Problem: Kicked from BAF because "I was an add and he was doing a 16 man only"
By
Adeon Hawkwood,
Posted on: 2011-05-03 19:29 in Suggestions and Ideas
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Yes, well said. Comparing jobs to entertainment is solid logic. |
Originally Posted by The_Coming_Storm
Well said. I half-love you now!
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/sarcasm
@Rylas
Kill 'em all. Let XP sort 'em out.
Is there some recognition by folks on either side of this debate that you're arguing over corner cases? Most of the time, this isn't a big deal. It's like anytime you're dealing with PUGs. Most experiences are fine, it's the few outliers that get your attention. But that doesn't change the fact that the bad experiences are the outliers.
Most people won't kick stragglers or care they got dumped into their trial.
But once in awhile you do get a group/league that does care and a league leader that has no compunction about kicking folks the LFG tools puts in their league. So long as that stays an uncommon occurrence (unlike uncommon drops, of course! 
) the devs are unlikely to do a darn thing about any of this.
My 2 inf.
The City of Heroes Community is a special one and I will always look fondly on my times arguing, discussing and playing with you all. Thanks and thanks to the developers for a special experience.
I agree it's uncommon now, but partly because a lot of people haven't heard that this is intended behavior from the system. I think premades' tolerance of outsiders will drop as word spreads (and if the sextuple-secret probation rewards system for the trials stays, I think tolerance for outsiders will drop from that, too).
I think a lot more people would be advocating to have a 'league lock' feature implemented if they didn't already think one was coming, or realized that the lack of it and possibly also the 'league star jumble' when you start weren't bugs but rather working as intended.
In general I think leagues need more robust all-around management tools. In addition to being able to lock themselves from mid-stream or unwanted joining, leagues ought to have a 'vote for new leader' feature, for example, in case someone gets the star in a jumble and won't give it up to the person who formed the premade, or if a fully-random league ends up with an abusive or incompetent leader with delusions of grandeur. A vote to kick feature is probably a little much, but it might also be useful, in the event that a league leader who's otherwise competent is sheltering someone who's behaving dysfunctionally, or if the leader isn't willing to kick people themselves - a lot of leaders, as some have noted, are very kick-averse even when they shouldn't be.
And I agree with the other side in this argument: the people using the LFG tool to find a league deserve not to end up being kicked and having to re-enqueue and waste their time. Just, the only way this is accomplished by not putting them on premades that would lock themselves if they could...
"Experience is the mother of good judgement. Bad judgement is the father of experience."
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Bingo!
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Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Is there some recognition by folks on either side of this debate that you're arguing over corner cases? Most of the time, this isn't a big deal. It's like anytime you're dealing with PUGs. Most experiences are fine, it's the few outliers that get your attention. But that doesn't change the fact that the bad experiences are the outliers.
Most people won't kick stragglers or care they got dumped into their trial. But once in awhile you do get a group/league that does care and a league leader that has no compunction about kicking folks the LFG tools puts in their league. So long as that stays an uncommon occurrence (unlike uncommon drops, of course! ) the devs are unlikely to do a darn thing about any of this.My 2 inf. |
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How few is too few? 10,000, 1000, 100, or 1? At what point does the player base/devs ignore this?
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Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Is there some recognition by folks on either side of this debate that you're arguing over corner cases? Most of the time, this isn't a big deal. It's like anytime you're dealing with PUGs. Most experiences are fine, it's the few outliers that get your attention. But that doesn't change the fact that the bad experiences are the outliers.
Most people won't kick stragglers or care they got dumped into their trial. But once in awhile you do get a group/league that does care and a league leader that has no compunction about kicking folks the LFG tools puts in their league. So long as that stays an uncommon occurrence (unlike uncommon drops, of course! ) the devs are unlikely to do a darn thing about any of this.My 2 inf. |
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We don't know and the devs will never tell us. When the devs changed Mystic Fortune so it couldn't be denied there was only a few vocal players that requested it get changed back and the devs complied. The same goes for the Market 60 day rule. Only a few morons couldn't be bothered to read the instructions that told them that if they left items in the market for more than 60 days they would be deleted. Yet the devs listened to the players input and removed the 60 day rule from the game altogether.|
Originally Posted by Gunstar
How few is too few? 10,000, 1000, 100, or 1? At what point does the player base/devs ignore this?
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Oh and don't assume that people sharing Snow Globes opinions are the majority. None of us have any hard numbers on which side has the most support so for all we know the people supporting private leagues are the majority and the devs will ignore the other side.
Personally I've agreed with Snow and Hyper on many topics in the past, but in this case I disagree with them.
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As I've already explained in previous posts, the reason why players are using a central meeting point for these trials is because relying entirely on the LFG queue to form league teams is not a realistic option at this time. More of often than not you will be placed in under strength/sized teams with baffling AT composition. Remember, the LFG tool does not care about your AT, power sets or level shift. It only cares about how much time has elapsed before it decides to dump everyone in the existing queue (whether it is 8, 10, 12, etc) into a league and hope for the best. Such a random system introduces far too many unknown variables into the equation. To be honest, if we aren't forced to launch the trial via the LFG queue tab, I would bypass it entirely.
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Originally Posted by Tocharon
he, he,
And what does exactly Pocket D have to forming a BAF/Lamda? I admit its easier to form a League from there, but that's it. Here's the fact, if you have enough singleton toons in the Q, with each toon in a seperate zone, a trial will begin. Pocket D just happens to be an easy place for people to meet to form a Trial, a gathering point could just as easily be the Rikti War Zone or somewhere else, although I admit I personally like seeing traffic in Pocket D. Even forming s league before hand is just to make things easier, you can start a trial if there is enough singleton's in the Q. Forming a league beforehand is just to make it easier to start one. |
I'm not going to comment on the kicking because I knew it was bound to happen sooner or later. Personally, I do not think that the LFG tool as currently constructed will work.
8 random people click first available.
The timer starts, trial begins, everyone loads, and you have a team of:
ALL Tanks. 
or all Stalkers
or all Defenders
with no level shifts
I smell fail.
advice to all, peek your head in a co-op zone. If there are a bunch of people gathered, more than likely a trial is forming. Use broadcast or whatever to get invited, and run the trials.
as far as I am concerned LFG = LFD.
question for the LFG advocates.
A leader is trying to run small, and the turnstile adds another. If everyone quits to start over, is that griefing too?
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It's okay, you're entitled to be wrong every now and again. |
Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
Personally I've agreed with Snow and Hyper on many topics in the past, but in this case I disagree with them.
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Just don't make a habit of it!
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Originally Posted by baron_inferno
As I've already explained in previous posts, the reason why players are using a central meeting point for these trials is because relying entirely on the LFG queue to form league teams is not a realistic option at this time. More of often than not you will be placed in under strength/sized teams with baffling AT composition. Remember, the LFG tool does not care about your AT, power sets or level shift. It only cares about how much time has elapsed before it decides to dump everyone in the existing queue (whether it is 8, 10, 12, etc) into a league and hope for the best. Such a random system introduces far too many unknown variables into the equation. To be honest, if we aren't forced to launch the trial via the LFG queue tab, I would bypass it entirely.
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More specifically: the failing of the LFG tool is that it assumes players are rogue agents all playing on their own terms. It doesn't recognize that the success or failure of a trial depends as much on strong leadership and agreement among the players as to their approach as on the activity of each individual. Recognizing this, most players join pre-formed teams because it gives them a very clear sense of who is in control and what the rules of this particular run are. MOST groups establish these rules before the trial even begins.
As a case in point, one time I clicked LFG and warped into a trial as the team leader. I did not know how to move team members around (and still don't know, despite being told I can "just drag them") and absolutely did not want the responsibility of being the league leader. Rather than deal with it, I just quit and went back to looking for pre-formed leagues.
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Originally Posted by spitting trashcan
From my perspective as a person who A) sees randomly assembled teams kicking tuchus all the time and B) does not like to wait for teams to assemble, the LFG queue's failing was that it allowed people to form premade leagues at all. And my preferred solution would be that LFG dissolves any group that enqueues, and assembles new leagues from the individuals in the queue. In other words, that premaking leagues would be completely impossible, and hopefully people would just stop trying and start enqueueing individually and rolling with whatever team results.
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What do you mean keep up the funny? What do you mean, you mean the way I type? What? Funny how? What's funny about it? |
Originally Posted by Fleeting Whisper
Keep up the funny  |
You mean, let me understand this cause, ya know maybe it's me, I'm a little messed up maybe, but I'm funny how, I mean funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you? I make you laugh, I'm here to freakin' amuse you? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny?
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Yes, you are here to amuse me. Carry on. |
Originally Posted by MunkiLord
I make you laugh, I'm here to freakin' amuse you?
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The City of Heroes Community is a special one and I will always look fondly on my times arguing, discussing and playing with you all. Thanks and thanks to the developers for a special experience.
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One of the best movies... ever..
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Originally Posted by MunkiLord
What do you mean keep up the funny? What do you mean, you mean the way I type? What? Funny how? What's funny about it?
You mean, let me understand this cause, ya know maybe it's me, I'm a little messed up maybe, but I'm funny how, I mean funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you? I make you laugh, I'm here to freakin' amuse you? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny? |
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/e thumbs up.|
Originally Posted by baron_inferno
One of the best movies... ever..
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indeed.
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Oh, to be sure it couldn't be done now. The more interesting point for me is that the developers tried to offer a choice between forming leagues the "old way" - by gathering at a spot and inviting from the applicant pool until a full league is formed - and the "new way" through the LFG tool, and I honestly don't think that the LFG tool was ever given a fair shake regardless of its own merits because people overwhelmingly chose to do things the way they'd always done them. If solo queueing had been the only way to get into a trial from day one, I strongly suspect we would be having a very different conversation.|
Originally Posted by Oedipus_Tex
IMO this would be an unmitigated disaster. I don't think there is enough harddrive space available to the message board system to handle the level of screaming that would happen if this system were put in place. The current "problem" is that players turned out to be much more organized and cooperative than the developers anticipated. Undoing that is perilous, to say the least.
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More personally, the idea of just dropping myself onto a queue and being shuttled into a trial PUG is exactly what I want from the system. To the nearest approximation it is player actions that prevent this system from working as I want it to, but it was the developers who gave them the choice to reject that option. Sometimes a choice isn't a choice in practice.
@SPTrashcan
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Conspiracy to commit a crime generally carries the same penalty as the actual act of committing that crime.|
Originally Posted by Silver Gale
Okay, let's suppose for a moment 8 friends form a Lambda Trial. They push the "begin Trial" button with the expectation of running the Trial with only the 8 people who were on the team. When they zone into the Trial, they found the queue system has added an additional player. The League Leader does not want to kick them, but instead, all eight people leave the Trial and reform as a team. They enter the queue again, and they continue to do so until the system puts them in a Lambda Trial on their own.
In other words, they make the exact same choice between giving up control over the team to play with the adds, or playing exactly as they like. But they make the choice to optimize their play experience in a way that inconveniences *both* parties instead of only one. Is there malice in that? |
However, I should be specific here: I don't believe that to be an actionable offense by the players that the game operators would either acknowledge or punish. I don't believe it to be literally a crime. I just think its sad.
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Except its irrelevant to the point being discussed. Nothing stops the devs from allowing a Hamidon raid leader from locking the Hive. Doing so wouldn't prevent people from casually entering the Hive or doing other activities within it as WW suggests: the game would just spawn another Hive that didn't have the raid participants in it when someone tried to enter it.|
Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
And Wicked Wendy's response in that other thread gave a great explanation why a zone can't be compared to a raid.
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And that's because, as was discussed earlier, all zones are really instances. Nothing stops the game from allowing a player to in effect lock a zone and force anyone else attempting to enter it from spawning a new copy of it. That is exactly what already happens when a zone reaches its occupancy limit.
We're not talking about locking a zone so no one else can enter it at all. We're talking about locking a zone in the same way someone would theoretically lock a trial league: prevent anyone else from entering their instance and joining them. That is possible with the Hive, and moreover causes no problems that locking trials wouldn't. It doesn't prevent anyone from doing anything except joining that team/league. The fact that the zone could have other things going on in it is not relevant, because those things could still happen with a zone lock in another instance of the zone.
Some servers actually manipulate the game servers to achieve the reverse of this result: they stack people into a zone like the RWZ so the game servers are forced to spawn a second copy of the zone, then people split up and run two simultaneous mothership raids. And in fact this is one of the proscribed remedies for dealing with a failed speed Hami raid that leaves behind mito blooms: stack players into the Hive until it spawns a new instance, then go raid the second instance. In effect, the players are demanding their own "version" of the Hive and the game gives it to them. You can ask for another copy of the Hive. You just can't exclude anyone from entering it short of filling it precisely to its capacity.
The same is currently true of the trials. You can theoretically fill the trial to capacity by loading a maximal league into the queue, but you cannot exclude people from running the trial. Its not "your" trial. Its an instance of the trial that at the moment it spawns is open to anyone in the queue. Its no different than if the Hive had a time lock.
You can argue the devs' intent here is contrary to your preference, but there is no ambiguity about the intent itself. The trials are specifically structured to be open trial zones with the turnstile as the gatekeeper.
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Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
Oh, to be sure it couldn't be done now. The more interesting point for me is that the developers tried to offer a choice between forming leagues the "old way" - by gathering at a spot and inviting from the applicant pool until a full league is formed - and the "new way" through the LFG tool, and I honestly don't think that the LFG tool was ever given a fair shake regardless of its own merits because people overwhelmingly chose to do things the way they'd always done them. If solo queueing had been the only way to get into a trial from day one, I strongly suspect we would be having a very different conversation.
More personally, the idea of just dropping myself onto a queue and being shuttled into a trial PUG is exactly what I want from the system. To the nearest approximation it is player actions that prevent this system from working as I want it to, but it was the developers who gave them the choice to reject that option. Sometimes a choice isn't a choice in practice. |
There are two places you can find groups of people thrown together at random and forced to deal with a stressful situation: horror movies and reality television. Neither turns out well.
The system would not have worked for the type of content it is being used for. It might fly for something where success is pretty much guaranteed (e.g. a zombie invasion or something) but as soon as you introduce the requirement that players coordinate with each other (e.g. "do this something special to get a badge") and especially when you introduce the possibility that other players can grief/mess things up, it's going to break down. This is not a failure on the part of the players.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
You can argue the devs' intent here is contrary to your preference, but there is no ambiguity about the intent itself. The trials are specifically structured to be open trial zones with the turnstile as the gatekeeper.
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I disagree. The gate keeper is the league leader. That feature would not exist if it were not implied that some person is in control. This is to say nothing of the silliness of randomly selected league leaders that the LFG tool produces. I'll never hit that button again as long as there is a chance I might end up leading a raid I had no intention of participating in at that level.
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The strategy part I'd argue, after being on x number of trials many people get the idea of the script to follow, this is true more so with Lamda. I have seen BAF done a couple different ways successfully, and in that case its more about following the herd than anything else, the role of the leader at that point, is largely to point people to the script. I've never been on a trial yet, where strategy was mentioned before hand, and i have unlocked and slotted all 4 slots, and have a minimum of tier 3s in all 4 slots( and a tier 3 in alpha as well). Heck I have been on incarnate trials where the leader really didn't have to do anything, and these were pick up leagues. This isn't to say a leader isn't never needed once the trial is started, but compared to whats needed for a hami raid...
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Originally Posted by Oedipus_Tex
The LFG tool doesn't work for what its designed to do, and probably never will. The sooner we all come to accept this the sooner I think a valid solution can be found.
Players do not pre-arrange teams because they are elitist. They do it because these events require coordination and leadership. The entire team has to be on board with the strategy or the trial is a potential wash. If random players are a potential liability to the team of course some teams will be reluctant to involve them. The badges for doing or not doing certain tasks in particular are practically guaranteed to lead to pre-forming and a resistance to random adds. The feature we needed, but didn't get, was the ability to post "advertisements" for teams that are forming. Functionally this is almost exactly identical to spamming global and private channels except without the spamming. Another way to look at it is the reverse of the "Looking for Team" flag. |
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Except if that is the case how come the trial leader can kick people out of the zone?
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
You can argue the devs' intent here is contrary to your preference, but there is no ambiguity about the intent itself. The trials are specifically structured to be open trial zones with the turnstile as the gatekeeper.
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I know I have never seen a message like"looking for archtype x for trial", while i think a certian AT balance is healthy, I'm not sure at level 50 an AT balance is needed as much as it would be for level 20, especially when your talking about 16 or more toons. Although I do have one observation though|
Originally Posted by Vega
I'm not going to comment on the kicking because I knew it was bound to happen sooner or later. Personally, I do not think that the LFG tool as currently constructed will work.
8 random people click first available. The timer starts, trial begins, everyone loads, and you have a team of: ALL Tanks. or all Stalkers or all Defenders with no level shifts I smell fail. advice to all, peek your head in a co-op zone. If there are a bunch of people gathered, more than likely a trial is forming. Use broadcast or whatever to get invited, and run the trials. as far as I am concerned LFG = LFD. question for the LFG advocates. A leader is trying to run small, and the turnstile adds another. If everyone quits to start over, is that griefing too? |
I have been on tankless leagues that managed the trials fine, in fact I didn't notice any serious problems with the circles( its possible people were getting hit with warnings, but I didn't notice), I attribute this with 16+toons spamming attacks, anyone keeping agro wasn't a serious problem as long they weren't using confront( although again its possible someone was using it, and I just didn't notice)
On a league with one tank, the tank seemed to be really challenged and frustrated, with tanks having what I would call sticky agro, they seem to generate warnings at a faster rate even w/o trying
On a league with multiple tanks, this seems to be less of a problem
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And her response in that other thread wasn't credible.|
Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
And Wicked Wendy's response in that other thread gave a great explanation why a zone can't be compared to a raid.
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Originally Posted by Memphis_Bill
I could, for instance, want to run an all-Controller BAF. We get 14 people. We go in and a scrapper joins. I, obviously kick him.
Yeah, that's OBVIOUSLY "because I don't want to team with outsiders or people I don't know." |
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Originally Posted by Memphis_Bill
Or, as I've seen quite a few of, maybe they're trying for a MOTrial and only want level-shifted characters. A non-level-shifted character comes in via queue. *kick*
OBVIOUSLY because they don't want outsiders or people they don't know - even though they may not know everyone else who is level shifted. |
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Originally Posted by Memphis_Bill
Perhaps you have trouble getting onto teams with the *sterling* personality you evidence here, but people do not kick people "because they are jerks." Are some people jerks? Sure. Is that what causes everyone who's ever kicked someone to do so? No.
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Originally Posted by Memphis_Bill
You assume much. And are incorrect in the assumption.
... You try to assume, but all you do is make yourself look like you lost your "ume." |
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Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Is there some recognition by folks on either side of this debate that you're arguing over corner cases? Most of the time, this isn't a big deal. It's like anytime you're dealing with PUGs. Most experiences are fine, it's the few outliers that get your attention. But that doesn't change the fact that the bad experiences are the outliers.
Most people won't kick stragglers or care they got dumped into their trial. But once in awhile you do get a group/league that does care and a league leader that has no compunction about kicking folks the LFG tools puts in their league. So long as that stays an uncommon occurrence (unlike uncommon drops, of course! ) the devs are unlikely to do a darn thing about any of this.My 2 inf. |
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Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
Oh and don't assume that people sharing Snow Globes opinions are the majority. None of us have any hard numbers on which side has the most support so for all we know the people supporting private leagues are the majority and the devs will ignore the other side.
Personally I've agreed with Snow and Hyper on many topics in the past, but in this case I disagree with them. |
Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters
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This explanation is likely the best you'll get:|
Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood
Except if that is the case how come the trial leader can kick people out of the zone?
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Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Is there some recognition by folks on either side of this debate that you're arguing over corner cases? Most of the time, this isn't a big deal. It's like anytime you're dealing with PUGs. Most experiences are fine, it's the few outliers that get your attention. But that doesn't change the fact that the bad experiences are the outliers.
Most people won't kick stragglers or care they got dumped into their trial. But once in awhile you do get a group/league that does care and a league leader that has no compunction about kicking folks the LFG tools puts in their league. So long as that stays an uncommon occurrence (unlike uncommon drops, of course! ) the devs are unlikely to do a darn thing about any of this. |
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Originally Posted by Snow Globe
The developers are smart enough to realize that some people will be jerks and will kick people from the league. However they likely think the actual amount of people kicked for that reason would be small. They are probably hoping that people will see the trials are able to be done with PUGs and will not care if someone enters from the queue. They probably even have a higher opinion than most people in this thread about the courtesy of people leading these trials.
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Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters
Here's another example of why having control over your league size would be helpful:
Let's say you have a group of friends that wants to do a trial together. This group of friends, however, likes to keep a colorful conversation. Swearing, dirty jokes, crass comments, mutual insulting (in good nature). Then player X gets dropped in and they might be offended by this kind of behavior. Perhaps they (misguidedly) find the team to be harassing or griefing them. They might ask the team to cut it out.
Now, who's in the wrong if:
• Player X reports lewd comments, resulting in potential accounts being blocked for a few days, or at best, minor slaps on the hand.
• The team tells them to get over it, and continues on their way interacting in the manner they've been accustomed to acting with one another.
• The team says beat it, and they kick Player X because they feel he intrudes on the fun they were having as a group that enjoyed being able to talk freely without censoring themselves. This of course, wasted Player X's time that could have been spent queueing into a team that would welcome LFGers.
• The team decides to allow the person to stay, but in his own team, so they can use team chat without offending him, and at the same time greatly increasing his odds at just getting 10 threads at the end.
Honestly, they're all bad results, and the current set up is at fault for not making these situations avoidable. At this point, the turnstyle is set up in a way to make people avoid it. There should be better control for teams looking/not looking for members, and more options for single players entering the queue (such as desired team size, Master of, etc).
@Rylas
Kill 'em all. Let XP sort 'em out.