Team Stacking By Donators

[redruM_13 17]

I have been doing a little research this morning by googling stacked teams in tf2. This problem is everywhere, not just in Lotus Clan. Public servers..... Other clan servers..... Everywhere. This thread is photocopied over and over with some of the same exact comments place after place. "We want to play with our friends.... we can't help if were good and others aren't." NKET's comment about football is probably one of the most laughable but brings out the most truth. TF2 is like a football game. It's a team sport. Imagine a team who plays football as a team all the time together, who want to play a game with random people from the street.... what do you think will be the outcome? It's not team stacking.... these are actual teams that have sprouted up in Lotus Clan, who play with each other everyday and know each others moves.... can make there team balanced by telling people there are too many engies and they listen..... Pick up teams do not. They communicate with each other and have fun doing it. Have you ever tried to communicate with the team of losers? They have mics. Most the time they just have nothing to say. They are mad. They start talking when they are winning again. The only solution offered through these threads that I could decipher was to have a live administrator that scrabled the teams at his or her discretion. I don't think this will work.

I like the threads like Chamrox's skunk rule. It shows people that are looking for a solution besides just switching servers. Switching servers works. I still think that stats should ratio with the team skill that you are playing. If one teams rank adds up to 100 and the other teams rank adds to 2000 then if you are on said 2000 team you get double bonus points towards your stats. This would give people some incentive to play against TEAMS (you notice how I did not use the term STACKED TEAMS). Of course there are loopholes there too, but maybe something to experiment with.

[+Henry Spencer 117]

None of you are real... just figments of my imagination.

[Rydawg 14]

None of you are real... just figments of my imagination.

To hell you say! I am real!

[Plasma Waffle 0]

People who say even team numbers aren't stacking teams are really annoying. Nket, your comparisson about Football... they're not playing get-together PUBs for fun, it's a league with set teams. Now if someone were in a league (eg. CAL, TWL) and they were complaining about stacked teams... then yes that would be ridiculous, it's just one team better than another. But in the case of a public game, the teams can be stacked with very experienced players who are very good at the game, against people who have recently bought the game and are new, not too sure what they're doing. As the numbers are fair, the level of skill completely becomes overpowered on one side. This is not a fun game, I would much rather play a balanced game then win every match flawlessly.

Edited March 24, 2009 by Plasma Waffle

[Nket 16]

If one teams rank adds up to 100 and the other teams rank adds to 2000 then if you are on said 2000 team you get double bonus points towards your stats.

being on teams will not affect your stats. Killing higher skilled players will raise your skill more than a higher skill player killing you. Notice how Keg, Miyari, and myself have all dropped off the top of the rankings, because holding a rank that high is goddamn near impossible, no matter how many people you kill. If we teamstack for stats reasons you are wrong. Because killing 15 idiots for each time we die to one of them (lolcrits) our skillpoints still drop, we stack to have fun, we stack to dominate the opposition. Once again, did the United States scramble teams with Iraq when we invaded them? traded our tanks and troops for their inferior ones? No, why would we, that is stupid.

[h3gi 5]

Consider this scenario.

You are on BLU, having stayed on the dominating team with half-donators and having a blast. Just as you're about to complete the final objective on the last stage, AUTO'D!! Why? Because some teamswitching donator dickface switched to BLU and forced an autobalance that picked, unfortunately, you.

That's fine. What counts is that it was originally your team and you helped in its success, so it's pretty much your win as well, right? After all, you just need to make the team you got switched to better. Except when you're constantly undermanned due to ragequitters, it's hard to contend with the donators who know what they're doing, especially when those that do stay are doing horribly. But you stick with your team, determined to win against your former team, knowing you're skilled enough to do so. Time passes, more and more decent people start joining your team, and you start winning a few rounds after losing many. Now, your team is winning and doing well, and you're having a blast. Just as you're about to complete the final objective on the last stage, AUTO'D!! Why? Because six teamswitching donator dickfaces switched to BLU and forced a massive autobalance that picked, along with others, you.

This kind of domination exchange flow between teams, I believe, is the main point of grief that we're discussing. But let's examine the roots of the problem. It's not enough to point the finger at donators who can switch teams any time they want. The flow is innate and happens in ALL servers, albeit more slowly when friends have to wait before being able to switch to the team their friends are on. Donator benefits just make it easier for some people, both intensifying the effect of the tug of war and tightening the time it takes to shift, especially consider donators are generally more skilled than most. What everyone is complaining about happens in every server; it just happens more/faster in Lotus servers.

[Chamrox 0]

So, the obvious solution is for everyone to donate so no one is autobalanced. Then, if everyone donates, we can have more and better servers. Also, since everyone is a donator, everyone can switch over to the winning side at the end of every map so there will be no losers! It's a win-win-win!

LOL, seriously tho, I've always been a proponent of turning off autobalance with 1:30 to go in any map.

Also, donators aren't the problem, it's the people that don't donate and whine about shit they get for free that's the problem.

[Nket 16]

you can get 10 dollars a month for donator benefits in a billion ways, not donating is stupid.

[Rydawg 14]

you can get 10 dollars a month for donator benefits in a billion ways, not donating is stupid.

The avg person doesnt donate because this is a game and would rather put money other places. Not everyone into the game as much as say you and me or whatnot. But if you just come out and say 'screw the non donators' you are signing the death bed of Mana's servers and of Lotus.

[You suck and have no life 203]

The avg person doesnt donate because this is a game and would rather put money other places. Not everyone into the game as much as say you and me or whatnot. But if you just come out and say 'screw the non donators' you are signing the death bed of Mana's servers and of Lotus.

If they don't care about the game enough to donate, then they shouldn't complain about getting auto balanced.

Just FYI, money can get you things. This is not news. If you cant afford 10$, thats your problem. That just means you have bigger problems to worry. If I couldn't afford 10$, I would probably go get an education and then work at getting a decent job.

[Rydawg 14]

If they don't care about the game enough to donate, then they shouldn't complain about getting auto balanced.

Just FYI, money can get you things. This is not news. If you cant afford 10$, thats your problem. That just means you have bigger problems to worry. If I couldn't afford 10$, I would probably go get an education and then work at getting a decent job.

You do realize that Mana has to keep the non donators just as happy as the donators right? Cause if he scares away non donators his bank roll will shrivel cause he will not have new people signing up and I doubt he or any donator wants the servers to tank... Simple business economics.

[Chamrox 0]

I'd be willing to bet that those that bitch the most about donators have actually spent $10-15/mo on an MMORPG account at sometime in their life.

[Rydawg 14]

I'd be willing to bet that those that bitch the most about donators have actually spent $10-15/mo on an MMORPG account at sometime in their life.

WHat you guys fail to see is that even donators are complaining...

[+Henry Spencer 117]

This thread is bad and we should all feel bad.

[Rydawg 14]

This thread is bad and we should all feel bad.

besides the few people saying 'Put up of shut up' this thread is pretty good, it gives all sides of the story.

[Melissia 7]

I'm not a donator, hegi, and so you can't accuse me of being able to do that. The most I can do is spec switch, and I do that occasionally if I want to be on the other team (usually because the current team is full of annoying fucktards or because the other team has people that I know and want to play with).

Oh, and Rydawg, I laugh at you and your arguments. Teams will never be fully balanced in TF2. Even if they were to take people by fucking rank and divide the teams based off of that, one team would always be stronger than the other, because you cannot measure luck, skill, ability, readiness, focus, and situation based off of numbers, and that's not even all the variety of things that need to be measured to determine how well any one person is going to do. All that can be done is to take newbies, give them help, and encourage everyone to try and be a better player instead of constantly bitch about team balance.

Also... to everyone in this thread: if you think always being assigned to random teams means the teams are going to be balanced then you're a fucking retard who needs to take his/her head out of his/her own ass. Teamscramble, randomly assigned teams, and for that matter even autobalance rarely make matches balanced, more often than not they just annoy the person who was switched, especially if they're now playing with a bunch of boring idiots who don't know how to play as a team and don't communicate-- it ruins the game for that one that was switched and doesn't help anyone else. One person with a lot of skill cannot save an entire team from losing if that team is durp durp durp.

Edited March 24, 2009 by Melissia

[Rydawg 14]

sure the teams will never be balanced, if they were balanced a team would never win. It would be like playing Hydro ever time

A perfect example of how a player or 2 can stack a team:

I joined stack maps, was on dustbowl. Was told the team i joined was getting raped for a long time, shortly after i joined Lunchbox joined, I go demo he goes krits medic. Spam turned into mass wins next few rounds and what happened? people from the other team that could join our team, did just so they wouldn't lose

Next map is Gravelpit, by this time Nket, Miyari and a few other good people come in, they all join one team. Teams are fairly even till Nket leaves and then it was easy mode for my team... I think its just killed me a little to feed Nkets ego

One player can make a difference

------

Either way, people keep saying the same thing but only 1 thing remains. If Mana sits by idle, he will slowly but surely start to loose people on the servers. There is no way anyone can argue with that. If you don't have non donators then you can't get new donators and if people are so upset that they leave the lotus servers you have noone for donators to play, then why donate? Granted it would be a process but it holds true.

[Nket 16]

Rydawg, you are an idiot if you think people playing on Mana's servers makes him money. Mana gains nothing from people joining the clan, and Mana gains nothing from people playing on the servers, at least nothing financially. Why do you think Mana went through the trouble of getting the donator benefits scripted? Because Donators help keep the servers afloat. People that do not donate and play our servers are leeches that contribute nothing except filling up server slots. Also crying when people who bother helping pay for the servers dominate them into the ground. Shut up, you know nothing.

[You suck and have no life 203]

Rydawg, you are an idiot if you think people playing on Mana's servers makes him money. Mana gains nothing from people joining the clan, and Mana gains nothing from people playing on the servers, at least nothing financially. Why do you think Mana went through the trouble of getting the donator benefits scripted? Because Donators help keep the servers afloat. People that do not donate and play our servers are leeches that contribute nothing except filling up server slots. Also crying when people who bother helping pay for the servers dominate them into the ground. Shut up, you know nothing.

I dunno... how many 17 year olds do you know with a computer as fancy as Mana's? Although I do agree that servers are pretty costly.

Rydawg

As far as keeping non donators happy, team stacking is prevalent on almost all servers. I doubt all 200,000 people are going to go away from lotus.

[Rydawg 14]

Rydawg, you are an idiot if you think people playing on Mana's servers makes him money. Mana gains nothing from people joining the clan, and Mana gains nothing from people playing on the servers, at least nothing financially. Why do you think Mana went through the trouble of getting the donator benefits scripted? Because Donators help keep the servers afloat. People that do not donate and play our servers are leeches that contribute nothing except filling up server slots. Also crying when people who bother helping pay for the servers dominate them into the ground. Shut up, you know nothing.

What do you mean by 'Mana went through the trouble of getting the donator benefits scripted' I have no idea what that means?

[Melissia 7]

Lol Rydawg, just lol. I can argue with it. Do not tell me that I cannot, because I can. I will argue with anything if given a chance, and you have, just like in TF2, left yourself open

Anyway. People have always bitched about stacking on every single damn server. Before I found the Lotusclan servers people bitched about it on all the random servers I went to. Before I joined Lotus, people bitched about stacking the Lotusclan servers. Hell, go to any TF2 forum and far more likely than not you'll find whiney bastards who can't play worth shit and don't know how to work as a team bitching about team stacking. If they leave LotusClan's servers to go to another, they'll STILL get stacked teams and they'll STILL bitch and then they'll leave THOSE servers for another server, and so on and so forth, like the worthless piles of refuse they are. I'm not the only one saying this, it's been said a few times in this very thread, which you've amusingly ignored. And "blah blah blah, when I join teams they turn around andn start owning!" No offense, but i've played against you, Rydawg. You're not so great as to completely and single-handedly turn a game around (and I would say I'm not either, and really, not even keg is that godly). Maybe you inspired everyone else to start playing better, or maybe you brought them good luck, but TF2 is and has always been a team effort, not a fragfest where half the players aren't shooting at you. Sometimes, teams just get lucky or unlucky streaks, sometimes they lose their focus and stop coordinating. I've seen teams full of Lotusclan members losing to teams full of anonymous people who had never worked together. I've joined teams and turned them around too, that doesn't mean anything. I've also watched teams start sucking even though there's been pretty much no change.

This game is far more than just skill, nevermind that skill is far more than just a number you can assign to anyone. Someone's ability to play is more than just raw talent, and even talent wavers from one day to the next, or even from one minute to the next. I've dominated Keg a few times before, doesn't mean anything, I got lucky and he was unlucky, or lost his focus, or just didn't give a damn at the time, or whatever. I've had a few games where I had a 1:1 KD ratio but half the enemy team was dominating me, and other games where I had a less than 1:2 KD ratio but I was dominating half THEIR team. With thirty two players on a server, things get chaotic and skill starts to matter a bit less and luck and circumstance start to matter more. That's part of what makes such large games fun really.

Basicly what I'm saying is that there's no reason to change things because quite frankly nothing you have suggested will ever fix the problem (and I would be arrogant enough to say that nothing you will ever suggest will either). So again, my response? Quit bitching about it and start encouraging people to suck less.

[Rydawg 14]

/snip

I never claimed a was awesomesauce, i stated i went demo and box went krits medic, spamming insued and we won. I think the way to unstack the teams is to make both teams only go Demo. spam ftw!

[Melissia 7]

I do not want to play on some shitty demoman-only server. I'd rather have fun. Everyone abusing the most abuseable class is even less fun than these so-called "unbalanced teams".

Edited March 24, 2009 by Melissia

[h3gi 5]

hegi

Who?

[Melissia 7]

Your face.