B2O and competitive BF5

[Kenadian]

Hello all,

This post is just a feeler to see if there is any interest in having a Band of Others competitive B2O Team?

With the announcement late 2015 that Peter Moore is heading the new EA CGD (Competitive Gaming Division) it appears as if EA is finally taking E-Sports a bit more seriously.

I maintain much of my contacts from competitive BF3 at TeamReddit and ShotDox so I'll certainly be into this with both feet.

...the question being, is anyone else here (or know of someone) interested in possibly creating a B2O Team?

Before you answer please consider this is not for the faint of heart. This is a serious time commitment that will require several hours of your time a minimum of 3 nights/week; minimum 3 to 4 hours each session.

Depending on what we decide to compete in, 5v5, 8v8 for example, we'll need at least double that to practice and scrim internally against.

In other words, if we field a 5v5 squad we need an absolute minimum of 10 players available as above with a bare minimum of 2 alternates willing to jump in at a moments notice.

Other items for your consideration:

• Squad Public Server play at least one night/week or weekend (outside of practice schedule)
• Strict ingame comms discipline
• In depth understanding of all geographical landmarks in all maps used in competitive play (will be taught)
• After practice, at least 1 scrim against another competitive non-B2O Team
• Ability to play several roles depending on ever changing game environment.

...and much, much more.

I know it sounds like a lot but it truly is pretty straight forward and is a shit load of fun.

You'll be competing against some of the most talented players out there who've been doing this for years.

Lastly, if we do field a Team we'll be entering some of the larger events where we team up with the players we typically scrim against.

To get more of an idea of how this works, please check out Daskro's Level BF Event Casts: https://www.youtube.com/user/daskro/videos

 

[ElektroVodka]

Before i commit i'd rather know if BF5 is going to draw my attention beforehand.

I've done enough scrims in '42 to know how much fun it is, yet no game released after BF'42/2 ever sparked that interest again.

I'd definitly give it a try if the game it's based in doesn't burn me out in a week.

The other thing is, timezones.
It might even be impossible to join as it's going to be nightshift for us Euro's, but i'll see where this gets.

 

[Jerad]

Jeebus the last game I played competitively was Counter-Strike when CAL was still a thing.

Depending on how BF5 turns out I might be interested.

 

[Kenadian]

Before i commit i'd rather know if BF5 is going to draw my attention beforehand.

I've done enough scrims in '42 to know how much fun it is, yet no game released after BF'42/2 ever sparked that interest again.

I'd definitly give it a try if the game it's based in doesn't burn me out in a week.

The other thing is, timezones.
It might even be impossible to join as it's going to be nightshift for us Euro's, but i'll see where this gets.

This could prove difficult because the timeframes are all usually EST for North Americans. In my short time doing this I'm unaware of any Euros scrimming with us outside of Saturdays.

I spent a good portion of the weekend researching the current competitive climate. I've also commented in one of the Battlelog Teams I'm a part of that has a number of comp players in it.

...hopefully someone responds.

I did notice a few of my ex-reddit mates were running L0B or L0BI tags but couldn't find out what Clan that was. So far I've only found a user with that name and I'm pretty sure that's not what I'm looking for.

From the competitive scene there isn't much going on either. Symthic appears to be doing nothing, Level BF is a ghost town, likewise ESL and every other Community/Clan/Program.

Jeebus the last game I played competitively was Counter-Strike when CAL was still a thing.

Depending on how BF5 turns out I might be interested.

It's way too early to tell what's going to happen but I'm just trying to get a feel for interest at B2O.

Given this topics not really garnered much attention it's clear B2O won't be doing anything so I'll be joining a Team looking for Armor (assuming it's in the game).

Having said that, I'm quite sure that if BF5 is supported by EA/Dice as an eSport then I have no doubt there will be plenty of options for weekend 32v32.

This is easily the best way for anyone curious about competitive play to find out if it's right for them.

As always I'll update as I know more.

 

[Jerad]

Sounds good Duke. I'd probably be down for the odd scrim at least. I can't imagine how battlefield as an esport would work, they will really need to overhaul their net-code for it to work. BF3 and 4 was frustrating because it was server side hit reg and only 16 tick servers (with some reports that it's actually 10 tick).

If they're not running at least 64tick for BF5 I can't see a legitimate competitive scene forming. As it is people complain in CS:GO when they're stuck playing on 64 tick servers instead of 128.

Hopefully DICE and EA pulls their heads out of their ass and produce a polished game this time around.

 

[Kenadian]

Currently BF4 is operating under 30 and 60 tickrate servers and definitely is an improvement over how it was in early days BF4.

I'm convinced however that even doubling it won't be enough unless EA/Dice seriously rethink "levolution". CS:GO has none of this by comparison and retains it's core map structure over the course of a round.

Battlefield is a continually evolving map in many respects with high levels of destruction to many static structures such as buildings, bridges, trees, walls, fences, etc., even weather.

This will always be a challenge and if they're to be successful this level of dynamic environmental changes should be an option that can be disabled at the server level.

I'd love to see an option where a Server Host can completely disable levolution and/or cater structural based damage to fascias instead of entire building collapse.

Lastly, there is a marked difference in hit registration in BF4 when the Pings are lower. I've played in Servers where the average Ping wasn't any higher than 100ms and everything was solid.

Add a few players with 150+ and all in the sudden you can be shot around walls.

... meaning you're being shot in cover on your screen but on the opponents screen you've not yet reached cover.

 

[Jerad]

Oh if they improved the tick rate that is awesome.the old 10-16 tickrates ment effectively the best ping you could have (not that it was reported this way) was around 200ms without added network lag. Making things like peeking snipers or tanks impossible.

Maybe csgo was a bad example considering there are no vehicles, levolution and only 10 players in a session but it is probably the most popular FPS out there right now.

If they can run at 60 tick I am sure that would be amazing in comparison. In the end I lost interest in bf4 because there was too much lag rng involved to try and play well and I'd just screw around as a support. (C4 all the things!)

 

[Kenadian]

There were so many complaints about BF4 originally that EA/Dice actually delayed their release schedule for the paid addon DLC (free to Premium Users) to address some of the glaring issues on launch.

It was widely publicized that EA/Dice knew the game wasn't ready for release but released it anyway.

It got so bad investors launched a class action lawsuit against EA stating things they were saying were to artificially inflate EA stock prices. I think originally a Judge sided with EA but how this ended I really have no idea?

I know it didn't help EA's reputation much.

EA launched the CTE (Community Test Environment) to Premium Users to get Community Feedback on what to fix in what priority. Tickrate was one of the highest priorities to users and has (and continues to be iirc) worked on and improved.

I know in my case it was well over a year after release that my sounds actually worked on the map Lancang Dam. For myself and many others, we tried to use BF4 in comp but it just wasn't viable.

Ultimately both Teams I'd joined packed it in due to waning interest and the same can be said for many of the more popular Teams such as Rival, Symthic and others.

BF3 had its issues as we all know but some maps were quite viable for scrims even with BF3's dodgy netcode.

More specifically Grand Bazaar, Operation Metro, and Seine Crossing were used more for 5v5 and 8v8.

Seine was sometimes used for larger scrims but it was utter chaos. Larger maps such as Tehran Highway, Noshahr Canals, Epicenter, and a few others were typically the choice for larger scrims (32v32).

 

[Fromthenavy]

Jeebus the last game I played competitively was Counter-Strike when CAL was still a thing.

Depending on how BF5 turns out I might be interested.

This.. EXACTLY this

 

[Peeble]

DICE LA have been the ones mostly responsible for the post-launch support of BF4. They're the ones responsible for turning it into a great game. I hope they're involved in the development of BF5. I don't have much trust in DICE Stockholm after they released BF4 and Star Wars: Battlefront. Hopefully they don't muck up Mirror's Edge too.

 

[ElektroVodka]

Afaik BF4 supports 144Hz/tickrate now.
It's quite the difference, however once in a while u still get the odd around the wall death. But it's nothing bad as compared to the 15/30Hz range

 

[Wapwap]

I'd be interested in this if the game can keep me interested. But, as mentioned earlier, I think the time difference will be sort of a problem.

 

[Daunt]

I know a few of us were talking about ARMA 3 and doing some stuff there... I'd be interested in firing that thing back up if we can get a solid team in game. I think quite a few of us own it.