Big thanks to  Snowie for this following submition

A lot has changed since http://www.tf2lobby.com first launched. After a tentative start, the system has gotten better and the players more reliable. In finding myself using it more and more for quick fix TF2 and seeing the declining attendance of IRC pickup games, I decided to investigate and see how the scene was developing.

For those not aware of it, tf2Lobby is a system that organises people looking to play 6v6 or 9v9 games, by providing them with a place to advertise their game in a manner similar to IRC. A player sets up a lobby using either his own TF2 server, or by choosing one of the servers provided to tf2lobby by various generous hosts. They then set up the gameplay rules for that, and wait for people to join and fill up the teams.

When a player joins a lobby, they can choose to join either team and pick any class that is available. Far from existing in a land free of class limits, there are actually multiple ways of setting up your game (including 9v9 Highlander). You can completely ban utility classes should you wish, or allow only the sniper, or all classes. This does have the side effect of allowing people to play pyro the entire game, however for the most part people realise that this would be a bad idea, if not then a friendly word beforehand will usually get them to agree to play scout/soldier for most of the game. Once all the spots are filled, the lobby leader locks the lobby and after a few seconds the server is automatically set up and the players automatically join it.

Games are quick to start, particularly on the most popular maps, badlands and granary. As always, the last spot to fill is usually the medic, although there do seem to be a lot of eager medics as every lobby I’ve ever joined or set up has taken less than 15 minutes to fill.

Generally speaking, the average player base for the lobby is at the same level as the #mpuktf2.pickup channel (over the last few weeks many of the people I have played with on tf2lobby have been using it whilst added to #mpuktf2.pickup and waiting it to fill up). Using divisions, this is about 5-6, or low/low+ using the ever fluctuating skill ranks. Voice communications are handled almost always by the in-game voice communication system. At a guess, maybe 10% of the people use comms actively throughout games, although using them first yourself often tempts other people to get involved.

For the most part, the system works. I’ve not faced too many complete clan stacks, although sometimes the teams are uneven, but in such an open system as this it would be next to impossible to assign skill rankings to everyone. Perhaps an option of randomising the teams by class once the lobby is full could be useful. I’ve had 5-0 rolls as well as 3-3 draws, similar to the pickup games I’ve played in the past.

Any player that drops or doesn’t show up for a game is reported and a substitute requested. These substitutes arrive 99% of the time, although it would be nice to have the substitutes added to the lobby player list screen, so that you could report a substitute who doesn’t show up as well. When the substitution system was first introduced it was clear that many people were clicking on the request to be a sub without even considering what it meant, as most never arrived. However now that it has been around for a few months, substitutes are much more reliable.

It’s even possible to get custom map and less popular maps played in lobbies. A few weeks after coldfront was being picked up in the US, I ran a few EU lobbies to try it out. Of course the games were somewhat lacklustre with many of the players never having seen the map before let alone played it to the degree that they’d played other maps, but it was still an interesting experience and a nice test of the system. It should be warned though, that if you intend to use custom maps you should make sure your server is set up with a fast download URL to allow people to get the map as quickly as possible. Custom map lobbies do take the longest to start if people are downloading from servers and run the biggest risk of no-shows, so make sure your server is set up correctly and provide people with links to download the map in the lobby before the game starts so they can be ready beforehand if at all possible.

One area that I’ve been interested in but haven’t yet had a chance to explore, is the possibility of using tf2lobby to provide a new way of organising clan games and especially gathering statistics from them. The stats generated are overwhelming. You can see a kill/death matrix by player, by weapons, but the real crown jewel is the match timeline. This shows on a map overview exactly where all of the deaths and captures occur. A system like this could be invaluable to a clan trying to learn why they keep losing the battle for middle for instance.

Glorious Stats!

So where can tf2lobby be better? A lack of comms is a problem, but one that is entirely down to the players. It may be possible to incentivize using voice comms by rewarding regular users some way, but the crucial thing to do is to make sure you use them yourself. Because of its completely open nature, tf2lobby will have lots of people who are completely new to 6v6, so hearing a regular clan player will be invaluable experience for them, as it is when playing pickups.

The karma system currently remains a mystery. I believe it is intended to be used as a way to mark out good team players, but currently the values assigned are invisible to everyone, so it isn’t useful at all yet. Hopefully this will change in the future.

The skill base is quite low. How would this be changed? Simple – get better players playing on it. I’ve seen many more ETF2L regulars from the higher divisions playing in lobbies in the last month. If you’re in divisions 1 to 3 and play lobbies then invite your clanmates to play as well. The other solution is to help out those who aren’t as good. If you see someone do something wrong, let them know in a constructive way and offer to help if you can. It wouldn’t take much to run regular mentor evenings on tf2lobby, just have two mentors as ‘captains’ in either team and advertise it as a lobby for people who are new and want to learn how to play better.

See who fragged who, where and when. It's the ultimate TF2 stalking tool

To see how tf2lobby looks from two very different perspectives, I conducted following two interviews, one with a newcomer to the competitive TF2 scene, and one with a division one TF2 player, who give their thoughts on playing on tf2lobby -

Interview with a new player

What TF2 experience did you have before playing on tf2lobby.com?
I was a micless pubber that hung out on the VIA clan pub server.  I was vaguely aware that a competitive scene existed, but didn’t know much about it.

How did you find tf2lobby.com?
I think it was through some friends I knew on pub servers, but it was so many months ago, I can’t remember for sure.

How easy/difficult did you find TF2lobby to get set up?
Not that easy, actually.  You have to add a key generated by tf2lobby to your steam profile, but it took several attempts for me to get it to recognise my account.

What classes and game types do you like to play on tf2lobby?
I play almost exclusively Medic and I enjoy anything that isn’t Badlands or Granary.

How often do you find people communicating with in-game voice comms? Do you respond if you hear them, or do you use voice-comms even if other people aren’t?
Comms in lobbies is usually poor or non-existent in my experience.  I always say ‘hi’ and, if anyone has a mic, they’ll usually respond.

Did you consider using tf2lobby.com to find a clan or was it an accident? How did you get into the clan scene?
I had a scout from a div5 team add me to their friends list, played my first few scrims with them and that’s how I found my way into my current clan.

What differences did you find between playing tf2lobby and playing clan games?
When you have a full team ready to play, organising games on #tf.wars works much better than lobbies: you get more chance of playing opponents of the right skill level, you can use mumble instead of in-game chat, games generally start *much* faster than lobbies, and people don’t drop out mid-game so much.

Do you still play on tf2lobby after joining a clan? How often do you play on it?
Only when we can’t get a pcw or mix, then we’ll go stack in a lobby.  So, I don’t play very much lobby these days.

Do you look at the statistics that are generated from the lobby games?
They’re very cool, but not that useful to me: I already know how many ubers I dropped and, as a medic, there aren’t really many other stats I’m interested in.  I suppose it’s nice when you get more heal points/ubers than the opposing medic, though.

What do you like/dislike the most about tf2lobby?
It’s a good way to get into more competitive-style games and meet some good players: you won’t be raging at people stealing health packs nearly as much as pubs, for example.  What’s bad about it?  You have to be pretty patient in waiting for the lobby to fill, then sitting around waiting for people to connect and requesting subs.  It’s often twenty or thirty minutes before a even game starts.

Have you ever played a pickup game using an irc channel such as #mpuktf2.pickup? If yes, how would you compare it to tf2lobby?
Nope.

Inverview with a Division 1 player

What classes and game types do you like to play on tf2lobby?
I play anything other than medic and usually 6on6 badlands. Pretty dull, but it takes less time to fill up.

How often do you find people communicating with in-game voice comms? Do you respond if you hear them, or do you use voice-comms even if other people aren’t?
In european lobbies very few people communicate in English. You’ll get the occasional russian buddies screaming at eachother and calling your medic a noob. Yanks however love to use their in-game voice, sometimes I prefer playing those pickups, just to hear them whine in different accents. And no, my mic has never worked in-game and I cant be arsed fixing it.

Why have you played lobby games instead of playing pickup games or mixes?
Mostly because there aren’t mixes or pickups going, so instead of playing public I’ll just join a random tf2lobby, very simple and entertaining.

What are the differences for you between playing lobby games and pickup games?
I think most people will agree that the #mpuktf2.pickup channels skill level has dropped to near-lobby-level, and the elitist prick one is never on. So theres not a huge difference at the moment. However I think they should at least try to implement a “pro”-mode in tf2lobby, where people have to communicate. Because as long as they keep it at in-game voice, lack of communication will hold the lobbies back in skill-level.

Do you enjoy playing with lower skilled players?
Sure, I get huge e-penis from it, and about 5 people adding me per day. I feel like fragga does after releasing his latest flick. Its a bit annoying though at times, because scouts give up very easily, and change classes to heavy,pyro or spy. Theres also an amazing rate of ragequitting in these lobbies, I wish they would punish ragequitting harder.

If more high skilled players played in lobby games would you prefer it?
Of course, pickups has made loads of good players like koeitje, kaidus and berserker, along with their equally bad manners. I hope more good players from higher divisions start using tf2lobby like pickups, so that people can actually learn something from playing lobbies. I learned a lot from my time in #mix2luxe, and I dont think Skinnie would’ve been as good as he is if it weren’t for the invite pickup.

Do you look at the statistics that are generated from the lobby games?
Yes, they’re pretty interesting, and I play like a complete statwhore at times.

What do you like/dislike the most about tf2lobby?
Pickups have traditionally created a lot of good teams (I’m pretty sure piece(of shit) slick and the old idk people met through playing pickups), where-as tf2lobby has such a bad standard that a player with 500 lobbies played, will have the same gamesense as someone who recently started playing competetively. So I really dislike that the pickups, which have always been brilliant in tf2, now are reduced to the crap level of play that is tf2-lobby standard. However with some improvements I think tf2lobby can be amazing, beause I love how easy it is to use, and how little time it takes to get a 6on6 going.

Conclusion

Tf2lobby has a healthy mix of new players and ETF2L regulars from all up and down the divisions. However like pickups, lobbies will never be a substitute for playing with a clan that knows each other intimately. Playing with strangers always carries a risk of having someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing, or who is a pain in the ass. But it’s still a fun way to play 6v6 (or 9v9 highlander!) gameplay when your clanmates are busy. Just don’t expect to beat my side at highlander on cp_dustbowl.