Why we love ESO - Ensemble Studios Online

[Arc_gu1ll3_sp]

It should be safe to say that all the graphical and optimization flaws and different bugs in DE will be solved in the coming days, weeks or months. There are many people reporting bugs and some great initiatives going on, like the “DE list of issues” thread started by Kaiserklein which will be posted in the official forums.

I am aware many of these posts/initiatives cover things I will say here, but I wanted to focus specifically in the multiplayer “social side”, which is the main reason for me (and probably for many) for loving AOE3 multiplayer. I will leave civ balance, maps and this kind of things aside.

I will try not to mention how things are in DE, since we all know them and it would make the post 2x long.

Why is (or was ☹) AOE3 multiplayer so great:

Let’s start from the beginning: The player account, or in game name:
In ESO one copy or CD key of the game is linked to one unique player account. That is your account, people know you by it and you know people by theirs. You get to know players, what civs they are good with, how they like to lame or not and so on.



You cannot change your account name and no other player in the world can have the same account name.

Let’s continue with how easy ESO makes it to be aware of who is online, what they are doing and interacting with fellow players. Chatting, finding games, inviting to games or clans or getting info from any existing account is super easy and straightforward. A couple of great things:

• Your list of friends is visible no matter in what tab of ESO you are, even if you are in a game room. There is a green circle if they are online, red if they are offline and a AOE3 symbol if they are online and playing. You can chat, check the profile or invite to a game in just 2 clicks on any of the names in your list.

• If you don’t have all the people online in your friend list (there is a limit), you can quickly get an idea of what’s going on by checking who is in each of the games in the game browser. You don’t need to join the game rooms, clicking on any game will show you the full list of players in it! Combine this with the ability to order games by rank and you will quickly have an overview of who in your rank range is online and what they are playing.

• There is a tab in ESO (called Homecities) where you can see details about your account and about any existing account. Things like when was the account created, Homecities for each civ, clan name, ranked power rating/skill level, games played, % of victories and game experience.

• You can easily access any player’s account information from a game room via a couple of clicks on their name. And you know what? A summary of this information will be shown right by the players name in a game room just by placing your mouse over their name.

In ESO there is a ranking system. This is for me part of the social aspect and an essential part of playing multiplayer competitively. Be it called elo, a PR number, skill level, bronze, silver or challenger (sorry there), it is needed and it needs to be shown for each player in game rooms.



Now onto playing the game I want with the players I want – custom game browsing

ESO allows you to play ranked or unranked games via the game browser. It also allows to find 1v1 and team games via quick search. I would say 95% of games played above pr 20 in the custom games browser are ranked. I’d bet my life 100% of team games played are played via de game browser.

The game browser allows you to sort games by game rules, nr of players etc. …and rank of the host, so it is super easy to find your type of game. As said before, one can see players in the different rooms without having to join.



For me, the game browser and the ability to play ranked through it is critical for the experience and is a main differentiator with other platforms (SCII, AOEII DE, LoL…). Here is where you get to know people by waiting for a game to start, here you can arrange teams so they are fair, here is where you can decide you won’t play with a low skill level player because it won’t be fair and fun, here is where you can try to get into the all high level game and have a try at being allowed to play with the pros in it… I think this kind of game browsing is a key element in building the community.

Guys, it would be nice to know your thoughts on this and get more ideas to be added or modify what you think is not so important or does not make sense. Feel super free to use this post or any part of it in any way that may contribute to prevent the death of the multiplayer of AOEIII as we know it.

I'd love to post this in the official forums, but I can't seem to get my account validated (tried with 2 different MS accounts). So, feel free to post it, edit it, take some part of it or w.e.

Thanks for reading and happy gaming!

[chronique]

QS is better for ranked game because that's avoid bashing.

[deleted_user]

Folks that met on ESO have flown around the world to meet each other in person. Sure, apps like discord and website forums are prominent social platforms, but a navigable, usable, communicable in-game interface is critical for the initial development, and endurement, of in-game relationships. This is important because it's very important.

[howlingwolfpaw]

I agree 100% this new version makes the game so impersonal.
They got this so wrong, and while the rest (bugs, balance, graphics) is fixable and forgivable I do not think the game lobby is.

What is the point of friends if you can not see them as online, or chat with them.
What is the point in trying to know people if they can change their name to troll your game with smurf accounts.
Why wont they let you pick an avatar for your account?
What is the point in not being able to see peoples skilled rank who enter a 2v2 or FFA or 1v1 in the game making lobby
Why force ranked into quick search where most people will want to play team games in the casual lobby but wont gain ELO, thus creating many "smurf accounts" or what I mean by that, is people with high amounts of games played but not ranked so it is harder to balance teams. (people will have lower ELO but play like higher ones)
ELO ranking numbers mean so little to me, but a captain, master sergeant, etc... those do.

These were not the changes the community asked for or needed or wanted.
While I thank everyone that participated in betas, I wonder how could you have let them publish this multiplayer interface.
Did your NDL agreements prohibit you from talking bad about the game in the week the beta went live?

If my opinions sound extreme it is only because I love this game and had such high hopes I want to like it, but its just not the case....

[howlingwolfpaw]

QS is better for ranked game because that's avoid bashing.

Bashing will still happen, even more so as no one will know in casual games rank disparities, so finding a good match will be a rarity.

[Arc_gu1ll3_sp]

QS is better for ranked game because that's avoid bashing.

Agreeing in that bashing is something to try to avoid, I wish it can be done in ways that won't be so intrusive to a system I think was great and key in the uniqueness of the multiplayer experience. For an idea: make it not possible for players under "x" elo or PR to play with players above "y" elo or PR. Once you reach "x" you should know what elo or PR are and it is up to you to take the challenge.

[howlingwolfpaw]

Also, ESOC (AIZ) designed a beautiful and efficient informative casting UI, it was so perfect... and made casting such a interesting thing to watch. The new one I have only seen a few times but is lacking in so much detailed information.

These games should be fan run they obviously put way more into it, its like Disney taking over star wars, and alienating all its true fans to try bringing in a new wave.... of money.

[Challenger_Marco]

Well I don't think they will read esoc forums and take feedback from here ,prolly copy paste all this and send it to aoe.ms/support.

[Efraín]

Except for the ranked system, which must be random imo (I think it is the best for a competitive game and is the reason why AOE3 was not so successful online apart from other factors, we already have the browser for the unranked and play between friends), I agree 100% on the rest, I don't know why they got so complicated.

[lemmings121]

Rated games only in qs is better, at least of 1v1, i woundt mind if rated teamgames could be hosted, but I guess is still better to keep only is QS (as long as there is a player base)


But on everything else I Agree, current interface is terrible.
You can see the person you last played...and thats it. you cant msg him, you cant invite to a custom game... you cant even do those thins to your friends, its absurd.

[lemmings121]

While I thank everyone that participated in betas, I wonder how could you have let them publish this multiplayer interface.
Did your NDL agreements prohibit you from talking bad about the game in the week the beta went live?

No. Me and a the vast majority of beta players were very vocal about how bad the current interface is. if i'm not mistaken, there was one guy who said "I like how clean an minimalist it is", and every single other person agreed it was a downgrade and shouldn't go live like this. I think the team got the msg but just didnt have the manpower/budget/time to fix it. We can only hope for them to fix via a patch in the next weeks (months?). Its also important to point this issue in the original forum where they probably keep a closer eye then here.

[howlingwolfpaw]

While I thank everyone that participated in betas, I wonder how could you have let them publish this multiplayer interface.
Did your NDL agreements prohibit you from talking bad about the game in the week the beta went live?

No. Me and a the vast majority of beta players were very vocal about how bad the current interface is. if i'm not mistaken, there was one guy who said "I like how clean an minimalist it is", and every single other person agreed it was a downgrade and shouldn't go live like this. I think the team got the msg but just didnt have the manpower/budget/time to fix it. We can only hope for them to fix via a patch in the next weeks (months?). Its also important to point this issue in the original forum where they probably keep a closer eye then here.

ESOC kept this game alive and I will continue to try to keep this site alive with my hits for views on topics. I am sure the message is ringing loud and clear... people play multiplayer games for the online friendships.

[ǝɯɐuɹǝsn]

" Why is (or was ☹) AOE3 multiplayer so great:[

eh not "was" hehe, we're still around 900 the evening for now, wich mean between 2/3 to 3/4 of the population is sitll here

[japanesegeneral]

While I thank everyone that participated in betas, I wonder how could you have let them publish this multiplayer interface.
Did your NDL agreements prohibit you from talking bad about the game in the week the beta went live?

No. Me and a the vast majority of beta players were very vocal about how bad the current interface is. if i'm not mistaken, there was one guy who said "I like how clean an minimalist it is", and every single other person agreed it was a downgrade and shouldn't go live like this. I think the team got the msg but just didnt have the manpower/budget/time to fix it. We can only hope for them to fix via a patch in the next weeks (months?). Its also important to point this issue in the original forum where they probably keep a closer eye then here.

Microsoft probably thought your criticism was hate speach. In order for them to recognize an issue you have to do some extreme sugarcoating. It is an American company after all they can not deal with honest critique.

[look]

Hope will be fine everything next weeks/month

[Jotunir]

Hope will be fine everything next weeks/month

It will take them years

[bobabu]

I don't agree with making game browser games ranked. I love to search for team games via a quick search. Now that you can invite people and search together I'm finding games in team quick search. If you make game browser games ranked it will be significantly harder to find a reasonably fair game. People will try to fully balance teams and you end up waiting a ton of time even though the game is reasonably balanced. An ai just deals better with this issue. An improvement would be adding an unranked rank so that teams could be balanced better in the game browser. Just like in Age 2 de. Since it's an unranked rank people will care about it less and also play a bit unbalanced games. But it will be enough so you don't have a col in one team and a recruit in the other.

There was so much bashing going on in asian dynasties with hundreds of smurfs.

[MCJim]

I agree so much with the first post. The way you play online now feels so impersonal, it's very any-social.

I'd have liked to see an updated, 2020 version of ESO.

[voigt1240]

To some extend it almost feels like how heartstone is designed socially.

[Hazza54321]

i dont see why qs team would be better that hosting a teamgame, it means 5 other people have to be qsing at the same time as you to get a game, not to mention its not skill based so the teams wont even be close to being fair. People are more likely gonna join a teamgame if theres a possibility of it being filled fairly quickly; you have no idea how many people are queing in qs

[[Armag] diarouga]

Ye QS is better for 1v1 and lobby better for team.

[Mitoe]

The thing I like about having team games force ranked in quick search is that I can actually choose my teammates, instead of being forced into random teams every single time in a game lobby. Part of the reason I never played team games was because I could never team with my friends, and playing against them is just not the same.

I think going back to ranked team lobbies means that team quick search dies 100% like on ESO, but at the same time I'm not sure that keeping ranked team quick-search only is sustainable long-term for AoE3 (in terms of number of players), especially if the matchmaking doesn't discriminate based on rank. Does anyone actually know how the matchmaking works exactly?

[Riotcoke]

The thing I like about having team games force ranked in quick search is that I can actually choose my teammates, instead of being forced into random teams every single time in a game lobby. Part of the reason I never played team games was because I could never team with my friends, and playing against them is just not the same.

I think going back to ranked team lobbies means that team quick search dies 100% like on ESO, but at the same time I'm not sure that keeping ranked team quick-search only is sustainable long-term for AoE3 (in terms of number of players).

On the flipside it sucks to queue team on your own.

[Mitoe]

Also the way they currently have lobbies set up is just terrible. Not being able to browse other lobbies while hosting is a huge pain in the ass and usually results in me hosting games for 10-20 minutes with no one joining before I have to rehost.

There also seems to be some kind of issue where players can't join? Almost like the old Failed to Join issue, but that should be gone?

[don_artie]

The thing I like about having team games force ranked in quick search is that I can actually choose my teammates, instead of being forced into random teams every single time in a game lobby. Part of the reason I never played team games was because I could never team with my friends, and playing against them is just not the same.

I think going back to ranked team lobbies means that team quick search dies 100% like on ESO, but at the same time I'm not sure that keeping ranked team quick-search only is sustainable long-term for AoE3 (in terms of number of players), especially if the matchmaking doesn't discriminate based on rank. Does anyone actually know how the matchmaking works exactly?

I feel like quick searching team games can only work for a game with huge player bases. In aoe3 if you wanna 3v3 you are almost always gonna have skill differences. Being able to play a lobby and split the worst 2 or best 2 to make the game more fair, or split certain civs etc is just really good. If i queue for a 3v3 game alone now there is a chance I get 2 bad mates and end up vs 3 guys on voice call playing together. I mean I get your post saying that you're happy that you can play with your friends, but on the other hand if I queue 2v2 and end up vs you+ hazza what am I gonna do with a random player.

I think this way of playing is promoting making sure you have certain civ combo's, don't queue team games alone, tryhard etc. I personally prefer them to be a bit more casual.