Let’s be real the issue of squads vs randoms has been brought up since the game started. The usual reply is typically “Just get friends to play with” or “We’re just playing with friends” etc… But these answers never actually address the issue and just emphasizes the point that if you’re not the one doing it then you’re at a major disadvantage.
Everyone wants to play with their friends of course, this is never something that people want to go away… even a solo player couldn’t be that selfish as to wish that on anyone (hopefully).
But in a game like Crossout with its metas and most lobbies tend to need filling out with bots; having a full squad taking up 50% (66.6% on consoles) of a full team is far too much of an advantage. Matches can literally be 1 squad + bots with no random players vs a team of just randoms… not helped by the randomized bots which is a separate issue in it’s own right.
I’ve brought this idea up before but obviously don’t expect any real changes - I think 9v9 matches with squads of 3 would be much fairer and enjoyable for everyone involved. I’d also like to say that the in a perfect world I’d argue for 12vs12 with 4 player squads to ensure less changes but the game limitations with parts per match would make this impossible as 8v8 seems to already be pushing those limits. So instead 9v9 would be the closest thing possible.
With 9v9 you’d want to make sure squads fit into the maximum player count per team without remainders to have optimal matchmaking hence the change to 3 player squads. This would make for much fairer squad matchmaking, meaning that even full squads wouldn’t have such a crazy high numbers advantage on their own.
You would never have 2 squads on 1 team without at least 1 squad on the other. PC matches could start with 5v5 minimum instead of 4v4 now, console can stay as 6v6 but with 3 man squads and nothing really changes.
I’d like to see what people think of this idea. Because if the argument is that you want to play with friends and it’s not about the advantage then just get 2 more friends and split your squad in 2 while you play, simple.
The only potential problems I see is that we don’t have enough players on console for 9v9 without filling up teams with too many bots.
Ideally, I would also like matches to be 12v12, but like you said, it’s dubious that the game engine could handle that, and we don’t have a big enough playerbase.
I can see some people saying that four person teams are needed for CW players to practice, but I don’t care about that myself.
Personally, I’d be ok with groups only being allowed in confrontation mode and CW, but I don’t expect many people would agree with me on that.
I can’t remember if I wrote it, but console just stays 6v6 but with 3 player squads. CW and CC can stay 4v4 and it would actually help those modes stand out as unique by allowing a higher squad limit.
Well if we can do 8v8 I feel like 9v9 isn’t a big stretch compared to the perfect 12v12. They talk about part limits being in place for the sake of the game engine, but we can get 4 80-part builds into raids with many raid enemies + boss (sometimes) so I’d find it hard pressed that we couldn’t run 9v9.
Also I’d like to think people would take to 9v9 if they reduced the part limit from 80 to 75 in order to reduce the max parts on the engine. This would make an 8 player lobby’s max of 1,280 parts down to 1,200, and a 9v9 would be 1,350 parts which isn’t that much higher than a maximum we have now.
I’d like to think it’s doable in some way, if we had an engine overhaul I’d love to see 12v12 with 4 player squads though.
Honestly, I wouldnt care if pvp didnt allow groups. That said, I typically dont mind playing vs groups either. Occasionally it gets old when it is a skilled group and your 3 mates are 3 noobs but that doesnt seem to common for me.
