Team Fortress 2 Megathread - winter is the most chill time of year

[rare creek]

so im not

[uncut spear]

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1029331568315093043/1229005344118800404/attachment.gif

[rare creek]

acutalyl wait

[livid oracle]

open tf2

have fun for 1 hr

close tf2

open internet

see most miserable ppl on the planet complaining about how they cant have fun in tf2 anymore

cycle repeats

[unborn pecan]

play the new game

[rare creek]

why did you remove your yes vote

[unborn pecan]

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/275004607690702848/1212826647741341757/dougie_funny.gif

[rare creek]

doogie

[unborn pecan]

dougie..

[orchid sorrel]

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/955182759414988811/1240359889000464445/watchyotonemf.gif

[uncut spear]

teach me how to. . .

[unborn pecan]

move your arms out side to side

[uncut spear]

CMOM ITS TIME TO GO DO THE MARIO

[lusty ice]

Does anyone know if -enablefakeip on dedicated servers still has issues?

Issues with getting the server on the master server list, more specifically.

[kind falcon]

why would you have that option on dedicated servers anyway

[small siren]

*why would you have that

option on dedicated

servers anyway*

- robert of shenzhen, china

[lusty ice]

Isn't the point of SDR to mitigate DDoS, among other things?

[kind falcon]

right mb

https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Source-1-Games/issues/5941

[lusty ice]

Yeah it has issues with MvM Boot Camp.
But is that all there is?
I'm asking because I've got a report hinting that FakeIP servers might not always show up but I haven't observed this issue myself so far.

[kind falcon]

shrug

all i see on community browser is femme hypnosis and skial 24/7 2fort

[lusty ice]

Fair enough.

[kind falcon]

https://tenor.com/view/stray-stray-game-teaser-trailer-sit-gif-26571301

[livid oracle]

@next nymph

here you go

[next nymph]

thanks

[tacit flare]

Reminds me of that System32 Virus. I'm glad it's an easy fix to just delete the folder the virus is contained in.

[next nymph]

please post this in #tech🤖 thanks

[high current]

I think an argument could be made that Valve currently is getting clowned on by cheaters across their fps games, namely CS2, which has people rapidly losing faith in Valve as a company at least as far as fps games go.
This is relevant to TF2 because it has the most blatant bot problem and the absolute lowest hanging fruit in terms of cheats (spin botting, copy-paste named, multi bots). Thus if Valve wanted to restore some faith in their anticheat efforts, TF2 would be the easiest and probably flashiest way to ban tens of thousands of cheaters. Since everyone who plays a Valve game knows about TF2’s bot crisis. Valve wouldn’t even really need anticheat to get a good news headline, if they just copied one of the reputable lists of bot SteamIDs they could get a headline if “Valve bans 10,000 multibots and fixes 16 year old game!”

Where as TF2 remaining bot infested just sorta sends the message of “if Valve can’t do something about spinbotting multibots in TF2, how are they going to ban the guy toggling in CS2 premier”.

It’s not an airtight argument. But I think it’s the most valid reason Valve would actually have to do something about the state of TF2

[next nymph]

i think the solution is simple: make there be more reason for valve to fix it

I propose we bribe eric

[high current]

Just start sending in fancy knives to Gabe Newell with “fix tf2” notes attached

[misty plover]

Omg... wtf....

Did you put an ip logger on my pc 🙀

[slender nexus]

Fardlogger

[livid oracle]

the problem here is that there aren't 10s of thousands of cheaters

[high current]

Just an example of an exaggerated problem. Maybe just some like ign article headline of like “Valve fixes TF2’s Bot Problem”. It’s a whole lot flashier than “Valve bans 2% more subtle CS2 Premier Cheaters”. Even if those are equal in scale.

[kind falcon]

apparently having a leaderboard open for everyone to see is a great way to manually ban cheaters

[high current]

And vacnet is already trained on how to detect spinbotters, so if they wanted an automatic way to detect them, they have it. Or they can just copy+paste the bot detector blacklist and manually ban them, even though they’d be back in a week.

Either way gets the head line

[kind falcon]

there are some legit people in the detector list just sayin

namely a great member of this particular server

[high current]

I mean vacnet also banned people using high dpi, easier to fix a couple false positives tbh

[kind falcon]

they unbanned both spinbotters and highdpi spinners

🙂

(with some falsepositives in determining the highdpi users of course, we love the benefit of the doubt around here)

[high current]

Or they could just ban users with the name omegatronic and that have 10,000% more reports than average, and that have 10,000% more voice activity than average.

The bots don’t hide that they’re cheating

[kind falcon]

ur evil man

[high current]

Point is, TF2’s bot problem is the absolute lowest hanging fruit of anticheat, most anticheat devs would have a wet dream over such blatant cheaters.

A python script could ban 99% of them

[kind falcon]

why do u keep doing this

[high current]

Probably wouldn’t keep them away. But it’d scare off the force-a-nature aimbot scouts and it’d be good publicity.

[next nymph]

peaches but fucked up and slightly twisted

[rare creek]

lol

[rare creek]

@left sand you have to mute me now

[kind falcon]

just break some rules

[rare creek]

i probably already have

[broken haven]

20 min video essay

[high current]

Hot take: casual ain’t that bad. And current casual match making is a significantly better user experience than quick play match making

[summer steeple]

honestly, agreed. rolls are not super common, and you get a nice balance of player skill levels

[high current]

Though the point about party sizes of 6 being excessive and only really used by bots to be kick-immune is valid.

[eternal haven]

I never played the game when quickplay was around but the current situation with casual on valve servers plus the option to play on whichever community server you choose seems much preferable to how quickplay was

[summer steeple]

imo sv_vote_quorum_ratio should be like .4

i'm not actually sure what it is now, it might be .5 or .6

[high current]

Quick play was basically just the server browser for people who didn’t know map names.

[high current]

I think it’s 0.6 according to the video

[summer steeple]

although, now that I say that, I don't know if changing quorum ratio would change anything

if a party of 6 still votes no instantly that'll still be at least 50% of the vote

[high current]

Once you learned map names you just kinda used the server browser to find valve servers on the map you wanted to play. Or you joined like skial to play a mix of maps.

People had much more defined favorite maps back then. Now people play a much wider variety of maps

[summer steeple]

I wonder how effective preventing a party from participating in a kick vote for their party member would be 🤔

[eternal haven]

Are the bots partied up?

[summer steeple]

not usually in my experience

it happens sometimes

[high current]

Adhoc connections and the ability to switch teams were pretty much the only up side to quick play. Anything else is nostalgia and/or copium.

[eternal haven]

I like that casual is matchmaking and has no adhoc connections

[small siren]

*I like that casual

is matchmaking and has no

adhoc connections*

- mysterious_eagle_46873

[eternal haven]

If you want adhoc connections play community servers

seems perfect to me, you get each

[high current]

Some bots do and will just insta-kick players. But it’s more rare. You basically have to join a brand new server that happens to be bot infested.

[eternal haven]

So is vac ineffective on linux or how doesn't cathook get detected and banned?

[high current]

Pretty much. It’s a little annoying seeing “searching for player” when your friend is in your party queued for your match for the past 10 minutes. Though I think that’s just bad implementation.

[summer steeple]

I don't think valve has actually put in the effort to let VAC detect cathook in years

[grim parcel]

i hope they add vanguard soon

[summer steeple]

probably because valve has moved onto other anti-cheat measures and tf2 just doesn't have them

[high current]

Cathook probably gets detected. It’s just VAC intentionally delays bans to prevent cheat devs from “knowing what triggered VAC”, so you can spinbot for like 2 weeks without consequence.

[summer steeple]

whatever software the bots use doesn't get detected

or at least, if it does they don't get auto banned

because many of the accounts have been bots for years

[grim parcel]

it’s also more like 2 days for most auto bans

if that

[eternal haven]

Yeah you can find bot accounts from ages ago that are not banned

I might actually go through pazer's list or something and query steam API for what percentage are vacced

[high current]

Fair enough. VAC as an anticheat and as an anticheat philosophy is outdated. It was maybe relevant in 2010 at the latest.

[summer steeple]

the bot accounts that are banned are usually very specific hoster's bots

things like omegatronic, deltatronic

and even then, not all of them

and they seemed to be from manual banwaves

[high current]

Is lmfaobox a banned word? Why did my post get blocked

[summer steeple]

it might be

it is

[high current]

For why. WTF

[grim parcel]

get good get fiendhook

[summer steeple]

free vac and YOU KNOW

[grim parcel]

only @ dnsense dot pub

[stuck locust]

I think VAC was targeted at people trying to subtly cheat. But frankly the difference between TimmyTurner2015 with wallhacks and some soldier with 4000 hours is irrelevant to most pubbers.
Ever since LUNCHBOX the cheater meta has basically been: go whole hog and cause as much disruption as possible, VAC be damned.
- peaches

[high current]

Ty

This server got some whack banned words tbh

[stuck locust]

well talking about cheats is discouraged normally

This includes no discussion of cheating/"hacks", no copyright infringement/"leaks", no self-botting, and no mature content (all content must be suitable for ages 13+).
#rules📘

[high current]

I mean yeh but why lunchbox specifically, that was relevant in 2012. If we wanted to discourage cheat discussions why aren’t any of the hooks banned

[summer steeple]

i thought cathook was a banned word tbh

[high current]

I mean cathook is dead now anyway. I think it’s some other fork now

[summer steeple]

we used to call it something like dogchain or something lol

[stuck locust]

well technically it's no longer a thing so why should it be banned?

[small siren]

*well technically

it's no longer a thing so

why should it be banned?*

- Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz

[high current]

Hasn’t lunchbox been dead since like 2014? I don’t think I’ve seen any of them in a decade.

[stuck locust]

no, it's still active

still getting updates i believe

got a pretty decent playerbase too

[high current]

Weird. Maybe they just stopped spamming the “get good, get lunchbox” in the chat

[small siren]

*Weird. Maybe they just

stopped spamming the “get good, get

lunchbox” in the chat*

- peachestv

[stuck locust]

well it's not meant to just be a blatant cheat

[high current]

But yeh VAC basically targets the wrong people to have any meaningful impact in this meta

[summer steeple]

i thought part of the chat spamming was to try and get cheaters to use the paid version instead so they don't just get instakicked

maybe it just wasn't lucrative anymore

[stuck locust]

that was likely its intention when it was first part of the cheat, but now i'm thinking it's more of a meme or just a way to get attention

[rare creek]

idk ive played with 6 people before and you need 6 people for mvm

[wild grove]

just watched this and was a HUGE waste of my time.

[summer steeple]

shrimply do not watch tf2bers

[uncut spear]

WHAT NO WAY

[summer steeple]

I only watch uncle dane at this point

[uncut spear]

watching people actually play the game is the best thing to do bruh 😭

[wild grove]

it's like crack tho! I love watching how doom and gloom they are.

[summer steeple]

you could be watching people play doom instead

[uncut spear]

SO TRUE

[wild grove]

so real!

[uncut spear]

devs react to doom speedrun

watch that instead

[rare creek]

lol i didnt even watch it

[high current]

Idk I think tftubers are fine. There’s actually a good amount of tf2 content coming out currently. Not all of it is gold obviously, but is pretty inline with the quality of YouTube overall. Like 75% of the same stuff you’ve already seen and don’t care about, 24% stuff you’ve probably already seen but don’t mind seeing again, 1% new content that you’re excited for.

And of course there’s the doomers like Spicy Zeus, pretty much the tf2 equivalent of the people who make YouTube videos about other YouTubers who turn out to be horrible people.

Tbh tf2 community is toxic af to its YouTubers. Like most of them are fine, just the tf2 community needs something to hate about everyone.
Spicy Zeus? Awful person. Tyler McVicker tries to be the anti-Spicy Zeus? Cringe. Other YouTuber releases a video about weapon ideas? Clearly has never played competitive. Competitive YouTuber releases a video about competitive? Go back to uncletopia, TRYHARD.
It’s out of hand honestly.

[unborn pecan]

Linux

[broken haven]

https://x.com/WeezyTF2/status/1797379480014712996

Weezy (@WeezyTF2) on X

Here are SOME of the creators participating in #FixTF2 tomorrow.

#1 trending, let's get it.

Twitter · Jun 2, 2024, 9:27 PM

wow tftubers

[eternal haven]

What are they doing?

[broken haven]

protesting

[hoary geyser]

I still don't understand what exactly they're planning on doing tomorrow

[high current]

They didn’t say. Because they wanted to keep it secret? Idk it was very unclear. Otherwise I’d participate in whatever it is

[lusty ice]

Delak and The Winglet? Kinda surprised.

[slender nexus]

casual actually is pretty good for picking up and playing tf2 ya

[rare creek]

they are going to stop playing tf2 for 48 hours

[small siren]

*they are going to

stop playing tf2 for

48 hours*

- totallynotniteruxiswear

[mystic turtle]

speaking of this, there was one vid that was shared in this thread yesterday, pointing out megascatterbomb's servers (and a lot of other source community servers) already have sourcemods and plugins that block most bots from joining and can thus only let them DDOS these servers

[cursive peak]

Plenty of server hosts offer DDoS protection, too.

[mystic turtle]

anyways, this looks real interesting
hopefully I can just sign up and lend support from a distance once they straighten out the trouble with gmail

[jagged pawn]

we love squimjim

[slender nexus]

this will achieve absolutely nothing ☠️

[rare creek]

the joke is

redditor protest

[slender nexus]

https://tenor.com/view/alf-redditor-gif-20688189

[tough locust]

if everyone stops playing we can see the true number of idle bots LOL

[rare creek]

to get rid of all the idle bots
kill all traders

[mystic turtle]

finally I can rip people off for an extra 5 cents when selling specialized killstreak weapons (there are no bots undercutting me)

[unborn pecan]

sup r/tf2

today i will be posting le epic chungus

[wild grove]

Oh no 50 youtubers and prolly like 100 people are going to stop playing the game for 2 days whatever shall VALVe do!

[slender nexus]

omg wholesome 💯 Fortnite bad Minecraft good chungus keanu reeves ‼️‼️

[high current]

Yeh there are a lot of servers that feature anticheat plugins. It’s mainly for stopping bots since it can’t see what’s running in the users computer like a local anticheat would, but it works for keeping the blatant things away. It just shows a comically easy it is to suppress bots in some form.

[unborn pecan]

yerp

[high current]

I can’t imagine there’s that many idle bots. A weapon drop is worth what like $1/10,000? Sounds like the least resource efficient crypto mining setup imaginable.

[mystic turtle]

yea, it's way more resource efficient to just use trading bots instead, considering they accept quicksells that are super cheap and then pop them for way more profit than you can usually get while still selling for relatively cheap

[wild grove]

and the trading bots from what I see only open the game when they need to, they are usually always in a non-steam game.

[slender nexus]

Inb4 all the bots also go offline during this time to fuck with everyone trying to track them ☠️

[high current]

Plot twist, they’re not actually bots, tf2 players just have a messed up sleep schedule and no life

[uncut spear]

dawg don't point me out tf

[eternal haven]

Btw I don't think you actually have to launch tf2 to show up as playing

For instance it looks like using steamRE steamkit you can tell steam that you've started a tf2 client, and you might even need to do that for certain interactions with the item servers or GC

I think that would count you as playing the game, idk though

[high current]

You’re telling me Spicy Zeus might have not considered all of the possible explanations for tf2 players not following expected patterns😱

[livid oracle]

how

did you fall for the Epic Fail that is ppl who started playing after mym saying that pre-mym community servers were all just scam servers or whatever

[cursive peak]

They still say all community servers are terrible.

[eternal haven]

What do you mean how?

[livid oracle]

wdym what do i mean how

you didnt explain anything

thats why i asked how

[kind falcon]

neva did 🫡

[eternal haven]

I like the current situation with tf2 because you can choose between matchmaking with no ad-hoc connections (casual) played only on valve servers, or you can play community servers if you'd like, where you can switch teams as you like, connect ad-hoc, etc

You get the option to choose

With quickplay, my understanding is there basically was no matchmaking

At least not casual-like matchmaking

[livid oracle]

so what

you want the casual levels and etc?

[cursive peak]

What does matchmaking even actually add?

[eternal haven]

I'm just saying I like that there's the option to play on official valve servers that you're queued into by a matchmaking system and that people can't join ad-hoc

and I also like that there's the option to play on community servers

[cursive peak]

You could get queued into Valve servers only with quickplay, too. That was the default initially.

[livid oracle]

ok i get this opinion now with taking into account that you haven't played pre-mym

[eternal haven]

Yeah I was under the assumption that pre-mm quickplay queued you into either valve or community servers and you could connect to any servers ad-hoc

[livid oracle]

ppl still mostly used the browser

[cursive peak]

Why is there an issue with ad-hoc connections?

[livid oracle]

shit like freak fortress or whatever servers were full all the time

[eternal haven]

I like that you have the option now to play on adhoc servers or non adhoc servers

did that option exist before?

[livid oracle]

its just that they cant imagine tf2 without casual because they havent played without it

[cursive peak]

There were no non-adhoc servers.

[livid oracle]

it's really a nothing thing to say i think

nobody back then were like "yep i would love to have no adhoc connections"

[cursive peak]

Queued into paid MvM.

That was the closest.

[livid oracle]

if you wanted nobody to join afterwards you'd set a password

btw the state of the game pre-mym was like

you could host a listen server

and it would get filled up by players quickly

(if you've port forwarded of course)

[cursive peak]

Non-adhoc servers just make it harder to join servers with your friends. I don't see any advantages.

[livid oracle]

i still remember hosting a srcds server off my own machine when i was like 14 and just messing with sourcemod shit and like giving ppl random weapons

my isp is hitler now though

[cursive peak]

It's weird using casual and not getting to choose a server.

[eternal haven]

I mean it's sort of like all modern games

Tf2 (and csgo) are unique in that you get matchmaking and you get normal servers

You get either

That's pretty rare

[cursive peak]

I was fine with just a server browser.

[potent wolf]

it's nice to have both options

[tough locust]

yeah it just looked for some random server in your gamemode, there wasn't any MMR or way to queue with friends you just had to get your friends to join through the server browser. They were working on a "new quickplay" that you could queue in with your friends but that was scrapped for casual

[tough locust]

yeah I remember hosting crappy listen servers on turbine and 6 or 7 people would show up until the server started lagging on my laptop at the time

[high current]

The only thing from pre-MYM I miss was ad-hoc Valve servers and being able to switch teams/spectate on demand.
That and 24/7 plr_helltower servers, god I miss those😢

Everything else casual does with better user experience tbh. Plus casual levels are kinda cool. I am an ape and I want my shiny jingles after I make TimmyTurner2015 reconsider his life choices on pl_upward.

[wild grove]

I think just adding...
. Ability to spectate
. Ability to switch teams upon joining a server.
. Auto scramble
. Reduced downtime between matches.
. A community server queue option.
Would def improve the casual matchmaking experience and those can be done with just commands I think.

Only one that can't is the community server queue.

Spectating for long periods does count as being idle right?

[cursive peak]

If you wanted to reduce downtime between matches, just have the vote come up 5-10 minutes before the maptime ends and roll right into the next map.

[wild grove]

Aw yeah, remove rounds to win and replace it with 44 minute time limits!

[cursive peak]

Lots of servers ran 30 minutes.

[wild grove]

Ah yes

[cursive peak]

And you say that like it's a bad thing.

[wild grove]

nah

The only issue with the server time thing is that the visual indicator for casual rounds caps at 9 I think? But VSH goes for super long so that shouldn't matter much.

[livid oracle]

i think matchmaking and rankings and etc ruined videogames forever

[cursive peak]

How do you even feel like you're improving with matchmaking? The ranks are kinda meaningless. At least if you're playing with regulars, you can gauge how you're doing relative to them.

[eternal haven]

I don't think anyone plays casual to feel like they're improving

at least not any more so than other servers

[cursive peak]

Isn't that the point of the numbers going up?

[eternal haven]

no?

the number going up just shows how much you've played

pretty much just a glorified hour count

[cursive peak]

Isn't it kinda the whole point of matchmaking? Push you up through ranks?

[small siren]

*Isn't it kinda

the whole point of matchmaking?

Push you up through ranks?*

- steamworks

[eternal haven]

In some games it is

tf2's matchmaking definitely not

[wild grove]

I think of the casual rank of how much you played casual over it showing how skilled you are.

Cause you could have the max casual badge but still play like ass.

[summer steeple]

I legitamately am not sure why they added casual levels

it just added confusion

[mystic turtle]

For me, sort of
I don't know why, but the closest thing to comp I've touched is MGE servers, as my connection is generally shoddy and I don't have much time to be stuck on the weekend playing nothing but 5cp matches with scouts that mop the floor with my face and having to use boring old stock scattergun

I just improve and learn from Casual, that is, when I'm not playing against a party of cracked sweats

and watch back-to-back steamrolls in the matches I queue into

[eternal haven]

Pre casual, could you get into a usually full server on pretty much any default map you choose?

[cursive peak]

There were thousands of populated servers at full/near full.

Arena maps and Hydro were difficult to find, though.

But, you know, you could join a server, !nominate, and vote for the map you wanted.

[eternal haven]

One downside of community servers is it's not really fair for who gets to join a full server when a slot opens up

[mystic turtle]

even in less populated regions like Asia (in my case) or maybe South America?
One peeve I have is that there are so few vanilla community servers around here these days with decent connections that are well-populated

[eternal haven]

You can get beat by people with faster comptuers or lower ping

Or by people with tons of IP addresses

[cursive peak]

People also tended to coalesce around communities, not maps.

Imagine if Discord worked like casual where it just dumped you into a server to chat.

[eternal haven]

Well it sort of does

You don't get to pick which actual server you're communicating with

[cursive peak]

Are you being obtuse on purpose?

[eternal haven]

No not really

Picking a "discord server" to chat in is like picking a map in casual or partying with your friends

[cursive peak]

If I launch Discord, I'm always put in this server.

Imagine it being a dice roll if you got put in this one or the uncletopia one or some random fuckin' server.

[eternal haven]

Well I feel like it's not really a good comparison

to compare a matchmaking system to a chat app

[cursive peak]

It's the casual experience versus the community experience.

[livid oracle]

i dont tihnk it's a good analogy but i get what he's going for

in community servers you often see the same ppl all the time

[eternal haven]

I mean you still have the option to join any community server you like

Really the only thing taken away from you was the ability to join a specific valve server ad-hoc

[livid oracle]

what casual servers take away is that there's less players in community servers, about ~60% of players are in casual

[cursive peak]

Casual did a lot of damage to community servers.

[livid oracle]

in pre-mym the vast majority of community servers were vanilla servers

often they were no-crits but they were basically almost like casual servers

[eternal haven]

Well maybe people preferred casual

Maybe the community servers were just worse and people preferred to have the vanilla valve server experience

[livid oracle]

the way the ui is structured makes ppl basically always play casual

the ui was much worse back then

[eternal haven]

True that's the other component

people just couldn't find the community servers as easily or didn't care to bother

without quickplay

[livid oracle]

it's not just a component

[cursive peak]

The Vanilla Valve Server experience was absolutely awful back then. You'd be in there with Fresh Install PabloGonzales2010.

[eternal haven]

You still are

[cursive peak]

And who wants that?

[livid oracle]

like this is such a weird thing to say while there's bots in casual and there aren't any in community servers lol

ppl just settle for "ok enough"

[cursive peak]

Or they're just too lazy.

[livid oracle]

it's what the big button puts you in

[eternal haven]

I mean at the time, I wouldn't be surprised if a bunch of people legitimately preferred casual

[potent wolf]

the big button is very convenient

[mystic turtle]

I believe it would've made a bit more sense to compare maps to topics of discussion, then, as part of that analogy.
Like, you can play 2fort like you can discuss TF2, but you could be playing on Skial or on Blackwonder just as you could be discussing TF2 in this server or in TF2CC

[eternal haven]

Now casual is shit because it's full of bots and bad players

[livid oracle]

again, back then the vast majority of community servers were basically casual servers

[cursive peak]

Valve servers were still unmoderated back then.

[livid oracle]

and then mym came and made it even less convenient to find those servers

[cursive peak]

Being able to permanently ban the bigot was nice.

[eternal haven]

Just mute and move on with your life

[livid oracle]

community servers were always strictly better because there was moderation

me when i mute a cheater and they stop aimbotting :wholesome:

[cursive peak]

I banned over 100 bigots of various flavors back when I was a community server mod.

It makes the experience better for everyone on the server.

[eternal haven]

What do you guys think about uncletopia?

I think uncletopia is just about perfect for playing casual tf2

[cursive peak]

Haven't played on there.

[eternal haven]

If casual servers were exactly like uncletopia I would be happy

[livid oracle]

what the update did is basically take those players and move them into official matchmaking servers

[summer steeple]

personally, I think that the pre MyM community server experience and the casual matchmaking experience are just 2 different niches

[livid oracle]

that's why pretty much every vanilla server died

even if you preferred community servers, you had to use casual

[eternal haven]

Pre-MM could you choose to get queued into only valve servers?

[mystic turtle]

Uncletopis is well, eh
It is basically the BEST casual alternative out there, and is arguably the only community server that can compete with Valve servers ping-wise for me
But I also sorta stink at the game, and unfortunately it's a bit harder to achieve decent results down there

[livid oracle]

because that's where everyone is now

[cursive peak]

Quickplay defaulted to Valve servers only on release.

[summer steeple]

iirc yes

[cursive peak]

Or you just used the server browser to pick a Valve server.

[summer steeple]

although pre MyM queing was one of the most tedious terrible things ever

[livid oracle]

most ppl didnt use quickplay

[summer steeple]

its like they wanted you to use the server browser

[livid oracle]

we have to realise ppl don't act like they do rn lol

[small siren]

*we have to realise

ppl don't act like they do

rn lol*

- crawl space

[livid oracle]

most ppl used the browser

[eternal haven]

If most people didn't use quickplay I don't see what's missing

save from ad-hoc to valve servers

that's like the only difference

[cursive peak]

There was a noticeable drop in community server activity when quickplay dropped.

[livid oracle]

look at any tf2 video from before, they opened the browser to look for servers

quickplay players were mainly super new players and they would often transition to just using the browser

[summer steeple]

the thing about games is that there's a lot of people who just want to play, they don't want to to anything "fancy"

so a lot of people just use the default

[cursive peak]

I never found the server browser "fancy".

[summer steeple]

i'm not saying it is

[eternal haven]

So pre update, the lazy people used quickplay with its default of valve servers, post update, the lazy people use casual matchmaking to queue into valve servers?

[summer steeple]

i'm just saying that a lot of people choose the easiest option, the main option if you will

[eternal haven]

What's the difference?

[summer steeple]

whatever is considered the "default" option

[cursive peak]

The difference is that the players coming in since casual never made a jump to community servers.

[eternal haven]

Mostly because a lot of community servers are garbage now and have been for a decade

[cursive peak]

Valve servers before that were like a bike with training wheels. You'd eventually ditch them.

[eternal haven]

I'd say I personally would enjoy playing on only about 3% of all the community servers in tf2

namely uncletopia and the few other servers/groups similar to uncletopia

[cursive peak]

2014 community servers were great.

[livid oracle]

the difference is that for a good long while, community servers were hidden in the ui more than it is now

i feel like this conversation is leading to nowhere i think you just want me to admit community servers were always shit or something lol

[cursive peak]

Fucking zoomers and "I don't want to get into a community where I'm always playing with people I know".

[livid oracle]

idk why i bother since again you never experienced pre-mym tf2

[summer steeple]

what?

[eternal haven]

Well you started this conversation after I said I like that you have the option now to use matchmaking or normal servers

[potent wolf]

LMAO

[cursive peak]

That's what any matchmaking is.

[eternal haven]

which is still all I want to say

I like that you have the option to use matchmaking, and I like that you have the option to connect to any community server you want

That's about the end of my opinion on things

[livid oracle]

it started when i asked what the point of wanting no ad-hoc is

because nobody asked for that

[eternal haven]

I mean it's not just no ad-hoc, it's everything that comes with it

[livid oracle]

like idk anyone that thinks "wow i like how people dont have ad-hoc connections to my server"

[eternal haven]

Like getting queued into a random full 12v12 on the map or maps you want

[cursive peak]

What do you get out of a lack of ad-hoc capabilities?

[mystic turtle]

I think "complicated" is another way to describe it?
You have the simple menu that lists maps and gamemodes, and then this obtuse, dated-looking mess that's difficult to read and presents a bunch of options

[eternal haven]

Most matchmaking doesn't allow ad-hoc connections

Imagine if you could connect ad-hoc to a fortnite lobby or something

[cursive peak]

Where would be the issue?

"Oh, I wanna play with my friend" Clicks "join game"

[livid oracle]

i don't see tf2 matches in the same way as fortnite matches at all

[mystic turtle]

I use the server browser myself but I feel many get turned off by it for that reason, and that's also why teamwork.tf exists in the first place

[livid oracle]

who cares about tf2 match outcomes

[unborn pecan]

me

[livid oracle]

especially casual players?

[unborn pecan]

and b4nny

duh

[livid oracle]

ppl just get in halfway through a match

go "yay" if the lady on the megaphone says they win

[eternal haven]

True fortnite is a bad example, any battle royale game is a bad example for comparison

[livid oracle]

or go "oh no" if they lose

[eternal haven]

But all modern games with matchmaking don't allow adhoc connections

[small siren]

*But all modern games

with matchmaking don't allow

adhoc connections*

- mysterious_eagle_46873

[livid oracle]

and then the next round starts

[cursive peak]

That just sounds like a mark against modern games.

[eternal haven]

tf2 gives you the option to have matchmaking like a modern game, or the option to join servers like normal

I don't see any downside

only upsides from having the choice

[cursive peak]

What is the upside?

[eternal haven]

most other games don't give you that choice

[mystic turtle]

I don't get either side of this convo tbh

[cursive peak]

It's like "most places make you take the shit sandwich, but it's great this one gives you the choice of shit or ham!" Isn't the choice alone great?

[livid oracle]

i do not get the upside of matchmaking at all other than "uhh modern games have it"

should tf2 get a battle pass

because modern games have it

[cursive peak]

Already does.

What is the Jungle Inferno pass other than a battlepass?

[crisp cedar]

skill-based matchmaking is absolutely necessary for some games

[eternal haven]

You get auto queued into a random full server in your region running one of the maps you selected, and for the most part everyone starts playing at the start of the game unless a slot has to be filled

That's the upside of matchmaking for me

[cursive peak]

And if you sort the browsers by ping and filter for your preferred map, you get most of that.

[eternal haven]

And you still can do that

If you like

Now you get the choice 🙂

[cursive peak]

But it's a pointless choice.

[eternal haven]

For you it is

[livid oracle]

you also can play at the start of a match in community servers though

casual servers just have the illusion that you always begin at the very start because it specifically delays it

[cursive peak]

Re-read the shit sandwich comment.

[eternal haven]

So are you guys saying everyone who plays tf2 does not like matchmaking, there's not a single person who likes it?

[livid oracle]

i genuinely dont understand the issue with joining mid-way through a match in a game like tf2

which still happens all the time with casual

because ppl still leave

and have to be replaced

and often it's the solo queuers getting placed in the empty slot

[cursive peak]

Only times I hate joining a match late is when it's my favorite map and it changes to another one like 2 minutes later.

[eternal haven]

Well it was an interesting conversation

I'm not going to change my mind, I still appreciate the fact that in tf2 you can choose whether to play matchmaking or whether you would prefer to play community servers

I don't see how anyone could argue against players having that choice being a good thing

[cursive peak]

There's no reason to choose matchmaking, though.

[eternal haven]

OK? For you there isn't, for other players there might be

What's wrong with having the choice?

[cursive peak]

If you're hungry, you can choose to eat or not. Why would you ever choose the not?

[jagged pawn]

not sure how much has been said in this (there's way too much to catch up on lmao) but I do think it's worth mentioning that people always hate current version. like back when quickplay was in the game I don't think a single person liked quickplay, we would constantly talk shit on how it killed community servers with the bait-and-switch of telling them to make their servers a certain way to enter the queue and then going back on it

[left sand]

so anyways

people like no ad-hoc so the matchmaker can put people where they belong in casual

i know someone might think its laughable to think smurfing is a thing in a game like tf2

but some people genuinely are concerned about uneven skill in their games

casual largely corrects that

so imo, that argument against it is wrong

and then the other argument about

now we have a choice between matchmaking and no matchmaking

thats not true either

[jagged pawn]

I still don't get what people are asking for when they ask for ad-hoc back

people know you can join your friends' games right

that's a thing right now

[cursive peak]

I thought casual didn't put people of similar skill in servers.

[left sand]

it does

[summer steeple]

when it works yeah

[eternal haven]

barely

[left sand]

quickplay had a choice between valve and community

in an easy to use interface

and the server browser could be used for more custom experiences

they got rid of the intuitive interface and kept the super clunky server browser in

[eternal haven]

I think the server browser is great

I cannot imagine it being more intuitive

[cursive peak]

I still don't get what's clunky about the browser.

[left sand]

so they essentially gave people a good matchmaking experience and those people who used to love the quickplay system to queue into community servers, they dont have that anymore

[left sand]

you cant think that and also think the matchmaking is good imo

[small siren]

*you cant think that and

also think the matchmaking

is good imo*

- mcoms

[mystic turtle]

it depends
some folks, like Peaches, get balanced matches
Then you have folks like me who, as I mentioned earlier, queue into back-to-back pubstomps to the point where neck-and-neck even matchups that still resulted in losses are frustrating

[eternal haven]

I like both

[left sand]

if you understand stuff about user experience, and how it matters

[eternal haven]

I always like to have a choice instead of no choice

[left sand]

its not a choice

youre making that up kinda

[jagged pawn]

yeah I agree with this, keeping quickplay around as a way to find community servers while also having casual for official servers would've been a great compromise

[left sand]

they added matchmaking, but removed quickplay

so they removed an option

that many people liked

the server browser is a downgrade for the same experience

people who used quickplay to find a community server now do not have another option other than the server browser

[eternal haven]

I was told that nobody really used quickplay and most people used the server browser anyways

I don't know how true that is, I never played tf2 when quickplay was a thing

[left sand]

thats not true

most people used quickplay

the people in here probably use the server browser because its more advanced

and theyre participating in a conversation about tf2

in a discord server about configuring the game

[jagged pawn]

that is absolutely not true lol quickplay was 100% the default

[left sand]

and they care enough to participate in said discussion

[cursive peak]

I did say there was a noticeable dip in community server activity when quickplay launched with Valve servers as the default and the option not as clearly marked to change it.

It was the beginning of the decline of community servers. The damage was done by the time they changed the default.

[left sand]

right, so if quickplay can impact the community servers that much

that means people were u sing it

[eternal haven]

I guess everyone just kind of has different opinions

[left sand]

some are just wrong

[eternal haven]

Hence again why I think having more choice is good

Obviously removing quickplay removed some choice

[left sand]

yes so they should bring back quickplay and have it as the default for community browsing

[mystic turtle]

Perhaps it's a skill thing, since I'd continuously lose against the folks that spearhead these rolls

[left sand]

which is exactly what they planned to do actually

[eternal haven]

but added matchmaking while keeping community servers adds more choice than was removed by removing quickplay

[left sand]

but never got around to it

eh, idk

what casual matchmaking turned into

was basically the same as quickplay

but with less options

[jagged pawn]

yeah I think the big issue with meet your match was never the fact that casual got added, or even the fact that it was bad honestly. I think if it was a new system that was clearly unfinished but presented the cool ideas and features that it did, people would've been excited for that. but they removed the primary way to play the game, that tens of thousands of people were using. that was never gonna go well unless they got casual absolutely perfect, which of course as we know they didn't come close to lol

[summer steeple]

they removed the main way that people were using and casual at launch was horrendous

[mystic turtle]

There's also the simplified server browser UI, which is way more intuitive for less experienced users
but it's off by default for some reason and still isn't as easy to use as quickplay, from what I understand of it

[eternal haven]

Valve could add back quickplay and have both quickplay and casual

Just set aside a portion of the valve servers for use as casual matchmaking, and keep a portion for ad-hoc quickplay

Just like they set aside a portion of the servers for the competitive matchmaking that nobody plays

I think the reason they don't do that is because they've gauged the demand for that to be low

or *didn't do that

obviously they won't bother doing it now

[left sand]

the reason why they dont do that is they want a crafted experience

which is why at first casual matchmaking was more like dota unranked

[small siren]

*which is why at first

casual matchmaking was more

like dota unranked*

- mcoms

[left sand]

where you couldnt leave

there was no late joins

etc

because they wanted to make the game different

they wanted matches to matter

they wanted to bring the casual and comp community more in line

[eternal haven]

I think the game is designed great as is

[left sand]

the thing is, they had very little social capital

[eternal haven]

All they need to do is ban the bots in casual servers

[left sand]

so they could not put their foot down

yeah

its just the game could be improved

[eternal haven]

It seems like the bots have had the effect of driving the skill level way down in casual

I assume most of the better players just decide they'd rather play uncletopia or other community servers

[wild grove]

If that was the case, we would see way less people complaining about casual being mostly unplayable.

[jagged pawn]

yeah I get the idea that they were going for. you're half right that they already weren't very popular at the time so no one was gonna trust them to make that radical of a change, but also I don't think they should really be able to tell people how to play. if they're that confident that their idea is good, add it and let people decide what they want to play, don't remove the alternative

even if they moved all valve servers to casual, and quickplay was strictly community, that would still be fine

maybe I would feel different if it worked tho lol

[eternal haven]

Apart from a 'wizard' click-thru type interface, and apart from valve servers, what did quickplay offer that going into the server browser and sorting your favorite servers by playercount doesn't?

[cursive peak]

If casual supposedly has the same same skill level as the Valve servers of old did, I don't think the skill level can go down.

Valve servers were still available via server browser during quick play. The wizard interface was it.

[eternal haven]

Well that's what I meant

you could ad-hoc join valve servers in quickplay and can't now

so you've lost that, and you've lost the wizard interface

[cursive peak]

But that's not a good thing.

[eternal haven]

in return you've gained matchmaking, and you still have community servers

I think that's reasonable

[cursive peak]

Matchmaking adds nothing and buries the server browser.

[jagged pawn]

I don't really feel like reposting my ad-hoc message lol

anyway in the very literal sense it adds nothing, but it's about the presentation of it

like this is classic "why doesn't everyone use linux" logic

[small siren]

*like this is classic

"why doesn't everyone

use linux" logic*

- Grapevime

[jagged pawn]

convenience is a huge asset

and quickplay was the, well, quickest way to play

[eternal haven]

I think it's usually less convenient to wait for casual (or presumably to wait for quickplay, don't know how that worked) than it is to open the server browser and click a server in my favorites

[mystic turtle]

"server in my favorites"

that's the thing

barring edge cases like mine where there's basically little to no options

[eternal haven]

Well or sort all internet servers by ping, players, or filter by map

[jagged pawn]

quickplay was faster than server browser but more importantly it was brainless

[eternal haven]

All are more convenient than waiting

[mystic turtle]

some folks legit don't know where to look

[jagged pawn]

generally, quickplay was how people found servers to favorite in the first place

you queue quickplay, if you enjoy yourself you add to favorites, if you don't you block. repeat. it was a great system

[cursive peak]

At various times, I've had buttons on my HUD's main menu for directly connecting to particular favorite servers.

[mystic turtle]

I encounter teams relatively often that can't kick bots and can usually kick them after I tell them how to use the function keys on those kinds of laptops that make you Fn+F1 to use them

I think they'll have more than enough trouble looking through the server browser

[eternal haven]

Yeah unfortunately the bots have made casual not worth playing

But prior to the bots it was decent

It's a bit puzzling how valve has made lots of bandaid efforts that end up hurting real players more than bots, but seemingly no visible effort to ban the bots

[left sand]

more choice is good except when it doesnt suit my argument

[mystic turtle]

wha

[eternal haven]

What message are you talking about specifically?

[mystic turtle]

like sorry, I'm just sorta out of the loop in this whole argument

[small siren]

*like sorry, I'm just

sorta out of the loop in

this whole argument*

- NeutralNotReallyaScoot

[eternal haven]

I agree removing the quickplay interface lessened choice

[left sand]

i think what valve should do:

• add a seasonal map rotation outside of the events
• add a workshop map voting and playtesting matchmaking system
• add a version of quickplay back for vanilla community servers, with improved options to discover different networks
• restyle the server browser slightly

[radiant merlin]

they should restyle the options too because it's shit

it doesn't even scale properly

[summer steeple]

valve should just remake tf2 from scratch

in an engine like... source 2

[wild grove]

I think just adding a community server queue as a casual option would be better than another queue just for community servers. But again, any new thing that isn't given to VALVe in a silver platter (email with way to implement it) isn't gonna happen.

[mystic turtle]

and another thing regarding Casual, add some way other than F1 to perform votekicks

[wild grove]

and make the option default to Mixed, with the options to only play on community servers or valve servers. I think this is already implemented for MvM boot camp but with 0 option to force only community nor valve.

[rare creek]

the only fun ive ever had playing this class

[mystic turtle]

Engineer getting a high score on the leaderboard for once?

cool, good work

most engies (including me) can barely make it outta the bottom

[rare creek]

engineers can get high score on leaderboards lots, it's just that it's usually from teleportation points

[mystic turtle]

maybe it's bc I'm on Casual, then; I find a lot of players are sub-par there

but yeah, teles are generally how engies can farm points, not kills

[fleet kite]

pft, as if you can even get a match with a 4+ party...

Btw I'm thinking of hosting a rd_asteroid (and maybe some other maps) server but honestly not sure if its a good idea in terms of security and moderation. Anyone got experience with that sort of thing?

[tough locust]

i mean they have a fake IP tunnel thing built into servers that you can enable now if you're concerned about that but moderation isn't really an issue. The server browser has thousands and thousands of perfect servers but they're just empty. I'm hosting a server and I don't see people randomly hop on it like I used to way back in the day

[summer steeple]

-enablefakeip

there's also things like "stac" or whatever for anti-cheat

its a sourcemod plugin

[kind falcon]

https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/187020781094567936/1183113639503343778/togif-5.gif

[cursive peak]

TF2 server hosting is also inexpensive.

[fleet kite]

I mean yeah I have a server, but I don't really want to just run it and forget it in a way that gives the rare joiners a bad experience

[high current]

Hot take: I don’t mind not being able to queue for community servers through the find game button.
There are a lot of community servers with rtd or donator particle effects that lag the beefiest of computers. The only community servers I bother with are uncletopia, spaceship mge/dm, or surf/jump.

Though in fairness I thing the invasiveness of donator perks like laggy particle effects is a result of community servers having to try harder to keep people coming back to them, which ironically keeps me away

[lusty ice]

I don't really want to just run it and forget it in a way that gives the rare joiners a bad experience
I'm pretty sure most servers are literally just "left to run" though.

[high current]

Yeh tf2 players have shit opinions and I don’t because I’m perfect and irrefutable

obviously💁‍♀️

[high current]

And since I’m irrefutable, if y’all haven’t already taken part in #FixTF2 and save.tf:
do it, or you smell like spy, and that guy has been smoking the same cigarette for the past 17 years…

[glass pollen]

Preach peaches

[broken haven]

tf2 twitter bouta post "we hear you!" then do nothig again

[small siren]

*tf2 twitter

bouta post "we hear you!" then

do nothig again*

- veramo

[broken haven]

20 year old game bro...

[high current]

It’s just a petition bro, you’re not gambling on anything. You lose nothing by participating

[limpid panther]

I really disliked this video

[summer steeple]

yeah I watched it earlier and it felt very... idk the right word for it

I had the word earlier but i can't remember

[formal dew]

Cheugy

[limpid panther]

I think it shows what is wrong with this campaign really well

[summer steeple]

like at least he has a relatively specific demand?

[limpid panther]

does he

[summer steeple]

which is the first time i've seen anyone related to fixtf2 actually have one

[limpid panther]

this is one of the main criticisms of mine

[summer steeple]

I mean he's pretty clear that he wants a functional anti-cheat

but then goes on this weird side-tangent about how there are no good anti-cheats out there and blah blah blah

which feels very uninformed i guess?

[limpid panther]

no, but I agree with him on that

this is indeed an industry wide problem.

[summer steeple]

like he's ignoring
A. anti-cheats are always a game of cat and mouse
B. Valve has several anti-cheat measures that actually function (at least on some level) and is pretty actively working on anti-cheats, its just that TF2 doesn't have them

there's never going to be a 100% effective anti-cheat

tf2's is just... 0% effective

[limpid panther]

A is what valve has always despised and refuses to get into. B is true, and I think they are in the right track with CS2

[summer steeple]

yeah exactly

CS2 is pretty clearly their current testing ground for anti-cheat measures, although it definitely hasn't been going well considering how many they launched the game withough, even if CSGO had those measures

if I really had to guess, valve probably wants to have a pretty good baseline anti-cheat that they can just leave running without too much cat and mouse stuff before they move it to other games

hell, Dota 2 got overwatch years after csgo

I guess my thought process is that if valve adds a really half baked barely finished version of their anti-cheats to tf2, would it help that much, and would it be better than if they waited like a couple months for a more robust version

would it be better to release it now and then update it later?

[small siren]

*would it be better

to release it now and then

update it later?*

- treacherousfiend

[summer steeple]

would anyone be around to work on it later

obviously i don’t have the answers to this

and I think that valve is handicapping themselves with how small they are

[small siren]

*and I think that valve

is handicapping themselves

with how small they are*

- treacherousfiend

[limpid panther]

steam trust, while still farmable, I think wouldn't need that much maintance and would help

[summer steeple]

yeah

[limpid panther]

this is the kind of specific point I don't see people demand

[summer steeple]

exactly!

i don’t think people even know it exists

[limpid panther]

elevating the discourse is extremely important for a successful protest like this

[unborn pecan]

Cheaters should be flogged by the state

That's the only rational solution

[limpid panther]

• elevating discouse on the issue topics
• refusing to engage with people who are not serious about the issue topics
• demands scoped as narrowly as possible while still improving or fixing the issues

I see none of these here

and I am not engaged enough to try and steer the movement that way

[summer steeple]

i mean this is what, day 2 of 3?

it’s a bit late to do that

[limpid panther]

no, I meant before

[limpid panther]

yea

[summer steeple]

ah

[limpid panther]

like I said: I'm not into it, and frankly i dont think any protest or movement of this kind would be specially effective, even if expertly coordenated.

I would be much more partial to contacting journalists and showing what the game has become

for an article with the angle of "late stage game as a service"

[limpid panther]

mfs are talking about removing text mode in other discord servers omfg

[summer steeple]

AAAAAAAAAA

[eternal haven]

That's so stupid

Removing the launch option would do literally nothing, and removing the functionality would cause people to have to spend a couple hours adding it back

[orchid sorrel]

this is the first main day, afaik

[formal dew]

just make the game paid again

[misty plover]

Doesn't Dane have direct contact with Eric?

[eternal haven]

What ever happened to artifact?

[misty plover]

I don't remember much about robocraft I found an exploit to fly out of the map and got permabanned like three months into the game's existence

Couldn't even do anything there

I like technical combat builder games, From the Depths is probably my favorite game of all time

[languid haven]

When i mean far more demanding i mean on hardware. It was so stupid it looked the same but ran worse.

[misty plover]

Unity moment ig

I wonder how FTD is doing these days I haven't played the game in a few years

[languid haven]

From the depths just takes a long time to learn and is more of an issue of "wtf can i even do?" It's kinda like making a gun out of legos.

[misty plover]

Yeah but its fun

I used to love making battleship water skiiers with hydrofoils

Oooh they added flamethrowers

[languid haven]

I um.... Might've made the mistake of suggesting being able to change player models and they kinda went through and anime girl phase?

[misty plover]

Tbf the server is full of very socially awkward weebs

[languid haven]

Also for some reason first person attacking a ship was so much easier so i suggested that to be a bit bigger on the game so idk what came of that. I kinda wanna try it out again later.

[misty plover]

Oh my god they actually made anime characters for it

[languid haven]

Yeeeeeeah

[left sand]

TF2 is a moba

[languid haven]

nah, too much dynamic movement. that's like calling fortnite a moba

[misty plover]

Depends on definition

[left sand]

every moba has dynamic movement though?

[high current]

club penguin would like to know your location

[languid haven]

like what? dodge? move faster? fake teleports?

[misty plover]

Are you an as written (any multiplayer online battle arena) purist or a colloquial identity (dota-like) purist

[languid haven]

if they game's movement looks like mildly modded fallout new vegas movement and claims to be a "hero shooter" then it's a moba to me. especially from top down or over the shoulder.

[next nymph]

blink 182

[misty plover]

The only thing tf2 lacks to be a moba under my definition is an in-match progression system

Also character locking, maybe, idk

I'm not sure if preselected characters really count as a moba defining feature

[next nymph]

mobas are really just a non-exhaustive collection of many different mechanics, one of the easier genres to point to for that. No mechanic defines mobas and can be found in other non-moba games, but enough of them together makes a moba

[misty plover]

Mmmh

[left sand]

let's look at the common features of MOBAs:

• symmetrical PvP gameplay
• a selection of playable characters with unique attributes
• characters have some sort of time-gated abilities (usually through cooldowns) they acquire over time
• characters scale over the course of a match, usually through experience points and gold
• characters respawn at their base on a timer after they die
• characters cover different fixed roles, like tank, dps, flanker/ganker, and support
• objectives are along a fixed path
• weak computer controlled units run down these objective paths
• objectives take time or investment to capture/destroy
• completing objectives may give the capturing team an advantage
• gameplay relies on teamwork and cooperation

[misty plover]

Tbh most game genres are defined on feel though

[next nymph]

though feel is defined by mechanics after all

[languid haven]

yeah these mean nothing. too broad.

[left sand]

TF2 checks a lot of these boxes, and arguably if you look at for example its economy system, you can argue that in terms of a meta system, it checks even more of these boxes

[misty plover]

More or less the same list I have

You can absolutely do a moba in tf2 though

Actually....

[languid haven]

the roles thing isn't a moba thing, that's a role playing thing.

[misty plover]

Vscript time

[left sand]

i mean

[next nymph]

you can rp in mobas too

[left sand]

but idk

in my opinion, MOBAs are just a more refined version of TF2

just like TF2 is a refinement of classic arena shooter gameplay

[misty plover]

Tbh if vscript vgui update wasn't forever sent to the shadow realm I would love to make a dota-like with tf2 because the gunplay in tf2 is phenomenal

[left sand]

i disagree

theres very little reactivity onto other characters except when they die

the only thing are those really weak sauce damage numbers

which dont fit the art style very well

theres no rhythm to the damage numbers

theyre awful

and hitsounds, which the default are really really bad

[next nymph]

I wouldn't go that far to say it's tf2 refined. It's definitely leaning more on some aspects, but the more you emphasize one the less you emphasize the other. And a lot of those aspects that are sidelined for mobas are pretty integral to tf2

[misty plover]

Mmmm true I guess but I was meaning more on the user experience side the TTK is at the right point to feel "good" to me

[left sand]

well, im not saying refinement as like

strictly better

more mean evolution, which doesnt mean superiority

[next nymph]

remember that footage of the first insomnia LAN with tf2? Playing 2fort with fulltime engies or something

[left sand]

yeah

[misty plover]

You know what I really want

I want an absolutely chaotic quake clone

[next nymph]

ratz instagib

[left sand]

so gaps in skill are less meaningful

[misty plover]

God I miss quake

I want to host a quake tourney...

[languid haven]

i feel like it's the opposite, you miss it could push your group 10 feet back or furtherr over a single mistake cause often you aren't the only one making that mistake even if it's about aim.

[misty plover]

Not rn

[languid haven]

it's like pushing a boulder up a mountain, you slip you could go a little bit back or get crushed by the boulder.

[next nymph]

why not take it to the extreme? How much teamwork is there in things like helldivers (the meta-game, not individual matches) where you have 50000 people on a team contributing points to meet a goal

[misty plover]

I went on solo helldives and it was fun as fuck

[languid haven]

that one people don't exactly know how to do team work also cause friendly fire but there's not much teamwork in that other than just shoot.

[next nymph]

I think there are a lot of factors into how much a game emphasizes teamwork, but number of players is definitely a big one, and too many players will de-emphasize it

[languid haven]

yeah, i heard helldivers killed billions of bugs in a few hours. o_o

[misty plover]

Encouraging teamwork is hard

Gamers all have strong egos

And there's also lunatics like me who really enjoys going in alone to fight the entire team even if I lose

Because the adrenaline rush is 🥴

[languid haven]

then there's the dumbass who doesn't know to take 1 step to the left to dodge a slow rocket.

[next nymph]

I think the big way to encourage teamwork is to have clear roles. If you just have 4 fighters then they may as well all be doing their thing, but if you have a tank with a dps and a healer and etc. then now the interplay between them is how you play optimally

[left sand]

i both agree and disagree

distinct roles usually biases a designer to create sort of middling power levels for each occupant of that role

because specialists are already strong by their very nature of specialization

(of course their weakness is lack of anything else)

[misty plover]

Specialists are always a problem child to balance yeah

Game design is hard

Balance is harder, because there's never a right answer

[left sand]

but you also see the tendency too, for example, make a dedicated healer weak at healing because healing is the only thing they do

[next nymph]

compare WoW raids to OSRS raids. In WoW they pretty much have to be done in teams because there just isn't enough role coverage by one player. Meanwhile in runescape there might be some minor roles taken on by individual players in a team, but for the most part it's a DPS check and players will optimize down to solo of possible

[left sand]

so they will be good at it solely through specialization

yes i agree with that notion

[misty plover]

I hate that aspect of game design

[languid haven]

or they make it heal too much so you could tank head on full team assault with a single heavy or soldier without ubering.

[left sand]

yes thats the problem

if a healer heals well

no real damage will be dealt

the game will be unplayable

if damage dealers damage too well

everyone will instantly die

the game will be unplayable

[misty plover]

The big issue of that stems from other flaws in the design of the game

[languid haven]

tf2 naturally has a great balance of healing even with the quickfix

[left sand]

i just think that every role should be a generalist in some capacity, i think roles are GREAT because of their ability to create meta slot efficiencies in terms of team composition rather than solo optimization because youre optimizing for a greater sum

[misty plover]

How do you weaken healing mid combat, do you make it scale in proximity to enemies, do you make it weaker after taking damage?

[languid haven]

maybe if the cross bow healed it's full amount over 3 seconds i'd think it'd be more balanced.

[left sand]

but i think synergies can come through more complex interlocking of multi-dimensional kits rather than just fixed single dimensional roles like an MMO

[misty plover]

How do you prevent healer stacking onto a single person? Do you restrict healing to one source or add some sort of curve?

[left sand]

i think the main solution people have found to this is to just add ultimate abilities

so a relatively weak person can be OP sometimes.

[languid haven]

just make healing better out of combat. they let their enemy retreat, it's their own fault for letting them get away.

[left sand]

for example, healers can have an ult which makes someone unkillable, or do mega healing

[misty plover]

I don't really like that though because most of the time it doesn't feel earned

[next nymph]

that's a big part of why I like tf2 actually. The generalist classes in particular have clear, but fairly ad hoc and fluid roles. Medic is a bit specialized into healing but scout vs soldier (itself pocket vs roamer) vs demo all have different role coverage without being totally pigeonholed

[misty plover]

I get to pop off for free after waiting so many seconds, oh boy

[left sand]

i dont like TF2 because they almost got it right

but imo, medic is such a flawed concept

it ruins the entire game

[next nymph]

yeah I like (subset of) tf2's role design

[misty plover]

Yeah medic as is kinda forces you to play around them in a way most people don't realize

[summer steeple]

heal beams and their consequences have been disastrous for the human race

[languid haven]

in tf2 you get uber after 60 seconds of healing a fully overhealed target but for anyone wounded it takes at least 40 seconds

[left sand]

and most of the other classes have flaws in terms of not being on the same design as medic

imo, medic presents something very interesting to the game

and i think valve did agree, given so many weapons have gimmicks about charges or bars, etc

[languid haven]

so does sniper and spy.

[left sand]

and the whole random crit damage thing

[misty plover]

Medic feels okay-ish because I have to be doing something to earn the pop off

[next nymph]

meanwhile roles like engie or spy are extremely specific and can barely do anything outside those niches that aren't even relevant half the time

[left sand]

that is also very true

[languid haven]

fuck i wished the quick fix had 50% crit resist on mega heal.

random crits kills me more often than anything doing a mega heal

[next nymph]

stickies are genuinely my favorite weapon in any game, as a single weapon its that exact type of fluid role coverage that I was gushing about

[languid haven]

i know this is off topic but if there was a medi-fluid charge up weapon that you could splash on the floor for aoe healing. would you take it?

[left sand]

imo, im just so used to stun mechanics in every game i dont mind it at all

in fact i think its a good thing because it punishes positioning for the most part

it makes positioning more of a skill based thing

and imo, stuns are one of those things where if designed well, its fun to play with on any level

because good players will know how to avoid stuns but on the other side, good players will know how to capitalize on stuns and use them effectively

but bad players dont know how to avoid stuns and also bad players dont know how to use stuns effectively or punish someone at the right moment

idk, to me, stuns mean a mistake happened before the stun

stuns arent a cause of me dying, theyre more of an effect to me

like hm, i walked somewhere i shouldnt have and now i cant get out

i cant walk back my mistake

i think thats very intersting

just personally

[misty plover]

I think stuns are best in the form of some kind of trap or avoidable mechanic tbh

So if you get someone it's 100% their fault

But it's hard to balance that right

[spare obsidian]

https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Source-1-Games/issues/6041 bruh

this dude is legit dumb

[potent wolf]

lmao

[limpid panther]

HAHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHA

[potent wolf]

that's so fucking funny

[misty plover]

Least deranged MSB behavior

[limpid panther]

kisak savage moment

[spare obsidian]

💀

[next nymph]

people just calling kisak "rude" now

[limpid panther]

lets see who nails the time of the lock
price is right rules

[tough locust]

it got closed!! that means they fixed it WOO

[uncut spear]

BASED LOL

[spare obsidian]

LO0L

[uncut spear]

god what a fucking mess this is

mfs are throwing punches NOWHERE

[spare obsidian]

this technically counts has a target harrastment since this mf said down vote kisak

[uncut spear]

that is true

[spare obsidian]

i think is best just to report scatter github account

[potent wolf]

I think it's best to just ignore it

[broken haven]

LMFAOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[uncut spear]

we can just observe with popcorn in hand

[limpid panther]

winner is @next nymph

[next nymph]

https://tenor.com/view/bill-gates-dab-gif-25596097

[potent wolf]

what did you vote for?

[spare obsidian]

https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Source-1-Games/issues/3477 the new comments are getting brainrooted

[next nymph]

< 10 minutes

[misty plover]

https://github.com/ValveSoftware/Source-1-Games/issues/6040

[potent wolf]

i forgot i can see the votes too lol

[uncut spear]

all these people making GitHub accounts yet they will never actually use the platform

[spare obsidian]

literally lmfao

can't wait for savetf2 to literally fail

[wild grove]

Wow these comments are terrible.

[spare obsidian]

because these people are delusional, that's it

[uncut spear]

it's now the perfect time to say that there is a thing called free and open source software that github basically is a platform for and everyone should look into what's out there to potentially decentralize yourself and the Internet

[spare obsidian]

these mfs

[wild grove]

Very epic.

[potent wolf]

and now it's time for someone (me) to point out that github itself is closed source and centralized

[uncut spear]

DAMN idc :3

shoutout gitlab forcing you to make an account for some reason

[wild grove]

But they aint wrong tho, better to talk about existing cheats in private then in public, it prevents developers from finding a way to bypass detection.

[spare obsidian]

rn people is spamming the issue tracker

it can't be the best time to spam emails now

[wild grove]

From what I heard, the tf team's email has a aggressive spam filter.

[orchid sorrel]

all of their live service games probably have one

[wild grove]

which is why some emails never get responded to.

[wild grove]

they should add that to github so people can stop spamming the issue tracker with the same damn issue with shitty solutions.

[left sand]

gosh this is a mess

[spare obsidian]

💀

[wild grove]

the spam filter is gonna stop most of em.

[potent wolf]

well, did you expect anything more from them

[broken haven]

this is so fuckinf funny

[misty plover]

Ignore us in one space, we poke from another.
Bro think he in a movie

[wild grove]

Main character syndrome.

[left sand]

this is why i really hate any modern "anti cheat" project in tf2

its just all idiots

well

not idiots

thats a bit too mean

more like uhm

people who dont know what theyre doing but are trying it anyway

[misty plover]

He's lost

[spare obsidian]

why not put your opinion there, like, the only reason to stop these comments is by someone who knows what they're talking about

[next nymph]

the comments will only stop with some time. Getting into arguments wouldn't result in less comments, you'd just get even more

[left sand]

i dont want to be associated with sludge

and that too

if theyve gone months without stopping

theyre not gonna stop now

plenty of people have told them no in life

they havent listened to any of it

[misty plover]

Me when I stalk and harass valve employees dressed as spy tf2

[uncut spear]

it's gonna be so fun seeing them cover up the actual issues people have put it now :)

[spare obsidian]

bruh

[left sand]

what happened to the steam discussions

please

just use that

please please please

we cant have these people here

well

i hope valve's internal triage is better

[spare obsidian]

those people where sent by scatter, by the premise of downvoting kisak, that's why i said he indirectly commited target harrastment

[uncut spear]

time to be annoying and do #fixl4d2

[misty plover]

Literally sent to harass Kisak

[spare obsidian]

this is literally worth a report tbh

[misty plover]

Kisak is one of the coolest people I'm actually livid at these motherfuckers

[spare obsidian]

yeah

[left sand]

real cringe hours

[uncut spear]

and all this because people can't stick together and provide clear solutions as well as not being able to just use community servers

[spare obsidian]

you couldn't ignore the fact some deadass send his squad to indirectly harrast one person that has nothing to do with valve

[uncut spear]

erm fix game plz x100

[spare obsidian]

the mf edited the post but this is what it originally looked

[misty plover]

What'd he change it to

[uncut spear]

politely disagree with this gentleman

[spare obsidian]

"don't clutter the post with shitpost 🤓 "

instead of you know

DO NOT HARRAST KISAK

[uncut spear]

wait doesn't github have like

dms?

[spare obsidian]

like fr

[spare obsidian]

nope

[uncut spear]

ok thank GOD

[next nymph]

upvote the shit out of that post

[uncut spear]

+2

[spare obsidian]

this is why i hate savetf2 is a literall trojan horse to harras people

"because muh, save the game"

[uncut spear]

I need my rank in a more than decade old game PLEASE

VOLVO FIX

[misty plover]

My dog just flung his drool in my eye

[uncut spear]

based

[misty plover]

Great dane moment

[rare creek]

let's harass valve and send them death threats on github!!!!!! surely that will get them to #fixtf2 #savetf2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ||/s obviously||

the tf2 community never ceases to be so unhinged 🥰

[uncut spear]

I'm watching this go down while listening to shortwave radio

[small siren]

*I'm watching this go

down while listening to

shortwave radio*

- aless109

[uncut spear]

LOL

my brain is gonna implode and I'm fine with thay

the sounds tickle my brain

http://websdr.ewi.utwente.nl:8901/

I'll post this here for y'all to enjoy

(yes it's not https boohoo it's just radio sounds)

[uncut spear]

those reviews won't change shit 😭

this is not helldivers bruh

[spare obsidian]

and helldrivers 2 people literally got conformed

psp got away with screwing up people because you can't longer buy the game in those countries

[potent wolf]

remember to do your part and give tf2 a good review

[spare obsidian]

like they got happy after they revoke the account requierement but not the buy status

[misty plover]

Do your part and eat a nice dinner tonight and sleep well and be happy instead of harassing innocent people just doing their jobs please and thank you 👍

[uncut spear]

bro this shortwave radio stuff goes hard

might order some pizza

[misty plover]

I'm making a fried chicken sandwich because I don't want to make something with actual effort

[uncut spear]

oh damn

[rare creek]

there we go

[wild grove]

Why did you crop the name and pfp out? I sent this to another server, and they assume it's fake.

[spare obsidian]

there

what 😭

[uncut spear]

if that were the case they would've been banned so long ago

[spare obsidian]

bro these people REALLY pretend to know what they're saying "nah man killing bots easy, that sounds SO simple in my mind"

[uncut spear]

cheaters in general wouldn't exist today then basically 😭

[spare obsidian]

tf2 players discovering the easy way to kill bots: just kill them lmfao

https://tenor.com/view/brain-gif-338783462287106063

[broken haven]

in simple terms, im him

[spare obsidian]

sometimes i think these people are just a character and they're playing along, but these takes are so stupid and desingineus at times 😭

[broken haven]

if i was sigma ceo at valve i would fix tf2 because i can

[rare creek]

tf2: the twitter of video games

[spare obsidian]

bruh

[misty plover]

Closed, working as intended.

[broken haven]

why are they larping

[misty plover]

I'm not reading that paragraph I'm too tired

[broken haven]

https://tenor.com/view/homer-smile-simpsons-gif-11742885

[spare obsidian]

tl;dr: guys scrap the game, remade it

[misty plover]

God.=

Can we get the children off of my github thank you

[left sand]

i love how its like

[misty plover]

"Yeah guys just remake the game it'll only take like a weak trust me!"

[small siren]

*"Yeah guys just remake

the game it'll only take

like a weak trust me!"*

- undefinedbhvr

[left sand]

no we're totally serious about the bot crisis

[spare obsidian]

in technicallity, they ported tf2 to s2 the thing is: there's no real reason to work on it

like, its not needed

[left sand]

this is totally not just a plot to get you to update the game again because we're jealous about the lack of updates

[spare obsidian]

what do you gain from remaking the game in s2? peole are gonna whine regarless of what action is done

[rare creek]

lower performance 👍

[broken haven]

https://tenor.com/view/ishowspeed-try-not-to-laugh-gif-7682731162751353849

[misty plover]

What if instead of team fortress 2 they called it left 4 dead 2 and instead of fighting mercenaries you fought zombies 🙀

[broken haven]

what if instead team fortress 2 they called it fortnite and you drop out of a bus and fight until ur the only one standing

[misty plover]

Honestly this movement has already killed my interest in the game for like the next four months

They're already just proving to be terrible people as expected

[spare obsidian]

wish the movement dies quickly

who though petitions at change.org even do dough water?

[broken haven]

tf2 players when they get shot in the head (only their brain is hit)

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1071852623738708049/1228383835406991360/G19QVcn.png?ex=665f4318&is=665df198&hm=9bcffda29c494278137cbb2d481b2f7d449f6f19d3c5413adb55198bb9a95dd9&

[misty plover]

Can it be hit if theirs is so small that it'd require atomic level precision to strike

[mystic turtle]

you know what, this is fricking it
my little brother is probably smarter than the folks behind fixmakevalveabandontf2, he knew that their efforts would only push them to give less of a shit

breaking news: tf2's playerbase has less combined intelligence than a sixth grader

[mystic turtle]

this. was. a. fricking. disaster.
you did something to TF2 that begins in a F. you dummies fucked it.
congratulations on killing tf2

[spare obsidian]

they brougth the game to negative review whitch wouldn't do nothing but doomed the game

[broken haven]

this. was. a. fricking. disaster.
you did something to TF2 that begins in a F. you dummies fucked it.
congratulations on killing tf2

[slender nexus]

#savetf2 shit the bed once again

[mystic turtle]

(I mean, it's not like it's that bad yet, but the potential of "Fix"TF2 has been downed by at least 99%)
and just because MSB had an ego fatter than that of a 10000 hour scout

how hard was it to just suck it up and go into that earlier issue? is it that hard?

[crisp cedar]

ootl i havent been following

what happened

[potent wolf]

nothing of interest

[mystic turtle]

Okay.
Megascatterbomb posted a letter on GitHub, Kisak closed it and redirected him to an older issue, he and his clique take offense at it