How can we improve our PR Community?

[wookimonsta]

aw well, i used to do some 3d modeling a few years back but i never managed to get deeply into it.
i would be interested in doing exporting, unfortunately i have no experience in the matter, but if someone had some tutorials, i would look into it when i get back to germany

[vilhelm123]

• Endeavour to not lock your squad, thus allowing new players to join in and get a game going. Yes you might want to game with just your friends but why not let another person in on the banter and allow them to learn from you and the way you play. You want less noobs in pr? Why not be the one to train them?
• Endeavour to reply to any questions in the chat about ‘how to do this’ etc. Shouting ‘RTFM!’ at a person doesn’t help you or them, indeed most players never read the manual for any game, heck I didn't read the manual for PR I learnt how to play from other players and by just playing the game itself as I’m sure many of you also did.
• Overall just be more forgiving of new players. There is a massive difference between a Noob and a Newbie but alot of the time PR players treat them exactly the same.

Those are my to points for improving the PR community.

[Scot]

Teabag everyone so that they learn to fear your nuts, and after that everyone will never want to die.

BAM.

Also, use Voip more.

[sfscriv]

Alright, for the most part this has been pretty healthy discussion, but touches only on surface issues. I, personally, will try not to turn this into a flame war. I would like to have a civil, constructive discussion on how to make our Project Reality Community better/stronger.

The “PR Community” diagram has been modified for illustrative purposes. Disclaimer: This is one of thousands of possible variations that could be used to communicate concerns/thoughts. It is not intended as an attack on any entity/node. Although, it is intended to get the discussion flowing.



At least one post suggested that the PR Tournament should be embedded into the PR Staff and that communications were very good between the PR staff and the PR Tournament. Let's pose this question, "How good is the communication between the PR Tournament and the PR league?"

No doubt, there are a handful of clans experiencing good communications with the different entities/nodes. What is being done about the hundreds of other clans? How can we improve communications and participation? Bear with me. There have been 43 posts discussing how to improve our beloved community and there has been little discussion about clans. In fact, the only post where I detected the word “clan” was in post 27 and in the illustrations.

When an individual identifies a problem, the proper thing to do is to suggest a possible recommendation.

As for the Project Reality League, I will hold-off on my discussion of the topic with one exception. There has very recently been a very good idea of instituting a liaison officer and the position has been established. Bravo!! Maybe, a similar position can be established (& advertised) within the PR Staff to open-up dialogue with clan leaders. This is just one idea of many that could possibly improve relations throughout our community.

Let's hear your thoughts.

Reminder: Civil, constructive discussion

[Wicca]

I think that the PR Community is split up in another way.

It is based on location and server preference.

Basically, you have the Russian Clans and the russian servers, eastern european clans and servers, Central european clans and servers and English clans and servers. The finnish, usually stay with themselfs.

They all overlap eachother, but are also standing apart.

The US community is split up into i think 4 main clans and servers, along with south america and their community, overlapping on some places. But to each their own.

The Australian community is the most centralized community, and get AFAIK little outside input, however, they sometimes overlap the US communeties, in terms of players gaming on servers.

There are Asian servers and clans, there is two chinese servers AFAIK and one Korean one.

And that is pretty much it.

The devs are all recruited from these servers and communities and basically, we are behaving like squads do in PR. Without any team cohesion in the community.

But who can blame us? We live thousands of miles from one another.

Things that make us united and more "stronger" is doing the same things togheter, and creating a "PR" atmosphere and culture, such as videos, competition. Helping eachother out, starting events.

It is important to create community by doing similar things. But how serious should we take this?

[PFunk]

I don't wanna blame the new guys, I mean they can really suck, but they aren't the bulk of the problem. I do however cringe at the thought of making an open squad on a public server most of the time. Just last night my squad was a mess. It was like taking care of a group of 5 year olds. They kept running around in circles, the idea of sticking close to the SL was just blatantly ignored, not like someone who doesn't care, but like a kid that doesn't even understand what you're saying to him. I'd say "get behind me and follow" and as I go at a walking pace one guy just runs ahead of me. I say "Hold here and face NE" the AR runs across the street to try and mix it up CQB style with the enemy we know is coming instead of waiting in ambush. "Dig this" takes 20 repetitions and 45 seconds to get one shovel.

Some of the new guys are positively retarded, not like pejorative retarded, but damned slow. Takes all that patience I learned in the PRT to not freak out. Handling a group of newbs or noobs is like making Windows work with some new game that won't work.

With that said, my squad was the best squad hands down. I had a group of underperforming nublets that wouldn't have lasted 10 seconds in a serious firefight with a real squad and we still racked up a big KDR and held the line (until that stupid Havok got into the air, stupid Beirut). The commander who joined in half way pretty much talked to me the whole time cause every other squad was practically useless or as he put it "you're the only competent squad I have". I didn't think so but it gave me perspective on what the team was like.

Whats my point? Where are all the good leaders? Why is everyone constantly trying to ninja flank the next flag before we've even capped this one, which usually means we lose all our flags? If the noobs are so bad why are all these locked squads out of position and barely contributing to the overall team strategy?

Not every round is that bad but a lot of them are. PRTA, NWA, Hardcore, whichever server I'm on coordination between squads is spotty at best. Usually the best combined arms we see is between clan mates that have divided themselves between an infantry squad and Helo Trans.

I think that the experienced PR community is a bit full of itself. Noobs, while difficult, still do what you say, more or less. I don't see a lot of SLs really trying to pull the team together with their actions. Its like they think its either a lost cause and they'll go and do their own thing (usually attacking 2 caps ahead of where they should be) or they have such a low opinion of their team that they're above contributing to the overall strategy and just wanna scout/sniper it up on a ridge.

I'm not trying to be a huge as whiner, but if everyone thinks the noobs are the problem then ask why they don't get better. In my experience the presence of an overwhelming structure and organization will force all useless players to conform or get kicked/leave. If you see a bunch of organized squads with a CO hammering it out with the enemy then you wanna join in. You take their seriousness seriously.

Now I can't attest to the universal nature of what I've said above. I only see it every time I log on and play lately. I've seen good rounds with coordination but that usually means its Ramiel and 3/4 of the squads are on the same side of the map near the known marker.

I think the PR community would do much much better if the guys who chose to click the "Create Squad" button actually pushed to make a team work rather than just their own squad. From that the nubs will draw more and more and will see that we're serious. Try and tell a nublet that they aren't getting with the program when the whole round is a mess is almost like berating a private in the trenches for having bad decorum right before a bayonet charge. Its insanity!

When I was in the midst of explaining some basic tactical concept as we moved to my squad one guy said to me "I've never had a Squad Leader that uses ideas like that". What does that tell you about whats really going on out there?

Thats my 2 cents plus thesis. Hate away haters.

[L4gi]

U mad PFunk! I can somewhat agree with you, but when the same things have been going down for years, you just dont want try anymore.

[Wicca]

Never giving up makes us stronger!

[PFunk]

U mad PFunk! I can somewhat agree with you, but when the same things have been going down for years, you just dont want try anymore.

I think if the culture of the servers was better for forced organized team play it could be a lot better. For one theres no real expectation that squads will perform a role or even try and be organized. Its just a kit dump for a lot of people. People never go CO cause nobody ever listens to them but if the admins were to for instance enforce a CO strategy then you could maybe see some more regular team play where its not just about the right leaders being on the same team but where even novice and unimaginative SLs could be given simple orders that put them into the line of fire where its helpful to the team overall.

I know this can work cause I've played over at United Operations, like ShackTac light in Arma2. They are casual and you can be the CO any time you want. Its not based on ranks but the guy who goes CO at the start of every round get the floor, organizes the team, makes the plan, hands out orders, etc. If anybody doesn't do what they're told they get kicked. The CO tells the admin to start the mission and can tell them who to kick if they're being disruptive.

Its just another step up from the mumble requirement and SLs in SL channel rule that some servers have. If some server were to reward guys who want to CO and work together in a required way rather than a "if you feel like helping team, cool" thing then it could be a really professional PR atmosphere that we usually only see in events and in the PRT or clan matches.

I'd like to see a server like that in PR but I don't think any of the established communities want to risk their server popularity on such a draconian experiment.

[mat552]

I think if the culture of the servers was better for forced organized team play it could be a lot better. For one theres no real expectation that squads will perform a role or even try and be organized. Its just a kit dump for a lot of people. People never go CO cause nobody ever listens to them but if the admins were to for instance enforce a CO strategy then you could maybe see some more regular team play where its not just about the right leaders being on the same team but where even novice and unimaginative SLs could be given simple orders that put them into the line of fire where its helpful to the team overall.

Tactical Gamer does enforce a few CO rules, namely, Follow the CO rules or be dismissed.

The CO problem in PR is that he really doesn't have a function in public matches outside of a specific set of duties. From.. 85? 9? until 96, there was no reason to go commander outside the deployment of the large area attacks. The UAV is nice, but it only works well under the pretense that the team is already organized and working together, sharing intel, etc. The commander rally is so limited in scope and use that it absolutely necessitates teamwork.

My reasoning behind him not being necessary is that PR, as a whole, hasn't changed much in.. ever. Gamechangers are few and far between, and the DEVs seem to like things pretty much where they are in a lot of areas. The problem with this is, everybody knows what to do and how to play the round. Infantry squad loadouts, force deployments, etc are either already in place or don't work fast enough to save the team. There's nothing for the CO to do except interfere or try new plans. Most people are resistant to new plans in PR, because the ones they have work fine. There's no flag in the hills in Kashan, but everyone's tried to control them since the map was introduced, stuff like that. It's mostly common sense that flows logically (logically as far as PR can take logic anyway.

There's a comfortable cycle to PR right now, and that's part of what's holding it back. You go here, you bring this kit, you do this. You do all that the same way, on the same maps and you play pretty much the same game. Risks are frowned upon by most of the veterans. (No where is this more exemplified than in helicopter close air support, but I digress). Comfortable too is the way squads organize themselves. Buddies find each other, everybody plays with everybody they know, and new players are left to their own devices until they break a code of conduct they usually didn't know existed. Most of them aren't offput by this, they're offput by how stale the whole thing is to a new player. It's pretty immediately obvious that everybody's following a plan that was layed out a long time ago as a new player on most servers.

Kind of rambling, but I guess the real point I wanted to make is that for the most part, very few people talking here in this thread will transfer any of this into the game. Most of the talk is left at the server door as the familiarity kicks in and puts them on autopilot.

Cheers.

[PFunk]

Tactical Gamer does enforce a few CO rules, namely, Follow the CO rules or be dismissed.

Yea but its not organized to require a CO. If admins would say at the beginning of a round "Volunteers for CO for both sides" and once they were picked they restart the map and you proceed from there with the admin making sure that from the get go you have a head of each team, THEN we'd really be cooking.

The CO problem in PR is that he really doesn't have a function in public matches outside of a specific set of duties.

I don't think thats true. You talk about how everyone already knows how to play, they all know their kits, have their preferred squad loadouts and who they want to play with and that they all share intel and make on the fly plans. Thats nice, and thats necessary, but that all exists in Clan and PRT and other organized play below the Commander level and you'll never ever see organized PR without a CO.

The CO fulfills a role that has nothing to do with rally points and force multipliers embodied in game features. These things are all part of the toolbox of a CO but its all secondary. The most important thing that a CO can offer a team is the ability to focus 100% on the design and adaptation of an organized plan and to direct the parts which are already operating independently towards a more coherent combined strategy.

Yes squads can replicate this to a satisfactory degree but nothing can replace a dictatorial voice directing the whole melange. What is that I heard someone say once, "One bad Commander is better than 2 good ones."

Fact is that on public play no CO isn't unnecessary because the squads can do it themselves, its unnecessary because those squads are playing against teams as equally or even more disorganized than themselves. The requirements for success at this point are so low that you don't need a fancy Commander to get it done.

One squad being smart and defending an objective while the rest of the team attacks is good, but a Commander that can forsee and put into place contingencies for if they fail as an independent entity is another thing altogether.

A server culture that forces those already competent veterans to listen to the plan of one CO wouldn't have the choice of being overly conservative or aggressive in their strategy. They'd just do it and the team would function as a single unit, just like an SL. Would you think that just because a bunch of guys in a squad all knew how to work together and were 100% proficient in their kits and roles that an SL would be unnecessary? No, because there is something missing without that singular voice making on the fly decisions.

SLs can make decisions in some democratic conference call on Mumble SL chat, but its not as fast or as decisive, and then you have ground leaders sticking their heads above where they're meant to be focused. Squad Leaders should be 100% focused on their objectives and their men and the bad guys in front of them. And god forbid if some of them don't agree. And lastly, SLs can work together in mumble, but it often isn't to the effect of having 100% of the 32 guys on your team clicking to one strategy. Theres usually at least a couple squads that just don't bother working with the group OR they're just so dysfunctional that they might as well be written off as disconnects.

I think that the rot in PR's public game is that people don't think a CO is important. I think its everything missing. Its the one feature that the Devs can't really do anything to improve. You can't develop better ground leaders, you can't develop better grunt pubbers, and you can't develop a good Commander at the head of a team that's got its shit together. Its an integral part to taking the quality of gameplay to another level.

The CO doesn't replace things that are already there, it augments it. You go play a PRT battle and if the CO chokes or gets indecisive then the whole team falls apart and is swiftly taken down cause the other side will have their CO sniffing around and will realize it and make a plan to exploit it almost as fast as it takes him to hit his TS whispers.

[sfscriv]

... contributing to the overall team strategy?

...coordination between squads ...

I believe the best way to get a team plan presented and understood by the squad leaders is to have the leaders enter a virtual planning room. The plan is issued:





And, then there is some time for the squad leaders to enter a separate virtual planning rooms to issue their plan to their squad.

Coordination between squads is a weak skill in the real-infantry. It is a skill that needs emphasis and practice. It is has been under-emphasized.

...People [rarely] go CO cause nobody ever listens to them ...

...at the start of every round get the floor, organizes the team, makes the plan, hands out orders, etc...

It is about conditioning the players in the Community to listen for everybodys benefit.

...The problem with this is, everybody knows what to do and how to play the round. Infantry squad loadouts, force deployments, etc ...You go here, you bring this kit, you do this. You do all that the same way, on the same maps and you play pretty much the same game. Risks are frowned upon by most of the veterans...

It is hard to fight familiarity. That is what makes new maps so important because everyone is more flexible and willing to try new strategies and tactics.


It would be great, PFunk, if you and others could contribute to the discussions in the EA UK Forum about the commander position and other teamplay features. I already taken the liberty of posting some of your thoughts in the EA UK Forum/Commander_Yes_or_No thread:

Commander YES or NO? - Page 50 - Electronic Arts UK Community

you may find this one interesting as well:

DICE, Have you Forgotten Integrated Teamwork? - Electronic Arts UK Community

[Wicca]

I usually Command, but rarely after pressing the "apply" button.

I usually squadlead and command. I like to have the stress of taking care of my own squad, and taking care of the entire team at once. Cause the idea is, that i have the tools and manpower of my own to hold a certain objective, without ordering another leader to do so. And it gives me a certain fall back position, should communication fail.

But this only works on PRTA. Cause everyone knows me there, and I am a respected "CO" cause i can boot their *** to mars.

The issue is, its easier to lead a squad than a team, and its boring to CO.

The only way to improve Commanding, is to completly remove the only thing the devs have left in PR that is EA. And that is flags.

It is commonly known that capturing an enemy units flag or banner, was shamefull and therefor humiliating. But this was in the napoleonic era. And fighting over a flag is very "unlogical".

Infact, if i want to win a battle, or a firefight, i want to stay away from flags, cause thats where the enemy is.

Remove flags = more team cohesion?

It basically is team death match, and as said, may the team, with the most coordination, communication and skill win.

Ill do some ingame tests on this to see if it is a more "fun" and teamwork applicable way of playing PR.

And no CnC is not team death match.

// Wicca out

[Lugi]

How about setting up a training event for commanders? That might embolden some players to command on public servers. The fact you've been trained and approved by the guys you know are good at what they do might be a big motivation shot.

And removing the flags kinda makes sense. But how about leaving only two of them, one per mainbase of each side with both being capable?

[Spec]

That's basically CnC then, just with main base flags instead of target FOBs.

I'm not sure if deathmatch wouldn't end up too confusing. Especially, a deathmatch mode could mean that noone's gonna defend anything, and as such, many gameplay features wouldn't be used. FOBs would be abandoned instead of defended once they have been found, to save tickets. There's no flags to defend either, and I can not really imagine a team deciding to really set up massive defenses anywhere... It might end up just being lots of single squads roaming the area, sometimes having a little firefight here and there... Well, like now.

[Arnoldio]

OMG!



We're all connected!!!

Hahaha, i rofled at that comment.

Anywho, community itself at the forums is really well organized, ingame.. tis a different story... First players divide by servers, then by level of skill etc etc. We need to unite more, bring everybody up to some level, to some standard so we are more equal and more skilled.

[PFunk]

We need to unite more, bring everybody up to some level, to some standard so we are more equal and more skilled.

Thats basically how I felt about the United Ops comparison idea. If the server functioned so that it was like a system that generally meant that leadership was paramount and not just coincidental then it could turn into an environment where you learn just by being there cause everyone is forced to work at a level that involves the better players standing out and making the lesser players 'play up' to their level.

Wicca can do it cause he's known but a server rule that the CO is god and that no round can run without a CO would change the entire dynamic.

And being a CO isn't boring, except when the team doesn't do a damned thing you say. The only reason to stay in main as a CO is the UAV. Leading from the front on a smaller map is very easy and a good change up from just barking orders on VOIP.

I also think being a good SL is harder than being a good CO. Being a GREAT of either is pretty hard, but CO is generally pretty easy as long as you understand the map and have good organizational skills. Communication is the decisive factor in that but thats just another skill that you'd learn playing it regularly, just like how you learned to SL.

It can work and PR doesn't handicap anything. I don't think removing the flags would make a difference because you need objectives other than just kill. The Vietnam war was a huge mess because all the commander's cared about was kill counts with no real cohesive strategy of what they were actually trying to do.

Why would I want to avoid being where the enemy is Wicca? Its not the middle ages where denying a battle to an invading army succeeds cause if he can't attack you in a few weeks the farmers in armor would just leave. Without flags it just becomes a ticket battle and you lose all military purpose to the event. Then it just stops being PR.

[L4gi]

Being a GREAT of either is pretty hard

No it isnt!

[phlupple]

I think more of us should make individual conscious efforts not to antagonise one another and flood global chat with cheap jokes. I'm sick & tired of hearing:

'Cobra fail', 'Over 9000', 'Like a Baws' and shit like that. I've never bought into it and I was hoping the community would have grown out of it after so many years.

I'm getting to the point where all I really want is an invite-only server exclusive to respected players who just want to play good PR. In fact I've reached that point and I've been here a while.

[PFunk]

No it isnt!

No you're right. Just play 35 hours minimum a week with L4gi. Simple as that.