Oy vey. I understand peoples frustrations with the Antagonist system it can be broken at times. But please tell me how is it other players have such a hard time dealing with an Antag and i dont? How is it my games are so different from theirs that they would call for the Antagonist system to be removed or made optional? But before you answer let me give you a little insight on how i play the game.
When i jump on Spacelords I check to see what Bps are available and which ones have very high gold and faction rewards. I play as a raider when try to obtain my daily rewards and when completed ill switch up and play as an Antag for a few games. I run in to my fair share antags. I win some i lose some, but i have a good time. I get that some of the player base doesnt like PVP but its not like they arent skilled players. So what reason could you give me other than "you dont like PVP" to get rid of the Antagonist system.
Further more Every person that dislikes both the Antgonist system and mentor matches only wishes to get rid of it by making it possible to opt out of both. Yet they never offer up any solutions to try and fix the current system. Half these problems could be solved with a solid form of communication between players. The prompt system doesnt work. If players (both vet and rookie) could communicate more clearly, coordinating against antags and teaching rookies would be so much easier.
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Only thing that's rough when you begin the game against antags is jack diddly for rewards and wasted time. That's what irked me back when I first started playing and what I feel for newer players today.
That being said, everyone is different. I love the gameplay so much, I didn't mind (most of the time) getting my ass kicked by antags. And it honestly made me a much better player. Not only helps being better against antags obviously, but also the PvE. It really sharpens your awareness and your ability to carry. As for as advantages/disadvantages in PvE, there are ALOT of variables that make that up, player level is just a small part of that. The game not being newbie friendly may not be good on MSE part to the sell the game, but it being a positive or negative is subjective. It's niche title anyway...
As for as folks quitting on sight when an antagonist shows up...don't know if it's a PC/XBox thing, but I play on PS4 and am level 168 and I have only seen that happen like 3 or 4 times through my playtime (and one of them is someone on this forum, who won't be named, but is a level 300+. You should be ashamed of yourself
). But your mileage may vary I guess...
I'm not opposed to antags being optional, but that would mean less games for antags. I don't play antag personally, but if I did, that pissed me off. Since I don't, I have no strong feelings, but the PvP folk would have every right to get mad ... My personal opinion is to just penalize players a portion of their rewards who opt out of antag. Tier 5 (LV 1-19) won't get penalized, but after that penalty will be steeper the farther the tier.
For now, like I suggest to every anti-antag person, find a group on reddit, discord, gamefaqs, etc who feel the same as you do and squad up. You'll queue matches much faster and you can all surrender when an antag shows up.