What games/setups are good for new players?

[fferyllt]

I like the idea of closed newbie setups, with a smallish list of normal roles and modifiers and a hard limit on the number of modifiers an ability can have. (1, maybe 2 max but not 2 modifiers for each non-vanilla ability).

Sort of like the simpler normal setups, but even more constrained.

To me, the skills acquired by playing open or semi-open setups a la NewD3 and older newbie setups don't easily translate to playing closed setups. But, the skills that closed setups build come very much into play in open setups.

I had hoped that when the Newbie queue was clearly dying on the vine, something like what I'm proposing could have been tried to see if the replace-out and retention rates improved.

[fferyllt]

I think that in order to have good newbie experiences, MS will need a staff member (and probably a whole volunteer team) to work on the stuff that the newbie queue was meant to facilitate:

• good learning experiences about forum mafia and mafia in general
  
• A strong pipeline to the rest of the queues
  
• players and mods who consistently dedicate some of their time, energy, creative effort to games that are newbie friendly
  
• keeping an eye on statistics about how successful MS is at curating a good newbie player experience
  
• lots of other stuff

I feel like these four listed aspects of the newbie queue had failed or were failing when the queue was shut down. Shutting down the newbie queue and having dedicated spaces in the open and normal queues didn't replace what the newbie queue at its best offered new players. To have that again will take leadership and concerted effort.