Versus Beginners

[FireWolfBoy]

Hey there! I’m Wolf, nice to meet you!

If you happen to be one of the newbies who joined Left 4 Dead 2’s Versus mode and got votekicked for any reason, please take a bit of time to read through this. I’ll make sure it’s worth your while.

I know you’re upset about getting votekicked and I get that. It’s not fun to get kicked from a game. Given that, I would like to share with you why that happens and some ways to hopefully lessen such instances from happening in the future.

If you really wish to immerse yourself in Versus from the get-go instead of pouring more hours into Campaign (the usual progression), I would highly suggest you play using Friends-Only Versus (the lobby setting) instead of Public Versus. This is because of L4D2 having a relatively high skill ceiling compared to other games and also because the game is full of veterans from its age.

Public Versus is a highly competitive environment where people are out to win matches. You have to understand that most of the players you will encounter upon joining a Public Versus match neither have the patience nor the time to teach newbies in such an environment—they are busy focusing on the match itself.

Take note that I said most and not all. Some of us here do help newbies learn and teach them the ways of the game. I personally accompany newbies in-game frequently simply to help them survive and teach them along the way. It makes me happy when new players are eager to learn.

To be reasonably fair, this is not behavior that you can expect from most Public Versus players because they are there to play a skilled match, not teach new players nor are they obliged to do so. In joining a Public Versus match with very little hours of playtime, you are inadvertently weighing down your teammates because they will either have to carry you or die alongside you as a consequence of your inexperience in the game.

I suggest adding a friend and then playing Friends-Only Versus with that friend in order to grasp how to control the Special Infected properly for their intended purposes. Read guides as well. When you’re confident enough with your abilities, bring that friend along to Public Versus so you can have some backup in case votekicks go off (at that point you shouldn’t be experiencing it much anymore anyway). It’s a democratic system, so use democracy to your advantage.

Also, here are some helpful game modes (courtesy of whalecrown) where you can practice in peace and without any pressure at all:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=675686554

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=655424673

The community isn’t as toxic as some people make it out to be. Most of these people you’ll encounter in the forum are just simply tired of all the newbie rants about getting votekicked, which might explain why they’re not quite as warm.

Here’s a guide that contains basic tips and strategies to jump-start your Versus journey:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2133187528

I hope this helps somehow and makes you feel less upset about things moving forward in your journey through L4D2.

Here’s a health kit for your troubles.

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by JAiZ:

You know what?

Let's all collectively agree to only comment the link to this thread whenever a new "i was kicked" post pops up.

No discussions

No lengthy essays

Just a link

Why thank you, kind sir!

Am I like, allowed to link my own thread elsewhere? Not sure how that works lmfao thanks JAiZ!

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by Baosas:

Originally posted by JAiZ:

You know what?

Let's all collectively agree to only comment the link to this thread whenever a new "i was kicked" post pops up.

No discussions

No lengthy essays

Just a link

Something tells me 9 newbies out of 10 will just consider that "unhelpful" and "dickish".

If the language and tone I employed in this essay still comes out to them as “dickish” then I don’t even know anymore lol unless you were referring to the act of leaving a link itself.

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by JAiZ:

Originally posted by Baosas:

Something tells me 9 newbies out of 10 will just consider that "unhelpful" and "dickish".

Perfect, having just 1 newbie be receptive to feedback and listen to the more experienced players would be a 200% improvement.

Agree. I just want them to be able to enjoy the game in the right way while learning to be more skilled in the process.

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by Projekt34 Your God:

Guys save your words, summer sale is coming...Put all your imagination there.

No need to save one’s words when one is an absolute chatterbox. Go figure haha.

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by Left 4 Pumpkins:

You wrote that beautifully Wolf :D

Why thank you, kind lady! I do what I can. :D

Don’t worry, I’ll take you to hell again pretty soon. ;)

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by Agent Wolf:

Note that should be added,is To NEVER join public versuses,history suggests that this is unwise. Form a team of players who you think you had executed excellent teamwork partnership in,expert of an example,as this is a coop game.
Nonetheless,Excellent post.

To be fair, I wouldn’t say to never join Public Versus at all. Some of the best experiences I’ve had with this game was from playing Pub Versus, like making an entire server shut down because I left all the Survivors hanging on The Parish bridge finale with one Smoker lmfao.

Public Versus can be very pleasant as long as the new players joining it have matured in both skill and attitude. They will blend in just fine by that time.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Agent Wolf! Here’s a health kit for your troubles.

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by Ayy-l-Mao:

dying game lol

I’ve been on this game for 11 years (12 if you count the first Left 4 Dead game) and counting. Sorry to burst your bubble kind sir, but the game is very much alive.

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by Ayy-l-Mao:

11 years - no ranked
dayz's got a larger playerbase - did it even get finished?

It was always unranked. Doesn’t make it any less playable.

With all due respect, the logic you are using for causation is incorrect. DayZ’s larger playerbase does not equate to Left 4 Dead 2 dying. There’s no causation relationship between the two games.

The game’s playerbase has been rather stable ever since the game came out. If you check the number of online players everyday, you’ll see that it’s roughly the same as about 5 years ago.

[The Front Man]

Originally posted by JAiZ:

You know what?

Let's all collectively agree to only comment the link to this thread whenever a new "i was kicked" post pops up.

No discussions

No lengthy essays

Just a link

Link this on oh why did I get kicked threads coming up.

[Primal God]

Originally posted by Ayy-l-Mao:

11 years - no ranked
dayz's got a larger playerbase - did it even get finished?

Well, in your desperate try to ♥♥♥♥ on L4D2 you actually point out one of the best things it got...No fkin ranked.
No boosted accounts, no smurfs to ruin your games, no trolls. etc etc...Imagine L4D2 with a ranked system hahahaha..

"DayZ have a larger playerbase"...Maybe..just maybe because its still receiving updates and its not 11 years old game? Idk...maybe you can just use common sense lmao.

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by Ayy-l-Mao:

It's a comparison.

Never said it was causality. Re-read.

A buggy mess like DayZ has more players than a finished product like L4D2. Tad concerning.

But:

"It was always unranked. Doesn’t make it any less playable"

The recent posts of newcomers being kicked is concerning; some people just want casual matches, like most multiplayer games out there.

Gatekeeping for older titles? It's not an e-sport, and the only thing getting hurt are the egos of elitists.

Apologies. The way you initially phrased it sounded like causation.

There can be many reasons why DayZ would have a bigger playerbase compared to Left 4 Dead 2. Some of my friends for example have outright stated that they don’t want to put much effort into Versus mode because of the high skill ceiling and they just want to play the game casually. Note that they did not mention anything about toxic votekicks and whatnot. They don’t do Public Versus, but they do Public Campaigns—which are still very much part of the game and the playerbase.

I am concerned about the upset newbies coming into the forum, why do you think I’m trying to help all of them out? Yes, they may be coming into Public Versus looking to have a casual match, but Public Versus is not a casual game mode. It is a competitive game mode and they will either get annihilated from having so little hours, or get votekicked because they’re weighing the team down as I already mentioned above.

No one is gatekeeping the game, at all. There’s no physical block in place preventing newbies from joining. If three other players agreed democratically that they don’t want you in the game, then majority wins. For example in Dota 2, we had a Rogue Knight who kept going LEEROY JENKINS towards the enemy team every time he respawned despite all our efforts to teach him the right path.

Who is in the wrong? My friends and I? Or the player who refuses to listen and charges to his doom each and every time?

[FireWolfBoy]

Ayy-l-Mao, why’d you delete your posts? Are you retracting your arguments about the subject matter?

[Bad-Mouth Basil]

tl:dr
[will clear comments for room on my end - it'll be a wall of text]
is it worth it tho? don't exactly gain anything from l4d2 tbh

@Yanni
11 years; with no new content is a good thing? common sense? rip

[FireWolfBoy]

Originally posted by Ayy-l-Mao:

tl:dr
[will clear comments for room on my end]
is it worth it tho? don't exactly gain anything from l4d2 tbh

@Yanni
11 years; with no new content is a good thing? common sense? rip

Oh, I do gain something out of it. It’s my personal de-stresser game when I’m not at the office. That’s for me though, I can’t speak for everyone else’s reasons for why they still play the game.

[Red™]

Why Rayman doesn’t pin any useful thread about VS guide? It could actually reduce the problem and at least force noob to consider because it’s impossible to miss that giant green pin while posting