I personally haven’t played Battlegrounds but I watch YouTubers and Twitch Streamers play it. I mainly watch Force Gaming play it on Twitch. Since it’s coming to Xbox One I might check it out. It looks fun but honestly it’s not really my type of game. I’m not into PvP. I prefer PVE. That’s why I’ll be playing Destiny 2 and Anthem. But Battlegrounds does look fun. I saw they added a Zombie mode so that really got my interest.
No trick, but it might sound sort of silly.
Play on the Asian server. The “AS” one. You can select it when you join a game.
I don’t know why, but they’re terrible. They have no awareness, they can’t aim, they all jump out at the beginning of the flight because they have no patience, so if you jump late you might only have <8 people on your entire area on the map, their movement pattern is very predictable so rarely do you get a person in a place you don’t expect if you know how people move in this game. They use cars stupidly, either driving around in circles or hopping in them to move up 50 feet in the last circles.
Lag isn’t much of a problem - while close fights do happen, this game isn’t nearly as much of a run and gun close quarters shooter like a call of duty game - a lot of shots happen from longer distances, against targets that may be laying around and don’t see you. Client side hit detection
I won another game last night, and came in 2nd in one that I should’ve won. I hit the last guy 4 times with 556 before he got behind a tree… the blue field was moving in and I was running with it and it killed me literally just as I reached the safe zone, like a foot out of it.
Which makes my solo record on asian servers:
2, 2, 9, 53, 1, 2, 10, 1, 12, 2
The server didn’t record all my games properly though, it says I’ve only played 7 games. I think it dropped the first 2, 9, and 1 from my first 5 games, because at that point it recorded me as only having 3 games, no wins, and a 2/3rds top 10 rate. It seems to have recorded games since then, but I guess the record keeping isn’t perfect.
I got a new longest kill last night.
My previous longest kill was 418m. But not officially. We were stuck on the beach on the south side of the island across from the military base island, and the field was coming in. We saw a squad of guys trying to load up into a car on the opposite shore about 500m away and since we were pretty much protected by the cliffs we decided to open up on them. I managed to hit a guy who was running to try to catch up with his friends in their car a few times and took him down.
But before the last patch, it was the guy who killed the guy after he was down that got the kill, instead of the guy who knocked him down. The guy I knocked down was going to die very soon - his squadmates left him behind and he was in the blue field - but my asshat friend decided to shoot at my downed, almost dead guy instead of the other guys. He managed to hit, stealing my kill… so he got the 418m shot on his stats page instead of me.
But… last night I was able to outdo him. I was in a building on the very south edge of the map, on the south side of the military island, and I spotted a guy on the hill north of the military base who was hiding behind a buggy. I shot out the buggy’s tires to dial in the range on the shot - about 800m. Once I had that, I fired a few shots as the guy crawled away - it was so far that even the crawling required me to lead my shots a full body length. Lobbed some bullets his way, managed to hit on 3 of them, and got him. Longest kill: 840m.
I wasn’t going to spend $30 on an early access game, but one of my friends bought it for me so I’ve played it a bit this weekend.
I don’t think this is really my type of game. I do think the concept is cool. But there are lots of bits that bug me:
- It feels like the game is a lot of nothing (running into buildings and looting) punctuated by bursts of combat that only ever seem to last a couple shots and then one person is dead. Which some people say is fun because it’s tense, but I just find it boring.
- Third-person camera leads to a lot of wonkiness being able to see around corners and such.
- Guns feel relatively indistinguishable in their own class - is there any real appreciable difference between the AK and the M4 and the M16?
- I like being able to see and identify people instead of constantly be looking at dark blobs far away saying “hmm… is that a person or a bush?” I wonder if people with different graphic settings have advantages or not. I’ve definitely had points where stuff far away was constantly shifting so it was hard to keep eyes out for players moving.
- It feels like most of the combat comes down to who gets the drop on the other person since it’s so easy to 0-100 someone, and quite often I find myself getting shot and not being able to tell from which direction (or get into my sights) until it’s too late.
- Lag is not always an issue, but it has been. One time I had a firefight break out in a 4v4 near the end of a match and as soon as the enemy team started shooting my framerate chugged down to around 10-15.
I dunno. I’ve always enjoyed shooters but I definitely like playing the arena shooter side of things, like Doom, Quake, Unreal Tournament, Team Fortress, etc. Never really did like Counter-Strike, and this just seems like a more extreme version of that, focusing on being more ‘realistic’ with the guns and bullet drop distance and such.
Well you pretty much identified most of what makes the game what it is as bad, so it doesn’t sound like you’ll like it.
Except the third person thing - I agree that’s problematic and they’re releasing a mode down the road that forces first person.
There’s definitely a difference between assault rifles but it’s fairly subtle - but that’s true in real life too. Guns are pretty close to optimized and all do the same thing. Here are all the weapon stats.
The graphics settings fortunately are not starkly different in terms of giving an advantage. Lower settings give a slight advantage.
But the rest - having a hard time spotting people at long distance, the person who sees the other person having an advantage, all that is an essential part of how the game works. This is basically the opposite of an arena shooter.
Played 3 squad games tonight and won two of them. All four of us survived in the second one.
The games don’t show up in our stats, though. I had the same problem with 2 of my solo wins. According to my stats, I’ve played 9 games in solo and won 1, but I was keeping my own records and actually played 15 and won 2.
In squads, we’ve won 4 out of the 15 games we’ve played, but the stats say 2 wins out of 12 games.
Not an Asia-specific problem either - we’ve won 2 squad games on NA and it only lists one. Unless there’s a caveat like you personally have to be alive to get the credit for a win.
I started keeping track of my results in a notepad file just to see what my actual results have been. It’s annoying to have games, especially wins, not recorded.
I won a solo match without getting a single kill. I almost went the entire game without firing a shot.
I don’t care about kills. Sure, they’re nice, they’re fun, but my only goal is to be the last guy alive. So I’d rather have a zero kill game where I win than a 10 kill game where I didn’t.
I’m really good at the strategy elements of this game. I’m good at predicting where people will be, and where they won’t, and which way they’ll move. When it’s safe to move and when it’s not, and the path to take. On the NA servers I managed to get top 10,000 players with a shitty kill rating (because my kill ratio is 0.7) mostly through smart manuevering and stealth. On asian servers I kill a lot more people ratios around 2.5-3 - simply because they make it so much easier.
The final 2 circles were in a little cluster of 5 houses southeast of Georgopol. I got there first as soon as I saw the third to last circle and then guarded the most defensible building, but no one attempted to breach it nor give me an easy shot while approaching it - people shot each other on the way into the other buildings. So I held that building until we were down to three. At which point the other two remaining players were content to shack up in 2 other buildings never exposing themselves. I was actually the only one willing to man the windows and actually try to kill the other two at that point. One popped his head out briefly, I fired 6 rounds at him, and he then hid in the closet for the rest of the game.
Before the last circle I made a quick sprint to go to the most central building and neither saw me. I knew that the random final disappearing circle would most likely appear somewhere in the middle, so I manned the position closest to the middle of the last circle, and neither of them came out to play. And it worked - if no one kills anyone else in the final circle for a few minutes, there’s one last shrink that turns the circle into nothing. Since I’d taken the central position, I ended up being closest to this point. Those guys being on the edges died as soon as the field began moving in. Bingo, zero kill win. Not even close.
Next up, a zero shots fired win. I was so close this time.
I played around with the graphic settings a bit. Biggest surprise was that the shadows basically disappear on medium and lower, which seems like a big advantage. Unfortunately I still sometimes get lag in firefights (starting to wonder if it’s a certain gun/weapon that does it, since it doesn’t always happen).
I think I was over-harsh with my initial assertions regarding the pacing… it definitely does help when you’re playing in a squad (since talking/strategy can fill the slow parts). I just really don’t care for the combat style… when I can’t see my opponent and have to worry about things like bullet drop and such it just feels like fighting the system instead of the good feeling I get in a fluid game. But that’s just personal taste.
Won another solo game today and my pan saved me 100%. My pan absorbed 2 hits as I ran away and I escaped with 10% hp.
Tips: Carry a pan. It will protect your taint.
Try to drop into low population areas. Avoid the obvious places like the military base, school, etc from the jump. Easier to start if you aren’t dead. Remember the flight path, and look out the back of the plane when it’s traveling. See how many people jump where. Approach the final circle from the opposite side of where most of the people will be. It helps to keep your flanks and back clear.
If you find a car on the way down, immediately drive to a high loot area away from the flight path. If you’re decently ranked, other people will do the same, so be careful. If you’re playing against low rated players (or Asians) you might not have anyone within 1km of you.
Don’t try to run people over under most circumstances. If they’re not looking at you because they’re shooting at someone else, then sure. But most of the time the guy standing around is going to beat the guy in the vehicle. On the other hand, if you do try to hit someone… veer in a random direction right before you hit. They’re going to dodge one way or another, so going straight probably won’t hit them - so take the 50/50 shot that you veer in the direction they’re going to juke.
Weave a little bit when you’re driving. Not wild turns, but enough that someone trying to snipe you probably misses the first shot.
The SKS is probably the best weapon in the game. It’s very silly that they put the SKS in for this purpose, especially when there’s already a weapon in the Soviet arsenal that totally fits what they’re looking to do with the SKS but actually makes sense in the role and looks cooler, the SVD / Dragonov. Why they have the SKS, which is more like a shitty AK that no one in the world uses except hobbyist shooters who want a $200 rifle, rather than the SVD which fits the role they want the SKS perfectly makes no sense.
I don’t generally pick up level 3 backpacks. Often if the final circle is within an open field, you’ll be doing a lot of crawling around trying to spot the other guy. The level 3 backpack is very tall and makes your prone profile higher. I’d rather give up the extra carrying capacity to be stealthier at the end.
People carry too much crap anyway. You’re not going to use all 30 bandages you’re carrying, probably not even more than 5. You don’t need to carry that sniper rifle flash hider 22 minutes into the game on the off chance you’ll find an AWM. You’re not going to go through more than 150 rounds of ammo under normal circumstances. Leave some space in your inventory so that if you kill someone you can quickly take their good loot without fooling around with making the capacity while you do it.
Keeping your flanks clean at the end is super important. Try to approach the next circle from the narrow side - that is, the side where the new circle is closest to touching the old circle. It leaves the smallest amount of area behind you. If cover and known locations of enemy permits, it’s wise the run around the edge of the outer circle to get to this point, which will clear one of your flanks in the process of travelling there.
If you’re going to park your vehicle to loot some buildings, park it near somewhere it would be plausible for a vehicle to naturally be so that no one is immediately tipped off if they come by.
Sound is super important and well designed in this game. It helps to have a soundcard with some sort of virtual surround sound and a good set of headphones. I seem to notice sounds way before any of my allies do, I’m not sure how much is paying attention and how much is my equipment, but the sound model in this game is excellent and helps you immensely.
Won another solo game. Had another guy just choose to passively die to the field at the end. After the third guy was killed he had about 90 seconds to move to the area within the circle, and he just didn’t. I was just sitting around waiting the whole time… I guess he hunkered down and hoped I would run out in the middle of the field or something. So I moved to the new circle and waited… and he did nothing… and lost when the field ate him up. How silly. I did get 2 kills leading up to that point though so it wasn’t another kill-free game.
That was my 30th solo game on the asian servers. Results:
2, 2, 9, 53, 1, 2, 10, 1, 12, 2, 7, 48, 50, 57, 8, 15, 1, 53, 17, 57, 1, 21, 3, 26, 4, 22, 6, 48, 25, 1
So that’s 5 wins, 4 times in second, another 7 times in the top 10. Just over half in the top 10 is actually lower than I thought. No games worse than 57, I almost never die early.
Two of those 2nd place finishes were literally like a quarter second away from being wins - super super close at the end.
The funny thing is - I’m moving up on the ladder, so I’m getting tougher opponents. So I’m playing against tougher Asians, right? Well… not exactly. I’m playing against other Americans who are on the Asian servers. In one game last night I asked who in the lobby was an American and got like 12 affirmative replies, and given that there were probably more that didn’t talk for whatever reason, the proportion of Americans and probably Europeans I’m playing against is going up.
How do Asian players tend to play badly? What would explain that?
I’d expect bands of players to have an overwhelming advantage. Is that the case?
As I understand it, you choose to play on a solo, duo or four-man squad server. So, in theory, you should only come across a band of players if you’re also in a band of players playing on a squad server. In reality, there’s nothing stopping you from coordinating with a friend on a solo server although you don’t see each other on the map or one another’s names and only one of you can win (you win as a squad on the appropriate server). I think that teaming on the solo servers is theoretically bannable although I don’t know how they’d test or prove that.
I don’t know why Asian players are so bad. My only guess is that maybe China doesn’t have a history of popular shooters so most of them don’t know how to play them.
They don’t have one single deficiency - they’re bad at everything. They get impatient and jump out at the beginning of the flight rather than wait 30 seconds for a better position. They can’t shoot worth a damn - I’m constantly escaping when on NA servers I’d be dead 100% of the time. They don’t particularly do stealth or movement very well. They don’t have very good awareness, sometimes you can walk up behind them and whack them with a stick. They use vehicles poorly, driving around in circles for no reason a lot. They die a lot to the blue zone - it happens less and less as I climb the leaderboards but on my first few games there would be literally 20+ people who would die to a totally predictable shrinking field. On NA it’s more like 1-3 people.
I’m going to try a world tour to see if the regions have a big difference. My very first duo game in the central/south America server was a win. But while those players didn’t seem especially good, they didn’t seem especially terrible like the Asian players either. They distributed much better at the start, only a few died to the blue field, etc.
I’m not sure what you’re picturing, but it’s not an MMO or a big 100 man server you choose yourself. You queue up and are dropped randomly into a game. Even if you and a friend queue into a solo game at the same time, due to differences in MMR and simply the fact that a billion people are playing the game and the lobbies fill up fast you won’t make it into the same game most of the time. There are modes for 2 and 4 players, but then you’re also facing teams of 2 and 4 players respectively.
The game’s stat tracking system is screwed up. Not only does it lose entire games randomly, but there’s no way the kill stats are right. It now says I’ve played 30 games and had 34 kills. But just looking back at the screenshots I took of my winner’s screen (and a couple of second place finishes), I have 37 kills just in those games. So that’s 37 kills in just those 7 games where I took a screenshot, yet somehow it records me as having 34 total in 30 games.
I’d wager the Asian players tend to be worse not only because of unfamiliarity (have shooters ever been big over there?) but also because they’re on potato computers. That was one reason Starcraft (and later MOBAs) caught on big there, was because those games have relatively low graphics requirements. I know in Korea most gaming is done at ‘PC bangs’ (LAN gaming centers, rent a computer), a lot of people don’t have high-end machines. That doesn’t explain the lack of strategy but may explain their lack of aim.
I’m wondering if part of the combat feeling clunky to me was because I wasn’t seeking out attachments enough. There’s no in-game stats, and the descriptions say stuff like “slightly reduces recoil” which made me think they weren’t that important, but looking at the stat page SenorBeef linked (thanks, btw) they certainly seem pretty big - carving off 20% recoil is no joke. Would explain why sometimes I feel my weapons can’t hit the broad side of the barn, but then I’ll be specc’ing and see someone calmly blast a couple of people accurately no problem.
Is there any sort of practice range? I’d definitely like the chance to experiment with the guns, and also settings. I’ve had quite a lot of times where that 8x scope feels great, but then in combat I zoom in and it throws off my aim entirely and I can no longer get sights on someone (especially if I’m prone or near cover). I do hope they can fix some of the wonkiness with the camera… I tried FPS mode and it was terrible. I knew to expect some disadvantage from being unable to see around corners and such, but stuff like the view bobbing wildly every time you crouch to pick up an item was awful.
I picked this up maybe a week ago and have been playing. Only “won” one game and that was a squad match were two of the guys completely carried me and the other guy. Playing solo, I’ve made it in the top 33% every match but once and made it as high at #12. I’m usually ending up in the teens or low 20s before I get popped off and usually get one or two kills under my belt. One dumb thing was last night I finally learned how to actually use a scope/sight (I had just been holding the right button) so oops.
It’s fun and can be tense though I’m not in love with it to the extent that some of my friends are. After three or four rounds I’m usually feeling done for the time being. I don’t see it something that I’m playing for months but I’ll get my 20-odd bucks out of it. I didn’t notice the Asian servers being too much different than the NA servers but I also noticed a lot of American-style names as well so maybe that secret is largely out. Or maybe Asian players often choose American sounding names and that Kummfather69 guy was in Korea. I don’t know enough about Asian gamers to guess.
Last night, I had a round where the plane seemed to just clip the island as it passed over. It maybe went over 25% of it at an angle. I don’t know how common that is (first for me) but it was, uh, “fun”. Fortunately, I only ever had one game where I was totally dorked on the initial circle and wasn’t either already in it or a short jog away.
I picked this up this weekend. My results are all over the place. I had a couple games where I was killed within the first two minutes after landing, then my first win. I didn’t have great gear (lvl 1 pack, AKM without scope), but my position was almost always in the safe zone, which allowed me to hole up and watch the entrance. The one time or so I wasn’t safe, I stumbled onto a vehicle and got there very quickly. When it came down to the end, three of us converged on a forested hillside. I hid while they duked it out, then went prone in the grass just inside the safe zone. Several bad shots later, I downed him without him getting off a shot because he never spotted my position.
I’m not a huge FPS fan, but I’m enjoying the game. It lends itself to memorable games. I could go into a lot more detail about that win. I still can’t shoot for shit, but a little planning and strategy make up for it against people who play like it’s Battlefield or Counter Strike.
have you seen Korean “PC bangs”? I mean, I’m sure they aren’t all created equal, but I’ve seen many with better equipment than I have!
I admit I haven’t, I withdraw my theory!
I’ve been playing the South America server. I’m going to do a world tour and see who has the worst PUBG players.
I just won my first game there, which is actually my first non-Asian solo win. I’ve won 5 or 6 Asian games, but never anywhere else yet.
We won our first duo game we played there, but I’ve mostly been playing solo: 3rd, 8th, 2nd, 16th, 3rd, ?? top 10 (forgot to record exact number), 10th, 2nd, 25th, 1st.
I’ve actually been killing them on a much lesser pace than I usually do on the Asian servers, with only 21 kills in 10 games. Despite me finishing in the top 10 most of the time, it’s been much more challenging. They’re a little worse at everything than in the NA server, but not grossly so, and they’re not doing anything utterly brain dead like having 20 of them die to the blue field.
There are a lot fewer players on the SA server though. I’m already up to 5900th place after 10 games - on Asia I’m 65000th after many more games and a much higher rating. Although the Asian servers severely under-record my kills for some reason, so my rating is artificially deflated a bit. But it seems like Asia probably has at least 10x the players of SA, maybe a lot more.
I got my first ghillie suit after many many games in that last game, the win. They’re very effective although obviously I’m showing it in the best case scenario there.
Also had more than a minute to play around with the M249, which I haven’t before, and it’s actually really effective. I only had a red dot and 8x scope and decided to try the 8x scope, worried it would be uncontrollable at that level of zoom, but it wasn’t. 2 or 3 round bursts were very controllable and it was very effective. The last two guys wanted to give me an easy win by politely lining up for me to kill them.
Do you leave voice chat on just to hear what they say?
“Ay caramba! Este gringo!”