Fine Tuning Update v50088 - 22/09/2015

(PixelTwitch) #41

Fraggers issue was only partially due to balance the main problem is the mechanics.

1 hit kill nade from nowhere with no warning is simply stronger then anything else in the game.

The lobbies are just crazy… I cannot believe that someone felt this was a smart idea… I mean sure, if everything else was working great then maybe there was a place for this change but with how things are currently you are further separating friends only creating team balanced based on stats. because I can tell you for certain when I am playing in a public match, the majority of the time I am the balance and it is awful to play. Getting the worst 5 players on the server on my team vs 6 people that know what they are doing is simply not fun.

Also due to horrible UI performance I now do not have time to change my mercs in between matches, cannot choose merc based on the team or the map we are about to play. The amount of effort I myself need to put in to get a “fun” game is crazy! I will say that when perforamnce is good in this patch that it does feel smoother, some of the new sound things (like bullets past head) are good and some of the weapon balance changes I feel while maybe not needed are not too bad.

However when it comes to the user experience I am certainly seeing things get worse here and not better.

(light_sh4v0r) #42

[QUOTE=Szakalot;538745]Played whole morning. Games are definitely more balanced now. Even with people at all lvl ranges (couple 40+, couple 15+ , few 3-5s few 10s), game quality is a lot better. Not every match ended up in a gripping overtime, but there is none of those ridiculous closing people in spawns either.

This change was needed for the casual objective experience.

Having said that, people that want to play exclusively with friends do get the short end of the stick. Some possible changes:

  • minlvl10 obj servers that do not follow the new lobby rules

- community rented servers that do not follow the new lobby rules

  • separation of servers for quick join - present lobby; and server browser - old lobby

  • map vote at end of map - map loads - warmup until people join - lobby just before map starts but right AFTER SHUFFLE (so people can pick mercs according to attack/defense)

  • more fluid matchmaking where a few wins get you a rank, few loses demote you : this is imo really important. I’ve been placed at gold4 in my placement matches, cause I’ve lost 3-4 games to premades. Presently, I’d only ever lose to premades, otherwise its an easy carry at gold level. Multiple cobalt-ranked players are way worse than me, and throughout the whole matchmaking experience I’ve only got to gold2.

If matchmaking adjusts your ranks faster it will:

  • match premades against tougher opponents quicker (5 mates will get to cobalt ranks soon and face cobalt-ranked opponents, rather than steamrolling through endless gold level soloqueues)
  • playing mm will be more rewarding as you see the results of your efforts better
  • bad players that got boosted on premades will reverse to their actual skill level better
  • I’d really like to see MM seasons every month/two like hearthstone, where acquiring a certain rank will reward you with a drop. Imo present matchmaking is largely broken due to inadequate rank placements, which are more dependent on how many premades you’ve encountered, than your actual skill level.[/QUOTE]

All of this sounds very sensible to me. Ideally there’d be separate queues for solo play and premade play, but if that complicates the matchmaking process then making ranks more flexible is definitely in order.

(Bangtastic) #43

addition to Private Lobbies: it seems the server performance is not as good as on the public servers. Players tend to warp lil bit for me, and im lagging too slightly. I feel like public servers run more stable.

Plus often players get kicked out of a private session and sometimes they cant reconnect anymore. Kicking players randomly is a competitive server issue too. I only experience it with private lobbies and competitive matches, never on public and I spent hundreds of hours on them.

(ragnak) #44

[QUOTE=Fluffy_gIMp;538758]
With balance changes (a la Fragger) we’re never going to please everyone, for those that are up in arms please do give him a bit more of a play before you make up your mind, we don’t believe the change is massive (but we are happy to be proved wrong).[/QUOTE]

Fragger is still no1 merc in the game by far, and it would be the case even if the recent change was an actual nerf. Its getting annoying that balancing one merc is such a major task for the team.

(PixelTwitch) #45

I have said it again and again, simple number tweaking does not cut it when dealing with a poorly designed mechanic.
There are dozens of options that could leave Fragger really strong but allow his enemies to have some counter play.
However SD seem determined to try and keep this 1 nade from nowhere insagib mechanic in the game.

Really blows my mind.

(ragnak) #46

[QUOTE=PixelTwitch;538800]I have said it again and again, simple number tweaking does not cut it when dealing with a poorly designed mechanic.
There are dozens of options that could leave Fragger really strong but allow his enemies to have some counter play.
However SD seem determined to try and keep this 1 nade from nowhere insagib mechanic in the game.

Really blows my mind.[/QUOTE]

Sadly. I wouldnt whine about it as much as i do if fragger wasnt freaking overpowered for over a year now. How long did it take to explain them that supersonic grenades arent ok at all ? I dont even want to think how long will it take now since he isnt as broken as he was =/.

I honestly cant understand how a merc with the best gun in the game, big hp pool and the best killing ability that does not offer any kind of counter play does not trigger a red light in SD design team. You simply do not release a character that is good at every range and situation, basic design stuff.

I also love how they think that Grandeur isnt underpowered and at the same time think that fragger is balanced while considering pdp to be overpowered, mind blown.

(Rémy Cabresin) #47

On the topic of the lobby, personally I kinda like the new layout but I think it would be a lot more user friendly if we had a more systematic way of ‘counting down’? Idea:

When it’s between maps have ‘phases’ that it follows in order.
“Phase 1”:
First 15 seconds, the map voting section is highlighted and the countdown for the map vote is in the highlighted border. No other actions can be done during this other than voting the map, using chat and leaving the server.
“Phase 2”:
After map voting is finished, the 2nd “phase” starts so you have 20 seconds to select your merc and loadout cards and that section of the screen is highlighted. As you already have a map clearly confirmed this is less clunky/panicky. During this you can only select mercs/loadouts, use chat, swap teams or leave server.
“Phase 3”:
After the 20 second merc selection, everyone gets auto-locked in and the last 15 seconds of synronizing loadouts etc start. During this nothing other than using chat and leaving the server is possible.

This won’t really change how the lobby works as a whole, but the highlighted borders would give players more direction on what is actually being counted down. Right now the lobby feels very ‘oh **** click things to get ready’ because the timer isn’t really highlighted nor is highlighted what is being count down for. Would probably make things feel more straight forward :stuck_out_tongue: especially new players right now have no clue whats happening in the lobby, 90% of the time I play public I see votes pass with 1/2 votes max as it seems the majority of players if fumbling around with merc selectiong.

(oh ps: the red line means removing the top right timer entirely)

(spookify) #48

[QUOTE=PixelTwitch;538800]I have said it again and again, simple number tweaking does not cut it when dealing with a poorly designed mechanic.
There are dozens of options that could leave Fragger really strong but allow his enemies to have some counter play.
However SD seem determined to try and keep this 1 nade from nowhere insagib mechanic in the game.

Really blows my mind.[/QUOTE]

Sniper insta Gib headshot is like having 5 nades in rapid fire. I find sniping unbalances the game much more then a fragger nade.

(FireWorks) #49

[QUOTE=adeto;538837]On the topic of the lobby, personally I kinda like the new layout but I think it would be a lot more user friendly if we had a more systematic way of ‘counting down’? Idea:

When it’s between maps have ‘phases’ that it follows in order.
“Phase 1”:
First 15 seconds, the map voting section is highlighted and the countdown for the map vote is in the highlighted border. No other actions can be done during this other than voting the map, using chat and leaving the server.
“Phase 2”:
After map voting is finished, the 2nd “phase” starts so you have 20 seconds to select your merc and loadout cards and that section of the screen is highlighted. As you already have a map clearly confirmed this is less clunky/panicky. During this you can only select mercs/loadouts, use chat, swap teams or leave server.
“Phase 3”:
After the 20 second merc selection, everyone gets auto-locked in and the last 15 seconds of synronizing loadouts etc start. During this nothing other than using chat and leaving the server is possible.

This won’t really change how the lobby works as a whole, but the highlighted borders would give players more direction on what is actually being counted down. Right now the lobby feels very ‘oh **** click things to get ready’ because the timer isn’t really highlighted nor is highlighted what is being count down for. Would probably make things feel more straight forward :stuck_out_tongue: especially new players right now have no clue whats happening in the lobby, 90% of the time I play public I see votes pass with 1/2 votes max as it seems the majority of players if fumbling around with merc selectiong.

(oh ps: the red line means removing the top right timer entirely)[/QUOTE]

Phases with highlighting. I thought the same and I bet, someone at SD also has this in mind. Id expect it to come up in the next updates.

But can a dev pls tell me why the Merc Selection cant be handled in the warmup and during the Intro/Explanation? Why could the sync be done ingame in Brink and why do we have to have it here and extend dead time?

The current way of handling breaks between matches are just meh to me. I cant go for a quick drink/piss/etc cause game needs attention right in the middle of the breaktime:/

(Rémy Cabresin) #50

[QUOTE=FireWorks;538846]Phases with highlighting. I thought the same and I bet, someone at SD also has this in mind. Id expect it to come up in the next updates.

But can a dev pls tell me why the Merc Selection cant be handled in the warmup and during the Intro/Explanation? Why could the sync be done ingame in Brink and why do we have to have it here and extend dead time?

The current way of handling breaks between matches are just meh to me. I cant go for a quick drink/piss/etc cause game needs attention right in the middle of the breaktime:/[/QUOTE]

(i think)It’s because if merc selection would be in-game, the game would have to load every possible merc/skin/weapon combination opposed to only loading the ones players are using. Meaning loading times would be increased massively(look at f.e a game like LoL which uses a similar system, loading times there are on average a lot higher compared to db). It’s also the reason why we only have ‘bring 3 mercs’ instead of 5 or a limbolike system like Brink or ET, as more than 3 means more combinations to load and thus more loading times and likely more strain on hardware.

(INF3RN0) #51

good patch overall, but now my game runs like garbo once again :/. The struggle to maintain smooth performance is killing me inside.

(chickenNwaffles) #52

No ****, Sherlock.

(FireWorks) #53

Thanks for answering, but I still cant believe its that much of a problem to load up a max of 16x3. Its just skins…

If some guy has the trash 1999 laptop HDD to load from, why do we all have to wait eternally? Any SSD fires this up in no time.

And we already suffer from players connecting into the match eternally. Why artificially increase this time with a hardcoded timer of extra 15sec?

(Rémy Cabresin) #54

[QUOTE=FireWorks;538875]Thanks for answering, but I still cant believe its that much of a problem to load up a max of 16x3. Its just skins…

If some guy has the trash 1999 laptop HDD to load from, why do we all have to wait eternally? Any SSD fires this up in no time.

And we already suffer from players connecting into the match eternally. Why artificially increase this time with a hardcoded timer of extra 15sec?[/QUOTE]

Because not everyone has an SSD and not everyone has hardware that’s top notch? By artificially increasing that time the faster players can load in quick and warm up and slower pc users have time to finish loading(unlike f.e again LoL where everyone is stuck waiting till that 1 slow turd pc user is done). Also I think(dont quote) during the ‘artificial 15 seconds’ the server is still processing things so it’s not actually ‘artificial’, its time thats actually needed but it allows you to already warm up in the game. Opposed to forcing you to stare at a loading screen until everyone and everything is 100% loaded.

(light_sh4v0r) #55

There are quite somepeople who haven’t loaded up yet when the game starts. If the 15 seconds are indeed for players to load up, getting rid of them means many more people will miss the first spawn.

(Volcano) #56

maybe it should run off the ready up system properly rather than autostarting the game

(Kl3ppy) #57

Was aimpunch raised? When getting hit by a SMG its so shaking, really dislike it!

(PixelTwitch) #58

It is really just a problem with high RoF weapons…
So weapons like the hotchfire and empire 9 really mess up your aim!

(Kl3ppy) #59

[QUOTE=PixelTwitch;538929]It is really just a problem with high RoF weapons…
So weapons like the hotchfire and empire 9 really mess up your aim![/QUOTE]

Thx. Yes, I noticed that Proxy with SMG and Phoenix with Hochfire are incredible hard to hit when they shoot at me.

(Mustang) #60

The only time I’ve ever suffered from view-kick is when Pansy was shooting one of Proxy’s SMGs at my face, of course every bullet hit and I couldn’t even see her to aim back.

That was a few patches ago though now, but it was so frustrating.