Let me start by saying that I have played ET now for well over a year. I play primarily on the pub FF servers but do venture into the non-FF servers for a change of pace. Prior to this I’ve been a gamer for over 10 years and enjoy the competition amongst teams.
I’ve noticed a couple of trends that I would like your views on, but moreover I would not like to hear unbiased views. I’d like you to take devils advocate against your views and answer what you think about these things:
- Regarding Axis team member experience gain: Do you think axis can more easily gain experience and if so in which classes and why? For instance, an engineer may gain much less experience as axis whereas the field ops gains it much faster. Yes, I know that engineers are a different class and played differently. That’s the point. How significant would you say the gain is?
Field ops do differ greatly on the axis side vs. the allies side. Remember I’m looking for your devil’s advocate thoughts not a biased view or cranky remarks because you dislike the questions.
Let’s take any map where allies have to charge out of one or two exits (which is most of the maps, including the intro maps such as fuel dump, gold rush, etc). Allies have to work their way through a barage of artillery. The allies have a much greater difficulty in getting through it and placing it in the right places to cut off, or redirect, the axis members.
This is not a dig on the Field Ops by me. Is this your percpetion about how that class fares?
Now consider that same logic on a non-FF server where the teammates don’t die to FF artillery. Please make no judgement calls on FF vs. non-FF servers. I’m not evaluating that perspective. Your views or opinions are your own on that topic.
-
Most pub servers have negative feedback to anyone that dies 10 times, 15 times, etc. Even though this is the case does it seem appropriate to have this negative feedback going out to say an engineer who is dying 10-15 times while trying to repair the tank (say on fuel dump when the axis is simply spamming the bridge construction with artillery)? This is applicable to both FF and non-FF servers.
-
Heavy Weapons restrictions: e.g., limiting the number of panzers and mortars. Obviously there are servers that limit these classes. We also see a limit on Fops. Now consider the limiting factors on the allies who (I’m assuming here) receive the exact same limitations as the axis side does.
Here’s how it goes: Axis and allies have limits on panzers, mortars and field ops. Now the axis is known to mostly defend, especially on the stock maps. This means that on a FF server they can have one or two field ops calling artillery at regular intervals. Since the axis also has a limited need for engineers, except to disarm and limited build chores there are typically only a couple of them. What I see is that axis then needs only a couple per team to effectively cover as fops and eng (if they are competent). Do you see that the limitations on mortar and panzer just push the players into other classes? What would you think is the class that they would naturally move into?
- Spawnkilling/Camping: My own opinion is that it’s fair. No one guaranteed the opponent safe haven. Just because you are in your spawn or can run into your spawn doesn’t mean you can find safe haven there.
Do you feel that safe havens in the spawn are legitimate and how far out of the spawn point (the exact point) should you be safe and do you think that from server to server that radius of safe haven tends to grow depending on the which side the admin plays on?
-
Another pattern I have noticed that I would like your opinion on is: Do you notice a pattern for sides for the clan and/or server owner? For instance, do you notice that the clan always plays on one side? If so, which? My personal observation is that the owner of the server, be it a person or a clan tends to play more on axis. I’ve also noticed this trend more as the game progresses. For instance, as the campaigns come players on the clan owned servers migrate to axis more than you will see them migrate to allies.
-
What are your views on whether it is easier to defend or be offensive. For instance, on a FF server you get killed more because you tend to have to move through defensive lines whereas the defensive side awaits you with artillery barages, etc.
-
I find that on the pub servers that you will find that medics are no longer medics. Medics tend to perform their medic duties to get up their skills and then they only perform them when they have to. That’s my opinion. I watch players repeatedly attempt to get revives and heals from medics who are level 4 who have gone rambo.
I see a trend appears to be more prevalent on the axis side which has less of a need for engineers, fops, and panzers (due to the factors stated above) and so you tend to see more medics.
Now, more medics prior to alot of these restrictions, was a good thing. More medics meant that the engineers were being covered, healed and revived. But with the fast regen, with adren, and with medpacks and the fast regen of the medpack bar, this makes a medic a very formidable machine gunner.
Ammo used to be a factor for medics but ammo cabinets are everywhere and now on most servers a medic can pick up an opponents gun, it means that ammo isn’t such a big factor, at least in my opinion.
I’ve noticed a trend where I have seen (not all the time, but at times) almost every player on axis playing the medic class (at the same time). It surely puts a frown on your face when you turn the corner and on a high population server you run into 5-6 medics all bunched up covering each other.
To counter this I’ve seen two efforts by server admins. On one of them they limited regen to the based HP of the medic. For instance, if the base HP of the medic was 134 then the medic could only regen up to that. As well they could only heal themselves up to that. If they want HP beyond the base HP then they have to find the packs of another medic. The next thing I’ve seen is that you can’t pick up the weapon of the opposing team (machine gun).
I think the most memorable thing is that in war medics are supposed to be the class that helps the wounded. They also are those individuals that have the shortest lifespan. In ET the medic seems to have very good regen and with the advent of free and easy ammo they have little inhibiting them.
From the perspective of the panzer----the panzer was limited because they had 4 shots and could take down a sizeable group. The mortar was the same way. It was desired that they are limited because a few of them in concert can take down a sizeable team attempting to complete their objective.
My opinion is that due to these other restrictions the medic has become increasingly autonomous (with the wealth of ammo)–mavericks–as we know one only needs health and ammo to survive.
I can respect a good medic. I can respect those that play a class well. But the trend seems to be that some players only play medic now, or they go for the abilities of the other classes and then once they obtain those abilities they switch to medic and rambo.
For instance, the medics go for the flack jacket, then trap awareness, assassin, and then enemy-recognition, and then they switch to medic and play only that class. It seems to be a trend.
Now with the advent of poison and throwing knives the medic seems to be a wealth of skills and that this encourages rambo medics.
What’s your views on these? We all tend toward the path of least resistance and so it is natural that some of these factors come into play. You don’t like to get panzered so you limit them. You don’t like artillery spam on your spawn exit so you limit it. You don’t like mortar spam on your exit so you limit that. Since artillery is more useful to a defending side than to an offensive side (no one wants to be slaughtered by their own teammates artillery) one would see that since most of the stock maps are axis defensive you would tend to see more trends toward medics on the axis side and due to the factors of large increases in skills useable by medics they now seem to all be headed toward rambo.
I’m going to be putting up a server on a 100mb fiber connection to the internet and I’m interested in mods that will help balance the game out. I tend to want to have the class perform the tasks they were designed to perform. Are there good mods that are more than glorified voice-taunt setups, or that feed the rambo medic mentality–in other words, that create balanced team play on both sides by encouraging the classes play as they were designed?
Sorry for making this such a long post. I sort of wanted to cover the bases and I didn’t want to write it in such a way that would provoke others.
Thanks for your time. If you comment read it all and read it in context and comment on it in context.
