Premades catching hate?

[Nadrojjj]

Premade is the way to go if you need wins, some players just don't care about getting wins, most of them are only there for comms. Making a premade with three other guild members ensures you have at least three others dedicated to winning. All the people who are sad pandas about losing to premades should make their own and stop qq'ing.

[Kellias]

"It's Akin to Cheating" is what got me. What part of it is cheating? Please do explain more thoroughly. Plus, since you are already personally attacking me, you already lost your argument. You have no backing and no credibility.

 

Debate 101, never insult the person you are trying convince. Only proves how arrogant you are on the subject. I only asked you two questions and you answered with a direct insult. "LOLWUT?" was only expressing that your post doesn't make sense, calling premades cheaters.

 

Look, I understand I may have come across a little harsh, but it's difficult for me to take people who consider premade vs pug a good thing seriously.

 

I said premades vs pugs is "akin" to cheating - meaning similar (but not the same).

By definition, cheating in a sport/game means having an advantage which your opposing team/player does not. But this is an MMO and that's such a broad concept that we'll just end up discussing semantics than anything else.

 

I want to play in premade mode with my friends, don't get me wrong... I want to queue up not even with just 4, but a full 8 man team of people I know and trust - but to play against another premade, to have a challenge, to have a close game. Not facerolling opposition on 6 - 0 huttballs before 5 minutes are out... it's stupid.

 

The game needs this mechanic.

 

What annoys me is people who call themselves hardcore PvP'ers claiming premade vs PuG is fine... any true pvp'er will want to fight against people who want to win, that are organized and will provide close and exciting games...

4 fully geared battlemasters queuing up to "fight" random fresh 50's who never met eachother before, who are trying to get by farming their comms while maintaining some dignity is not PvP.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Kellias

[Machazareel]

MMO's are about grouping and accomplishing bigger and harder tasks as a team not as a solo player. I can understand why people want the ease of playing alone, but this genre is not about that.....and I hope Bioware does not put in measure that discourage grouping, rather see them concentrate on making grouping more prevalent.

 

So, my vote would be for them to leave WZ's the way they are, and if people are having a hard time going it alone, please take the time to remedy that on your own, it CAN be done, just make your own groups and take care of it yourself.

 

Telling the majority to conform to the minority is often not a very successful endeavor. At least not if you're running a business which you wish to succeed. However I feel this issue will mostly be solved by the addition of cross-server warzones. Because premades are indeed a great minority, the pool of solo queuers will be so much larger that people will be much less likely to be paired with and against premade teams. Much like in WoW, where premades exist, but are a rarer occurance due to the pool of players who are participating. Sure, you'll sometimes fight a premade, but it won't be so often that it would warrant separating the queues.

 

What MMO's are about in this day and age will vary from player to player. The business has made a point of attempting to cater to multiple facets and playstyles as opposed to the forced grouping and harshness of earlier games. Today it seems to be more about making as many people enjoy it as possible, and some people just do not want to organize and would rather play casually, but still want to enjoy their playtime. Wanting something like that is not surprising, nor should it be a point of critique against them, they've been conditioned to expect it so far by the direction MMOs have taken, it's not odd that they should want it to continue after hitting 50. People have fun in different ways, and people really need to start accepting that, and stop trying to force their own idea of fun upon others.

[Faat]

Premades cathcing the hate they deserve ? Yeah.

 

Premades whining they'll have to wait longer to get in a Q against another premade ? Shocking. All that tells me is that they DON'T want to have to wait to face competition. They just want their easy wins and Epeen inflation, teaming up against people without heals / guard.

 

Seriously, they brag about their skills, while some of them NEVER Q without their group. Some of these no life kids are so bad, they're entirely dependent on their heals and guard that when you do have a good PuG setup, you can win. Funny stuff. As a vanguard, it's pretty easy to catch a premade offguard, if you pull their healer in your Ops group and your teammates aren't clueless you can kill him and then the premade folds. Most of them don't kite, don't avoid AoEs, don't position very well because they're used to just steamroll bad PuG opposition, with heal and tank support. Remove one of their support and they're just as bad if not worst than the player who's used to NOT have that support. The thing tho, if you focus their heals they'll be all over your nuts if they communicate on vent. That's basically the biggest advantage they have.

 

I used to be a premade guy, was forming my own 'elite' team in other games I've played. I entirely seen what happened with WAR, I played that game from beta 'till SWTOR release, and experienced all the server merges and the PvP, on each single server, literally DIED because PuGs would be pit against premades all the time. That made WAR lose millions of player (not only that, but that was an issue). You had a few 'elite' premades circle jerking with a gear advantage and a horde of PuGs having better things to do than getting farmed with no chance to win. In the end, forming a group with the 'elite' PvPers basically REMOVES the competition in those uncompetitive environment, that are SWTOR / WAR. I was in a competitive PvP guild, had my regular 6-12 friends, and we would NEVER lose unless facing THE only group on the server that was able to give us a challenge, out of hundreds / thousand players. Most of the time though, it was boring as all hell. It takes a lot more SKILLS to have a good winning % when you PuG, when you don't constantly rely on your BFF healer and your whole team assisting the target you call on vent, the one that's all over you and that'll kill you if your teammates don't react.

 

When they'll create the rated WZs, you can bet a lot of those premades won't even be playing in that bracket, unless BW puts an algorythm in the Q system to prevent sync Qing in the solo PuG bracket. If premades want a healthy game they'll accept longer Qs and fight other premades only.

[Vydor_HC]

Telling the majority to conform to the minority is often not a very successful endeavor. At least not if you're running a business which you wish to succeed. However I feel this issue will mostly be solved by the addition of cross-server warzones. Because premades are indeed a great minority, the pool of solo queuers will be so much larger that people will be much less likely to be paired with and against premade teams. Much like in WoW, where premades exist, but are a rarer occurance due to the pool of players who are participating. Sure, you'll sometimes fight a premade, but it won't be so often that it would warrant separating the queues.

 

What MMO's are about in this day and age will vary from player to player. The business has made a point of attempting to cater to multiple facets and playstyles as opposed to the forced grouping and harshness of earlier games. Today it seems to be more about making as many people enjoy it as possible, and some people just do not want to organize and would rather play casually, but still want to enjoy their playtime. Wanting something like that is not surprising, nor should it be a point of critique against them, they've been conditioned to expect it so far by the direction MMOs have taken, it's not odd that they should want it to continue after hitting 50. People have fun in different ways, and people really need to start accepting that, and stop trying to force their own idea of fun upon others.

 

I understand the claim that people that solo are the majority, I don't know if that's true. It's easier and faster no doubt. However, there is only one genre that is centered on playing with other, millions of other games that cater to the individual mindset. For the good of the genre, I would want to keep it that way. This isn't a selfish request on my part, as this genre has a really really small player base compared to the solo genres.

[Kellias]

I understand the claim that people that solo are the majority, I don't know if that's true. It's easier and faster no doubt. However, there is only one genre that is centered on playing with other, millions of other games that cater to the individual mindset. For the good of the genre, I would want to keep it that way. This isn't a selfish request on my part, as this genre has a really really small player base compared to the solo genres.

 

Very true - but noone is asking for people to stop grouping up! On the contrary it should be encouraged.

 

All it needs to be done is enforce a strict premade vs premade queue and PuG vs PuG queue - that's all - it'll be even easier to get matched once the cross-server PvP goes live.

[Vydor_HC]

Very true - but noone is asking for people to stop grouping up! On the contrary it should be encouraged.

 

All it needs to be done is enforce a strict premade vs premade queue and PuG vs PuG queue - that's all - it'll be even easier to get matched once the cross-server PvP goes live.

 

-nods-

 

But giving premades a longer wait queue, or forcing them to play against players outside of their community is not encouragement.

 

EDIT: I would expect people playing this genre solo, would expect things to be more difficult, not the other way around.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Vydor_HC

[bicuspid]

people like to come up with excuses about why they lose so much, as long as they dont have to admit they suck

 

i win about 70% of the time solo queue, near 100% premade. republic on my server, at least the ones that are still playing this game despite the terrible odds, all know what they're doing by now so I never get a team of tards.

 

statistically speaking, if one of your excuses on why you lose so much is "i always get a team of 7 people who dont know what they're doing", its PROBABLY YOU. and you being a baddie means your judgement is worthless to begin with

Edited February 20, 2012 by bicuspid

[BadNewzzz]

I have nothing against premade but it must be premade vs premade and even better make premade squads for 8 ppl then we could have guild wars.

Now premade vs pugs is just stupid, win 9/10 times who is that fun for?

[XenonParsec]

Threads like these are truly ridiculous.

 

If you people can't handle the fact that people are allowed to team up and coordinate to win WZs, then perhaps you should put on your tionese and go master predictable, scripted PvE encounters.

 

People want free purples at 50 to be "competitive" and now people want BW to somehow regulate premades.

 

How about BW just offers a "PvP Nub Entitlement" queue, where all you do is queue up, automatically win, and get bag with 100% champ/BM drop. I swear this game has the most whiny PvP community.

 

The fact is, that the only separation you're going to see is when rated WZs are implemented, and you can join the rated or unrated queue, and then you still might face a premade in the unrated queue.

 

Still can't handle it? Well then perhaps PvP just isn't for you. Someone has to lose in PvP, walk it off.

[Machazareel]

I understand the claim that people that solo are the majority, I don't know if that's true. It's easier and faster no doubt. However, there is only one genre that is centered on playing with other, millions of other games that cater to the individual mindset. For the good of the genre, I would want to keep it that way. This isn't a selfish request on my part, as this genre has a really really small player base compared to the solo genres.

 

It's blatantly obvious that pugs are the majority. In any given warzone, the two most common group comps are PuG vs PuG, or PuG vs Premade+4 or more PuGs. In the first situation, you have 16 pugs and 0 premade players. In the second, you have 12 pugs and 4 premade players. Games with more than one premade do occur, but at least from my own personal experience (Which I am well aware can vary from server to server) in every MMO I've ever played, which is almost all of them, the PuGs were the majority and premade vs premade was a rare occurance. I am well aware of statistical outliers like a couple friends queueing duo, but let's be honest with ourselves and simply state they are obviously not the target of these complaints.

 

It's not so much the 'individual' mindset that I'm talking about either. It's the casual, pick-up and play mindset. People like playing on a team, as long as they don't have to personally form and recruit said team. Solo queueing is popular because people do enjoy teambased PvP, but at the same time want to be able to just click and play right after they log in. As counterintuitive as it may sound to some, it's the reality of a good portion of the casual playerbase, and they are in the majority. To think otherwise could almost be considered delusional. This is one of the reasons TDM shooters are so incredibly popular. In the time that MMOs required a more hardcore dedication to advance, they never had anything close to the player numbers they've had since catering to casuals. That's obviously not taking into account the asian market and their korean grinders, but I'm strictly talking about the western MMO market right now.

 

 

Edit: Please note that I am not advocating seperating the queues. I'm merely trying to give some perspective other than "pugs are bad, man up and make a premade" and other such arguments because they just aren't helpful in these discussions, and never have been.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Machazareel

[formulaic]

EDIT: I would expect people playing this genre solo, would expect things to be more difficult, not the other way around.

 

That's incorrect.

 

-> Soloing in an MMO usually provides lesser reward than grouping (e.g. solo loot is 'green' and group loot is purple or whatever). But the difficulty is no harder.

 

The logical choice is:

- pug queue.

- premade queue. 2x reward of pug queue.

- ranked queue. Uber reward of some type.

 

Just make the rewards 'something other than ludicrously unbalanced equipment' and people will accept that.

[Faat]

people like to come up with excuses about why they lose so much, as long as they dont have to admit they suck

 

What then when a premade loses to a PuG ? Because that actually happens. Do you think those people would be happy to be forced to Q against other premades ? Above is the type of butthurt response when 'hardcore PvPer' is just thinking about having to fight other premades, instead of facerolling PuGs. Most premades do so so they win many easy fights and feel they're good. I'd rather see them complain about being steamrolled by better premades than seeing PuGs leave in droves after being put against the same premade so many times.

 

'PuGers suck', 'L2P', 'MMO grouping is prevalent', all empty phrases spoken with the wisdom of the seasoned 'I played 14 MMOs I am a skilled and hardcore PvPer' etc. Tell me what other game has been sucessfully retaining their playerbase when they pit pugers against premades ? NONE. Is that type of PvP a SUCESSFUL MODEL IN TERMS OF BUSINESS ? NOPE NOT AT ALL. I just so hope they give PuGers a way to enjoy the PvP, so that the game thrives and keeps a healthy player base for YEARS.

 

GW1 had random arenas for PuGs and competition arenas / guild vs guild / hall of heroes for groups = best Esport MMOlike game ever created.

[ghettogenius]

Dont segregate pugs from pre-mades, just give them the main thing pre-mades have going for them - voice chat!

[OnyxJedi]

From now until the end of MMOs an group of average players working together will always pwn a group of great players acting individually.

[Flowerslayer]

Friends playing together in an mmo happened?? *shock*

 

No reason to hate premades. Im sure they will fix the queueing to premade vs premade and PuG vs PuG in the future if we just keep asking for it. (optimist)

[SpaniardInfinity]

I think it's a matter of your server. For late December and January on my server, the Empire dominated the Republic in PvP. It was never a close match, even if you pre-made. Comebacks were non-existent and you basically just hoped the round would last long enough to get a few medals. It used to take me the full seven days to get my weekly done (seven days of 3-4 hours of PvP to get NINE wins...)

 

Then, as soon as February rolled around, the Republic started balancing out on my server. You can easily finish your weekly in a day now, and most matches are decided in the last 5 minutes.

 

How exactly does that have anything to do with why people are hating premades? If the conditions on other servers were like mine last month, pre-mades would be completely infuriating. After spending a week to get nine kills and having to face another pre-made is rage-worthy, even if taking a step back I know the reason they won is their gear and their coordination. When both factions are balanced, though, the frequency of those complaints drops because everyone has a roughly even chance (whether you queue solo or in a group).

 

With that said, my number one pet peeve with certain pre-mades are those who function as their own little squad, ignoring the other four people on their team as long as they get their medals.

Edited February 20, 2012 by SpaniardInfinity

[sahrinity]

Friends playing together in an mmo happened?? *shock*

 

No reason to hate premades. Im sure they will fix the queueing to premade vs premade and PuG vs PuG in the future if we just keep asking for it. (optimist)

 

I really hope so, until I can get a full 8 in versus another full 8 I'm pretty much done with pvp. Nearly every huttball anymore is me with my other 3 people trying to score while 4 people farm medals, with the other 8 people on the enemy team working together (Ok maybe exaggerating to say every match since it's probably abou 50/50). I don't know if they have ever confirmed ops queues, but I really really hope so, pvp as it stands now does not encourage competitive play and good matches, which really sucks for me because those close well balanced matches are the most fun and the only reason I pvp.

[Vydor_HC]

That's incorrect.

 

-> Soloing in an MMO usually provides lesser reward than grouping (e.g. solo loot is 'green' and group loot is purple or whatever). But the difficulty is no harder.

 

The logical choice is:

- pug queue.

- premade queue. 2x reward of pug queue.

- ranked queue. Uber reward of some type.

 

Just make the rewards 'something other than ludicrously unbalanced equipment' and people will accept that.

 

I dunno, you can't do every thing in an MMO solo, that's what I am talking about, not rewarding. If you want to do dungeons, you must group, or else it's extremely hard. If you want to be competitive in PvP, you should group or find it extremely hard to do the big things.

 

Grouping should be, imo, emphasized over all else.

[Vydor_HC]

It's blatantly obvious that pugs are the majority. In any given warzone, the two most common group comps are PuG vs PuG, or PuG vs Premade+4 or more PuGs. In the first situation, you have 16 pugs and 0 premade players. In the second, you have 12 pugs and 4 premade players. Games with more than one premade do occur, but at least from my own personal experience (Which I am well aware can vary from server to server) in every MMO I've ever played, which is almost all of them, the PuGs were the majority and premade vs premade was a rare occurance. I am well aware of statistical outliers like a couple friends queueing duo, but let's be honest with ourselves and simply state they are obviously not the target of these complaints.

 

It's not so much the 'individual' mindset that I'm talking about either. It's the casual, pick-up and play mindset. People like playing on a team, as long as they don't have to personally form and recruit said team. Solo queueing is popular because people do enjoy teambased PvP, but at the same time want to be able to just click and play right after they log in. As counterintuitive as it may sound to some, it's the reality of a good portion of the casual playerbase, and they are in the majority. To think otherwise could almost be considered delusional. This is one of the reasons TDM shooters are so incredibly popular. In the time that MMOs required a more hardcore dedication to advance, they never had anything close to the player numbers they've had since catering to casuals. That's obviously not taking into account the asian market and their korean grinders, but I'm strictly talking about the western MMO market right now.

 

 

Edit: Please note that I am not advocating seperating the queues. I'm merely trying to give some perspective other than "pugs are bad, man up and make a premade" and other such arguments because they just aren't helpful in these discussions, and never have been.

 

My experience leads me to believe otherwise about premades being the minority, I guess that is because my background is from DAoC and WAR, where it's almost a given that you team up to do anything important. And from my experience in this game post 50, most of the WZ I get in have premades, so I don't really see this as premades are the minority issue here either.

 

And I too am not saying PUGs are bad, or that they are definitely not the minority. What I am saying is I believe the genre hurts itself when it caters to the mindset of making it easier for the solo players. This type of game should encourage group play above all else, that is what sets it apart from the numerous other genres out there. The argument that there are soo many more solo players around, so lets do all we can to make life better for them, imo, hurts this type of game more than it helps it.

 

I've had this opinion for years and with the way MMO's are going these days, to me, I think they should go back to the group first mentality instead of the go it alone mentality you see so prevalent these days. This is just another issue to me that is on that path.

[dlouismartin]

I am a solo queue pvp'r. I don't care about premades. I think that people who moralize about how it's unfair should really can it. If you are level 40 and you encounter someone who is level 12 in a WZ are you going to attempt to roflstomp them? Of course you are? Well think about that level 12 guy's fun factor. Pretty low huh? I mean come on--he likely doesn't stand a chance against you. Please--

 

PVP is supposed to be a competitive environment. That means willing people will group up and attempt to--- you guessed it, WIN. Now you are either unable or unwilling to group up. If you are unwilling then it's on you. Period. If you are unable, then perhaps these forums are a place to start to learn how.

[Humankeg]

People don't realize that it is a 50/50 chance they will face off against, or play with a pre made.

 

So in the end it all evens out, and the bottom line is they still lost because they and their teammates are bad, not because they faced a PM.

 

PM's are fine vs pugs and with a max of only 4 players, should not be separated. ill even insist on changing it so that PM's can be a full group of 8.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Humankeg

[Machazareel]

My experience leads me to believe otherwise about premades being the minority, I guess that is because my background is from DAoC and WAR, where it's almost a given that you team up to do anything important. And from my experience in this game post 50, most of the WZ I get in have premades, so I don't really see this as premades are the minority issue here either.

 

And I too am not saying PUGs are bad, or that they are definitely not the minority. What I am saying is I believe the genre hurts itself when it caters to the mindset of making it easier for the solo players. This type of game should encourage group play above all else, that is what sets it apart from the numerous other genres out there. The argument that there are soo many more solo players around, so lets do all we can to make life better for them, imo, hurts this type of game more than it helps it.

 

I've had this opinion for years and with the way MMO's are going these days, to me, I think they should go back to the group first mentality instead of the go it alone mentality you see so prevalent these days. This is just another issue to me that is on that path.

 

I played WAR since beta and for about 2 years off and on after, and pugs were the majority there, too. That is, until they all quit because because the synergies of classes in that game made organised premades even more powerful than they are in most other games, along with other stupid stuff like GTAOE stacking and terrible class balance in general, coupled with some of the worst, and buggiest PvE content ever. Not to mention the game couldn't actually handle mass RvR, which was the main selling point. I'm aware most of that was fixed, but the damage was done, because they took a damn long time to fix it. PuG Warbands in RvR getting decimated by a small bomb squad, guarded Witch Hunters or Witch Elves with a DoK/WP Healer who was likely guarded by a 2nd tank etc etc. RvR was largely filled with randoms as well, most people zoned in and joined the largest open warband in the list and started zerging, or... they were lazy and leeched outside the warcamp, but that's a different matter entirely

 

While it's true that organised PvP groups were more prevalent there than they are here, it shouldn't be surprising since WAR was a pvp centric game, and SWTOR is not. Just as DAOC was a pvp centric game. You go into those games expecting a playerbase that is very pvp focused. SWTOR is a very different type of game, despite certain similarities and having personell from WAR working on the pvp systems. It's a themepark, and it's no secret that most of the developement so far has been invested in the PvE aspect. This means you have a different type of playerbase than that of a PvP centric game like WAR or DAOC. And this is the playerbase you need to pay attention to. They're footing most of the bill.

[Vydor_HC]

I played WAR since beta and for about 2 years off and on after, and pugs were the majority there, too. That is, until they all quit because because the synergies of classes in that game made organised premades even more powerful than they are in most other games, along with other stupid stuff like GTAOE stacking and terrible class balance in general, coupled with some of the worst, and buggiest PvE content ever. Not to mention the game couldn't actually handle mass RvR, which was the main selling point. I'm aware most of that was fixed, but the damage was done, because they took a damn long time to fix it. PuG Warbands in RvR getting decimated by a small bomb squad, guarded Witch Hunters or Witch Elves with a DoK/WP Healer who was likely guarded by a 2nd tank etc etc. RvR was largely filled with randoms as well, most people zoned in and joined the largest open warband in the list and started zerging, or... they were lazy and leeched outside the warcamp, but that's a different matter entirely

 

While it's true that organised PvP groups were more prevalent there than they are here, it shouldn't be surprising since WAR was a pvp centric game, and SWTOR is not. Just as DAOC was a pvp centric game. You go into those games expecting a playerbase that is very pvp focused. SWTOR is a very different type of game, despite certain similarities and having personell from WAR working on the pvp systems. It's a themepark, and it's no secret that most of the developement so far has been invested in the PvE aspect. This means you have a different type of playerbase than that of a PvP centric game like WAR or DAOC. And this is the playerbase you need to pay attention to. They're footing most of the bill.

 

MMO's to me, are not solo-centric. My basic point is it hurts the MMO genre more than it helps to cater to solo type game play. From my understanding of you're point, it's that there are so many solo players that it benefits the genre to cater to them as to attract as many people as possible. In the long run, I think that attitude is self defeating for an MMO, as the genre loses it's strong points and becomes just another of the millions of solo style games on the market. That in and of itself is the reason I am against issues like this one, which primarly are wanted because people are playing a grouping based game, but want to play it in a solo fashion. I think our disagreement, if we have one, comes down to is it better to have more solo players playing, or is it better to have a smaller group oriented audience. My thought is the later.

 

EDIT: On a side note, WAR lost its audience due to other reasons than PUG vs Premade. The game functioned perfectly well catering to the grouping mindset, it just collapsed due to the end game design and balance issues.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Vydor_HC

[maradigamer]

It's blatantly obvious that pugs are the majority. In any given warzone, the two most common group comps are PuG vs PuG, or PuG vs Premade+4 or more PuGs. In the first situation, you have 16 pugs and 0 premade players. In the second, you have 12 pugs and 4 premade players. Games with more than one premade do occur, but at least from my own personal experience (Which I am well aware can vary from server to server) in every MMO I've ever played, which is almost all of them, the PuGs were the majority and premade vs premade was a rare occurance. I am well aware of statistical outliers like a couple friends queueing duo, but let's be honest with ourselves and simply state they are obviously not the target of these complaints.

 

It's not so much the 'individual' mindset that I'm talking about either. It's the casual, pick-up and play mindset. People like playing on a team, as long as they don't have to personally form and recruit said team. Solo queueing is popular because people do enjoy teambased PvP, but at the same time want to be able to just click and play right after they log in. As counterintuitive as it may sound to some, it's the reality of a good portion of the casual playerbase, and they are in the majority. To think otherwise could almost be considered delusional. This is one of the reasons TDM shooters are so incredibly popular. In the time that MMOs required a more hardcore dedication to advance, they never had anything close to the player numbers they've had since catering to casuals. That's obviously not taking into account the asian market and their korean grinders, but I'm strictly talking about the western MMO market right now.

 

 

Edit: Please note that I am not advocating seperating the queues. I'm merely trying to give some perspective other than "pugs are bad, man up and make a premade" and other such arguments because they just aren't helpful in these discussions, and never have been.

 

Good post. But you forgot to add one important thing: No matter what devs do and no matter what premade players say, we are never going to change the way we enjoy playing. If someone doesn't think running in a premade is fun, they aren't going to spend their fun time doing it.