Multiplayer # of players searching display

just leave the rank how you have it now and bring back the number of players searching for a game.
Is it that difficult to understand the meaning of the thread?

I don't care about the rank of other players I play, but i would like to see how many are looking for a game.

This is a game for MEN who want a good fight and don't care about the bruises. It's not a kindergarten sandbox.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAj26rVWK14

I really dislike the idea of having no idea who you're loading in against. Even level gave you some information (time spent playing the game). Ideally you'd like to know where they rank on the ladders.

If people are dropping because they're scared to play against high level players, that really should be their own problem. The game shouldn't cater to them, and try to "trick" them to stay in the game. If they think they have no chance and want to drop, let them drop, that's their prerogative.

I really dislike the idea of having no idea who you're loading in against. Even level gave you some information (time spent playing the game). Ideally you'd like to know where they rank on the ladders.

If people are dropping because they're scared to play against high level players, that really should be their own problem. The game shouldn't cater to them, and try to "trick" them to stay in the game. If they think they have no chance and want to drop, let them drop, that's their prerogative.

Couldn't agree more. Losing is part of improving at the game. If players drop just at the sight of someone's Rank, let alone their ladder position, maybe they are not quite ready for MP yet?

I believe the reason why so many people are dropping is the lack of lobbies and custom games. People with no steam friends playing coh2 are FORCED to automatch. Custom games gave possibilities to chose and estimate opponents before the actual battle and in CoH1 few chose auto over custom.
CoH2 is severly lacking here...

Losing may be the best way of improving, however, truth is most people hate it and don't see it this way. Most just play this game to have fun and losing to higher ranked players isn't part of it.

I really dislike the idea of having no idea who you're loading in against. Even level gave you some information (time spent playing the game). Ideally you'd like to know where they rank on the ladders.

If people are dropping because they're scared to play against high level players, that really should be their own problem. The game shouldn't cater to them, and try to "trick" them to stay in the game. If they think they have no chance and want to drop, let them drop, that's their prerogative.

The problem here that this dropping only occurs usually in games greater than 2 V 2 - games which traditionally aren't played by "Pro" players - hence these players don't take their COH "seriously" - they log on - fire up a 4 V 4 and boom - they see their team full of low rank - the opposition rank stacked and they're like "Ok - this isn't going to be FUN - I'll just DROP and find another GAME".

That's the problem - there's just too much focus here on the "pro" game - and most likely why things like lobbies, Annihilation etc won't get addressed - the Dev's are soundly pandering to the 1% - the "pro" player - and ignoring the rest to their detriment.

We probably also won't see Annihilation due to what I'm guessing is a major balance issue too given the german factions armored strength end game vs relatively weak russian AT - but that's another topic.

Pro's won't suffer this drop effect as:

1 - Pro's usually play 1 V 1
2 - Pro's want to protect their stats at all costs

These same criteria don't apply to Joe Public gamer - they see a stacked team on a map not of their liking - it's then rather easy to just say "GG - then "/leave" and go roll the dice for another game - one where hopefully they have a better team and a map of their liking.

Hiding rank doesn't fix this - it's just like the Ostrich sticking it's head even deeper in the sand.

Instead of showing a number which confuses people who don't understand the system, perhaps we could use a low/medium/high value for players searching. Would that be a better alternative?

Wtf? How is this easily usable info confusable to anyone? This makes no sense.

I suppose we could try to remove faceplates on the loading screen as well, a lot of people were dropping simply on seeing higher ranks.

Wtf? Remove faceplates people pay for? If people quit a game because their opponent is deemed too strong that's THEIR problem, and absolutely doesn't require any sort of fix.

Don't fix what isn't broken. Bring back the numbers please.

If anything hide the bulletins and cdrs of the rival player. there is no real reason to show me that a player has 3 t-34 bulletins so I should expect him to rush for fuel/tanks early. I wouldn't know that about him normally and it takes away some of the surprise in the game

Even though I would rarely ever play public custom lobby games, I see the value in having them - as mentioned above, they provide an alternative to automatch so people can get their feet wet in MP games. Once people get some confidence playing against people rather than AI, then they can move on to automatch. This helps continually bring in fresh blood to the player pool. The population will likely (or already has) drop much faster due to no public custom game lobby.

If anything hide the bulletins and cdrs of the rival player. there is no real reason to show me that a player has 3 t-34 bulletins so I should expect him to rush for fuel/tanks early. I wouldn't know that about him normally and it takes away some of the surprise in the game

I think now that most of the bulletins have immaterial effect, bulletins can be hidden (especially since it shows so much about Soviet strategy 1v1 as they have to pick between tier buildings).

Commanders, however, should not be hidden at all since some give exclusive units. If my enemy has Feshtung Armor, Assault Support, and Jaegar Armor equipped and I see him pop smoke, I want to be able to know that he is going to have access to Pak43's later in the game rather than be guessing which commander with smoke he picked.

I believe the reason why so many people are dropping is the lack of lobbies and custom games. People with no steam friends playing coh2 are FORCED to automatch. Custom games gave possibilities to chose and estimate opponents before the actual battle and in CoH1 few chose auto over custom.
CoH2 is severly lacking here...

Human nature says otherwise. Lobbies were as much a way for people to stack games by booting anyone who seemed higher than their side.

The goal with only automatches right now was to get everyone into the automatch system so that it would always have a larger pool of players, instead of everyone idling in some lobby yelling out room names.

Now, this assume the automatch works well, but there's not inherently better about lobbies.

I never liked the display of level, since the only thing it says (more or less) is how much time the other player has spent playing the game, nothing about how close in say win lose ratio to me he is. Could even be compstomps!

Something like ELO or rank pos would be great to incorporate instead. I DO think that the faceplates should be there, just not showing level (or stars) since that doesnt in any way reflect skill. And if the ELO system works, displaying stars is more than pointless.

On a sidenote, I do think that both commanders and bulletins should be shown. What I would like to see is a "mouse over" over the commanders that your teammates and opponents bring. Now there are MANY commanders in the game, and you can not possibly remember them all and their respective faces. A mouse over like the one in the "lobby" would be awesome.

ive read somewhere that the number of players searching was only those in your elo range. anyone know if thats true? perhaps that is causing some of the confusion? if it is true, people might see like 10 players searching and jump to the conclusion that "the game is dead". maybe they could add something like war thunder where it shows how many people are playing multiplayer currently (steam stats include singleplayer) and how many games are currently in progress.

as for players dropping based on level, i dont think there is anything that can, or even should, be done to stop this. if people are bad sports and only want to play lower levels, there is no way to really stop them. even if you remove all info from the load screen, you could quickly search for the player and find their rank on this site. im fine with removing the actual number and only showing the faceplate, but this shouldnt be taken any further.

Do you play games?

If that is true, I would always play vs/with players of similar ability.

It definitely isn't so. Some players I play vs often are so bad, they offer no meaningful resistance.

So, forget what you read. Your experience will tell you different

Instead of showing a number which confuses people who don't understand the system, perhaps we could use a low/medium/high value for players searching. Would that be a better alternative?

I suppose we could try to remove faceplates on the loading screen as well, a lot of people were dropping simply on seeing higher ranks.

Here is possible solution:

huge number of players will never be 'educated' into playing games that they don't enjoy. A lot of players will never get used or accept being forced playing games/maps they have no control of.
For example unbalanced games, I understand perfectly reasoning for what Relic is doing (short wait for games, and no one gets offended by getting kicked from custom games,etc)

But, problem is I bought the game for my own enjoyment not to make some kid feel happy because he gets to try out the game by ruining it completely for me.

Not seeing ranks (ELO ranks, not that $#!^ that was there to begin with), or number of players searching only makes me wanna play less.

Solution:

• 
  get rid of meaningless ranks, and use ELO ranks (displayed on start game)
  Make lobby custom games available (you already got rid of the biggest problem - smurfs, can't do anything about drop-hacks either way. there will always be idiots)
  Lobby chat, some people don't like it for others its invaluable feature. for sharing info, learning, meeting friends, learning tactics, etc. (majority of people don't like forums, because any idiot can jump in and write insults, etc. chatting while waiting for game with friends, a lot better than looking at COH2 search screen)
  
  

For starters, I think Relic really needs to evaluate their decisions and direction they are taking (openly and without bias) without holding onto the decisions and trying patching up problems with sticky tape.
I mean, you can do as much PR as you wish, and try to put the fire out with meaningless drops of water here and there. At the end of the day, you have to look at the large picture.
People are quitting/quit the game left right and center. Because or balance, no lobby, ranks, unbalanced games, ELO in teamgames is no chat, more commanders than maps (what is there 2 maps for 4v4 and 20+ commanders, from what I see the most searched for game type) etc, etc.

I for one, don't wish to play games when I can't see who my opponent is or teamgames where I am thrown into a game with players of drastic skill differences or/and very unbalanced. Can't choose map, can't chat or make in-game friends..
As such I hardly play. Sadly, I spend 20x more time posting crap of this forum than playing the damn game...

Thats my opinion, feel free to disagree

Thanks

As I see it there are three groups of players: the pro players, the core players and the for fun players. The pros want their stats to be high, their streaks long and care about the ELO rating, also they are ones mostly concerned with equal balance of the game. The core players play a game when they can, some mind if they lose some don't some are frustrated, some encouraged to beat a stronger opponent. But they are not as vocal as the pros, they just play the game as is. Then there are the for fun players, these are your scheldt and compstomp annihilation players that just want to see things explode and like to spam things like artillery. They will definitely quit if they see no fun in a game playing against pros and vice versa will the pros quit when they have to play with for fun players on their team. They will post everything that's imbalanced and broken on the forums.

So maybe enable a setting in the automatch for what kind of games you are looking for playing for fun or playing for ladder points or whether it doesn't matter. But you will still be all in the same ranked match pool! And the match-maker would try(!) to find matches according to your preferences.

If you select pro: you will see the other players ingame rank, ladder position, ELO and maybe even your possible rise or fall on the ladder when you win or lose against this opponent.

The ones looking for fun players could only see the other players faceplates and if they are also looking for fun. So they can be happy if their game consists of mostly players that are all looking for fun.

And the core players who do not care for ladder points can simply see the ingame rank as usual.

On all settings the Bulletins should be hidden. And revealed after the game. You have beaten Player x who had chosen commander Y with these bulletins: A, B and C.


Offtopic:
And please add the bulletins in game to the unit, sometimes I forget which unit is buffed. Or alone for the sake of replays when you are watching someone else's units. Just add the bulletin like the other buffs to their portrait section of the UI.

And please add maybe a little icon next to the commander portraits that shows which endgame unit/ability they wield (Tiger, IS-2, left etc) because if in 6 months the game will have over 40 commanders it will be a nightmare to tell them apart solely from their portrait. Weren't they supposed to be some sort of Mr. Potatohead code in their portraits? like the Stahlhelm is for the Tigertank, the fur coat for camouflage ability etc.?

Likely would just split up and make even smaller an already small group.

I've seen a lot of people complaining about completely misunderstood searching numbers and in-game levels both in-game and on the forums. I don't think having these things visible in game honestly added anything. And yeah, a lot of those players who leave when they see levels really just want to have a custom mode and lobby so they can try to make sure they never play anyone better than themselves. I suspect they'll be incurable until they have that.

I've not actually seen anyone leave because of a faceplate but y'know.

Ladder rank in that mode or something would at least be more reasonable. These are all things I'd rather see post-game, myself.

Likely would just split up and make even smaller an already small group.

No, no. Its just a visual. You would still get mixed in with all the others you just wouldn't be reminded of the other players higher rank. Think of it more like pink-shaded-sun-glasses. If you don't see the other players higer rank it won't bother you as much. But you have the Option to put the glasses on or off...

As I see it there are three groups of players: the pro players, the core players and the for fun players. The pros want their stats to be high, their streaks long and care about the ELO rating, also they are ones mostly concerned with equal balance of the game. The core players play a game when they can, some mind if they lose some don't some are frustrated, some encouraged to beat a stronger opponent. But they are not as vocal as the pros, they just play the game as is. Then there are the for fun players, these are your scheldt and compstomp annihilation players that just want to see things explode and like to spam things like artillery. They will definitely quit if they see no fun in a game playing against pros and vice versa will the pros quit when they have to play with for fun players on their team. They will post everything that's imbalanced and broken on the forums.

So maybe enable a setting in the automatch for what kind of games you are looking for playing for fun or playing for ladder points or whether it doesn't matter. But you will still be all in the same ranked match pool! And the match-maker would try(!) to find matches according to your preferences.

If you select pro: you will see the other players ingame rank, ladder position, ELO and maybe even your possible rise or fall on the ladder when you win or lose against this opponent.

The ones looking for fun players could only see the other players faceplates and if they are also looking for fun. So they can be happy if their game consists of mostly players that are all looking for fun.

And the core players who do not care for ladder points can simply see the ingame rank as usual.

On all settings the Bulletins should be hidden. And revealed after the game. You have beaten Player x who had chosen commander Y with these bulletins: A, B and C.

Why not just give the choice that was available Day 1 in COH1?

Just put back in the lobbys and let the player decide what style of game they want to play, on what map they want to play it and with whom they want to play?

Leave the Automatch there too - as it was in COH1 - and magic - everybody is happy.

The simplest solution is often the best - and as many have said - the problem with Smurfing is gone now since the account is tied to the steam account.

And really - don't give us the "well that option currently exists....." - out of interest - how many NEW players have people met IN GAME on COH2 and added to their friends list?

I can tell you mine is ZERO.

Once a game is over - most people just go look for the next match or shutdown - they don't hang about to chat - and that's the problem, unless A LOT of your friends are RTS types, you'll often have no use for the custom system in place.

I can tell you mine is ZERO.

Once a game is over - most people just go look for the next match or shutdown - they don't hang about to chat - and that's the problem, unless A LOT of your friends are RTS types, you'll often have no use for the custom system in place.

Two. But I see them rarely because of diffrent work hours/time-zones. An ingame Lobby to meet people would go a long way to meet people before a match, to set up games under the conditions every one agrees to and wants to play with.

Can't this be done within the steam overlay? Creating offical lobby groups for the game and using the Steam chat/groupchat to invite join-game and all the other functions steam already provides?