This forum is doing too much infighting and not enough Valve-blaming.

[TGUSOL]

Originally Posted by Diocletian

Again IN MY OPINION, the majority play Vanilla because they don't know about the alternative modded servers, etc. Many people who DO know about alternatives quickly see Vanilla for the imbalanced crap it is.

silly boy you missed the point of my whole post read it first before biting...there fixed yours.

p/s maybe Nero would have been a better choice of name Don.

[Kaizoku]

I'd argue that the reason no one uses team versus is because it was included way too late in the game's lifespan and doesn't have the proper tools of a formal team versus mode. There are no pause utilities, the matchmaking has had a history of being pretty off, and it's a competitive mode and the vanilla game just isn't that good competitively. By the time team versus existed most people that played 4v4 were in private servers with scrims set up with all the utilities they wanted with a makeshift balance mod to make up for the shortcomings of the vanilla game. No one that would play team versus had a reason to by the time it came out, so no one used it, and because no one used it, no one now uses it.

Outside of that, I also agree with the premise of the thread in that Valve handled the series horribly. While they have done a below average job with fixing things in the second game and trying to support both casual and competitive players, they did an absolutely awful job in both concepts in the first game. There were very very obvious shortcuts, dead tank spawns, and severely overpowered tactics, and a gun that was so over powered that it was later even nerfed for *vanilla*. This is game that could have supported a large casual and competitive player base, and the reasons that both communities are somewhat small today is because of Valves shortcomings and unwillingness to take what the community was providing for them in their absence.

[Diocletian]

Originally Posted by Kaizoku

I'd argue that the reason no one uses team versus is because it was included way too late in the game's lifespan and doesn't have the proper tools of a formal team versus mode. There are no pause utilities, the matchmaking has had a history of being pretty off, and it's a competitive mode and the vanilla game just isn't that good competitively. By the time team versus existed most people that played 4v4 were in private servers with scrims set up with all the utilities they wanted with a makeshift balance mod to make up for the shortcomings of the vanilla game. No one that would play team versus had a reason to by the time it came out, so no one used it, and because no one used it, no one now uses it.

Outside of that, I also agree with the premise of the thread in that Valve handled the series horribly. While they have done a below average job with fixing things in the second game and trying to support both casual and competitive players, they did an absolutely awful job in both concepts in the first game. There were very very obvious shortcuts, dead tank spawns, and severely overpowered tactics, and a gun that was so over powered that it was later even nerfed for *vanilla*. This is game that could have supported a large casual and competitive player base, and the reasons that both communities are somewhat small today is because of Valves shortcomings and unwillingness to take what the community was providing for them in their absence.

Finally somebody who understands the issue completely.

[henrikhe]

Originally Posted by TGUSOL

But it is not a rebalance just a different flavour which some people cant get into their head, your reply kind of proves my point of modes of play which are empty of lobbies its not hard to understand why because people would rather play another mode.

it's more balanced because the health bonus differentiates between teams who walk in relatively untouched and teams who limp into the safe room.

i agree with kaizoku. some of the best and coolest players i know have left because of the bugs that carry on into the different configs even.

[source-maps]

Originally Posted by henrikhe

it's more balanced because the health bonus differentiates between teams who walk in relatively untouched and teams who limp into the safe room.

i agree with kaizoku. some of the best and coolest players i know have left because of the bugs that carry on into the different configs even.

the problem almost sounds like a similar situation in our society
you present them the facts and use logic to argue with these people.. but they just freaking ignore it and say it's a matter of opinion.. sigh

[Diocletian]

Originally Posted by source-maps

the problem almost sounds like a similar situation in our society
you present them the facts and use logic to argue with these people.. but they just freaking ignore it and say it's a matter of opinion.. sigh

The "matter of opinion" thing is surprisingly common around here. It's as if people think facts don't exist when it comes to gaming.

[TGUSOL]

Originally Posted by Diocletian

Finally somebody who understands my narrow point of view.

Fixed for you


Kaz nice to see you're still around by the way casual gamers by industry standards are all about hours played, and that could be farmville nothing to do with skill or anything else and i have never ever heard anyone moan about the lack of a pause option!, nice to though you start the post with I'd argue I repsect your opinion but disagree with it entirely.

On a side note I wish your infected thread was sticky very helpful for pointing newer players at it, just a pain to find it.

@henrikhe
what did the comment about labels push a button,a good anology is American football one team may have all the pressure say 90% but get beat by a single touchdown, or boxing a boxer may get hammered for 11 rounds then knockout his oppenent in the last round, as we say in football( it is all about putting the ball in the back of the net) and they are far more competitive than L4D2 players.

so what was yout point again?


@source-maps
LOL
Fact 1 less than 50% of playerbase play Vr's confirmed by valve.
Fact 2 realism Vr's and Team Vr's are almost abandoned.
Fact 3 more people like crazy modded servers than confogl.
Fact 4 more people like vanilla than confogl.
Fact 5 saying confogl is a better balanced way to play is an opinion.

Dont see any fact's in ethier your's or don posts ? go figure

@Don Quixote aka nero the dramtic emperor aka Diocletian
Now i cant believe looking at how many topics you post nor the fact you claim to be the port of authority on L4D2 that you waited until Apr 2012 to register where have you been , i feel like i know you so well

[Diocletian]

Originally Posted by TGUSOL

@Don Quixote aka nero the dramtic emperor aka Diocletian
Now i cant believe looking at how many topics you post nor the fact you claim to be the port of authority on L4D2 that you waited until Apr 2012 to register where have you been , i feel like i know you so well

You don't seem to know that person very well because I am not him.

[wootin]

Originally Posted by Diocletian

-When you miss a deadstop, blame Valve for not getting hitboxes synced. Not everybody who plays this game should have to go to a forum to read about how the hitboxes actually work.
-When you have inexperienced players joining VS, blame Valve for not treating this game seriously and implementing a matchmaking system.
-When you have people in your VS game who don't know the map layout at all, blame Valve for allowing people to access VS mode without having to complete all the maps in Campaign mode.
-When your Smoker tongue breaks, blame Valve for not making that tongue unbreakable unless an actual hit is registered on it.
-When you get teamswitchers, blame Valve for allowing teamswitching in the middle of a game.
-When you have map exploits being used, blame Valve for taking 2-3 years to fix a simple exploit.
-When you have people abusing the kick function, blame Valve for not putting a limit on kicks during a game and letting even the creator of the lobby get kicked.
-When you have to play Confogl to get a truly balanced game, blame Valve for not making EVERY MODE balanced.

You people aren't getting anywhere by saying that the people who play this game are bad. Bad behavior is caused by being in a bad system, a system that Valve created and has been slow or unwilling to fix. Every problem we run into with this game is a result of Valve thinking that just because this game is about "shootan zambies woohoo!" that nobody will care if the game has major bugs and lack of structure.

Stop blaming each other. Blame Valve. Make them fix this game. Every single thread in this forum should be directed right at Valve henceforth, and if you continue to blame each other, you're just not paying attention to the inherent flaws that have been around for years.

Hey, not me. I blame Valve to the point where I don't buy games on Steam anymore.

Although to be fair, I don't blame Valve so much as I blame their lack of a business model for the game. This isn't a charity effort or a volunteer organization, this is a business product and we should have the RIGHT to put our money where our wants are.

But Valve isn't letting us because they're - what? Too busy getting money somewhere else? Don't think we would open our wallets for new campaigns? I dunno what or even if they're thinking, but if they are going to stonewall the progress of the game, then I don't want them to be in charge of the progress of any other games I play.

[source-maps]

Originally Posted by TGUSOL

Fixed for you


Kaz nice to see you're still around by the way casual gamers by industry standards are all about hours played, and that could be farmville nothing to do with skill or anything else and i have never ever heard anyone moan about the lack of a pause option!, nice to though you start the post with I'd argue I repsect your opinion but disagree with it entirely.

On a side note I wish your infected thread was sticky very helpful for pointing newer players at it, just a pain to find it.

@henrikhe
what did the comment about labels push a button,a good anology is American football one team may have all the pressure say 90% but get beat by a single touchdown, or boxing a boxer may get hammered for 11 rounds then knockout his oppenent in the last round, as we say in football( it is all about putting the ball in the back of the net) and they are far more competitive than L4D2 players.

so what was yout point again?


@source-maps
LOL
Fact 1 less than 50% of playerbase play Vr's confirmed by valve.
Fact 2 realism Vr's and Team Vr's are almost abandoned.
Fact 3 more people like crazy modded servers than confogl.
Fact 4 more people like vanilla than confogl.
Fact 5 saying confogl is a better balanced way to play is an opinion.

Dont see any fact's in ethier your's or don posts ? go figure

@Don Quixote aka nero the dramtic emperor aka Diocletian
Now i cant believe looking at how many topics you post nor the fact you claim to be the port of authority on L4D2 that you waited until Apr 2012 to register where have you been , i feel like i know you so well

first of all, I believe they said it's a struggle for the #1 position between VS and CP, and CP usually wins

don't forget that l4d2 has a lot of game modes.. so a close second is a large player base.. on top of that, I think you're underestimating the power of competitive players, cs 1.6 is still alive today because of dedicated players.. if this game was a casual crap game, they would hop on to the next title ASAP like you see with COD.

l4d2 on the other hand, doesn't appeal to those types of competitive players and the only player base this game has are people that come and go, play coop with friends, or play competitive in private modded servers

rvs and team vs obviously take a bad approach to trying to solve glaring problems.. if you're going to play in public.. glows are pretty vital to those uncommunicative players and it's balancing versus in the wrong way.. don't get me wrong tho.. I freaking love no glows.. it's just not a right way to balance it for the masses

team versus is really flawed, because it will only make RAGEQUITS worse, because there is still no match maker that makes sure the players are at least close together skill wise.. so if you get 4 friends owning 4 other friends.. only one guy has to rage for the whole match to be over because its friends will soon follow.. go figure it's hardly used.. so simple to understand it's not even funny.

more people like crazy modded servers? I got the general feeling modded servers are really disliked.. people constantly ask Valve for ways to filter them out.. but I can imagine a less serious form of versus with 10 players might be fun to some because now they can actually play the game.. get some fun with the infected and don't have to worry about rage and unbalanced games so much

finally, did I say confogl?.. Valve is perfectly capable (oh lol what am I saying) to balance versus on their own, they're just not willing to do so.

nerf the tier 2 weapons, massively reduce the amount of trow-able times and health items.. and you got your self the game the way it's supposed to be (just check l4d1 commentary where they said under powered infected and overpowered survivors = no fun... hence why they split the game in 2 game modes.. always wondered why Valve made a second campaign mode version in l4d2 but with human controlled SI, if you get what I mean )


if 2 equal skilled teams are up against each other, and every game results in 25 point time breaks.. it doesn't take much thinking power to understand this game has a problem

I forgot who wrote it, but the baseball analogy was brilliant,
to make it short.. the team that has to stop the other team from making point has to have the advantage or else you will get a very dull and broken game...


l4d2 is a great game, it's missing some animations here and there which I think is a bit lame of Valve.. and bugs never really bothered me that much unless they where really lame like the No Mercy door glitch.

but that fact that Valve doesn't realize that 12 medkits in parish 2 is a freaking overkill baffles me.. and the fact they took only 10 months to develop this game without fixing the BIGGEST PROBLEM in l4d1.. that is the bad social situation it was having.. really makes me frown upon them for treating their fans this way.


put all of this aside, if Valve did some careful thinking, it could have easily also made l4d2 appealing for both competitive and casual players.. if RVS was left as a mutation.. and we would have had vanilla versus, and a balanced RANKED versus by Valve where you can't ragequit or else you would loose points that would put you down a rank in the invisible match maker stats, everyone could have been a lot happier

by now, I think it's too late for l4d2.. but seriously.. problems are obvious.. what needs to be done is obvious.. Valve please don't ever make these foolish mistakes again and don't listen to people that say everything is fine because it clearly isn't and you darn well know it.

[FapJak]

Valve are not willing to "balance" versus because they think the game is fine and actually it is. Left for dead series are meant to be zombie shooters and they are succesful ones. Stop rubbing confogl and competitive gaming in my face. Yes its a casual game

[Spanky88]

Tgusol the same thing happens in baseball. A pitcher can make 1 bad pitch and lose 1-0. However that's why w/l is a subpar stat in baseball for pitcher, it doesn't accurately show a pitchers performance, and relies on the offense just as much. Of course baseball has plenty of other stats and sabermetrics to help evaluate performance. In l4d2 all people care about is winning, and one mistake can win or lose a game and that causes lots of rage. With the health bonus it adds another stat if you will to evaluate performance and reward better play.

Overall the vanilla scoring is flawed because it doesn't accurately reflect performance when one mistake can ruin 4/5 maps worth of work. Of course the scoring would work better if the humans didn't survive most of the time.

Oh and versus/campaign split is only partially in favor of coop. Iirc the stat valve released was 48/52 or 46/54 so while it's technically played by less players, you try to make it sound like it's 30/70.

[source-maps]

Originally Posted by FapJak

Valve are not willing to "balance" versus because they think the game ia fine and actually it is.

k on the ignore list, really tired of your ignorance man
edit:
btw, you're the first that ever got on it so congrats

also, I wasn't rubbing confogl in your face and I also realize that Valve is catering to the casuals unfortunately, if you had read my post btw.. I told you there is no reason casual and competitive can't go exists

[Spanky88]

Originally Posted by FapJak

Valve are not willing to "balance" versus because they think the game is fine and actually it is. Left for dead series are meant to be zombie shooters and they are succesful ones. Stop rubbing confogl and competitive gaming in my face. Yes its a casual game

Casual games are only fun for casual players; competitive games are fun for everyone. Counter strike and tf2 both have large player bases because the support both casual pub play and hardcore comp players. Being more competitive can keep those casual players hooked longer too, valve missed the boat with that on this series and have relegated it to a diminishing player base that could have been just as large as pre-f2p tf2 if it was executed correctly. Instead the game got boring and the comp gamers jumped ship and the casuals jumped over to the newest cod or whatever.

[wootin]

Originally Posted by Spanky88

Casual games are only fun for casual players; competitive games are fun for everyone. Counter strike and tf2 both have large player bases because the support both casual pub play and hardcore comp players. Being more competitive can keep those casual players hooked longer too, valve missed the boat with that on this series and have relegated it to a diminishing player base that could have been just as large as pre-f2p tf2 if it was executed correctly. Instead the game got boring and the comp gamers jumped ship and the casuals jumped over to the newest cod or whatever.

Worse, they did it just as zombies got popular. I mean, REALLY popular. How the heck do you create a successful game property right at the start of a massive boom in the popularity of the game's central concept, and then NOT jump on that wave? We should have had a crapload of custom map and character tie-ins, like for every zombie movie or TV show EVER.