long enough, goodpost, and understand basic internet courtesy. It takes time, but you'll get there.

[kevansevans]

52 minutes ago, Xaser said:

simply apologize, move on, and do better

We need those last two steps in giant bold glowing neon letters. Way too many times have I seen passionate people who try to integrate in these communities, genuinely screw up, and fail to actually put in effort to be better. They get caught up with this idea they need to redeem themselves, or forgiveness is owed because they felt bad enough, leading to more self destructive behavior that gets them further exiled from the community.

 

As Xaser says, we’ve all been there, we’ve all had our moments. But refusal to grow is what keeps you in a hole. The fact people here are willing to tell you so politely what put them off should speak volumes to you.

[Xaser]

A sorta-on-topic corollary: You will see folks say things like "baaaah the regulars are so cliquey! they shut me out!!" in any community. Sometimes people indeed don't get a fair shake, because shit happens, but take things like these with a grain of salt, because a lot of times you're hearing a complaint from someone who got banned or shunned because they were being a jackass. :P -- Every well-run community will have its detractors, because there will be bans, and modern Doomworld is on the good side of the line more often than not.

 

[This isn't @OP, I don't get the impression you're doing this here, just sometimes you'll hear such things from outside folks and it's tempting to give in to confirmation bias.]

[Gentlepoke]

1 hour ago, Xaser said:

Just to add on to Arlene and Decay's posts: your reputation isn't Bad Forever(tm) because of any of these things; simply apologize, move on, and do better, and you'll build it back up in no time. Many of us regulars started out as spammy bad posters -- if I can recover from that, so can you. ;)

Just as an aside, you broke Graf Zahl for a moment back then, which I gotta say was mighty impressive!

[Downcologo one]

On 3/25/2024 at 3:07 PM, Decay said:

Just make maps dude who gives a shit.

Only one correct answer