What is the difference between teams and squads?

Question

I have been enjoying this game, but slightly confused with online play.

I know, for example, when playing Squad Deathmatch, you can usually have 4 teams of 4 playing, correct?

But sometimes you win, sometimes you loose. Right after the game ends, it will say 'Your team lost' or 'your team won'. Is there a difference between team and squads?

I ask because I have seen the 'your team lost' show up, but then get a badge on the next screen saying 'be a part of a winning squad'. Also, when talking to others on my squad, I saw 'your team lost' on the screen but they were saying that we won that match.

Answer 1

Your confusion is because DICE, the game developer, is using the terminology imprecisely.

First:

• "Team" is a major faction, US or Russians.
• "Squad" is a group within a team. Squads have 4 or fewer players. If a team is small enough, it might consist of just a single squad.

When you play Squad Deathmatch, it's your 4-man squad that wins even if message says "team" at the end. I don't recall off-hand whether the same confusion exists in the Squad Rush game mode, but I don't think so -- see below.

I suspect DICE coded the game with some standard win/loss text and just failed to tweak it for Squad Deathmatch games.

• In Rush and Conquest it's the team as a whole (Russian or US) that wins, not a squad within the team.
• The Squad Rush game mode also pits US vs. Russians, even though each team happens to be composed of a single squad, so at the end of those games you could properly say either "your squad won" or "your team won".
• Only in Squad Deathmatch are there more than 2 groups competing, so it can't break cleanly into US vs. Russians. The "Part of a winning squad" badge gets the terminology right.

I'm not sure about Onslaught since I play on PC and don't have access to that game mode.