Rant about flaming caused by perceived lack of team-play

Fatshark Lounge
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Hello!

(Let me first warn any reader, this is quite the rant from my side and it stems from a …run that went bad to say the least. )

So recently i have been encountering a trend of people just going absolutely …fruitbat mad the moment they think you arent playing properly as a teammate.

I´ve always been playing in a fairly independent manner. I always prefer kiting bosses to open areas and also fighting hordes in such as i personally think camping in cramped spaces are just begging a packmaster/gasrat to wreck your entire team.

That or 50 enemies stacking ontop eachother and killig two people instantly, that happens a lot too when people try camping it out.

Like just now i had a case on [Righteous Stand], it was nothing strange to begin with, we made it to the first grim area as per usual, but then the others just ran right past the grim while chasing kills…seeing the others run so busily i figured i´d just take the grim and catch up to them.

“They wouldnt just run off completely, right?” Is what i thought…and was i mistaken.

Realizing i had the grim the other 3 didnt slowdown at all, instead they sped up and rushed past the open area between the grim barracks and into the building with the second tome that is before the cannon area.

From what i could tell they then pull over a heap of stormvermin and start fighting.

But by the time i was halfway over the open area the horde music starts playing, with prior experience of the building being a deathtrap, i decide fighting outside is the proper thing so i stay outside.

What i am used to is that when the group encounters a horde in that situation then we´d back out to the safe and cleared open area before the building and then we´d clear enemies and specials at our leisure.

I turn and look backwards in the opposite direction from the others and indeed, bunch of enemies spawn and i get to it, then i hear a boss warning which turns out to be a Chaos Spawn.

I quickly clear out surrounding enemies only to realize one guy has gone down, i turn around and realize…that the bunch is still inside the building, and that the one who went down died almost right after.

As i see it, fighting a horde and a spawn in that space is nothing short of suicidal, no space to dodge and specials can easily blitz someone.

The other two then seem to wise up, they quickly run right out and we start going at the spawn and remaining+incoming horde rats but while i and one guy are finishing the spawn our third member dies from a gasrat+horderats, it was almost instant.

Then the guy who died first suddenly starts going absolutely nutters at me and the guy who died after, a few insults are thrown right away and i was told to “KYS”, the other survivor also says something quick before running off at topspeed.

I am a bit confounded at first but i take a look around for a lost tome before trying to run after him without saying anything, the second guy who died didnt say anything either.

We make it past the cannon area and over to the building with the second grim, we get our lost fellows back on the way.

But as we enter the grim building a horde spawns, fighting on the upper level in there is yet another deathtrap as i see it so i jump down…the silent one thus far joins me and we start clearing enemies.

Then the first flamer dies, again, because he and his friend tried camping it out despite having pulled a bunch of stormvermin over to their little corner along with the ongoing horde.

Meanwhile i am separated from the silent fellow, a few stormvermin forced me to move around so i got seperated from the guy and he died almost right away.

But flamer nr 2 and i managed to clear all the remaining enemies…and its here things got real sour.

Flamer nr 1 goes absolutely ham, multiple insults, racism and whatnot while flamer nr 2 then kills me with friendly fire because i apparently wasnt a good teamplayer.

At this point i question the comparatively lighter flamer nr 2…i mean i was dead anyway, and ask why he felt so and apparently it was because i first stayed outside when the boss spawned and flamer 1 died the first time.

And then just before in the grim building when i jumped down as soon as i heard the horde music and didnt even try to defend the second floor, he then calls me useless and says that i was basically doing nothing.

At which point i reply that at least i wasnt like flamer 1 who spent more time dead than alive to due lack of melee proficiency, to which both reply that apparently he wouldnt have died if i was with the others.

If they couldnt save him from his own choice of sitting a corner with a Spawn coming in…how was i supposed to do it?

Was i really mistaken in my actions there? No matter how i look at it from my perspective of how to ensure survival and safety i was correct in how i did things but its far from the first time i get a torrent of “flame” for such conduct.

I frequently do things like this, i also like kiting along the side of a incoming line of enemies before going around their backs all while attacking and then moving back to the others.

But apparently that is also a horrendous&awful and dumbass way to do it because it means i am a small distance away from the others…even with no other enemies or specials in sight or around.

In the end the only questions i find myself wanting answered is…is it really necessary to stick to eachother like glue, going no further than a couple of steps apart? Is it so bad to escape a building you know is extremely difficult to defend when a safer alternative exists very near?

Does one really have to sit ontop the others at all times?

I´ve been playing since the closed test, and i never recall people behaving like this before. Its like heaps of people suddenly got obsessed with some manner of idea about perfect unison and teamwork and they …well get extremely angry the moment any deviation appears to put it mildly.

I played at least 800 hours without encountering this stuff at all, and now i get flamed by this kinda fellow every few days.

Am i really wrong or what is going on? I dont care much about what i perceive to be to be a pair of trolls but its starting to happen a bit too often and i find myself wondering :confused::slightly_frowning_face::worried:

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Sounds like a regular QP to me :joy:
Seriously though - most people are not great. Also, I’m sure none of them can read your mind. Did you use the T-wheel to communicate your positioning to the others?

General advise: stick to playing with friends - much less саnсеr that way.

As for your questions: yes, it’s alright to reposition in response to certain dangers and situation changes, but it is preferrable to get into a tough fight and try to defend your mates if you see that they did not perform the tactical move you had in mind (and hopefully communicated to them).

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Well, the Trolls gonna troll.

My Brother and I play QP quite a lot when we’re out of deeds or fed up with Twitch and I have to say that far more wipes happen while;

  • people recklessly attempt to save some world class idiots who have brainlessly to windmill into a horde while there’s 2 hookrats and a boss. Let them die rather than compromise yourself.

  • people who either drop down and run ahead to get Sucked Off by a leech, or stay behind and spend time rummaging through every.single.chest and get pounced by a runner.

  • People triggering a patrol when everyone is low/grey health because they’re IB/Zealot/Slayer and think they can solo a patrol. Most can’t.

And so on.

Having just ONE other player who play similar to you means you don’t have to even attempt to save those mindless buffoons. Muting VOIP and CHAT is also a godsend.

The rise in this kind of behaviour I think is since BBB, as there are much less classes that are completely broken and OP - therefore when people make a mistake they are punished for it and can’t use broken mechanics to save them. Some people are still playing Pyro like they always have, and the same with BH so these people must rely on getting carried - even though they’re not aware how awful they are because they can still stumble through runs if everyone charges around in a bundle like some six years olds playing football. Hammering along within three feet of each other IS a viable tactic for those who are a bit weaker at the game as you’re companions wil lstop the odd little nappy-rat giving you a stab-stab.

I got FF halfway health by a Zealot who was getting in a serious red-mist-rage because I kept “drinking all the healing and leaving none for him” when he was on 40hp. I tried explaining but he responded with “Listen you little f*ggot, I know how to play so stop wasting the healing and give me some.”

sigh

I think you’re discussing the fact that there are a whole pile of people in Legend who simply aren’t good enough to be there but have completed enough runs for them to think they’re better than they are. Add in the power creep from DLC weapons and Character balance and you’ve got some players miles outside of their ability lurching through legend over and over again.

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For the first case i didnt really feel the need to communicate aside from saying “im getting grim”.

At which point they still ran off to the tome building before i had even gotten up both the stair flights in the grim building and into the open area. .

Then the following situation with the horde+boss…i mean who tries to fight a boss+horde in a cramped space? It doesnt even work on paper, much less in reality.

Well i could probably have given a “come here” signal when i jumped down in the second situation, it would have been a more foolproof thing to do in hindsight.

@Argonaut14

That second case of yours hurts a bit :stuck_out_tongue: In effect what i ended up doing to fetch the grim was dropping behind willfully…well i do blame the others for being so busy chasing kills that they´d ignore a grim though and running ahead knowing that i was getting it.

As for people playing legend while lacking skill…well come to think of it i have been seeing cases that would match this, i mean flamer 1 in that bad run died pretty much constantly when he got into a melee…the silent guy did too though.

As for balance questions, i do agree that there are some pretty large gaps here and there, seen people switch from zealot and just die instantly all over and frequently too…something about his style seems to make people really careless about taking hits.

I usually dont mind if people drop or die, i mean stuff happens right? But i cant get used to the thought that i have to sit in a corner with the others when i can pretty easily dismantle any number of basic enemies with a multitude of weapons in melee…even on a ranged specialist.

And its more fun right? Who wants to huddle in a corner praying to heaven there isnt a packmaster or a special about to murder the entire group when you can run wild outside, getting adrenaline by knocking down as many enemies as dare come at you.

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Well, stopping for a Grim is easily identifiable as something people are doing - I’m more talking about people who are tootling around rummaging in every corner looking for art in a PUG in Legend blissfully unaware of the runner stalking them even when it flies past inches from their position… and still get stabbed up minutes later and rage about it.

There is a whole swathe of players who think Blocking is a very good and viable tactic. 0.o and they can’t possibly understand how dodging is better - so why go outside and risk having things get behind you where you can’t block?

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Aye, you just experiencing normal QP, lol. I normally play WS for QP, which let’s me snipe nearly every special and elite. To the effect of me sitting around 60 elite kills per game and my next best teammate having 6. This just leaves hordes and bosses for my team mates. Which helps runs go much smoother with randoms. As in about 9/10 games, they will still die to normal hordes, no elites or specials.

And god forbid you trigger a boss during a horde. No one seems to know how to counter this. I even had one guy type “RIP, they need to fix this” and then quit out of the game without even trying to fight the Rat Ogre lol. Normally I’ll take agro and pull the boss away to solo it while they clear the horde. Unfortunately, most QP players are not that intelligent. And the BH with his back to the horde will ULT the boss not understanding that knock backs = aggro. GG, now you got a Roger punching you into the horde that you’re already surrounded by.

Long story short, you need to play QP with the mindset that everyone is extremely bad and you can’t count on them for anything. Treat the runs like a solo. Prioritise enemies, that hook rat/gutter runner/leech is your biggest threat, as you can not expect your QP team mates to help you. Most don’t even know that dodging is better than blocking. Make sure you’re block pushing hordes in between combos if you stack up in a hallway to kill a horde. As they will most likely just spam light attacks and die.

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Oh lord you guys are spot on, players blocking and acting as if dodge does not exist :drooling_face:

Still I have no clue how to address these problems. I assume that FS really cannot do anything about it, do you think their are any technical changes they can implant to address this?

I think it would be a great idea to have a more detailed “training” or “prologue” map, so you could possibly teach newer / non experienced players how important team play and these mechanics, or strategies, are to successful gameplay :v:

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To me, your story sounds like you were dealing with the kind of person who has hard time admitting their mistakes, and thus a tendency to blame others. It also sounded like they were still using some lower-difficulty tactics and positioning, even if their personal skills would’ve otherwise been enough, so likely they’d gotten carried before or just new to the difficulty (Legend, I assume). Not a fun combination for others, that.

While keeping the group together indeed will keep everyone alive better, it also makes them vulnerable to Gas Rats and other AoEs. And while staying in tight spaces for hordes (well, moderately tight, anyway) can still be a valid tactic in Legend (and even beyond), it will need a lot of horde-clearing power from the whole team - something you can’t control in QP, and that is hard to notice in the middle of action. Melee blender is fun when it works, but the team composition and setups for it to work (on Legend) isn’t that common. Outside that, your assessment of more open space being (usually) better is indeed correct, though some capability of manipulating the hordes and their direction is still needed, either through equipment, environment or plain skill.

The selfish players also tend to make pacing of the group difficult. It’s quite commonly agreed that going slow isn’t good, but personally I prefer a more moderate pace than seems to be the case for many (most?) high-level players. So while I like to take a few seconds extra to go check a slightly out-of-the-way chest or a corner where a piece of art might be hiding, in QP the people who don’t pay attention to their teammates or who just prefer a fast pace would have gone forward, possibly bringing more trouble for both. Unfortunately, in these cases the most aggressive player will end up defining the pace, even if a bit slower would mean more resources to go around (and possibly less need for them too as too fast a pace will lead to surprise Patrols and Bosses in bad locations), and thus better survivability for the group.

In the end, no, I don’t think there’s a need to keep hugging each other all the time, and at times it can be even counterproductive. But keeping in close distances is indeed helpful for the group’s survival, but the responsibility for it lies with everyone, not just the one who goes to fetch an extra resource or who rushes ahead while others fight.

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