What Video Games Have You Been Playing #12: Rage Quit - ain't my thing

[TheMeInTeam]

Yeah, I quit playing multiplayer games years ago. I also found that, in the team games, many players regard "teammates" merely as opponents or obstacles that they aren't supposed to shoot.

If your teammates actually shot at the enemy rather than facing them/not noticing them anyway and doing nothing they were already around at least median level of usefulness. Any form of communication or skill above what I would have expected from my nephew when he was 10 are bonuses!

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

This image reminded me of a recent explanation of what competitive Pokemon battles are like by @TheMeInTeam

This page always gives me a giggle to read, though. "Charm turns Luvdisc into a very sturdy physical wall that can survive two Caterpie Tackles and force it to switch out."

 

[EgonSpengler]

If your teammates actually shot at the enemy rather than facing them/not noticing them anyway and doing nothing they were already around at least median level of usefulness. Any form of communication or skill above what I would have expected from my nephew when he was 10 are bonuses!

Right, it was always stunning to me how many people log into these games and then don't participate. Some were probably bots, I suppose. In the games that have progression trees, I think you always gained some "XP" or whatever from games that your team won, so having a bot simply log in and then do nothing would, over time, accrue some in-game currency.

Also, the games themselves are usually poor at instructing new players, so once the game has been running for a while, new players are dropped in with the sharks. Company of Heroes had a system for attempting to match players by skill, but the other games I played didn't even bother. CoH usually had 1-3 players on each side, while something like World of Tanks has 15 on a side, and 30 players by skill would probably be really difficult, and/or take a long time. The upside was that you could get a game of World of Tanks in less than a minute, even if it meant half of the 30 players weren't really meaningful participants. I think WoT introduced a revised and expanded tutorial for new players after I quit, so I never got to see how well it did. I was fortunate enough to get into the game early, before players had time to become extremely good. It must be hell for novice players now.

 

[Lexicus]

Right, it was always stunning to me how many people log into these games and then don't participate. Some were probably bots, I suppose. In the games that have progression trees, I think you always gained some "XP" or whatever from games that your team won, so having a bot simply log in and then do nothing would, over time, accrue some in-game currency.

In league of legends people use bot farms to accumulate XP and the in-game points you use to unlock stuff. The bots are no match for human players and basically make whatever team they're on lose (assuming the other 9 players are human) but that doesn't matter as you get XP and points for lost matches (just not as many as when you win obviously).

 

[EgonSpengler]

In league of legends people use bot farms to accumulate XP and the in-game points you use to unlock stuff. The bots are no match for human players and basically make whatever team they're on lose (assuming the other 9 players are human) but that doesn't matter as you get XP and points for lost matches (just not as many as when you win obviously).

Right, bot detection must be another tough nut to crack, or I suppose every game would've done it by now.

 

[Lexicus]

Right, bot detection must be another tough nut to crack, or I suppose every game would've done it by now.

Well fwiw my friend gave me the login for a bot-boosted account as compensation for some of my accounts he got permabanned by trash-talking, and I used it for a few weeks before Riot permabanned it so I think they're getting better at it.

 

[Socrates99]

There was a sale last week on the HoMM franchise so picked up my favorite from the series, III. Played that a while and decided to snag VII even though I didn't like VI much. I'm really enjoying VII. I guess it was buggy on release so reviews are mixed but its playing pretty smooth now. I'm enjoying the city development setup of VII a lot and the skill layout on the heroes is neat. I'm sure I'll dump a significant amount of time into it.

 

[Synobun]

Achievement hunting in HoI 4 blows.

 

[Lexicus]

Achievement hunting in HoI 4 blows.

I don't think I've ever even played an achievement-eligible round of a Paradox game.

 

[Synobun]

I don't think I've ever even played an achievement-eligible round of a Paradox game.

It sucks, man.

 

[Lexicus]

It sucks, man.

I make a lot of asbent-minded mistakes when playing sprawling strategy games (including Civ). Not being able to save-scum them away would completely ruin the experience for me.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I make a lot of asbent-minded mistakes when playing sprawling strategy games (including Civ). Not being able to save-scum them away would completely ruin the experience for me.

The problem with Pdox games in particular is that sometimes the mistake is the player's, and too often for comfort the mistake is the developers'.

Say you pick a focus that says "can create factions". In fact, knowing your nation was one that could create factions you align ideology specifically to recruit certain nation(s) in advance, and time when you get that ability in the focus tree accordingly.

Then, you discover that you can't actually create factions "because you don't have the national spirit to do so" even after taking the focus, despite that this focus is supposed to give you that national spirit and does exactly that on most focus trees.

Now you're stuck. You either start over completely, or you slog through an extra 5+ years of in-game time fighting against a nation you specifically set up to avoid having to fight.

The developers of HOI 4 do not consider this to be a significant issue, which is why it has persisted for IRL years and can now happen in multiple different focus trees. It's not the only issue by far, unfortunately.

So this:

It sucks, man.

Certainly has some truth to it. Still, for some reason I'm a glutton for punishment and have most of the HOI 4 achievements. Truth be told only a couple of them are even kind of hard so I just wound up getting them. You can make back-up saves and kill process to get around ironman, but I almost never resort to that because it's annoying. Most just when checking an unclear rule post 1944 or something.

 

[Fippy]

There was a sale last week on the HoMM franchise so picked up my favorite from the series, III. Played that a while and decided to snag VII even though I didn't like VI much. I'm really enjoying VII. I guess it was buggy on release so reviews are mixed but its playing pretty smooth now. I'm enjoying the city development setup of VII a lot and the skill layout on the heroes is neat. I'm sure I'll dump a significant amount of time into it.

To think what a better publisher than Ubi could have done with Homm after 3 was such a huge success..almost makes me cry.

 

[Akka]

It sucks, man.

Not being able to save-scum and not being able to mod a Paradox game makes for a pretty drab experience.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

To think what a better publisher than Ubi could have done with Homm after 3 was such a huge success..almost makes me cry.

I thought 5 was pretty good and implemented some nice ideas (initiative, more unique mechanics between factions, spell school interactions). I still think 3 was better overall but I enjoyed 5 a lot. Hasn't looked so good since. And certainly, in the hands of someone better than Ubi it might still be considered one of the all-time best series even among modern titles.

 

[Gorbles]

An arguably-unhealthly amount of Borderlands. I went through the first one with a friend, and am getting myself used to TVHM (New Game+) again while running the second with the same friend. The aim is to get him up to speed so we can do the recently-released story DLC that sets us up for BL3 later this year.

My (increasing) objections with the management of Gearbox aside, their developers are talented and have created some really inventive systems. I loved reading their old "Inside the Box" devlogs, and for better or worse I'm invested with more than a few of the franchise's characters.

(also some Overwatch, and some Civ, but those two games are relative constants in my life - I haven't touched Borderlands for several years at this point)

 

[Lexicus]

The problem with Pdox games in particular is that sometimes the mistake is the player's, and too often for comfort the mistake is the developers'.

I mean for me a substantial fraction of my mistakes are my fault, I'm willing to own up to that, though a small number do happen because the UI isn't clear about the actual mechanical effects of some decision. But I don't think I should (from my perspective, anyway) waste hours of gameplay because I happened to make a mistake just before a scheduled autosave overwrites my save file.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I mean for me a substantial fraction of my mistakes are my fault, I'm willing to own up to that, though a small number do happen because the UI isn't clear about the actual mechanical effects of some decision. But I don't think I should (from my perspective, anyway) waste hours of gameplay because I happened to make a mistake just before a scheduled autosave overwrites my save file.

I don't see anything wrong with your position on this. I've just overplayed EU 4/HOI 4 to the point where most of my mistakes (which I still make) are recoverable easily because the game does give a fair bit of margin for error. When you put 6k hours into something the mistakes become less frequent and the ability to recover improves.

But it's still frustrating to have the game lie about what will happen before you declare a war, or set 60 > 60, or block you from taking land you could core with the (false) explanation that you can't core it, or hide fort rules to the extent that I can post a screenshot that's impossible for anybody on the development team to tell me where armies are allowed to move because it's contingent on information you can't know by looking at the game board. This is a special kind of frustration that you don't typically see in other games. For its flaws the Civ franchise does this much less frequently, and most games almost entirely lack it.

 

[Socrates99]

I don't think I've ever even played an achievement-eligible round of a Paradox game.

Easy, try the Warlock II the Exiled. I got all excited when I saw the Paradox label. It's easier than CivVI, not even joking.

 

[Socrates99]

To think what a better publisher than Ubi could have done with Homm after 3 was such a huge success..almost makes me cry.

I'll always go back to III especially now that I have it easily accessible on Steam. I did like IV alright, V was about the same but with VI it felt like they went over the top with graphics to the point where it hurt gameplay. I'm almost 40 and colorblind. I have no interest in squinting at maps to find nodes.

I thought 5 was pretty good and implemented some nice ideas (initiative, more unique mechanics between factions, spell school interactions). I still think 3 was better overall but I enjoyed 5 a lot. Hasn't looked so good since. And certainly, in the hands of someone better than Ubi it might still be considered one of the all-time best series even among modern titles.

I did dump a considerable amount of time into V. I think I even chugged through all the campaigns in it. I might actually do that with VII.

Really like a lot of the ideas in the series overall. I do wait for sales now though.