Brad's comment in video on joining as teams...

Pantheon should be random... Custom games or skirmishes, teams are fine.

Just my opinion...

Ever play a game where you join as random and get paired against a team on vent or what not... Fun stuff... Not really.

If they added it so only randoms vs randoms, and teams vs teams, then I could prolly live with it...

But if not... And I find myself constantly going up against these premade teams all on some sort of voice service, against me and some random people, that probably will spell the end of the game for me.

you need to be able to join pantheon as a team.

Like I said in another thread. Premades should only play with premades, or nobody plays as a premade. Anything else skews the ladder because a premade vs randoms is always a skewed team. Even if the randoms are good players, the premade team has their Demigods and strategies picked out to complement each other, and randoms are, well, random.

Im just curious on what everyone elses opinion is on the comment Brad made in the video yesterday about adding a feature where even on a Pantheon game people could join as a team with thier friends to play?

Must've missed that video (and can't find it on the site). Do you happen to have a link for those that missed it?

Thanks

Quoting Rinoftw,

reply 2

you need to be able to join pantheon as a team.

Any more detail to your reasoning? I mean if they do some special tournament for teams to enter thats fine. But we are talking about the regualr Pantheon here.

I dont think it will promote people playing to get hammered on the Pantheon by arranged teams. The Pantheon should stay as it sorta is now...it randomly teams people based on skill or whatever to try and make a fairly even and fun match (well thats the idea anyway). Leave the teams to skirmish matches, custom games and for any special tournaments Stardock does etc.

Quoting Frank Buratai,

reply 4

Im just curious on what everyone elses opinion is on the comment Brad made in the video yesterday about adding a feature where even on a Pantheon game people could join as a team with thier friends to play?

Must've missed that video (and can't find it on the site). Do you happen to have a link for those that missed it?

Thanks

No he took it down it was on that update from yesterday as he said he wanted to edit it shorter. I was able to watch it before he did and he made a comment with one of the other devs of "Yeah we can make it so people can get a team of thier buddies together and launch into a Pantheon game together or as a clan etc"

If they added it so only randoms vs randoms, and teams vs teams, then I could prolly live with it...

that would work great

If they added it so only randoms vs randoms, and teams vs teams, then I could prolly live with it...

Agreed. What would be the problem with this? I know for me that I am going to have friends that I want to play the game with. Why not give the option to play competitively?

Joining Pantheon as teams is fine, as long as you CANNOT BE TEAMED AGAINST RANDOMS.

Please.

If they are seperated that is great. Just look how Warcraft 3 has it set up, works good - different tracking for random/organized.

quoting post

Im just curious on what everyone elses opinion is on the comment Brad made in the video yesterday about adding a feature where even on a Pantheon game people could join as a team with thier friends to play?

Me personally I dont like that idea at all. Yeah its fine for custom games or for Skirmish games even. But the Pantheon games should be a good playing field for everyone. Not a setup where 4 guys who are pro's can hammer 4 random matchmaking guys into the ground 5 games a day to inflate thier rankings.

I also see the possibilty of arranged game exploit possibly happening if guys figure it out. As it is right now its impossible as you join and its just luck of the draw to a certain extent which is how it should be at least for the Pantheon games in my opinion.

Just my opinion on thinking of it at first thought.

I agree with this for the most part.

Yes many of us don't enjoy playing games by ourselves. I doubt I would play this game at all if I weren't playing with buddies...so playing together in something like Pantheon sounds fun. If they make two pantheons, one for teams and one for singles that would be great. But personally I think a team-oriented one is more important, for the longevity of the game.

Also random teams isn't 'fair and balanced' ...sure everyone has a fair chance to get the good team, but that doesn't make the teams themselves balanced.

Quoting rtschutter,

reply 12

Also random teams isn't 'fair and balanced' ...sure everyone has a fair chance to get the good team, but that doesn't make the teams themselves balanced.

Agreed...but I think the greater concern some of us have is that the Pantheon will turn into this thing where you have a half dozen teams just ruling the matches stomping everyone using comms and perfect balance teams etc. So basically anyone not playing with a group of 3-4 other people might as well not even play in any of those matches.

Plus imagine the new players coming in...

"Ahh Pantheon...persistent tournament thing...that sounds cool lets try that out..."

"Wow those guys must be on comms they converge on everything perfect and have heals, tank etc perfect setup."

"Man why is that one guy on my team just standing in the base."

"Man this sucks...6 games in a row against these premade teams...this sucks."

Just looking at it from both sides. Teams will still be fine for Skirmish...or as everyone has said make it a deal where the Pantheon recognizes your team size and puts you a in a hold waiting for another arrganged team of the same size. That would be the best thing. Only issue of course with that is you had better be patient as if you have a team of 4 or 5 people you have to wait until another one joins.

If anyone needs a reminder of why teams vs randoms is a Bad Bad Idea, look no further than Battlegrounds in WoW, especially the always-hated Warsong Gulch, with Arathi close behind. It became common practice when going up against a premade to just roll over and let them win so you get it over with quickly since you'd have no chance anyway.

Or Dawn of War 2 RANKED games.

No no no. You need to have premade teams and 1 system. This is a team game. It would be really silly to divide the community in a way where people have separate ladders and such. We need 1 system. It works for Red Alert 3, it'll work for Demigod.

It would be really silly to divide the community

You mean kind of like how there's already 3 different ways to play MP?

I think the community is already large enough to support an additional team vs team layer in the Pantheon and Skirmish modes. It wouldn't even need a separate ladder, just make sure Pantheon premades don't get set up with Pantheon randoms, everything else can stay the same

Quoting Annatar11,

reply 17

It would be really silly to divide the community

You mean kind of like how there's already 3 different ways to play MP?

I think the community is already large enough to support an additional team vs team layer in the Pantheon and Skirmish modes. It wouldn't even need a separate ladder, just make sure Pantheon premades don't get set up with Pantheon randoms, everything else can stay the same

Exactly as he said...

We are not saying have two totally different leaderboards etc for random team games and premade team games....the results all go together. Just have the match matchmaking system though in that if they add the ability to join the Pantheon as a team...make it so the matchmaking will only match them against another premade team. Dont take 3 guys playing together with the perfect character combinations and then match them with a random team of 2 Sednas and a QoT. This will drive people away from the game.

You cannot logistically support a team based game by creating a system that caters to single players. The game does not have any built in voice chat. Pantheon -should- be a tournament where people who want to play together fight against other people who want to play together. If a person wants to avoid that he should join a custom game. The more skilled players generally do ranked games more than custom.

I will use Red Alert 3 as an example. We had 1v1 for a while but the community wanted 2v2 automatch. They listened and gave us a great 2v2 system and ladder. It was an option for for people who wanted to competitively play together. It works. There's no need for separate ladders there.

Red Alert 3 is way more of a 1v1 game than Demigod is. Demigod is a team game.

Quoting Polynomial,

reply 16

No no no. You need to have premade teams and 1 system. This is a team game. It would be really silly to divide the community in a way where people have separate ladders and such. We need 1 system. It works for Red Alert 3, it'll work for Demigod.

I would argue that the system Warcraft 3 uses works much, much better. Pre-made teams are matched against other pre-made teams. Randoms are matched against randoms.

I like the idea of being able to go in as a time, but the only fair way to handle it is to have two separate ladders. One where people join solo and get put together with a random team, and another where people can join as a team going in. If you mix the two, the guy without a team always gets screwed and he has zero motivation to play that way at all.

There needs to be an arranged team and random team ladder. There's a market for both playstyles. Some people love to be able to get with their buddies on ventrilo and coordinate their attacks. This is gaming at its finest. However, there are also lots of people that just want to be able to pick up and play without having to rely on others and "find friends" in order to compete.

WC3 had a solo ladder, random team ladder, and arranged teams ladder. This worked the best.

I know that I will probably quit Demigod if I find I "have to" make friends just in order to enjoy myself on Pantheon. I'm too old, too busy, and too engaged with my family to try to create a "social life" in an online gamespace.

Furthermore, my experience with WoW arenas has taught me that teams that are not made of real life friends are extremely utilitarian and perfunctory. A few bad games and one dude decides to quit because he is too immature to handle the learning curve. We don't need any of that here.

Bottom line: If you introduce arranged teams, you have to have a random team ladder. If you have just one or the other, then you will limit the player base and overall popular success of the game.

P.S. I am a ranked player on Azeroth for random teams in WC3FT and I find that system, though with flaws, works well. It's true, you usually get at least one noob on your team but so does the other side. Finding out who that noob is and exploiting that weakness is part of the art of winning random team games. So, on one hand, I love to be part of a team effort. On the other, I don't have the stomach to try to "make friends" with other gamers in order to compete. That's just me. SD and GPG don't have to cater just to my playstyle, however they need to keep in mind there are a lot of people that like team play but just don't want the social overhead of being on arranged team.

You cannot logistically support a team based game by creating a system that caters to single players.

It doesn't cater to single players. This isn't a 1v1 automatcher.

Pantheon -should- be a tournament where people who want to play together fight against other people who want to play together.

Obviously, which is what it is now. (or will be, once they remove the AI from it)

But there's a difference between being a "team" game and a "stacked team" game. A premade team that gets matched with randoms is stacked heavily in the premade's favor. This isn't an even playing field, but the ladder would reward them. Climbing up the ladder would be less about skill than it would be getting lucky and getting auto-matched with randoms so you could roll over them and get lots of favor points.

If you want a competitive game, you should realize this. Any premade team should only be allowed to be matched with another premade team. Then a win would actually mean something.

This sounds very carebearish. You cannot cater to everyone. Having separate systems decreases the matchup frequency. Why does there need to be an automatch for people who play solo? There's custom games for that. This is not Starcraft or Command and Conquer where 1v1s reign supreme. This is a team game. There is no need convolute matters more by catering to every person's playstyle.

Again, no one is complaining about this in Red Alert 3. If you don't want to play like this, then you can avoid it through custom games. Its simple.

Quoting Polynomial,

reply 24

This sounds very carebearish. You cannot cater to everyone. Having separate systems decreases the matchup frequency. Why does there need to be an automatch for people who play solo? There's custom games for that. This is not Starcraft or Command and Conquer where 1v1s reign supreme. This is a team game. There is no need convolute matters more by catering to every person's playstyle.

Again, no one is complaining about this in Red Alert 3. If you don't want to play like this, then you can avoid it through custom games. Its simple.

It's a marketing issue and from the perspective of a gamemaker you want to appeal and satisfy a broad number of customers. If the game only suits and favors one narrow interest or another, then you will decrease your player base.

Now, if SD and GPG wants to have less people playing their game, I guess they could take your attitude. But I'm not quite certain why a game company would want to do that.

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Brad's comment in video on joining as teams...

your opinions on it...