So I want to play an actual game. (NA only, no Euros allowed unless you want 150+ ping) If you would like to play an actual game as well, join the [Team Bacon] group and join the group chat room around 6 PM Eastern Daylight Time on Sunday, 4/10/2011. First 12 in the channel and then we find a random 12 player server and all join at the same time and play a few rounds that way. I don't have a server to use myself unfortunately, but just joining en mass will work well enough I expect. No team picking, just let the random team selector do its thing and slumming with the in-game voice as the [Team Bacon] Team Speak server is currently dead. Comments? Suggestions?
It sounds like you want to get a PUG(pick up group) group going, great idea! An active PUG community is beyond important for a game like this and will really aid in getting a more active competitive scene happening. But to get such a thing off the ground, might I make some suggestions? 1: In game voice chat doesn't cut it. You need a Mumble/Ventrillo/Teamspeak server with enough slots such that you won't be running out of space if someone's friend shows up. Any voice client will do, but Mumble has taken over as the preferred "serious bsns gaming" voice client because it provides markedly lower latency, allowing communication to take place with as little delay as possible. Servers for any voice client are usually available on the cheap. 2: Gotta have a server, bro. Admin lets you kick ne'er-do-wells and super high pingers, password makes sure random players who aren't looking for a proper high-teamwork/skill game don't join, and you can set the rules to whatever custom(or default) settings your little heart desires. 3: Team captains. Picking "random team" and hoping for the best is going to lead to misery, as I'm sure you've seen over and over again in pubs. The common way to prevent this team stack is to assign two team captains, who take turn picking people until none remain. Ensures fairly even teams as it generally splits up the proest pros that ever proed into separate teams. 4: A steam group will bring order to chaos. With a glance you can see how many people are on-line, and know if it's a good time to start pugging. And sending out a 'PUG NOW GET IN DA SERVER' announcement is more convenient than messaging everyone on your friends list. Best of luck getting this going.
I just want a game with people that don't have such a ridiculous skill differential. I don't care one bit about a PUG right now, just want to see what happens when you get 12 or so actual players that have some semblance of understanding of the game. We'll see if anyone shows up. I am quite aware of what it takes to get a competitive scene going. That is not the intent. If you seed a server with 9-10 players the ne'er do wells and undesirables won't matter even on a public server.
I have a Mumble server you might be able to use for this, and I'd love to play sometime other than a Sunday or Wednesday evening as well.
