Is the "One Steppe at a Time V" achievement reward a bit cruel to put up?

[Mawlzy]

Winning is the goal since it grants various rewards - it can be the win itself, experience, tomes, whatever. What you described is your own justification for not achieving the goal, as well as how rewards are allocated.

These are not the same.

The only way that "winning is not the goal" is if someone is completely apathetic to the outcome of the match - for example, some could care less as to the amount of series EXP rewarded that they get from the match. In which case that person is likely to make little or no effort. i doubt that they're even having fun at that case, in which I go back to wondering why they're even there.

I guess another way of putting this is that for a small subset of people just there for the XP, there really isn't a goal beyond queueing in. They might want to get the match done as quickly as possible, which is a problematic goal, since the easiest way to achieve it is to throw. Either way, this is completely antithetical to the goals of the majority of players and the stated purpose of a match.

This rarely happens in other roulettes, because even if you're just there for the XP, doing any damage and not dying gets the raid/dungeon/trial completed faster. PvP is unique, thus roulette rewards should work differently IMO.

[Elfidan]

This post is kind of the same thing as the 'should raids have lockouts?'.
Could it be a bit easier? Sure. Is it necessary as a retention method? yes.
I will say that the rise of commanders has made this less stable than it used to be and more similar to the old days where one GC was always the winner. At least the teams are random, but I can see where you might get dunked on by random chance more than desired by the dev team who previously added the freelance system to force a more routine 33% win rate for most.

[Eno_R]

an update for my journey through this little monster of an achievement.
I'm finally half way \o/ (51 wins as of writing this)
My Bf has been joining me on ques in recent so that by even a fraction, I have another person that I can trust isn't just standing there for queue experience.
Does that mean i'm doing better at it? god no, I've failed 3 times today so far and last week I had a 7 loss streak before I got anything that mattered. (Ricky bobby rules in this achievement: if you're not 1st You get no progress)
I've even taken up to trying out different classes, the gameplan seems to be Tanks being able to become virtually unkillable for a time in a timed event so I've gotten to practice being an utterly toxic unkillable bean for bursts of 10-30 seconds, Untill the entire team focuses you with more stuns on various classes than what seemed feasible. Still can't figure out how BLM nukes so many people without being killed for it constantly. Sage being able to hold areas has felt utterly useless since everyone seems to know how to drop an AOE inside the shield making it a useless killbox. I want to continue using Machinist but kills seem to be only possible for groups of people overwhelming someone with their multitude of defensive/healing abilities and I too often found myself focusing the wrong person. (sniping is still fun though)

In the very least having someone to do it with is a way to help ground you, if you find yourself as someone with a temper that tries to get away from you. Its not perfect... having an entire team be somehow coordinated and all decide to focus you with stuns locking you in place despite having popped cooldowns. Or getting Snipped by someone through your shield when its not once ever worked for you that way. Or swearing that a Paladin somehow effing Holmgang'd you, Paladin's don't have a yank move right!? wtf...
either way having someone around to destress with while voluntarily running your head into a wall (metaphorically)Is good.
*EDIT* took 5 or so fails but I got a win xD i'm free for today.

For other context Construct 7 is a reference from FFT, for me Worker 8/Construct 8 was one of my most favorite characters in that game. It would be an easy guess to how I learned to draw my particular style of art. I can see the lines that lead me to having a fixation on wanting to get that mount.
What's more I've also made my own FC in the hopes of eventually craft/sell Airship parts so I can start making money. The S-Core from Faux Commander usually sells for somehwere between 15-20 million gil. Maybe I can just buy the red one and that neurotic part of my brain that wants the dang mount can be satisfied with a red one.

[Chasingstars]

Winning is the goal since it grants various rewards - it can be the win itself, experience, tomes, whatever.

Which is just varying amounts. It doesn't change the luck-based nature of frontlines. As it still is a participation reward, just like the malmstone series rewards are participation rewards. The only difference between a person who wins every frontlines match and a person who gets 2nd/3rd place with most of their matches is the amount earned and how long it takes to complete a given achievement.

What you described is your own justification for not achieving the goal,

I assume your not saying that is my own justifcation for how I play. I said that a person could semi-afk and get same rewards as a person who did. After all, I seen this behavior from teammates who will end matches with 0/0/0 as their KDA but were in the full match of frontlines.

as well as how rewards are allocated.

Yeah because it a timewaster most of the time from a "win or nothing" point of view. You have a baseline 33% chance of victory. if you play 3 matches in a day, get 1st place, 2nd place, and 3rd place once for each, then that means 20 to 40 minutes of your day was eaten by an activity that gave you no reward if you only care about getting 1st place and therefore progressing an achievement.

As I take issue with the matter of "Winning is the goal of pvp [frontlines]". As you will be far more disappointed and frustrated at losing which has a baseline 66% chance to happen.

The only way that "winning is not the goal" is if someone is completely apathetic to the outcome of the match - for example, some could care less as to the amount of series EXP rewarded that they get from the match. In which case that person is likely to make little or no effort.

News flash, I don't give two shits if I win or lose. But I will fully participate with my team anyway. A healthy dose of apathy is required for frontlines to roll with what the RNG gives you, its what lets me have fun even if my team comes in third, where I don't get frustrated.

i doubt that they're even having fun at that case, in which I go back to wondering why they're even there.

It's certainly a healthier mentality to have with frontlines and treat it as what is than having a "win or nothing" mentality with it and becoming miserable from getting loss after loss especially if you are actively grinding it in a day for the series malmstone of that season. I already got the rewards I wanted from that season and just the general frontlines achievements rewards of the mounts and the coat.

After all, here is a screenshot from my previous series malmstone where I just kept playing for fun after I got the reards. Which yes that alone translated into 160,000 wolfmarks.

[Silaryn]

As I take issue with the matter of "Winning is the goal of pvp [frontlines]".

What are you talking about? It isn't subjective; winning is the goal. In pvp 2 or more individuals or teams compete against each other TO WIN.

Maybe I should've used the word "objective" instead of "goal"? The objective of pvp is to win.

[Nubrication]

Hello everyone,

I am a casual PvP player, who always likes to pop in each day for the Daily Roulette. I really enjoy playing it every day and I try to do my best. Unfortunately, my FC members are not very much into it.

However, with this new achievement and it's fancy mount attached to it, I think PvP is starting to be less appealing to me.

Every day I do my best to try to get a win out, but it is getting very hard to achieve. I am lucky if I manage to secure at least one victory. On weekends, I may be able to play slightly more. During the week, I am lucky if I have time for the daily Frontline.

I don't think I'm a bad player, not the best one either, I would consider myself average. But I've never one 100 games in Frontline before, and I doubt I will get this achievement. But I really fancy getting that mount and most of the times you lose due to other players ( as said, I'm not a great player, but I understand enough to know how to win, I think) which is not nice at all.

Shouldn't the mount be tied to a participation achievement (Do Onsal Hakair 200-300 times say)? At least you know you can get a reward for playing this and not loosing the desire to play PvP.

It probably sounds like a rant, and you could be right. But after a couple of victories only, after 10 games, I think I needed to put something up on this board to relieve some tension. ^^'

Auryn.

Keep playing, you’ll get there eventually. It should definitely not be a participation award, that’ll just encourage more people to be useless and or “afk.”

[Cidel]

I've even taken up to trying out different classes, the gameplan seems to be Tanks being able to become virtually unkillable for a time in a timed event so I've gotten to practice being an utterly toxic unkillable bean for bursts of 10-30 seconds,

Well yes, that is the gameplan depending on which tank you're playing and the general IQ of your team/enemy teams. The only 2 tanks that come across as "virtually unkillable" would be DRK and PLD due to the nature of their LBs. In a FL environment, PLD is far more effective at being a distraction/nuisance with a side of clutch covers/stuns for finishing-off people. DRK is... a meme at this point so I think it goes without saying what it's capable of.

WAR is more of a disrupter/ set-up role. And GNB is probably the most glass-cannony of the 4 that requires an aggressive team to do well in. Not to say they aren't "tanky" either, they just lack the emergency "how to keep morons occupied for 10 seconds" buttons DRK and PLD have.

...Untill the entire team focuses you with more stuns on various classes than what seemed feasible.

That's a positioning issue. If you're ever caught in that situation you likely overextended or overstayed your welcome/ your team left you. Up against upwards of 20+ people, you are bound to get chain-CC'd.

...Still can't figure out how BLM nukes so many people without being killed for it constantly.

Any BLM worth their salt in FL is keeping a safe distance or surrounding themselves by other teammates. What works in their favor is that your average FL player is unable to look (or tab) beyond the DRK or DRG in their face to the healers or ranged DPS standing 3 feet behind them with a significantly smaller defense bonus modifier. People often don't realize that a BLM will take a fraction of the effort/damage required to kill than any melee job. I've seen people ignore ranged DPS in situations of a choice between them and a melee/tank just because the latter wasn't quite at full HP...

...Sage being able to hold areas has felt utterly useless since everyone seems to know how to drop an AOE inside the shield making it a useless killbox.

Sage's LB in FL is a perfect example of the This Looks like a Job for Aquaman trope. It's useful in bottleneck areas like Borderlands' caves ramps and narrow chokepoints to the middle of the map, or bridges and mid ramps in Onsal. If you don't think you can get a use out of it defensively, consider dropping it in an enemy chokepoint the same way a MCH drops its turret as a deterrent. Their LB in Frontlines is rather underwhelming in most scenarios and you're better off focusing on swapping your Kardia target around to yourself and your party members most likely to be hit so you can buff your Toxicon's potency after applying your DoT and applying your defense-down AoE as often as possible to help things get killed.

I want to continue using Machinist but kills seem to be only possible for groups of people overwhelming someone with their multitude of defensive/healing abilities and I too often found myself focusing the wrong person. (sniping is still fun though)

MCH can be tough in FL, as they're initially quite underwhelming against tanks and melee DPS due to their highest-level defense bonus modifiers. You're far better off picking-on other ranged and healers. And without high teammate support, your damage has to be fast and concentrated. Otherwise your target will just outrange you and heal-up everything you just did. MCH's turret is great space-control; most people will immediately clear out of wherever you drop it, otherwise eat chip damage and a defense-down debuff. MCH's LB seems to be the hardest thing for people to use effectively. I often see people wasting it on people near-full HP/ People in their Guard bubble (it doesn't penetrate Guard, only buffed Drill does that)/ or on PLDs and DRKs in the middle of their LBs. Unless you are rocking a high Battle High level, their LB should be used on ranged/healers sitting at less than 60% HP; preferably after a buffed Drill or Air Anchor.

The focusing the wrong target is something a lot of people seem to struggle with. As a general rule, unless you absolutely have no better options, higher priority targets will always be healers and ranged DPS. Until you hit Battle High 3+, you're basically tickling melee and tanks without concentrated team fire. It's unfortunate, but I'm sure a lot of people aren't even aware that in FL, tanks and melee have a large defense bonus compared to healers and ranged. Such information isn't exactly made apparent for some reason.

...Or swearing that a Paladin somehow effing Holmgang'd you, Paladin's don't have a yank move right!? wtf...

They don't. They have a potent close range, single-target stun on a 15 second cooldown and a 5-second AoE Heavy if their Sheltron barrier isn't broken before it expires. You probably got drawn-in by a WAR or DRK in close proximity of said PLD.

[Chasingstars]

What are you talking about? It isn't subjective; winning is the goal. In pvp 2 or more individuals or teams compete against each other TO WIN.

For you, your cart (fun) is drawn by your horse (winning). If your horse fails, the cart doesn't reach its destination.

Meanwhile my horse (fun) pulls my cart (winning). It may seem innocuous at first, but I value my journey over my destination.

And since its frontlines, there is going to be a longer journey than compared to rival wings or crystalline conflict. Which means there will be lots of detours in 3rd and 2nd place by comparison.

Does that register for you?

[IDontPetLalas]

Which is just varying amounts. It doesn't change the luck-based nature of frontlines. As it still is a participation reward, just like the malmstone series rewards are participation rewards. The only difference between a person who wins every frontlines match and a person who gets 2nd/3rd place with most of their matches is the amount earned and how long it takes to complete a given achievement.

I assume your not saying that is my own justifcation for how I play. I said that a person could semi-afk and get same rewards as a person who did. After all, I seen this behavior from teammates who will end matches with 0/0/0 as their KDA but were in the full match of frontlines.

*snip, length*

As I take issue with the matter of "Winning is the goal of pvp [frontlines]". As you will be far more disappointed and frustrated at losing which has a baseline 66% chance to happen.

News flash, I don't give two shits if I win or lose. But I will fully participate with my team anyway. A healthy dose of apathy is required for frontlines to roll with what the RNG gives you, its what lets me have fun even if my team comes in third, where I don't get frustrated.

It's certainly a healthier mentality to have with frontlines and treat it as what is than having a "win or nothing" mentality with it and becoming miserable from getting loss after loss especially if you are actively grinding it in a day for the series malmstone of that season. I already got the rewards I wanted from that season and just the general frontlines achievements rewards of the mounts and the coat.

After all, here is a screenshot from my previous series malmstone where I just kept playing for fun after I got the reards. Which yes that alone translated into 160,000 wolfmarks.

First of all, I don't see why you seem to think that my comments were addressed to you personally. They weren't, I have no way of assessing your personal "apathy", and I don't want to be unkind, that ss happens to be extremely easy to achieve.

I also disagree that every loss necessarily leads to disappointment and frustration, certainly I prefer winning. However if I am in a close match against a very good opponent or 2 very good opponent in FL, or my team has come back from 3rd place and we have almost won- even if I am have been trying in the past for an achievement- I felt good. I knew that we tried, we didn't give up. Going in with the attitude that we can always steamroll is fun at first but actually gets boring after a while. So no, a mixture of wins and losses is fine as long as it isn't due to apathy.

Secondly, you're once again conflating the goal, the reward system and the design. You may or may not like what FL rewards or how FL distributes rewards. It's another matter to disagree with how FL is designed, whether is not liking the 3 alliance system, or that "PreMades ruin EveRy thiNg (TM)".

[Mawlzy]

First of all, I don't see why you seem to think that my comments were addressed to you personally. They weren't, I have no way of assessing your personal "apathy", and I don't want to be unkind, that ss happens to be extremely easy to achieve.

I also disagree that every loss necessarily leads to disappointment and frustration, certainly I prefer winning. However if I am in a close match against a very good opponent or 2 very good opponent in FL, or my team has come back from 3rd place and we have almost won- even if I am have been trying in the past for an achievement- I felt good. I knew that we tried, we didn't give up. Going in with the attitude that we can always steamroll is fun at first but actually gets boring after a while. So no, a mixture of wins and losses is fine as long as it isn't due to apathy.

Secondly, you're once again conflating the goal, the reward system and the design. You may or may not like what FL rewards or how FL distributes rewards. It's another matter to disagree with how FL is designed, whether is not liking the 3 alliance system, or that "PreMades ruin EveRy thiNg (TM)".

Yeah, agreed. Plus I'm trying to imagine what a "healthy dose of apathy" looks like. A non-attachment to winning and losing might be a better way of looking at it (in the Buddhist sense). Like you, I can enjoy a variety of matches irrespective of the result, but as you say, the goal of PvP is to win. This is what tells us to fight the enemy and capture objectives.