Frontlines sucks Ultra megathread

[YouWereIndicted]

As I said not too long ago in another thread, the only issue with these game modes is the player base. Yes, balance wise it is a meme and is all over the place but even so there are moments where it can be chaotic and fun. I mention the player base because these modes are full of lazy leechers who have no intention of playing to win or coordinating as a team. Then complaining when another team is. Which makes the experience frustrating for people who are going for achievements or are playing to win and try their best. I swear this is the only game and the only PvP mode I know of where people are against winning or playing optimally. It boggles my mind. Nowadays I default to selfish jobs like NIN or DRG that can get Battle High and survive well even on a team that cannot burst or maintain a fight to save its life because if I play a job like SAM or WAR the experience is way too frustrating on a passive team. I only play certain jobs (WAR, GNB, RPR) if I recognize good regulars on my team or a coordinated group. Which everyone should do, in my opinion.

Yeah, until they do something about bad players who don't care to improve or work as a unit this mode is screwed. A friend of mine is quite new and decided they wanted the Field Commander Coat. They had an optimistic view until they caught onto how Frontlines truly is. Despite being new they were always right up there with me in top 5 damage dealt on my team (which shows how easy doing the bare minimum is) and they also realized how many leechers are in the mode and refuse to fight which was frustrating to them. Nothing like seeing your team wipe to the same obvious burst countless of times without guarding, healing or repositioning then complaining about premades, lol. Yeah, they're the problem, surely. But this same team will ignore the first place team that is 20 points from winning and run to a useless node that will do nothing for us and leave all the players who are fighting with the other alliance(s) to die.

Premades are just people like me who got tired of dealing with anchor teammates and want to reliably fight without flipping a coin if your team is going to back you up or not. They aren't the problem...can we please stop talking about them already, lol.

[Cidel]

Instead we have people running to an S node (on the other side of the map) when another team is about to win. They don't realize that the S node doesn't matter when the other team wins in a few seconds.
We (team A) have people see that team B is 50 pts ahead of everyone early game and they tell the alliance to focus that team even though we have safer nodes closer to base being pushed by team C who is currently last place.
We have people that don't know how to pinch and end up being pinched instead.
We have people hit a guarded target or tank when an enemy ranged with BH is right next to them.
We have people go for BIG ice when SMALL ice has spawned.
And I can go on.

So much this.

It's not so much that Frontlines flat-out sucks, than it is that much of the NA people playing it flat-out sucks.

-Enemy DRK or PLD jumped in first? Better hyper-focus on it for 20 seconds through their CDs, LB then Guard than the legions of easier-to-kill ranged DPS standing 5 feet to the side.
-Enemy is less than 50 points from winning and third team trying to push them? Nuts to that. We're 200 points behind and an S just spawned by our base. Everyone turtle on it.
-Pushed a chunk of a team back near their base? Keep pushing! The points we got off of kills was just a buffer to the massive points we're about to lose from their invincible respawners and rest of their team.
-Team 2 has a minor lead 1st 3 minutes in and Team 3 is pushing to our respawn and farming our people? FOCUS TEAM 2! THEY'RE WINNING! THROW BODIES AT THEIR NODE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE MAP! IGNORE TEAM 3!

I could go on too. The ugly truth is a marginal majority of people queuing FL on our side of the puddle seem to be incapable of simple logic, utilizing resources or adapting to dynamic and changing situations. I can't entirely blame them though; the rest of the game is "press 1-2-buckle my shoe-then 3" under the monotonous choreographed dance that is team jump rope. FL is "casual," yes, but it's often the equivalent of people joining EX/Savage clear parties without having seen a single mechanic in the fight, let alone knowing their job's rotation, or even using their oGCDs. The only real meaningful RNG in 90% of FL matches is which team has the least amount of those kind of players.

[Chasingstars]

Yeah, until they do something about bad players who don't care to improve or work as a unit this mode is screwed. A friend of mine is quite new and decided they wanted the Field Commander Coat. They had an optimistic view until they caught onto how Frontlines truly is. Despite being new they were always right up there with me in top 5 damage dealt on my team (which shows how easy doing the bare minimum is) and they also realized how many leechers are in the mode and refuse to fight which was frustrating to them. Nothing like seeing your team wipe to the same obvious burst countless of times without guarding, healing or repositioning then complaining about premades, lol. Yeah, they're the problem, surely. But this same team will ignore the first place team that is 20 points from winning and run to a useless node that will do nothing for us and leave all the players who are fighting with the other alliance(s) to die.

Same thing happened to my friend who wanted to win and just get a Field Commander Coat, but they got so fed up with pvp and also drained from statics for savage/extreme, they felt the whole game wasn't worth playing. Their interest is just dead. As having unfun things does create what is known as a churn rate, the higher that is, the more you lose players.

Premades are just people like me who got tired of dealing with anchor teammates and want to reliably fight without flipping a coin if your team is going to back you up or not. They aren't the problem...can we please stop talking about them already, lol.

Maybe if certain pvp jobs get reworked to be more tolerable in the frontline environment.

[OliviaLugria]

The fact that you have to resort to using the lodestone is proof enough that you have nothing worthwhile to say, and no points to argue against me with.

You haven't completed my challenge. You've just given me a list of excuses, and then told me that NA is full of casuals "who don't know how to burst, guard, hold an objective, etc." Sounds to me like someone just prefers playing easy mode.[/QUOTE]

Showing a contradiction in your statements is a valid point to make. The ad hominem attack after... not so much. It's hard to say you can grasp a gamemode when you haven't done enough pvp to unlock any of the mounts or have more than 2 jobs unlocked. Your statements about alts is basically empty words and "excuses" as you say since you can't demonstrate they exist.

I question if you bothered to take the time to read my post. The first sentence was wanting clarification on your "challenge" I assumed you wanted some premades to go to JP, which they have, so I considered it completed. You then blame me for using excuses when those rather valid (and demonstrable) reasons in my opinion were prefaced with "I don't go to JP often" as in, I go to JP to play.

As for the state of NA, it is still pretty subpar in terms of skill level, but there's an increasing number of people who want to improve and work together. I want to continue to raise that floor of Aether by spreading and demonstrating my guide.

[Archeron]

It's hard to say you can grasp a gamemode when you haven't done enough pvp to unlock any of the mounts or have more than 2 jobs unlocked. Your statements about alts is basically empty words and "excuses" as you say since you can't demonstrate they exist.

Sorry, you're not going to see my characters. I don't need to prove anything to the likes of you, or your friends. My privacy, is my choice. I have listed a character that I don't particularily care about, or play on very much on crystal, and I genuinely laugh whenever someone brings this up as a "GOTCHA". No thank you, I don't want harassment directed towards my FC members, or my friends. I prefer to keep the hostilities on the forums, to the forums. If you can't respect that, I don't know what to tell you. Go take a hike.

You deflect, and say that "other" premades have gone to JP. How about yours? I know you have *personally* gone to JP, but you have avoided confirming whether or not you have premaded there with your team, so yes I safely assume my challenge has not been completed by you. I personally have a character in the works which I plan to play on the JP DC when time allows.

I disagree with the way you wish to improve the skill of people, and cooperation in PvP. I will not rehash arguements which span multiple threads at this point. I firmly believe nothing can be done to fix it without a major overhaul to Frontlines.

[Crusader1]

So many of these "premade" champions wont go to other datacenters because alone they cant be as effective with their add on programs they are using. They are only good partying up with others using the same "special" stuff. I have seen these champions que solo sometimes and they perform horribly, a far crly from their 10/0/100 numbers they get with their "special" premade friends.

[Mawlzy]

As for the state of NA, it is still pretty subpar in terms of skill level, but there's an increasing number of people who want to improve and work together. I want to continue to raise that floor of Aether by spreading and demonstrating my guide.

I accept that's your goal. I don't think your approach will achieve it. The skill level is low on average because of the significant fraction of the player base there for XP and rewards. Every time they get stomped by your premade, their view that the mode is worthless increases. Meanwhile, solo queuers like me who do try and are in the top 25% of skill actively avoid you because the enjoyment of the game drops.

If you want a high-skill version of FL, lobby for a separation of party and solo queueing. The fact that you have inspired more players to play in premades is extremely double-edged for the health of the mode. Mostly I see negatives.

[OliviaLugria]

It doesn't take much to go from daily rouletter to effective player. Literally follow the commander, burst with your team, leave with your team. Harder without one though, but then again I've seen more and more commanders popping up and they're all not bad and I've seen more and more people following them.

I can really only see more premades as a good thing. That's more people wanting to win and makes it harder to dodge competent players, so the cycle continues.

Adapt, die, or quit I guess :/

[Mawlzy]

Adapt, die, or quit I guess :/

I'll stick with "avoid."

[OliviaLugria]

eventually, you won't be able to. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯