It will pick up once DH comes about

I don't care for TDM because I dont in my opinion think it's as good as CTF.

and ctf sucks balls :D

yes i play duel but dont care about recent tdm in ql.

i played very actice, almost tdm only in my main "quake career" .

i was fortunate to play tdm in the glorious osp days and imho ql is just meh,,,

i was fortunate to play tdm in the glorious osp days and imho ql is just meh,,,

care to elaborate for those who missed these days?
i always wondered what was different back then but never found a satisfying answer

tdm used to be the one mod everyone tried to prove themselves in. that changed when money became available for only the duel comps.

This, duel competitions ruined quake for europe, damn russian/american conspiracy is what they were!

You had lots of leagues that catered for low level clans as well as top clans

Leagues.

Cup format is all well and good, but for me it was always the league format (Barrysworld in particular, things like Jolt, UKCCL and Savage as well) that made TDM interesting. You didn't have to be top tier to get in a team and play in a league as they were separated by divisions of similar skill levels. Even a midrange clan could get excited about the prospect of winning division 3. You'd have an allotted time slot and server to play on (none of this server location/time negotiation that makes starting a clanbase match take longer than the game itself). The map rotation would be fixed, meaning that a pool of maps would get played an even amount and every clan would have to play every map.

hmm i see

although the current competitions (esh tournament, clanbase and kuh3liha) also have divisions, so its really just up to the players to get a team going and play, you dont need to be high skilled to compete and have fun

having set servers and times really does make a huge difference. the other thing that was good, that I don't know if you still get, is that teams stuck around for ages. This allowed for interesting rivalries and grudge matches. Clans would fight to progress up through the leagues.

Now a days clans seem to change lineup every couple of months, or change name entirely. I could be wrong?

having set servers and times really does make a huge difference. the other thing that was good, that I don't know if you still get, is that teams stuck around for ages. This allowed for interesting rivalries and grudge matches. Clans would fight to progress up through the leagues.

hmm well nowadays we have a default date (set time?) and clans can reschedule if both agree. so what exactly is the difference? just that those dates were binding?
that certainly streamline the whole process and safes everyone some time (together with set servers), but at the same time it requires a certain commitment that is hard to achieve for everyone, mostly due to the fact that the average quake tdm player is not in school anymore i would guess

Now a days clans seem to change lineup every couple of months, or change name entirely. I could be wrong

hmm it seems to be something in between atm lot of teams and their core players stay while at the same time there is a huge fluctuation in the exact lineup and a lot of teams disband as fast as they were created

I did not know many leagues operated with a set time. I think set time and set servers actually leads to much less commitment if it's enforced. Players only need to commit to one hour a week, and they always know when. I know some people who used to really hate clanbase just for the fact that a match would take the whole evening. If you have a family and other commitments that can be tough.

In my case, I had a lot more time in the q3 days and played in loads of leagues. Now I don't play for any clan because I can't commit to it. If there was a league with just one match a week at a set time, I could easily schedule my life to play it and perhaps find like minded players to join me.

prolly had 10-12 ping and if the enemy had 35-40 the match was done, glorious osp:]

Teams don't give a crap anymore about getting better than other teams, so clans are less practised and you don't get upsets too much, plus that results in less overall activity (In OSP, you would sometimes see completely new teams and players rise from Div3 to Div1 inside 2 seasons..)

Something has to be said about the state of the game when the top clans can comfortably reach the playoffs almost guaranteed despite practising at most a few times per month.

Most of the top teams have started practicing quite a bit more recently or have always tried to do so (just hard when you dont have someone to play against).

I admit I haven't been around much for the past few months, but this is not too surprising of a development, because most of them will be playing at Dreamhack soon. After that, with no further LANs in sight, do you really think clans will keep on practising as much?

Dunno, i will stop playing QL alltogether if there arent any interesting follow up tdm tourneys :)

Yeah, to me it currently seems like a lot of established players are either getting more inactive or quitting completely, when compared to like a year ago :P

interesting = lan?

Something like the ESH tourney would also keep my interest up i guess, but mainly well covered, hyped up tournaments where everyone is looking forward to and players actually care. Nobody cares about the clanbase leagues anymore for example and the 2v2 EMS is a complete disaster as well.

This season's CB EC isn't a disaster at all, it's well covered, teams mostly play their games, and there were already lots of close or 1 frag diff. games. Atleast it's not like it used to be in the past few seasons.

just because you and a few of your pro buddies dont play in cb doesnt mean no one cares about them.

just my impression of it

DRAAAAAAMAAAAAAAAAH

finally.

yea im gonna throw a chair at him @DH

i hope lvl^ will cover this

good point although although its quite the generalization and hopefully getting better

Recently the clans I play for have lost the motivation to even play the official games. Perhaps it will get better but atm I only see it getting worse with every league. Maybe it's because I'm an old fart and can't accept the fact that old players retire and new ones replace them as "top players" :P

was fortunate to play tdm in the glorious cpm days :)

which lasted for one whole season of wansanity.... but yeah, that was cool :)

ps. i still blame arqon for ruining everything with the dreaded DRAG

Erm 4 seasons of barrysworld, 1 season of clanbase & 1 or 2 of jolt :p

Pleaaase, wansanity was just the icing on the cake, while the cake itself was Barrysworld

OHYEAH

i only started to follow tdm when i started to play it aswell.

before it was always so confusing, even more so cause i simply didnt know the maps and it seemed really random, but once you get to see what decisions are being made and what wins a game, its so fucking awesome.
so an important part of getting people into tdm is good casting that explains this kind of stuff, but i am sure lvl will continue to do a good job.

edit: silly me, thought this was about watching tdm and not about playing

It's simple. TDM takes more brainpower, knowledge, and team coordination than any other game mode. There's no gimmicks, there's no BS. It's straight up the team who plays better wins the game. The only "luck" involved is spawns (should be random in EVERY mode anyways...).

So why isn't it popular? Because you can't get lucky and expect to win a game. If you're not in your top form while playing TDM, it shows. People don't want to get exposed, so they play other modes. People DON'T want to run around timing items, contesting for a powerup that expires once the carrier is killed. Instead they prefer games where an acceptable tactic is standing in mid railing for 20 minutes.

there's no BS.

Yes there is :/

It reduces all the damage you receive by 75%

This is much better. =)

AHAHAHA NICE

so standing on red and throwing a couple of weapons to mates requires alot more brainwork than lets say sneaking in to a base meeting with a mate and take thea flag with 100/0 from a 200/200 guy and run across the map with 2-3 enemyplayers, right?

lolctf

You're talking about fighting the map, not the player. The map doesn't think.

ye well they frag you in tdm and you spawn a couple miles away and quad is do in 5-6 sec, you'll figth those corners:]

That was me, and it's an argument against VQ3, not in support of CTF.

fast reply lolz...

fast edit

yup, it does.

if you think that TDM is "throwing weapons to teammates", well, I don't need to say more

im under the influence that were talking about 4v4, becouse the first thing that pops into my mind if i think tdm is 4v4, more than 2v2, if we talk about 4v4 I pretty much think what i've wrote, least I don't think its rocket science to decide bs or quad. If we'd talk 2v2 it would be alot different, atleast in my opinion 2v2 is where the bigger work is at.

in 2v2 u need to play with someone who's at ur level skill, otherwise u need to carry. Besides teamwork with 4 people can be way more efficient, 4 good players can be beaten by 4 not so good players if they are working well in team, that won't happen in 2v2

If all you do is stand on red and throw weapons, you won't win a TDM game.

go look into this, this is 1 quad for me total, and 18 minutes on red cuz i was tired, i have 7 ppl to back this up, but 3 at minimum:*

http://www.quakelive.com/r/profile/matches/Ka...fd90/tdm/1

Attached Thumbnail: 82420-Clipboard01.jpg (262KB)

Pickups and tdm don't have much in common. You got two teams and play on the same maps but thats it. Can you link a real match vs a decent opponent pls?

I took the link from the match, its not good, after all its ql how could it be:] than thought i'll up the screen of the match, looks like it needs approval so lets just go like this: www.zolotov.atw.hu/Clipboard01.jpg

this ain't pickup, as for the question how decent this enemy was... i wont judge that (and the story wasnt about it anyway), but it was a cw. You'll find it in 2-3 weeks back thursday i think. Also damage is like nothing but as far as i know that only describes your e-penis and not the outcome of the match:]

Well in that match it seems that Smoggii and IzI did all the work while you killed mostly low hp enemies. If everyone on your team hides/camps armor and deals ~4k damage only you'll have a hard time winning. Even if you played your position very effective you still depend on your teammates fulfilling other positions.

You once again have no idea wtf your talking about. TDM doesn't take more brainpower, knowledge, and team coordination then CTF. For your logic FT takes more skill then TDM or CTF. As in FT you have all the aspects of TDM but with thawing and camping frozen bodies. CTF takes so much more teamwork then TDM in high level play.

stupeder then u're mom

TDM is a blast to play but not to watch, at least for 20 mins per map. Has there ever been serious consideration to adding a frag limit?

and how would that work considering that different maps have completely different scorelines?

I dont have a problem watching it. Especially when Disrepute and vor are casting :D

needs multi-view.

For me it's the opposite, I like to watch it (with casting, without it's boring), when the casters can explain the stategies etc, but I don't really like to play it, I prefer action over tactics for playing.

TDM is fun to spec if ur watching a beast like tox/fox/linkin etc, but if ur watching noobs, its just shit. Playing it is fun when ur on a team with friends in vent, calling each dicks for not being at the right positions and shit.

However getting pickups and teams on vent takes longer than most ppl have time for, so its a dead mode. Especially public tdm, just fucking bad.

Watching noobs is shit in any mode.

Pub tdm might have been better if there were more people playing, but it's dead in NA b/c of the reasons rushh stated. Scrubs would rather play CA and space ctf.

Oh god, captain obvious strikes again. Watching noobs duel is fun? :|

Public tdm has always been shit in q3. The tdm-pickup channel is way more active than any ctf-pickup channel at the moment. And using voicecomms is no problem at all these days, even with pickups.

even when watching high skilled players play tdm, most of them just run around and get 1 weapon and kill 1 player and die, then rinse and repeat or try MG battles. I only enjoy watching the best of the best. CZM in the american tdm tournament (recently) , only his pov on most maps. He had ridiculous net and killed tons of ppl with finesse and controlling areas like a boss. He just couldnt die.

I only watch TDM beasts.

in North America there is no concept of public pickup tdm at the moment, whatever tdm happens is between same old pool of 16-20 elite players. I envy europe in this regard.

EU has hardly a 'public tdm' either, like there was in Quake2 where you could join a server, lock teams and play. Even in q3 public tdm was shit. But using IRC for pickups has always been great. Since the new update tdm is incredibly populair with lots of players.

untrue tdm is picking up new players but very very very very slowly

is there a NA TDM pickup channel on quakenet or gamesurge?

if not I'm pretty sure draven would give you the source to the pickup py-bot

I think I even got it somewhere

NA ql or vq3 for that matter has never run pickup from irc. sad but true.

i've been looking for TDM games, pickups whatever and just can't find anything other than the very occasional pub game. I really would like to play a team game with actual team strategies instead of random pubness.

And using voicecomms is no problem at all these days, even with pickups.

And why still no one using them?

Are you sure? I actually use it alot. Free link on the tdmpickup.eu site. There are few players who use it alot like ujio13 etc

havent seen it used once, but maybe i just need to ask more often

Never saw anyone except ujio and raw were asking about comms. "I play with music, ya all can't english lol, comms are taking too much attention" same excuses over and over again.
Imho tdm is more fun with communications. :(

I haven't ever really played it. I feel like its just not a fun gametype to pub. Too much teamwork for the average pub team to put together, especially with the long weapon respawns.

Not saying they should be changed or that I don't like them, just saying that its a pain in the ass to time items when there are a bunch of other people grabbing them too.

loltdm

hi there , random CA newbie, indeed tdm must be funny to you, since its an actual competitive mod, where braincells and skill is actually needed, TUTTI FRUITY MOTHER FUCKER

Would watch more if there was mvd gtv.

Streams annoy me more and more: lags, idiotic gfx settings (force team models to mynx), weird POV selections (however, lvl casters in tdm do an awesome job). Yes, gfx is a matter of taste, but that is why streams fail compared to gtv and always will fail.

One sided games too often (in CTF that woul be over soon because of the cap limit).

And it takes more concentration to watch because of the complexity the gametype brings (and lives from) so one has to be in the right mood.

I play duel and ca (for the lulz).

I have tried some tdm pickups but the weapon respawn time is what really gets me off. I always end up shooting ppl with mg for 3/4 of the time, and when I do get a weapon, I get so excited I end up raped by a camp noob :-(

then be happy that you have much to learn and play more

It is a much more complex game type then it appears at first. There are so many variables it is a difficult mode to get good in fast.

u cant play public tdm and expect to have fun, and joining a clan + organizing clan matches is too much of a hassle (to me)

id rather just jump on a ca server and carelessly shoot around a bit on my own time.

I don't play TDM (mostly duel), but since lvl^ cast it, i really enjoy watching it and i think i can understand what is going on.
But i never comment a match, because my knowledge is only based on what i watch..

Looking forward to DH =)

I've been playing Quake for around 1.5 years now, mainly duel in pub or with friends, and occasionally CA/CTF, also on public servers. I really enjoy watching TDM casted by the lvl^ guys, and I even download demos now and then. The reason I've never really played TDM is because it's harder to find good games in that mode than in any other for me. In public it is in fact dead, I don't have enough friends to play it with (nor a mic yet, but that's the smaller issue). In the last week I've been playing in some pickup games and I enjoyed them too, but my net dmg has always been between +500 and -1500 which makes me feel quite guilty. If I play shit in duel I just lose, but if I do it in TDM, other people suffer because of me as well :(.

The mode is complex, so is the maths. Although net damage is a good indicator it doesn't fully reflect how useful you were to the team or how guilty you should feel.

Back in the days of OSP (when I started playing TDM) people were saying that if you played certain positions/roles on certain maps and NOT have negative net in the end, you didn't do your job (see famous comment about shaft position when RA is lost on pro-q3dm6 by -- i believe it was -- czm).

That exactly is the problem in my opinion: People don't enjoy to put in effort and reflext on their results. At the same time others drop negative comments about other players although they (especially) did not reflect on the results and it's reasons.

When I started in late 2003 in OSP TDM on planetquake.de and kplay servers I got crushed by pretty much all the players who played there, and there were div 3 people like apacer and dante playing there alongside div 1 players like zealot, issue, hitman and so on. Hardly any bad comments, ever (lo, jilted :P). I just played and slowly got into it. I enjoyed the game and the insight of other players in the community who helped me out rather than just enjoying my own stats... until finally I (more or less fully) understood the game. At that point, it's quite simply the best mode ever!

Until you reach that level of understanding, and unless you are humble and patient person, the mode will pretty much such.

And which casual Black Ops camper (or public ctf mid defender railwhore for that matter -- no offense) ever wants to try and be humble and patient...

In the last week I've been playing in some pickup games and I enjoyed them too, but my net dmg has always been between +500 and -1500 which makes me feel quite guilty. If I play shit in duel I just lose, but if I do it in TDM, other people suffer because of me as well :(.

thats not really a problem, although i know the feeling.
if you share resources (armor and weapons) and support your team when powerups spawn etc you shouldnt feel bad and nobody should give you shit (havent seen that happen besides some one line comments or in extreme cases when someone ends up with 2:50 stats in the end)
you only get better by playing anyway so keep it up

I do, usually I even give my only weapon to a freshly spawned mate if I know he could make better use of it. I try to time a minor item and a higher tier weapon near it (mega + shaft exactly, maybe the yellow by feeling on dreadful place for example). I often forget about the PU time, which is theoretically the easiest to remember, but I go for it when people start spamming their teamchat binds unless I manage to die right before it.
And like I've said I'm really enjoying TDM and none has flamed me yet, so that's good :}

Fuck others. The question is if you want to get better. If you do, there will be a period where you will bring certain teams down. You shouldn't care.

My long essay on shit (I'm bored..)

I've tried playing a bit of TDM pickup here and there but it's too FFA for me.
Closest I've come to actually playing a reasonably organized game was when me and owzo were in a pickup on the same team and we just raged at each other on mumble. If there's one thing I've learnt, it's a shit ton harder timing outside your head when you're talking :| By that I mean saying out times and stuff and communicating what's going on. Also stuff like me calling times like 73 etc (don't ask me why but I time items past 60 seconds by just adding up to 80 90 etc. I just automatically know them as the under60 version).

Would love to get into a decent TDM team or at least a small regular scrim group but nobody seems to be active enough for what I wanna do. I guess I just like going keen. I don't see the point in just jumping into a 'team' that do the odd mix game every so often. The way I've always found was best getting into a 'competitive' scene isn't to just join a group of similar-skilled guys and playing as many games as you can, but joining a few guys who are the same skill as you, and one really knowledgeable guy who can get you all up to scratch. I've done it in some games and find that no matter what other teams I play with, I just sync up with the guys I first played and grew with a ton more.

Specing I have to say I'm 50/50 on CTF/TDM. CTF I love watching clutch flag kills or fast flag runs. It's always impressive to see guys pull of awesome rocket jumps with just enough health to spare to do whatever is needed. That said, watching TDM pcw practices with guys on mumble is a ton more interesting to me nowadays because it's always fun to talk about the scene's news, DRAMA and the games themselves. There's also tons of sexy moments in games which are just gold-dust sometimes especially when everyone on voice-comms is watching the same guy and all transmit a "OOOOOOOH SHI-" at the same time.

When it comes down to it, CTF is a faster exciting spec experience (siberia) and TDM is a more laid back interesting gametype which often has some awesome comebacks where the scores get brought back at the last few minutes which is where it can get exciting.



TL;DR
TDM is good
CTF is good
lolCA

Would love to get into a decent TDM team or at least a small regular scrim group but nobody seems to be active enough for what I wanna do.

have you tried looking around on irc? shouldnt be too hard to find a team
and although you just said you dont prefere creating a new team with just similar skilled players it would still be a good start and what better time than now?

I've got into a couple of irc teams but the games just ain't regular and haven't clicked with the guys because I barely ever talk with them unless there's a game going on (which there rarely is). Basically, when it comes to getting into a game, I find that it's generally more important to get on with the guys then just sticking 4 mad-fragging prima donnas together. Chemistry 'n all that.

It's that kind of thing in CS1.6 scene where everyone expects a certain line-up to be top but they underperform because they just don't sit well with each other. Then you have teams where the players don't exactly stand-out individually but together they dominate.

probably got lucky with the 2 teams i have been in so far
maybe just try asking all cb oc / kuh3liga div 2 or 3 teams if they could use another player

we usually play at least 3 times a week if not more. I asked you to join us and u gladly came to the irc channel but never did reply even when I called you for games. You gotta be more active on irc and talk with ppl if u wanna get games. I dont think anyone from the team even knows that u wanted to join if I didnt told them.

Basically you gotta be more present and communicative and games are there, nobody will chase you to play.

If you actually read whats posted in the duel threads 50% of it is arguing over some drama or maps and the other 50% is shit like

T O N Y
O
N
Y

Basically if you think team based games are shit dont play em, pickup and scrims are the only things worth doing in QL, duels have become so dogshit boring to spectate, FFA/CA is fun for a messabout for an hour or so but thats it..

Also dont base TDM/CTF on publics cos they are a bigger joke than rikks movement - join pickups, make a team with ur mates and play scrims.

I don't play TDM because:

1st It is way too difficult to get a team of players together who are actually willing to train, lets say 3 times a week for several hours and actually loose games without quiting for the rest of the practice-session.

2nd The gameplay and mechanics of TDM simply do not suit me.
If you are on the loosing side you run around with what ever weapon you found after respawn (if you get lucky and find any) and try to get control back by having eighter immense luck or immense teamplay (second never was possible for me because of 1st point). If you do have control, you simply are denying items/weapons from your opponents and spawnrape them while waiting for Quad to spawnrape them even more.

And I also don't care a bit about "Pro"-TDM since it is simply "Zzzzzzzzzzz-goingonintoabyss-zzzzzzzzz!" gameplay for spectators to watch.

Your second point is like saying ql duel is about denying items and spawnraping when in control and stealing yellows and hiding when out of control, or that RTS games are rock-paper-scissors.

No it's not.

In duel you always have a chance to get control back by simply timing the major items and engaging in a fight before the next major where you have the advantage. In TDM due to the shitty weapon spawntimes and the ammount of players you never will be able to get control back that easily.

the tdm maps are large enough the team that is not in control can usually control enough resources to get ready for the next powerup or can gun down an opponent players that overextended himself. and if you are not playing the top teams its not nearly as dire as you make it sound, two guys with a weapon and a yellow are often enough to get back control of an area

Try that on dm6 please.

who plays dm6?

so you don't like tdm gameplay because of a map none plays anymore?

Clueless. =X

what

It is easier to kill someone in tdm as in duel. Usually you don't face 200/200 guys in tdm (if so the game is over anyway :D) whereas in duel it is quite common even between two equally skilled players. If your opponent isn't a complete retard it will take at least 2 min for you to challenge a big powerup.

by simply timing the major items and engaging in a fight before the next major where you have the advantage.

I give you an example why this is wrong.

http://www.quakelive.com/#!profile/matches/ff...d90/duel/1

Look at the dmg done, my accuracies and the score. I new both ra/mh timing (+- 2 sec) for the whole game and yet I got raped though I hit like an aimbot and did almost the same dmg. I wasn't able to build up a decent defensive stack because he denied every fucking armor and I played to aggressive in defense. I did exactly what you have written and this was my mistake. Instead of challenging nearly every big item I should have vanished for a couple of minutes to build up a decent armor stack. Then and just then you can try to get either mh or ra when they are synced.

i usually play duel, but enjoy spectating CTF

Spectating TDM is pretty boring to me. imagine a football (or soccer) game where the team wins that manages to pass the ball around without losing it for the longest overall duration. yeah theres strategy involved, and theres powerups to mix things up a bit, but mostly its watching the score go up, either knowing who wins well before it ends or having the buzzer arbitrarily declare a winner by 3 frags. Thats what makes CTF more exciting for me, theres a clear goal -> capping flags, that drives people to control areas or kill other people, not just for the sake of more frags.

TDM is awesome with a decent team but its less 'structured' than a lot of other team-based gametypes like CTF or DE (CS).

Even less skilled players can have some notion of the concept 'defend the flag' or 'attack the flag' (not saying CTF is less skiled, just perhaps more accesible)

TDM games have more tenacity to become lopsided (not saying it isnt possible in other modes).

Also like the nobles guys in this thread mentioned it was the well organized (took a lot of commitment though!) leagues with divisions that made it a lot more fun

hightier TDM: still kicking
hightier CTF: its gone

I for one always had ctf before tdm, but lately moved to tdm.

+in pickups atleast 5-6 maps are played in tdm, and in ctf pickup japanese castles only (which i grew to hate quite intense since it apeared in ql):]

costly for the players, sponsors and tournament organizers
boring to play for most ppl
boring to watch for probably 95% of the quake population and close to 100% for other gamers

all team games are hard to watch, since it is not easy to spec a whole team. Ctf is a bit more fun to watch, because it has a clear objective and can result in a few fun moments (like last second flag returns etc.)

tbh tdm has nothing going for it, apart from the fun the that the ppl that like it have.

Even the competition part is against it. It is hard to sponsor a whole team. Too much money for salaries and travelling. The players also won’t get much for the time they invested. The winning prizes must be split up to 4 players or more.

If tdm was used in competitions instead of duel, there would be no tournaments at all for ql (and q3). Why watch ql tdm instead of another team game where the objective is something more interesting than having more frags than the opponent team. Also there many much more popular team games than ql. The thing that makes ql stand out, is the fun and excitement that a ql duel can provide even to ppl that are not familiar with quake.

I have nothing against tdm, but I can understand clearly the state that it is now and will ever be. It would had been weird if the things where different, but as it is now makes perfect sense to me. I am glad it will be used at dh, since it would be something different and a lot of known players will participate.

well tdm does not need to be the next e-sport thing and i dont think anyone is arguing for that right now. if it has an active online community and bigger tournament once in a while that would be more than fine, so the sally/travel cost thing is a bit irrelevant

boring to play for most ppl

sad but true, you cant just play tdm on a public and it takes quite some time to get good

boring to watch for probably 95% of the quake population and close to 100% for other gamers

thats a bit harsh, with good coverage it can be made interesting to a lot more than 5% of all quakers.
although i have to admit that i didnt care before i played it myself aswell. its all a matter of getting people into it.

Why watch ql tdm instead of another team game where the objective is something more interesting than having more frags than the opponent team.

thats just an oversimplification from the point of view of someone who does not have a clue at all.
"its all a matter of getting people into it.", cause then you wont hear something like this

thats just an oversimplification from the point of view of someone who does not have a clue at all.
"its all a matter of getting people into it.", cause then you wont hear something like this

No it's not a oversimplification, it's the goal of TDM. You have to get more frags to win a match. Ofcourse there are tactics and teamplay involved but the game is clearly focused on killing the opponents. And if it is difficult to cast a 5on5 CS 1.6 match where every round has the same build up:

1. Spawn
2. Run/take positions
3. Try to kill 1-2 guys by banging/waiting
4. At 1/2 minute left organized go onto a spot
5. Fail by being killed or succes by planting bomb
6. Fail while trying to retake the spot or succes by defusing the bomb
7. Repeat

,how difficult will it be to catch all the action in a 4vs4 TDM where people are killing each other all the time and respawning again and killing each other and respawning again and so on during 20+ minutes???

Only mode that could be interesting for spectators beside duel and maybe ctf is 2vs2 tdm, since there you only have 4 players and if you are interested in casting it as detailed as possible you build in a second screen into the main one where you see the other teammember of the team you are currently watching.

No it's not a oversimplification, it's the goal of TDM. You have to get more frags to win a match. Ofcourse there are tactics and teamplay involved but the game is clearly focused on killing the opponents.

well yes, of course that is the goal but implying that this brings uninteresting gameplay because the goal is simple, thats the oversimplification.

and although its always harder to cast team matches, i dont think tdm is harder to follow than cs where a round can be decided before you switch to the right player. i think the implementation of an overview map and more use of 3rd person camera, at quad for example, could help.

Usually the argument as to why CTF is a better game type to watch is that its such a simple concept. It is not a negative that the core objective of the game is simple to understand.

I would argue you can take a lot more from each point of view (the players) in a TDM game, then you can from each point of view in a CTF game, and there are far more conflicts about who you should be following and when, in CTF then TDM.

Yes the 95% is probably a bit exaggerated. My personal view is that u must play tdm a lot in order to appreciate it and maybe even more for enjoying watching it. Teams with known players, interviews, hype and good casters could help. GTV also could help, since even in duel sometimes is annoying when the casters don’t spec the pov u want and there are only 2 playing, not 8 and follow killer works pretty well.

would two streams help?
one with casting/how its usually done
and a second uncasted stream that roams around more pov wise?

Your own slanted opinion mixed together with 100% bullshit, fascinating.

it's the truth and couldn't care less

wish u the best in making tdm popular to play and watch

Its your truth only, you little ignorant dipshit

nothing new here

When a gametype isn’t popular, its funs become a minority and many of them turn to cunts that lick each others balls. I have seen the movie many times and I don’t care. I truly wish the best to tdm. Why should I care, it is not even competition. With CS we had a grudge, because at least it was far more popular. Tdm is and will always be totally harmless. I can understand ur pain.

¸are you entirely new to the quake series and the quake scene in general? sure sounds like it

the thing is that my truth is the reality and ur truth is ur dream. I wish ur dream to come true, but as it is now it's not the reality.

I wouldn't care if it turns out having many more tdm tourneys. I have seen more than enough in duel.

The thread was about "TDM and those who do not play it". I gave my opinion. If u want a thread to post about how awesome tdm is, make one.

You are completely delusional buddy

they don't know what pain is, I play promode

tdm is going nowhere. it actualy IS boring to watch.

2v2 tdm is way better to watch.

You value your own opinion so much that you post it anonymously, I will have to admit you might just have convinced me.

2v2? lol, thats soooo freakin lame and boring to watch

duel>tdm4v4>ctf>>>>>>>freezetag>ca>tdm2v2 :D

costly for the players, sponsors and tournament organizers

Works for CS, so the only sponsor trouble would be getting them to support a dead game.

STFU about TDM isn't interesting to watch. Accidentally watching a well commentated TDM game VOD several months ago is what got me, complete outsider, interested in Quake, and it was how I learned about the existence of Quake 3 and Quake Live and began to play it regularly.
It all depends on how it is presented. I watched some streams on level up and I can see how people can think that TDM is boring. Those streams are horrible, it's like the commentators not commentate the game, but read preprinted text from paper. No intonations, no emotions, no accentuation of crucial moments, etc.
The lack of good commentators doesn't mean that TDM is not interesting as a spectator game mode.

Registered: 13 May 2011... yea u convinced me.

btw do u have a link to one of those vids?

Convinced you of what? That I am a new player who learned about QL only a few months ago and about ESR only few weeks ago and registered only today to reply something?
It was russian stream of Russia vs France nations cup final, if you know russian, you can watch it somewhere at cyberarena.tv. For some reason, most russian TDM commentary is very interesting while international streams are boring. I don't know why, but that's not problem of TDM mode itself. Since then I watched a lot of russian streams of TDM games and it was very interesting to watch, no less fun that duel games. With good commentary TDM is great for viewers.

I don't think us Brits do well with excitement. It just does not sound quite right. But it is an area we can improve upon.

i love the dry humor in your streams :D fake excitement = big no no

yeh fake is awful, and brits generally don't get excited about anything we are just tooooocooool!

id rather have calm/cool analytical commentary (a la cricket) than people pretending to be excited.

Don't change your commentary style, not one bit. I really enjoy the dis+vor casting combo, especially the occasional nvc jump-in. Great insight, humorous remarks and voices pleasant to the ear.
You guys are doing a fantastic job, keep it up.

And if I wanted genuine excitement in a casters voice, I'd listen to cyberfight.ru ("HAROOOOSH!" :D ), even though I know only a few words in russian (which i've learned watching their zotac cup casts).

I agree that the lvl^ guys could use some more passion, but I think their casting is still very enjoyable and insightful. This kind of shoutcast is, in my opinion, way better than where casters are like "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMAGAWD WHAT A RAIL OOOOOO AAAAAAAAAA WOAH DID YOU SEE THAT OOOWWW" (khm usa) throughout the whole match, although I would probably think otherwise if I were an outsider to quake.

It is also very hard to get excited in TDM for these reasons:

- We see so many mistakes because of the complexity and lack of a professional level in TDM.
- We played at the highest level ourselves, so to get excited we need to see a level probably higher then we played which in general play doesn't happen that much, because most shots are so standard.
- The patterns of play and tempo are so variable between teams, players, and related to item times etc that you end up being all over the place. Plus its for 20 mins solid.

I still agree its an area to work on if we want to improve. I was actually thinking of doing a test stream commentating at a much higher tempo then normal and seeing how it turned out.

I am not really talking about "WHAAAT RAAAAAAAAAIL!!!!!!111" excitement. I am talking about discerning what moments are important for the match and what are just routine.
For example, watching Level up stream, for me it would be really hard to get that a team taking control of RA room is much more important event than someone picking up shotgun, because it sounds with exactly the same intonation on stream.
The russian streams don't actually analyze as much as Level up commentators, but watching them I understand so much more about TDM and what's happening in the game, simply because important events are emotionally emphasized and I know what to pay attention to.

I understand and I will work on it.

Please don't. You accentuate everything well, epic moments are accompanied by a "visible" increase in volume and excitement. It's hard to get excited every time when control of RA switches.

If I had to say how you were to improve, I'd just say do the things you do better. I don't know how one would go about that, though. :p

practice, practice, practice!

Just cast like TotalBiscuit. YELL EVERYTHING YOU SAY. :D

lvl up commentators and streams are actually very enjoyable.

Unfortunately, it's the most boring game type. It was only fun when Sweden had about 4 active teams. Swedish cess > *

TDM is a much more skillful gametype than CA is or will ever be, yet ironically CA is played more than any other gametype, which is just backwards imho.

I always laughed whenever I saw "competitive" tournaments for 2v2 CA on Thunderstruck.

breaking news

epic trollink

yes how weird, people dont wanna play the more skill dependant gametype in a public teamgame.

back then you would look for a game and have one in 5 minutes top. also just look at this:

http://biberbutzemaenner.de/index.php?cat=matches


LOOK AT THE FUCKING NUMBER OF GERMAN TDM CLANS.

ashlen
uKNToT
3dq
wf
kta
TeT
ork
sohei
dwc
[
EiS
dgh

and so fucking on. there are numerous more. And that is just the German TDM scene. There were so many clans back then, such an active competition and people actually tried to get better. OH GLORY DAYS.

hah, that's just the games i lost vs you guys :p

edit: http://biberbutzemaenner.de/index.php?cat=mat...matchID=61 :D

hehe ospdm5 love all the way :)

found a q4 win in the end, nice list btw! after that game i think we both stopped playing, heh :S

ye for sure

http://biberbutzemaenner.de/files/screenshots...c_map1.jpg

Glory days indeed ;)

that is just old, dude. plus, in their shape and on dm6 everyone would have lost.

i know.. i ended up semi-bald back then although not as bald as you after this game :)

did they really dominate that hard, i cant remember, i would have thought the germans or russians could comeup with a decent duo to compete against those two :D (stelam, mikes, polosty, zyz, slinger etc come to mind..)

When I played them all these you just mentioned were already inactive.

What?! But then you missed the golden days of q3tdm completely :P
2000-2003 is where it was at :>

let me rephrase: when I played tox in that match stelam, mikes, polosty, zyz, slinger were already inactive! I've been playing since 2000.

oh alright :) Then you really do you know how good we had it :D

yes, I even remember seeing sk. vs god knows who on dm14 and i was always surprised why (e.g. sk.kane) they would never use pummel and just +back with mg on the stairs near the lower yellow. dm14 used to Germany's best map. Now our best map is test_bigbox

sk was beastly for sure, could be a tactic that worked better back then, i can hardly remember now:) I still think german teams are good on dm14 at least when we play them (im a lower div tdm player :) ) lol testbigbox

excuses

i remember the big drama of this two names. tox and fox used some special OSP names, the first letter switched from f -> t -> f and so on, so the opponents didnt know if they were fragged by fox or tox. ppl whined so hard, that admins forced them not to use this name. after that they had this red names (tox,fox). big drama :)

Problem for new players to TDM is getting weapons, CTF works on pubs cos the weapon respawn so dying doesnt mean much while in TDM the penalty for dying is harsh

TDM players are too unknown and teams are constantly changing, currently there aren't any well established or "legendary" teams with well known characteristics and style. And it isn't interesting to watch random mixes of players fight each other, I always want to cheer for someone and see how various teams progress compared to each other.
In duels, for example, when you see cooller vs strenx match in semi-finals, you are already excited about it before it begins, because of history of these players, because of their contradicting "brain vs aim" styles, etc. If cooller wins, you can discuss how strenx is nothink on the lan and how cooller is best player ever, if strenx wins, you can comment on how cooller taught him to choose situations when to be aggressive and when to be not aggressive, etc. All the past championships, rivalries, dramas, etc, associated with duel players and tourneys, it all makes spectators care and skip work to watch streams and spam on IRC and write silly comments on ESR and tell their friends about how exciting Quake Live is, etc.
In TDM, teams have no history to create any pre-match excitement, it's just some players, nothing to make people care and cheer for teams. Some players vs some players match is not exciting. So what if some players win? It will be simply forgotten, because next tournament it will be some other players. Boring.

thats an issue for sure (and part of the reason why i am doing the tdm interviews) and similar to what 2gd said about tdm month ago. but i dont think that it is as bad as you make it.

there will be grudge matches for example between 4K and srs with 2 of juven1le and the palyers who doubt him. and the teams certainly developed a distinguishable style and the lvl guy do a good job pointing differences out. (i am having high hopes for their dh streaming where i wanna see them getting people a bit educated about the maps, interested in the teams and excited for the matches).
there are a lot of players known players with character, i mean come on at dh alone we have: avek, toxjq, stermy, purri, link1n, noctis, fazz, draven and a lot more to still sign up. on top of established tdm veterans like zyv, v3rb, zik, krysa, deus, ... and players that are active in the community or talked about here on esr like zeroql, frs, vium, funnyb
and no history? sure we dont have any lan rivilaries build over years but the just look at 4 top teams TA, 4K,
xt, RG who played and met in all the alst major tournaments (EC XXII, EMS XII, ESH FT, EC XXIII). there certainly is some history and consistency

so i dont know about you but although i see the problem, i am still pretty fucking excited actually and it will only get better from here cause tdm is coming back biatch

what grudge match vs [r]? :f

from the replies and discussion below i took that this was aimed at you guys
http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=2075622#pid2075622

let us have some drama ;)

haha i wouldnt think so :D we take part in every tournament we possibly can, prizes or no prizes, we just wanna play :)

just took it from the response, was a bit surprised aswell^^
so who did he mean?

i have no clue but i'd guess either ic or the russians. not like there's many signups on the dh team list who dont take active part in the community tournaments

true, but well there is also a few missing so far that i expected to attend in some form, but well its still tiem

"(i am having high hopes for their dh streaming where i wanna see them getting people a bit educated about the maps, interested in the teams and excited for the matches)"

like who?

you're not going and vor? :\

wtf arent you/vor/nvc going?

I thought you meant other then us or alongside us. Nothing is confirmed about DreamHack, although I would of course like to go. vor can't go.

nah i was thinking about you guys, although i guess there will be plenty of players around who might co cast aswell

I want fox to co-cast with disrepute or nvc, that would be nice!

is he going ot what?

I'm pretty sure that if he went he'd play.

People who play for every team are the problem too. These days no matter who's playing you can be pretty sure you will see deus. :P

Duel and TDM are my favourite modes but I just can't play TDM in Public servers.

You have to have a team to train and communicate if you want to enjoy the TDM experience in my opinion, and that's probably why this mode isn't popular in public because it's a huge mess where you find yourself with a mg only almost all the time.

I don't agree with people saying TDM is boring to watch. It just depends on the match your looking at. Every mode can be boring to watch if the level isn't high enough I guess. I watched a lot of TDM and CTF matches and they were all nice. At least they were more entertaining than a Counter Strike match, so let's go.

Let's hope DreamHack will open a new future for TDM, big structures like Reason, Fnatic (well...), 4 Kings, srs, etc. should always care about TDM lans and make it known to the organisers of those events.

CA is utter crap. Can't believe people play this counterstrike mode in Quake. I wish id would delete that junk.

TDM is fun to play, but I can only bear watching big names. When czm/rapha/dahang/cl0ck play toxjq/stermy/gopher/link1n then I'll be interested, but I'm really not interested in those division 2 matches that levelup casts so often.

I am slowly but surely being convinced TDM is better than CTF. There's too few caps on CTF maps to make it worthwhile, sometimes its just plain lucky that a team gets a capture. People die way too quickly as well.

I think it's ridiculously dumb to say that TDM requires more brain than duel, in reality its wishful thinking. TDM coordination is not that advanced. TBH playing video games in general doesnt require that much brain.

so much shit in a single post, amazing.

sup adv3nt.

*caugh*

TDM coordination is not that advanced.

sounds a bit true, tbh

because it is boring fucking shit?

i like tdm lately, proves to be much more interesting to play it then what it was to die out of boredom when spectating it. i still prefer ctf, i get to tdm there if i want to, do tricks if i want to, and grab flags to top it all. plus, i think tdm is the most static/campish mode in ql.

CA > *

;)

If you ask me the answer to the question is because the QL scene is a little quiet at the moment, hardly any clan matches in CTF or CA lately.

A lot of people are playing still just not dedicated enough, the fact that most the games are being played as TDM is simply because it's everyones favorite for team games at the moment, even when everyone becomes active again I think TDM will be the most played gametype again finally. Thank Dreamhack for that (and soon HoQ ;).

The funny thing is usually when the scene goes quiet TDM is the gametype that tends to suffer and CA stays alive because you can just jump in and play and enjoy without having to think too much. This is the most dead I've seen the CA community.

there's a ca community?

accidental plus :(

Thank Dreamhack for that (and soon HoQ ;).

looking forward to it

I love watching TDM or at least i did back in the old days when big teams like QPO and Ic played each other.
this is all gone now which is sad, nowadays its usually just a mix team of Duels.

For me the peak of TDM was for many years ago in a diffrent game called Quake3 with OSP. Back then you had diffrent playerstyles and clan styles aswell(movement, tactical vs aggresiv with good aim etc). Nowdays everything looks so blant and boring, and all players seems to play the maps in almost identical ways.


QuakeLives teamplay mechanics is just not that appealing to me nowdays as it was back in 2000-2004. Perheps with a more modern take on the Quake series fast gameplay and more tactical choices infused with this, a Quake 5 Arena based game could spice up the FPS multiplayer world alot. The fast paced gameplay and it´s deep learning curve is still more appealing to me then any modern "war" FPS game out there. But the teamplay must go deeper then just running for the same items for 20mins and trying to pick the best spots on the maps. I need to be inspired by other players and clans playwise. In the duel competitions I can still be impressed by looking at some of the best players out there go at it. But for TDM I feel nothing at all.

Nowdays everything looks so blant and boring, and all players seems to play the maps in almost identical ways.

i think its a natural progression as people get better but saying its almost identical is a bit too harsh. on the one hand its just that the players nowadays are well rounded, they all can aim well etc but still there are players who stick out, look at how fnatic could still beat everyone with how well they did in the fights and look at how smooth a player like v3rb stafes through the map. probably to a less extend but teams still have different styles in general, just look at what people said about D9 for example in the last ec thread. its hard to but those general labels on the teams but there are still finer differences and a lot of map dependent stuff.
so yeah, a lot is down to the maps aswell. sure when you play dm14 nowadays you wont see much of a difference (except for maybe how hard you push to take back red before you settle for the yellows and some play around the powerups) but if you take a new map like dreadful place, you still see teams with different setups, trying out new stuff and so on. (on the other hand a map like deep inside is designed well enough that it still offers different ways to play it. i am not saying its all about the age)
so although you got a point i feel like this is the view of someone who does not follow tdm closely nowadays.

TDM pickup is a pain 9 out of 10 times. Only the most skilled players know the most easy basic fundamentals like sharing weapons, stay together etc. it's hard to bear, still I play it I dunno why

There is NA #tdmpickup?

then try to educate those people, there are guides out there that you can simply link or explain some basics to them. in any way, they will get better and the na community needs to grow from somewhere

also: There is NA #tdmpickup?

Personally i just think TDM is boring to watch and play. Having people sit in zones of a map for a game is just not for me. Contrary to some of the first opinions on the thread about how it requires more brainpower than other modes i totally disagree.

Duel requires the single guy to time the items, know where his enemy is, and outplay his enemy. You cant just be carried by a couple of really good team mates.

So to sum up, i feel its just a fun mode for people that like co-op games but is not representative of the skill level that duel is, hence i find it boring to watch and expect a lot of others do too.

As for the posts you get on every announced duel tourney about 'sigh another duel, how about some tdm competitions'...well its because duel is cheaper to run, far better to spectate especially for non-quake players, and takes (imo) the most skill to play and hence is more suited to competition.

may i ask to what extend you played, followed and understand tdm?

Personally i just think TDM is boring to watch and play. Having people sit in zones of a map for a game is just not for me.

none.

wanted to hear that from him ;)

Only played in the old pickup channel in quake3, none in quakelive indeed. I am not really a teamplayer i prefer everything to hinge on my own skills and not those of my teammates so have never been into teamgames or class based games :)

TDM is bland and boring and at times, massively chaotic. I remember a game vs FRONT on ospdm6, where we kept the score pretty close despite being demolished on all the reds and powerups. Neither the casters or our team were able to tell why the scores were so close, which in my opinion says something about the complexity of strategy in TDM.

The so called "teamplay component" in TDM, from what I have experienced in my games against top teams, is pretty basic all around. It is not particularily dynamic nor complex. (Which is why it boggles my mind even more that a lot of middle tier players don't know/learn these things) Perhaps this is a result of playing mostly maps that everyone has played for 10 years, which means that you don't need to practise much to stay on top and it is almost impossible to innovate.

got a demo of that game (or maybe even a vod)?

http://clanbase.ggl.com/demodl.php?did=895983

IIRC, cooller was raping RA like mad and they got the much better end of the quadruns.

I take it this was still played before mg and sg damage got lowered, i think everyone agreed that tdm was much more ffa-ish before that and a red armor didnt give you as big of an advantage as it might do now, also you had deus in the team, would be curious to see his damage given stats :P

Even if your opponents have RA control you might have still had rail, and having 2-3 railers on your side can be quite hard on them and can lead to a close game.

Having said that i haven't actually watched the game yet, might do when i get home.

I find QL tdm to be fairly boring and that is simply why I don't play it or care to play it. I mean, I've played it with skilled players and I've played it with newbs and I didn't have an exceptionally good time playing with either groups of people in TDM.

I like to think I was severely spoiled by QWtdm :P

CTF is the only mode that is enjoyable to me besides duel.

TDM is for me the heart of quake. No matter what era or quake game you come from. I do however think that todays average players knowledge of how real TDM should be played and enjoyed is lower than 7-8 years ago right after QW/Q2TDM's prime, but during Q3OSP days... This is simply a mix of less pure TDM players/teams today, and that most teams/players (even from the Div.1 teams) are duel players and 'mix' teams, also the scene is different, and naturally, also less players playing.

But this can be redone/revived if we have the best teams constantly playing in tournaments and coverage is done right. People tend to think to much of the 'good old days' rather than living in the present. 2-4 LAN tournaments /year somewhere in Europe in combination with good online tournaments where all the teams actually signup/play would be a start. Perhaps the scene is to small, but I do think that if done right, it could be positive for the TDM and in the end also for the Quake Live scene.

Teams/players need consistancy and organisors need to promote and do good coverage, then the scene would 'feel' for the teams and getting more interested. Partly this is also in id softwares hands to give the streams/organisors the tools for better coverage -> Such as multiview etc.

I personally hope that DH is a start for something nice for the TDM scene <3

fuck off with your positivity!

We definitely need more spectator features for TDM (multipov, dynamic camera switching, better scoreboard...). At the moment it's hard to follow for non-TDM players, and not so pleasant even for TDM players themselves.

The DH tournament is going to be a turning point for the future of TDM. It will hopefully have a big audience. That's why I hope id will release new spec features for TDM before the event. So far the TDM player base hasn't stopped to decrease since the first Clanbase Cup in Fall 2009. We'll see.

That TDM is boring to watch and play, unplayable on pubs too complex to get into, too costly to sponsor crap is retarded.

Look at cs, dota\its clones, halo or any other teamgame that's seeing its sunlight right now. Are they really any easier to watch, to understand for a newbie? Are they really better at any of the problems written above? Hell no! Other than for the parts that make them more attractive for newbies and worse for esports, they also have a healthy scene: tournaments, casters that are able to explain what's happening, active, motivated and distinctive teams in both low and high tier play.. and hype around all of that.. No need to get into specific examples here, what I'm saying is that in general, it's this what makes a teamgame and what quakelive currently lacks.

Now, I'm not sure what situation QL is in compared to what it was half a year ago (RL made me avoid ESR unfortunately), but generally, it's evident that there are things that could help the community.

-Ladders, more clanpage functionality. =D

-More organization in general : look what happened when that pickup channel was created. Somebody just has to step it up and do it.

-Stricter rules, more specific times in tournaments\leagues: Nobody's winning when a tournament game only starts after a 3 hour warmup, or when for a usual league game you have to be ready for the whole day. Something like that QWTDM pro thing they had going would be great.

- More pickup games. More clan action around pickup level.

etc.

Overall, it all comes down to motivation and activity. Many people (even on this very topic) seem to not bother even though they admit they could [do whatever towards these goals] and would enjoy it. Maybe the upcoming tournament could swing things around. Maybe not. IMO, it's more about the general consensus in the hardcore community (here\irc) than stream views. Annoy your friends, spam ESR, spam twitter. It's a geometric rather than an arithmetic progression you know, for better of for worse.




On a (sort of) unrelated note, it interests me why exactly TDM stream view numbers are that much smaller than those of Duel. It it the hardcore community, or the outsiders who don't watch TDM?


oh and #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup #tdmpickup

On a (sort of) unrelated note, it interests me why exactly TDM stream view numbers are that much smaller than those of Duel. It it the hardcore community, or the outsiders who don't watch TDM?

Because if you don't play tdm yourself, it looks like a big mess. In duel you can cheer for your favorite player without knowing what exactly is going on. CS-like top down view would help streamers and viewers a lot I guess.

Is QL TDM even active or what?