To Be "BackNBlack"
Worlds Ranked `#1 BackNBlack, behind the scene
DISCLAIMER
The technical side of the BnB strategy in the last abyss, you can see here.
Initially, I did not plan to make a post about BnB, but after taking the top 1, interest in the topic was inevitable.
It is important to understand that a victorious BnB strategy itself and its successful realization is not an accident or a gift of heaven, but a natural consequence of the great work done. The fundamental part of which is the building an active and motivated community that the leaders of the "blacks" managed to create.
In this post I will try, as briefly as possible, to analyze what the BnB community is based on and how it differs from what can be seen in the RU community (in my humble experience).
Due to internal regulations, I do not have the right to disclose some of the nuances of the guild organization and this post will only be made public after prior review by BNB leaders for sensitive information.
Please be understanding.
Intro¶
When I left the "No Mercy", the curious were interested, why BnB, NM is the top of RU community?
But that's why I left, I wanted to look at a fundamentally different community.
Then some reassure:
There all the same!
It's just that the whales are fatter!
What do you think you'll find there?
Well, after the abyss, it's time to share my experience and impressions.
And about what I was looking for and what I found.
Worlds Ranked #1¶
Currently BnB #1 in the world.
For the first time, the realms Grand Prix was taken by a non-Chinese.
KLBR were breathing in the back, the calculations were so verified that just one sleepy guildmate could ruin the first place.
But the system built in BnB did it!
A lot of human labor has been invested in this victory, for the most part certainly from the leaders and all those involved in organizational activities.
These are people who have many outstanding human qualities, among which I would like to highlight:
- Motivation and ability to count.
- Attention to detail.
- Organization and coordination.
The three pillars behind BnB success
What is BNB?¶
In fact, BNB is a closed community of highly motivated people whose main goal is maximizing the potential of player accounts, which will logically affect the results of AbEx as well. (But only kind of!)
Discord¶
When first get into the "black" discord, a truly incredible amount of content opens up to your eyes.
In BnB, there is some prohibitive number of channels dedicated directly to the game itself, there are 50+ of them, despite huge amount, channels are well categorized. Following jono advice make navigation even easy.
As for the other 350 channels, the BNB discord is designed in such a way that any person could find not only game related question information, but a place where you can comfortably spend your leisure time and chat / share any aspect their interests.
Everything is done here so that each participant would be as comfortable as possible within the community.
By the way, there are no strict rules or some kind of, this function is perfectly performed by the server index describing all server channels with clearly defined topics and expected content.
As you may have noticed, a separate discord server with a comparable number of channels is used for the abyss.
At first I assumed that the main purpose of such a decision was to once again emphasize the importance of events, but when I saw the total number of channels, it became obvious that the placement of all this on the farm on one server would be hell for any manager (who has access to all/most of these channels).
But even despite the initial reasons for such a decision, this does not detract from the above positive bonus + open opportunities for organizing / distributing key coordinators specifically for the abyss and easy management of role-playing accesses, without the need to embed them in the role model of the main server of the community.
Organizational structure¶
Pay attention to the reddit article, Compo's final words:
Shout out to all of leadership at BnB for your hard work, coordinating 193 people in a mobile game for two weeks isn't an easy task!
193 is the exact number of active BNB abyss players, just wonder what it's like to coordinate 193 people? Using army terminology, the guild (70 people) is considered a company soldier, and 193 is the maximum size companies. It takes at least 5 people to manage that many people(and this is not counting the commanders of the platoons and squads of which the company consists).
But the analogy with the army is not appropriate, in the case of BnB especially, because the mobile gacha and army have nothing in common and cannot have:
- There is no threat/enemy here
- There are no clearly regulated statutory relations
- Any given army unit, for natural reasons, are characterized by:
- One age group
- Homogeneous social and civil status
To mention, BnB has a very diverse composition on a national basis.
How non-trivial can be the coordination of people, where everyone is free to do as he sees fit, for many
English is not a native language, and some do not know it at all?
Although the analogy is not appropriate, in the BNB approach to the abyss is extremely serious and the organizational structure consists of more than two levels of coordinators and it turns out to some extent follows the canons of the military craft.
System created by BnB has clearly shown its effectiveness.
I take my hat off to the creators.
Feedback¶
FATALITY 
The only thing that I don't like about BnB, within AbEx, is a big delay in providing information on the mechanics of packs and their construction.
Despite the fact that the information is very detailed and includes many variations of account leveling, you are almost completely unaware of full-fledged packs and their mechanics until the last moment, which compresses the opportunity to test them well.
It is obvious to me why this is being done: to avoid possible information leakage.
But from the player's point of view, this makes it extremely difficult to effectively allocate time to show the best result.
Instead of a conclusion¶
Even before BNB, it was obvious to me that a good result (1) in the AbEx (and not only) is mostly organization / coordination, calculation, strategy (building) (2), and the BR is not even in the top five in importance.
- Implies around [top 100 : top 10].
It is important to understand here that above the top 10, this is a completely different league. But even there the BR difference is still not a prevailing factor, take a look at pic. obviously in any sport/competition, the higher league, the closer general skill of all participants, so smallest difference can become crucial. But right now AbEx still far from it.
- In that given order. S1 - S2, were not even about strategy, who was able to manage at least 30 people, to cooperate, already hit the top 100.
In BnB, this is especially clear. And S10 victory belongs solely to human skills.
Tests, calculation of the minimum required relics, coordination of such a large number of motley people. These are all merit of human genius. The BNB understands this very well and therefore creates all conditions for for the comfort of people.
Of course, BR plays a role, which is important to some extent, but for BNB this question is out of scope.
A strong community always attracts and gathers around itself the most motivated and goal-oriented people.
Which is very natural, because only in such conditions people can and will show their best qualities.
Post about CIS Community can be found here