Disruptive Frontline Gameplay

[Aravell]

I want to put forward a general question here:

Do you guys realise that the people who play in pre-mades aren't purely people who want to stomp teams and get easy wins? Casual players are very likely to play in pre-mades because they don't like PvP and only play with friends. Your solution would force casual players or new players being introduced into PvP by a friend to get stomped repeatedly by these pre-mades that you say are a problem, causing them to quit PvP, losing us new players.

So it's fine as long as you don't have to see the pre-mades, right?

[Mawlzy]

I want to put forward a general question here:

Do you guys realise that the people who play in pre-mades aren't purely people who want to stomp teams and get easy wins? Casual players are very likely to play in pre-mades because they don't like PvP and only play with friends. Your solution would force casual players or new players being introduced into PvP by a friend to get stomped repeatedly by these pre-mades that you say are a problem, causing them to quit PvP, losing us new players.

So it's fine as long as you don't have to see the pre-mades, right?

Yes, am aware, although why someone who doesn't like PvP would play PvP with or without friends puzzles me. And if they do decide to play, they can't get stomped by premades if there are no premades.

Obviously I don't want to remove people's opportunity to play with friends, hence dual queues.

[Aravell]

Obviously I don't want to remove people's opportunity to play with friends, hence dual queues.

And if people do decide to play with friends, what do they get? Ah yes, they get to wait in a longer queue just to get stomped by the pre-mades that everyone claims are a problem when they get a match. This is basically just pushing the problem that people have off to somewhere else that they don't plan to go.

[Scintilla]

And if people do decide to play with friends, what do they get? Ah yes, they get to wait in a longer queue just to get stomped by the pre-mades that everyone claims are a problem when they get a match. This is basically just pushing the problem that people have off to somewhere else that they don't plan to go.

Yes, and you don't see the problem with putting the casual 'play for fun' pre-mades permanently in the same queue as the 'meta comp and voice comms' pre-mades?

Other alternatives would be better, naturally. This isn't a single issue, but lots of smaller ones. It's not solely because players can play together as a party with friends that this issue comes about. It contributes, definitely, but there are other factors at play.

It's something which needs to be fixed somehow, but finding a solution will not be easy.

[Mawlzy]

And if people do decide to play with friends, what do they get? Ah yes, they get to wait in a longer queue just to get stomped by the pre-mades that everyone claims are a problem when they get a match. This is basically just pushing the problem that people have off to somewhere else that they don't plan to go.

You're creating a hypothetical that may be problematic for a small number of players, whereas I'm attempting to address one that is poisoning the entire mode.

[Aravell]

You're creating a hypothetical that may be problematic for a small number of players, whereas I'm attempting to address one that is poisoning the entire mode.

Clearly it's not poisoning the entire mode. I and several others have never had much issue with this supposed pre-made problem.

Does it happen? Sure it does. Is it a problem everywhere? Not at all.

Calling pre-mades a poison upon the entire mode is an exaggeration. And before you deflect and call me one of the pre-mades, I only queue solo, been doing it since FL began, will continue to queue solo.

[IDontPetLalas]

Clearly it's not poisoning the entire mode. I and several others have never had much issue with this supposed pre-made problem.

Does it happen? Sure it does. Is it a problem everywhere? Not at all.

Calling pre-mades a poison upon the entire mode is an exaggeration. And before you deflect and call me one of the pre-mades, I only queue solo, been doing it since FL began, will continue to queue solo.

I couldn't agree with you more, I don't know whether this stems from people who detest the actual mode (3 alliance) , who haven't had a lot of experience with larger scale random alliances, or find it really different from their prior experience and don't like it.

For example, one prior comment said that it was "daft" to mix a pre-made into solo queues. Now, this isn't the first game where I've seen this in a non-competitive mode, it was used in a PvP/PvE game and players here would have found it even worse because a whole pre-made team (6 people) could be matched against a full pug OR a pre-made. Were pre-mades hard to form there? Not at all, yet some people solo-queued anyways - and yes, the premades would usually win.

[Mawlzy]

I couldn't agree with you more, I don't know whether this stems from people who detest the actual mode (3 alliance) , who haven't had a lot of experience with larger scale random alliances, or find it really different from their prior experience and don't like it.

For example, one prior comment said that it was "daft" to mix a pre-made into solo queues. Now, this isn't the first game where I've seen this in a non-competitive mode, it was used in a PvP/PvE game and players here would have found it even worse because a whole pre-made team (6 people) could be matched against a full pug OR a pre-made. Were pre-mades hard to form there? Not at all, yet some people solo-queued anyways - and yes, the premades would usually win.

Uhm. Sounds kinda daft

[Scintilla]

I don't know whether this stems from people who detest the actual mode (3 alliance) , who haven't had a lot of experience with larger scale random alliances, or find it really different from their prior experience and don't like it.

I presume you aren't referring to those of us who are making points against premades because, if you were, I'm not sure where you draw this conclusion from at all?

Personally, I like the 3-alliance structure and would be rather sad to see it go. It has it's flaws, not least as it can be baffling to try to understand the logic of the third team in some games, but I still very, very much prefer it to a regular 2 alliance game.
I wouldn't say the second point applies to me either: I much prefer PvP to any other aspect of this game and, aside from a few daily roulettes, practically all of my online time is spent in playing FLs across my 3 alts (CC too, but to a somewhat lesser extent. As I said, I like the larger scale, 1v1v1 setup of FL more). 3-a-day are purely my alts FL dailies; I play extra to that even after those are completed.
And, finally, in the past I have played PvP heavily in other games before FFXIV and I much prefer the system here. In one in particular, PvP was extremely toxic and flaws in the system were heavily abused by players wherever possible. There, flaws were even greater and more numerous than those here, hence I was very pleasantly surprised when beginning here at how much different it was. However, while better than other games, this system still has issues and we want to highlight these issues in the hope that it results in some kind of resolution or improvement being found. It won't be easy or straightforward, but it's still immensely better than simply ignoring the situation.

this isn't the first game where I've seen this in a non-competitive mode, it was used in a PvP/PvE game and players here would have found it even worse because a whole pre-made team (6 people) could be matched against a full pug OR a pre-made. Were pre-mades hard to form there? Not at all, yet some people solo-queued anyways - and yes, the premades would usually win.

Purely because the situation might be worse in a completely different game, it still doesn't mean that the problems here are non-existent. Okay, so there's another worse-off game (there'll be many out there), how does that mean that this game requires no improvement whatsoever? Do only the very worst games in history need improving because the rest are "well, they're worse than us, so our problems can be ignored"?

It sounds almost like you're suggesting that because a different game is currently in a much worse situation, that means that all issues and reports of problems in this game are invalid

[Mawlzy]

Clearly it's not poisoning the entire mode. I and several others have never had much issue with this supposed pre-made problem.

Does it happen? Sure it does. Is it a problem everywhere? Not at all.

Calling pre-mades a poison upon the entire mode is an exaggeration. And before you deflect and call me one of the pre-mades, I only queue solo, been doing it since FL began, will continue to queue solo.

Friend, I'm not in the habit of accusing people here of anything. I believe we bother to post because we enjoy FL and want to see it improve and grow.

I only play on Aether, so yes, I cannot speak for the entire mode.

I do hope SQEX look into the data, because ultimately that should be the deciding factor. For example, if the vast majority of those queueing as a light party have comparable K/D/A and win-rates as those queuing solo, there is no problem worth addressing. But it sure doesn't feel like that.