Does this game snowball too much?

I'm a recent player for this game, but it seems to me in my somewhat limited experience that it snowballs a bit too much. What I mean by that is that once a team gets ahead, it's almost impossible for there to be a comeback (barring things like players leaving or switching teams, of course).

Once a team gets map control, they have control over 3 major points: the Annihilator (which keeps the enemy zoned in their base), Bullseye, and Juice dispensers. Not only that, but because the winning team has map control, players have more room to retreat and pick their fights carefully, which preserves their killing streaks, which nets them more gold than the enemy team.

Of course, the winning team should have an advantage, but these points seem insurmountable. I especially don't like control over Juice dispensers, though I also think that Juice is slightly too strong (but that's another issue).

Does anyone else think this is an issue? It seems that once a team gets map control, then there isn't much of a point for the losing team to stick around, since their going to lose eventually and comebacks seem impossible.

One change I would like to see is the removal of bonus gold for killing streaks and instead make that player worth slightly more gold if he's killed. In dota games, a player on a killing spree does not get bonus gold, just the player kills, but the streak player is worth slightly more gold. This gives the enemy team a chance to earn some more gold by killing that player on a spree (who himself would already be buffed from building Juice from player kills). Then again, MNC isn't dota, so I defer to more experienced players' opinions.

You can always fight back, I have won many matches where our team clearly had the disadvantage in terms of kills, money and moneyball damage.

Even if it seems hard, it's not impossible to capture back key points (juice dispenser & annihilator).You can go there juiced, kill every pro and ensure that you keep the control. But instead of that, you could also be sneaky and take the occasion to push your lane hard and destroy half of their turrets in the blink of an eye (Gunners and Sins, yes I'm looking at you).

Adaptability, that's the key.

I've built juice as support by keeping our rock-its barely alive, pushed through two gunners and a sniper, killed a firebase all with my shotgun and airstrikes, and nabbed the annihilator at the very last second of my juice before their juicehappy assault destroyed me. It gave us enough of an advantage for my team to get an opening, but they didn't. One guy was hiding in spawn, another in the process of ragequitting, and our failsassin just kept dying after attempting to kill the sniper. Players who give up the moment they begin to lose are entirely the reason it's impossible to come back. As long as there's not an aimbot or something in the game, the teams aren't being stacked or some other unfair advantage I see no reason to ragequit instead of fighting back.

A perfect example of a match turning against me, then my team keeping the moneyball alive long enough for Overtime to hit and take the win.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLN7WRQGPto

Your video shows that you should have won about 3,4 and 6 minutes into the game but you fail to shoot the money ball. Or even go buy juice and instead prioritize useless skills in place of a money ball kill. Hell, if it drops that early, you can even forgo your Passive3 upgrade to get juice if you already burned the first one killing turrets and such.

Poor way to show a snowball effect.

3 drops on the money ball (and even a near 4th drop!), and yet it still goes to over time. So very bad.

When it drops the first time you work it to have $500 (or farm a juice) and kill it. No exceptions.

Overall, I'd say you had almost nothing to do with actually lucking into a win in OT apart from some bot pressure. Sadly, this is quite rare and I do commend you on actually killing bots.

Get the Annihilator and go buy juice when that ball drops. Really.

If you bothered to read the comments, you'd know I chose not to go for the moneyball so early, I wanted the match to last longer, so I held back. Almost cost me the victory, but it was fun, nonetheless, which is what games are supposed to be.

Now, if there was reason to actually win, then the match would have been ours much earlier.

To answer the topic question: no.

A bit of off-topic but you might learn something from this video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgTQKzjGAJk

Thank ya much Deadstretch. :mrgreen:

You also decided to not really contribute like many assassins before you yet lucked into a win because there were some decent players on your team.

Besides, there is always a reason to win: not losing.

Sums up my MNC experience up to the time I stopped playing.

You'll find people saying "good riddance" when people say they've stopped playing but it really is the communities loss.

I have no vitrol fueled hate for the game and I love the Devs, it's just unworkable these days because people are useless wankers and the player base is dwindling at a phenomenal rate due to a lack of advertising for MNC, so your choices are terrible team number 1 or terrible team number 2.

It's really crap standing out on a server now as well, people apparently think they're decent and when you roll them the abuse is constant and annoying.

It's also painful that stacking is hated, mainly by the people who force me to stack in the first place.

"So I was forced to carry your worthless arse for a fair few games and was successful. You then managed along with a few others to craft such a humongously weak effort we lost, in spite of my massive efforts. Now I'm sick of it, I want decent team mates and suddenly I'm the bastard because you can't play for S***?"

Awesome.

sorry about your experience mail...

normally when i play my experience is very similar. although last nite i ended up getting into a server with several experienced people and those games went very well. back and forth. Very well played on both sides.

one game came down to ctrl of the center in OT. back and forth the whole game, then the other team got the juice dispensers in ot and done... Guess thats what you get when you dont control the center :-(

But as for good games, they're out there. its just difficult to find good players to fill the server.

On topic:

I can't even count the number of games I have joined a random server off the list to be put on a losing team with bots in my base and the moneyball at like 50% and turned it around for a win. It is a big advantage to be winning, but on the flip side a lot of players are really bad so you can just beat them if you know what to do and do it well.

Off topic:

Some teams just can't be carried. I joined the HKCentral.com server with a friend last night (I would consider both of us quality players) to show him something, a few minutes later some HK admins showed up and other people started filling in and people were using voice chat and I COULD ACTUALLY HEAR THEM and it was just a really positive experience. The HK guys were really good at controlling juiced players, and probably just a coincidence but there were at least 6+ people in there who were 'good' or better (read as: not bad)

hkcentral... ill have to keep that server in mind. Im always looking for decent players to play with / against. Having a server or a couple of servers that i know decent players frequent is always a good thing.

It's a pub game, I try to have fun. A quick rofl-stomp is not fun in my opinion, but that's all it is, an opinion. Take it as you will.

I'll respond to this with my morning coffee. For now, this is a place holder as I'm too hungry and exhausted to not froth at everything that currently has the sheer gall to be happy and alive. With my cold condescending fatigue-induced rage I COULD HATE A HOLE IN PARADOX SPACE ITSELF, STRAIGHT THROUGH TO A NEW REALITY FRESH FOR THE HATING, and I'd rather not say things like YOU ARE SUCH AN IGNORAMUS I COULD **** MILES OF RAGE SNAKE TO CHOKE YOU TO DEATH when that would make me hate myself as honestly this isn't a post that needs that magnitude of reaction, especially from me; instead I will turn my computer off.

Depends on the map. Some maps have two lanes, but have both of them overlap. Others have a very hard to control middle point. Most of them have multiple exits, so even if one team is dominating one lane, the other lane can be reasonably pushed.

Except for Steel Peel.

Steel Peel has overlapping lanes, an easy to control middle, and all three exits out of your spawn can be covered by the middle. If you're losing in Steel Peel, and they have mid, then it's almost impossible to come back. Especially if someone keeps the anilihator on cool down, and they constantly buy juice. God help you if they set up firebases up top, and a sniper has a freeze trap on your jumppad outside of spawn.

I've had games on that piece of **** map where we were locked into our base the entire game, just because their two supports put their firebases in the right spots, and they covered every possible exit that we had.

Steel Peel is the single most hated map I've seen. Every game Im in with steel peel as a map, I ask if people hate it, and 90% of the server says yes. This is a common theme, and worst still, Steel Peel empties out servers like no tomorrow. Which is a problem in a game mode with such a limited map pool.

It'd be super easy to fix too. Just lower the middle high ground by 75%, and make two jump pads. One that goes to the right upper deck, and another that goes to the left upper deck. This will make it so one Gunner/Firebase can't cover all three exits, while keeping an LOS block against Snipers on the ground level. It stops one Sniper effectively shutting down the only way easy way to the upper levels.

I also think that the ledges near the spawn shouldn't be able to have freeze traps placed on them by the enemy team. It's bullshit to be locked into your spawn by one Sniper who can freeze you and then headshot you. Worst still, you can't "trip" the trap prematurely because your gate stops you from shooting out. Yes, I know there's a lower exit. No, it doesn't help much, because instead of being able to drop down to it, you have to take a long winding tunnel, which makes you burn valueable time.


Anyway, point is, every game I've been you can have a fair shot of coming back from, if only because you can counter attack and go for a base race. EXCEPT on the map Steel Peel. Unless the attackers are truly terrible, or they had a mass disconnect/team switch, more often than not the team that gets mid will win. The game is pretty much sealed if they get a firebase on mid or up top, positioned in a place where it's hard to bomb it.





It also still rewards players for keeping the middle.. But makes keeping the middle much harder.

I'm sure there's other problems with the map, but

A win in OT is not proof of anything - especially regarding the OPs question.

Ok, not quite right. Many times its proof of how useless it is in terms of finding a winner in MNC. Might as well change the game to checkers for 2 mins.

Winning or losing in OT was the same to me.

As far as the OPs question goes, I would say that he is right and he is not. He is correct that the team who is already in a positional favorable position is handed extra tools to compound it.
But a lot of the time that will be rendering meaningless by the mechanics of the game, giving you several opportunities during a game to have the bot lanes reset, which has lead to several turnarounds in the games I have played.

Either way I can see how it often puts you in a position of feeling snowballed. It just swings wild. Which for me lead to playing feeling irrellevant.

Now that I'm fed, rested, caffeinated and overall satisfied, I can respond to this in an intelligent manner. Generally the kind of person I'm talking about is the group of dudes who just want to pub stomp constantly. Playing with your friends is fine. Coming into a server with three friends to "Own nubs" is not. It's stupid, shows no skill, sportsmanship or class, and is generally not fun for either team. Where's the competition when you grossly outclass nearly everyone in the server? Quick games where you don't even get opposed might as well be exhibition blitz, as I derive just about as much enjoyment from it.

Also I don't understand why so many people hate playing against their friends. It makes no sense to me, this game is almost guaranteed fun if you're voice chatting with each other while playing, no matter the team. Anyone who gets into a server with two or more friends and absolutely refuses to play against them does not really understand how friendly competition works, and I dare say does not understand the concept of complimenting your opponent's good moves.

There's pretty much not a fairish game I've played and lost where I haven't complimented someone on the enemy team for shutting me down or just doing something pretty cool or hilarious.

I agree mostly, but when half of your friends list is really good snipers, if you have more than one on the other team it's kind of just infuriating, because everyone goes for their friends first (if for no reason other than they know they are the best player on the other team).
I had a game with 4 snipers on the other team.
It was NOT fun.