Friends vs. randoms: which do you play better with?

[Superhands]

This is something I've always got into a discussion about with my Steam friends. Some of us tend to play better when we're with our friends, we feel like we can enjoy things more and we play better as a result. Whilst with others of us, we relax too much when playing with friends which makes us play badly.

Which one of these describes you?

I personally play a lot better with randoms. If I'm playing with friends, as I said I just relax too much sometimes, not only because I'm just having fun but also because I know I'll almost certainly get revived.

If I'm playing with randoms, I don't wanna go down because I know there's a chance that I'll die out. There's also the fact that I wanna play well, I don't wanna look like a bad player. With my friends, they've seen how I can play, I need to prove nothing to them, and as I said my friends will most likely revive me so going down doesn't matter so much, especially if I have the points to recover.

[TheZombieChicklet]

Playing with friends is easier, more relaxing, you tend to not think about it as hard, which means you don't do as good most of the time, Through with friends, your guarenteed to get revived 99% of the time, which means you don't have to recover as much (espessicly if you have the money) I myself mostly play with my girlfriend. her sister, her brother, there mom, my brother, my sister, some other lesbian friends from around town, and my dad. through, I will play with randoms occasionaly if I need a break from my circel of friends.

I prefer friends, but as I always say all your closest friends were randoms at one point.

[Tom852]

Well, i have 3 points.

On one hand, i agree to superhands' opinion. I relax too much when I play with my heterosexual friends, so I might play not as professional. But with randoms, I try to give my best.

But now, on the other hand, you are only as good as your team is. When those randoms behave as dummies, my game is in much more danger, causing a lot of downs of myself.

Another point is, I think you only rate your own game compared to the other players. When you have 2 downs and the other guys 20, that looks as you would have played well. But when you have 2 downs and the other 0, it looks as you would have played bad.

[TheSlushTurtle]

Friends deffinetly because we can actually make a strategy and communicate because we all have mics....but i havent played with randoms in a few months because of the ones without mics and arent that good

[BlindBusDrivr]

Playing with friends. Even if my friends were horrible, still them because every time a random goes down he leaves :facepalm:

[Superhands]

Friends deffinetly because we can actually make a strategy and communicate because we all have mics....but i havent played with randoms in a few months because of the ones without mics and arent that good

I guess I meant, not with high rounds but with performance in general. There are games when we only get to round 20, I go down and everyone else follows. But throughout the game I made a ton of crazy revives and got out of loads of bad situations etc. If I'm going for high rounds or just a generally awesome fun game, I'll always hit my friends up.

[BlindBusDrivr]

Just curious here Superhands, are the 'randys' on PC better or older than those on say XBL?

Because if I had to describe XBL randoms there's a few things

high voice little kids

guests

box spammers

never seen round 15

or

no mic

sits in corner on his own

and typically they go leave if you don't pick them up.

[Superhands]

Well... when I was first installing the game, I was thinking 'PC gamers are hardcore, I bet even the randoms kick so much as at this game'... but, as it turns out, they're just the same as you'd find on any other console I think what annoys me most is, even thought everyone has the option to type chat, so many of them downright refuse to communicate and co-operate.

[perfectlemonade]

To be honest, I don't think it matters. ;)

[Tom852]

Well, did a game yesterday with hands. I didn't even watch my back anymore, I was too lazy for it. I mean, hands was there to revive. I run about 5 times in the same spawn point, got blocked and died, just cause I was too lazy to stop my shooting for a second and check if a zombie is coming out that spawn point there.... I mean what we had hands? 10 and 15 downs or something around that at Round 50? How ridiculous is that for us. Just remembering a random game, that ran quite well a few days ago, where I had 2 (unlucky) downs at 40. One was cause those damned death machines spinning up at the Easter Egg part, totally defenseless there

So in the end I guess I will also play more focused with randoms.

So it's imho definitely something that matters. I just think it doesn't change your skill, it changes your effort and focus you put into the game.

[Superhands]

Well, did a game yesterday with hands. I didn't even watch my back anymore, I was too lazy for it. I mean, hands was there to revive. I run about 5 times in the same spawn point, got blocked and died, just cause I was too lazy to stop my shooting for a second and check if a zombie is coming out that spawn point there.... I mean what we had hands? 10 and 15 downs or something around that at Round 50? How ridiculous is that for us. Just remembering a random game, that ran quite well a few days ago, where I had 2 (unlucky) downs at 40. One was cause those damned death machines spinning up at the Easter Egg part, totally defenseless there

So in the end I guess I will also play more focused with randoms.

So it's imho definitely something that matters. I just think it doesn't change your skill, it changes your effort and focus you put into the game.

This is just what I was saying when you play badly with your friends because you know you'll get revived, especially after the EE is done as you don't really care if you go down.

I guess if you say to some people 'Yeah, got to round 50, 11 downs' they'd say 'Huh, 11 downs? Sounds like you got dragged'. 'Well, they had the same amount of downs as me, so I guess we dragged each other'. Point being there, you can play like crap with your friends and still go to whatever round because you all know how to revive each other, regardless of how badly you're playing this knowledge doesn't go away. Whereas with randoms, you're forced to play well or you won't last. Not to mention there's the competition between downs, whereas playing with friends I could care less if I had 1 down or 10.

[Tankeo Dempsaki]

My friends are usually better than the Randoms I get.

I get to higher rounds with friends,

But I play better with friends

[Tom852]

Just played a lot with randoms now, and right now I would say again, that I play better with privates. The games seemed anyway pointless, so much pointless, that I didn't even give just a little bit of effort into the game.

I guess my opinion about this questions changes randomly....

[Dandaman955]

I have few friends to actually play with, as only a few have a compatible router that will let them host me. Other times, I'm forced to play randoms: The most aggravating bunch of people I've ever had the displeasure to meet - Hosts quitting at high levels, robbing your kills early on, dying before round 10, hitting the box instead of reviving you, irritating 12 year olds who want to show people their new microphone, I have a whole list here. It wouldn't be hard to see why anyone wouldn't go for 'Friends' being the better option, but it's always nice to diversify...

[sw33thearts87]

I would have to say friends just because they know you play. Sometimes randoms ask really stupid questions. But they are fun to play with and troll.

[piepwns]

Well, I'm tempted to just hop right up and say friends, but it depends on the random, hence the name random. The person who I have always worked best with in zombies I met in a random WaW Der Riese lobby. So, it really depends on the random.