There are so many variables here though. Multiplayer is meant to be fun. Before widespread internet connection, multiplayer was introduced to play with friends, in the same room. I would appreciate the portal to have 10-30 of my friends list, in the same room, against each other, having fun.
I don't have an issue with K/D ratios, bots or no bots. The issue is, they advertised normal progression in portal, playing tailored matches for you and friends. They took it away. Rather than fixing the real problem of not having enough server space.
If the matchmaking was better, the people who are farming for a high K/D, will just get shown up in the "real" experience. Same as if matchmaking is based on the player rank. If it's all farmed XP, you'll have an easy time.
What they have done is backwards. It wouldn't be such a backlash, if it was the other way round. I somewhat agree. If it has to be done, remove the ranking for soldier but allow the weapon progression. My honest opinion is just leave it how it was. It doesn't affect your gameplay. They could fix some other, more pertinent issues instead.
Cheating, Map/mechanic abuse. The console only cross play. Other bugs, misinformation that isn't listed here.
BB-Knight89, I remember my first LAN party :) I actually got introduced to BF at a LAN party.
Matchmaking is a problem, though I don't know what the solution is. Four friends want to squad up, one might be new and another way above their skill level - hard to get a fair match going and still keep that group together. So I think they try to match a wide range of skill levels within each match, although I'm not sure their reason is to keep squads of friends together.
I've said it before, I think the solution is remove weapon progression completely, and watch the servers free up. My friends and I probably wouldn't have played against bots yet except when we realized the ridiculous grinding for weapons/challenges(for guns).
If you also stopped bot kills from counting toward your profile stats, I think everyone would be happy.
I still remember arguing over screenwatching on N64 Goledeneye. We were all playing on the same television set.
Then I remember on the ps2, think it was called a multitap? so you could conect 4 controllers instead of 2. then the original x-box came with 4 connections as standard.
It can feel a bit one sided sometimes but that's just battlefield. What I'm trying to say is, regardless of progression. Soldier or Weapons. It will still largely be about skill. You will have rank 8 killing rank 60. I don't think that's an issue.
It's not the worst idea i've seen, removing the weapon progression altogether. I do like the sense of achievement it brings. As you say, some of those challenges are insane and some players will never get there.
My biggest gripe is they advertised the verified portal mode, with standard progression but then remove it after the refund window passed. That's not dealing with the main issue, it's a blanket fix and actually punishes certain player groups.
What makes it worse, you would have played against bots, because even in the standard servers I'm encountering a fair few. so it's ok for their servers to have them with standard progression but we can't.
It's unususal for me to have many friends but I'm part of a group, Friends of friends etc. We can be in discord or PS party, anywhere from 6 to 25 of us online at one time. Mainly UK and US. To have us all playing in the same game, even on either team, without Portal, is very difficuly. If there's 8 or so, even that can be a challenge. You can enter room as squad of 4, then split. If there are bots in that room you can have friends piggy back into the server. It doesn't feel quite right or genuine to do this. The portal method would and should have been great, they just needed to address the server space. They should appreciate that people want to play their own way. People complained, other people were having fun, they listened to the noise of complainers without appreciating the quiet ones who were just in there having a blast. Now I'm on forums and searching for information, eating away at play time. I appreciate the majority of this community.
Much Respect to you.
N64 Goldeneye, I think we might be getting old BB-Knight89 :D
I think removing attachments from Weapon Mastery will solve a lot of problems. I know a lot of people were using bot servers to quickly level weapons so they could start experimenting with builds. So it would free up a significant amount of servers.
But you're right, a lot of people like a sense of progression. For a pvp game, which should be skill vs skill, I think you need to remove power from easily attainable progression. Progression should be things like titles for bragging rights, cosmetics for soldiers and weapons, maybe really niche gadgets or guns that a lot of people wouldn't want, but those with really high skill can flex by using them.
I play with the same 4-8 friends, and I detest playing against them. Either we are all on the same side or I lose interest. Most of the time that's possible in normal servers, but above 4 and it's much easier on custom servers.
Hopefully they find a better solution to the real problems, and get xp back to Portal.
