Heheheh, keep voting with your feet players (towards bigger servers, stop playing NS2 and COD will invade your dreams, mwhaha!), keep going if you believe, such things change governments, let alone a computer game situation.
To be honest, I've seen servers getting bloated (bigger than originally intended) in a fair bunch of MP games, and most of the times it didn't really bother me. Like for instance the 64 player Metro servers in BF3 (best example, biggest clusterfuck you can imagine). I never saw the big appeal in it, but it wasn't getting in my way of playing the game like I want too, because there were always plenty of other 24p/32p servers to choose from.
Which is why I am slightly worried in the case of NS2, since this community is rather small to begin with, and there are fewer and fewer decent 16 player servers to pick from. To me it feels like the NS2 pub community is getting gobbled up by all the emerging 24 players servers. It has gone from the original 16 to 18 to 20 to 22 and now to 24. Which leaves me wondering how much bigger the servers are gonna get. I'm probably overreacting, but if the current trend continues, the prospects are grim for pub players like me.
So if I come across as some frustrated elitist, it's only because I feel like an endangered species. Didn't mean to insult anyone.
My server started out as a 24 from the beginning, and I have no plans on ever increasing that limit. I think 24 players is actually a good spot for an NS2 server, but obviously that's just preference.
24 player servers are just the Tower Defense version of an RTS game. Something for the ADD gamers who just want to kill things and not have to think.
That's fine with me but at the very least it would be good for the server browser to list them as modded. If a new player only experiences the fucstercluck that is 12v12 it's only clouding a large portion of game mechanics and metagame that he/she will not notice or care for and more than likely wont help in retaining them as a regular.
God I love misinformed people like this. I mean, it shouldn't be possible to get all the ADD gamers in my fucstercluck to do anything like what we did a couple nights ago running rounds playing hide and seek, where we gave marines a time limit on researching jetpacks and mines and find their hiding spots, then within a certain amount of time have the aliens track down and kill every marine who could only use mines and his axe. If they couldn't find and kill every marine, marines won. We did this with all 24 players, with brand new people coming in the server and joining right in. Everyone listened. But again, us ADD gamers who only want to run around killing stuff don't do things like this on these big dumb servers, ever.
I don't think showing an example of 24 players playing some made up catch and kiss game relevant to rebutting the fact that players are missing alot of what ns2 has to offer when playing zerg v zerg.
I could give an example of joining a 24 player server and having every commander ejected repeatedly by a bunch of trolls but it contributes nothing to the debate.
The example was made in rebuttal to the notion that 24 person server players are just ADD kids bent on mindless zerging and killing. I think this accomplishes that quite nicely actually.
And honestly, why don't you educate me on all these mysteries of the game that my players are somehow missing. To date, I've seen most of the major strategies (some silly ones like gorge rushes, and some more serious like crag hives first, etc) brought up on these boards tried out from time to time to see how they work on a bigger server. There's actually quite a few intelligent, more mature players that frequent mine who could probably give some of these competitive players a run for their money if they weren't just casual players. And I can't even remember the last time I saw a com ejected on my server. Trolls last about 5 seconds once they're realized, and I honestly haven't even had to deal with many of those either.
Both sides of this argument are being juvenile, who cares. 24 slot servers are not unplayable or people wouldn't play on them. Play on a server with the size you enjoy, and you'll be playing with like-minded people. Forcing everyone onto smaller servers accomplishes nothing. Everything is fine, carry on.
It also provides several game mechanic bonus' to the marine team. These are:
Early game aliens suffer a self-egg lock penalty if they die to much, giving marines early game breathing space (hence the shift hive being the primary strategy)
Marines in larger numbers (3+) groups generally win equal number fights due to ranged attacks
Marines get enough players that they feel safe enough to be aggressive and this is a significantly more fun playing experience for both teams as both sides will be aggressive and doing missions into each others territory which requires defence/reactions.
You forgot to mention that due to more players, marines can have more (dedicated) builders without significant loss of offensive power. (Also I don't think that gorges build stack) So 2-3 marines will get their stuff up WAY faster than the same amount of gorges.
If you don't care about the conversation or somehow think you're above it then don't comment and certainly keep the unnecessary insults out if you chose to do so. Otherwise it just makes you look like an asshole.
The example was made in rebuttal to the notion that 24 person server players are just ADD kids bent on mindless zerging and killing. I think this accomplishes that quite nicely actually.
And honestly, why don't you educate me on all these mysteries of the game that my players are somehow missing. To date, I've seen most of the major strategies (some silly ones like gorge rushes, and some more serious like crag hives first, etc) brought up on these boards tried out from time to time to see how they work on a bigger server. There's actually quite a few intelligent, more mature players that frequent mine who could probably give some of these competitive players a run for their money if they weren't just casual players. And I can't even remember the last time I saw a com ejected on my server. Trolls last about 5 seconds once they're realized, and I honestly haven't even had to deal with many of those either.
You basically just remove the entire metagame of territory control and res awareness.
As soon as each kill/death becomes unimportant, you remove any necessity to think. The only strategy involved is throwing more numbers at areas.
i actually spoke to a server admin who ran a 24p server about this, asking why he chose to run a 24p server instead of a 16p or even a 20p server, as the game got really messy above 16 players and the maps are too small to accommodate 24 players + entities (fps drop anyone?).
his answer, in short, was simply because "the pub players like it".
i'm actually kind of relieved that they didn't offer 32p as an option for servers. i think many 24p servers would be 32p if given the choice.
Not mine, and in reply to hus, you obviously haven't played on a good 24 player server. All of that stuff you assume is not important on a 24 player server is still every bit as important. The only difference is it get's more hectic defending that territory, which, to me, makes it that much more fun.
OP I know your feel. In AUS, the most popular server is a 22 slot server called "I live for the chomp" and I really don't understand how it fills up every day when it averages 40% performance once it reaches 20 players. In game ~10 tick rate.
I'd rather not play than play on such a server.
Sorry most popular Aussie servers are monash.
They are also the servers which put on the ~80+player game back in the late days of the beta.
24 players on monash does not cause server ticks to drop below 30 or performance below 98%.
Most 24 players are not up to chop...but the monash ones are almost totally bullet proof.
If more servers performed like monash we would be wondering why we dont have 40 player servers.
OP I know your feel. In AUS, the most popular server is a 22 slot server called "I live for the chomp" and I really don't understand how it fills up every day when it averages 40% performance once it reaches 20 players. In game ~10 tick rate.
I'd rather not play than play on such a server.
Sorry most popular Aussie servers are monash.
They are also the servers which put on the ~80+player game back in the late days of the beta.
24 players on monash does not cause server ticks to drop below 30 or performance below 98%.
Most 24 players are not up to chop...but the monash ones are almost totally bullet proof.
If more servers performed like monash we would be wondering why we dont have 40 player servers.
The monash servers are great yeah, 40 players would be battlefield
Not mine, and in reply to hus, you obviously haven't played on a good 24 player stuff. All of that stuff you assume is not important on a 24 player server is still every bit as important. The only difference is it get's more hectic defending that territory, which, to me, makes it that much more fun.
And you've just concluded that you like 'hectic fun', which takes me back to my tower defense analogy.
You're just following the more numbers is more fun simplicity that pubbers seem to love. I don't have a problem with it. Just for the love of god, make the servers appear as modded so that the new players don't assume that this is the intended experience.
I know I'd be pretty disappointed if I worked on developing a game only for people to take a shit on it and just play tf2 32 player instaspawn mode.
I know I'd be pretty disappointed if I worked on developing a game only for people to take a shit on it and just play tf2 32 player instaspawn mode.
and why would you? people who play for casual fun are in the majority. they'd spread the game through word of mouth for you, which in turn means more customers and more money for you.
imo, that is more than enough reason for any developer to start making games for casual fun. $ > all.
OP I know your feel. In AUS, the most popular server is a 22 slot server called "I live for the chomp" and I really don't understand how it fills up every day when it averages 40% performance once it reaches 20 players. In game ~10 tick rate.
I'd rather not play than play on such a server.
Sorry most popular Aussie servers are monash.
They are also the servers which put on the ~80+player game back in the late days of the beta.
24 players on monash does not cause server ticks to drop below 30 or performance below 98%.
Most 24 players are not up to chop...but the monash ones are almost totally bullet proof.
If more servers performed like monash we would be wondering why we dont have 40 player servers.
The monash servers are great yeah, 40 players would be battlefield
I had the pleasure of being around when Endar set the limit to 100...only got up to about 70 odd when I was on but was epic.
Seeing 20 or so skulks rush into your spawn is pretty damn scary...though trying to get past a door that 15 marines are all aiming at is nigh on impossible.
I avoid playing on anywhere other than monash if I can manage it...as the gaming experience is severly impacted by the server.
I know I'd be pretty disappointed if I worked on developing a game only for people to take a shit on it and just play tf2 32 player instaspawn mode.
and why would you? people who play for casual fun are in the majority. they'd spread the game through word of mouth for you, which in turn means more customers and more money for you.
imo, that is more than enough reason for any developer to start making games for casual fun. $ > all.
Cool, so make more dumbed down junk for the masses? Got ya.
There use to be this 32 slot server but it had horrible performance and got shut down so I switched to 24 slot servers. They are all around more fun and I think 24 players is enough considering the map sizes.
Not mine, and in reply to hus, you obviously haven't played on a good 24 player stuff. All of that stuff you assume is not important on a 24 player server is still every bit as important. The only difference is it get's more hectic defending that territory, which, to me, makes it that much more fun.
And you've just concluded that you like 'hectic fun', which takes me back to my tower defense analogy.
You're just following the more numbers is more fun simplicity that pubbers seem to love. I don't have a problem with it. Just for the love of god, make the servers appear as modded so that the new players don't assume that this is the intended experience.
I know I'd be pretty disappointed if I worked on developing a game only for people to take a shit on it and just play tf2 32 player instaspawn mode.
Where are you coming up with this shit? It was the dev's themselves that built the 24 player limit into the game. I'm quite confident we're not "taking a shit" all over them. And perhaps it's YOU that isn't experiencing everything that NS2 has to offer if you refuse to play on anything over a 16 player limit.
Cool, so make more dumbed down junk for the masses? Got ya.
yeap, simply because it sells better. i don't agree with dumbing down games, but in the end, money is still important to people who make games for a living. ns1 was developed and released for free, so ns2 has to have some sort of revenue. you don't really expect them to be continue releasing games for free, do you?
anyway, this is not the point. we have our 16p, 18p, 20p, 22p and 24p servers. it's just that 24p happened to be much more popular with people seeking casual fun. you can't blame them for wanting it and having 24p as an option for servers isn't "dumbing down" the game in any way.
to show it as modded or not, i think it doesn't really matter. there are people who are in a team and scrim regularly, people who play gathers, people who play 16p and people who play 24p. they all know how the game plays out with different amount of players. this is how most people who seek casual fun automatically know that 24p is the way to go for them.
let the pubbers play their own crazy public games. if they're interested enough, they'll join you on the competitive side. if they're not, too bad. that's the way i see it.
I saw someone put forward the argument on some other thread a couple months back about how the competitive community was the lifeblood of a game. I didn't say anything then, but honestly that's the most ludricous pile of crap I've ever heard. EVERY game I ever played competitively, from TFC to BF2, and pretty much everything in between, I got into from first starting out playing on pubs. I'm not saying NS2 should completely overlook the competitive community in this game, not by any means. But for those types of people to come in and say that their way of playing the game is the only pure and true way of playing it is just beyond stupidity.
I used to play on smaller servers, always avoiding the 24 slot ones. But then one night by chance connected to the dumbass brits server and had the most amazing round of NS2 ever. From that day I happily wait for 15 minutes until a slots becomes free.
Honestly I think many mechanics actually work better with 12v12. Take the Exo. It's shit in 6v6 (ask savant he wrote a PhD about it) but in 12v12 when there actually are enough people to welder-support a group of 5 exos they become these amazing killing machines that walz about the map and Aliens really have to step up the game to stop them.
While stupid Power Node rushes sometimes work in 12v12 they are far harder to pull off because there actually are enough marines to defend 3 bases.
Also saying no teamplay is reuqired is utter bullshit. If anything there is more teamplay required because in 12v12 there is hardly ever the situation where one or 2 guys can roflstomp an entire team. So even good players have to work with the team in order to win and it is actually possible to win against a stacked team with the help of teamplay. We all know how a stacked 6v6 is going to play out.
It might be a shock for you guys but this ridiculous high skill ceiling of NS2 makes it very unattractive to anyone who has not the time to practice 2 hrs a day. You can teamplay as much as you like but if youre a bad shot you are going to get stomped in 6v6. In 12v12 you actually can contribute alot by just teamplaying.
So plz guys just stop this Be polite. -Talesin elitism. If you'd close down all >16 player servers NS2 would be dead within 2 months.
I used to play on smaller servers, always avoiding the 24 slot ones. But then one night by chance connected to the dumbass brits server and had the most amazing round of NS2 ever. From that day I happily wait for 15 minutes until a slots becomes free.
Honestly I think many mechanics actually work better with 12v12. Take the Exo. It's shit in 6v6 (ask savant he wrote a PhD about it) but in 12v12 when there actually are enough people to welder-support a group of 5 exos they become these amazing killing machines that walz about the map and Aliens really have to step up the game to stop them.
While stupid Power Node rushes sometimes work in 12v12 they are far harder to pull off because there actually are enough marines to defend 3 bases.
Also saying no teamplay is reuqired is utter bullshit. If anything there is more teamplay required because in 12v12 there is hardly ever the situation where one or 2 guys can roflstomp an entire team. So even good players have to work with the team in order to win and it is actually possible to win against a stacked team with the help of teamplay. We all know how a stacked 6v6 is going to play out.
It might be a shock for you guys but this ridiculous high skill ceiling of NS2 makes it very unattractive to anyone who has not the time to practice 2 hrs a day. You can teamplay as much as you like but if youre a bad shot you are going to get stomped in 6v6. In 12v12 you actually can contribute alot by just teamplaying.
So plz guys just stop this Be polite. -Talesin elitism. If you'd close down all >16 player servers NS2 would be dead within 2 months.
That server might have good players but I've played there and the server lag is just horrible.
If 6 good players vs 6 good players is the ideal way to play the game, but only half of pub players are good... then creating 24 player servers is the most reliable way to create those 6v6 good games. There will be another layer of players adding a bit of chaos to the mix, but in general you'll only end up with 6v6 actually playing the game.
From a personal point of view, playing 6v6 means I spend too much time doing things I'm not interested in, because there's nobody else to do it. I also spend too much time as a marine on my own, which is not fun because for one thing, it makes two of the already limited weapon upgrades untenable, and generally just makes the game a tedious exercise in getting killed because you need to split off to do something, but are highly likely to die somewhere in the doing of it.
Essentially 6v6 involves more structure building/destroying busy work and dying in the process, but not quickly enough to justify not going out immediately after you respawn to do the same thing again, because you actually did manage to achieve some slight strategic progress.
In larger games there are more people so that particular tedious duty gets spread out more, I can spend more time doing fun things and only occasionally have to pick up the busywork.
Also small games means more time walking and not fighting anything, some maps are rather oversized for a 12 player game.
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Which is why I am slightly worried in the case of NS2, since this community is rather small to begin with, and there are fewer and fewer decent 16 player servers to pick from. To me it feels like the NS2 pub community is getting gobbled up by all the emerging 24 players servers. It has gone from the original 16 to 18 to 20 to 22 and now to 24. Which leaves me wondering how much bigger the servers are gonna get. I'm probably overreacting, but if the current trend continues, the prospects are grim for pub players like me.
So if I come across as some frustrated elitist, it's only because I feel like an endangered species. Didn't mean to insult anyone.
This guy gets it.
I don't think showing an example of 24 players playing some made up catch and kiss game relevant to rebutting the fact that players are missing alot of what ns2 has to offer when playing zerg v zerg.
I could give an example of joining a 24 player server and having every commander ejected repeatedly by a bunch of trolls but it contributes nothing to the debate.
And honestly, why don't you educate me on all these mysteries of the game that my players are somehow missing. To date, I've seen most of the major strategies (some silly ones like gorge rushes, and some more serious like crag hives first, etc) brought up on these boards tried out from time to time to see how they work on a bigger server. There's actually quite a few intelligent, more mature players that frequent mine who could probably give some of these competitive players a run for their money if they weren't just casual players. And I can't even remember the last time I saw a com ejected on my server. Trolls last about 5 seconds once they're realized, and I honestly haven't even had to deal with many of those either.
You basically just remove the entire metagame of territory control and res awareness.
As soon as each kill/death becomes unimportant, you remove any necessity to think. The only strategy involved is throwing more numbers at areas.
his answer, in short, was simply because "the pub players like it".
i'm actually kind of relieved that they didn't offer 32p as an option for servers. i think many 24p servers would be 32p if given the choice.
They are also the servers which put on the ~80+player game back in the late days of the beta.
24 players on monash does not cause server ticks to drop below 30 or performance below 98%.
Most 24 players are not up to chop...but the monash ones are almost totally bullet proof.
If more servers performed like monash we would be wondering why we dont have 40 player servers.
The monash servers are great yeah, 40 players would be battlefield
And you've just concluded that you like 'hectic fun', which takes me back to my tower defense analogy.
You're just following the more numbers is more fun simplicity that pubbers seem to love. I don't have a problem with it. Just for the love of god, make the servers appear as modded so that the new players don't assume that this is the intended experience.
I know I'd be pretty disappointed if I worked on developing a game only for people to take a shit on it and just play tf2 32 player instaspawn mode.
and why would you? people who play for casual fun are in the majority. they'd spread the game through word of mouth for you, which in turn means more customers and more money for you.
imo, that is more than enough reason for any developer to start making games for casual fun. $ > all.
I had the pleasure of being around when Endar set the limit to 100...only got up to about 70 odd when I was on but was epic.
Seeing 20 or so skulks rush into your spawn is pretty damn scary...though trying to get past a door that 15 marines are all aiming at is nigh on impossible.
I avoid playing on anywhere other than monash if I can manage it...as the gaming experience is severly impacted by the server.
Cool, so make more dumbed down junk for the masses? Got ya.
Where are you coming up with this shit? It was the dev's themselves that built the 24 player limit into the game. I'm quite confident we're not "taking a shit" all over them. And perhaps it's YOU that isn't experiencing everything that NS2 has to offer if you refuse to play on anything over a 16 player limit.
yeap, simply because it sells better. i don't agree with dumbing down games, but in the end, money is still important to people who make games for a living. ns1 was developed and released for free, so ns2 has to have some sort of revenue. you don't really expect them to be continue releasing games for free, do you?
anyway, this is not the point. we have our 16p, 18p, 20p, 22p and 24p servers. it's just that 24p happened to be much more popular with people seeking casual fun. you can't blame them for wanting it and having 24p as an option for servers isn't "dumbing down" the game in any way.
to show it as modded or not, i think it doesn't really matter. there are people who are in a team and scrim regularly, people who play gathers, people who play 16p and people who play 24p. they all know how the game plays out with different amount of players. this is how most people who seek casual fun automatically know that 24p is the way to go for them.
let the pubbers play their own crazy public games. if they're interested enough, they'll join you on the competitive side. if they're not, too bad. that's the way i see it.
Honestly I think many mechanics actually work better with 12v12. Take the Exo. It's shit in 6v6 (ask savant he wrote a PhD about it) but in 12v12 when there actually are enough people to welder-support a group of 5 exos they become these amazing killing machines that walz about the map and Aliens really have to step up the game to stop them.
While stupid Power Node rushes sometimes work in 12v12 they are far harder to pull off because there actually are enough marines to defend 3 bases.
Also saying no teamplay is reuqired is utter bullshit. If anything there is more teamplay required because in 12v12 there is hardly ever the situation where one or 2 guys can roflstomp an entire team. So even good players have to work with the team in order to win and it is actually possible to win against a stacked team with the help of teamplay. We all know how a stacked 6v6 is going to play out.
It might be a shock for you guys but this ridiculous high skill ceiling of NS2 makes it very unattractive to anyone who has not the time to practice 2 hrs a day. You can teamplay as much as you like but if youre a bad shot you are going to get stomped in 6v6. In 12v12 you actually can contribute alot by just teamplaying.
So plz guys just stop this Be polite. -Talesin elitism. If you'd close down all >16 player servers NS2 would be dead within 2 months.
Essentially 6v6 involves more structure building/destroying busy work and dying in the process, but not quickly enough to justify not going out immediately after you respawn to do the same thing again, because you actually did manage to achieve some slight strategic progress.
In larger games there are more people so that particular tedious duty gets spread out more, I can spend more time doing fun things and only occasionally have to pick up the busywork.
Also small games means more time walking and not fighting anything, some maps are rather oversized for a 12 player game.