A few thoughts about premade

By Zbyh20 on June 20, 2009 8:27:49 PM from

Hello!

Last weeks i see like 75% premade custom games. People are obviously making some race for highest winning streaks.

Make it clear, normally it's not fun at all to play in random team against premade team, like 3 friends vs 3 random or 4 friends vs 4 random. Sometimes You can beat premade team, but thats really hard to achieve. So I started to think... is this game going to be fully premade ? At the start, I could play this game just for fun, from time to time, joining some first custom game on the list and have fun playing with all random teams without any disadvantages from one side (sometimes I was unlucky and got newbie in my team, sometimes other team was unlucky and that was fair).

Yea, I know playing with friends it's great thing, I'm not saying it's bad. But well, just look at some people. They can play only in premade team !! And to be honest, they just won't play against other friend team at all, they just like to kick random !! Why ? That's good question.

The stupidest thing around here is, when You are a host and You are losing, just quit and the game won't save at all !! Today I had a game, where host team was losing, so he quits game just before their citadel was destroyed. Result ? He got 110 games winning streak... still (just imagine, how many times he had to do this "trick" to achieve this proud result !!).

I can't understand why some people care so much about ranking ? Do they THINK people will say "he is good, he has 100% wins" ? And what about fun, If You crush Your rivals in 95% games, otherwise (if You fight against better team, premade or just lucky), You just quits to not count that game ? Is this still funny for You or You are playing just to get next win in ranking ? I can't say, never tried that, but it sounds hilarious.

I know no one like to lose, at least I don't , but when I see the game was close and we lost just by a magrin, it's fine for me, really. But I can't understand, how can people have fun from this constantly wins. These games are like with AI, just do Your job, same as always, other team has almost no chances anyway. Aren't that wins starting to be... automatic games ? You don't really play, You don't really need to think there. Just find out which players from opposite random team are the weasest and constantly attack and kill them, buy better gear from that "free" money and then You can do whatever You want to.

I'm saying that as a random player, who played this game just for fun, to stress out. Now, it's really no sense to play for players like me. I know clans would clear this situation a bit. At least You could easly see some players from same clan, before game start or even make clan vs clan battles. But there will still be some people, who just like to kick random assess hour by hour, day by day, week by week.

I think, there should be a possibility in lobby to check player history. Let's say last 10 battles, by showing only players names and result of battle from the person You are checking. Why ? Well I don't want to play random vs friend games, really. There is a line between losing on same terms and being smashed by a well organized friends, when You can just observe how Your random team is feeding them. I don't want that, it's not funny at all. That's why I think people playing premade games should be easly detectable from lobby menu. Just think about that - it's really no fun to realize You are losing almost all Your games, because You are playing (sometimes literally) alone vs 3 or 4 friends.

I think that's the main reason, why this game have no chances to stay popular longer than next couple months. Even the strongest person would give up after 2-3 weeks of constantly losing vs friend games. You just can't play this game alone now. You need to have few skilled friends in Your party, because You can be 75% sure, the other team will be premade. And if You really want to play "24/7" with friends, there are plenty of MMORPG's, which are made this purpose. Anyway, I think making premades detectable from lobby, would help alone players a bit.

+1 Karma | 42 Replies

All I can really say about premades is, host your own game and place "no premades please" in the game title. I admit I'm in the camp that would really rather "premades" and clans etc announce themselves somehow instead of leaving us all in the dark, but I understand that opinion's not the popular one here.

I agree. Honestly though, I don't think we'll ever get any legit indication of whether or not a team is premade. It'll just be up to the community to be polite and forthcoming enough to say, "3v3 we are premade," for instance. And for that to actually stick and be commonplace will be the real challenge. I myself have a few online friends with whom I get together on occassion (we use Ventrillo), and you could pretty much call us a premade. 80% of the time, however, I am alone and play with random teammates. So, I know both sides of it. When I am premade, it's not as if I want to lure people into my "premade trap." I will thus try to start letting people know. As for whem I am alone (again, like 80% of the time), I would hope that others will let me know.

- andpancakes

This issue is already being addressed with the Clan Wars patch which will add all of the required features for pre-made Teams to play against other pre-made Teams.

Also, I don't think 75% is a fair assessment - I have yet to play against a pre-made Team. Perhaps the Teams you're fighting against aren't pre-made, they're just good players?

Most poeple join the custom games I make as a pair, so even if you're not playing against 3 people in a premade, theres a very good chance some portion of their team is. One thing it does do is raise the standard of play, at least.

I almost exclusively play with my friends, all the way up to 5v5s. We normally always put some skill/team indication in the titles of our games. But honestly when we just wanna play and have fun, people tend not to want to play us because we're a team. And it gets EXTREMELY annoying sitting around for 20min waiting for people to work up the courage to play against a premade. Now we normally win against randoms but there's plenty of times we lose. We also tend to try to make the game 1 size larger than we have players.

I sometimes look up the host's name on the website http://pantheon.demigodthegame.com/.

then look at his gamelist, if he's playing with the same people, then it's premade and then I just quit.

My friend and I sometimes join 2v2 games that are obviously premade (they are easy to spot if you know what to look for). They turned out to be some of the most fun and informative games that I've played in. I highly recommend it.

Quoting Blitz64,

reply 6

I sometimes look up the host's name on the website http://pantheon.demigodthegame.com/.

then look at his gamelist, if he's playing with the same people, then it's premade and then I just quit.

Yeah that's the best solution to check them out right now. But, all knows Demigod don't like alt-tabbing, beside it takes some time to check it out, so it really SHOULD be a system which let you check history in-game (nicks of people this guy played with in last few games would do the job). People need to have opportunity to check who they gonna play with.

I like to play vs premades, but only with my own friends, so the chances are equal. Right now, almost all my friends quit the game, because it just bored them. And yeah, when I played with my friends, I got like 95% wins vs random. Communication wasn't the most important case here, we played few games without Vent. The main reason of winning was... you know your friends, you know their behavior, you know they are good and you can count on them. If you are in random party you don't know anything about your allies, you can't count on them and you just need to do all by your own (ask them not to buy priests as the game starts, buy gold yourself, buy citadel upgrades yourself, protect towers yourself etc.). Of course sometimes you met very good players in your team, but well... only one n00b in your team takes all chances to win against premade. Maybe opponents just gets too much cash / exp for killing enemy demigod ? I don't think one player's 3 or 4 deaths early game should be so critical in 4 vs 4 game, and right now these deaths burry all your chances in most games.

Guilty as charged. Sometimes I play with a friend... but we do this in 3v3 and 4v4 games. So basically, we always have luck of the draw with the extra party. I must say, that even with my friend and I communicating properly we still can get steam rolled if the other team works together. That's what I like (and don't like) about demigod. You are either a very strong team or one of your teammates is a serious chink in your armor. We sometimes win 2v3 (when our teammates leaves for the AI to take over) but these are rare cases and we feel like we are over working ourself to compensate for our teammates uber feeding skills.

Either way, if you feel like you are playing vs stacked then by all means, rage quit. If they didn't advertise it in the game description then you have been deceived. In my opinion it is the same as writing "no noobs" in the game description and then you have a noob in your team that thinks he can solo vs 3 other demigods and the concept of "running away" isn't an option for him... you are by all means allowed to rage quit. "This isnt what I signed up for".

I would also like to comment on all the douchebags that join a game and see all the Forces of Light team full and think that it is a "stacked team" and leave. How long have you been playing the game? This is how the system assigns the slots. Fills up the Light side first and then the dark. Sheesh.

I only play Demigod with a friend of mine, I just find it a lot more fun, but we don't just do 2's, we play 3's as well and have the random person playing with us, sometimes they feed, sometimes they are good.

I really wish Stardock would add a Team Skirmish option because sometimes it feels like we play against some baddies, but its has a lot to do with our cooridnation and vent...

I think what will really lower the barrier between premades and non is when Impulse gets VoIP.

GpG and stardock wanted to make a game for casual games, because of no real team games and clan support we got a different thing like dota now.

Demigod is one of the games that is most unforgiving for casual gamers who waste peoples times in games. Casual gamers will get yelled at every game they mess up and will leave demigod after some games of frustration.

Same with other medium players who dont have premade teams and get steamrolled every game . If you dont have a good team this game is no fun and thats a instant kill for casual gamers.

The problem here isn't playing premades. I know it's the BEST fun to play with friends. But take an example: right now in lobby there are 4 EU games. Three of them are 3 vs 3 and one is 5 vs 5. All of them are premades (checked ranking). So why the hell, premade party don't want to join other premade ? It's equal then, all can win. Why all try to "make a trap" for random players ? If you are premade team, join other premade and fight against them. Isn't that fun to win when you have equal chances ? I think that's the biggest problem with premades. Almost all players just makes premades to take easy win, and I can't understand this kind of thinking. Is another easy win so funny ? Where is challenge ?

Couldn't agree more Poul. If stomping random players makes the game fun for them, then I don't want to play with them. Most of the fun of Demigod, for me, is the challenge in winning against good opponents.

Quoting Poul,

reply 12

Quite simple. So you see a game with 3/6 players. Now you suggest I take my 3 player team to that game? I'm not going to do that because it's far easier to create a game of my own where I can guarantee my friends get in. Joining a half full game is a hassle, there may be randomers joining in at the same taking spots from you or your friends. You need to ask the host to kick them, and then there might be connection problem with the other team and one of your friends. So the reason to create your own game is simple: no hassle. Only insecure people think the premades set up "traps", get over yourself, the world isn't out to get you .

I play with friends mostly, I don't really know if just playing with whatever friends are on counts as pre-mades, but if it does I guess I'm very guilty of this. I sometimes try to find pre-mades to play against but it's often quite difficult to get them to admit they're a team, and only a few will admit it even when they're obviously a team.

I don't see why it's such a bad thing to join or host a game with friends, me and my friends aren't HOLY SHIT AWESOME , and we don't usually come up with super complicated steamroll strategies, we usually just play to have some fun, and playing with each other on voice chat makes it much more fun.

Izzo, if your friends don't get in, just ask the randomer to leave. Inform him that the other team is premade and you'd like a crack at them with your own team. Works for me, although if the host team is cowardly you might freak them out and cause them to kick you. In that case just find another game, no big deal.

There's this one person I played against last night that I've been thinking a lot about since. Although the match itself was 1v1, I feel like this is somewhat of a similar issue as premades, so I'll just explain it here rather than making a whole new topic. I'll avoid using any specific names, as I don't want to be that guy who calls people out on the forums.

So anyway, I saw this person hosting a 1v1 on Crucible. Now curious, I immediately looked up this persons stats, and he's apparently one of the very top Demigod players right now with an absurd win-loss ration. To make a long story short about the match itself, I decided to take up this person's challenge and lost fifty minutes later, although I'm told that I did comparitively better than most opponents.

While I have no doubt that this guy is legitimately a good player and not a bad sport, what urks me about him are his practices made apparent by the Pantheon stats. For one, he's only played for a week and has over 150 matches, which seems rather unhealthy. More importantly, though, when a person has a lot games under his belt with an absurd win-loss ratio at about 90%, it comes off as suspicious, usually for good reason, and this player is not different. At first, although he only stuck to using one demigod ever, he was quite varied in the matches he played, even playing in Pantheon and Skirmish and winning the vast majority of the time without any apprent sign of premaking. About a third of the way in, he changed his sole choice in which demigod to play to something else. A little after the halfway point in his career, though, he fell into what I think is a bad routine. At this point, he always hosts his games, which is either a 2v2 with a specific premade partner or, when the buddy isn't around, a 1v1. His choice of maps are either Crucible, Prison, or Cataract. He specifically told me that he has no desire to ever play with a person that isn't a premade buddy of his.

What this leads me to believe is that this person is afraid of ever playing in a match in which he isn't virtually guaranteed to win by default, a trait likely common in players who exclusively play in premades, which I find rather sad. He has no trust in anyone besides his personal buddy, which is why he falls back to 1v1s on Crucible, where he has played often enough to create a formula to win all the time (hint: it involes securing the gold/artifact flag as much as possible, getting the HoL early, and having to return to the Citadel as little as possible). It's like as if he got his very high ranking by having such a tight control over his matches. I have no idea why he continues this monotinous routine, as it doesn't sound like fun at all. It most likely isn't fun for the people he plays against, either, especially since he can hardly get through his 1v1s without the other person quitting. On a positive note, he did tell me that if there was a Team Pantheon, he would use it.

After this match, I got curious about the other top-ranking players, and sure enough, it was easy to tell who premakes a lot. A thought has come to my mind, though: how about if we make a new topic that lists known premades? That way, single players can avoid falling into "premade traps", and perhaps the premades can even become aware of each other to organize competitive matches, if that is what they really want. I have plenty of groups in mind that I can share if such a topic is made.

a premade custom games option would be cool.

Heh, I played a guy today, it wasn't premade, but Zamzophs post reminded me. I didn't check the server settings, normally I have a quick peek. So we launched into the game and we have start level 5 and 8K in the bank.

Dam annoying playmode, but this guy won because he was so used to this setup. It was destroying to the two teammates I was with, as they were newer players and had no idea what to invest in. I couldn't keep up with this guys kills (he was UB, I was playing Erebus for the 2nd time). Admittedly though, it was a lot better to lose faster than spend a lot of time losing slowly!!!

I wonder how many games that guy has won with just setting up customs with different settings.

WE NEED RANDOM TEAMS OPTION FOR CUSTOM GAMES.

That is all.

There's no arranged teams for skirmish and pantheon. If/when they add this (basic) functionality you will undoubtedly see a significant drop in the amount of custom premade teams.

This is pathetic. I can understand you not wanting to get curb stomped, that is one thing, but you put the onus at the wrong spot. If premade teams are constantly crushing you, the problem is YOUR team not your opponents. Maybe matchmaking in skirmish and pantheon will improve such that a premade team will still be equally pitted against skilled opponents - the onus in this case is in the matchmaking being able to properly gauge the team of people vs the random people it is trying to match with. There is no reason for demigod to know you are on a premade team, other than if they add a matchmaking option of "Only match to other groups."

In custom games, my words to you are: tough. No, seriously, tough. You are always going to win some and lose some. This has zero bearing on being a premade team or not and has everything to do with how good your own team manages to work together. I am truly sorry if you have not gotten to play with random good people, but to put that blame on people you don't know is ridiculous. Step it up a notch. Get better. Whether you are playing against a premade team or not, the determining factor of whether you win or lose is how YOUR team plays. If you are all good players and communicating, you better damn well be able to give a good premade team a run for their money - if you can't, maybe you're simply not as good as you think?

This whole post and those supporting it boils down to you not wanting to be TOO challenged. You have, in your head, some weird and incorrect idea that you should only lose a certain amount and under certain circumstances. This is ridiculous. You either win or you lose. Put the blame on yourself.

Quoting Lumifly,

reply 22

Absurd. Put it in the flipping title. Play another premade. Random vs. random fair. Premade vs. random unfair. Premade vs. premade fair. Period. People don't do it for two reasons.

1.) It's slower to get people to join (because it eliminates randoms)
2.) People want to win (playing another premade would be too hard)

I have mixed feelings, being that I just played several hours of DoWII, and it was custom games the entire time (it's usually me allied with my friend 95% of the time). First game, stacked team for sure, but I thought "so I'll lose, but I'll watch the replay and learn". Well, the team not only stacked, they used some kind of exploit to win, and THEN, after all that, did some other exploit so you got no replay of the game (buring the evidence I guess).

The next game, a stacked 2v2; and for some reason, my teammate in the lobby kept trying to convince me to stay and play, so I did. When in game, he tells me via Ally chat that he's really a good player, and he's been trying to "smurf" the other 2 guys on the other team for a while cause they stack and lure new players in all the time (the game was called "Noobs"). Sure enough, as the game starts, it's obvious the other team is FAR from noobish, has voice chat, and has premade strats all set. But my "smurffy" friend was so good, we won (regaurdless of how little I could help him).

So sure, you want to play with friends, and having a practiced team makes victory more assured, so I think once Skirmish and a team-play mode is fixed, this will help a lot. But if your going to play with friends, I wish people would at least mention it to the other team; or put one of your friends on the other team sometimes.

As stated above in various different fashions, the problem with premades is that voice chat and coordination from playing together in the past will give you a very good chance of smashing any random put together team, and in particular, any new players. This is extremely demoralising for anyone, and will make the game bland fast.

Here is what I worry about happening.

New player decides to start playing custom games.

New player gets roflstomped by premades 80% of those games.

New player decides to quit custom games and go to Pantheon/Skirmish.

New player finds Pantheon/Skirmish still lacking in functionality and offer mostly 2v2 only.

New player quits DG, and goes to play Halo 3, with its semi-functional ladder system.

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A few thoughts about premade