Disruptive Frontline Gameplay

[Aravell]

When I say these attacks are simultaneous, I'm not overexaggerating.

I'm not doubting your experiences are real, but I remain skeptical. I've played a lot of FL across every iteration and on several DCs, I've never met an unbeatable pre-made that could not be disrupted in some way, even the 8 man deathballs back when we could queue as a full party could be disrupted. People aren't robots, I'm very skeptical that people can have perfect coordination throughout the entire match. Unless, of course, said people have some, shall we say, assistance?

As for this reply to my suggestion of a hidden rating system:

Ultimately, it will lead to the same veteran players being endlessly matched against the same premade teams, to the point where they just stop playing. So no, to believe that such a system will work shows naivety at best

How many experienced FL players do you know that consistently dies to DRK combos? Most veterans are experienced enough to understand how to deal with it. You yourself conceded that you can deal with them by pinching them with the other alliance. What makes you think a full game of 72 veterans would be so disorganised to completely lose it to a singular pre-made?

Like I said before, the main problem is the skill gap at work. And when I say "skill", I don't mean how well someone pushes their buttons, any monkey can push the 6-7 buttons that we have now. I'm talking about FL-related skills like map awareness, knowing when to go in and when to back off, understanding when you're in a bad position, being able to tell when your team is in a perfect position to get pinched, all qualities that a shotcaller would have.

[Scintilla]

How many experienced FL players do you know that consistently dies to DRK combos? Most veterans are experienced enough to understand how to deal with it. You yourself conceded that you can deal with them by pinching them with the other alliance. What makes you think a full game of 72 veterans would be so disorganised to completely lose it to a singular pre-made

Veteran players are less likely to die repeatedly to premades. But, in my own experience, even when playing as part of very good teams, the most effective (and sometimes the only way) of handling of premades remains to 2v1 them with the other alliance. This isn't simply "pinch them once or twice and then play as normal", but a constant focus on them throughout the duration of the game:

As said countless times already - this requires both random teams to make a silent alliance to focus down this premade together. While they're attacking one random team, the other comes to support them and kill the premade, and vice versa. This would need to be done repeatedly throughout the entire match to keep their BH down - just doing it once or twice might hit the reset button (assuming you do actually kill them all), but they'll quickly pick up that BH again the moment you stop. Objectives become totally ignored and/or given to whichever random team is currently in second place to keep them in the game.

Is it a remedy? Yes, it's not frequently employed by random teams largely because it involves adjusting play significantly from what would usually be correct. But it is a method becoming more common as players become more familiar with premades. But it's treating the symptoms, not the cause. There is currently a significant imbalance caused by current FL setup which is taken heavy advantage of by premade teams. This is a reality.

There are 2 options to work around this:
1. Create a premade team of your own
2. Spend the entire game with both random alliances focusing down the premade's alliance, often finishing up with one random alliance having to sacrifice their game for the sake of the other.

Having a premade team of your own should never be obligatory or a prerequisite purely to make FLs competitive and to do so would only make the situation worse by making the issue more common and widespread, forcing more and more to do the same or quit PvP entirely.

As for option 2, I don't see why FL games should involve forcing one random team into sacrificing their game to assist the second random team, just to keep any semblance of competition going. The many being forced to adjust purely for the benefit of the few - a few who prefer to take an easy route to wins rather than employing any of these characteristics which you define to be 'skill'

[IDontPetLalas]

Veteran players are less likely to die repeatedly to premades. But, in my own experience, even when playing as part of very good teams, the most effective (and sometimes the only way) of handling of premades remains to 2v1 them with the other alliance. This isn't simply "pinch them once or twice and then play as normal", but a constant focus on them throughout the duration of the game:



Is it a remedy? Yes, it's not frequently employed by random teams largely because it involves adjusting play significantly from what would usually be correct. But it is a method becoming more common as players become more familiar with premades. But it's treating the symptoms, not the cause. There is currently a significant imbalance caused by current FL setup which is taken heavy advantage of by premade teams. This is a reality.

There are 2 options to work around this:
1. Create a premade team of your own
2. Spend the entire game with both random alliances focusing down the premade's alliance, often finishing up with one random alliance having to sacrifice their game for the sake of the other.

Having a premade team of your own should never be obligatory or a prerequisite purely to make FLs competitive and to do so would only make the situation worse by making the issue more common and widespread, forcing more and more to do the same or quit PvP entirely.

As for option 2, I don't see why FL games should involve forcing one random team into sacrificing their game to assist the second random team, just to keep any semblance of competition going. The many being forced to adjust purely for the benefit of the few - a few who prefer to take an easy route to wins rather than employing any of these characteristics which you define to be 'skill'

"As for option 2, I don't see why FL games should involve forcing one random team into sacrificing their game to assist the second random team, just to keep any semblance of competition going. The many being forced to adjust purely for the benefit of the few - a few who prefer to take an easy route to wins rather than employing any of these characteristics which you define to be 'skill'"

That's... an interesting view. I don't view 2 alliances forming a partnership as "sacrificing their game". What game, exactly, when it's a 3 way match, and even in other game's that I've played, such as in in 3 faction OW PvP, it was typical for temporary alliances to form between 2 factions in order to fight the 3rd? You may not like the mode - but in a 3 way fight- this is going to happen. There is a good chance that one of those 2 teams will win - so, again "no sacrifice". Personally, I like having the choice of this mode and RW as a 2-way fight.

[Scintilla]

That's... an interesting view. I don't view 2 alliances forming a partnership as "scarificing their game". What game, exactly, when it's a 3 way match, and even in other game's that I've played, such as in in 3 faction OW PvP, it was typical for temporary alliances to form between 2 factions in order to fight the 3rd? You may not like the mode - but in a 3 way fight- this is going to happen. There is a good chance that one of those 2 teams will win - so, again "no sacrifice". Personally, I like having the choice of this mode and RW as a 2-way fight.

It's not a 'view', it's a real outcome. Premade scores increase incredibly fast purely from the kills they get, meanwhile the random alliances fall following the deaths. The results screenshot I posted on the previous page show this: the two random teams have fairly even scores, both around 600. Meanwhile the premade's alliance score is more than double the score of the two random teams. This isn't just a one-off lucky game, this is frequent.

Random teams cannot afford to waste time fighting each other over nodes. Whilst they're busy trying to win the objectives, the premade are farming kills (and points) from both of them. Obviously, this isn't a tactic employed only by premade teams - any aggressive alliance will do the same. But the key point is that premades obtain far higher kill numbers than random teams do, with these kills leading to a significantly faster point gain. If you want even the slightest hope of keeping that point gain under some level of control, you have to spend the entire game focusing them down. This can only be done with both alliances. More often that not, they will have already picked up a major lead before both alliances come to accept this (if they ever do - some don't) and/or despite attempts to slow it, their point gain will continue to increase rapidly. With the premade getting such a large and rapidly increasing lead and the random alliance scores trailing further and further behind, "win the FL" becomes "stop the premade winning the FL". And sometimes, the only option to do that is for full effort to go on killing the premade's alliance members, with objectives going to the random alliance in second place just to keep alive the chance of them winning the game and pushing the premade to second place.

Numerous occasions I've heard agreements in alliance chat to "just focus the premade, I'd rather (other random team) win than them"

[IDontPetLalas]

It's not a 'view', it's a real outcome. Premade scores increase incredibly fast purely from the kills they get, meanwhile the random alliances fall following the deaths. The results screenshot I posted on the previous page show this: the two random teams have fairly even scores, both around 600. Meanwhile the premade's alliance score is more than double the score of the two random teams. This isn't just a one-off lucky game, this is frequent.

Random teams cannot afford to waste time fighting each other over nodes. Whilst they're busy trying to win the objectives, the premade are farming kills (and points) from both of them. Obviously, this isn't a tactic employed only by premade teams - any aggressive alliance will do the same. But the key point is that premades obtain far higher kill numbers than random teams do, with these kills leading to a significantly faster point gain. If you want even the slightest hope of keeping that point gain under some level of control, you have to spend the entire game focusing them down. This can only be done with both alliances. More often that not, they will have already picked up a major lead before both alliances come to accept this (if they ever do - some don't) and/or despite attempts to slow it, their point gain will continue to increase rapidly. With the premade getting such a large and rapidly increasing lead and the random alliance scores trailing further and further behind, "win the FL" becomes "stop the premade winning the FL". And sometimes, the only option to do that is for full effort to go on killing the premade's alliance members, with objectives going to the random alliance in second place just to keep alive the chance of them winning the game and pushing the premade to second place.

Numerous occasions I've heard agreements in alliance chat to "just focus the premade, I'd rather (other random team) win than them"

You're missing the point. I explained why I would expect this would happen, I'm not challenging that it does happen, in addition I explained that it happens in this mode ( 3 faction combat) outside of FFXIV as well.

What's rather humorous is that you last line summarized what I was saying, and yes, your "view" or "opinion' if you like was expressing that you were in your own words "sacrificing their game to assist the second random team". That is your opinion of this tactic. You just agreed that the goal of each of the coalition members is to beat the alliance in the lead so that one of them will win. I don't see how that is a "sacrifice".

[Chasingstars]

You're missing the point. I explained why I would expect this would happen, I'm not challenging that it does happen, in addition I explained that it happens in this mode ( 3 faction combat) outside of FFXIV as well.

What's rather humorous is that you last line summarized what I was saying, and yes, your "view" or "opinion' if you like was expressing that you were in your own words "sacrificing their game to assist the second random team". That is your opinion of this tactic. You just agreed that the goal of each of the coalition members is to beat the alliance in the lead so that one of them will win. I don't see how that is a "sacrifice".

Because it is not always about beating who is in the lead. It can be beating down who has the perceived advantage. If the shotcaller believes and were to think that the 3rd or 2nd place team has a premade stack that could make a comeback, the map's objectives matter far less to those people. That the team that relentlessly "pinches" whoever has the perceived advantage, even if that other team has fewer points. That upon seeing Astrologians or Dark Knights with a battle high of 3 to 5, it is to potentially "throw" the match to spite another team and prevent them from winning. This warps the mentality of the game, where throwing is perceived as a moral victory over another team, and therefore make the experience far more miserable for those that want to have a normal match. And in turn shifts the meta in a way that is not conducive to long term health of the game and the retention of the player base.

[IDontPetLalas]

Because it is not always about beating who is in the lead. It can be beating down who has the perceived advantage. If the shotcaller believes and were to think that the 3rd or 2nd place team has a premade stack that could make a comeback, the map's objectives matter far less to those people. That the team that relentlessly "pinches" whoever has the perceived advantage, even if that other team has fewer points. That upon seeing Astrologians or Dark Knights with a battle high of 3 to 5, it is to potentially "throw" the match to spite another team and prevent them from winning. This warps the mentality of the game, where throwing is perceived as a moral victory over another team, and therefore make the experience far more miserable for those that want to have a normal match. And in turn shifts the meta in a way that is not conducive to long term health of the game and the retention of the player base.

I honestly am not understanding what you're trying to communicate, my apologies as I'm not trying to be obtuse, however it's a bit convoluted I can't quite follow your logic.

So, in my view the end game is to win. Whether the tactics that you use are to go directly for who is in the lead, or to get there by hitting the 2nd place team- why is that relevant?

Then you're discussing throwing a match. Let's be clear- throwing a matching is giving up, in various ways, so that another team can win. How is advocating for that? If for example , teams A and B want to block team (c) from winning, at a specific point when "C" is demoralized or far enough behind, either A or B is free to go for the win.
Unless I misunderstand, you seeme to be in a situation of team A being very strong, team B being v very strong, and team C saying 'what the hell, I know I won't win, but I'll make sure that I'll pick whom I want to win". If so, if team C really does have the weakest team- why should they win? What you see as "being miserable", in that same situation, I would see as making the best of a bad situation, it is a "normal" match.

"And in turn shifts the meta in a way that is not conducive to long term health of the game and the retention of the player base." There will always be some "meta" that players perceive. We had ranged jobs as the meta not that long ago- particularly SMNs and to some extent WHMs. We had the PLD cover issue. We had MNKs (in particular) kicking people off of ledges and racking up BH which drove new people in particular crazy (and nothing was done). If you define a specific "meta" as problematic then players will always switch to another. That is just the nature of many players. I would prefer than Square considers FL and CC separately with regards to jobs in PvP, in addition there is the issue of BH which should be re-examined.

[Scintilla]

You just agreed that the goal of each of the coalition members is to beat the alliance in the lead so that one of them will win. I don't see how that is a "sacrifice".

To make it simpler - Blue are premade, Yellow and Red are random.

Now, just to check that I'm not misunderstanding:
You argue that because the random alliances' goal has now changed from "Let's win" to "Let's make sure anyone wins except the premade", that Red having to voluntarily lose the game in favour of supporting Yellow to win, means that they are no longer making a sacrifice?
That Red are sacrificing nothing because their new goal was to stop the premade (Blue) winning?

It is another angle to view it from, but I still can't say that I fully agree with it. I acknowledge it remains a conscious decision, but in all fairness, they aren't given all that much choice: you either both lose to the premade or only one of you loses to the premade. And given that the whole point of FL is to support your alliance to victory, being presented with such an ultimatum somewhat goes against this. Unless you would now view the two random alliances as one united, singular alliance.

So many players affected, solely because 4 players decided they wanted an easy run.

[Aravell]

Veteran players are less likely to die repeatedly to premades. But, in my own experience, even when playing as part of very good teams, the most effective (and sometimes the only way) of handling of premades remains to 2v1 them with the other alliance. This isn't simply "pinch them once or twice and then play as normal", but a constant focus on them throughout the duration of the game

Can you define what "play as normal" means? Do you mean just playing for objectives? Because that's a fantastic way to lose the game. This is PvP, player vs player, you gain points from killing a player and the other team loses points for losing that player, killing players is the most effective way to win the match, you're even saying that the pre-mades are winning off kills.

So, why exactly would going after and farming the pre-made harm your chances to win? If you insist that pinching the pre-made is the only way to beat them, that means that the other alliance is also in combat with the pre-made, why are they getting the objectives and you're not? Your scenario doesn't make any sense at all. If the other alliance is breaking off a light party to go and grab objectives that spawn while the bulk of them are staving off the pre-made, that is a common tactic, why is your team not doing the same?

If your team is hyperfocusing on the pre-made when they're behind the other team for fear of the pre-made having a sudden comeback (which is laughable, since if you've been destroying them long enough for them to fall to last place, they're very likely to not have any battle high and they'll be more wary of diving into places where you're both fighting), then your team did actually throw the match, but not because the pre-made made your team throw the match to keep them down, your team threw the match because none of your team had the map open to go contest the 3-4 people from the other alliance that went to grab the objective that spawned.

[Scintilla]

Can you define what "play as normal" means? Do you mean just playing for objectives? Because that's a fantastic way to lose the game.

Firstly, no. I can safely say that I am not a "focus ice" player
In fact, calls for such approaches push my patience immensely, but that's another matter...

I completely agree that kills are just as valuable as objectives (with an excellent team, perhaps even more so). Typically though, FLs are won from a balance of objectives and PvP.
Basic rules in a normal game: in terms of PvP, it's focus the winning team; in terms of objectives, it somewhat depends on the circumstances including how valuable the objective is (large/small ice, B/A/S rank nodes) and the current situation (No point running to fight Yellow for an S-rank node when Blue are on the brink of winning and have an A-rank spawn nearby etc.).

In the event of focusing down a premade, ultimately, objectives become ignored. A few players are likely to still go for them, but the main majority of the team will remain focused on the premade and their alliance.

So, why exactly would going after and farming the pre-made harm your chances to win? If you insist that pinching the pre-made is the only way to beat them, that means that the other alliance is also in combat with the pre-made, why are they getting the objectives and you're not?

I have just mentioned this in my previous reply: it is a conscious decision. An ultimatum.

As my previous screenshot of a premade game's scores show, there is often an immense difference between the final scores of premade teams and those of random teams:
Approx. 600 for both random teams, over double that score for the premade's alliance. They farm points far quicker than a random team would and sometimes, despite attempts from both alliances to focus them down, their score cannot quite be brought to equal levels with the two random teams. Leaving the random teams with an ultimatum: either they both lose to the premade or they give up objectives to the random team in second place to try to push them into first, in which case, only one of them loses to the premade.

which is laughable, since if you've been destroying them long enough for them to fall to last place

Sadly, not the case. Both teams focusing the premade's alliance down will drain their score, certainly, but they will still be gaining points, the premade using their alliance members as a shield whilst they attack, run, heal, repeat. It will be a far slower rate than they were as the premade will have to be far, far more cautious and the deaths of alliance members will be draining many of the points they gain. But still, the score gaps are often huge and point gain still increases, albeit much slower.