Why I hardly play on your server anymore

[X6JohnnyStorm]

Its a real shame, as I love playing with you guys, so much better teamwork and friendlier than most European servers when they just don't speaka da language. Or maybe they just like ignoring any English people. lol

But your server is 90% of the time unplayable, unbalanced, shit. I'm probably exaggerating, lets say 75%. Its so bad, that my new years resolution to not waste my time playing unplayable games was if we lose every base, I quit. Which I know Redkilla thinks is bad of me. But its so common place to have 5 people playing vs 1, every base held, and no one changes.

Whatever balancing mod you have, its appalling. It does more threatening to balance than actually balance, and the nonplayer bots screw it up too. It really should balance as people join, and give some weighting towards ticket difference and if people are on the team but not playing.

I'm sure this comes over as big winge, and perhaps it is, perhaps I'm a whiny bitch, but while it continues like this I just cannot play here as much. Its supposed to be fun, enjoyable, not a miserable pointless slog.

If you don't believe me. Have a look at the server stats (I assume it creates them) and look at the general results of the game. There shouldnt be 1000 ticket wins going on all the time, should there?

I am on the server as I type, the score? 0 - 1169.

One last thing, I dont know if this even exists. But a vote Map_restart command would help a lot when the team with more players decides to cap every base while the other team are afk or not yet joined.


Nb. Next game started, its 8 v 5 (with 2 afk), and within first few minutes the 8 captured every base. Another pointless game.

 

[Raynet11]

I feel the morning pain as well, and to be honest it's a side effect of only a handful of players on the server in the morning hours here (4:00am - 7:00am) when I have taken days off work and jumped on the server say 11:00 CST on it's usually jam packed and at night their is a queue just to get in. Does that mean matches aren't one sided, no, I love it when there is a full server and it's a complete down to the wire situation, we all do. Everyone has been on the winning and loosing side of a jam packed server and your team and teammates just can't seem to get into a groove to make it a decent game. This server is so different depending on the hours of operation and who jumps in at any given time. I have spent hours of my life seeding this server waiting for friends to show up to see if we can put a good round together in the morning. Sometimes that happens but most of the time it's lack luster in terms of real players but it's the chicken or egg thing also, nobody jumps in an empty server so the seeding does get a game going and sometimes that spark turns into a flame and next thing you know you have a good game going, other times not so much.

I have the same issue, but it's part of the deal with it's 4:00am in Chicago, I can play across the pond I guess on the servers that are full and at times I do , Shanghai is one of my favorite maps as well as the Caspian Border so there are times I'm in the mood for something different.

There are good mornings and bad ones, this is very early for most in the USA to actually hop on and play, remove the bots and you are not going to get anyone until 8:00 am here I'm guessing.

 

[RedKilla]

While we do have a balancer running, in the mornings its tough. I know when I start seeding at 4am on Saturdays and Sundays I am constantly switching sides to keep it even. I don't mind doing this because quit frankly I get more points by taking flags. Johnny, you are usually one of the first ones to join. However, you have this ridiculous rule for your self that if you lose all the flags you just up and quit and leave your team hanging. That's not team work, that's selfishness. Now If I am in there, I will make people back off and let the other team cap a few flags before I go on the assault again.

We cant be in the server 24-7 because, well, I think we have lives outside of the game. I enjoy having you in there but Simpson works very hard to the keep the server as balanced as possible. We had one guy the other day and he does this every time that he's in there, switching sides to the winning team.

There are always going to be selfish players that only care about their K/D and not the team. There are only two bots that are deployed in the mornings. And I cant remember how many people have to be in there before they automatically disconnect, but Raynett is right when he says if we remove them the server takes longer to start up.

I really appreciate your feedback, but we do everything that's possible for even game play.

 

[Carp]

If I may, this is a work in progress. I've only been here a short period of time, but honestly I have never experienced any game on the server that was not enjoyable. To me, this is only a game. I can only speak for myself. I play for the fun of it. I play for the friends I meet. As a matter of fact the relationships that I am fortunate to develop by playing make the game incidental. In my opinion, management does an extraordinary job of maintaining the server, website and community. Life is too damn short to complain why we don't get what we want.

"You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time"

 

[RedKilla]

Thanks Carp

 

[Raynet11]

 

[X6JohnnyStorm]

However, you have this ridiculous rule for your self that if you lose all the flags you just up and quit and leave your team hanging. That's not team work, that's selfishness. Now If I am in there, I will make people back off and let the other team cap a few flags before I go on the assault again.

Why do I have this rule? In direct response to the conditions on the AARP server. I was having pointless, frustrating game after game, and it was putting me in a bad mood. To which I said, this is stupid, if the game is crap, quit and play somewhere else. And that became the rule. I mean if I team cant even hold one base, then is there a chance?

I will literally go. Teams... 5 v 3.... TEAMS! And no bugger changes!

The thing is, having decided not to play on AARP, ive been playing other servers with the same map. When you start having games where the ticket difference is only a few 100 or less at the end, you realise something is wrong.

And like I said, I like you guys and enjoy playing with you. Which is why I bothered posting, rather than just walking away.

Do the bots really make the server start up from empty? All the regulars know about them, so know its empty if its only showing 2 players.

Its a few hours since I posted... Lets have a look what the server is upto! I join - every base captured by one team, tickets 990 vs 1394. So doing my best. Then look again, teams are not 6 v 4 on the one with the now 800 ticket lead. Fancy that.....

Its virtually every game. Simpson just joined the game, which is great timing

 

[Raynet11]

Johnny I can tell you if you were to set an alarm clock one night... From 7:00PM -10:00PM CST the server is a whole different experience

 

[X6JohnnyStorm]

Johnny I can tell you if you were to set an alarm clock one night... From 7:00PM -10:00PM CST the server is a whole different experience

You mean when its totally full? I hate that. You can barely go anywhere without beep beep beep being targetted. lol Do I sound hard to please? :chargrined:

 

[RedKilla]

You mean when its totally full? I hate that. You can barely go anywhere without beep beep beep being targetted. lol Do I sound hard to please? :chargrined:

Yes

 

[Raynet11]

Yes it’s like that and last night I had close to 40 some kills in the attack heli and had a lot of fun doing it... it’s hard, very hard... another night I had the same gunner the entire round and he took 70 kills.. by the end of the round there wasn’t an engineer who wasn’t carrying a stinger ....so those kinda rounds do exist, as do the slow morning sessions as well ..

 

[Carp]

Yes

Yes.

 

[Akula20342]

I’ve always found autobalancers to be terrible. They either swing the pendulum so far to the other side halfway through the round or three quarters of the way through which by that time it’s too late to recover. Either way at least it’s the admins way of trying to keep it fair and although it’s not perfect, at least it’s hetter than letting players just jump to the winning teams all the time. I’m not sure there is a better auto balanced out there. Since it’s more or less a machine, it can’t take into account the flow of the battle and adapt accordingly. It’s just part of the game.

 

[KarekCat]

People will always swap teams for many reasons. Perhaps to just win, or perhaps to play with a friend. Personally, I try to stick to the team I start on, but I can swap as long as there's something I feel I can actually do to help. In some cases there's nothing, so I hang back and try not to contribute to the death toll. The trouble is that we get a lot of 'game changer' players. Individuals who are skilled enough that they can beat the average player without a problem. Jet Jockies and Chopper Try-Hards are particularly bad since the only real counter is the AA, and you need someone really good in the AA to counter them. Even then, if there's not sufficient ground support the AA can't do anything and the issue only compounds on itself. I get stuck in games like this all the time. Yeah, it's frustrating, but I at least try to see it through to the end and hope the 'pros' leave next round, or the teams actually shuffle.

 

[Akula20342]

I swap teams when my team is too useless. I don’t know why but there are these rounds where you wind up with nothing but idiots that are afraid to die in of all things A GAME lol. It often takes me a few deaths before I realize me and my squad are the only ones trying to take flags while the rest of the team has either surrounded F to spawn rape or just can’t get close enough to take it. Fucking annoying to be honest. My thinking is that if my team doesn’t want to make the effort to take flags then I really don’t want to play with them lol. Anyhoo AARP usually scolds me for trying to switch haha no worries.

 

[jsimpson32]

Johnny,
We will all have our own separate opinions on this topic, this is my take. Listed reasons games tend to get unbalanced most often. Keep in mind the balancer really only tries to keep the same amount of players on each team. Not balance skill sets on each side.

1.) Players of similar abilities tend to play together. Therefore lvl 140 veterans will group together and change teams and squad up. Likewise noobs tend to group. So if a player enters they will choose a team with friends. Next thing you have most high performance players on one team.

2.) An alarming amount of players change teams upon entering the server to the winning team. A winning team will most likely mean an easier game with more kill opportunity. For example I moved Riker twice to your team this morning. He moved himself so he could pile on the weaker team I bet. That's why I entered to help balance the game this morning. Although we didn't win, Riker was asking for my first Daughter as reparations for killing him. lol -ROK- the Japanese AA player does this so much I permanently banned him Monday. He literally will not play on the server unless he joins on a team that's winning a landslide. We also have platoon player that do this practice as well. It's prolific. Gamers don't like losing and mostly are poor sports about it, hence the large population of cheaters.

3.) I don't know how to stop people switching teams. The balancer is enforcing the best I can set it.

4.) It's nearly impossible for a script to judge how a player will perform to assign them a team in my mind. Sometimes players are MPV and other times they screw around or are learning a new skill.

5.)Scrambling squads after rounds would help even teams but people come to play with their friends and it would go over like a fart in church.

6.) The mornings is hands down the most brutal and frustrating time to play. My hat is off to you for seeding so much. It's absolutely vital. I've got over 1000 hours on this server alone and the seeding has made me jaded. Not sure you could tell but I enter the server looking to kick some ass this morning when I see them encroaching on the base. "No mercy in that dojo". That's my tag line. lol

So wish I could flick a switch and make it better but I'm at a loss how to improve.

 

[wiz_of_wuz]

I always swap to the losing team. If I join the server i immediately go to the losing team. With zero fucks to give about my score, I embrace the challenge of overcoming the loss.....

 

[jsimpson32]

I always swap to the losing team. If I join the server i immediately go to the losing team. With zero fucks to give about my score, I embrace the challenge of overcoming the loss.....

Lol :excitement:

 

[BulletBitten]

I always swap to the losing team. If I join the server i immediately go to the losing team. With zero fucks to give about my score, I embrace the challenge of overcoming the loss.....

Feel the same way... but there are times where you have gotten together in a fully functional squad and you are scrambling to take flags and stay alive... look up and the score is way out of whack. I do try to jump to the losing side when I see the score falling out of balance which as mentioned by others helps your own score. Unfortunately there are those players more concerned with the win which tends to lead to a bunch of frustration for others. As J mentioned... there is only so much that can be done with the balancer and there is such a wide range of skills on the server at any time that it would be nearly impossible to develop that perfect solution.. So... no good answers but I have felt your pain... just go out there and have the most fun possible.

 

[Carp]

I surrender!