Guild Wars 2

What I have noticed about my server (Dragonbrand) is that unless there is a guild group on the map, only 25-50% of the players in our zerg will be in the TS channel. I advertise our server’s TS as much as I can to get more people listening but the number of people never goes above 50%. I feel like a lot of the players who join our map zergs do not understand how important voice chat is for winning zerg fights. How can I show the usefulness of voice chat to people who don’t use it, and don’t want to try? I want to change the culture of our server, because I have a feeling that the casuals on the T1 and T2 servers are more likely to use voice chat than we are.

I think this is a serious problem for my server, I’ve seen situations where our zerg was the same size as the enemy’s but our commander would not engage because he knew the enemy was more organized (staying tight, stacking might, etc.).

You and many others will not like this answer but unfortunately for most that is too much work. Maybe a shift in mentality is necessary. I know it’s a hassle but if those willing to lead found a way to utilize chat better maybe more “randoms” would pay attention. Just a suggestion.

You have to remember that some people just play to unwind after work or school… giving 100% attention to a game is not on their priority lists, nor their wives/husbands/kids.

Just tag off and force them join on ts if they want follow u.

Eternal Rain.9376:

Just tag off and force them join on ts if they want follow u.

It won’t work. They’ll just map hop or go do something else.

Maybe I’m just smarter than the average bear but I don’ think TS is needed to know that you’re supposed to follow the blue triangle around on the screen.

fellyn.5083:

Maybe I’m just smarter than the average bear but I don’ think TS is needed to know that you’re supposed to follow the blue triangle around on the screen.

A case could be made for that but voice communication is much faster, pre-cognitive actually when you consider the commander can say what will happen before it actually occurs. You would transition from a reactionary style of play by simply following to a active style by knowing what will come to be.

Or you can remember WvW is not only for zerging and people just don’t give a kitten if server wins or not.

I’d rather not listen to TS…takes away from the game for me. Plus, I multitask while playing…don’t want another thing to pay attention to.

fellyn.5083:

Maybe I’m just smarter than the average bear but I don’ think TS is needed to know that you’re supposed to follow the blue triangle around on the screen.

For a simple train perhaps you are right.
For fighting against good organized guilds/zergs that’s not the case. They use TS for movement and tactics and you will have a hard time winning from such a group. If you win at all.

You just have to tell them that you’ll tag off if people don’t get on.
If you are repeatedly ignored, it’s time to start saving gems.

We had this problem on SoS after we lost most of our WvW guilds. You have to be verbal (spam the address, explain it to people like an adult).
They don’t have to be able to talk but they should be able to listen.

There are always those that say they can’t stand the chatter (too dumb to use volume adjust or mute) or that you should be able to lead with just map chat (because fighting and typing 60 wpm is normal for commanders, right?)

When you tag up, simply say “I’m here to help us get some points, not run a bag delivery service”. If people don’t listen, map hop. If no one goes on TS, pack up your bags because if the community wants to fight in T8 then you shouldn’t deny them the opportunity.

I don’t think there’s anything you can do, unless you are also recruiting those people into a guild that makes TS mandatory. Best bet is to assign 1 or 2 assistants to relay everything important into /t chant and relay what is said there back to you so that you don’t miss it. Active fighting of GW2 doesn’t lend itself to typing and fighting, really… But the stubborn ones or very casual gamers will never be convinced or care enough for it to make a difference.

Just keep running them into [Os], [TFG]‘s or [ZoS]’s groups this week. Every time they get curb stomped by an equal or smaller group of those guys explain to them it’s because those groups are listening to the commander on TS and able to react and buff themselves faster and better because of it. They’ll probably either get on TS to gain a competitive edge, or leave the map because they keep getting pounded. Best way to show them how effective it is is by putting them on the business end of it.

I don’t like listening to random people talk while I play a game. It’s different thing when you play with friends or small group in instance but being bossed around is not my definition of fun. I see enough of people with unwarranted self-importance on the chat. There are simply too many bosses around and not enough leaders.

Some people like listening music/podcast/talks while playing, hence won’t listen TS.

I have ran into problem that I can’t get into our TS, which require verification. Even though have asked multiple times for verification, never got one, so gave up even trying. Might be that I just have really bad luck with it.

aop.6052:

I don’t like listening to random people talk while I play a game.

I was basically going to say the same thing. Plus, I haven’t had many positive experiences with public voice chat when it comes to ‘off-topic’ chatter.

I also think it’s a lot to ask of a “casual” to d/l & install a program for one aspect of one game when they may not be that serious about WvW or have any use for TS outside of WvW.

My server has a commander who insists on using TS to the extent of not relaying any information in map/team chat. The result is every time he decides to fall back, WP, switch maps, etc. half the zerg is lost. I don’t see how that helps anything either.

After a year of listening to my fellow Rallians whine about everything under the sun, I no longer use the public teamspeak server.

I’d rather die 100 times than listen to one more person whine about BG’s coverage.

fellyn.5083:

Maybe I’m just smarter than the average bear but I don’ think TS is needed to know that you’re supposed to follow the blue triangle around on the screen.

This and other people saying similar things…

There are commands the commander says in TS that you won’t get in mapchat. Stuff that will keep you alive and get you bags, or stuff that will help you win the fight, or stuff that will help the whole server in general.

As an example, in TS, a commander gets a call to push X server’s keep because they are pushing on another map. In this map, you’re outnumbered, but you know that if the other map is successful, your PPT will spike sharply. So you start pushing, fully expecting to lose engagements. As a commander though, you want to keep most of your people alive, so you will move around the engagement very quickly. If you’re not in TS, you’ll miss most of that and either 1. become rallybait or 2. fall behind the main force and miss out on your bags.

Basically, my view is that anyone not in TS is rallybait and not worth trying to keep alive. If they can’t make the effort to help the server, then I’m not going to make the effort to help them get wxp, bags, karma etc.

As for whining about being outnumbered, having too much random chatter etc., I just tell them to shut up and listen to commands. Usually works a treat.

Part of joining a server TS is making friends outside your guild or small group of friends you regularly play with, there is no need to talk until you feel comfortable or you are scouting.

Just like finding a commander tag you enjoy running with, finding the right TS commander is crucial, some like to yell or speak rapidly others will speak with an accent or even in a foreign tongue, what is important is the communication a commander will give during a fight which cannot be typed out in map

Make your servers TS a community hub, let guilds have their own channel and have channels for those seeking PvP and dungeons to go to. Promote the server all the times, especially after a commander wins a fun battle and even after a group has been wiped.

Having such a strong community hub allowed Blackgate to get the first Tequatl kill, but alot of people had never used it as part of their everyday GW2 experience until that time, thats what you need to encourage as a server, WvW, PvE and PvP all player types need to want to load into TS whenever they load GW2

Some people do not know what TS is, make sure to occasionally include the how to download TS or vent or raidcall whatever voice program you use for your server

also you need to have an admin group who can be trusted and community driven, willing to sacrifice their playtime to verify those looking to join, setup the permissions and kick trolls and bots

Even on a server like Blackgate we do not have 100% TS numbers, usual numbers are between 50-75%, and as it was already mentioned running tagless is a great way to get people on TS even if it is only during the fights, be glad for those who do join you in TS and realise you will never get 100%

Also using something like plug dj to have shared music playing for those wanting to listen to music is also fun and can add something when the drunken commander starts to sing in TS :P

TLDR: You need to make your servers TS feel like one big server wide guild and somewhere anyone can join and enhance their game time.

id like to start off with saying i do indeed use ts when i feel its needed. however there is a few reasons not to log on to a community TS especially in the community that i reside currently. one of the main reasons not to go onto a community TS server on my server is the constant member stealing that occurs from smaller guilds to larger ones. now this in and of itself is not too big a deal but it really limits the amount of things a server can do in wvw by making the entire fighting force one guild it tends to be just zerg fest and multiple objective fighting becomes hard, not impossible but more difficult then need be. another reason is the amount of people who assume that because they have a c.tag that they are infallible now again mind you id say a good 50% of the time they run fun runs and do good but listening to other folks who may have insight is good as well. then of course there is lag issues inherit in the game to begin with coupled with a few bad computers and some folks who simply can not run both at the same time due to whatever limitation their hardware has. now my solution is going to sound a bit silly but generally the most simple solutions sound pretty silly at first. type, yea i know you cant fight and type at the same time and it becomes increasingly difficult to execute commands to others while fighting in fast paced combat such as guild wars presents but all in all dis-including a part of your warriors because they are deaf is not a smart military choice by any means. so if it becomes so tiresome that you can not type and fight assign someone to do it for you on TS. i know your kinda asking a bit much but the overall server cohesion will noticeably increase and maybe foster a few friendships in the process. i have not truly commanded in quite some time but when i did or my friend ahnk did we would type and then move or be en route and giving commands that would ensure our objectives where understood before reaching them. so just a little food for thought

Rather than just post the TS info, which is often the case, and expect them to hop on, take a few mins to explain why it helps. Be aware a lot of so called “casuals” have different reasons for not wanting to get in channel. Find a way to explain its in their (all our) best interests. When in TS, be aware some people are unfamiliar with some of the tactics and commands, and a few simple instructions or a brief explanation of attack plan can go a long way to encourage people to help.

that’s another fine point there. explaining your actions be it a successful or unsuccessful action would indeed go a long way. especially since you guys tend to come up with names for things and then scoff at folks who do not understand your intent.

and yes sorry unknown i kinda cherry picked from your post

Not to mention the griefers that log to just harass and interfere.

aspirine.6852:

fellyn.5083:

Maybe I’m just smarter than the average bear but I don’ think TS is needed to know that you’re supposed to follow the blue triangle around on the screen.

For a simple train perhaps you are right.
For fighting against good organized guilds/zergs that’s not the case. They use TS for movement and tactics and you will have a hard time winning from such a group. If you win at all.

Not necessarily true. There are several factors at play here.

One, some commanders just don’t lead well, and there is really no big advantage to listening to them.

Two, good situational awareness and experience trumps all. Even when I’m not on TS, I’m often sticking to commander better and dropping the bomb better then those on TS.

Three, what class you are matters. Heavies not on TS are at a disadvantage, but ranged classes have the advantage of watching from a distance and it’s usually obvious when to drop the bomb, haze, etc… If I dont’ want to be on TS, I usually play a ranged class.

All that said, you do still need a core that is on TS, but good players can follow that group easy enough and mean the difference between winning and losing.

Players with little wvw experience, or badly geared players, is just something you have to deal with gracefully. They will rally the enemy and lose battles for you, but that’s part of the game, we all have to deal with that. It’s better to just keep spamming mapchat with TS info and incentives for getting on TS. Don’t yell negative things to people not on TS, like ‘you are losing battles for us’. That’s not going to encourage people to get on TS.

I often ditch TS either because as someone else said, I just want to play in relaxed mode and unwind, or if there is just a bad commander on the field, or I just get tired of the immature conversations that the commander won’t squelch like they should.

To the OP’s question though, good commanders get more people into TS because people naturally want to follow good leaders. Never get negative in TS, don’t denigrate those not in TS. Make it fun, keep a good signal to noise ratio. Treat fights as learning experiences. If you lose NEVER go negative or blame other people. You were the leader, take responsiblity and move on.

I’ve found it works well to tell people that you know you are outnumbered but you are going to use this as practice and fight anyways. Find a way to have fun even when losing fights, that is just so crucial to keeping up moral and numbers. What separates good commanders from bad is how they handle bad situations, not how much they know about the game or classes.

I think the problem isn’t one of utility – people get the idea – but of trust. On our world for example, the ‘official’ TS server (which was nothing of the kind of course, but I digress) turned out to be run by a scammer who was using it to harvest personal details.

In terms of getting people on board, other than the trust issue there are two main points:

• Don’t spam the TS server address repeatedly, don’t abuse players for not using TS. That’ll just make people determined not to use it.
• Emphasise that you don’t need to talk, and in fact you don’t even need to own a microphone. Many people are uncomfortable talking to strangers on the internet, but would be happy to listen only (it’s basically no different from internet radio or a Youtube commentary at that point).

There are always those that say they can’t stand the chatter (too dumb to use volume adjust or mute) or that you should be able to lead with just map chat (because fighting and typing 60 wpm is normal for commanders, right?)

‘Stack on me’, or ‘zerg going to Hills wurm gate’ doesn’t exactly require 60wpm.

Edit: Should probably explain that I’m from a middle-ranking server (Gandara, second in EU silver league) so my experiences relate to that environment. I also like Teamspeak and use it extensively in another game (M&BW: Napoleonic Wars), I just don’t always like the sort of aggressiveness with which people try to promote TS ingame sometimes.

I have never used TS and some common sense and awareness will serve anyone better than people yelling in my opinion.

Dreadforce.6980:

I have never used TS and some common sense and awareness will serve anyone better than people yelling in my opinion.

Pretty much

TS often signals up the red flag of people taking things too seriously, I really don’t want to turn recreation into a second job or be abused because people are having tantrums.

It’s never gone well so I just stay away from it.

Carzor Stelatis.9435:

There are always those that say they can’t stand the chatter (too dumb to use volume adjust or mute) or that you should be able to lead with just map chat (because fighting and typing 60 wpm is normal for commanders, right?)

‘Stack on me’, or ‘zerg going to Hills wurm gate’ doesn’t exactly require 60wpm.

It’s not “dumb”, it’s tedious. Personally speaking, I do not have a set schedule. Sometimes I log in NA prime time, sometimes EU, sometimes SEA, sometimes Oceanic, it varies. So, we’re talking about potentially an entirely new group of people in TS every time I play. I will then more than likely (at least based on previous experiences) spend the next hour or two of my gaming time frequently alt+tabbing to hunt and peck for every person who is a problem, whether their mic is too loud, if I want to mute them, etc.

Turning WvW into a minigame of alt+tabbing to play whack-a-mole on TS is not a reasonable expectation.

Carzor Stelatis.9435:

‘Stack on me’, or ‘zerg going to Hills wurm gate’ doesn’t exactly require 60wpm.

If that’s all your commanders say then they must be really really bad…
Good Commanders will be saying a lot more and especially in the middle of a fight, they’ll be calling for pulls, stability, time warps, water fields, statics, well bombs, directing the melee train when to push and what direction to maneuver. It’s a lot of things to say that can’t physically be typed.

Best way to get people on teamspeak is to make them feel bad that they aren’t on it.

There’s usually too much random chatter and not enough relevant communication. I don’t play WvW to hear about people’s real lives.

Occasionally you get a commander who uses TS well, calls targets, combo fields etc. But not often.

You don’t need team speak if all the commander is doing is telling you which tower they’re hitting next, followed by some random kitten about real world politics and their musical tastes.

Our TS became more popular with ‘casuals’ when it was used to coordinate the PvE population for Tequatl. It’s never a bad idea to reach out to more of your casual players this way, as they are more likely to see the benefit of it first if it’s immediately benefitting them. We have many more PvX guilds utilizing TS and getting in on a regular basis since the whole Teq thing.

My experience is that being on server TS consists of being aurally cornholed by a collection of random stoners, bros, and stonerbros. So I think I’ll pass.

Dreadforce.6980:

I have never used TS and some common sense and awareness will serve anyone better than people yelling in my opinion.

Not really, TS lets a good commander issue instructions on the fly, where to stack, where to fire fields, what type of field to fire, the melee path etc. all of which generally means you stay alive longer and collect more loot. If your not on TS you don’t know what to do and when to do it.

I’ve only been playing about 6 or 7 weeks and the first couple I just followed the tag using my common sense and awareness as you put it, i then dl’ed TS and just sat in the channel and my loot shot up and my deaths shrunk by a huge margin because i knew what the plan was, as it was happening.

Possibly Deso TS is just far too civilised compared to the TS you’ve tried but its generally only relevant information that’s coming over the comms.

Decado.9304:

Dreadforce.6980:

I have never used TS and some common sense and awareness will serve anyone better than people yelling in my opinion.

Not really, TS lets a good commander issue instructions on the fly, where to stack, where to fire fields, what type of field to fire, the melee path etc. all of which generally means you stay alive longer and collect more loot. If your not on TS you don’t know what to do and when to do it.

I’ve only been playing about 6 or 7 weeks and the first couple I just followed the tag using my common sense and awareness as you put it, i then dl’ed TS and just sat in the channel and my loot shot up and my deaths shrunk by a huge margin because i knew what the plan was, as it was happening.

Possibly Deso TS is just far too civilised compared to the TS you’ve tried but its generally only relevant information that’s coming over the comms.

I’m glad it has helped you but as for me I see no need for it. If at some point the majority of WvW players (on my server) start to think TS is a must have and harass/force people to use it then its simply time for me to find another game to play.

Deli.1302:

Best way to get people on teamspeak is to make them feel bad that they aren’t on it.

You represent a lot of what is wrong with gaming today. You don’t care if people are having fun, you genuinely want to ruin their fun if they don’t play your way. It’s not a game to you, it’s a way of life, you have to win and you don’t care how many people you make feel bad to do it.

If you want people on TS, incentive. Do not try to force people/make them feel bad if they do not. Playing without TS is reasonable, understandable, and acceptable.

Call me the old geezer and tell me I’m not the typical player, but the ONLY thing I have a problem with is the language. Yeah, it won’t do a bit of good to say anything and I don’t. Just letting you know the one thing that makes me log out at times.

Deli.1302:

Best way to get people on teamspeak is to make them feel bad that they aren’t on it.

This can be done without belittling others and it is an effective way of getting more on TS. It worked for me…and now I have more fun since I tried it. IMO its just a matter of getting others to try it. It has to be done tactfully, but constantly letting others know that you could have won a fight if more were on TS without blaming anyone (at the same time) works wonders. Compliment their efforts, but stress how it could of had a different or better outcome.

We have one commander on our server that “commands respect” from the pug groups. That’s not to say he is demanding, he earned the respect because he explains his strategy and helps the new WvW players to understand why we do things. My fun-level and feeling of contribution went up immensely from just listening. I can only say that if you’ve had a bad experience or never tried TS take the time to tune in at different times to make sure you haven’t just had a bad first impression.

Khayoss.2019:

I don’t think there’s anything you can do, unless you are also recruiting those people into a guild that makes TS mandatory.

I agree with this, more guilds should make TS mandatory. Thats the only reason I started using it, and its much more efficient. Through TS you can hear calls for water fields (which are then blasted for hp), Veils, dodges (straight through the opponent to make them blow cooldowns), fire fields (which are blasted for might stacking), etc.
Try and convince more WvW guilds in your server to require TS.

Deli.1302:

Carzor Stelatis.9435:

‘Stack on me’, or ‘zerg going to Hills wurm gate’ doesn’t exactly require 60wpm.

If that’s all your commanders say then they must be really really bad…
Good Commanders will be saying a lot more and especially in the middle of a fight, they’ll be calling for pulls, stability, time warps, water fields, statics, well bombs, directing the melee train when to push and what direction to maneuver. It’s a lot of things to say that can’t physically be typed.

Best way to get people on teamspeak is to make them feel bad that they aren’t on it.

Nope, even when I do use TS (usually when I’m running with the Yakslappers guild group) the commanders never go into that sort of detail. They must be doing something right, as we finished second in our league above some higher-population servers and behind only the Desolation gigazerg.

Carzor Stelatis.9435:

I think the problem isn’t one of utility – people get the idea – but of trust. On our world for example, the ‘official’ TS server (which was nothing of the kind of course, but I digress) turned out to be run by a scammer who was using it to harvest personal details.

In terms of getting people on board, other than the trust issue there are two main points:

• Don’t spam the TS server address repeatedly, don’t abuse players for not using TS. That’ll just make people determined not to use it.
• Emphasise that you don’t need to talk, and in fact you don’t even need to own a microphone. Many people are uncomfortable talking to strangers on the internet, but would be happy to listen only (it’s basically no different from internet radio or a Youtube commentary at that point).

I think it’s important to make the information available. Since the most reliable way to get a lot of people on TS seems to be by posting the address constantly, I don’t see that changing anytime soon. I definitely agree that people shouldn’t try to push TS on others though, I understand there are perfectly legitimate reasons for not using it and it’s shameful to belittle someone for not using it. Of course if you can’t use TS, you should respect a commander’s wishes if they only want people on TS following them.

I think the best way to get people to use TS is to make it fun. What brought me into playing this game more was coming across people who were lighthearted and had a sense of humour about the whole business of WvW, that may not appeal to the most hardcore (who will have their own voice comms anyways) but I believe it will draw in the broadest group of players.

I’ll say the same thing I always say when this topic is brought up; “pay attention.”
I’ve never used teamspeak, don’t ever intend to. I’ve never had a problem with following the commander and the rare times I die are my fault for being distracted. Although yes this is personal experience and opinion, it still doesn’t make it any less valid that all people need to learn to do is to pay attention.
If a commander pauses, stack. If he/she throws down siege, build. If they start to retreat from a zerg, follow. It’s common sense, really. I find that depending on teamspeak would, if anything, make you a worse player rather than better. Because without hearing the orders you’re going to forget to follow the pin because you’re used to hearing it not seeing it.
Also, people complain about the most ridiculous things in map chat sometimes. And as I’ve heard, they do the same in teamspeak, too. I’d much rather not pay attention to mapchat and listen to music than have to tolerate peoples b_tching in my ears while I try to pay attention to what the commander is saying.

the way we got people into our ts was through advertising it and also making it fun. we got a lot of fun events like drinking nights so more and more people joined. but our ts has many channels aswell, not just 1 so guilds get their privacy and roamers or havoc squads dont need to be in a channel with the blob.

XacTactX.6709:

I feel like a lot of the players who join our map zergs do not understand how important voice chat is for winning zerg fights. How can I show the usefulness of voice chat to people who don’t use it, and don’t want to try?

TC has the exact same problem.

But… it is not that people do not know that voice commands are important. That’s usually not the reason why they don’t use voice.

There are alot of reasons why some people don’t use voice.
Some people use computers in shared rooms and can’t do voice.
Some people can’t use sound because they got parents walking around and the things people say in mumble aren’t exactly family-friendly.
Some people don’t like the swearing that goes on in there.
Some people don’t like orders yelled three times at them.

Lot’s of reasons other than ‘people don’t know that voice is important’.

Once you know the reason why someone doesn’t use voice, you can much easier convince them otherwise.

Wait a second. You’re from DB. You’re an ENEMY. I just gave advice to the enemy! Wo on me!!!

It’s a multi-tiered problem…

1) leaders are slaves: Commanders, you’ll have to get used to the notion that you are there to empower everyone else and that sometimes you’ll have to do ridiculous things to achieve it.

2) Language like “fairweathers” and such doesn’t encourage anyone to try harder. Learn to utilize these players rather than degrade and blame them. You’re only as strong as your weakest link.

3) Stop expecting casual players to play like pros. It’s just unrealistic. Maybe it’s time to rethink how we attack and defend with that in mind rather than only considering the “hardcore” players.

Just some thoughts…

I’m mainly a PvE’r who’s really only in WvW to map. I doubt you really want me in TS when my contribution will be marginal at best. The most you’re likely to get from me is some assistance in capping Sentries/Ruins, killing Dolyaks, and maybe helping to capture a Camp or two. Sometimes I’ll tag along with a zerg if they’re taking a Tower or Keep and help build siege or attack gates/walls.

That said, I will call out in /t if I see enemy movements, because I know it helps to have more eyes around the map.

Trow on a commander tag, type in mapchat.. lead people around to cap 1-2 things.. then ping a different borderland waypoint, tell in mapchat we are going to take keep X, tag off and remain on your own border while you tell your friends on TS the Q should pop any minute..

Have one of your friends who has been waiting on the pinged borderlands post TS information and the message “If you were on TS you would be farming loot with commander Y on the borderland you just came from.. thank you for opening the Queue..”

Rinse and repeat with all good open raid commanders on you server.

Zaxares.5419:

I’m mainly a PvE’r who’s really only in WvW to map. I doubt you really want me in TS when my contribution will be marginal at best. The most you’re likely to get from me is some assistance in capping Sentries/Ruins, killing Dolyaks, and maybe helping to capture a Camp or two. Sometimes I’ll tag along with a zerg if they’re taking a Tower or Keep and help build siege or attack gates/walls.

That said, I will call out in /t if I see enemy movements, because I know it helps to have more eyes around the map.

Do you have any idea how important that last thing is? It allows the commander to keep fighting and hearing, not reading, that ogrewatch is being attacked by 30+ zerg. So your contribution is not marginal at all.

Till mapchat will be part of this game you cannot force people using a third-party software. Overall (tbh) most of time people who talk in TS is really annoying. It’s not a guild raid. Less QQ about TS pls and deal with it.

And least but not the last if people is not able to follow a blue dot.. just meh.

If you’re in a PvD karma train zerg you don’t need TS.

If you don’t mind repairing your armor a lot you don’t need TS.

When I was a more casual WvW player I used TS to determine which guilds/leaders were the best to run with. Just as important, you can use TS to determint which commanders NOT to follow. Some of the bad commanders when I first got on TS have improved to the point now that they are worth following. However, there are a few that are still bad and I will follow their tag ONLY if it’s a PvD karma train.

What changed my mind about TS was when I was in my own BL and the enemy took NW tower. Our side gathered at gari and pushed to the tower, only to get wiped by a zerg that popped out of the portal, moved as a ball of death, melting any in their path. They went back in the tower and waited. Our side decided to build a treb and finally knocked down their wall. The masses rushed to the opening only to have the ball of death chase everyone back to gari, at least those that survived. They went back into the NW tower and waited, did the same tactic 3-4 times and never did repair the wall. Eventually they got serious and built a treb, knocked down the gari outer wall and systematically destroyed all defenses in gari and took it.

All during this there were about 5-10 people screaming in map chat that they had the best plan to beat them and that everyone else should listen to them. It was at this point that I knew that TS>map chat.

TS gives you the opportunity to live longer and collect more loot bags.

TS takes away a bit of anonimity in game. People will hear your voice so most of the people will not be so qq like in map chat.

Swamurabi put here great example on TS coordination.

I have other one:
We were outnumbered and trying to defend a tower. We made it inside, 10 players, while tower was being attack by 30 enemies.
Another 5 players joined us in game but not on TS. But we advertise TS in map chat that those players should joined us.

We stacked behind portal, buffed up, and on my mark we moved through and start killing enemy. On my next word we moved back to tower while 3 our eles were finishing those downed enemies at gate by meteor shower.
Water field, blasts, buffing #2 and run out again.
We made 3 these raids through portal and then all enemies were killed.

result:
1 raid – all our player that were not on TS with died because they stayed out too long as they did not hear order to retreat into tower
2raid – 2 guys dies as they were heading to kill rams, they managed to get those rams to 10% and our eles finally killed rams
3 raid – we managed to finally kill all enemies

Another example?
Yesterday afternoon RoF border, we heard that SM is under attack and outer is down. Few people that were on TS(like 10-15 if i remember) moved to EB, Sheepie from TaG put his commander on and started to lead us to defend SM.
There were Arborstone players trying to get in, and also Blacktide players trying to get in.
North and south gates were down, they even broke north inner. We managed to get in SM in time and we managed to defend SM sucesfully.
Without TS, we would not be able to do that as they were 2 big groups trying to kil us, and there was really a huge mess in SM. But with help of TS, our commander did not need to stop and start writing orders. He just say those orders while he was killing enemies or trying to repair gates.

And this is how TS is helpfull. Without TS we would not be able to do this. And this is why I am still using teamspeak everyday talking with those great people there.

Neeho.3859:

You have to remember that some people just play to unwind after work or school… giving 100% attention to a game is not on their priority lists, nor their wives/husbands/kids.

^^^ This. I know we can all be more effective if everyone is on TS but I don’t really care. It’s also not that hard to follow a Tag with a Target on their head around. I stack better than many people who are on TS and it’s pretty easy to know when too might up. I still get plenty of kills and have plenty of fun.