Could you change the way team balance is handled?

[Mighty Mycroft]

I doubt any of you know who i am and i doubt even less it matters. I've been playing Interim Apex for maybe two or three months (my memory sucks so its a guess), i found out about it while discussing renegade in another C&C oriented mod community and at first i was thinking that between the maps and the new content i could never go back, it was like everything i could have wanted out of original renegade....then i started to notice the same trend i see in a bunch of shooters.

It seems to me alot of the time that the opposing team seems to always have some of the same players, in particular the BEST players. I've been told that it chooses at random but i don't feel confident about our chances to win when the opposing teams players all have hundreds of recommendations apiece whereas ours MIGHT have 100 between us all. I've lost count of how many times literally half our base got rekt by a single guy in one attack even when our entire team is dropping everything to take him out in just this one week alone, how can one microwave tank constantly wipe out multiple mammoth tanks, walkers and light tanks at the same time? even if we DO kill his tank he's even MORE powerful the second he's on foot where we can't gun him down and for some reason we can't crush him by ramming into him, we can't shoot at him at all due to how close he is whereas he is stripping away our armor like he's going through a can of pringles, you can't get out to gun him down because he'll just steal your tank and if your friends get light tanks to shoot him with he just kills them in ONE HIT! it's like we're starting shit with saitama from one punch man! you just have to sit there and take it, hoping someone else gets a lucky shot.

If this was one or two games i might just ignore it but i've seen it happen every single game i've played over an entire week and i can't remember seeing my team win over an entire month even one time, sure you can say that its about the "Struggle" to win but for that to work it has to BE a struggle. I'd rather have a hard-won victory then just get effortlessly steamrolled match after match, a 4v6 can still be fair if that four has their shit together and the six is just okay at best, shit it'll probably still favor the four. Whatever judgement you guys use to determine team balance focuses on the numbers but it seems to ignore completely how good those players actually are, half our team ragequits so to balance it out you give us the guy who has been afk for 30 minutes? gee.....thanks, this will really balance the teams....

I'm not going to pretend like i'm some badass pro who got the controls changed on him or some shit like that, at BEST i am average, maybe even ABOVE average. I REALLY try to work with everyone else and support the team where i can but i'll never be more then average and if i have no chance of having a real match why am i even here? the ONE time this month an admin forced someone really good to switch teams to try and balance it, when our team began to quit like crazy and it turned into 10 vs 6, the dude got so angry about being put on our team he decided to quit outright instead of playing it out. Really? I get winning is where the fun is but how can you even find any challenge if you keep stacking the teams like this? even an endless string of victories HAS to get stale and boring after awhile.

I can already hear people getting ready to tell me to "lern 2 play" but seriously, when your entire game revolves around these hardcore badasses just stomping newbies all day, i'm not going to try and get better, i'm just going to LEAVE and play ANOTHER game where i've actually got a rats chance in hell. I may be making assumptions about your community but i would assume the last thing you want to do is chase off anyone new. You gotta let em WIN a few if you want them to come back, we see the same thing in casinos with electronic slot machines, if you set the win chance to nothing everyone just goes to another casino but if they see someone win big every now and then, they'll think they could be next and keep coming back for another go. 

 

Edited March 1, 2019 by Mighty Mycroft

[ganein14]

I see where you're coming from, and believe it or not, there are times I still feel the same way, even with how many recommendations I have. To be honest, recommendations don't really amount to all that much other than letting others know who's good and who's yet to prove themselves. The secret is in learning the weak points of units, what units/weapons counter what units. Using the correct unit against another can pretty much shut down another if you know where to strike. Another key, is trying to be efficient with the money you have. Do you put what you have into researching upgrades at the cost of not having much to defend the base with? Do you buy the most expensive units in the hopes of doing some permanent damage to the enemy base? Or do you go for something in the middle of the two? No one unit is good against everything. There are some that come close to that, but at a great cost in some way for it. Try to experiment with different units and where you're striking the enemy. Who knows? Maybe you'll have an ahha moment.

Edited March 1, 2019 by ganein14

[FRAYDO]

Unfortunately, I'm not sure we can do much in the way of balancing teams. Team stacks do happen, and it can't be helped. However, ganein has provided some good advice. Interim Apex has loads to offer, and the best way to find the proper counters in the various situations is literally what you're doing now. Try everything, approach with every possible attack, place yourself in the enemy's mind. The last one is especially important for a game that has this much content. The next time you find yourself on the other team, try out their vehicles and units and see what kicks your ass there. Take that new knowledge and bring that back to the other team the next round. Before you know it, you'll have a better idea of what counters what, and what units are the right ones to bring out and which ones are the wrong ones.

But yeah, I don't know you. You are also right in that it doesn't matter. All I know is you're another player and it's great to see a fresh face. Welcome to our community, Mycroft!

[Kaskins]

Hi @Mighty Mycroft, thank you for registering at W3Dhub and take you time and effort to write about your thoughts and issue regarding team balancing.

Interim Apex has a very steep learning curve for new comers but if they are willing to hold on and continue to play they will unfold the whole thing. IA is basically an extended version of Renegade something like Shockwave of Zero Hour. But to some people is an entirely total conversion mod.

On 3/2/2019 at 3:32 AM, Mighty Mycroft said:

If this was one or two games i might just ignore it but i've seen it happen every single game i've played over an entire week and i can't remember seeing my team win over an entire month even one time, sure you can say that its about the "Struggle" to win but for that to work it has to BE a struggle. I'd rather have a hard-won victory then just get effortlessly steamrolled match after match, a 4v6 can still be fair if that four has their shit together and the six is just okay at best, shit it'll probably still favor the four. Whatever judgement you guys use to determine team balance focuses on the numbers but it seems to ignore completely how good those players actually are, half our team ragequits so to balance it out you give us the guy who has been afk for 30 minutes? gee.....thanks, this will really balance the teams....

Team balancing is been and issue and maybe forever an issue in a online video game. Ranging from trolls, idiots, team hampering, drop out and even deliberate act to ruin someone day. As for your case recommendations is nothing. Is like an achievement they had in life, yeah you may say if he/she play more he/she may have more experience and know what to do.

When a match start and someone drop out, some player's can be good enough to swap to balance out. However not all the time happen. If I am around I will usually ask those who want to swap or not.

I enforce balancing only if

• Within the 5 minutes mark when the match starts.

• No major structure or crucial structure such as powerplant, infantry production or vehicle production is destroyed like those.

But I will only force myself over and if is still not balance I kindly ask who ever wants to go over, if not I pick a random one.

 

On 3/2/2019 at 3:32 AM, Mighty Mycroft said:

 

I'm not going to pretend like i'm some badass pro who got the controls changed on him or some shit like that, at BEST i am average, maybe even ABOVE average. I REALLY try to work with everyone else and support the team where i can but i'll never be more then average and if i have no chance of having a real match why am i even here? the ONE time this month an admin forced someone really good to switch teams to try and balance it, when our team began to quit like crazy and it turned into 10 vs 6, the dude got so angry about being put on our team he decided to quit outright instead of playing it out. Really? I get winning is where the fun is but how can you even find any challenge if you keep stacking the teams like this? even an endless string of victories HAS to get stale and boring after awhile.

 

 

I have no idea if this is true or not but do please next time record of a video of some sort of evidence for this. As this require some clarification. Or at least provide me some date and time as it is hard to pin point.

On 3/2/2019 at 3:32 AM, Mighty Mycroft said:

I can already hear people getting ready to tell me to "lern 2 play" but seriously, when your entire game revolves around these hardcore badasses just stomping newbies all day, i'm not going to try and get better, i'm just going to LEAVE and play ANOTHER game where i've actually got a rats chance in hell. I may be making assumptions about your community but i would assume the last thing you want to do is chase off anyone new. You gotta let em WIN a few if you want them to come back, we see the same thing in casinos with electronic slot machines, if you set the win chance to nothing everyone just goes to another casino but if they see someone win big every now and then, they'll think they could be next and keep coming back for another go.

 

I am sorry to hear that this was your first impression of the experience you are getting. As IA is based around a server and ranging from amateurs to experience players play at it. Unlike many other games some have different server match for different ranking but this people still exploit by recreating accounts. I do hope to hear or see you in game sometime and do please hang around, I will usually guide player's myself to teach them stuff. That is the best I can provide at the moment as I do not have resource to create a tutorial session.