Competitive Pubs

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Competitive Pubs

by AronTimes » Wed Jan 20, 2016 4:57 pm

I noticed that there has been a lot of interest in competitive lobbies here in CSN. Have you guys considered doing what TPF is doing (playing pub games competitively)? I don't mean super tryhard mode where everyone has to go for the standard loadout, but a game where everyone actually plays to win instead of just fooling around. The idea behind a competitive pub is that it's a step up from the madness that is your everyday TF2 experience, but a lot more convenient than the logistics nightmare that is competitive lobbies. Everyone can come and go as they please, with the assurance that people will actually try to win the game instead of griefing or idling or trolling.

Remember, competitiveness isn't binary; it's a spectrum. On one end you have silly servers where the objective is just to fool around and pose for the camera. On the other end, you have big invite tourneys where real money is on the line. Most players, servers, and communities fall somewhere in between these two extremes. The problem with lobbies, be they the standard 6v6 or the less popular Highlander is that they're played with artificial restrictions in place. TF2 was designed as a 12v12 game; in a small game like 6s, the core classes (Scout, Soldier, Medic, and Demoman) are overpowered in such an environment to the point that the meta has solidified around them. Even in Highlander, forcing a team to have a Spy means that you always have to worry about Spies, whereas in a normal pub game, a team might not have a Spy so the spychecking done by the enemy team is a waste of time (not that they know that).

I come from an RTS background, and the thing about Spies is that like stealth units in RTS games, the threat of having them can be a greater weapon than actually deploying them into battle. For example, if you are known to always use Dark Templars or Banshees, your opponent can blind counter you by building detection. Also, if you always know that DTs or Banshees will be present, you will play accordingly and the surprise factor that these two stealth units have is lost. However, if you don't always use them, your opponent has to scout or guess if you have them. In TF2 terms, spy checking is a waste of time if the enemy team never has Spies; the potential threat of instant stabby death is greater than the actual stabby death itself.

Other support classes also suffer in competitive formats. Engineers are an awesome support class if you already have a good core lineup to support, but they're dead weight when you have a smaller player count and every player is needed to contribute now instead of later (the Engineer is a class that gets stronger the longer he stays within a specific area). Pyros are pretty much dead weight in a format where you can't afford not having someone that can actually fight directly with the enemy team. There are also other things that work well in 12v12 that simply doesn't work in competitive formats:

1. As an Engineer player, I can place a sentry gun somewhere it will shoot down incoming Soldiers, Demomen, and Scouts, as well as flanking Scouts and Pyros. I've gotten long killstreaks with pub-optimized strats that pro and semi-pro players never have to deal with. It's not that these strats are cheap or cheesy, it's that they simply wouldn't work in a competitive setting where having 1 perma-Engineer means an insta-lose against competent teams.

2. Full-time Pybro is viable in a 12v12 setting. I need never venture from our battle lines; I simply spread happiness to my team and occasionally catch people who aren't already happy (enemy Spies). I airblast enemy projectiles and burning teammates, and unsap friendly buildings. By doing this, I can keep my teammates facing forward and firing forward instead of wasting their time and ammo spychecking. This is one thing I like to do on TPF servers, where competent Spies and competent teammates abound.

So yeah, please consider hosting a competitive pub server in addition to your organized lobbies. :)
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by Someone Special » Wed Jan 20, 2016 5:04 pm

KaneAdamson wrote:I noticed that there has been a lot of interest in competitive lobbies here in CSN. Have you guys considered doing what TPF is doing (playing pub games competitively)? I don't mean super tryhard mode where everyone has to go for the standard loadout, but a game where everyone actually plays to win instead of just fooling around. The idea behind a competitive pub is that it's a step up from the madness that is your everyday TF2 experience, but a lot more convenient than the logistics nightmare that is competitive lobbies. Everyone can come and go as they please, with the assurance that people will actually try to win the game instead of griefing or idling or trolling.

Remember, competitiveness isn't binary; it's a spectrum. On one end you have silly servers where the objective is just to fool around and pose for the camera. On the other end, you have big invite tourneys where real money is on the line. Most players, servers, and communities fall somewhere in between these two extremes. The problem with lobbies, be they the standard 6v6 or the less popular Highlander is that they're played with artificial restrictions in place. TF2 was designed as a 12v12 game; in a small game like 6s, the core classes (Scout, Soldier, Medic, and Demoman) are overpowered in such an environment to the point that the meta has solidified around them. Even in Highlander, forcing a team to have a Spy means that you always have to worry about Spies, whereas in a normal pub game, a team might not have a Spy so the spychecking done by the enemy team is a waste of time (not that they know that).

I come from an RTS background, and the thing about Spies is that like stealth units in RTS games, the threat of having them can be a greater weapon than actually deploying them into battle. For example, if you are known to always use Dark Templars or Banshees, your opponent can blind counter you by building detection. Also, if you always know that DTs or Banshees will be present, you will play accordingly and the surprise factor that these two stealth units have is lost. However, if you don't always use them, your opponent has to scout or guess if you have them. In TF2 terms, spy checking is a waste of time if the enemy team never has Spies; the potential threat of instant stabby death is greater than the actual stabby death itself.

Other support classes also suffer in competitive formats. Engineers are an awesome support class if you already have a good core lineup to support, but they're dead weight when you have a smaller player count and every player is needed to contribute now instead of later (the Engineer is a class that gets stronger the longer he stays within a specific area). Pyros are pretty much dead weight in a format where you can't afford not having someone that can actually fight directly with the enemy team. There are also other things that work well in 12v12 that simply doesn't work in competitive formats:

1. As an Engineer player, I can place a sentry gun somewhere it will shoot down incoming Soldiers, Demomen, and Scouts, as well as flanking Scouts and Pyros. I've gotten long killstreaks with pub-optimized strats that pro and semi-pro players never have to deal with. It's not that these strats are cheap or cheesy, it's that they simply wouldn't work in a competitive setting where having 1 perma-Engineer means an insta-lose against competent teams.

2. Full-time Pybro is viable in a 12v12 setting. I need never venture from our battle lines; I simply spread happiness to my team and occasionally catch people who aren't already happy (enemy Spies). I airblast enemy projectiles and burning teammates, and unsap friendly buildings. By doing this, I can keep my teammates facing forward and firing forward instead of wasting their time and ammo spychecking. This is one thing I like to do on TPF servers, where competent Spies and competent teammates abound.

So yeah, please consider hosting a competitive pub server in addition to your organized lobbies. :)


Well, we kinda do have one of those servers. It's called Slaybox 2, it has all those Pro maps, ya know? We just don't have the playerbase to keep both it and the other servers popped consistently unfortunately.
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by Balubish » Thu Jan 21, 2016 2:16 am

We have a comp server setup already, dont know the activity of it at all, but guess the owner could just open it for anyone and done.
Its not like I see it full of comp players now anyways, so Redmins is this possible?

And what ur comparing TPF with I have no clue, the only difference they have on their pubs I've played on is valve players with some pro maps and all talk turned off.
And CSn even with all talk and skill/longtime players have much higher skill lvl thanks to that anyways. And if your just looking for that I guess SB2 with pro maps already added, we could just turn off all-talk and voila we are like TPF, problem with CSn players we all like the open talk area as a community and TPF players usually hang out in mumble anyways so the reason for turning off all talk is kinda pointless then.

Just wondering what goal you have Kane.
Is it just a regular pub server with no all-talk and some pro maps added like TPF have?
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by Lia_Rein » Thu Jan 21, 2016 7:14 am

Having played on both substantially I don't see any big difference in the amount of griefing or idle-ing on CSn compared to TPF. I don't get the specifics of what you're suggesting either.

What I love about CSn is that people are very capable of both having fun and playing to win at the same time. I haven't found that anywhere else :P
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by AronTimes » Thu Jan 21, 2016 11:24 am

tl;dr: I totally forgot that Slaybox 2 existed, so we actually already have what I was looking for.

Balubish wrote:We have a comp server setup already, dont know the activity of it at all, but guess the owner could just open it for anyone and done.
Its not like I see it full of comp players now anyways, so Redmins is this possible?

And what ur comparing TPF with I have no clue, the only difference they have on their pubs I've played on is valve players with some pro maps and all talk turned off.
And CSn even with all talk and skill/longtime players have much higher skill lvl thanks to that anyways. And if your just looking for that I guess SB2 with pro maps already added, we could just turn off all-talk and voila we are like TPF, problem with CSn players we all like the open talk area as a community and TPF players usually hang out in mumble anyways so the reason for turning off all talk is kinda pointless then.

Just wondering what goal you have Kane.
Is it just a regular pub server with no all-talk and some pro maps added like TPF have?

I don't like competitive TF2, because I think it is an artificially-restricted version of TF2 that encourages skill classes at the expense of meta classes. Also, competitive TF2 is infested by some very toxic pro and semi-pro gamers like the one we talked about in my other thread (the one where I posted a video of me getting votekicked). Since I will never participate in 6s or Highlander as they currently exist (because I disagree with the rules behind the two formats), I can't join you folks in your organized fun.

This doesn't mean that I'm not a competitive player, because I am competitive within the confines of my metagame (pub servers). I play to win, but never forget the fact that TF2 was always designed with a casual 12v12 environment in mind. Furthermore, the logistics of setting up lobbies and my erratic schedule means that I can't join you guys even if I wanted to play 6v6 or Highlander. Also, I'm not saying you should turn off alltalk, because it is the main selling point of this community (besides, I started playing TF2 on an alltalk server, so it is what is normal to me). What I'm saying is that I'd like to see something in between lobbies and pubs. Apparently, we already have this in Slaybox 2, so I guess my suggestion is moot.

Note: I started playing TF2 on Chocolate Hammer, which was an alltalk server. ChHa had a competitive counterpart in Super Happy Fun Time, or ShaFT. The servers were made up of members of the Giant in the Playground, home of the Order of the Stick webcomic. The server died out before TF2 went F2P, and was not a casualty of Valve going nuclear on saigns and NighTeam (when Valve chaned Quickplay to default to Valve servers only, resulting in many community servers dying out).

Lia_Rein wrote:Having played on both substantially I don't see any big difference in the amount of griefing or idle-ing on CSn compared to TPF. I don't get the specifics of what you're suggesting either.

What I love about CSn is that people are very capable of both having fun and playing to win at the same time. I haven't found that anywhere else :P


See above. I had actually forgotten all about Slaybox 2, which is actually what I was looking for. Unfortunately, so have a lot of other members, which would explain why it's empty most of the time.
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by Balubish » Thu Jan 21, 2016 11:57 am

Problem with our gamers is that many of them dont know about SB2 cause they have only found the server and dont bother going to this forum.
We have the CSn Elite Group on steam that we use to send out pop messages, its growing slowly but we need atleast a 100 "new" players on CSn to join to be effective to send out these messages for that server.

So yeah, the more often we play on SB2 the more popular it will get in rating, im all for it so send me a message.
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by flufffage » Thu Jan 21, 2016 1:07 pm

Balubish wrote:So yeah, the more often we play on SB2 the more popular it will get in rating, im all for it so send me a message.


Dittoed.

If you want a little more competitive action, I know there have been a couple people who brought up having our own tournaments, 6s and 9s, but also maybe like 12 man teams, but bracket style.

Personally, I'm not sure how that last would work

Then, we do have our annual dodgeball tournament ;)
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by Age » Thu Jan 21, 2016 2:01 pm

KaneAdamson wrote: Also, competitive TF2 is infested by some very toxic pro and semi-pro gamers like the one we talked about in my other thread (the one where I posted a video of me getting votekicked).

Personally I have to say that I have probably experienced more toxic players on pubs than in competitive. That's not to say they don't exist, sure, but they exist in way less numbers than a lot of people seem to believe. So far I have played in both ETF2L and UGC and neither time have I met toxic players. Nor in PuGs. Only time I have met them are in lobbies to be honest.

Of course this is anecdotal and your personal experience may vary.



Overall though I get what you are going for and I think I would enjoy that too. So if help is needed to populate SB2 I can help out.
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by Balubish » Thu Jan 21, 2016 2:20 pm

Age wrote:
KaneAdamson wrote: Also, competitive TF2 is infested by some very toxic pro and semi-pro gamers like the one we talked about in my other thread (the one where I posted a video of me getting votekicked).

Personally I have to say that I have probably experienced more toxic players on pubs than in competitive. That's not to say they don't exist, sure, but they exist in way less numbers than a lot of people seem to believe. So far I have played in both ETF2L and UGC and neither time have I met toxic players. Nor in PuGs. Only time I have met them are in lobbies to be honest.

Of course this is anecdotal and your personal experience may vary.



Overall though I get what you are going for and I think I would enjoy that too. So if help is needed to populate SB2 I can help out.


You dont meet toxic players in ur own team, its a given.
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by Age » Thu Jan 21, 2016 2:48 pm

Balubish wrote:
Age wrote:
KaneAdamson wrote: Also, competitive TF2 is infested by some very toxic pro and semi-pro gamers like the one we talked about in my other thread (the one where I posted a video of me getting votekicked).

Personally I have to say that I have probably experienced more toxic players on pubs than in competitive. That's not to say they don't exist, sure, but they exist in way less numbers than a lot of people seem to believe. So far I have played in both ETF2L and UGC and neither time have I met toxic players. Nor in PuGs. Only time I have met them are in lobbies to be honest.

Of course this is anecdotal and your personal experience may vary.



Overall though I get what you are going for and I think I would enjoy that too. So if help is needed to populate SB2 I can help out.


You dont meet toxic players in ur own team, its a given.



I mean overall. All opponents I can remember have been incredibly nice. Same with random people in PUGs.
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Re: Competitive Pubs

by HobbesTF2 » Thu Jan 21, 2016 3:35 pm

Lia_Rein wrote:Having played on both substantially I don't see any big difference in the amount of griefing or idle-ing on CSn compared to TPF. I don't get the specifics of what you're suggesting either.

What I love about CSn is that people are very capable of both having fun and playing to win at the same time. I haven't found that anywhere else :P


Exactly. Playing a fair bit on TPF in the past as well, I find that when people attempt to play pubs "competitively", instead of working together, it's two or three people complaining and barking out orders to their team. CSn has always been very good about working together, because there are always people willing to play classes that aren't necessarily the "most fun". I rarely find games without at least a medic and an engie (or someone who quickly realizes it and switches).

So while maybe Slaybox 1 isn't necessarily filled with trendy call-outs or meta loudouts, everyone essentially plays pretty well. Even the best players can't top score everytime.

In my opinion, CSn has all the good aspects of comp (i.e. teamwork, overall skill, and communication), while not putting too much weight on the rather unimportant things (i.e. Always winning, getting angry at people for not doing well, super uptight-ness, etc.)
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