BlackBart

And I hate to be a whiner.. (actually I kind of enjoy whining a bit), But I feel the team stacking on the server is getting a bit out of hand. Not only do the "good" players tend to wait and join the same team, but I am seeing a trend now that if someone gets autobalanced to the other team... they will goto spectate until a spot opens on the stacked team again.

This is making the game seriously UNFUN for the players on the team that gets thier butts handed to them every single turn.

I use random team whenever I join up for a round, but it has reached a point where I dread it because I know I usually end up on the "other" team.


just my $0.02

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It's not what you know,
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[TG]BlackBart / [TG]FatalCure

Ikariam!
Alpha as Lord Foul
Capital - Honayos[29:21] > Fouls Creche::Wine
Colony - Riluos[29:20] > Andelain::Sulfur
Colony - Mureos[28:20] > Stonedowners::Marble
Colony - Juroios[28:21] > Crysanthium::Crystal

Beta as BlackBart TG
Capital - Cleyhios[22:54] > The Cove::Sulfur
Colony - Ardotia[21:54] > RockinAntigua::Marble
Colony - Zhurios[21:55] > Grapes of Wrath::Wine

Gamma as BlackBart TG
Capital - Eraeos[60:43] > RocketTown::Marble
Colony - Gievaios[59:43] > Vini Vici Vino::Wine
Colony - Aratia[60:42] > Stinkville::Sulfur

TheFeniX

I try and just click random when joining the server. Most of the time my PC loads a lot slower than most other players so I miss most of the pre-round joining.

That said, I haven't noticed a whole lot of steam-rolling going on when the server has a good show of regs. Even with numerous TG on one team, it seems fairly even. Then again, I'm only one player.

Now players jumping to spec to wait for a slot to open on the other team is frowned upon and I'll try to do a better job spotting this and taking action to correct it. Really, the only hard solution I could take from an administrative stand-point would be to force an "mp_scrambleteams" about 30-60 seconds after a map loads. I'd need to dig for a plug-in that could do this.

Right now, through HLSW, I see a pretty good split of regs among the teams. If you notice a game with this happening, see if there's an admin on Steam and contact them about it.

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Eternaly_Lost

What we really need is something like balance from tgns. That plugin made most of the game somewhat balanced.

Wonder how hard it would be to port an AMXX plugin into a TF2 plugin...

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Current game name : |TG| Lost the Phantom Thief

Fish #641

I'm somewhat guilty, as I try to be on my brother's team as much as possible. To be fair though, whenever we're on different teams, we can hear each other's VOIP. It generally isn't a steamroll situation, but I did see it today on Mach4. We (the winning team) asked for mixup. Even though I ended up getting on a team that I rather wouldn't be on (NO ONE WOULD TALK!), it was a much closer game. I've actually more often seen teams that were supposedly stacked lose to the other team than the other way around. Generally, however, it seems to be fine.

TheFeniX

I can talk this over with korm and pokerface. Right now we're running SourceMM with BAT and a very cut-down version of SourceMod (used only for SM_tracespray. I am looking into using it for Nextmap as BAT tends to break the mapcycle). I'm open to options, but I rather let the community attempt to police itself first. If that doesn't work, then plug-ins might be the route we need to go.

Make your opinion of the teams known, but in a less direct way. Try something along the lines of "I think the teams might be a little stacked." You may get a more positive response.

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Fish #641

Yea or "Can we get so-and-so or what's-his-face?" seems to work, as long as you substitute so-and-so for Miles, and what's-his-face for FeniX.

Ferris Bueller

Yeah, the one thing that doesnt work is saying "Magna needs to play something other than spy."

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|TG-6th|Ferris Bueller

TheFeniX

I've had a few complaints about stacking from other players and I've also noticed a few stacks myself. While they are pretty rare (I think maybe 1 out of 10 games get stacked), we should work to spread the members and regs out. If not to balance the teams, then to show public players a bit of what we're made of. Your average player won't always remember a good experience lasting 9 games. People tend to focus on that 1 game that really sucked and leave in "protest."

I have been considering looking into a balance plug-in like what TGNS has (like Lost mentioned), but I'd rather have the community try and police itself. I'm not going to put it on anyone, but if you've got the nerve: try and switch teams if you notice a lack of skill or coordination on the OpFor.

Also, don't be afraid to call for a scrambleteams if you think it's needed.

Really: in a perfect world, we'd have a server full of nothing but members and regs. So start spreading the word and show the public players that come onto the server just what we have to offer.

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MagnaCentipede

I'm still in favor of team imabalnce being resolved by the strong team winning and everything being shuffled with the map change. Problem is some maps that suck (DUSTBOWL UGH) will play forever even if one team is pushing the other around.

If you're going to micromanage, go for the big score. You may as well have the server maintain a list of player rankings and assign everyone to their mathematically-determined most-balanced positions, and to save game time, declare every round a stalemate from the start.

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Eternaly_Lost

That requires that you have enough skill to match up so that it will end in a stalemate.

Really, what happens on tgns, and it balance is not bad at all. The games often go slightly longer, and are a lot more fun. It a lot funner to be fighting with a team that is near your teams level vs one that could be half alsleep and still steamrolling you.

After talking with Fenix about this however, I found out the major problem with porting over the Balance from tgns into tgtf2. The Place on Team command is broken, and only places people in spec kinda makes it hard to do anything when you can't assign the players to a team...

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Current game name : |TG| Lost the Phantom Thief

MagnaCentipede

You need to get involved with sports. You could really help out those olympics. I hear the teams are not only imbalanced, but they reward the stacked team with medals!


Are we not supposed to be encouraging strategic play? Exactly how valuble is strategy when teams are nanny-stated to within ±.4 pwns of each other? Not very... all you need is one or two people (e.g., one good scout or a ___+medic) to exploit a team's current weakness, or you can just roll the dice and let crits decide which team receives the pat on the back.


I don't see it as either the TG way or the TF2 way to start BAWWWWWWing when someone's team isn't working together. Player skill isn't a huge argument because TF2 gives the first-time FPS player options -- Medic doesn't even need to hold the button down anymore to be useful, a sentry in a stupid place will still catch the first guy through the door, and pyro becomes more powerful the less carefully you aim. Furthermore, exactly how are we promoting teamwork when we stir the teams whenever a side starts using teamwork and wins a round? Nothing's going to kill communication faster than pulling apart the people who actually talk to each other, other than disabling voice on the server, of course.


And finally, who wants to play somewhere where they're told they're "too good" and must be managed? I don't.

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Fish #641

That was a really good point.
I was waiting to get onto Johnnyboy's team the other night, and someone else in Spec was saying how everyone was trying to get on the winning team (there was one other guy in spec and he was afk). He ended up joining the other team, and they won the next 2 rounds. Why? At first, it didn't make sense. We had a vast majority of regs/members (what's the difference?). It turns out that we had too many, and the major ones were Heavies/Soldiers. The other public players mainly became medics, so no one said boo. Every time, we ended up losing because our attacking force (our entire team) would blinding push through, and 2 scouts would sidestep us and cap while their defence kept us occupied. Basically, what I'm trying to say here, is that even if the teams get "stacked", it ends up in their un-stack-ation (it's a word, look it up). I would say that it's not even 1 out of 10 games that have a majority of regs on one team. I would approximate it at more around 1 out of 30, and half of those games aren't a problem.

SpadeTF2

I'm guilty of joining spectator when I first join the game. However, I don't join the winning team. Personally I find it more fun, and more of a challenge to join the losing team and try to rally them. If the teams look even, I'll join the team with the least ammount of spys, because 99% of the time, I'll be playing spy.

I will admit though, from time to time, regardless of how the game has been going, (Loss after loss, or steam-rolled wins) when the map changes, I'll wait and see who goes where.

Although it's fun for me to go up against Magna every round, sometimes I'll join the same team as him and see what damage we can do. Or, I'll join Fenix or Fish because it's fun playing with those guys. We talk, strategize, joke around, and it just makes the game more fun.

That being said if the teams end up really stacked, and there is room on the opposing team, I would switch over to try and help out.

Personally, I think the game is at it's best when you're playing competively with a good team of guys. Not necessarily the best players, but just guys who enjoy playing the same way you do. However, if the game gets lop-sided, no matter who you're playing with, it loses some of the fun.

I think I'm rambling now... I should go.

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TheSkudDestroyer

I think the solution takes effort on all our parts - If you want to balance out the teams, ask 2 or 3 from the other team to come over to yours. The admins can switch whoever.

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|TG-6th|Skud
BMT Graduate - 320th Training Squadron, Flight 024 - MSgt Romero - "Kids no more!"
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Eternaly_Lost

First off, Balance only affects people not yet on teams, so if the only team who is working together is the spectator team....

TGTF2 is not a match server, it a pub server.

And you say that balancing the teams will hurt the game play? On TGNS, balance the teams, often makes the game fairer, longer, and funner. Why because the good players end up on different teams, and so they have to work with each other. Rather then say, oh, we have 80% of the skill on the server on our team, lets just mass kills and win. People on tgns where somewhat resistance to the whole balance thing, but as soon as it stopped working, we had massive calls to get it fixed. Why? Because it was doing that it was intending to, make the game fairer, longer, and more fun. Why can you hate that?

Really, just because I see the whole "Persistence is the Key" Achievement going on at the start, does not mean that I want to break up those who already joined a team, I want those remaining people sent to a team, that would bring the game fairer, and break up the whole, I must join with these players to have a chance at winning.

Fish: I was playing in a game two nights ago, that an admin was calling fair, that the whole attacking team was stuck up in spawn, would come out massed, kill most of the defenders, get about halfway to the point and be killed off completely from the spawners, and have to repeat this. We only got a point because the the defenders forgot they had to defend the first point, and not just spawn exit camp, so the let a scout get by thinking what can he do?

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Current game name : |TG| Lost the Phantom Thief