Lemmie give you a quick example: lets say the opponentās team has a tank, a healer and 3 damage dealer types and your team has no healer, unless you coordinate your attacks and burst opponents down faster than the healer can hope to heal them, your team is most likely going to lose. PuGs typically donāt have that kind of coordination.
Just want to clarify my stance on the topic of a āMetaā.
I LIKE THE IDEA OF A META. I just donāt like playing the āMetaā since Iām typically an āAnti-Metaā Player. I canāt exist as an anti-meta player if there is no meta for me to counter, right? lol
A clearly defined Meta game for me is very good since it lets me know what I should prepare for.
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The real problem with following the meta in general is that someone tries something and it seems to work so they spread the word on it. Then people read or hear it and try it too. Then you have an echo chamber all saying mostly the same thing. But it doesnāt take too long for someone creative to come along and try something new that destroys previous misconceptions. And so on. There used to be a time when this sort of group think wasnāt as widespread in CCGs and such. Pretty much before the internet got huge. Then youād only have it in small groups. Theyād each have their own meta.
Iāve been playing a digital ccg, SolForge, for a while. I made about 40 decks inspired by combos I found myself amongst the cards. And only about 10 later when I started looking at the SolForge forums. I tried out some of the meta ideas and it was interesting but I enjoyed finding my own path a lot more.
Youāre not guaranteed to have that coordination even if everyone in the group was playing the meta. Weāre talking about PuGs here.
Lack of coordination is pretty standard in PuGs, Iām in agreements there. My point was that an uncoordinated group following the meta will have an advantage over an uncoordinated group not following it.
Although I should clarify that by meta, I mean a group with balanced roles (whatever has been proven to be most effective and is generally used in high level play, such as the olā tank-healer-dps). Iām not talking about everyone having that one optimal build/items. I always diverge from the recommended builds and customize it to my playstyle. As I gain experience, I learn to adapt said build to the current situation as well.
A meta does not just describe a team comp. It describes the best way to win the game. COD: Best rotations around the map due to enemy spawn positions, best sightlines that give ample vision for you but still protect you.
Smite: Best way to rotate camps to obtain the most amount of exp, therefore giving a level advantage over opponent.
Battleborn: Best ways to traverse maps, More important to go for your own Thrall camp or the middle one where two spawn.Plus a lot more nitty gritty things. A meta is not just about Team Comp.
There are a finite number of optimal strategies for any game, and this number is much smaller than the suboptimal strategies. If your opponent is playing with a better strategy, his odds of winning are higher unless you are simply a better player and can offset that with skill. That is the genesis of the meta: a standardized set of strategies that are understood or believed to be the best way to play, and if followed by all parties should let skill be more of the deciding factor. That is to say, whoever wins did not win because of a better build order, or jungling rotation, but because they executed everything better. They aimed better. They made better targeting decisions. They played as a team better, and so on.
All that being said, the meta is certainly not gospel, nor is it always correct (if it was, it wouldnāt evolve). But, players who deviate far from it without good reason and obviously poor results probably will hear about it from some teammates. It is a finicky situation because while one can easily argue āI can play however I want,ā one can also counter with āSure, but when the fun of nine other people rely on you, should you?ā
In other words, no one would care at all how anyone played if their play did not directly impact anyone else, and when it does I feel it fair to expect some accountability from others. This does not mean you need to adhere to the meta, it is more along the lines of, āI am going to do my best to help the team win, and I can expect others to do likewise.ā When a whole team fulfills that contract, it is usually pretty fun, win or lose.
Of course, there are always going to be toxic players that demand you play one way (their way, naturally), but as long as you are genuinely trying to help win I donāt think anyone has much room to comment on how you play.
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I am new to the whole PvP thing. I mostly like to play alone or co-op. But the twitch streams are making me want to play the PvP. I just want a group that wants to win, and not give up if we are losing badly. And not always play by the meta. Play as your character is ment to be played, play as a team, and not get butt hurt if our team is losing. I hate the toxic players that get on you when you are playing alright, but not great. I am jusyt hoping to meet up with players that like to have fun and help me out when i sneak attack the thralls with my mellka in incursion. Lol
what platform are you on?
Ps4. I cant wait until the beta to try the PvP. I just hope the bigger community is as nice as this one.
What is your PSN?
I think that, at the end of the day, thatās what we all want, hehe.
yes.
Psn is DrakenArc. Add me if you want to play battleborn together. Might have to finaly get ps+ now. 
I mostly play games for having fun time , not necessarily for winning !
if you play only for meta then you ruined the game for yourself and your teammates , IMO.
meta makes ppl aggressive since they think other teammates MUST pick meta champs and if they dont , well you know what their recation !
thats why I always avoid meta players.
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I donāt believe in a meta anymore after playing Smite for so long. Any team can overcome anybody else with strategy and error free play. In my opinion(and not trying to offend anyone) anyone that plays by the meta because āits what you are supposed to doā is either an elitist who wants to be good at the game but has a fear of failing without direction, or someone that just follows the trend and never plays for what the game is for fun and teamwork. Meta is not relative to me anymore as i just see it as an excuse to follow a trend.
The worst is when itās just like one guy on your team who has the meta āall figured outā in their mind, and expects everyone else to adhere to it exactly as theyāve decided. They almost never ASK you to do something in chat, they just complain when you DIDNāT do what they alone decided was optimal strategy.
I donāt play meta, I wonāt be enforced to play by unwritten rules of other players, but I AM here to help the team & get better, so if you need something, ASK - donāt complain afterwards when you didnāt get it.
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It scares me how many people are āagainst the metaā. There is a reason why meta exists - it works and it helps.
Obviously no meta is perfect and there are always set-ups, builds and strats that are not the part of current meta, but actually work well. The problem is, the majority of anti-meta players that Iāve met are just going with what they want with no regards to what actually works. In result the team ends up with weaker team-play since there is a support who went full dmg because he likes that or somebody picked an assassin with no dmg in current build.
IMO, people need to accept few things:
- You need to know the meta and know why and how it works.
- People need to learn to accept the fact that the meta isnāt perfect and if something works but isnāt part of the meta - it is fine.
- If you decide to deviate from the meta - INFORM YOUR TEAM AND EXPLAIN YOURSELF. Or even better, ask them if they mind you trying something else (maybe mention that it worked before if it actually did)
P.S. Iām talking ranked games here. You can do whatever in casual
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I completely agree. I donāt understand the hate for metas in games, they serve as a good understanding of whatās best to do for a comp. match. A meta is just what works well- having a support healer, an initiator tank, a jungler who hits flanks; having good team composition and knowing the best actions to take as each hero, pushes a team to do better. A healer is commonly garbage agents a tank, as both have their obvious respective roles to play that work well. Just as a tank sitting in the back of the line makes no sense.
If you want to improve and get better at games, you perform strategies that have naturally developed from experienced player that work towards winning. The most superior strategies that typically win games are easily going to be done again and again until a better strategy is formed to defeat the old one, and the cycle continues. I donāt understand why you would hate what works.
A well composed team with the understanding of what works best against a team trying something new is more likely to win- however itās not impossible nor uncommon for a new strat work, and thatās how even newer metas are formed; by trying something new to defeat a well working meta.
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āMetaā is not exclusive what everyone is doing in a game, or what they say is best. Meta is the strategies and concepts that exist within a game that are not expressly designed by the creator. Meta is stuff like feints and bluffs, unconventional uses, and other things of the sort. These things can come together where the community sees a combination or composition or some such that seems to have the least downsides to it, itās not unbeatable and not the gold standard, itās just ideal in the majority of situations.
āThe metaā as most people consider it is usually a comp, or perhaps the guideline to a good comp when dealing with this sort of game. And this is not a bad thing. It doesnāt exclude other options, it just says that this is the safest option. I donāt think that people following it is bad for the game, if anything it says the community is interested in winning, and having a competitive community drives a game to be refined.
All of that said, this game doesnāt have a real meta. With people not yet understanding how to work as a team, and how to use supply stations, a character like miko seems really advantageous and thereās no reason not to pick him. This also encourages the counter pick of galilea. Some changes perhaps need to be made to this to prevent this from stagnating the game. Someone else needs wound, and people need to understand how to move around the map efficiently and as a group. Buuuutā¦
Thereās only a few things that I see that every team needs. Each team needs a decent amount of CC, CC is important in all kills more or less. Each team either needs to collectively, or within one character, be able to properly clear waves. And you need a character who is focusing on grabbing shards, preferrably one who can efficiently go behind enemy lines and take their shards, and use those shards to build buildings. Some characters can do all of these, a lot can do a couple of them.
The last thing that I see teams need, which I donāt like and needs to be changed in my opinion, is a sniper due to their ease of destroying buildings while staying completely out of harmās way. But other than that, thereās no āEvery team needs a supportā meta, thereās no āGet plenty of tanksā meta, and there definitely isnāt a specific superior team lineup.
I canāt say Iāve seen any real elitism when it comes to the meta around here, but I think the game is in a pretty good state as far as avoiding having a majority of people fall into the same ideas. And we have people like me (and others) who try really hard to convince people against absolutes in the game. I thoroughly enjoy that I can play reyna as an āassassinā sort of character and still function. Itās all pretty open, and theyāve intentionally designed characters to be able to do a few different things and being able to focus into them.
There should be a meta, it lets the developers get in tune with the heartbeat the community to understand what theyāre doing. And it can drive the community to compete. But there should also be plenty of people crusading for the viability of everything, explaining and proving its merits. This drives the game to continue evolving. From there the developers can see what should be changed, if anything, and understand how their game is being played regardless of their original intentions.
Iām not really a supporter of the idea of a perfect balance, yin and yang, democrat and republicanā¦ But these two things should exist because they push against eachother and cause a refining process. Donāt complain about people having a meta or aligning to it, instead debate with them, see why the meta is how it is, and do some actual research and experimentation. Let it drive you to make those incredible discoveries that turn the meta on itās head, then do it again, over and over.
This is a glorious game, itās more or less a moba thatās controlled as an FPS. The skill is less about APM and constant feints, itās about aiming and excellent movement. It retains all strategy and teamwork from mobas without having the informational wall that is the true difficulty curve of mobas. I canāt wait to see where the developers take it, where the community takes itā¦ and I dream of the day to see this on a competitive stage, being played for a large prize pool in front of hundreds of thousands of people.
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