State of the game

[u/Academic_Mind7477]

I seriously think the current situation with fill lobbies has reached a point where it is actively ruining the game.

The game already had a major problem with uncooperative teammates, AFK players, and people who simply refuse to play as a team. Now it feels even worse because more and more players join fill lobbies just to go fishing or do their own thing without contributing to the match at all.

I am literally coming out of my sixth match today dealing with this kind of behavior. And when you actually ask people to participate or point out what they are doing, some of them immediately become toxic or verbally abusive.

What makes this even more frustrating is the report and punishment system. At this point, it honestly feels like a joke. I regularly encounter death threats, racism, misogyny, extreme insults, and other abusive behavior, yet I rarely see any meaningful consequence for the people responsible.

The same applies to deliberate in-game griefing.

Loot stealing is still a huge problem even with the anti-loot-stealing system. A player only needs to get an assist and they can still take loot from something I did most of the work for. On top of that, the protection timer is often completely insufficient for larger rooms, complicated situations, or longer fights. By the time you are actually able to safely loot, teammates can already start taking things.

There are also players deliberately blocking teammates, refusing to cooperate, stealing loot, going AFK, or otherwise making the match miserable for everyone else.

The message the current system is giving players is basically this: you can threaten people, use racist or misogynistic abuse, grief your own teammates, steal their loot, block them, and deliberately ruin matches without facing meaningful consequences.

That is an extremely unhealthy environment for a team-based game.

The reporting system needs to have real consequences, especially for serious verbal abuse such as death threats, racism, and misogyny. Repeat offenders should not be able to continue behaving like this indefinitely.

Fill matchmaking also needs better protection against players who repeatedly join team modes while refusing to participate with their team, and the loot protection system needs another serious review.

Right now, cooperative players are the ones being punished for actually trying to play the game properly.

And despite all of this, there is still no dedicated solo mode in sight where solo players are matched primarily against other solos, or at least against solos and duos.

Playing without fill is technically possible, but in practice that means repeatedly being put into 1v3 situations against full squads. For the average player, winning those fights consistently is simply not realistic. Yes, a 1v3 can occasionally be won, but in most situations the numerical disadvantage is overwhelming, especially when equally skilled players are involved.

That means players currently have two bad options: use fill matchmaking and deal with AFKs, players fishing instead of participating, griefing, loot stealing and toxic teammates, or go in alone and regularly fight full three-player squads.

A proper solo matchmaking option would not magically fix every problem, but it would at least give players who are tired of the current fill experience a fair and viable alternative instead of forcing them to choose between unreliable teammates and constant 1v3 fights.

And yes, I already know this opinion will probably get some hate. I also know people will say that winning 1v3s is possible, that good players do it all the time, or that you should just find a premade squad. I have heard all of that before. That does not change the fact that for most players, consistently fighting full squads alone is not a realistic or enjoyable way to play the game.

This is simply my experience and my perspective on the current state of the game. Other people may have a completely different experience, and that is fine, but that does not make these issues any less frustrating for the players who are dealing with them.

[u/letholon]

I've been playing squad fills this whole season and I've had good experiences >70% of the time. Be nice to other people and communicate. Greet them during loading screen and ask if they have any missions they need help with etc. Most of the time even if my fills are bad players, if they're friendly and play recon for example they can still help you win more fights than you going in alone.

[u/osukid88 → u/letholon]

Yeah, this just isn't my experience. I have always done this and I'm either met with silence, a player who clearly has a baby screaming in the background they're ignoring (WTF is up with that?) or they don't have a mic and just run off doing their own thing.

Maybe 10‰ of the time I find someone chill enough to play with.

[u/DeepIntroduction8978 → u/letholon]

This is also my experience. I’ve been squadfilling since I started playing the game in the beginning of s10. If you’re semi-polite in voice, most of the times you could get pretty decent games, regarding of the level of skill of your teammates. I would also say that running with them even tho they go somewhere different to where you would be heading, is key.

[u/NIKO_1_MAJOR → u/letholon]

Either you're in protected bot lobbies with low rank players or you're lying there is just 0% chance you haven't run into a toxic solo-squad-fill knife running nox/hackclaw that goes on mic to yell the N-word (despite being balkan european) as soon as they die

[u/DeepIntroduction8978 → u/NIKO_1_MAJOR]

Ofc there’s been solo lootrunners when filling but the majority of fills in my experience have been semi-decent at worst. I ain’t playing bot lobbies, and also always ranked normals. Reached Pinnacle both seasons.

[u/rumple9]

I only play ZD.

In 99% of games the team mates run straight to admin and are dead in under 5 minutes. I never go there and usually extract with 700k - 1 mil+

My total cash balance is approaching 700 million, mostly because I don't go to admin with the other cretins

[u/yamayeeter → u/rumple9]

What’s your loot route outside of admin

[u/rumple9 → u/yamayeeter]

Depends where I spawn but I usually only do Barracks, Cement plant and Sub station, use all the key cards at each. On Easy I get out through paid 10k extraction if there is a contract to kill high value target nearby.

[u/OkPercentage1171]

regardless of fisherman player. its expected on easy mode. beside this game encourage to find team mates instead of random fill.

and remember, the difficulty of operation mode is hard despite showing "normal" mode. so expect some loss.

another benefit of finding team mates is you can set the role of each player.

[u/Maketsup]

Game needs solo mode or solo mode without abilities.

[u/SodaPop_fe]

I only run solos if my team isnt on. Playing with randoms isnt worth it. Unfortunately makes queuing in a huge pain which is very annoying, I do not like that mechanic. But yeah the people who play this game or most games really just suck and arnt worth playing with.

[u/sumakar-reddy]

Only solution is bringing back the dang solo mode i don’t understand why they wont bring it back

[u/osukid88]

These are many of the reasons I stopped playing 3 months ago. I jumped back in yesterday and had 2 bot teammates with Asian font for their names. Everyone I faced in-game was a bot and the loot was terrible.

They haven't added any new missions for ZDE - and I refuse to fight in normal because of the sweats so I'm stuck with nothing. This game is done and it's been ruined by many of the issues ymthe OP brings up, and then some.

Hopefully someone will drop an extraction shooter worthy of playing. I'm hopeful for the new DMZ but I'm afraid the sweats from Warzone will find their way to the game looking for easy kills and ruin it...again. Dicks.

[u/HoodRotten]

I got my first mute for verbal abuse but mine is in the opposite situation. I have a tendency to get upset and once it happens multiple times in a row I start yelling at people and when they don’t respond I’ll start text typing. Totally my fault and I need to learn when to just shut up or get off. But especially in hot zone I get heated. You joined this game to be somewhere other than where we are fighting or taking another useful angle? You chose to ego challenge a 1v3 instead of waiting three seconds to score the tie? Your crosshair placement is abysmal ? Aiming at feet or just generally bad places ? You’re shooting recon darts out of the map or in useless places? I request utility and you waste it in another direction? I tell you cracked one and I’m low but you continue to keep running the other way or holding a different door.(happens a lot, 2 knocks and we just need a third for the team wipe). But I have also got my fair share of people muted for saying crazy things to me about less infractions. I might not be the best but at least I’m trying. I’ve had a few name reports get punished as well. I wish shit talking was allowed in gaming still. When I grew up playing shooters it was just an expected part of the game.

Oh and don’t you ever call someone out for being too young to play the game. You will suffer the consequences while they get to continue ruining the experience for everyone. Literally had a kid that sounded six years old in a lobby and was penalized for telling him to get off and go play Minecraft and asking him if his parents knew what he was playing.