Kills are strategic; K/DR is a vital statistic

(FrankieGodskin) #61

[quote=Jess Alon;331822]Frankie. For a brilliant player like you I understand how K/D is important. But not everyone with a good K/D ratio is a good player. Some players use cowardly tactics to keep a good K/D ratio intact. Also in Brink there are bots. And I know you could only have the K/D count in regards to humans. But what if a bot distracts you or something and a human player camps your while you’re fighting his bot teammate? What if people boost their K/D by just playing on easy against bots? It renders the K/D meaningless.

Some people are obsessed with that K/D. And it makes them hide out and only take easy kills. What I’m saying is there are a lot of bad players out there that want people to think they are good so they only shoot at guys when they think there is no risk of dying and they hide all the time instead of consistently producing kills.[/quote]
Thanks for the kind words, Jess. I think you’re absolutely correct about the bots polluting the K/DR stats for a variety of reasons. At the same time, as you know, I’m not someone who gets a high K/DR because I’m hiding and only taking “safe” kills, but you’re right that other people might take that route. Hmm. I might have to rethink my stance.

(FrankieGodskin) #62

[quote=Kurnuttaja;332185]K/DR was the reason that killed MNC and turned it into a deathmatch with no-one caring a crap about winning a match but instead just looking at their K/D stats on scoreboard. K/D can be game breaking for any objective/teamwork based shooter as it rewards lonewolfing and using the most overpowered class/weapons to achieve the best K/D.

K/D in Brink would lead into: Everyone playing medic/engineer with Carb-9 and only buffing themselves. Every round ending up in defenders winning, without the first objective completed.
Kills are what everyone only care about if shown on the scoreboard or tracked as ratio.[/quote]
I only played MNC for the first month, but in that time, I was one of the best Gunners in the world. I had a 3.0 K/DR and a 2.0 Assist/Death Ratio (6,000+ kills, 4,000+ assists, just under 2,000 deaths) and I was in the top 100 on two leaderboards. I was one of the first people to get 2,500 minigun kills and I consistently outfought the other known Gunners (Boo5ive, etc.) and had matches where I had 50+ kills and no deaths.

If we had lost these games, it would have been a waste of time and energy. But when I was murdering everything in sight, my team was capturing the moneyball. We won BECAUSE my K/DR was so high and I was laying waste to the opposition.

In any shooter game, you can only score your objective if you’re alive. And if the enemy is dead, they can’t prevent you from scoring. That’s where players like me come in.

(Ghostdog) #63

[QUOTE=zenstar;331495]
Generally people don’t like public KDR because it encourages selfish play.[/QUOTE]

I imagine that if there was a public kdr there would be less people willing to risk their virtual necks planting charges, reviving/buffing others or hacking/repairing objectives and more people playing the game like a tdm. Maybe not so much if there was just a kill tracker rather than full kdr tracking.

(zenstar) #64

[QUOTE=Frankie Godskin;332235]I only played MNC for the first month, but in that time, I was one of the best Gunners in the world. I had a 3.0 K/DR and a 2.0 Assist/Death Ratio (6,000+ kills, 4,000+ assists, just under 2,000 deaths) and I was in the top 100 on two leaderboards. I was one of the first people to get 2,500 minigun kills and I consistently outfought the other known Gunners (Boo5ive, etc.) and had matches where I had 50+ kills and no deaths.

If we had lost these games, it would have been a waste of time and energy. But when I was murdering everything in sight, my team was capturing the moneyball. We won BECAUSE my K/DR was so high and I was laying waste to the opposition.

In any shooter game, you can only score your objective if you’re alive. And if the enemy is dead, they can’t prevent you from scoring. That’s where players like me come in.[/QUOTE]

But then you got the games with 3 snipers who would camp in the spawn room and only pop out for a shot and then back back in and they were doing it for the KDR. There was no way your team could push the enemy team with 1/2 of you refusing to leave the spawn room. And then when the other team was too close they’d just sit inside the spawn room unable to even shoot the odd shot just in case they died once.

That is how KDR killed the game. Just because you didn’t play that way doesn’t mean that the stat didn’t influence a portion of the population to play that way and if you look at the MNC forums (I haven’t for a while) they would be full of Stat Boasting threads. My KDR was often bad because you don’t get kills for bots or turrets or moneyball damage. Guess what I did most of the time?

The only question is how much of the population would be detrimentally affected with the inclusion of KDR. If it’s a small portion then it isn’t all bad. But make no bones about it: there is potential to kill the game by it’s inclusion. Just how big a potential we won’t know unless it’s included.

(jeavis) #65

Basically if you want the K/D ratio it’s just so you can stroke your epeen. It will only encourage camping and kill farming. As it stands now people are not concerned with their ratio so they throw themselves at the opposition without the hesitation of it hurting their massive epeen.

Do the objectives, play the game as it was meant to be played and stop trying to bring CoD to everything you play.

Thank you please drive through.

(Kurnuttaja) #66

[QUOTE=jeavis;332260]Basically if you want the K/D ratio it’s just so you can stroke your epeen. It will only encourage camping and kill farming. As it stands now people are not concerned with their ratio so they throw themselves at the opposition without the hesitation of it hurting their massive epeen.

Do the objectives, play the game as it was meant to be played and stop trying to bring CoD to everything you play.

Thank you please drive through.[/QUOTE]

I think his user title already (#4 on 360 leaderboard) tells that all he cares about is his own e-peen and thats why he wants KDR into this game too.

(FrankieGodskin) #67

[quote=jeavis;332260]Basically if you want the K/D ratio it’s just so you can stroke your epeen. It will only encourage camping and kill farming. As it stands now people are not concerned with their ratio so they throw themselves at the opposition without the hesitation of it hurting their massive epeen.

Do the objectives, play the game as it was meant to be played and stop trying to bring CoD to everything you play.

Thank you please drive through.[/quote]
Every single stat in existence could be claimed to “stroke your e-peen,” from win/loss ratio to most revives. We can see our average XP on the Brink stat site, which is certainly an e-peen measurement by your definition. What’s the difference if K/D is added?

And as I said in my initial post, I don’t play COD, so that reference is irrelevant.

The fact that I have a high Gamerscore–with over 92% completion and no boost games played–is an accomplishment I’m proud of. And since this site has a leaderboard, why wouldn’t I want this stat to be public knowledge? In my experience, people who want stats hidden are the ones who are embarassed by how poor they’re performing.

(R_Shackelford) #68

I know it’s not really OT, but are you telling me that as a “PC elitist” you’re playing on a four year old PC that’s never been upgraded that cost you $400 in 2007 (including mouse and KB, excluding speakers and monitor), and the games are actually looking better now than they did four years ago?

-sigh- “PC elitists”… oy.

P.S. It’s not like you’re the only person with a family to feed.

(zenstar) #69

Some stats encourage teamwork and the general gameplay that Brink is working for.
Some stats discourage the very same or encourage the opposite.

It is thought that KDR would encourage solo play and stat padding play that would be detrimental to teamwork.

I’m not commenting on if it would or wouldn’t or how detrimental it would be or if it should be public or private. But that is a valid counter to your “all stats are epeen material so why not KDR” point. Of course this point can be counter-countered with a valid argument as to why KDR wouldn’t encourage solo gameplay & stat padding.

(FrankieGodskin) #70

I can partially concede this point, but something I mentioned earlier is that I believe good players will not “risk their necks” as often, since instead of running up to an objective, dying, and failing, they’ll take their time to clear out an area and succeed on the first try. For example, as a Medic, I wouldn’t run into a battlefield under fire and revive trhee teammates, since I’ll die and my teammates will likely die when they are reviving. I’d rather clear the zone out first, then dispense the syringes. If my teammates don’t want to wait a few seconds (they can see I’m 3m away), they can always respawn at our base.

[quote=zenstar;332249]But then you got the games with 3 snipers who would camp in the spawn room and only pop out for a shot and then back back in and they were doing it for the KDR. There was no way your team could push the enemy team with 1/2 of you refusing to leave the spawn room. And then when the other team was too close they’d just sit inside the spawn room unable to even shoot the odd shot just in case they died once.

That is how KDR killed the game. Just because you didn’t play that way doesn’t mean that the stat didn’t influence a portion of the population to play that way and if you look at the MNC forums (I haven’t for a while) they would be full of Stat Boasting threads. My KDR was often bad because you don’t get kills for bots or turrets or moneyball damage. Guess what I did most of the time?

The only question is how much of the population would be detrimentally affected with the inclusion of KDR. If it’s a small portion then it isn’t all bad. But make no bones about it: there is potential to kill the game by it’s inclusion. Just how big a potential we won’t know unless it’s included.[/quote]
I think snipers, in general, are bad for gameplay. One of the selling points I loved about Brink was the lack of sniping and one-shot kills (although we’ve seen that isn’t 100% true). But I agree that any game which rewards people for hanging back and leaving their team down a man, for all intents and purposes, is a game which is creating a fun experience for a small percentage and aggravation for a larger percentage of its players.

As far as K/DR helping or hurting the game, again, I can’t say for cetain. I think players might be more cautious, but I don’t believe they’d “hide” all game or avoid completing objectives. In the Halo 2 & 3 days, my K/DR was always abysmal (usually just above 1.1 or so), because I exclusively played objective gametypes and would often sacrifice myself to keep an objective alive (such as jumping into a group of enemies and touching a flag-in-play to reset its spawn timer and keep it from returning to its base). Even though my K/DR suffered, I still completed objectives because I enjoyed the game and wanted to win.

(zenstar) #71

[QUOTE=Frankie Godskin;332315]I can partially concede this point, but something I mentioned earlier is that I believe good players will not “risk their necks” as often, since instead of running up to an objective, dying, and failing, they’ll take their time to clear out an area and succeed on the first try. For example, as a Medic, I wouldn’t run into a battlefield under fire and revive trhee teammates, since I’ll die and my teammates will likely die when they are reviving. I’d rather clear the zone out first, then dispense the syringes. If my teammates don’t want to wait a few seconds (they can see I’m 3m away), they can always respawn at our base.

I think snipers, in general, are bad for gameplay. One of the selling points I loved about Brink was the lack of sniping and one-shot kills (although we’ve seen that isn’t 100% true). But I agree that any game which rewards people for hanging back and leaving their team down a man, for all intents and purposes, is a game which is creating a fun experience for a small percentage and aggravation for a larger percentage of its players.

As far as K/DR helping or hurting the game, again, I can’t say for cetain. I think players might be more cautious, but I don’t believe they’d “hide” all game or avoid completing objectives. In the Halo 2 & 3 days, my K/DR was always abysmal (usually just above 1.1 or so), because I exclusively played objective gametypes and would often sacrifice myself to keep an objective alive (such as jumping into a group of enemies and touching a flag-in-play to reset its spawn timer and keep it from returning to its base). Even though my K/DR suffered, I still completed objectives because I enjoyed the game and wanted to win.[/QUOTE]

I can get behind most of what you say here. Just remember that while YOU may not be a stat-padding cheeserocket doesn’t mean that they don’t exist.
The only issue is how many are in the community and how badly adding a KDR would affect the game.
I personally don’t care for it and am wary of it due to the bad effect it had on MNC when I was playing.
I like KDR in DM-centric, Kill-centric games. I don’t feel Brink revolves around the kills. Sure they’re a big part of the game but they’re not the part in the spotlight. They’re not the aim of the game.
That being said the only true way of knowing would be adding it, but then it’s too late to take away (because there would be more rage to have it and then have it removed than just never having it).

(Glyph) #72

So here is the bad news… Brink tracks stats for the game based upon when you enter it until the game ends. As a result Exp/Game is hugely flawed as you can join a match with a few mins to go and only get 1k experience or less while the next game you may for 20 minutes and get 7k experience. So your average is now 4k. If you join another game and come in late managing another 1k then your average drops to 3k. You see where this is going, right? As you have no choice in when you join a game the entire system is pointless, just like K/D would be.

Overall Exp/Game is hugely flawed and it should be Exp/Time instead (minutes seems the best choice). What’s worse is that the stats site tracks all private Freeplay matches too, so if you play a game trying to find new routes, work on your Light routes or test bullet patterns it will track all of those stats as well, even if you are playing solo. The entire system is basically pointless and a waste of space as it exists currently.

(Glyph) #73

[QUOTE=Frankie Godskin;332235]I only played MNC for the first month, but in that time, I was one of the best Gunners in the world. I had a 3.0 K/DR and a 2.0 Assist/Death Ratio (6,000+ kills, 4,000+ assists, just under 2,000 deaths) and I was in the top 100 on two leaderboards. I was one of the first people to get 2,500 minigun kills and I consistently outfought the other known Gunners (Boo5ive, etc.) and had matches where I had 50+ kills and no deaths.

If we had lost these games, it would have been a waste of time and energy. But when I was murdering everything in sight, my team was capturing the moneyball. We won BECAUSE my K/DR was so high and I was laying waste to the opposition.

In any shooter game, you can only score your objective if you’re alive. And if the enemy is dead, they can’t prevent you from scoring. That’s where players like me come in.[/QUOTE]

Sorry but I also played a lot of MNC and a team that was getting stomped could easily turtle and then OT rush based upon how the rules were back then. A Sniper could single-handedly take down the moneyball in OT with a single juice.

The reason why K/D ratio mattered in MNC was be you were rewarded for maintaining high killstreaks. In turn this would benefit the rest of your team as you could upgrade turrets, spam Bouncers, buy juice, use the annihilator, etc. Brink does not provide these types of bonuses for killing alone.

The irony is that if you talked to Uber they recognize that one of the failures of MNC was that they rewarded players too much for killing other players. Juice-chaining was only an issue because of how the killstreak bonuses worked. So yes, even killing in MNC is flawed.

(R_Shackelford) #74

[QUOTE=Glyph;332412]So here is the bad news… Brink tracks stats for the game based upon when you enter it until the game ends. As a result Exp/Game is hugely flawed as you can join a match with a few mins to go and only get 1k experience or less while the next game you may for 20 minutes and get 7k experience. So your average is now 4k. If you join another game and come in late managing another 1k then your average drops to 3k. You see where this is going, right? As you have no choice in when you join a game the entire system is pointless, just like K/D would be.

Overall Exp/Game is hugely flawed and it should be Exp/Time instead (minutes seems the best choice). What’s worse is that the stats site tracks all private Freeplay matches too, so if you play a game trying to find new routes, work on your Light routes or test bullet patterns it will track all of those stats as well, even if you are playing solo. The entire system is basically pointless and a waste of space as it exists currently.[/QUOTE]

Now that is some BS. I’ve had a number of games where I’ve joined and before I’ve even gotten to spawn once, up pops the “Mission Successful/Unsuccessful” banner. Guess I should just pad in private freeplays against bots (if I cared). :rolleyes:

(Glyph) #75

Even worse, if you leave before the game ends you get all of your experience but it will not track on the stats site. You literally have to finish the game for it to count.

(brbrbr) #76

i said “death”, not ****ing talk with statswhores !

(H3LLS1) #77

best thing about a good team game…is no two teams will ever agree on how to properly be a team player. i’m a team player cuz i keep the obj clear of enemies. i’m a better murderer than i’m friends…they know this. my job…on my team…is to lay down over powering fire :slight_smile:

(Jess Alon) #78

Sorry dude but being proud of your accomplishments is not wrong. Especially if you do it the right way. And completing a game in it’s entirety and being good at what you do is OK. And I’ve played with Frankie in Brink. He’s just a beast in general. He doesn’t hide from anyone. He outshoots people and he kills and destroys. When you play with him on your team you only need to buff him and concentrate on the objective. He also communicates clearly calling out your gamertag when talking to you and calling out his own gamertag when he needs assistance making it easy to play with him. And he never talked down to any of us or acted like a tool.

Before I got to play with the dude I thought he might be a prideful jerk because of his accomplishments but he’s actually down to earth and one of the few people I look forward to playing Brink with.

He doesn’t care about e-peen. He cares about accomplishments and some people are driven for that and some people come by it honestly instead of grinding XP they just play the game. Instead of getting a good K/D by camping they get out there and play the game well. There are actually some good players out there and Frankie is one of them. He just needs to realize that K/D boosters ruin this stat for dudes like him so in Brink it’s a good thing that it’s been removed.

I personally think that you should be able to view your OWN K/D if you really really want to so you know how well you do in that regard. But others should not be able to view yours. Because it will promote retarded behavior I outlined before.

And Kurnuttaja: Don’t judge people. You don’t know them.

(Jess Alon) #79

I’m a good team player because I’m the biggest harrasser ever. I launch nades, get knock downs, flank and do it again until they chase me away. Then people like you shoot them in the back.

(Steinernein) #80

KDR isn’t a vital statistic nor are point values; they’re both fundamentally flawed in several ways especially considering that this game is class/body type/whatever based.

The only thing that really matters is team composition statistics (including weapon layout etc) and the only thing that matters is whether or not your team can win. Thus, the OP’s title is utterly misleading and a complete lie on top of that (how he can write it with a straight face is beyond me - he probably didn’t).

However, he makes one single good argument: Why not? And frankly, there isn’t a reason to not include it. Players will come in with preconceived notions one way or another with what they think is ‘cool’ and what have you. That alone does more damage (or in some rare cases it benefits the team) to the team than anything else.

Also we’re really mainly talking about pubs here. Does it even ****ing matter? I am sure that if it were possible to run statless servers and everyone was max level they would still be doing the same **** they did on servers with displayed stats. I have no idea why all you people keep thinking there is some profound truth (and by debating it you guys really do believe that) behind KDR and how it reflects upon players. Make no mistake that stats are useful but to say it has a profound effect on pubs? Ehhh, that’s a pretty big stretch.

As other posters have pretty much made clear it’s not the ****ing stat that makes the pub go crazy, it’s MORE about how the game rewards/punishes you for being an individual and when I say individual I mean the Navy Seal definition of an individual.

How politicized.