Has In-Game Comms become reliable enough?

[Neutral Calypso]

I hear everyone going on about talking on Teamspeak or Vent or Mumble...

But has the in-game comms advanced to the point where they are viable to use for squad and platoon coordination in-game?

How do various outfits coordinate their comms anyway? Especially the larger ones. I have been in squads and platoons that had multiple things going on at once, and it seems that people start talking over each other.

For instance: Two galaxies flying to different locations, let's call them Galaxy A and Galaxy B... and then at some point Galaxy A's pilot orders everyone to drop... only for several passengers in Galaxy B to hop out at the wrong time. Woops.

So how do the various outfits and such handle comms?

[Assist]

Curious myself, since I don't run in a large group. I've been considering joining a larger outfit but the voice comms is one reason that generally turns me off. I play a lot by sound(footsteps, voices, etc) as well, so tons of people talking drives me nuts.

[EVILPIG]

On alts I play with open squads a lot and there are a lot of groups and outfits that only use in game VOIP. It works well.

[bpostal]

They're not bad, but I'm not sure they're perfect either.
They work most of the time and after some configuration (that takes maybe a minute) for your transmit you can be pretty much off and running an open platoon.

Creating/finding a custom channel is a little clunky but I haven't used that for a while so I'm not sure how it sits at the moment. The option is there at least.

Depending on the time of day and where you're at, there are only a couple folks spamming voice chat with music or that xbox kiddie bullshit where they're bickering with their parents over an open mic and it's easy enough to mute them. A side note: It used to be easier to mute people, with the option right next to their name when they spoke but that functionality has since been removed. wtf?

Long story short, it's not terrible and gets the job done. Just make sure that the comms stay as disciplined as possible or the pure noise will start to do your head in.
Hope that helps

[Hamma]

I've used it once or twice, but it remains off for me 98% of the time.

[Neutral Calypso]

New thought: Is there a way to disable proximity chat but leave the other in-game VOIP alone?

[Assist]

Originally Posted by Neutral Calypso

New thought: Is there a way to disable proximity chat but leave the other in-game VOIP alone?

yeah, click the check box :P

[Obstruction]

it is ok but it tends to be more plagued with critical failures than any 3rd party VOIP.

• in game comm keys can fail to operate intermittently until client relog or at minimum disable/reenable in the settings
• comms can drop out mid sentence or become garbled by client lag at times
• there's no administrative control (each person must be muted by every individual and even then it doesn't always stick)
• only 2-4 channels exist depending how you look at it. squad/platoon for up to 12 and 48 people respectively, outfit to broadcast to possibly larger groups, command to broadcast to faction squad leaders (if certed).
• terrible line-in capability (music/soundboards are really gross sounding in game)

i'm sure there's more.

and believe me i use in game comms in pick up groups often, as well as proximity voice to coordinate quickly with other lone wolves. i consider it to be invaluable. but it does fail at crucial moments in sometimes critical ways, or is simply inadequate for the task at hand.

one prime example is running air and ground at the same time. ideally you want to keep a certain amount of air up, and allow people to join infantry and armor when they are grounded, then rotate some infantry back into the air when your coverage gets thin. in game, everyone is talking in one giant group at worst, or clumsily moving squad to squad to try to have some level of order to the madness. in any event either you hear a bunch of chatter you don't need to hear, or can't hear what you wish you'd heard.

something like teamspeak is more suited to this simply because you have whisper, whisper lists, and channels. you can group infantry and armor in one big room, or many rooms, where they can scream GO GO GO all they want, while the pilots can sit in another channel and plot attack vectors free from crosstalk. then it's a simple thing to have squad leaders put into a whisper group so that top down coordination can happen without every swinging dick piping up with his opinion while the brass is talking it over.

in game just can't do that, and probably won't ever.

[Neutral Calypso]

My efforts at muting people never work. I can only wonder why that is.

The typical example is the nonsensemonger who starts playing stupid music through proxy chat or whatever at high volume, and nothing you do makes the damn thing stop.

I really wish SOE would fix the mute option.

[Sledgecrushr]

I use proximity chat every time I play. It seems to work well every time I use it. The native voip Ive used only a handful of times and even though at times its a bit staticky I actually like it like that because to me that seems realistic.

Edit*. I urge everyone to turn on your prox chat, at least when you get away from the warpgates. The stupid shit stops when the bullets begin to fly and its good to be able to communicate.

[Calisai]

Whisper lists and different rooms for different squads is key in outfit organization. It's fine for pickup groups or quick talk with other squad leaders, command chat but it's lacking in a lot of features.

The biggest advantage is whisper lists for tank/lib/gal/sundy crews. Gunner/Driver communication without spamming the whole squad/platoon while still being able to hear the others in general.

You also have better control over volume levels of particular rooms/people.

That said, Most of our squad leads keep in-game comms on as much as possible. It helps with co-ordination with non-outfit players and other squads. So it has its place.

[Gonefshn]

Can't stand in game voice still.

[ThatGoatGuy]

Many large outfits use things like Teamspeak. Though, when running lone wolf, I occasionally use prox chat.

[Snoopy]

We use Teamspeak. Each squad is set up in a different channel, and squad leads/fire team leads communicate with each other, and platoon leads using whispers. In game comms aren't used for obvious reasons, and no one really uses command chat because of enemy spies.

[WSNeo]

Ingame comms work fine, but cannot compare to Teamspeak and Ventrilo obviously.

Proximity voice is good if you're talking to people around you, I mainly use it whenever I want to talk to my gunner and don't want to clog up the TS comms.

There's a channel that only squad/platoon leader can access whenever they are certed in to it (Think of it as the voice equivalent of CR4/CR5's /command chat). This is used commonly to direct squads, our outfits during large scale operations. It's perfectly clear for me and I've not had many problems with it.