Why do my allies always let me down?

[Brutalist Ape]

I have just played four consecutive games where I was winning my part of the game, but:

1) An ally resigns out of the blue, leaving the whole team in the lurch and causing us to lose
2) An ally sits on their part of the map, not contributing at all to the battle the entire game
3) An ally is hopelessly incompetent, and gets absolutely destroyed by the enemy

It's very common, that I find myself in the following situation:

A) I am the highest scored player on my team
B) I am winning my fight with a 2 to 1 or higher K/D
C) The game evolves into a 4v1 against me because all my allies have played badly and let me down.

This is so incredibly frustrating. I am doing my job right. I am winning. Yet time and time again, I end up losing the game because it is 4v1 against me.

It would be nice, if just ONCE in a while, I would have allies who

1) Actually have a clue what they are doing
2) Communicate, instead of resigning without saying anything
3) Pull their weight in the team, actually hold their front, and don't keep losing all the time

Now, as I understand it, you would think that there is an even chance of being on the stronger or weaker team. That it would work out 50/50, like flipping a coin. Random chance suggests that it should even out.

But that's not what I'm finding. I played 3 games yesterday and 100% of the time, it went against me through the incompetence and failure of my teammates. I played again this morning and the same thing happened again.

That's a 100% rate of allies letting me down, not a 50/50 rate.

Now, there's two explanations:

1) Either this is extraordinarily unlucky, a fluke run of extreme bad luck; or
2) Some other explanation, unknown

Now, one explanation would be that I suck at the game, and that the defeats were all my fault. I'm expecting someone to post that in the comments! It's the first thing to expect.

However, that wasn't the case. Often I am fighting heroically, taking down enemies 1v2 or even 1v3 and still winning against the odds, while I tribute resources to my allies to help them out. There is nothing humanly possible more that I could have done. I'm already punching well above my weight, carrying the team on my shoulders, doing the work of several players at once. And yet my team still loses. It's not me that's letting the side down, it's the other players.

I'm playing only 4v4 games, unranked, and the teams are random teams. I cannot work out why the probability of all the bad players being on my team, and all the good ones on the enemy team, would be so consistently the case.

Any suggestions?

Note - preferably not any of these...

1) "Noob!"
2) "You suck"
3) "Uninstall the game plz" and other similar responses... XD

Thank you!

[Kampfschwein Fjonda]

I play with my cousin also a lot of 4v4 ranked. Same problem 60% of the time.

Our solution:
Make friends. Team up with friends who have proven themselves. So you are not matched with the worst of the worst all the time. We are always looking for help [1300+ team Elo, bans: Black Forest, Hideout, Megarandom, Favorite: Nomad]

And a bit of specific advice to you: Do not dwell too much on your view that you are the hero while all others are incompetent. It is not a successful attitude.

[-Dare Devil/x/]

-This is somewhat compounded because you are playing unranked that it happens an extremely high rate of unlucky.

-If you are newer, bear with some weird games to start in ranked. But then you should have a much more consistent experience. You'll still run into a smurf once in a while though.

-That is what I sorta am thinking.

[billytringuyen]

make friends, play with players u know that is good

[D_loaded]

Congratulations that means your good at the game. Trust me its far worse to actually BE the person who let the team down.

[Alicante]

Originally posted by Brutalist Ape:

I have just played four consecutive games where I was winning my part of the game, but:

1) An ally resigns out of the blue, leaving the whole team in the lurch and causing us to lose
2) An ally sits on their part of the map, not contributing at all to the battle the entire game
3) An ally is hopelessly incompetent, and gets absolutely destroyed by the enemy

It's very common, that I find myself in the following situation:

A) I am the highest scored player on my team
B) I am winning my fight with a 2 to 1 or higher K/D
C) The game evolves into a 4v1 against me because all my allies have played badly and let me down.

This is so incredibly frustrating. I am doing my job right. I am winning. Yet time and time again, I end up losing the game because it is 4v1 against me.

It would be nice, if just ONCE in a while, I would have allies who

1) Actually have a clue what they are doing
2) Communicate, instead of resigning without saying anything
3) Pull their weight in the team, actually hold their front, and don't keep losing all the time

Now, as I understand it, you would think that there is an even chance of being on the stronger or weaker team. That it would work out 50/50, like flipping a coin. Random chance suggests that it should even out.

But that's not what I'm finding. I played 3 games yesterday and 100% of the time, it went against me through the incompetence and failure of my teammates. I played again this morning and the same thing happened again.

That's a 100% rate of allies letting me down, not a 50/50 rate.

Now, there's two explanations:

1) Either this is extraordinarily unlucky, a fluke run of extreme bad luck; or
2) Some other explanation, unknown

Now, one explanation would be that I suck at the game, and that the defeats were all my fault. I'm expecting someone to post that in the comments! It's the first thing to expect.

However, that wasn't the case. Often I am fighting heroically, taking down enemies 1v2 or even 1v3 and still winning against the odds, while I tribute resources to my allies to help them out. There is nothing humanly possible more that I could have done. I'm already punching well above my weight, carrying the team on my shoulders, doing the work of several players at once. And yet my team still loses. It's not me that's letting the side down, it's the other players.

I'm playing only 4v4 games, unranked, and the teams are random teams. I cannot work out why the probability of all the bad players being on my team, and all the good ones on the enemy team, would be so consistently the case.

Any suggestions?

Note - preferably not any of these...

1) "Noob!"
2) "You suck"
3) "Uninstall the game plz" and other similar responses... XD

Thank you!

in TG you often play against premade teams... you have a significant disadvantage when you go in a TG alone... you get randoms and often the team does not work. That's not a problem. It starts becoming a problem when the enemy team is premade

Have some friends and log in with them or play 1 v 1

[guglu]

going solo is often frustrating.
if u want to voice chat , add me . we can play in party

[Chronos_Sora]

Originally posted by -Dare Devil/x/:

-This is somewhat compounded because you are playing unranked that it happens an extremely high rate of unlucky.

-If you are newer, bear with some weird games to start in ranked. But then you should have a much more consistent experience. You'll still run into a smurf once in a while though.

-That is what I sorta am thinking.

" You'll still run into a smurf once in a while though."

Fake information.

I have played SO many games now, that i can confirm the real information, you will run into a smurf O F T E N.
On like 15 games last day, 10 of them had a smurf and i'm low elo, so it's not fun either for me or them, it's just frustrating for both sides, only 5 games was 100% same level.

[TheDiaper]

Originally posted by Otanashi:

Originally posted by -Dare Devil/x/:

-This is somewhat compounded because you are playing unranked that it happens an extremely high rate of unlucky.

-If you are newer, bear with some weird games to start in ranked. But then you should have a much more consistent experience. You'll still run into a smurf once in a while though.

-That is what I sorta am thinking.

" You'll still run into a smurf once in a while though."

Fake information.

I have played SO many games now, that i can confirm the real information, you will run into a smurf O F T E N.
On like 15 games last day, 10 of them had a smurf and i'm low elo, so it's not fun either for me or them, it's just frustrating for both sides, only 5 games was 100% same level.

https://aoe2.net/#profile-2887173
Becoz you were heavily overrated. There was TG elo inflation before May 2021, everyone would gain elo in the long run as the elo algorithm was flawed, making the elo median 14XX. At the time, the more you play the more you gain, even those who were supposed to lose elo (AKA players with <50% win rate) climbed up the ladder. This can be proven by your plummeted elo after the fix.

[DMg Halt]

Originally posted by Brutalist Ape:

I have just played four consecutive games where I was winning my part of the game, but:

1) An ally resigns out of the blue, leaving the whole team in the lurch and causing us to lose
2) An ally sits on their part of the map, not contributing at all to the battle the entire game
3) An ally is hopelessly incompetent, and gets absolutely destroyed by the enemy

It's very common, that I find myself in the following situation:

A) I am the highest scored player on my team
B) I am winning my fight with a 2 to 1 or higher K/D
C) The game evolves into a 4v1 against me because all my allies have played badly and let me down.

Now, as I understand it, you would think that there is an even chance of being on the stronger or weaker team. That it would work out 50/50, like flipping a coin. Random chance suggests that it should even out.

...

Any Suggestions?

Thank you!

Because you are doing it wrong. You're queueing up for a Team Random Map game, as a SOLO player. You are not playing on an actual team, right now you are just a group of individuals that were randomly put together and expected to be able to play a match as a cohesive unit executing an overall strategy.

This is why I only play ranked with people I've played with before, and have on my friends list. You can do this fairly easily, if you are ever put together with another ally, where you both played well together, add them to your friends list. Do this for every game and soon you'll have over 100 friends. Mine is currently around 250+, so I never have a shortage of fellow players to invite to a party should I want to play a ranked match, or even an unranked one for that matter.

The advantages of doing it this way:

1. No language barriers! Since you are in control of who gets to be in your inner circle, you can count on them being able to communicate in the same language as you!

2. You know what to expect. I absolutely hate quitters and people to who go AFK mid-game. I'm not talking about the random guy that disconnects because his computer crashed, internet drops, or had to step away to take care of something important. I'm talking about those players that quit the game because they think it's over, when it's not even close!

Perfect example here: When you're playing with random people on a 4v4 arena game, and you're in the pocket position, and ally in flank. He gets wrecked by an early push where the enemy flank did a Cuman rush by ramming down walls in feudal age while his pocket follows up with scouts and archers, while also the enemy pocket on the other side castles and sends in lots of knights.

The guy on flank getting 3v1ed is taking serious damage and quits, without even asking for help! Or even saying gg?!?! In that type of situation, the rest of your team is busy booming, while the flank is taking all the heat. You are actually now in a BETTER position than the enemy team, but the 3v1ed flank quits because he can't bite the bullet and buy the rest of his team some time to deliver a retaliatory strike.

3. You already know what your teammates are capable of Playing 10s and even 100s of games with the same set of players, you get to know them pretty well. You know their play styles. You know what they're good at doing, and what areas they suck at, and they know your strengths and weaknesses as well.

I'm much better at playing the pocket position than flank. I'm also way better at playing a supporting role, rather than the one initiating the strike. I pay attention to my flank and make army to compliment theirs.

Teams of random players put together, all doing their own build order and plan, ends up messy. If you were to put together two groups of players for a 4v4, one of which was a team of players, with headsets on discord, and have played with each other for years. And the other team is an equally skilled team(ELO wise), but never played with each other before, they all speak different languages, and they don't plan out what civs to pick either. The team with the headsets will almost always win, without even much effort on their part.

4. Command structure. When you have a team to play with you can have one person in charge, calling the shots and doing overall strategy, while the other 3 players follow orders. Having this ability opens up many more strategies that you would almost NEVER see in a game consisting of randoms. Slinging, coordinating scouts to pick off villagers are some off the top of my head. And having one person make navy, p2 transport ships and p3 makes army, and p4 makes extra villagers and mines stone. P3 and P4 send their armys and villagers in the transport ships to be ferried to the other side (Team islands) while P1 defends the convoy from enemy naval units. P3 lands on enemy terrain first to secure the area, P4 lands next to start building castles and production buildings.

After that it's usually played by making judgement calls (decisions) in real time to figure out what to do next.

If you play with the same group for long enough, you can try executing these types of tactics where everyone plays a role into making it succeed. You either succeed, or fail, all as a unit.

Hopefully this answers your question about "Any suggestions?"

Pro-tip: If I see quitters, I instantly mute them through in-game chat. That way if I ever see them in the future, the mute will stick with them forever and I'll know to kick them from my lobby if I ever see them again, or go on the opposite team (if I'm not hosting).

[Creeping Death (VvvvV)]

welcome to steam :D

I think you should have to play thorough a campaign before you can join ranked MP. But that would upset the trolls who make accounts to smurf.

[DMg Halt]

Originally posted by 丂тяιкηιηє:

welcome to steam :D

I think you should have to play thorough a campaign before you can join ranked MP. But that would upset the trolls who make accounts to smurf.

Or at least the tutorials. I know Runescape has a tutorial island you have to complete before the rest of the game is unlocked. It does a pretty good job at preventing people from creating mass accounts, but then again it's annoying for honest players because it takes like half an hour to complete.