So when is AST getting nerfed in Frontline

Job stacking AST spamming Gravity II and Macrocosmos killing entire alliances is really killing the game mode. It makes it harder for casuals to have fun.

It is even worse when the alliance those ASTs are on just rely on them, like are you playing to have fun or what?

It is just disheartening to see especially on Crystal.

The issue isnt AST, it's premade groups..
same story with DRK and DRG combo..

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Originally Posted by Asteraku

It is just disheartening to see especially on Crystal.

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I haven't heard good things about Crystal PvP as far as I know, but is it really that bad over there?

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Originally Posted by Zeastria

The issue isnt AST, it's premade groups..
same story with DRK and DRG combo..

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pre-mades have nothing to do with it, you can do the exact same combo with randoms.

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Originally Posted by Astralrisk

pre-mades have nothing to do with it, you can do the exact same combo with randoms.

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Certainly true with random psychics.

There are a couple jobs that have personally annoyed me in Frontlines and could be nerfed, namely WAR, DRG, DRK, AST, WHM, DNC, MNK, SAM, SCH, SMN, PLD, BLM, GNB, RPR, MCH, RDM, NIN, SGE and BRD.

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Originally Posted by Eisi

There are a couple jobs that have personally annoyed me in Frontlines and could be nerfed, namely WAR, DRG, DRK, AST, WHM, DNC, MNK, SAM, SCH, SMN, PLD, BLM, GNB, RPR, MCH, RDM, NIN, SGE and BRD.

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Agree 100%, hate when they do that whole attacking me thing.. Square should just disable them in pvp..

Square enix always disresgards frontline while its they're most played and liked pvp content. Square enix just doesnt care about that, quick go to square enix store and buy they're millions of cash grab garbage before they're out of stock. Do it wage slave.

I feel like a lot of the issues with Frontlines would be solved if they just gave AoEs a damage fall-off after a certain number of enemies. Not even necessarily every AoE, just some of the more obnoxious ones

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Originally Posted by Connor

I feel like a lot of the issues with Frontlines would be solved if they just gave AoEs a damage fall-off after a certain number of enemies. Not even necessarily every AoE, just some of the more obnoxious ones

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Sounds like a great start to the deathball meta where zerging groups never die.

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Originally Posted by kayll

Sounds like a great start to the deathball meta where zerging groups never die.

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True if applied to literally every AoE at the same rate, but if they made the fall-off proportionate to the skill then they’d still have stopping power to take out large group, just a bit less than they do now. If anything it’d make people more likely to mark and gang-up on enemies one at a time rather than using aoes. Plus, aoe effects that aren’t strictly direct damage don’t need fall-off or limitations on the amount of enemies it can affect (i.e Stun from Afflatus Purgation, DRKs / SMN draw-in, etc).

I mean, I don’t think it’s a major problem personally, but I do feel like certain jobs do too much aoe damage. I’m not even suggesting a heavy fall-off like 50%, even if it was just like 25% less for additional enemies after X amount. Scholar is a big offender with being able to Biolysis - Deployment yourself to top dps with fairly little effort. But then all that damage doesn’t actually result in many kills (usually), do it makes it seem as if Scholars doing ‘the most damage’ is true. Which, it technically is, but that’s not quite so true in practice (more damage isn’t much help if the enemy survives and runs away, they need to die).

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Originally Posted by Eisi

There are a couple jobs that have personally annoyed me in Frontlines and could be nerfed, namely WAR, DRG, DRK, AST, WHM, DNC, MNK, SAM, SCH, SMN, PLD, BLM, GNB, RPR, MCH, RDM, NIN, SGE and BRD.

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https://media3.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2...pody/giphy.gif

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Originally Posted by Astralrisk

pre-mades have nothing to do with it, you can do the exact same combo with randoms.

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Pre-mades can be a huge issue.
Yes, these same skills are available to everyone and, naturally, you can be very lucky and get an amazing team of randoms. But this isn't particularly common. And, as much as you may try, even in the good random teams, coordination has its limits.

A well-coordinated premade can very quickly pick up battle high and easily control any frontline. In the worst cases, unless the other two random teams make a silent alliance to blindly focus down the premade, there's little hope of winning. Even this isn't remotely guaranteed as, usually, one of the two random teams will decide it's not worth the fight and will take the easy option of siding with the premade to secure second place. Now imagine them spamming it, again and again. Same pre-made, same outcome every time.

Some premades are a slight nuisance, but perfectly workable. Others are a nightmare. There is no-one who can persuade me that pre-made teams are a non issue. I can only imagine that they haven't met a nightmare one yet!

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

Pre-mades can be a huge issue.
Yes, these same skills are available to everyone and, naturally, you can be very lucky and get an amazing team of randoms. But this isn't particularly common. And, as much as you may try, even in the good random teams, coordination has its limits.

A well-coordinated premade can very quickly pick up battle high and easily control any frontline. In the worst cases, unless the other two random teams make a silent alliance to blindly focus down the premade, there's little hope of winning. Even this isn't remotely guaranteed as, usually, one of the two random teams will decide it's not worth the fight and will take the easy option of siding with the premade to secure second place. Now imagine them spamming it, again and again. Same pre-made, same outcome every time.

Some premades are a slight nuisance, but perfectly workable. Others are a nightmare. There is no-one who can persuade me that pre-made teams are a non issue. I can only imagine that they haven't met a nightmare one yet!

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Premades aren't actually an issue. I just got out of a seal rock game that had Flames win while being over 600 points ahead of second place. Did they have a premade? Yes, probably. Were they the issue? No. What was the issue? Every time they went for a DRK pull, at least half the people on my time refused to press Guard, and they got deleted. No, they weren't throwing WAR/DNC/RPR limit break into it. Premades are not the issue. Rather, they highlight the real issue: people cannot be trusted to use their 90% damage mitigation cooldown.

premade are 100% the problem. They should absolutely be removed or fix the game. one or the other

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Originally Posted by Naizakane

Premades aren't actually an issue. I just got out of a seal rock game that had Flames win while being over 600 points ahead of second place. Did they have a premade? Yes, probably. Were they the issue? No. What was the issue? Every time they went for a DRK pull, at least half the people on my time refused to press Guard, and they got deleted. No, they weren't throwing WAR/DNC/RPR limit break into it. Premades are not the issue. Rather, they highlight the real issue: people cannot be trusted to use their 90% damage mitigation cooldown.

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If you're only saying it was 'probably' a premade, then it clearly wasn't a particularly good one.

I spend the majority of my online time in frontlines and about the only role I don't play in them is ranged. Yes, in random teams a sizable proportion of the players will be playing purely for roulette. They may take little interest in the game, just want it over with as quickly as possible, and probably wouldn't think to use Guard: they were full HP one second, dead the next.
But even amongst the players who do use it, whilst Guard may save you against many smaller or less coordinated premades, in some cases even that isn't remotely enough. Against some teams, even using Guard can leave you almost instantly deleted - it just buys you maybe an extra second, making you one of the last of your team to be so.

When it becomes clear we're vs a premade all you can really do is try to avoid grouping together too much (almost impossible in some areas, such as Fields of Glory and the centre section of Onsal Hakair), mark the DRK, use Guard if you do get caught. Focus them down and hope that the other random team does the same. I suppose some classes can help somewhat: AST and PLD for heals/defence and perhaps MNK or MCH to try to push away the DRK when they see them coming to buy a little time.

All you can do is turn down non personal FXs, and open your eyes for DRG LBs coming from miles ahead.

Problem is exactly like low ranked CC but exacerbated. Certain things are just too much for casual players.

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Originally Posted by maximesan514

premade are 100% the problem. They should absolutely be removed or fix the game. one or the other

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Removing premades will just make the game worse and not actually address any balancing issues at all. It's not like removing them will automatically make those jobs balanced, all you'd do is remove the ability to play with friends in a MMO and make the game worse, while still letting the actual problem exist.

On Caetsu's stream a couple of days ago, a very obvious premade included a member with 23/95 K/A. You really okay with that? Agree balance is a separate issue, and that people should have the ability to play with friends, but mixing parties with solo queue simply isn't working IMO.

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Originally Posted by Astralrisk

Removing premades will just make the game worse and not actually address any balancing issues at all. It's not like removing them will automatically make those jobs balanced, all you'd do is remove the ability to play with friends in a MMO and make the game worse, while still letting the actual problem exist.

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I mean.. I agree... but its sooo broken and they dont do anything... its been broken for over a year now...

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Originally Posted by Valence

All you can do is turn down non personal FXs, and open your eyes for DRG LBs coming from miles ahead.

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An example of one premade we get:
A WAR and DRK will jump into the group simultaneously. The WAR stunning the group, the DRK voking. If caught unawares, purify would remove the stuns, and then you can use Guard. However, by this time, the DRGs of the premade team have already used their LB. At best, chances are you'll have taken at least the first one as full damage before even getting the chance to use Guard. Your HP will be low and Guard isn't enough to cover the remaining LBs from the premade.

Sometimes you can avoid it by keeping away from the group, though, this is almost impossible on some maps. Marking the premade will make them easier to spot, giving you more notice to prepare Guard to avoid both the stun and reduce damage somewhat. But, even if you're lucky and able to use Guard immediately, it still isn't always enough to cover the huge wave of coordinated damage you're about to get.
Not only this, but it requires players to be prepared of the premade's method of attack which, if they only play occasionally, they're unlikely to be.

It's not like people are complaining about one or two DRGs. Then I would understand your advice of "Open your eyes".

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Originally Posted by Astralrisk

Removing premades will just make the game worse and not actually address any balancing issues at all. It's not like removing them will automatically make those jobs balanced, all you'd do is remove the ability to play with friends in a MMO and make the game worse, while still letting the actual problem exist.

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There is job imbalance, yes. But there is an immense difference between playing vs teams of randoms and a premade. A good premade is coordinated, attacks are pre-prepared and simultaneous, all aimed at the same target group. Very heavy, concentrated damage on a pre-positioned group of victims. Repeatedly.
Regardless of how well they try to coordinate, a random team's attacks will be a little more spaced. There will be slight delays, giving target players the opportunity to change position, heal, or defend. Any 'simultaneous' attacks will be by chance and unlikely to be repeated consistently throughout a game

If the problem was purely job imbalance, you would see no difference between playing a random team and a premade one. In reality, the difference is a gaping chasm

I play AST in Frontlines and CC. The issue is not AST, but DRK. DRK is the only reason that the DRG/AST meat grinders exist in the first place. Salted Earth is the root of many, many problems in Frontlines, especially when the maps are designed with chokepoints.

Also saying that premades aren't an issue is laughable. I play in a premade (DRK/DRG/DRG/AST btw). I don't want premades to be removed. But pretending that premades don't have significant advantage over solo-queuers is crazy. Guard means nothing when you are 100 to 0 in the 1 second you are in the Salted Earth succ animation.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

An example of one premade we get:
A WAR and DRK will jump into the group simultaneously. The WAR stunning the group, the DRK voking. If caught unawares, purify would remove the stuns, and then you can use Guard. However, by this time, the DRGs of the premade team have already used their LB. At best, chances are you'll have taken at least the first one as full damage before even getting the chance to use Guard. Your HP will be low and Guard isn't enough to cover the remaining LBs from the premade.

Sometimes you can avoid it by keeping away from the group, though, this is almost impossible on some maps. Marking the premade will make them easier to spot, giving you more notice to prepare Guard to avoid both the stun and reduce damage somewhat. But, even if you're lucky and able to use Guard immediately, it still isn't always enough to cover the huge wave of coordinated damage you're about to get.
Not only this, but it requires players to be prepared of the premade's method of attack which, if they only play occasionally, they're unlikely to be.

It's not like people are complaining about one or two DRGs. Then I would understand your advice of "Open your eyes".

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Sky Shatter requires 3 seconds of cooldown before trigger, starting at activation of Sky High. Purify + Guard takes 1s at most, and you can add 1s of reaction time (which is the human average reaction time). It's plenty of time to react accordingly (unless the FL servers crap the bed, which is another can of worms).

In practice though DRGs come from a lot further away when initiating their LB unless they're extremely cocky and jump directly in, which can be a death sentence. FL maps are huge in comparison and if you dive in first odds are you're going to be crowd controlled to death, have to purify before finally attempting the LB, which will not only be obvious as heck to everybody now seeing their target jumping away and become untargetable, but also probably with half your HP missing already or more. And pray not to just get polymorphed by a WhM, which means you'll just end up flat dead with no purify exit.

So in practice DRG LBs come from further away and have to slowly run to their targets, which often takes more than 3s to resolve (up to the full 5s). If they're trying to coordinate with their tanks, odds are they'll need the extra time of margin before landing. Honestly, I find premade SkyShatter stacks a lot more cumbersome for that very last reason, solo LB is a lot more free and easy to pull fast because you don't rely on anybody else doing their part at the exact same time. However, a point has to be made on staggered Skyshatters, which are the best way to mop up people that guarded the first ones. But those all but necessitate a premade to pull off, in fact, premades tend to focus on trying to land a one stack nuke that will leave no survivors if unguarded, while staggered LBs tend to naturally happen from solo players (which can make solo BH5 players extremely dangerous in another way than premades).

Amusingly enough, it's the semi casual / semi hardcore DRG players that I find the harder to kill at times, because a lot of them don't even seem aware that geirskogul buffs the LB damage as well, and catching better players immediately when they land with the buff active negates more than 25% of their innate DR and makes them squishy. But obviously, those half baked LBs are a lot less dangerous in counterpart.

That's why essentially I was saying it's a problem of skill and reaction. A lot of players are just not trained to react fast enough or spot those properly. Every time I use a DRG LB in FLs, on average half of the people under me will guard eventually, while another half will remain completely clueless. Although honestly, the best answer always remains to run away or not be the first to engage the enemy team if you're a squishy job.

Another thing I want to add is that players are just completely clueless about all the counters they can use against those, especially premades, because premades by definition require more setup and combinations, which leaves a lot of holes to be exploited, namely the DRK which is the weak link of the whole deal. The DRK can be silenced, stunned, polymorphed (even better) when you just see them running in. To add insult to injury, it can also be pushed away with various pushbacks. Last defense lines can also be Mesotes popped at the right moment, even if it just covers one team. Is this much harder to pull than the ones on the other end doing their combo? I don't think it is.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

If the problem was purely job imbalance, you would see no difference between playing a random team and a premade one. In reality, the difference is a gaping chasm

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That's again why I'm saying it's a problem of skill difference. I do not, absolutely do not feel the same way. When I deal with premades or solo BH5 players (the good ones), I don't see any gaping chasm on my end. I'll chalk it up to different experiences as well. I'll say it again though, but the day they actually start fielding dancers in those premades is the day i'll freak out, because THAT would suddenly be a problem. But they don't, because so far they never felt the need to do it, since it seems to work on 50% of the playerbase and nets them enough bodies to turn fights (much like any solo players can also do on their own), and it requires a lot less coordination in the first place. What those premades do is essentially something that is very close to what can be achieved by a bunch of solo BH5 players already.

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Originally Posted by Valence

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Hence why they will initially begin to run in alongside the DRK/WAR, then using the initial LB cast slightly before the WAR stun / DRK voke. Whether you want to believe it or not, they have the timing perfect. I do agree that many casual players won't even attempt to use Guard/Purify, which obviously doesn't help the matter. But even those who do don't fare much better. It may help you to get through the initial attacks (just...), but as soon as they reach BH5 (which obviously doesn't take long), there is very little anyone can do. Add in the WARs LB to remove Guard, and you're having the time of your life...

That said, the most common arguments for premades that I've seen so far have been these:
1. "Nothing's stopping them from doing it too. The combos are available for everyone"
2. "Having a premade team playing means nothing and gives no advantage. It's just that random players aren't good enough"

I personally play FL with friends (though rather than coordinate, we tend to compete with each other instead), but there are many who play solo. Having a large premade party should never be a pre-requisite to playing FLs without being repeatedly destroyed every game with ridiculous score differences. A reality of 'If you want to win, you have to have your own premade team, otherwise it's a guaranteed loss' is only going to push more players away from FLs. We aren't at that point at the moment (and I hope we never will be), but it's not a good outcome.

Practice will obviously give an advantage, there's nothing can be done about that. Players who play FLs a lot will likely do better than those who only play occasionally. In the rush of the moment, many casual players may overlook the skills available to them. That is the same vs premade parties or random ones and is ultimately irrelevant. The main argument here is the advantage that premade parties have and the issue they have become in FLs.

Random players manage perfectly fine vs random teams, hence why the win rates vs such teams are quite even. But when vs premades, random players suddenly 'don't have the skills'?
Which just confirms what we've been discussing: premade teams do have a big advantage over random teams.

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The DRK can be silenced, stunned, polymorphed (even better) when you just see them running in. To add insult to injury, it can also be pushed away with various pushbacks.

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Kind of depends on the premade. The DRK may be silenced, stunned etc., but I've also seen some premades which have prevented even this by having the DRK set off with Guard, a WAR/GNB jump ahead to stun the target group, immediately following which the DRK joins them to voke. The only way to stop this being to remove the DRKs Guard yourself - for example, using a MNK LB to stun and Enlightenment to push them away. If you're quick enough you may succeed, but chances are you'll die doing it - jumping out into no-mans-land to stop the DRK while a horde of enemy team are within range waiting to take advantage of the voke.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

I personally play FL with friends (though rather than coordinate, we tend to compete with each other instead), but there are many who play solo. Having a large premade party should never be a pre-requisite to playing FLs without being repeatedly destroyed every game with ridiculous score differences. A reality of 'If you want to win, you have to have your own premade team, otherwise it's a guaranteed loss' is only going to push more players away from FLs. We aren't at that point at the moment (and I hope we never will be), but it's not a good outcome.

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This is the critical point! And in addition to turning away new players completely, there's another insidious consequence that serious players should care about deeply. We hear the complaint that there's a population of players wandering around aimlessly in FL just farming the daily XP. Maybe if matches involving premades weren't such rookie slaughterhouses, those players would enjoy the mode and be interested enough to improve their skills?

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

Hence why they will initially begin to run in alongside the DRK/WAR, then using the initial LB cast slightly before the WAR stun / DRK voke. Whether you want to believe it or not, they have the timing perfect. I do agree that many casual players won't even attempt to use Guard/Purify, which obviously doesn't help the matter. But even those who do don't fare much better. It may help you to get through the initial attacks (just...), but as soon as they reach BH5 (which obviously doesn't take long), there is very little anyone can do. Add in the WARs LB to remove Guard, and you're having the time of your life...

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I legit don't see how there is little anyone can do. 3 Skyshatter with BH5 will not magically go through guard.

However if WAR removes guard, that's starting to be akin to having a DNC (easier to coordinate with a WAR, just a lot less powerful and far reaching). I have yet to see such premades though, but maybe they're everywhere on other DCs idk. They generally prefer stacking 3 DRGs, or 2 DRGs with an AST for Celestial River.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

I personally play FL with friends (though rather than coordinate, we tend to compete with each other instead), but there are many who play solo. Having a large premade party should never be a pre-requisite to playing FLs without being repeatedly destroyed every game with ridiculous score differences. A reality of 'If you want to win, you have to have your own premade team, otherwise it's a guaranteed loss' is only going to push more players away from FLs. We aren't at that point at the moment (and I hope we never will be), but it's not a good outcome.

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You're right, we're not at that point at the moment. I'll chalk it up to differences between DCs because so far in every game I have witnessed, premades are a minority, and most people just queue up with the jobs they like. Most BH5 players are also solo players, and while a lot of them sure use meta jobs, a lot also don't, and almost all of them are easy to take out without even the need of having your own counter premade.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

Practice will obviously give an advantage, there's nothing can be done about that. Players who play FLs a lot will likely do better than those who only play occasionally. In the rush of the moment, many casual players may overlook the skills available to them. That is the same vs premade parties or random ones and is ultimately irrelevant. The main argument here is the advantage that premade parties have and the issue they have become in FLs.

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That's where I don't agree and will probably never do. I don't see that so called advantage people keep bringing up, unless we suddenly see Guard removal jobs mixed into the deal, which I've never seen so far. And as I said above, I do think staggered DRG LBs from solo players are more dangerous, I personally fear those more than I fear premades, because I know how to defend those, and staggered LBs cannot be all guarded, which means you need to know exactly when to bail if taken out of position.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

Random players manage perfectly fine vs random teams, hence why the win rates vs such teams are quite even. But when vs premades, random players suddenly 'don't have the skills'?
Which just confirms what we've been discussing: premade teams do have a big advantage over random teams.

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I've never witnessed those supposedly gaping differences myself. People are blowing this out of proportions.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

Kind of depends on the premade. The DRK may be silenced, stunned etc., but I've also seen some premades which have prevented even this by having the DRK set off with Guard, a WAR/GNB jump ahead to stun the target group, immediately following which the DRK joins them to voke. The only way to stop this being to remove the DRKs Guard yourself - for example, using a MNK LB to stun and Enlightenment to push them away. If you're quick enough you may succeed, but chances are you'll die doing it - jumping out into no-mans-land to stop the DRK while a horde of enemy team are within range waiting to take advantage of the voke.

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If your DRK guards instead of doing what they're supposed to do, they can't be guarding and rushing your team at the same time, that's just not possible even with expedient up. If they start guarding once they're already there instead of using salted earth, you already missed your window of opportunity to silence them in both cases. If they wait that long to pop salted earth while making sure to soak silences under guard, it leaves 5 more seconds for people to bail. This is a fail strategy.


Either way, the whole point I was trying to make is that whether there is premades or not, the disaster is there.

Alright, actually, instead of trying to have a deaf conversation between obviously two very different types of experiences where my casuals are not being impacted as much when yours are literally living through armaggeddon, please send me some footage of the problem so we can share a common basis?

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Originally Posted by Valence

Alright, actually, instead of trying to have a deaf conversation between obviously two very different types of experiences where my casuals are not being impacted as much when yours are literally living through armaggeddon, please send me some footage of the problem so we can share a common basis?

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Perhaps I should consider it, as clearly quite a proportion of players seem to believe that purely because they haven't seen anything like that when in FLs, that it doesn't exist. That said, I am not particularly tech-savvy, so working out how would be a new challenge in itself! :D

A few months ago when I was trying to get the Seal Rock achievement glamour on my alt, I found a particularly frustrating premade to be spamming the FLs for most of the afternoon/evening (inconveniently for me at the time, haha). They'd win every game by a huge margin. Occasionally I was put with them but, more often than not, I was against them. This did continue for quite a while but, more recently, I do admit that I have begun to see them slightly less. Now, if I do see them, it tends to be in the evenings/night. So, on the positive side, there's been some improvement in my experiences more recently. However, I don't doubt that other players on other DCS, are still going through the same issues.

Theres a premade in Light EU thats probably notorious by now for regularly carrying teams. Boring to play with and against.

Edit: 80% win rate by the DRKs own words lmao. Assuming they meant weekly and on a sunday.

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Originally Posted by Valence

Alright, actually, instead of trying to have a deaf conversation between obviously two very different types of experiences where my casuals are not being impacted as much when yours are literally living through armaggeddon, please send me some footage of the problem so we can share a common basis?

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You might look at K/D/A stats after each match. That's what originally got my attention. Obviously for a single match an excellent shot-caller and skilled players can produce surprising stats. But over the course of a session you see the same four names appear with consistently amazing stats.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

Perhaps I should consider it, as clearly quite a proportion of players seem to believe that purely because they haven't seen anything like that when in FLs, that it doesn't exist. That said, I am not particularly tech-savvy, so working out how would be a new challenge in itself! :D

A few months ago when I was trying to get the Seal Rock achievement glamour on my alt, I found a particularly frustrating premade to be spamming the FLs for most of the afternoon/evening (inconveniently for me at the time, haha). They'd win every game by a huge margin. Occasionally I was put with them but, more often than not, I was against them. This did continue for quite a while but, more recently, I do admit that I have begun to see them slightly less. Now, if I do see them, it tends to be in the evenings/night. So, on the positive side, there's been some improvement in my experiences more recently. However, I don't doubt that other players on other DCS, are still going through the same issues.

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To be perfectly clear I have seen premades and I am not saying they don't exist. I just happen to disagree on their actual impact.

You don't need to record or whatever, I was just interested if someone had any footage at hand, or VODs from any streamer where it can be seen.

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Originally Posted by Mawlzy

You might look at K/D/A stats after each match. That's what originally got my attention. Obviously for a single match an excellent shot-caller and skilled players can produce surprising stats. But over the course of a session you see the same four names appear with consistently amazing stats.

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Never that clear cut in my experience, and usually I'm up there with the top as a solo player, with other solo players, which tends to makes me doubt that either we have any premades active when it happens, even though we can see them operate at times with that DRK followed by DRGs. I've never ever witnessed a single game where there was only 4 top names in the same team and literally nothing else at the top of the KDA...

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Originally Posted by maximesan514

I mean.. I agree... but its sooo broken and they dont do anything... its been broken for over a year now...

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I don't think the solution to a broken issue is to create more problems. Removing the ability to do pre-mades does make it harder for players to effectively do stuff like DRK+DRG, yet you can still do that even without a pre-made. You don't fix the actual issue, you just make it harder to do. The problem still exists, and now I can't just do a chill game with my friends where we just play for fun, because of a lazy fix that didn't actually do anything.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

An example of one premade we get:There is job imbalance, yes. But there is an immense difference between playing vs teams of randoms and a premade. A good premade is coordinated, attacks are pre-prepared and simultaneous, all aimed at the same target group. Very heavy, concentrated damage on a pre-positioned group of victims. Repeatedly.
Regardless of how well they try to coordinate, a random team's attacks will be a little more spaced. There will be slight delays, giving target players the opportunity to change position, heal, or defend. Any 'simultaneous' attacks will be by chance and unlikely to be repeated consistently throughout a game

If the problem was purely job imbalance, you would see no difference between playing a random team and a premade one. In reality, the difference is a gaping chasm

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Being able to coordinate with people is obviously an advantage, and being able to do so with people in a pre-made is also much easier. It still doesn't change the fact that you are still able to do so with or without a pre-made. I'd argue that being able to coordinate with the other 20-23 randoms in your alliance is much better than an individual pre-made. If you have a game where you just have some guy who can easily just do callouts to tell the entire alliance where to go, that is far more effective than a 4 man pre-made coordinating an LB push to win one fight every 90s at most. Because even with how annoying it is to go up against those people, those 4 players can't possibly carry an entire team to victory if no one is actually playing objectives and farming BH off of the leading team.

People finally realize how strong AST is in frontlines, I feel like it's been a sleeper pick for months, aside from those who knew. Can easily top the dmg ranking, macrococosmos hits hard and its whole kit is strong and full of utility, exponentially more so with competent players in your party or as a premade.

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Originally Posted by Teno

People finally realize how strong AST is in frontlines, I feel like it's been a sleeper pick for months, aside from those who knew. Can easily top the dmg ranking, macrococosmos hits hard and its whole kit is strong and full of utility, exponentially more so with competent players in your party or as a premade.

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Did you see your last line? Of course that's true. On the other hand, if your party scatters to the four corners of the map then the AST goes to waste.

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Originally Posted by Astralrisk

I don't think the solution to a broken issue is to create more problems. Removing the ability to do pre-mades does make it harder for players to effectively do stuff like DRK+DRG, yet you can still do that even without a pre-made. You don't fix the actual issue, you just make it harder to do. The problem still exists, and now I can't just do a chill game with my friends where we just play for fun, because of a lazy fix that didn't actually do anything.

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A multitude of problems contribute to the situation, including: class imbalances (DRK, in particular), premade parties (coordinating attacks to maximize damage whilst hindering any attempts to stop/prevent it), player attitude (defeatism upon realising they're against a premade).

I enjoy playing with friends and would rather a different solution than just to ban all parties and make it a solo queue, but if that's what's needed to prevent premade teams (as they will no longer be able to queue together and guarantee being in the same team consistently), then I will go with it. Premades have become far too much of an issue to ignore any longer and to let them continue will only push casual / solo players further away from FLs.

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Being able to coordinate with people is obviously an advantage, and being able to do so with people in a pre-made is also much easier. It still doesn't change the fact that you are still able to do so with or without a pre-made. I'd argue that being able to coordinate with the other 20-23 randoms in your alliance is much better than an individual pre-made. If you have a game where you just have some guy who can easily just do callouts to tell the entire alliance where to go, that is far more effective than a 4 man pre-made coordinating an LB push to win one fight every 90s at most.

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Some random teams are excellent at coordinating their attacks but, regardless of how good they are, they still do not come remotely close to the coordination and advantage that is obtained by premades. I totally disagree with your suggestion that a random team can achieve the same or better results than a good premade. A bad one, perhaps. But not a good one.

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Because even with how annoying it is to go up against those people, those 4 players can't possibly carry an entire team to victory if no one is actually playing objectives and farming BH off of the leading team.

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:rolleyes:

http://i.imgur.com/9gR1Z7P.png


I've covered the names of all for anonymity, but I don't need to point out which are the premade.

(I would add - this in an Onsal Hakair match which didn't have too much time spent in the centre platform, so most of this was obtained on quite open areas of the map.
Now imagine what the scores would be in somewhere like Fields of Glory or in a Onsal Hakair match which did have lots of time on the centre platform.)

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

A multitude of problems contribute to the situation, including: class imbalances (DRK, in particular), premade parties (coordinating attacks to maximize damage whilst hindering any attempts to stop/prevent it), player attitude (defeatism upon realising they're against a premade).

I enjoy playing with friends and would rather a different solution than just to ban all parties and make it a solo queue, but if that's what's needed to prevent premade teams (as they will no longer be able to queue together and guarantee being in the same team consistently), then I will go with it. Premades have become far too much of an issue to ignore any longer and to let them continue will only push casual / solo players further away from FLs

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I still don't think this is a great solution to ban them for a more "balanced" game, since you can solve the issue in a lot better ways. When problems occur in other games with groups of players abusing the meta and make the game worse when playing against them, devs don't make it harder by removing the ability to play with your friends across the entire player base. Instead, they look at what those players are using to abuse the game and remove that instead. I think your image proves the point more of the issue being the meta just being dominated by how strong jobs like DRG/DRK/AST are rather than a pre-made. Especially since you don't need to be in a pre-made to abuse the meta, it just gets worse in that enviorment.

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Originally Posted by Scintilla

Some random teams are excellent at coordinating their attacks but, regardless of how good they are, they still do not come remotely close to the coordination and advantage that is obtained by premades. I totally disagree with your suggestion that a random team can achieve the same or better results than a good premade. A bad one, perhaps. But not a good one.

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I agree that a pre-made is overall better, especially a good one. As said before though, that's just been a common thing in multiplayer games since forever. Being able to talk to and coordinate with a competent player directly and personally has always existed. Yet, no games have gone out of there way to try and keep that from happening, and I don't understand why the opposite has to be the case in this game. . This is an Massive Multiplayer Online game, where having the ability to play with others of your choosing is important. Removing that ability would just make playing the mode worse, and might not even fix the issues with the mode since you can just queue sync and hope your on the same team.

The meta is already Zerging, or haven't you been paying attention?