No love for 10 v 10?

[stella artois]

First thing first to get it out of the way for flamers. Vanilla or 4v4 modded is probably a more tactical and maybe even skillful experience, I appreciate its almost a different game that appeals to a different group of players, this thread isn't about "you're wrong for liking one over the other".

Now back to the topic. 10 v 10 might not be Left "4" Dead, but its a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ exhillarating experience. It harks back to Serious Sam style facing wave after wave of non stop action. There is hardly any time to think in some modded versions, it is pure chaos once that safedoor opens. They usually come with standard mods of select infected and flying in ghost mode and glitch fixes (no mercy lift), stuff Valve should have taken on board a long time ago. However there are a number with buy/perk/beserker mods that may not be to everyones tastes, but in my opinion they only add to the pace by presenting you with more options of things to do at any given moment.

Loads of common problems are eliminated too:

- a team member rage quitting or just leaving doesnt mean game over. 10 v 9 or even down to 10 v 7 can still be an even experience and it generally fills up again fairly quickly.
- rushing alone generally doesn't work. With an on average spawn time for 1 infected every 3 seconds (30 seconds / 10 infected), you need to be pretty pro and therefore deserving of making it a success.
- noobs and newbs have less of an impact, if someones dawdling at back or clearing out every single room you leave them and 10 v 9 is no biggie, the same on infected side, loss of a player is less pronounced than 4v4.
- no infected class is lame. Selecting a class you'd think everyone would go hunter and charger, but boomers are now more potent having 10 people to boom, and jockeys see more than their fare share of use with jump mods as standard for throwing people over 4 foot or less walls (don't think this in vanilla been so long since I played). Many more infected ability mods are usually introduced as standard and provide a better balance evident by selection of all classes being fairly even.

The only time you really have a bad game is when team switching is enabled (quite a few servers no longer allow it) and all the decent players know to switch to the better team, rolling over the less populated side.

If it wasn't for 10 v 10 I might have dropped this game at the 1-200 hour mark, its just a little too slow paced at times, and once you've grown a taste for 10 v 10 you probably couldn't handle going back. The number of servers are getting bigger by the day, around 100 in the linked community group I'm in, there may be more I don;t know about, but yet I see no talk of it in the forums or even a mutation mod by Valve seeing as it must be one of the most popular mods?

Thats one reason for posting this thread but I also thought there might be one or two other people who have never heard of it who'd love it. The bigger the 10 v 10 community, the greater a variety of servers. Not sure if you can link community groups (as linking servers is against forum rules?), if a few people confirm the opposite I'll post a link, otherwise PM me for the names.

EDIT: I realised why I initially wrote this, all this pissing and moaning about griefers, pubstompers, rage quitters, etc, etc, its almost non-existent in 10v10 as an issue that imapcts your gameplay.

[Tiberium]

First thing first to get it out of the way for flamers. Vanilla or 4v4 modded is probably a more tactical and maybe even skillful experience, I appreciate its almost a different game that appeals to a different group of players, this thread isn't about "you're wrong for liking one over the other".

Now back to the topic. 10 v 10 might not be Left "4" Dead, but its a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ exhillarating experience. It harks back to Serious Sam style facing wave after wave of non stop action. There is hardly any time to think in some modded versions, it is pure chaos once that safedoor opens. They usually come with standard mods of select infected and flying in ghost mode and glitch fixes (no mercy lift), stuff Valve should have taken on board a long time ago. However there are a number with buy/perk/beserker mods that may not be to everyones tastes, but in my opinion they only add to the pace by presenting you with more options of things to do at any given moment.

Loads of common problems are eliminated too:

- a team member rage quitting or just leaving doesnt mean game over. 10 v 9 or even down to 10 v 7 can still be an even experience and it generally fills up again fairly quickly.
- rushing alone generally doesn't work. With an on average spawn time for 1 infected every 3 seconds (30 seconds / 10 infected), you need to be pretty pro and therefore deserving of making it a success.
- noobs and newbs have less of an impact, if someones dawdling at back or clearing out every single room you leave them and 10 v 9 is no biggie, the same on infected side, loss of a player is less pronounced than 4v4.
- no infected class is lame. Selecting a class you'd think everyone would go hunter and charger, but boomers are now more potent having 10 people to boom, and jockeys see more than their fare share of use with jump mods as standard for throwing people over 4 foot or less walls (don't think this in vanilla been so long since I played). Many more infected ability mods are usually introduced as standard and provide a better balance evident by selection of all classes being fairly even.

The only time you really have a bad game is when team switching is enabled (quite a few servers no longer allow it) and all the decent players know to switch to the better team, rolling over the less populated side.

If it wasn't for 10 v 10 I might have dropped this game at the 1-200 hour mark, its just a little too slow paced at times, and once you've grown a taste for 10 v 10 you probably couldn't handle going back. The number of servers are getting bigger by the day, around 100 in the linked community group I'm in, there may be more I don;t know about, but yet I see no talk of it in the forums or even a mutation mod by Valve seeing as it must be one of the most popular mods?

Thats one reason for posting this thread but I also thought there might be one or two other people who have never heard of it who'd love it. The bigger the 10 v 10 community, the greater a variety of servers. Not sure if you can link community groups (as linking servers is against forum rules?), if a few people confirm the opposite I'll post a link, otherwise PM me for the names.

EDIT: I realised why I initially wrote this, all this jarateing and moaning about griefers, pubstompers, rage quitters, etc, etc, its almost non-existent in 10v10 as an issue that imapcts your gameplay.no you'(re right, 10v10 is fun, i like to go spectator and watch the ♥♥♥♥load of SI's and horde rushing survivors, and 10 survivors that talk at same time it's a load of fun hehehe.

pills here, im down, chargaaar, shooting me?!! that's some crazy ♥♥♥♥, ♥♥♥♥ need some help, hang on im comming, boomaaaaa !!, im down, Dig Ding DIng Ding.... auuuuuugghhhh, aaaaaa, OOOOOO. spit/boomeer/smoker !! molotov comming,got it, nice shot coach, pipe bomb out, ♥♥♥♥ im not gonna make it, TAAAAANK.

[Kinkade!]

did you really have to quote him with a second post?

[SS Dragon]

As someone who used to play 10v10 a while back, I can vouch for it having its unique sense of fun, regardless of the whole "it's not 4v4 so it can't be balanced or worth playing blah blah blah". For me it was more about hanging out with the good people and friends I met on those type of servers than the actual mod.

But as someone who also plays a lot of confogl, I did get tired of those servers too. Not because it was 10v10, but because almost all servers were being unnecessarily filled with pointless mods that kind of drew away from what 10v10 servers should really be about.

And not only that, but the more you get used to playing 10v10, the more you accept those mods you are forced to play with as normality. You get accustomed to them so much, that when it comes to playing a vanilla/confogl/modded 4v4 game once in a while, you kind of become a worse player because of it. That's certainly true of all my friends I met on 10v10 (who some still play) and they forget how a 4v4 game is supposed to be played.

Where's the fun (or the point for that matter) in fighting and taking down a group of survivors when one points-master on the server has a key binded to give 100% health either to himself or to all 10 survivors? There can be awesome 10v10 servers, trouble is that stuff like shopping menus ruin the potential.

IMHO, 10v10 confogl with the right tweaks to make it balanced would be the best, where if you want to make it to the safe room then you are forced to play well and intelligently. The way 10v10 servers are now, you can afford to play like the worst player in the world, but as long as you knew the shopping menu, you could always be saved by your piggybank.

[Glass_Shatters]

I got sick of Vanilla game after a few weeks. I mean the current server I've been playing on is a 12/16 man expert rushing where tanks are beefed to hell and back during camping finales. Whats good about the 16 man server as 4 people can also join the infected. There are points and perks and everything but you gather them all quite fast. Oh also the horde sizes are ridiculous and with fire protection and with friendly fire off it'd be damn near impossible.

While I do enjoy 10 vs 10 servers, I find them more fun on l4d1 for some reason. Though i do lag quite allot in 10 vs 10 on l4d2.

[Zeratulz]

Meh, the servers I tried 10v10 on couldn't handle it. ♥♥♥♥ty pings and lag, so I gave up.

[pikarikku]

I don't play 10 vs 10 since my computer can't handle it (and I don't like playing online) but I do play 8 man co-op with different survivors. It is definitely a lot of fun when you hear a charger, turn around, and half of your team is missing since they all got hit.

[source-maps]

10 vs 10 breaks what this game is about, coop

[Kinkade!]

10 v 10s are a laugh once or twice but they are basically a pile of crap.

[stella artois]

Addressing the issues:

Meh, the servers I tried 10v10 on couldn't handle it. ♥♥♥♥ty pings and lag, so I gave up.

If you're not from the US or EU then as with many games you will get a crappy experience unless someone local to you decides to host a server, being from the UK, I can play on a canadian server with less than 200ms (not perfect but not bad), all EU servers are 100 or under. If you're from these parts then maybe your connection/computer cant handle the extra data? Sending you a community link in case you havent already got access to all servers, you might find a better experience as they show in latency order.

10 vs 10 breaks what this game is about, coop

Like I said its a different game, its only an inferior game if you aren't into cheap for thrills fun and prefer more thoughtful gameplay. Saying that, as a survivor, co-op is everything in 10v10, if a few rush then infected concentrate on stragglers at the back and they're toast, a co-operative survivor team sees much more success. On infected the same is true again, blindly attacking like a noob without backup is the same as a 4v4 game, you've just wasted a spawn. Co-op is as much a part of 10v10 as 4v4, maybe ever a greater part as you are fighting superior numbers if you don't co-operate with your team. What it needs less of is co-ordination for a full on incap strike which is where 4v4 trumps 10v10 on the tactical front.

10 v 10s are a laugh once or twice but they are basically a pile of crap.

Thanks for the excellent in depth informative analysis, I have no retort.

Can anyone clear up whether I can advertise community group links on a thread?

[offishulwoland]

I learned to play infected in 9v9 and 10v10 where you can get away with being a newb without getting kicked or abused by other players. The problem is that alot of these servers are heavily modded. I used to play alot on a server which allowed the smoker to move with his victim. I then had to break some bad habits with the smoker when playing vanilla 4v4.

There is less tactical depth to 10v10 as it is harder to co-ordinate attacks and keep on top of the team situation as survivors. It is definately much more of a free-for-all, which can be fun sometimes but generally I don't like playing 10v10 anymore.

I hate points buy. It is a pile of crap and should never be used. I used to play on some points buy servers and have ended up in ridiculessly tedious stalemates. In one game a few survivors made it to the saferoom but someone bought a tank and managed to get inside with them. This led to a situation of them fighting this tank and buying health, and the tank incaping suvivors and buying health, with the rest of the players either dead or as infected sat outside the saferoom twiddling their thumbs. This went on for about 15 minutes before I left. I don't know how it ended, maybe they are still playing that game 2 months later.

[offishulwoland]

as a survivor, co-op is everything in 10v10, if a few rush then infected concentrate on stragglers at the back and they're toast

Yep. noob rushers are more of a problem in 10v10 because they tend to feel safer doing it as they usually have 2 or 3 others rushing with them while the rest of the team gets piled up on by the extra SI. Then they wonder 'i was doin so well, what went wrong?' when they are massively outnumbered and destroyed by SI further on down the map.

[Zeratulz]

Addressing the issues:



If you're not from the US or EU then as with many games you will get a crappy experience unless someone local to you decides to host a server, being from the UK, I can play on a canadian server with less than 200ms (not perfect but not bad), all EU servers are 100 or under. If you're from these parts then maybe your connection/computer cant handle the extra data? Sending you a community link in case you havent already got access to all servers, you might find a better experience as they show in latency order.

I live in the EU, I usually have around 20-40 ping to EU Servers, my connection and PC are top-notch.
And 10v10 isn't all that fun anyway.

[Tyrant vs Tank]

8vs8 and 10vs10 when properly committed to with admin support and updates cut down on a good lot of problems the vanilla pub game has.

That said, its still not perfect especially when you give the team that's OP to begin (Survivor) the ability to have a shop of any kind.

[CosmicD]

10 vs 10 is so useless in l4d, it's like having an entire cake force-fed into you as a matter of atmosphere breaker. Why would you even bother to release someone from a smoker when you are with 10, even if it's 10 it's just a rushfest. Then i'd say it's just a glorified version of counterstrike.

It totally destroys the tension of having to look after eachother.

[bloodfox1222]

Well i for one like the perk mods

*Quickly gets beat to death by people who hate free speech and mods*

[SeizureDude]

OP is basically right.

Thing is, a lot of servers use rollover and pay2win points. This one I play on gives item and upgrade discounts to teams according to how many points the players have. I troll everyone by keeping enourmous amounts of points and fluctuating the prices :p

[prophecy holder]

I love 10 vs 10 servers, it's a real pleasure to get away from the regular ragequitting fests that is 4 vs 4. It's chaotic, hectic, bizzare, weird and down right fun.

It's almost like a Super smash brothers fight, just all around wackiness.

[fuxiao23]

I like playing 10v10. I only play on pEg server. So I am familiar with the rules and properties of both sides.

The key of a successful 10v10 server is balance, even with bots. Sometimes bots are better than human players.

[Vasa]

10vs10 is definitely a lot of fun, but the teams need to be balanced. When one team is much stronger than the other its no fun. Really hate the rushers though, they don't come back to get their teammates and yell at them for being "too slow". I mean not much you can do when you are being pulled back by a smoker. I noticed the teams that usually move in one group win, while those that rush and leave others behind lose.

[RugbyOddjob]

As one that tends to play Realism Versus with friends I very often go on 10 v 10 servers for a quick blast and "warm up" for a proper game.

OP is correct that losing one or two players isn't a game breaker and things usually get sorted by new players joining.

10 v 10 has its place and it doesn't take itself too seriously. Just drop in and enjoy the chaos!! :D