Community Question: Spread vs Recoil

(shirosae) #161

[QUOTE=BioSnark;404717]Question for everyone using the term “lotto/lottery” with regards to spread.

Would each shot being represented as a damage cone with higher damage numbers in the center and drop-off on the edges be more acceptable? Is the randomness your issue with spread or is it that it alters the skill curve or both? Or would this change be too obvious of an abstraction of a bullet? Just wondering.[/quote]

So instead of firing a hitscan projectile that hits or misses, you fire a damage wavepacket and you pick the highest damage that enters the hitbox? That way you don’t get random vanishing bullets, and if your aim is on target you get the maximum damage potential.

That would work, because the same damage distribution would exist even in small samples. I still think it’s a bit screwy, because it messes with hit feedback and still lowers the skill ceiling*, but not nearly as much as typical spread.

*EDIT: Actually hmm, it works more like a compression of damage output rather than blunting the skill ceiling. It’d make for an interesting game mode.

EDIT2: If you had the total damage under the distribution curve be equal, then moving about would smear that curve out? So if you were crouching and scoped, you’d need to be on target to get high damage, but if you were jumping over boxes you’d be doing less damage per shot, but wouldn’t need to aim so accurately?

That might cause issues. Would need a lot of careful balancing.

(tokamak) #162

That packet would then take the shape of a 3dimensional bell curve which then expands along the cone of fire.

The dexterity emphasis would be determined by the height of the standard deviation. So Shirosae would prefer a really small standard deviation (a really spike bell curve projection) that remains relatively unaffected by stances.

I still think it’s a bit screwy, because it messes with hit feedback and still lowers the skill ceiling*

You could do interesting things with that, like sound modification depending on the amount of damage you dealt. Something like the lower the damage the more out of tune the hitsound.

Maybe I just need a beer.

EDIT: Now you’ll also have to take into account how much of that player falls under the projection. That can get ugly really fast.

(Apoc) #163

I never like games with too big spread, and i dont think im alone with that. Recoil isnt great either, tbh i would prefer all weapons to be accurate with med - low recoil, then have weapons differentiated by their weight (thus impacting movement speed), their fire rate, individual bullet damage and range/falloff. These 4 factors along with clip size and any sort of effects can be toyed with to make guns feel rewarding in that they go where you aim, but also require a tactical decision as to which you choose depending on your style of play or role required.

(shirosae) #164

Not necessarily. The lack of quantisation effects makes this more flexible. It has downsides, but it lacks the bluntness of spread.

Nope.

I have no problems with stances and motion affecting gunplay. Randomness is my issue.

(Senethro) #165

I actually was thinking about damage as a cone instead of a projectile or hitscan line this afternoon, strange coincidence. Problem I see is selling the hit feedback to players in a way that’s satisfying, because the shooter and target will both be annoyed at a million tiny bullets that don’t kill.

(tokamak) #166

The animation could stay the same actually, you can still have a spray of bullets animated. It just means that it’s no longer necessary for them to actually contact in order to damage. The difference will hardly be noticeable.

It’s just… it does take a bit of charm out of the game. It’s an abstraction of what’s actually going on and I’m sure most players would rather not know about it’s existence.

(shirosae) #167

I had the same thought too. SYNCHRONICITY.

Maybe you could take the whole critical hit idea, and instead of making it a dice roll, actually point it at this?

You get damage by aiming close enough, you score a critical hit by being dead on. Of course there’s distribution shape and stuff that might make it less two-tier in practice, but it’s an idea that’s familiar to players.

You represent the incoming damage with the severity of sound effects and red flash. Some shots are glancing, others sound like a serious impact?

For the firing player, you have a hit sound that changes depending on how much damage was transferred? Like you have the headshot hitsound to distinguish in ET/QW.

(tokamak) #168

I’m not sure I understand the critical hit thing.

But it does get us to the issue of resolving head-shots. Headshots as we know it would take their departure and instead the headshot area would multiply the damage according to how close the hit is to the centre.

All in all I must admit that it’s an excellent way of keeping the value of stances while at the same time completely eliminating any random factor in the game.

I hope everyone understands what we’re actually talking about. We’d actually need a 3D animation to get this across.

(Senethro) #169

No, see, having your gun draw a spray of random bullets with no relation to events is the lazy thing to do. Somehow you need to generate awesome looking/sounding feedback based on calculated hits very shortly after the hit has been determined.

(tokamak) #170

The sound can be related to the damage packet, but I still think that the visual aspect will be hardly noticeable.

(Senethro) #171

God you are so lazy when it comes to other peoples ideas. I’m phone postin on the clock so no manifestos right now, but a suitable level of feedback for a low value shot could be an extra flashy ricochet calculated and drawn separately for each player to cross his field of vision with a great big Hollywood KAPING noise.

(tokamak) #172

It’s fully the lack of imagination on my part when it comes to trying to work this out in my head. Saying that the audible and visual effects should bear close relation to how the hit packets are distributed is something different than actually providing how to do so.

And you should know that I’m actually letting go of my fondness for random spread if this can work. That’s quite something.

(ailmanki) #173

It sounds like a random factor by the developers. I appreciate the simplicity of body shot/head shot, if it where to simulate ‘real’ damage my expectations would be very high. Maybe possible today, would be to simulate a real gun with real physics properties, but then again I guess the server would need to create the random seed for the physics engine. And hopefully in a few years the rest. Although I don’t think it will make more fun then it does now. Less is sometimes more. And games should simplify real life things.

(Dormamu) #174

How much time did you need it to release a patch for the accuracy of the weapons in Brink? You said you needed time to make small variations to the gazillion variables in your weapons. Do we need that again? Why not “Keep It Simple Stupid”, make it work, then add your fluff and puff and your heart desires.

Why not let the server, generate random stats for the similar weapons you will use(/loot from your enemies)? From pinpoint accuracy and encumbering movement to Hjammerdeim spread, from Elephant Gun recoil to no recoil, from incendiary bullets to paintball bullets, from +1 to recovery to 20% blindness, etc. <= Now this is in contradiction with my previous paragraph, but if we want to dream about something, Let’s Dream Big! :smiley:

(Humate) #175

Just give everyone a lightning pistol, that changes colour the longer you hold down mouse1.
The longer you hold it, the less damage it does.

/massive cough

(amazinglarry) #176

In regards to how the Community Question is phrased, then I choose a mix of spread and recoil.

If I had to choose which weapon I would use over another, it would be the one with more spread, and less recoil. I’ll take burst fire over having to readjust my mouse every time I shoot somebody any day of the week. Except Mondays. **** Mondays.

(Dthy) #177

[QUOTE=Humate;404768]Just give everyone a lightning pistol, that changes colour the longer you hold down mouse1.
The longer you hold it, the less damage it does.

/massive cough[/QUOTE]

You know, I’d actually like that. Not being sarcastic or anything but it would be a nice touch since the Lightning Pistol is pretty OP when someone who can aim uses it.

(tokamak) #178

[QUOTE=Humate;404768]Just give everyone a lightning pistol, that changes colour the longer you hold down mouse1.
The longer you hold it, the less damage it does.

/massive cough[/QUOTE]

That reminds me of the ‘projectile problems’ stroyent commercial.

(tangoliber) #179

Agreed.

Personally, I don’t think weapon variety should be about having lots of smgs or assault rifles. You can have a couple of variations of those…your burst fire guns, your low ROF or semi-automatic guns…but in general, I think its better if you have a variety of different types of guns, rather than a lot of variety in one type of gun… You can look at arena shooters, or Resistance 3 for ideas on how to make guns unique. You can even look at borderlands, and see its corrosive revolvers…its flak cannon style shotguns which bounce bullets, shotguns which cause knockback, etc.
Look at the Aeons of Death mod for Doom 2. Here is me playing a randomized level using the AeoD mod:

//youtu.be/p6yVtE02NjU

I come across a huge variety of weapons during that randomly generated level (though some of them are too crazy), and their differences aren’t based on accuracy tweaks…they are completely different kinds of guns. Give us disc launchers and flak cannons and chain laser guns… not 5 types of smgs with different spreads.

(tokamak) #180

There’s only so much you can do with hitscan type weapons before it gets really bonkers.