Shatter

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Originally Posted by AdamZ

But in something like slaughter, it only makes sense to have a small area. There is no motive to go off over the map to other areas, or break off from main group, or spread your team out.

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Originally Posted by loreleidiangelo

This doesn't make sense, though. If you want a mode where "PVP matters", why would you encourage teams to spread out across a wide area? Slaughter's tiny top map was EXACTLY what forced people to PVP, instead of just running away or "waiting in mid for ice", like they do with Shatter. And as AdamZ pointed out, trying to arbitrarily make use of a "larger map" by adding random objectives to it just does exactly what everyone has been complaining about with Shatter...more focus on running away to PVE.

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The top area for slaughter is fine for 24 man matches but way too small for 72 man. Would have been nice if the 72-man death match battle ground is like maybe triple the size of that top area. :rolleyes:

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Originally Posted by loreleidiangelo

"which premade brought the better healers and has more of their BLMs on VOIP to time Cometeor drops". It's like when they took away Cleric Stance because 8 JP WHM Holylol trains were borken as heck in Secure - rather than doing something about multiple Cometeors, the developers tried to create maps where the spaces aren't so enclosed as to allow that to be a viable strategy.

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Instead of fixing BLM's Cometeor they should instead just remove the ability to go premade already and no one will ever have a problem.

Premades are fun and all but it's also not fun standing no chance. It's not fair in the slightest going against a full team of coordinated players with voice communication while you have a bunch of randoms. It ruins Frontlines. It's like having an instance where it's a damage contest and whatever team does the most damage on the dummy wins. But 8-man premades are allowed to queue up against random teams.

It needs to be removed. Or at the very least, 1 partner. Like Feast. That would be fair. And if it's needed, have 24m( 8v8v8) premade Full Party Frontlines separately.

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Originally Posted by Magic-Mal

Instead of fixing BLM's Cometeor they should instead just remove the ability to go premade already and no one will ever have a problem.

Premades are fun and all but it's also not fun standing no chance. It's not fair in the slightest going against a full team of coordinated players with voice communication while you have a bunch of randoms. It ruins Frontlines.

It needs to be removed. Or at the very least, 1 partner. Like Feast. That would be fair.

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I agree with this, having premades is not fun at all. Like it's ridiculous they can dominate 2 GCs at same time. And I also agree at least they can party with max 1 or 2 man.

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Originally Posted by Eul

I agree with this, having premades is not fun at all. Like it's ridiculous they can dominate 2 GCs at same time. And I also agree at least they can party with max 1 or 2 man.

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This would also be an acceptable alternative, yeah. I'm just trying to point out that the problem with Slaughter wasn't necessarily Slaughter's design, it was how stupidly effective Cometeor stacking was. Slaughter was actually a mode where a TON of PVP happened, it was just hugely tilted PVP where people only attained kills through a total cheeseball strategy rather than simply being good at strategy.

EDIT: To be fair though, people in Slaughter would stack Cometeors even if they were queuing solo. It wasn't exactly a strategy that required voice communication - you saw an orange circle drop on the ground, you dropped yours too and hoped you nabbed all the kills from it. I still maintain that a true PVP map that forced skirmishes in small map areas would have issues with Cometeor either way, simply because it's a huge radius and does a respectable amount of damage.

There are multiple problems with PVP in this game, really. I enjoy playing it, but it's hard to narrow down the plethora of issues to which ones have a "higher" priority.

The Cometeor timing happens in JP groups irrespective of voice communications; the leader simply throws down a marker or two when everyone signals that they're ready in text and does a countdown so people have a chance to use their crowd control. Bam, half a dozen perfectly-timed AR explosions and most of an entire team wiped out. I don't know how it is on non-JP datacentres but blocking premades won't stop that in the slightest; most steamrolling GCs are just 1 sensible person with lots of macros and a bunch of randoms who follow orders. Personally, I don't mind it the way it is (Slaughter is ridiculous but it never pops any more due to the level cap).

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Originally Posted by Serilda

The Cometeor timing happens in JP groups irrespective of voice communications; the leader simply throws down a marker or two when everyone signals that they're ready in text and does a countdown so people have a chance to use their crowd control. Bam, half a dozen perfectly-timed AR explosions and most of an entire team wiped out. I don't know how it is on non-JP datacentres but blocking premades won't stop that in the slightest; most steamrolling GCs are just 1 sensible person with lots of macros and a bunch of randoms who follow orders.

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In non-JP datacentres, premades stomp without having to stack caster LBs. They literally win by killing people normally and the other two teams get steamrolled by this one party. The skill level gap between premades and randoms in non-JP servers is huge compared to the JP servers.

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Originally Posted by Serilda

The Cometeor timing happens in JP groups irrespective of voice communications; the leader simply throws down a marker or two when everyone signals that they're ready in text and does a countdown so people have a chance to use their crowd control. Bam, half a dozen perfectly-timed AR explosions and most of an entire team wiped out. I don't know how it is on non-JP datacentres but blocking premades won't stop that in the slightest; most steamrolling GCs are just 1 sensible person with lots of macros and a bunch of randoms who follow orders. Personally, I don't mind it the way it is (Slaughter is ridiculous but it never pops any more due to the level cap).

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Originally Posted by Rilasha

In non-JP datacentres, premades stomp without having to stack caster LBs. They literally win by killing people normally and the other two teams get steamrolled by this one party. The skill level gap between premades and randoms in non-JP servers is huge compared to the JP servers.

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Both of these perspectives are exactly why PVP in general has a lot of problems. Trying to limit scope by saying "premades are the problem" or "Shatter/Slaughter/whatever is the problem" barely TOUCHES upon the plethora of issues the game mode has. There's not just problems with premades - tons of solo queuers could make macros to stack Cometeors in Slaughter, and they do it sometimes in Shatter too, it's just that there's not as many casters left in the mode due to caster-gutting so it doesn't always work out. It's not just a problem with Cometeor spam though either - there's not much room to capitalize on that in Shatter due to both less casters playing AND a bigger arena, and yet premades are still trolling around the map with multiple Battle Fevers winning the match with mostly just kills alone.

Even the removal of three-team gameplay, while solving a LOT of problems, would mean nothing without a separate queue for soloers and a separate queue for premades. And even THOSE things might mean nothing without the removal of personal LBs, back to the system of one shared LB that you were forced to coordinate and use wisely. Or even the removal of the LB system altogether.

It's hard to pinpoint exactly just one thing that is screwed up with PVP in this game right now.

I never understood complaining about premades in a PvP game. It's like "I don't have friends to play with, so noone else should be able to play with theirs". It makes no sense to me. Yes, teamwork is OP, but that's the point of a team game, isn't it?

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Originally Posted by dragonseth07

I never understood complaining about premades in a PvP game.

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Well, nobody complains about premades as such - it's premades fighting non-premades that's always the issue, because one team has a (potential) advantage. That's just like bots, cheats, hacks and extra programs are only an issue if people using them are matched with people not using them. The real complaint is always a lack of parity - one side has an advantage.

As such, the solution is simple: Premades get matched with other premades of the same size. If the matchmaker can't find matches for that size, well...tough luck.

Imo when people complain about premades in frontlines what they're really complaining about is the battle high/fever mechanic. It massively amplifies any discrepancy in skill level between the alliances.

Ive seen I think 2 noteworthy groups on aether that could loosely be considered premades, and I do frontline's a lot. I see a lot of groups of people from the same server, presumably queuing together, whom playing against doesn't feel any different than randoms (no offense to anyone)

19 out of 20 frontlines matches are well balanced atm (and this is better than its been in the past lol). Preventing that 1:20 doesn't justify preventing friends from queuing together. (99% of statistics are made up, btw)

What is a premade ? some players with a vocal maybe playing the pvp how it should be played.
They win because players aren't waiting a regroup, don't cooperate and feed endlessy not waiting to be enough to fight them in most case.
If a premade is too good and attack your base, you can even just run and take the base of the enemy, it will make this premade retreat because if there nobody to fight, there no reason to stand in the enemy base.

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Originally Posted by Enlial

Ive seen I think 2 noteworthy groups on aether that could loosely be considered premades, and I do frontline's a lot. I see a lot of groups of people from the same server, presumably queuing together, whom playing against doesn't feel any different than randoms (no offense to anyone)

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Thats true one of the reason I only ever joined the same premade all the time because most premades since garo are just new ppl where it doesnt matter if they premade or not. In the end instead of complaining ppl should just let it go its only fl and its not like u running into premades all the time.

http://imgur.com/a/fOgYN

I always tought Shatter was hybrid of Secure and Seize with small twist so this is how i see it should be played. There is of course diffirent methods to win but this should atleast work when match starts, it allows double base capture and double flanking(assuming everyone goes to mid like usually)with support from group B in middle or groups A and C goes for ices that might spawn in enemy territory while B snipes kills from both teams in middle.

Maybe stuff like this only works if all teams are premades and not with PuG, it would be cool to see matches like that even with PuG tho. Too bad there are no rated frontlines :s

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Originally Posted by Synestra

http://imgur.com/a/fOgYN

I always tought Shatter was hybrid of Secure and Seize with small twist so this is how i see it should be played. There is of course diffirent methods to win but this should atleast work when match starts, it allows double base capture and double flanking(assuming everyone goes to mid like usually)with support from group B in middle or groups A and C goes for ices that might spawn in enemy territory.

Maybe stuff like this only works if all teams are premades and not with PuG, it would be cool to see matches like that even with PuG tho. Too bad there are no rated frontlines :s

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Alliance splitting died with Secure. It fell out of practise as more 24 man fights started instead of 72, and by the time Seize came about it was all bit lost with the mob mentality taking over, trying to move as a unified group. The groups that pulled it off were almost always successful which caused everyone else to want to do the same thing. Sadly it's not as easy to get that many people to move as a group.

I for one would love to see alliance splitting back again.

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Originally Posted by Canadane

It fell out of practise as more 24 man fights started instead of 72

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I still dont understand why they removed 48man instead 24man in secure, its totally diffirent mode with 24man and has nothing to do with "secure", its more like slaughter with bases that nobody cares...

kinda wish S.E had the option to either que for 24 or 72 or a thing where you can see how many players are in que like in PVE
would be great if feast had that option to see what class is missing as well

I love how people are trying to support not allowing friends to form premades because they are "unfair" and "have an advantage" by being able to communicate with your group.

Yet every frontlines I've been in, someone is shouting directions and flagging locations where to go and what to focus, yet 80% of alliances are off doing their own thing not listening and coordinating.

Perhaps the problem isn't the premades but the lack of reading comprehension...

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Originally Posted by Kaisinel

I love how people are trying to support not allowing friends to form premades because they are "unfair" and "have an advantage" by being able to communicate with your group.

Yet every frontlines I've been in, someone is shouting directions and flagging locations where to go and what to focus, yet 80% of alliances are off doing their own thing not listening and coordinating.

Perhaps the problem isn't the premades but the lack of reading comprehension...

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I second this.

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Originally Posted by Synestra

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Originally Posted by Canadane

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Me too, I wish we could get back to Party coordination and alliance splitting to even just some extent.. I think the RNG mechanics of Seize & Shatter are the culprit as to why not. Even the best coordination efforts struggle to work because there's too little time to explain, windows of opportunity open and close so quickly that there's just no point in making the effort in communicating..

or circumstance can change so quickly on a dime that half of the time you're retracting your own instructions anyway. Safer to just travel as a mob, where you're essentially communicating with your avatar's moment, doing a follow-the-leader/puller.

If RNG is still the theme of future Frontlines, maybe they could mix that RNG with an occasional or a single Scripted event in the match. Some scripted foundation to coordinate from could help with alliance cohesiveness.

Because right now we do not need our 2+ minute wait time at the onset of Frontline Campaigns of Shatter/Seize. Nothing to discuss but GLHF.

Basically never hit ice in Shatter and never got kicked lol

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Originally Posted by Kaisinel

I love how people are trying to support not allowing friends to form premades because they are "unfair" and "have an advantage" by being able to communicate with your group.

Yet every frontlines I've been in, someone is shouting directions and flagging locations where to go and what to focus, yet 80% of alliances are off doing their own thing not listening and coordinating.

Perhaps the problem isn't the premades but the lack of reading comprehension...

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Actually that supports the reason why they aren't fair. Because premades actually do listen to each other.

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Originally Posted by Magic-Mal

Actually that supports the reason why they aren't fair. Because premades actually do listen to each other.

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So by your logic then raid statics should be removed too because they talk and communicate and it makes raiding easier then pugging. Let's just make FF14 a single player game because you think every aspect of an MMO is unfair.

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Originally Posted by Kaisinel

So by your logic then raid statics should be removed too because they talk and communicate and it makes raiding easier then pugging. Let's just make FF14 a single player game because you think every aspect of an MMO is unfair.

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Raiding isn't a competition.

An equivalent would be a damage contest in DF where you need to do alot of damage on a dummy. The team that does the most damage is the winner.

And coordinated, 8-man premade statics are allowed to queue against randoms. Not fair.

#Remove more ice

I don't quite think people are against queuing with a few friends, but against this idea that they could be going up against a team that has an 8 man elite premade all in voice comms communicating well. I can't say how real this usually is in Frontlines currently, but it's somewhat understandable to dislike that idea even if it's a bit of an extreme case.

Unfortunately there's not currently a better way to communicate and I'm not sure if there could be one, but having to read text directions in the heat of battle isn't exactly easy.

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Originally Posted by Magic-Mal

Raiding isn't a competition.

An equivalent would be a damage contest in DF where you need to do alot of damage on a dummy. The team that does the most damage is the winner.

And coordinated, 8-man premade statics are allowed to queue against randoms. Not fair.

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You just described Shatter, to a degree.

And the answer isn't to punish or hinder the players that DO work together. If anything, it should encourage people to work together. If someone steps up to call the shots and they're making good calls, listen to them. If someone's there who CLEARLY is a veteran player, listen to them. If a call is bad, don't argue over it, simply suggest something better; if the shot caller wants to win, they'll put aside their pride and do what's best for the team. Premades don't always win. However when random players refuse to cooperate, you pretty much hand over the victory, and that's not on the premade, that's entirely on those of you who won't work together.

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Originally Posted by ThirdChild_ZKI

You just described Shatter, to a degree.

And the answer isn't to punish or hinder the players that DO work together. If anything, it should encourage people to work together. If someone steps up to call the shots and they're making good calls, listen to them. If someone's there who CLEARLY is a veteran player, listen to them. If a call is bad, don't argue over it, simply suggest something better; if the shot caller wants to win, they'll put aside their pride and do what's best for the team. Premades don't always win. However when random players refuse to cooperate, you pretty much hand over the victory, and that's not on the premade, that's entirely on those of you who won't work together.

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Based on my experiences PvPing against premades offers 10% win chance and free nightmare coupons.

The chance of winning isn't 0% but it also isn't high either.

Truth be told, I went up against my fair share of premades solo, and the one thing I noticed was that they cover each other, they mark and focus targets, and they stick together. . . You don't need to be in a premade to do these things, and on rare occasions I've gained victory over premades by having a random group that would operate in a similar fashion.

Don't be swayed or deterred by the fact that your enemy is in a premade party. If you know what to do, and you're confident enough to lead, step up. You could very well be that key component the team needs to win.

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Originally Posted by ThirdChild_ZKI

Truth be told, I went up against my fair share of premades solo, and the one thing I noticed was that they cover each other, they mark and focus targets, and they stick together. . . You don't need to be in a premade to do these things, and on rare occasions I've gained victory over premades by having a random group that would operate in a similar fashion.

Don't be swayed or deterred by the fact that your enemy is in a premade party. If you know what to do, and you're confident enough to lead, step up. You could very well be that key component the team needs to win.

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I'm never afraid of or avoid fighting premades but honestly, I know they can be beat if my teams work together and use tactics like the ones you listed.. Sadly, I have never seen it work.

-Marking Battle Fevers on 12 kill streaks or whatever and no one is killing them.
-Our only healer running around in the outskirts of the map trying to break small crystals while we all die.
-Teams' downright passiveness and refusal to fight and "Stay at A" even though we MUST attack.
-Healers sitting at base "guarding" it while again, everyone getting killed.
-Getting a fever/high down to 1% and no one at my side to get the final hit despite being marked.
-We may be winning and we're screaming "Don't die!", then they continue pushing and all wipe.
-Adders have 1,500 points while Flames have 650 and the teams completely ignore our pleas to just stop attacking Flames..
-And my favorite, when you are running on 5% HP for 2min straight and your alliance healers just leave you to God's mercy and continue doing their business T.T

All of these things seem to happen no matter how many callouts, macros, map links, you name it are used. It's even worse with Seal Rock! I have only won four matches ever since.. Like 3.3 xD.

Why they can't attempt to balance the matches based on premade size is beyond me. People want to queue with their friends? Totally fine. But make them go up against another premade of similar size instead of just being tossed into the first match found. Then again, you can't really curbstomp randoms if you're up against another premade, can you? :p Then the queue dodging commences, because really, all anyone is in it for is to farm kills.

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Originally Posted by Praesul

Why they can't attempt to balance the matches based on premade size is beyond me. People want to queue with their friends? Totally fine. But make them go up against another premade of similar size instead of just being tossed into the first match found. Then again, you can't really curbstomp randoms if you're up against another premade, can you? :p Then the queue dodging commences, because really, all anyone is in it for is to farm kills.

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Doesn't seem the playerbase is large enough for that sort of thing, I'd be happy with this, though.