While we discuss gameplay, remember this!

Well if you're having trouble understanding "balance" then I have some bad news for you, because that is not something that takes a background in linguistics to understand. When people want something balanced they want it raised or lowered in performance, and it's just an opinion. Although sometimes people cite stats to support their opinion on balance issues, especially in this game.

Meta, alright, I'll give you that. It's a subjective phrase when it comes to PS2. But metagame usually means one of two things - either what is best in the game, such as how a TR MAX using fractures would be the meta, whereas the same MAX using pounders would not be meta. Or, it means the zenith of gameplay. A lone infi solo-capping bases is not metagame, but multiple platoons duking it out at an amp station fighting for an alert victory is metagame.

Although most of the time when I hear people mention metagame, it's because the game doesn't really have one, and that might be why nobody can agree on what it is. Alerts are really the closet thing to a metagame PS2 has, and they're...alright. I hear a lot of people asking for outfit-controlled and upgraded bases, and battles over those might be considered metagame.

You're missing the point entirely. Whoosh, right over your head.

It was not my definition of balance that was at issue here. It was the disagreement about the definition leading to a failure of communication.

Which, somewhat appropiately, also happened in your post in a severe way.

Actually.... metagame rarely means either of those. It's usually a player inspired alternate option added to the gameplay.

As an example for clairty: attacking another lane in the lattice to pull players away from the true objective (e.g. push their warpgate to pull them from the biolab). This strategy, and the act of countering that strategy, would be an example of adding another layer to the FPS (i.e. shooting and capturing the point) game we think of as PS2.

Yet, in these forums, we have calls for "meta-game" that include everything from more awards, to using the FOTM weapons/empires, through more involved examples as the one I cited. Those things do not match the same definition, and cause confusion in the conversation. This leads to disagreements based on misunderstandings, and does little to bring the community to an agreement - and thus the developers any closer to listening to any of us.

A fair number of the above posts make it clear just how much this is more than a "semantics" issue (whatever they mean by that, presumably "ignore it").

The accusation of me misunderstanding "balance" in a condescending tone is a very fine example. That guy seemed quite convinced he had a firm grip on the definition, without noticing for a moment that the very issue is not even his definition, but the fact that there's not much agreement on what entails "balance" in this game.

TL;DR version: Obviously we have a problem if people use words and can't even agree on what they mean. Until people become better at that, best to DEFINE what you mean in your posts. "BALANCE VANU NOW" better have, for example, a definition of what the OP means, other than "If Im Vanu buff it, if I'm not Vanu, nerf it".

I never said your definition of balance is the issue here. I argued that there is no disagreement on the definition of balance, that's a very commonly understood word when it comes to gaming. People are always referring to something being too powerful or not powerful enough when they use that word.

I agreed that there was some disagreement on the definition of meta, and fleshed it out exactly you said to in your first post. If you think I'm missing the point somehow then you sir need to remember that most people failed mind reading in high school. I know I did. What you wrote is what I addressed, to the letter, I even did what you said to do in your first post. If you had some hidden, invisible point that you claim I'm missing, well gosh darn, you got me.

I'm seriously wondering if you think that because somebody disagrees with you, they don't understand your point.

Metagame is a phrase that comes from things like Chess. Meta means beyond a classical misconception is that beyond game means after game or end game. However beyond is when it comes to being "in" a game is more about what is outside the game.
That brings us to meta knowledge. Meta game is applying meta knowledge in game...Yes there is a lot of debating on metagame and what it is but researching it a bit this is what i found at the end.

We should not demand metagame. We should demand tools for the metagame.
And for that to work we should look in the forums for ideas we like. Like them and add to that thread to give it more attention.
And also make posts that are easy on the eye to read. This catches the eye of the devs as they process all threads in the forum and use it to help them see what we want and what ideas we have (or so luperza has said sadly i don't see much of it in game)

Players really need to get better at using and understanding the purpose of this forum and that there is a limit to what the Devs and mods can do here. Thus whiny spam threads are doing nothing but being annoying as they will in the end be ignored anyway s.

I'm hard-pressed to think you actually went to wikipedia or websters for the definition of metagame, because that sense is usually referring to stuff like how cheering fans in football can disrupt a team's ability to decide on a play. The 12th man, sure, that's metagame. Stuff that is the game but not the point of the game.

You're right if you're talking about real life, I guess. In that case there would be no issue on the clarity of the word, but I've never heard anybody refer to the term in that way when it comes to online games. I would say the strategy you gave an example of is just a legit strategy and not really metagame. I hear people talking about what's meta and what's not almost entirely in the sense of what's good and what's bad. It's like balance, that word doesn't mean the same in an online game as it does in physics.

But, see, we're fleshing it out and talking about it, just like OP wants. Inb4 he says we don't understand his point.

Last line was presumptive.

But, to flesh things out and to re-establish what I was asking: discussion is great, but may be hard to do, again and again, thread by thread. At the very least, I ask, make clear what your personal definition (as right as you may feel it is or not) of "balance", "metagame" or the like is in those future posts.

That way we can avoid useless threads such as "Vanu is not balanced. Nerf Vanu. Nuh uh Vanu needs to be balanced it is not powerful enough" and so on and so on, shooting rhetorical ammo blindly without even hitting each other.

I still think everybody understands what balance means

In fact I still think it's easy to understand what people are saying just by inference, and I say that having failed mind reading. But I'll concede that a lot words are used ambiguously, that's true. I guess my point is that if I, a humble non-telepath, can understand what people are saying even if they use words they don't understand, I don't see it as a big deal.