A new type of Stopwatch

(tokamak) #1

The appeal of stopwatch, for many, is that it copes with the asymmetrical nature of objective modes well. There’s no attacker or defender advantage if teams swap between the rounds.

The weakness of stopwatch is the risk/reward nature that comes when competing for time. Objective mode gives a generous time for the attackers to complete the objective. This means that it’s more important for the attackers to mount and a stable and gradual offence rather than cutting corners and doing lemming tries in order to get a faster time.

A SW game has less tactical depth in each round due to time pressure. It also partially explains why side objectives weren’t really seen as a big necessity in old maps. Teams simply didn’t have enough time to afford it on side objectives.

So here’s a new idea:

Make teams compete for a team-score.

  • Just like in SW you play two rounds where teams swap sides.
  • The second round however isn’t going to be constrained by the first one.
  • Both attackers get the same deadline (of say, 20 minutes).
  • The team that has scored the highest amount of xp at the end of the match wins.
  • The difference in completion time becomes a bonus xp-modifier to keep pressure on the attackers.
  • The modifier is applied to the (substantial) flat reward of winning a round.

What this does:

  • It keeps the level playing field of Stopwatch
  • It has the tactical flexibility of Objective mode
  • It puts a bigger emphasis on scoring xp

All in all a mode like this allows for DB to be a more diverse game. The main condition for this is that XP acquisition has to be incredibly balanced and acquired. Each merc should be able to score the same amount of xp each match on average. The xp-difference between attackers and defenders still can’t be too large in order to compensate for the team that gets the first favoured side.

But yeah. It requires a larger responsibility on the development side but the dividend is that you get a game that is more inclusive for different games, a game that feels more rewarding for different roles while still favouring the teams that know how to defend for as long as possible or complete as fast as possible.

(PixelTwitch) #2

I have been saying this since the first few days of playing Dirty Bomb.

Having the core game mode dictated by time is just plain silly.
I do think your ideas also have some problems but overall I would just love to keep the debate about Stopwatch open.

(tokamak) #3

No doubt this idea has weak spots as well. And there may be other modes that reconcile this square peg in a round hole that is asymmetrical ranked gameplay better. It’s just, well, incredibly difficult.

(onYn) #4

Eveno tho I would like to jump on the “Stopwatch is bad” hype train you two are riding here - I can´t imagine it happening.

I honestly wonder - but can understand when looking at the current maps - how stopwatch mode can have little tactical depth. Honestly side objectives have the job to enable an easier completion of a main objective. It should be a tactical decision if you want to give up 1-2 minutes of your precious time for a side objective (given it´s lower defense) but then have an easier way to the first objective or skip the side objective and go straight for the main objective being confident in your teams abilities. I don´t see side objective being an issue of stopwatch mode but more a consequence of the, well known, map flaws.
Every time you attack or defend an objective you need to decide how you attack it, which lineup you pick for that attack/defense and how you coordinate the attack/defense. At the same time you have to decide wether you want to just lemming it or do it in a clean fashion where you kill of the entire enemy team and then start doing the objective. As a defender on the other side you need to adjust your defensive line to catch lemmings before they reach the objective, while not being too aggressive and getting picked by the enemy.
You need to pick and adjust a specific combination of those factors EVERY time someone of your team re spawns depending on who you have in your team and who you play against, which objective you attack or defend as well as how much time you have left. Attackers and defenders have to adjust themselves properly all the time, according to the objective overall map situation and also the enemy adjustments what for me creates nothing less then an insane tug of war (I googled it ^^) where objective progress can go both ways. In the end you will only win the objective in a time you “need”, if you have adjusted those elements properly (thats why I am so heavily against one merc limitations). I wonder how taking the factor time out of this mix would give your more tactical depth.

For the suggestion itself: I would like to test every mode possible, and also have as many of them in the game as possible, could definitely help people to find what they are looking for in a game :slight_smile:

(tokamak) #5

Oh I agree. But let’s take this one step further. Initially DB maps were mainly tested for SW. For SW to be satisfying it helps if a map is streamlined, preferably favouring attacks to prevent daraws. While for Objective it works better if a map consists of several ways for the attackers to ‘anchor’ their progress (through side objectives).

Time-trail makes players behave differently and it makes maps look differently.

(onYn) #6

[QUOTE=tokamak;511840]
Time-trail makes players behave differently and it makes maps look differently.[/QUOTE]

Obviously it does, but like I said, I think that a side objective should be an investment for the main objective they are linked to. They should be an investment in time - that generally pays off in therms of the main objective being easier and done in a faster time then without the side objective being completed. This is something that would work on SW as well as Objective mode.

Giving more flexibility for objective mode in this sens would actually add plenty of extra work. I am sure once DB is out, and SD sees themselves which mode is most successful by watching at numbers of which game mode is being played most, instead of what wannabe game developers say on those forums ^^, they will focus on those mode and actually unleash there potential.

But as much as I would love to see more modes - I really believe in the selection of the game mode by the amount people play them and how a larger community sees them - I would prefer to see the work happening on the mode that was here from the beginning. Until the circumstances are provided, under which this mode can be judged properly, I prefer to see improvements on this side, then on development of new game modes.

(tokamak) #7

I disagree that side objectives allow for faster completion. The fastest time in which a map can be completed is the time it takes an objective class to sprint straight to the objective and completes it.

Side objectives don’t trade of time, you’re not investing time to win it back again. What happens is that you’re trading time for more security by anchoring your progress.

This means that in SW you look differently at such anchors than in Objective. In Objective your deadline is fixed, it doesn’t matter how fast you complete it as long as you do it before the deadline. In SW, as a first attacker it does matter how fast you do it. Side objectives become luxuries rather than important securities. You can still do them, but there’s less incentive than in objective mode.

This is why I think SW is holding back the amount of side objectives SD is comfortable with putting in a map.

(onYn) #8

This could be seen as a different explanation for why a side objective can improve your time. As an investment of time (what you need to spend) it CAN pay off in a better time then you would have without investing, because you would have lost the objective progress because of the missing security. The point about an investment is, that it doesn´t allways pay off, and maybe you just would have gotten a much faster time without doing the side objective.

It is a tactical decision that you need to do, that can or can not be beneficial for you in therms of completion time. Even if you start as an attacker in a stopwatch mode, you will try to get the fastest time possible, and that may be possible by doing or skipping the side objective - it will depend on your teams strengths and weaknesses which one is better for you. In my eyes this is exactly what a side objective should be about.

(Glottis-3D) #9

i see this as a nice mode, reminiscent of l4d/l4d2.
long plot-driven objective filled-maps. where you need to get further, than the opponent team.
to make it even more alike to the l4d you can go with attacking mercs vs defensive mercs.

but as i said before: first things first.
lets fix SW, lets make it the best mode ever once again, and only THEN lets play around with additional modes!

(montheponies) #10

[QUOTE=tokamak;511849]I disagree that side objectives allow for faster completion. The fastest time in which a map can be completed is the time it takes an objective class to sprint straight to the objective and completes it.

Side objectives don’t trade of time, you’re not investing time to win it back again. What happens is that you’re trading time for more security by anchoring your progress.

This means that in SW you look differently at such anchors than in Objective. In Objective your deadline is fixed, it doesn’t matter how fast you complete it as long as you do it before the deadline. In SW, as a first attacker it does matter how fast you do it. Side objectives become luxuries rather than important securities. You can still do them, but there’s less incentive than in objective mode.

This is why I think SW is holding back the amount of side objectives SD is comfortable with putting in a map.[/QUOTE]

That certainly wasn’t my experience playing SW in RTCW. You would always apply tactics, the limit of time on SW meant that anything other than doing so would come back to haunt you. It was never the, rinse and repeat, lemming rush that you’re seeing just now, that’s more to do with the crap spawntimes.

The clue is in the name, it’s called Stopwatch - it should be based upon time, the maps and spawntimes should be created or adjusted to suit the mode. The main issue, again, is that Objective is more like storymode - so should have longer maps and more in round progression - sharing the same maps for Obj and SW is the problem.

Adjusting the mode to suit the poorly design maps and/or spawntimes is just the pinnacle of cart before horse.

(warbie) #11

Agreed. The forum’s full of theory crafting like this - trying to get around problems that didn’t exist in the first and best game of this type. SW doesn’t work! Let’s blame the gametype rather than the obviously poor maps and the spawn timers that don’t allow for defensive biased choke points.

(Glottis-3D) #12

i wonder, whom are you talking about…:rolleyes:

:cool:

(tokamak) #13

Side objectives mainly lower the standard deviation on the time. Teams that ignore the side objective will have a wider bell curve in time completion than teams that focus on the side objectives. Where the mean actually ends up probably depends on the map.

Funny, because that’s how I see stopwatch in general. Stopwatch is a compensation for the fact that the game is asymmetrical. It’s inherently unfair, that’s the point, and therefore we need a chiasmus to make things fair again. Games like ET and ETQW are best played in campaigns. However, you can’t run ranked ladders on that type so we have to roll with time trails. I think competing on team-wide scores may just be the mode that solves the weak points of stopwatch.

(montheponies) #14

Stopwatch as a mode is excellent.

Please don’t refer to ET or ETQW as examples for Stopwatch, neither were built with that mode in mind, serial Objective maps stitched into a Campaign with semi-persistent XP is the complete opposite of the foundation for Stopwatch. In fact SD have never, in my opinion, designed a game to suit Stopwatch - everything from the maps they produced for RTCW (large, serial objectives), through W:ET to ETQW all supports an Objective based game mode.

Really boils down to SD having to settle on what they want this game mode to be - at the moment it’s an uncomfortable fudge. Tweaking the mode will just make the fudge that bit better/worse, dependant upon your viewpoint.

(tokamak) #15

Hey I’m all for maps having a less linear more ‘sandboxy’ feel to it. If you believe that works for SW then I’ll take your word for it as I haven’t tried it myself.

I mean, I can see it work when there’s such a variety of side objectives that there many different ways attackers can complete a map (but never all at the same time, so there’s also objectives that will close off other possibilities).

That way you can play real mind-games in SW. I’ve just yet to see that happen.

(Glottis-3D) #16

the problem is, that SD want no draws, no fullholds, so they try to bias maps to attack, which is wrong even for SW.
maps should be balanced 51% to attack, 49% to defence.

(Kendle) #17

To echo what warbie and montheponies are saying, RTCW invented the objective game mode, and of course SW, but it’s a different animal compared to ET / ET:QW and everything SD have produced, and to lump it in with “DB’s predecessors” is to ignore what made SW work in that game and why it doesn’t work as well in SD’s version of the genre.

SD maps, including those in DB, are geared towards being played for the given time limit, finely balanced, lemming rushing objectives and the outcome being more down to luck than judgement. ET’s campaign mode was a great innovation for public play and the maps suited it, but in so doing they didn’t suit SW, and the maps in DB follow that trend.

RTCW was about really long spawn times (sometimes 30s attack / 40s defense), leading to a real sense of attacking / defending in “waves”, all of the attackers attacking all of the defenders at the same time, and either succeeding or failing, then a pause before the next wave. DB does not have this because with short spawn times, poor spawn placement, and less clearly defined front lines you end up with some of your team at the front line, some just spawning, and some on their way (via multiple and separate routes).

If DB are serious about a) having a SW mode and b) it being successful, I can only suggest making dedicated maps for it, and use the 6 RTCW “war maps” as the template for them. Leave the existing maps for Obj, and add a campaign mode to further exploit the objective nature and add a narrative to the game.

(Glottis-3D) #18

the main rule for SW mode:
in a good SW match teams win/loose a round several seconds before time runs out.

thats all. they win or loose it in final seconds. then it is an awesome match, no matter what round it is, or who the winner is.

(warbie) #19

I must spread some reputation around before giving it to Kendle again.

This bit rings particularly true - ‘all of the attackers attacking all of the defenders at the same time’. You knew the defending team were set up and waiting. You knew you were running into a trap. But all your team were around you! You were going to smash into them, wipe them off the map! And vice versa for the defending team. You’re in your position, defending the choke point. You knew where they were coming from - you had every tactical advantage. But you knew they’re were going to keep crashing into you, wave after wave. Faster than your reinforcements could arrive. Constantly pushing you back. But all your team were around you! You were going to hold the line!

DB doesn’t do this. You don’t have your team around you. You’re not set up, waiting for the attack, or moving forward, ready to punch through the defence as one team. It’s lots of little encounters, often spread over an area. It’s why the class synergy never kicked in. There wasn’t a medic around when you needed one - he was somewhere else, having a fight.

(INF3RN0) #20

I don’t really know what to say about this mode with earning XP and all that, but I’d say that SW can easily be improved to make it a more interesting mode. The issue is that there’s a disconnect between the mode, the mechanics, and the maps. Something I might consider more appealing than SW though is a base race scenario, also found in MOBAs. It would be a bit difficult to adapt any maps to that mode, but if I was going to pick something else it would be that. SnD would also be fine as well. Overall SW is entirely reliant on the game mechanics and meta carrying all of the weight, where as it only serves to offer a ‘fair means’ of determining a winner.