Is Dirty Bomb Defender sided

(watsyurdeal) #1

I want to address the elephant in the room, er, in Dirty Bomb. Is this game heavily one sided for the defending team?

*I’ll add more to this later

(nokiII) #2

Yes it is defender sided, as the defenders win approx. 50% of the matches, which is neat in objective mode, but pretty bad in stopwatch as you don’t often set a complete (or only in the 13-14 minute park) time with even teams.

(Jostabeere) #3

Sure it is. Only Dome is better balanced.

(Verticules) #4

Think about spawn waves and how many offense needs to win vs how many defense needs to win. Defense possitions are easier to play, but a couple of f-ups will cost you the game.

(Ctrix) #5

Depends on the map.

Bridge is heavily defender favoured.
Dome/Trainyard/Chapel the last stage is defender favoured. Which I feel benefits stopwatch
Dome is heavily attacker favoured.
Did I forget anything?

The rest of the maps are ok I guess, but I only really play 6v6 objective pugs.

(Amerika) #6

Honestly, it depends on the size of the teams. In 5v5 I would say most of the maps, rightfully, favor the offense. I feel if legit 8v8 matches played out with even skill levels on both sides the maps would be heavily defensive favored. Even 7v7. 6v6 is kind of a toss-up. But that’s all just theory.

(Eox) #7

It’s heavily map dependent.

(Black) #8

It’s depends on what you mean by “Sided”.

Do you mean as in spawn counter, spawn points, map rountes, objectives, and etc?

Because as far as I’m concerned, the attackers spawn seem way to far back as I’ve explained in one of my previous threads.

(Laionidas) #9

I only play objective, but based on my experience I’d say it’s equal on some maps, defender sided on others, but again offender sided on yet other maps. Don’t even get me started about how unbalanced some stages of some maps are though, and no I don’t think having easier and more difficult phases on a certain maps results in balance overall.

I can’t say I agree with this one. The last stage is terribly unbalanced, yes, but not towards a specific side. The problem is that there is just a single concentrated kill zone. If the attackers manage to get lucky once and get say a 6 out of 7 kill, it is way too easy for the attacking team to deliver both EMP charges. However, if they fail to get lucky once, it is way too easy for the defending team to get entrenched. Basically, the area is too easy to entrench for either team. What is terribly unbalanced in favour of the defending team is getting the EV from its starting point to around the corner. After the second corner though, it completely changes around and offense can basically just roll home to the elevator.

The last stage of Trainyard is defense favouring like you said, and I’d say the second stage is ad well, but then again, the first stage is very much offense favouring.

Dome is a lagfest. I rarely play it these days for that reason, so I can’t really say anything sensible about it. From my limited experience though, it is unbalanced in every possible way.

Terminal is very much defense favouring I’d say, at all stages.

Underground I find annoying as hell, but balanced. Still, overly powerfull sniper positions make that I prefer to play some of the more unbalanced maps.

Bridge is a difficult one. When you win or lose on that map, it always seems to be by a very clear margin, but I’ve never been able to determine whether it favours a side at any stage. So, verdict: balanced.

(Mrarauzz) #10

I’ve never had a map where I thought I was at a disadvantage …well except if I knew how my teammates played last game. Everything being even it all feels pretty good to me, but even if one side did have a bias I guess that is why we play stopwatch to make it a best of both sides :stuck_out_tongue:

(BerylRdm) #11

Depends on map and teams size.

(TheVulpesFox) #12

If you think about it the defenders should win anyway. If the teams are absolutely even then the attacking team shouldn’t be able to win because the teams keep on holding there own meaning they are both struggling to keep the enemy back and don’t get anywhere.
However this rarely happens and it is also map dependant as well.

(Sinee) #13

I wouldn’t say it’s ALL defender sided, but a lot of the maps are. Bridge is a big example. I dread being on attack a lot of times because it’s so much more difficult to get in.

(Ballto) #14

usually is two teams are so close to evenly matched, say about an average skill difference of about 5% on all people (pulling a number out of my ass but it would be low regardless) it could go either way.

Even though db is obviously not a 1v1 game, if two people of equal skill level started 1v1ing with their best class on any given map its more or less 50/50 who wins, and in actual matches it boils down to squad composition. If your team on defence has two auras/sawbones a stoker and some proxies/BWs/Fletchers/Naders/rhino to taste, they will probably do better against an evenly skilled team of proxies vasilis and a sawbones.

Likewise if an attacking team has phoenixes proxies fletchers and other aggressive shootemup mercsthey would more easily bowl over a team of mostly proxies, fraggers, naders, and no support classes or what have you

if two equally good steam builds with reasonably equally skilled players, i would assume that if we had a statistic of all wins/losses of equally well comprised and skilled players defenders would have a slight lead over attackers, but it probably wouldnt be too pronounced, and would probably be more pronounced on only some maps, like bridge or chapel.

(Gi.Am) #15

Defense is easier than offence given the same ressources (atleast thats what a prussian general had to say about that).

However Dirtybomb doesn’t give out the same ressources.
In Objective mode its pretty clear cut. The increasing faster spawntimes of the attackers ensures their victory in the end. Unless they really suck.

But in general the maps lean ever so slightly more towards the attackers side.
If you look at the map design, attackers usually get several entrances (that can’t be covered at the same time) to the objective compared to the defenders. This forces the defenders to cover more ground and to split their forces. Atleast till they push the attackers back into a bad chokepoint (in the worst case the spawn).

Exectution is the extreme example of that splitting defenders up technique, you have to defend two bomb spots and you can’t cover them both.

So with that said and to coming back to that quote. Defending is easier for a very simple reason in this game you defend primary by killing the attackers. This is simple most players are very good at this and it doesn’t demand communication. attacking on the other hand needs a bit of planning to be effective needs a keener eye on Merc synergy and timing *. At the very least it needs players that can acknowledge what roles are in need currently and play accordingly… on top of that they have to kill as well as the defenders.

But a team that brings that to the table steamrolls the defenders simply because the gamemechanics (map design, ability design) in general gives atleast in my opinion the attackers more possibilities.

  • extreme example and the reason why thunder doesn’t work right know (tho I like him) is that his flashbang needs communication to really shine. i.e. you have to warn the team that you throw and than the team has to rush in, take advantage of the few seconds blindness and disabled deployables.
(torsoreaper) #16

I think it depends on the map.

Bridge is probably the worst for attackers and Dome is probably the easiest for attackers.

If I could fix bridge I think I’d either make it so the defenders start farther back or one of the walls by the EV is missing so the defending team can attack their side of the EV from the bridge. Right now I can basically every time be #1 on my team and ensure attackers don’t win by just playing Aura, dropping the health station by the wall near the door the defenders always rush, and just racking up heal and revives. As long as one person watches the street, the attackers are pretty screwed. Even better is a Stoker next to me supplying ammo and throwing a molotov into that little part of the hallway at the base of the stairs. Really this is the worst map to be attacker. The only caveat I would make is that since NOBODY seems to know the objective of the 2nd stage is to defend the barricade pump, in that regard it is attacker favored but only on the 2nd stage and only because people are oblivious. 3rd stage sucks balls. If the defenders just camp the room they win. That’s all they have to do, it’s so easy it’s a shock when my team loses unless attackers are heavily stacked. By typing it all out, your team has to really be terrible to lose as defenders. If you are past lvl 5 and you don’t know how to win Bridge as defender, you might want to just give up and start playing COD.

Terminal stage 1 can really be a pain in the butt if your team doesn’t push to get forward spawn.

Chapel isn’t that bad because the run isn’t that far and you at least have some ways to cover your side of the EV by being on the catwalk or in the warehouse.

Trainyard is actually pretty forgiving as well though I have noticed I somehow always end up with like 3 vasili’s on my team whenever i play this one. I think people think they can snipe down the train track on stage 1 and be helpful. They usually aren’t helpful.

Underground is a very fun map attacking and defending and if you just know where to plant the bomb at the end, the last stage is pretty fair as far as difficulty.

Overall, I would say dome and bridge cancel out (even though nobody plays dome) and the rest are like 45/55 or 40/60 which is about as close to even as you’re going to get in a game.

(capriRocket) #17

on pubs its easier to position as a team when you defend, attacking together on a pub barely happens.

bridge and terminal are both very defender sided on pubs for the same reason and because 6 guns aim at one doorway…

when teams communicate its a whole different story.

(XavienX) #18

Most of the maps are defender sided, but not to a ridiculous level. There’s just more pathways that defenders have to their advantage than the attackers do.

(KattiValk) #19

It depends on team size and coordination. I know that an Attacker team that works together in a pub will be insane to counter, but the issue is no pub team would ever do that. To actually have a medic understand that you are like, the only reason the team hasn’t been spawn camped by now and follows you around, is a small miracle by itself.

(Demolama) #20

Maps being defense-sided isn’t a bad thing as long as spawn times are adjusted to take advantage of the map design. However, SD with their “reinventing the wheel mentality” have taken an easy solution to this problem, such as making defenders have a longer spawn time and attackers have a shorter spawn time, to the equal time system we have in place. The way DB handles spawn waves is just overly complicated and does not punish defenders for aggressive plays.