Player Preferred Pattern: Difference between revisions

 

See also [[Abridged Arena Array]].

 

* If a fighting game has [[Character Tiers|a tier list]], then expect many people to automatically choose the characters that are near the top of the tier list just because of that fact.

* Many shooter-players have their own favoured gun from the [[Standard FPS Guns]] list.

*** And if the game otherwise requires your team have a certain mix of classes/weapons to ensure optimal teamwork, this trope is especially horrible to have to deal with.

*** Which brings up another point: Teamwork itself rarely ever falls under the [[Player Preferred Pattern]]. Quite a large number of people generally focus on their own personal score and ''nothing else'', not even ''winning the game''. This is highly cultural, though -- it's almost never a problem in ''[[Starsiege Tribes|Tribes]]'' games, for example, even on public servers, while in ''[[Call of Duty]]'' this is pretty much guaranteed unless you go out of your way to set up a game with people who you know will actually act as a team.

** Halo Reach has the DMR, which, now that everyone is capable of headshots due to the game's large aim-assist, is worse than the BR in many situations. Then there's the sniper rifle, which can kill banshees, falcons, warthogs, ghosts, revenants, wraiths, and even the mother of all vehicles, the scorpion, in some situations. [[Fridge Logic|It kills vehicles more easily than the rocket launcher]]. Again, due to the aim-assist, the sniper rifle is incredibly easy to use at close range for a large, bulky .50. You don't even need to "[[Call of Duty|Quickscope]]." One can easily kill a charging shotgunner at point blank or a DMR marksman at mid-range using only the sniper rifle. The AR is also completely useless in this game, and of course, there's a commendation for using it.

* ''[[Team Fortress 2 (Video Game)|Team Fortress 2]]'' was specifically designed with this in mind, providing nine premade characters based on popular play styles and equipping them with only their associated [[Weapon of Choice|Weapons Of Choice]].

*** Of course, now that Backburner has been given airblast, people now complain it's too strong and there's no longer any reason to use other flamethrowers. [[Unpleasable Fanbase]] indeed.

*** Before the recent Enforcer nerf, many Spy players had the "Dr. Enforcicle" weapon selection. It consisted of the Dead Ringer (a watch that allowed you to fake your own death and gave you a special invisibility that blocked 90% of all incoming damage for 6 seconds), the Enforcer (a revolver that did 20% more damage at the cost of a longer time needed to activate your cloak), and the Spy-cicle (an icicle that made the Spy immune to fire for 2 seconds, at the cost of it melting and being unable to use it for 15 seconds). These three items synergized very well together: the Dead Ringer could not cloak at-will, but cloaked you instantly if you took any damage while it was out. This instant cloak nullified the only downside to using the Enforcer. The Spy-cicle made the Spy's worst enemy, the Pyro, almost completely useless during the two seconds of fire immunity, during which time the Spy could have a free shot or two with his 20% stronger revolver.

** Counter-Strike has a total of 22 guns that can be chosen from (6 pistols, 2 shotguns, 5 SMGs, 4 assault rifles and 3 sniper rifles) but basically all are inferior to the 3 mainly used guns: The AWP sniper rifle (1 hit one kill), or the M4A1 or AK47 assault rifles, as these latter two are the most powerful and accurate by far of all the guns. Anyone using any of the other weapons, except possibly the pump shotgun, usually results in "noob".

** There are dedicated "scouts 'n knives" maps, which only allow you to carry the Scout sniper rifle (AWP's weaker brother) and the knife. These often involve reduced gravity to add a new dimension to the gameplay.

** Along with bikes, most people will only use certain characters due to them having slightly better bonus stat boosts compared to other characters. Expect to see no one but Daisy and Funky Kong online and in the records for Time Trials and tournaments.

** Or people on Wi-Fi usually just play as their [[Author Avatar|Miis.]]

** A Fire/Kinetics Controller is the go-to character for all manner of farming and power-leveling as well as general gameplay, combining awesome damage potential with crowd-control ability. Rare is the player without one of these in the roster. Toning down (i.e. nerfing) either Fire or Kinetics will unfairly punish those who use one powerset without the other, so it continues to reign supreme after years. Villain-side it's a little less cut and dried, but Super Strength/Willpower Brutes come the closest.

** Also, as a way of [[Player Preferred Pattern]] of [[Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game]] players, every team ''allegedly'' needs a healer.

** Until you start [[Boom Headshot|sniping smokers and hunters waiting on buildings in the face.]] And trying to jump on you. And boomers trying to fall on you. Then they complain about how much it sucks to get killed before they can get anywhere near you. However, with the relase of The Sacrifice DLC, the Hunting Rifle in the first game now matches the accuracy of the same gun in the sequel. Time will tell if people will use this gun more often in VS.

*** Similarly in the sequel, the most used weapons are either Auto Shotguns or AK-47s with a laser slight (if one can find a laser sight), simply because of how powerful they are.

* Online ''[[Reset Generation]]'' opponents typically consist of Plumber and Cyborg - especially the latter, for which there are two steps to easy victory: 1. Grab energy drink to charge Rocket Jump. 2. Grab enemy princess and Rocket Jump to the nearest teleporter or self-colored tile.

* In ''[[Sim City]] 4 Deluxe'', expect most cities to be crammed packed full of skyscrapers due to only Dense zone use, as well as to never see one railroad or elevated rail system as opposed to avenues, roads, subway and bus stations. That is of course, if somebody's trying to [[Serious Business|rebuild a real-world city]]. Oh yeah, almost nobody plays the game without a [[Game Mod]].

** This shows up in ''[[Final Fantasy XII (Video Game)|Final Fantasy XII]]''. Because it's so damn ''easy'' to teach every character every spell and skill in the game thanks to the License Grid, many players have a party with identical skill-sets and equipment.

*** This can pretty much happen in any ''[[Final Fantasy]]'' game where anyone can learn anything.

**** Bitch Please. Doublecast Bahamutt, [[Game Breaker|Quick]], then [[Completely Missing the Point|quadruplecast Bahamutt.]] There you freaking go.

** ''[[Final Fantasy XIII (Video Game)|Final Fantasy XIII]]'' had the [[Bonus Boss]] Vercingetorix vulnerable to poison. Due to his sky high stats, the target time for him was 20min for an endgame party. Cue everyone facing him with Vanille/Fang/Snow, poisoning him and spamming Mediguard until it needs repoisoning or it dies.

** Played with a bit in the new major version - ''all'' maps have magma, you just have to dig until you hit the mantle. Unfortunately, the lag caused by the sheer amount of magma will cripple your computer.

** Indeed, players who aren't doing something that could get their entire fortress killed are considered to be doing it wrong. Exceptions may be made for sufficiently epic 'Megaprojects', however even most of these have a good chance of killing everyone if they go bad. For example, if you want the eyes of your colossus to be magma behind obsidian, then you're going to have to pump magma up some dozens of stories in order to get it there.

*** There actually is a reason for that though. Ninjas are literally bad at everything else. Dual wielding theoretically puts Ninja at a point it can equal two handed weapon users for DPS. In reality, they do less because every hit gets the same defense value subtracted from it, so lots of fast hits do less damage than a few slow ones. This doesn't apply to Monks because Hand to Hand has special math for damage. Debuffing is terrible, a Red Mage (one of the classes almost every party wants in late game for reasons beyond debuffing), can debuff faster, more effectively, and with a wider range of debuffs than a Ninja can.

*** Ninja subjob is also required for some endgame content, as well, for reasons other than elitism. Some endgame mobs have AoE abilities that instant kill. Blink is the only reliable way for any class, except maybe Paladin, to survive those attacks.

* In ''[[Call of Duty]] 4'' and ''World at War'', everyone uses the Stopping Power perk. Failing that, the Juggernaut perk. Otherwise... you're very unique.

* ''[[Modern Warfare]]'' 2 has a few class builds: tending to use mainly the assault rifles rather than the other weapons, with the Stopping Power perk. Marathon-Lightweight-Commando, a sub machine gun, and a pistol with the Tactical Knife attachment which halves the recovery time of your melee attack. If the class uses Danger Close, they will have an explosive launcher with either the Scavenger or One Man Army perk to replenish their explosives. Or, on very rare occasions, the Riot Shield, which cannot even be penetrated by FMJ.

* ''[[Call of Duty Black Ops (Video Game)|Black Ops]]'' The Big 3 according to Treyarch are the FAMAS, AK74u, and Galil. The FAMAS and AK74u have been nerfed amid cries of being overpowered.

* Despite being a rather well-balanced game overall, [[Battlefield Bad Company (Video Game)|Battlefield: Bad Company 2]] players will tend to pick very similar loadouts within each kit, comprised of the weapons considered to be [[Game Breaker|OP]]:

*** The AN-94 is very popular, due to the fact that it does the highest damage out of all the assault rifles and fires an accurate 2-shot burst. Made even deadlier when paired with the 4x scope and magnum ammo.

** Engineers use the Carl Gustav rocket launcher like a deadlier 40mm grenade.

* In the ''Carmageddon'' games, the player can complete a regular race in three methods: take down all pedestrians, cross all checkpoints in order for some laps, or waste all opponents. Very rarely will players want to race or kill pedestrians, as fun as it is. This is also true regardless of the current vehicle's weak strength.

* Few are the players who tackle the [[Bonus Boss]] of ''[[Persona 4]]'', or most of the endgame for that matter, without the combo of Yoshitsune + Power Charge + Hassou Tobi. The only variation comes in how many buffs you use beforehand.

* The randomised [[Tech Tree]] of ''[[Sword of the Stars]]'' was implemented for the purpose of preventing this. You may have a winning design and loadout in mind, but if the [[Random Number God]] doesn't like you, you'll just have to throw your best-laid plans out and work with what's available.

** There is a tiny chance of you getting a "missing" technology from a wreck of an enemy ship, provided you are the winner and you have scavenger ships in your fleet. Even then, you have to run a special project to even determine what you'll get from the wreckage.

*** This is because out of all weapon types swords deal the most raw damage numbers and as a result are the [[Player Preferred Pattern|most popular choice]]. Guns deal pathetic damage per hit. However, swordies have to dodge or block enemy attacks once in a while while gunslingers can just keep pumping lead into the enemy, resulting in higher average damage over time in some cases. Bombs are good for support or inflicting [[Standard Status Effects]]... a playstyle unlikely to be a [[Player Preferred Pattern]] in [[Spiral Knights]].

* JRPGs in general fall victim to this. There is one party that everyone uses, no matter how many characters they have available to use.

 

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