Teamwork
Hey guys I have a crazy idea. Instead of blaming the specialists for no teamwork, how bout we blame the battlefield community that seems to forget that teamwork is essential. Crazy idea I know.
Forum Discussion
@acousticxero Yes. I see the type of player that is responsible for no teamwork. MOSTLY: infantry player who hates vehicles and all he wants to do is have a kill every second and look at the scoreboard.
Does not revive even when standing on top of dying squad mate. Ignores squad leaders request constantly. If managed to get in a vehicle, just drives by everyone in the open and hands vehicle over to enemy team at next killing spree spot etc.
if VOIP comes alive (hopefully soon) it will help. I could say to squad mate: ‘revive me please right here around corner’ or ‘guy on roof when you get to the top on ladder’ or ‘ please heli driver pick me up underneath you’ or ‘mckay could you get to the top of the container and tell me where that guy is?’ Etc.
There will be plenty of opportunities to play as a team when VOIP comes. You can do it now too. No need to blame specialists. Classes were better (?) or just different (?). It is really mostly up to players.
Does not revive even when standing on top of dying squad mate. Ignores squad leaders request constantly. If managed to get in a vehicle, just drives by everyone in the open and hands vehicle over to enemy team at next killing spree spot etc.
if VOIP comes alive (hopefully soon) it will help. I could say to squad mate: ‘revive me please right here around corner’ or ‘guy on roof when you get to the top on ladder’ or ‘ please heli driver pick me up underneath you’ or ‘mckay could you get to the top of the container and tell me where that guy is?’ Etc.
There will be plenty of opportunities to play as a team when VOIP comes. You can do it now too. No need to blame specialists. Classes were better (?) or just different (?). It is really mostly up to players.
Believe it or not, the specialist system and the class system are very similar. The only thing that separates them are the unique gadgets and names. As for me personally I don’t mind the specialists and I kinda like them ( this a sin in battlefield community apparently). Would I rather have classes back, yes but at the same time I don’t want them to remove specialists. I hope DICE sees this and takes the Star Wars Battlefront 2 approach in which you have your main classes but then you can select the specialists if you want.
- @acousticxero In theory, yes. In execution, no.
Class system: You know more or less the loadouts of your teammates. Limited weapons and gadgets resulted in you having an idea of what kinds of weapons and gadgets they have so you could pick a class to complement.
Specialists: No indication of any of this. And while I love the freedom with weapon/gadget selection, it makes it impossible to know what loadouts your team has so you can pick something that works well with it. Even something as simple as a small UI element next to their names that showed the weapon class and gadget would be a huge improvement in this regard.
But it's all the intentional design decisions from previous games that are missing. Why can't I get suppressing credit for helping lay down covering fire for my team as they move up? Why can't we have "oldschool spotting" back for our squad only? (it makes sense that it's gone for the whole team) Why aren't there any rewards for actual interactions with the specialist skills to encourage players to find interesting combinations and work together to achieve them?
I could go on, but my point is that while yes, teamwork has always been hit-or-miss in terms of what players actually do, the design to encourage and reward teamplay was very much more present in previous BF games compared to 2042. You can't control/force players to play a certain way, but you can absolutely encourage/reward it. And there's little encouragement or rewarding of teamwork in 2042.
It's a tough one. Teamwork has been an issue for a while now but Specialists may well not help matters. There are plenty of players who do support their team or squad, and utilise the Specialists to do so (using Casper's drone, healing as Falk or resupplying as Angel for example), but equally there are those who are happy to grappling hook to a camping spot and snipe with an ammo box.
- @ElliotLH Ye, the folks that just grab an ammo kit and play solo are deeply frustrating.
I usually play Falck (since I play medic mostly) and I like her kit - I res folks frequently (at my own risk most of the time) and spend a lot of time healing. It's solid and being able to heal at range is great.
It's just a shame there's not more to encourage specialist diversity to create more teamplay opportunities. The tools are all there for interesting interactions between specialist skills or their skills and gadgets. There's just no real systems to highlight those options or reward players for using them. Which would be complex to set up, and given that we don't even have a properly functioning scoring system like in past BF games is likely unreasonable.
Shame, because the teamplay options are potentially amazing.- @edgecrusherO0 You're very similar to me I think - I mainly play a 'support' Specialist and try to perform a role, like reviving or ferrying ammo around (BTW if you haven't tried it yet, stick an ammo or health crate on Casper's drone. Good times). You're right though that there needs to be more incentive for players to support each other more, be it with points or even just tips in-game, and while it'd be hard it'd also be worthwhile.
- @ElliotLH You could still play team work by camping in the back with a sniper rifle doing over watch for your team attacking in breakthrough. Team work doesn’t only means giving ammo and health packs.
- @skullcracker2378I guarantee while you’re hanging back and your team is pushing the point and dying, they’re not thinking “thank god for skullcracker giving us over watch while we die repeatedly”. They’re thinking “that guy thinks his KD is more important than the W, what a selfish *”. (Cleaned up by forums, isn’t what you think I said, maybe a little) I don’t know how many maps have been lost as a tenth of the team hides in the back. Unless your spamming Soflam at choppies, get your * on the point
