that's cause they are good, if youre good enough you can beat them, simple as that really
I'd love to play CQC! ... But.
- Thread starter nosleepdemon
- Start date
that's cause they are good, if youre good enough you can beat them, simple as that really
That's seriously bad luck, then - I think there are literally two active players with that sort of win/loss (which they have earned by being exceptionally good - they can reliably beat the people who can walk over the people who can walk over beginners). A more believable K/D of 3-4 and W/L of ~2 seems to be where most of the really strong players are.
Most of the games I've had recently have had a few high-level players and a mix of mid-level and beginner players ... but it seems to be very heavily dependent on when you play and what the matchmaking server thinks of you.
On your other points:
1) TDM's okay at busy times, but yes, plain deathmatch is where the players are. A combination of the other issues and as Jezzah says perhaps a lack of interest in the basic adversarial style has left it unfortunately short on players in total. If it had AI to pad out matches - not necessarily even good AI - it would probably get enough players not to need to actually use them very often.
3) This is certainly a surprising thing not to have.
4) Both the basic text comms panel and voice comms work in TDM. No comms in free-for-all.
6) There's a key-binding which can be set to show the match scoreboard with ranks mid-game (or wait until you get killed and then check). It's not set to anything by default.
7) The problem with four is that - unless there's a very big difference in skill - five is going to be a walkover for the side with three if anyone else joins. It'll start one with six players. I don't see why it won't start a free-for-all match with just two, though.
Yep it's a real shame that numbers seem to be so low. There are at least 2 new maps in the works I believe (they were supposed to be in the 1.5 update but didn't make the cut). Hopefully they'll make it into 1.6, and spike numbers for a bit. (If they're anything like Asteria Point, which I assume was one of the later maps they made given its complexity, they should be fun too 
)
On your specific points, I've had a slightly different experience on some of it, although I am now a level 40... :/
1. I get Team Deathmatch pretty reliably, but it has to be at peak times GMT (7-9pm ish on weekdays, evenings on weekends)
2. Matchmaking is definitely poor. The game obviously does try and put 40+s with 10+s at least if it can though. It's rare, but this weekend I was mainly getting owned by 50+ Prestige players. (FWIW I tend to go for the big dogs over easy kills if I can when the balance is off. There's no fun in shooting a flailing fish in a barrel :/)
3 / 4. Yep lack of lobby chat is pants. You can voice chat with your team in game, but current default is to muted.
5. Haven't experienced this at all, weird.
6. I tend to check the names of the high rank opponents at start.
7. Team matches def suffer with less. I have seen the game start with 3 vs 3 though etc. Think there's a 'length waited' aspect in there.
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Such a shame that there are so many issues though. When you get a match that goes to the line it's properly epic
)On your specific points, I've had a slightly different experience on some of it, although I am now a level 40... :/
1. I get Team Deathmatch pretty reliably, but it has to be at peak times GMT (7-9pm ish on weekdays, evenings on weekends)
2. Matchmaking is definitely poor. The game obviously does try and put 40+s with 10+s at least if it can though. It's rare, but this weekend I was mainly getting owned by 50+ Prestige players
. (FWIW I tend to go for the big dogs over easy kills if I can when the balance is off. There's no fun in shooting a flailing fish in a barrel :/)3 / 4. Yep lack of lobby chat is pants. You can voice chat with your team in game, but current default is to muted.
5. Haven't experienced this at all, weird.
6. I tend to check the names of the high rank opponents at start.
7. Team matches def suffer with less. I have seen the game start with 3 vs 3 though etc. Think there's a 'length waited' aspect in there.
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Such a shame that there are so many issues though. When you get a match that goes to the line it's properly epic
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I hate to say "well duh", but... Well, duh! The point is that rather obviously, most new players including myself are not that good. In a game with a match making system, you should not have players running around with such a massive win/loss ratio and if you do, that's clearly an indication that there are either nowhere near enough players playing, or that the match maker is not doing its job. What you're saying is essentially "It's ok to put Elo level 2200 players into Elo level 1300 matches every game and it doesn't matter that they simply clean house, because if you're good enough, you can beat them!". This is of course ignoring the gear advantage, which just compounds the issue.
It's mainly the "not enough players" and especially not enough high level players. It has improved since Arena was released standalone - I regularly see matches with three or four good players now - but other than the one player who can beat everyone, most W/L ratios over about 0.5 (deathmatch) mainly reflect the quality of the opposition rather than the pilot's own skill as such.
That said, you don't improve if you don't play against people quite a bit better (in-game comms would be useful for teaching purposes, among others...) so a "perfect" matchmaker would have its own problems - but that's one which would need more sophisticated systems than Arena currently has (e.g. the ability to set up matches with a manual player list)
The gear advantage is fairly small - it can be a useful edge in an otherwise even match, but if it wasn't close to start with it wouldn't have been close if the winner flew a stock Condor either, and most of the really useful bits are unlocked in the early ranks.
That said, you don't improve if you don't play against people quite a bit better (in-game comms would be useful for teaching purposes, among others...) so a "perfect" matchmaker would have its own problems - but that's one which would need more sophisticated systems than Arena currently has (e.g. the ability to set up matches with a manual player list)
The gear advantage is fairly small - it can be a useful edge in an otherwise even match, but if it wasn't close to start with it wouldn't have been close if the winner flew a stock Condor either, and most of the really useful bits are unlocked in the early ranks.
Like many things in ED it just feels like it's not done yet. Its the bare minimum for this type of thing, 3 basic game modes a handful of maps, a few ship and weapons and thats it. If it's worth doing then it really should be done properly, several more maps that really look and play differently. Perhaps the next size of ships added in as an alternate league. A race mode, king do the hill, protect/destroy the cap ship. Improved lobby with chat and the ability to see the current games in different modes waiting for players so you can see whats busy and what isn't. Bots to fill up games even when there aren't enough human players around and so on. But it seems to be becoming a bit of a thing for Frontier to half implement a good idea (or a bad idea depending on your point of view I suppose) then lose interest and go off and do something completely unrelated (halfway again usually).
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I wouldn't say it's a half implementation, but it's definitely a minimal one. Definitely Frontier's SOP to put out a minimal but solid implementation that leaves everyone begging for more.
When you can manage to get good matches, CQC is fantastic, and the most fun I've had with multiplayer space dogfighting since Allegiance. Populations are low enough though that good games and quick start times only reliably happen during specific "peak hours" windows.
Personally I think the "single most needed thing" is private matchmaking support. Specifically, this would solve:
- People could play with their friends without having to deal with random aces crashing the party and slaughtering anyone.
- The top-shelf pilots could arrange tournament and ladder games against each other, and probably spend less time seal-clubbing as a result.
- Likewise, you could have arranged noob-only matches or training sessions.
When you can manage to get good matches, CQC is fantastic, and the most fun I've had with multiplayer space dogfighting since Allegiance. Populations are low enough though that good games and quick start times only reliably happen during specific "peak hours" windows.
Personally I think the "single most needed thing" is private matchmaking support. Specifically, this would solve:
- People could play with their friends without having to deal with random aces crashing the party and slaughtering anyone.
- The top-shelf pilots could arrange tournament and ladder games against each other, and probably spend less time seal-clubbing as a result.
- Likewise, you could have arranged noob-only matches or training sessions.
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I wouldn't say it's a half implementation, but it's definitely a minimal one. Definitely Frontier's SOP to put out a minimal but solid implementation that leaves everyone begging for more.
When you can manage to get good matches, CQC is fantastic, and the most fun I've had with multiplayer space dogfighting since Allegiance. Populations are low enough though that good games and quick start times only reliably happen during specific "peak hours" windows.
Personally I think the "single most needed thing" is private matchmaking support. Specifically, this would solve:
- People could play with their friends without having to deal with random aces crashing the party and slaughtering anyone.
- The top-shelf pilots could arrange tournament and ladder games against each other, and probably spend less time seal-clubbing as a result.
- Likewise, you could have arranged noob-only matches or training sessions.
I would like to see a ranked ladder as well, with visible match maker ratings possibly with 1v1, 2v2 leagues etc.