Balance ffs!

[laboRHEinz]

Hi all!
As unbalanced matches keep being a major issue on the server, I want to make some points perfectly clear:
Switching to or joining a winning team leads to unbalanced and short matches, which in general are boring for the winning team and frustrating for the losing one. Thus, this behaviour is lame and poor and I really don't understand, why so many players prefer short and boring matches!? It's like eating a hamburger compared to enjoying a 3 star menu ;-) Fast food just keeps you from staying hungry but you always will keep in mind a deluxe meal with pleasure ^^.
That is why I herewith ask you all to balance an unbalanced match!
Balancing is quite easy and always makes you the moral winner. This is a little how-to:

Code: Select all

1) Join the server as a spectator; If the match is already running then goto 8) else goto 2)

2) Prior to a match press F1 to see how the teams have been put together. If your team obviously has more skilled players than the other team, then goto 5) else just play and goto 3)

3) If you notice your team is holding more than 50% of the nodes (especially when gathering them within short time), then please press F1 to take a look at the teams. If there are obviously better players in your team, then goto 5) else go on playing and goto 3)

4) press Esc -> Game -> spectate, goto 8)

5) If your team has a bigger amount of players, then simply goto 7) else goto 6)

6) If switching to the losing team is not possible because the player amounts are even (or your team is even smaller) and the auto-balancer doesn't let you switch, then play and wait a bit until another player joins your team and makes switching to the losing one possible, then goto 7) else goto 4)

7) press Esc -> Game -> Change teams and goto 9)

8) observe as a spectator which team is the weaker one, wait until joining this losing team is possible, either by newly joining players correcting the player amounts or one that quits the winning team (yes, there are ;-)) or by the auto-balancer, then join the losing team and goto 9)

9) Have more fun with a better match, be the moral winner and get highly appreciated! Goto 3)

As simple as that :-)

There might be some logical mistakes in this lil how-to but I think you all get what I meant to say ;-)

[Zon3r]

Today i had the worst match of all time (it ruined my mood enough to leave the server the next match), the game was very unbalanced the whole f***ing time, but no one even thought about switching, trying to balance. i'm really getting tired from this. from now on, i will never balance the game by switching to the losing team. no more join-the-server-as-spectator-and-enter-the-game-by-playing-in-the-losing-team. and no one can say to me anything if i do so, cause i was playing fair since i started playing UT2004 online </rant>

PS: This thread should be deleted cause no one gives a flying **** about it anyway

[Dalyup!]

Don't be like that, Zoner. There's always going to be players who aren't sportsmanlike and simply want to stomp the other team, and I doubt there's anything that can be done about in the long-term, but being the one who switches may encourage others to do the same.

[Pegasus]

Hmm. You know, resolving to exacerbate a situation when you yourself have already diagnosed it as severe is probably the least helpful way of addressing it, never mind fixing it. But lemme step back for a bit.

Balancing the teams matters to everyone because that's the only true way players' map voting decisions can be honoured and respected. Properly playing and giving a fair chance to each map, instead of half-assing matches because we didn't care for a particular selection, is a central pillar in maintaining a cycle of trust among the members of a gaming community such as this one: "do right by me and I will do right by you, in turn, come the next map". And on and on. Abiding by stacked teams so that "we can get through this as quickly n' painlessly as possible", as some players sometimes rationalize it, or because some ppl may simply be enjoying themselves stomping a weaker team belies a short-sighted mentality that can inevitably erode any sense of sportsmanship and camaraderie, strip a server bare of any sense of investment in it from its playerbase and turn a previously amicable environment into a selfishness and opportunism-driven mess; and, lemme tell you, servers that turn into that don't usually last long either. This simple tenet of reciprocity applies even to maps we just know to be bad picks, btw; it doesn't matter, some people still voted for them and that's what should be respected.

It's this message Heinz tried to communicate with his mini guide here too, but the simple matter is, a balancing mentality can't be imposed or forced on a community from above or outside; it can only exist if its importance is understood and consciously preserved by everyone. Either we all realize how much it matters in preserving what we got, or we allow things to deteriorate by looking out only for ourselves and suffer the consequences of driving away more and more ppl who become sickened by it. IMO, instead of losing faith, having fits of rage, proclaiming indifference or washing one's hands of it all, raising awareness and appealing to ppl about this is how we can actually work on improving the team balancing situation. Even an automated tool like EvenMatch can only carry us so far, the rest is up to each of us. Fortunately, we have a msg board and, through it, the ability to reach out to fellow players and talk about it. It's just a matter of caring to persist and fight to get the message across and keep things going the right way instead of giving up, convinced that no one gives a damn about it.

[elect]

Today i had the worst match of all time (it ruined my mood enough to leave the server the next match), the game was very unbalanced the whole f***ing time, but no one even thought about switching, trying to balance. i'm really getting tired from this. from now on, i will never balance the game by switching to the losing team. no more join-the-server-as-spectator-and-enter-the-game-by-playing-in-the-losing-team. and no one can say to me anything if i do so, cause i was playing fair since i started playing UT2004 online </rant>

PS: This thread should be deleted cause no one gives a flying **** about it anyway

welcome the club

[Droopy_Bollocks]

Well for once I can sympathise with Zoner, I was in that match that Zon was talking about (on his side) and frankly some of the gamesmanship from people was pathetic.

Peg of course is right, it can't be forced, like many old hands I play for the fight rather than like some others to gain a high score and a win at all costs, I swap when I see an imbalance purely because it makes for a far better fight.

I think one problem that has shown up more to me in my few days back is the mentality of a few experienced players who consider it ok to spam, camp, spawn kill and defend it with the normal crap "I'm defending a node" or "We need to win" and it's become accepted as parts of those players style....this I believe is where players should be warned and if necessary given temp bans to try and help them to play as team players in what after all, is a team game.

Simply some will fight, some will sit back and want a high score, and some simply play I believe to annoy others as they get a rise out of it.

All I can say is Zon, like me you get exasperated by elements of the game but in the end you can only try your best and control your own game, I'll carry on switching to help whenever I can but that's all I can do.

DB

[joeblow]

Problem being is if everyone switches to the "loosing" side then its all lopsided again. Plus all the team switching messes with the team auto balance etc.

[EmanReleipS]

By the time I joined yesterday, the server was also completely full. I checked back to see if I could switch every couple of minutes, but it remained full until almost the end. You had a bunch of really good players on the side of the losing team, but it would have needed someone like Dally or Funky to turn the game. So I was hoping a better player than I would switch and asked my teammates when a spot on the losing team was open. Someone was kind enough to switch, but the match ended shortly after that.

I think a lot of our regulars don't have a problem with switching. But yesterday most of those who readily switch weren't online yet or were already on the losing team.

Anyway, you cannot force people to balance teams. Sometimes you will simply end up with an unbalanced game. That happens especially often if you play earlier during the day with only a handful of people and the team with the strongest player will always win, even if he switches to balance. It's not great when a match is unbalanced, but I don't think it's worth getting upset about. Please don't get discouraged and stop balancing teams, Zony.

[elect]

Well for once I can sympathise with Zoner, I was in that match that Zon was talking about (on his side) and frankly some of the gamesmanship from people was pathetic.

Peg of course is right, it can't be forced, like many old hands I play for the fight rather than like some others to gain a high score and a win at all costs, I swap when I see an imbalance purely because it makes for a far better fight.

I think one problem that has shown up more to me in my few days back is the mentality of a few experienced players who consider it ok to spam, camp, spawn kill and defend it with the normal crap "I'm defending a node" or "We need to win" and it's become accepted as parts of those players style....this I believe is where players should be warned and if necessary given temp bans to try and help them to play as team players in what after all, is a team game.

Simply some will fight, some will sit back and want a high score, and some simply play I believe to annoy others as they get a rise out of it.

All I can say is Zon, like me you get exasperated by elements of the game but in the end you can only try your best and control your own game, I'll carry on switching to help whenever I can but that's all I can do.

DB

Are you referring to me, to the map with crossed nodes, dear?

[Droopy_Bollocks]

Are you referring to me, to the map with crossed nodes, dear?

No matey, this was a full game but lot of people were just not bothering, saw at least 3 players never actually move throughout the whole game, just sniping their way to higher scores.

Bad games all around.