Thre important changes please to Frontlines to stop an RNG slaughter-fest

[Chiami]

First of all, I am by no means a hardcore PvPer, only do some Frontlines occasionally.

But by now I have see three things happen over and over... to a degree that turns me away from PvP entirely.

a) Extremely unskilled players end up in the same party and instance as extremely skilled players, turning the first into cannon fodder for enemy teams, which is a giant frustration if you are lumped in a party/alliance with a lot of the cannon fodder, but also not great for those who are nothing but just... fodder.

b) Party/alliance composition, oh how we are in RNGsus hands. If you end up in a PUG party where no one has healers leveled sufficiently? While the other teams have enough healers to keep them up? You are dead dead dead, prepare for 3rd place as you get slaughtered. Your own skills, team coordination mean little to NOTHING then.

c) Can we talk about the elephant in the room, premades? If I see a premade mowing across the map of Frontlines, slaughtering and bullying naturally less-coordinated (and usually less skilled) PUGs like a well oiled machine, that is not decent, fair PvP...

... that is a nasty slaughter-fest creating more frustration for all but the handful of premades out there who feed on all the other PvPers and laugh their heads off about this near-exploit in the system for easy victories. And yes, in my experience it is rare to the extreme to see more than one premade on a map, IMO it really borders on an exploit (even if not against ToS of course) how they mostly seem to queue during times when it is 8v8v8, where they know they will reign supreme.

All of that together has turned Frontlines into something nasty, ugly, and sucking out whatever fun was once in there. No one would cheer if highly trained knights or samurai of a well-disciplined and experienced, tight-knit unit are given a permanent opportunity to slaughter feebly experienced, randomly thrown together peasants for gain and glory (is that actually glory?), but that is what it looks like by now when you allow experienced premades into PUG maps.

I just came out of such an instance, where we PUGs could just give the one premade a wide berth, while they chased and bullied us across the map, and most of my party members shared the same sentiment here:

Don't allow premades onto the same maps as PUGs. Either you get a map only of premades, or only of PUGs, no mix-matching.

And I say this as someone who likes to queue with friends, including into PvP, but I rather give up that, than seeing the current state continue.

Also please at least TRY to rank people according to PvP skill and through it form according parties and maps so people can learn at their own skill level and get better (rather than get conditioned to be nothing but canon fodder, going in only for the 3rd place participation reward) -- because it is obvious that right now that is not happening, going by the results.

And don't allow parties to happen without anyone queued in as a healer, to at least a little bit alleviate the "Oh joy we have zero healers, we are so dead."

Of course you can now say, "Well if you don't like it then don't do PvP." And if things don't change that's what I am gonna do. But I still care enough to point out that by this kind of logic the quality of all content can be allowed to slowly degenerate if there are flaws in the system, until it becomes near-dead content, or in the case of PvP either something done only by premades and newbies who leave after a couple of frustrating experiences, or only participate for the 3rd place wolfmarks, and don't give a hoot about the quality of the match. Is that what we want here...?

(And yes, I have seen plenty of comments in Frontlines by now of people saying essentially "I don't care, win or lose, I get my participation reward, screw PvP, I just want the glam/hairstyle/minion/whatever." Baaaad indicator of where Frontlines is headed these days...)

[Keoeson]

c) Premades make up a decent portion of people queueing at any given time. Without them, queue times would suffer. The people that queue in premades aren't going to solo queue because playing with bots and bad players is a miserable experience. Its really a win-win when you look at it. Separating the queues would hurt queue times all around.

How exactly is it an improvement by making the experience for everyone else a misery? During the day with 72man premades are tolerable at best, but in the evening they kill queues immediately in 8v8v8, because once you "experienced" a premade, you rather call it a day.

As you said, if you don't like it, don't do pvp. It isn't content for everybody.

This attitude is what kills PVP. If you kill the fun even for lower skilled/less experienced you constantly shrinking the player pool.

[griffinborn]

Not everyone enters PvP with the same mindset. Some people want to win, some people just want to get their daily over with, some people just want to farm for glam.

The problem is that there aren't enough people playing the game that are serious about PvP because, quite frankly, it isn't very good.

[Araxes]

Well to be fair, 9 button pvp is in itself miserable. We're all having a bad time playing it. We're just having slightly more fun than you are.

Speaking right out of my heart.

I myself mostly go in with Friends from other Servers. It IS kinda unfair TBH.... it really feels like you raid some poor villagers in some cases. That said: i usually would advise you to find a premade yourself but i know that no one queues into PF to find a bunch or pvp players. Joining a pvp Discord might help better in that case, the only problem is to find an ACTIVE pvp Discord.

[Keoeson]

Well to be fair, 9 button pvp is in itself miserable. We're all having a bad time playing it. We're just having slightly more fun than you are.

I can only repeat myself, this selfish attitude is what kills PVP. You can use the chance of the current hype and teach people about PVP or you can only blame yourself if it's soon dead again, because people don't like to be used as canon fodder.
Maybe you should take your own advice, if the 9 buttons make you miserable and "if you don't like it, don't do pvp. It isn't content for everybody", but it's no reason to spread your own misery onto others.

[Keoeson]

Yeah, its definitely not the plethora of bots that Square refuses to do anything about...

So instead of exercising a little self criticism, you're just deflecting the blame to others?
I'm only going to repeat myself here, so no further comment.

[DrWho2010]

PVP isn't supposed to be a "feels good" time where everyone wins. That's not PVP.

[Araxes]

if the 9 buttons make you miserable and if you don't like it, don't do pvp.

The Problem is : Some Players coming from other Games love PvP. I myself played Aion for Years (even reached Great General as a PvP Rank) wich is basically a fulltime PvP Game. No matter where you go, you could be attacked any second. Sadly, the Game was destroyed (pay2win, the Game is almost dead by now) by the publishers in the EU and so i went to find another Game. I found FFXIV just as Heavensward started and i loved the PvP even though there is still no open pvp and now will never have open pvp thanks to the 4.X changes.

So then, are we supposed to switch Games or even pay 2 subs for 2 different Games just to play PvP in another Game? No. We just "make the Best" out of what is left.

[Keoeson]

The Problem is : Some Players coming from other Games love PvP.

It depends on what kind of PVP you're expecting. FFXIV generally tries to keep the skill gap low, so it can be enjoyed by a majority of players. Deep mechanics with a big skill gap are usually a big barrier of entry for new players, but can be satisfying for hardcore players.
It seems some people think you can only have fun by winning, but I don't think modes like frontlines are designed for that. It might be alien concept for some here, but you can also have fun without winning as long as you preserve the illusion that you could have won. This way you stay motivated and queue again and maybe next time you get a better alliance or better node spawn rng. You will always have a certain percentage which will be bad at this, but why should they not have a chance at enjoying this? On the other hand keep players motivated and you'll increase the pool of players who gradually get better at this. This may not the type of PVP you want, but it's what we got. Premades are one element that throw a wrench into that system and demotivate everyone but the most hardcore players.

We just "make the Best" out of what is left.

Maybe the best for you is to lobby SE for separate PVP worlds, but by alienating other players you'll only go back to long queue times, because nobody wants to play with you.

[Araxes]

but by alienating other players you'll only go back to long queue times

I dont see any issues here TBH. Queues are opening sometimes until 3-4 am with a 5 minute Wait in Primetime.
Yes i prefered the more skillrequiring PvP, i miss it very much and i kinda have to smile every time someone brags about making Top 100 in the Feast.... after Season 4. (Yes i know its a FL topic.. but still.)