Just another feedback post v2.
It’s been nearly 3 months and 8 patches since.
The first time around my post seems to have gained a lot of positive feedback on both, reddit and warchest forums, may as well… repost. Few things have been altered/updated/added/removed, though for the most part it’s just a copy-paste. I still urge you to read over it.
Previous posts and other resourceful links:
- [li]Pansy and the ever lasting hatred for aimpunch[/li][li]How to effectively balance Vassili, by ChickeNWaffles[/li][li]JPB’s feedback post[/li][li]Pixeltwitch’s Dream patch notes[/li][li]sick6 newb’s feedback post[/li][li]sick6 newb’s feedback post - Reddit comments[/li][li]BUNGABUNGA and some thoughts on DB[/li][li]Closed beta and first impression[/li][li]Any plans to include top players into weapon balancing?[/li][li]Pixeltwitch’s Jank 2.0[/li][li]Titan’s merc tier list
Disclaimer:
These are, without exception, strictly competitively oriented.
My suggestions are merely suggestions, they’re up for debate and most definitely not the only way to counteract or fix the problems listed below.
However, the problems remain whether or not you agree with my suggested way of addressing them. If you’ve got a solution, please do post. That’s what we’re here for in first place aren’t we?
Gameplay:
[ul][li]Spawntimes[/ul][/li][INDENT]This has been brought up over and over again.
There are multiple issues with the current system in place: One being the synchronized timer between Attacker and Defender team, another the extremely inaccurate representation of it (too much leeway given, ie: Dying on 22-23 will in most cases not result in a missed wave but instead allow you to respawn regardless).*
As many of you are aware, in the current state of the game: Attackers and Defenders both (Stopwatch only) will always be spawning at the exact same time.
This creates a heavily unbalanced pace towards the attacker side, not only are they already put at a disadvantage of having longer attack routes, they now also are thrown into a situation that will, always, result in attacks being executed on their own fullspawn. What this does is further slow down the game and break the pace.
There’s no safe way to upkeep pressure as an Attacker without being at constant risk of being taken out at a full spawnwave and as such you are, as Attacker, severely punished for timed attacks. Even if you were to execute an attack on a primary objective, with getting the Defender team on a fullspawn as focus, it currently gives you no benefit due to the attack routes.
As an example we can take the first stage of Bridge, from an Attacker’s point of view (this applies all maps):
Attackers synchronize their entry with the spawntimes to take full effect of wiping Defenders for the longest amount possible, standard stuff, every team does it or at the very least tries to utilize it.
But what if your attack fails? Let’s assume your team manages to only take 4 Defending players out for a 20+ second wave timer, while losing 5 players themselves. What happens next? Absolutely Nothing. Due to the fact that both teams will always spawn at the same time and attackers additionally to that, having a way longer route to the objective. We’ve accomplished absolutely nothing. We did not get rewarded - at all - for having killed 4 Players all of whom are advantageously positioned already due to Defender bias. The entire map has reset, we’ve just wasted a whole minute on attack without having accomplished ANYTHING.
It’s a simple problem with a simple solution. Introduce an offset between the spawntimes. Something random that changes on a per-game basis. 1-10 seconds is all it takes. Or even better, to give attackers a little of that advantage they need, decrease their spawnwavetimer from 25 seconds to 20 seconds. This would not only promote much better gameflow, for both viewers and players, but allow attackers to upkeep pressure on objectives.
Not to mention adds another, albeit small, skill gap between players that are able to keep track of spawntimes (ie counting 20 and 25 seconds) and players that simply aren’t. This positively affects “spawnrapes” just as much, as you now have to time your explosives according to your Enemy’s spawntime as opposed to your own. Also, this would take having to figure out your opponent’s spawntime in first place, whether it be by scouting it out or actually paying attention to the game and judging it based off of selfkills and their arrivals to certain areas.
A few forum related discussions, showcasing several suggestions made by the community for a change to this system, such as introducing Dynamic offsets, “Dystopia spawnsystem”, and more. Whether you’re a fan of the one or the other is highly irrelevant, the fact is that this game drastically needs a change.
Personally I’d vote for something as simple as reducing the Attacker’s wavetimer to 19seconds from 25 and leave Defenders as is.
- [li]Simple Idea for a new Respawn System[/li][li]Spawn Times[/li][li]Thoughts on Dirty Bomb’s Spawn system
At this point, I’d love to just see the spawntimes being de-sycnd from each other. Anything. Really. Just… DO SOMETHING.
- As of Patch v48857 this seems to be “resolved”, though most are under the assumptions of this being a bug rather than a feature. Patch notes do not mention it either. Clarification?
Also, not quite where it’s supposed to be, while the leeway was drastically reduced, it’s still there. You still have more than a second, sometimes up to two depending on the circumstances of your death, in which you can avoid a fullspawn, after the timer has already reset and is counting the next wave. [/INDENT]
[ul][li]C4 explosive timer[*][/ul][/li][INDENT]I believe the timer on C4 explosives could benefit from a small buff. 35 seconds perhaps.
This would promote more side objectives actually being planted, as opposed to focus fired with explosive and… Give attackers a little of that edge they need.
Having to defend 2 plants on Terminal, or even just a single plant on Underground, for TWO full spawn waves is a little bit extreme.
The fact that you’ve essentially wiped the Defenders once already and planted the charge is, in most cases, a massive feat by itself, but now being presented by having to wipe the Defending team twice, in a row? (Notice how spawntimes are related to this as well?)
Again, nothing but a simple fix. Defenders wouldn’t have to be so worry free, all the while the game pace is being sped up and attackers will actually be rewarded, as opposed to punished, for having accomplished something.[/INDENT]
[ul][li]PRIVATE SERVERS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD[/ul][/li][INDENT]Why isn’t this a priority? Everyone wants them. Casuals as well as competitive players. You’ve hinted time and time again about wanting to introduce a “system”, why the secrecy? This needs to be done asap if you want to upkeep a competitive scene.
The current “Private Lobbies” are not what we needed or wanted. It’s a half-assed job that has the exact same issues we’ve had with the “private cup servers”.
Not to mention how much easier this would make your job as well, why not give us server settings to fiddle around with? We can play-test pugs, scrims, cups, anything we ever dreamt of all the while you can just sit back, relax and look over the data once in awhile. It’s been long established that we can playtest things much more efficiently and thoroughly, as a whole, than your QA. We have the numbers, we have willing people, all we need are the tools. Let us help you.
This doesn’t even require you to do anything other than give us SETTINGS. We’re not asking for binaries, we want to be able to access the server config. Nothing more and nothing else.
It’s real simple. Let us rent servers from you. QL’s system was good, BF4’s system is decent. Rust/H1Z1/DayZ all works fine too. (Read: We want to give you money!) All we need is a simple tab with settings to go through ie:
[/INDENT]
[ul][li]Ragdoll animations[/ul][/li][INDENT]This is a bug more than anything. (I hope?)
Gibbing is tough. Ragdoll animations are on acid. 9 out of 10 times I can’t headshot the downed player I just killed due to the simple fact that his entire body is spinning around and breakdancing on the floor.
Hilarious bonus gif to showcase funky animations. (Credits go to iNytz)
https://fat.gfycat.com/DrearyPitifulHeron.webm[/INDENT]
[ul][li]Attacker spawn last stage Trainyard[/ul][/li][INDENT]Heavily related to spawntimes (gosh, shut up already!), but attackers could benefit from a slight buff by having their spawns moved a little closer (perhaps inside the first building, you know the one, the one that gets smashed in by the train?)
Cutting a tunnel through in either direction (ALT#1 to the outside for easy access to river/middle ; ALT#2 for easy access to the brick house/current ammo cabinet).
[ATTACH=CONFIG]14082[/ATTACH]
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- [li]Community Maps
- [li]Separation of sounds, voice chat, announcer, cutscenes etc.:
[ul][li]Funky Audio[/ul] [/li][INDENT]The sound in this game is weird to say the least, positional even more so than anything. Few parts of the maps (ie Underground) sound appears to travel through 4 different stages and gives you the illusion of being right next to you when in reality it’s still at the first objective. Other times sound seems to… travel too far, I hear people shooting on the other side of the map as if they were standing right next to me, while the person actually next to me, is barely audible at all.
Underground weirdness:
//youtu.be/hicAWwbgHdU
[/INDENT]
[ul][li]Viewmodel aka drawgun:[/ul][/li][INDENT]Any possibility at all to be granted a feature that removes the gun and hand models from your screen entirely? They take up way too much screen space, block important information and are otherwise just utterly obnoxious and intrusive.
I understand that, given your weapon skinning and ironsights this is unlikely to happen, but… pretty please?[/INDENT]
[ul][li]Accessibility to seeing opponent team classes:[/ul][/li][INDENT]I should not ever be able to see my opponent’s team’s selected merc by a simple press of TAB. I can understand wanting to see the loadout POSSIBILITIES the opponent has, but not the currently selected merc. Too much information is being handed out for free.
Same deal as spawntimes really, it just takes out any and all surprise out of the game. These are things I shouldn’t just… know without ever even having seen a single opponent.[/INDENT]
- [li]Progress bar on C4 plants/defuses.
I’d like to have the “progress” bar removed entirely. This includes disarming progress. I find it silly for such valuable information to be made so easily accessible. I can, with a simple look at it, judge whether or not my opponent will try to suicide rush for it rather than play for control, I don’t even have to guess. Being able to watch the clock and determining when it’s “going to blow” based on that or “how much time they’ve got left to defuse” is and should be part of general gameawareness, not accessible on a single glance.
In the case of the E.V it’s not too much of an issue, but I still don’t see how or why the Defenders should have access to this information. All we need to know is if it’s up and alive or not. Especially when it comes down to disabling it, saving rather than throwing an Airstrike can make all the difference and players with the better awareness and knowledge of how much damage a tank has suffered should be rewarded. Which it does, fairly enough so, but the information is simply too easily accessible. [/INDENT]
- [li]Healthbar + Ghostsystem on enemies
[ul][li]Separation/Rework of HUD Elements[/ul][/li][INDENT]I’d love to see the Spawnwave timer and Gametime to be separated from eachother. Also, let us edit/rework the fireteam, or at the very least move and resize it?
Objective Icons are drawn and displayed as overlays, it blocks out your crosshair entirely (also affects RedEye’s Smoke negatively) and should be re-sizable without having to change your entire HUD’s resolution.
Option to remove HUD elements entirely? If I wanted to not display the chat at all, or my ammo, or hp, or anything really. Right now the only two options you’re given are HUD and… no HUD.[/INDENT]
- [li]Demos.
[ul][li]Mounted MG buggyness[/ul][/li][INDENT]Player models acting up, hit registrations being wonky. Stuck in MGs. Not being able to use it at all… Tons of bugs.
Perhaps work in a feature such as ETs in which you can destroy a mounted gun with explosives and be able to reconstruct would be worthy consideration as well?[/INDENT]
- [li]Walking/Moving while Crouched
[ul][li]Selfkill delay[/ul] [/li][INDENT]The delay on your selfkill is atrocious. You’re required to selfkill up to 2 or 3 seconds before your own spawn if you want to make it into the next wave.
We should be able to use as much time as possible without having to be penalized for selfkilling a second or even half before the spawn only to miss it and end up being full, the timer is there for a reason, if I die before it resets to 24 or 0 I shouldn’t be put into a later wave, this whole system seems to contradict with itself.
Also, when trying to selfkill immediately after being revived it straight up ignores you for up to 3 seconds.[/INDENT]
[ul][li]Gun sentries, ammo stations and health stations blocking explosive damage:[/ul] [/li][INDENT]Intention or bug?
Sentries, ammo stations and healing stations, all, soak up any and all damage from nades. A player sitting right behind a sentry, will very likely not get damaged. Where as if the sentry was another player, both would have died from that specific grenade.[/INDENT]
[ul][li]On the fly accessible stats is a thing I’m missing, coming from Quake/ET/RtCW this is definitely one of the many things I want to see in this game.[/ul] [/li][INDENT]I genuinely don’t give a rats ass about those after game reports many games seem provide these days. (ie. Battlereports in the BF series, what’s up with that? Pointless to look at, doesn’t provide any useful information at all and inaccessible DURING the game).
Such as ET’s implementation of /scores, /weaponstats <player ID>, /topshots would be highly favorable.
Weaponstats and Scores are great, gives me everything I need, accuracy, hits/bullets fired, kills/deaths, damage dealt and received, it’s definitely something I reckon a lot of players wouldn’t mind seeing.
More importantly, definitely not something I reckon takes a lot of extra coding? Those should be there already, in a sense or another. Keeping track of them or outputting them to file shouldn’t be too difficult of a task.
People generally love looking at their stats and scores, even if they don’t really resemble the game much, but it adds an extra layer, really.
And you can always add “Global” or “Lifetime” stats to your community site/user profiles later on if that’s something you guys had in mind. But the reality is, people care more on a “per game basis”, from what I’ve noticed.
Examples of the above:
- [li]Client Stats.log output[/li][li]GamesTV console.log parser[/li][li]Community console.log parser[/li][li]RtCW console.log parser
If there should be any interest, I do have the source for some of these parsers. Feel free to pm and ask.
/scores & /weaponstats (used as bind in below example) console output in ET:
SD Pls :([/INDENT]
[ul][li]Spawnshields[/ul] [/li][INDENT]Queue “ET did it this and that way feedback”.
No, seriously. I’ve suggested this months ago. The current implementation of spawnshield is counter-intuitive. Make it a static amount across the board (3 seconds, maybe less… most definitely not more) of invulnerability and we’re good to go.
Right now you’re being punished rather than rewarded for trying to defend yourself in your own spawn area, which ironically… Is something I’ve been abusing, I’d drop a nade/strike/whathaveyou and bait people into shooting me as 99% of the playerbase is unawares of how exactly spawnprotection works.
Fixing it to a static amount lets players not only defend themselves but spawnkilling becomes harder as the killer’s timing becomes more crucial and less forgiving.[/INDENT]
- [li]Blood/muzzleflash
- [li]Freecam “wallhack”
[ATTACH=CONFIG]14086[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=CONFIG]14087[/ATTACH]
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- [li]Medic cam
Balancing:
[ul][li]Instagibs vs freedom of movement[/ul][/li][INDENT]We really can’t have both. Sniping is, in comparison to any FPS title ever, way too easy and rewarding.
Currently Vasili is just straight up overpowered. Personally I’d love for the instagib to go, seeing as how it breaks the game pace and renders medics useless. Good snipers in this game have become a hardcarry to the point where you’re FORCED to snipe as a counter-measure due to the effectiveness of the instagib.
This would not affect his viability at all, really. You can still relatively fast gib a person in a single shot, you can still put a stop or at the very least delay a push with well placed headshots. Taking away the instagib would draw the sniper’s attention towards taking out supportive classes (medics) as opposed to straight up taking out the damage dealers and call it a day.
You already have all the positional advantages as a sniper to begin with. You can 1shot kill a person, you can jump/strafe snipe without any real punishment to your aim and you aren’t affected by fall-off damage as every other merc is in this game. Why would you be rewarded with an instagib as well?
Teams should be allowed to make decisions in their merc picks rather than being forced to have a sniper due to his extreme effectiveness.
The difference between Vasili and any other merc with potential instagib abilities is just that, they’re abilities on a cooldown. Fragger can at the very most achieve an instagib every 17 seconds, Vasilli can - theoretically achieve it every single shot. Skyhammer can achieve instagibs once every MINUTE. Nader, Arty, Kira, Fletcher… Any merc really, can’t achieve an instagib at all.
Not to mention, due to the new revive/gib mechanics, a Vasilli can make an active choice whether or not he wants to gib a person. There is enough time to land 2 quick shots on a downed person before a medic can successfully revive. This would further increase the skill ceiling of a sniper as he is now confronted with additional choices, do I gib or do I take my chances and try to kill the medic? Do I gib or am I confident enough in my awareness that there is no medic closeby. [/INDENT]
- [li]Kek-10
[ul][li]Hochfir vs SMG-9 vs Crotzni | M4 vs Timik vs K-121[/ul] [/li][INDENT]The Crotzni is your most “popular” gun, for a very simple reason. Loadouts. SMG-9 has arguably been a lot better for months. The reason it’s not being used is simply that, augments.
Not to mention the fact that the SMG-9 has horrible fall-off damage in a game that is primarily designed around long to mid-range gun encounters. It has nothing to do with accuracy, nothing to do with recoil, or any other imaginary data echo might show. If you want the weapons to be used, give us better augments. Done.
The exact same thing applies to the M4 for Fraggers. K121 is strong, really… strong. Was strong 2 months ago, still was strong a month ago. Today’s patch reduced it’s spread by a total of 20% which is utterly idiotic. And here’s the irony in it. It still won’t be used simply because of how much stronger the M4 LOADOUT is. Loadout cards skew weapon stats left and right. Get the picture yet?
M4 on skyhammer, again a primary gun. Why? Loadouts. The Timik is fun, the timik is decent (not nearly good enough simply due to having to control the recoil while having no real reward tied to it, ie higher RoF or DMG).
Number 1 step to fixing these guns or making them an actual choice rather than forced onto players with a clear “favourite” at all times… Fix. The. Augments.
Above all, STOP balancing around RNG. No one likes RNG. If you’d recall that’s exactly what killed Brink. If you feel a gun performs better than the other, look at the core of the problem instead of randomly adding more RNG to it. Look at the RoF, DMG, Clipsize, Recoil, Fall-off DMG, anything but “accuracy”. And most importantly, the loadouts. [/INDENT]
- [li]Nader direct hits close range
- [li]Fletcher/Aura/Proxy more smg access
[ul][li]Fletcher Sticky Bombs[/ul] [/li][INDENT]As we all know sticky bombs can be shot out of the air, which is an alright mechanic - not the biggest fan of it, but it’s manageable. What annoys me however, is that you can shoot a sticky bomb directly out of a fletcher’s hand. If you are “cooking” or merely “holding” a sticky in your hand with the intention of aiming and releasing, it can detonate in your hands. Fletcher is already at a disadvantage by design, and poor weapon accessibility, you shouldn’t be punished for merely holding a sticky in your hand.
A minimum fuse time at which the sticky grenade can trigger by being shot at might be feasible, nothing too drastic, 0.3 or 0.4 seconds should do the job entirely. You just don’t want a sticky exploding in your own face just because your opponent may be a tad lucky with the spread (read: bad aim). [/INDENT]
[ul][li]Arty[/ul][/li][INDENT]I like arty. I like the idea of an artillery, but in order for him to be viable we need to see a drastic change in Ability. He’s already at a severe disadvantage due to this weapon loadouts.
The recent buff was a good start, but still not nearly enough. Either have him drop multiple delayed shells or another 20% increase in AoE & damage is in order.
In short: Arty’s problem is that anything he can do, others do better.
He doesn’t have an indoor ability, which both Skyhammer and Stoker supply, coupled with a very long and very big area of denial ability. Both of which are more efficient at taking out the E.V or other destructible objectives.
He has poor weapon choices by being limited to Burst and Single shot rifles in comparison to Stoker and Skyhammer, thus his combat ability is sub-optimal.
On the other hand, Kira has the longest lasting area of denial ability that does immense damage and can travel across the map. Kira, while arguably has the same “bad weaponization”, has the added benefit of being a lot faster and isn’t quite as stationary in combat and doesn’t get crippled as much.
Nothing Arty can do, any of those other 3 mercs can’t do… and more. They all supply a team with ammo, they all have area of denial ability (all of which last way longer), they’re all much more efficient at utilizing their abilities to take out objectives or even just deal damage. And all 3 mercs are much more versatile in combat. [/INDENT]
[ul][li]Differing Character model height[/ul] [/li][INDENT]Please fix character model heights. It feels absolutely ridiculous and weird switching between regular sized characters to smaller ones (ie kira and sparks) and having to aim UP to get the crosshair onto head height. Right now in default position the crosshair of Kira barely reaches the nipples of a Sawbonez.
Whereas the Sawbonez is aiming WAY above the Kira but is not affected by it because she has a ridiculously large head hitbox that goes far beyond her actual model.
Also hugely affects jumping. While all characters have the same “jump height”, the shorter ones can’t reach places your regular male sized models can, simply because the model itself is bigger. Consistency, please.
Head hitboxes for kira, proxy, sparks and aura vs center crosshair position on small female merc:
Also a short clip to further demonstrate:
//youtu.be/UbsUmR8qnZ4
[/INDENT]
[ul][li]RedEye aka Arty#2[/ul] [/li][INDENT]The smoke is a joke, it’s not dense enough, player models are clearly visible inside and around it. Hud icons stick through it (player health, name, objective progress and icons, muzzle flash), explosives “destroy” it far too easily and above all, it’s way too tiny.
Also, what the **** is up with the 10FPS animation for the actual smoke can?
I was quite hyped for RedEye even, smokes are interesting, smokes are generally very intriguing for competitive play, but the mediocre weapons, horrible loadout combinations and above all awful ability makes this just another mediocre merc that won’t be competitively viable enough to replace any of the core mercs, if even just situational.
Right now I just don’t see myself freeing up a spot for RedEye if it implies I have to drop Nader, Skyhammer, Kira or even Vasilli for him.
The merc has absolutely nothing to offer that other mercs don’t, or are better at. He is, in a sense, useless.
The single unique trait he has is too lacking to make him viable. Which is exactly the problem if he’s bundled with an otherwise, in comparison, horrible kit.
He’s bad in close combat due to his weapons. He performs badly in mid-range combat and gets outshined by every merc with a similar weapon setup due to their abilities strength or otherwise supportive capabilities.
He’s even worse at long range, PDP doesn’t perform nearly as well as the MoA does (especially considering the ridiculousness of instagib). Grandeur doesn’t even remotely compare.
What’s left? His “spotting”? Again. Other mercs do it better all the while having way stronger primaries.[/INDENT]
[ul][li]Spark’s REVIVR / Revive & Gib Mechanic[/ul] [/li][INDENT]Borrowing from adeto’s reddit post:
Removed gibbing during getting up phase
Players are now invulnerable during getting up phase, but completely immobile until it is finished. (could even increase the get up phase time a little if it’s too short to slow down pushes)
The movement penalty already makes training less viable(compared to the OP days) but not impossible. Medics will have a choice to revive mid fight or solo, opposed to the current state where the only real choice is to fight as the gib during get up makes reviving mid fight almost a guaranteed fail as gibbing is simply easy atm. This will also buff Phoenix’s self revive slightly as currently it’s completely near useless and takes way too long and when you finally do get up you can still be gibbed. For him it would mean he can still easily be gibbed while downed(as the self revive charge up takes a while) but if players aren’t quick enough his ability actually punish them for it.
Sparks REVIVR now takes a 50% minimum charge for a successful revive.
The ‘gib during get up after revive’ feels like it was only implemented to stop Sparks from being unstoppable, her REVIVR removes the time of having to run to a dead teammate AND gives her the ability to stay away from the fight while doing so. Making her REVIVR have a minimum charge balances her out. This way reviving on Sparks is balanced out opposed to having a mechanic that ‘nerfs’ the other medics a lot harder than it does Sparks.[/INDENT]
[ul][li]Proxy, aka Arty#3[/ul] [/li][INDENT]Again, nothing Proxy does, others can’t. All the while they’re better at it. More suited for combat, more health, better guns, better abilities.
Suggestion; having her landmines be buffed in similar fashion to ETs. We can start off lightly by merely removing the glowing highlights and sounds for it. Being able to hear a landmine through 5 different rooms kind of takes away its benefits. Shooting it, exploding/disabling it is all fine and dandy, but… I’m not going to rush head first into a room, at full speeds if I can hear the obnoxiously annoying “BEEP BEEP BEEP” sound blearing in my ears. It’s too much information. If the highlights and sounds were removed it may just give competitive players more incentive, failing that… Why not turn them invisible, into actual landmines. Have them be “burrowed” in the ground, this could be remedied by having Proxy have a “arming time” much rather just randomly throwing it places. Either way, bottom line: Proxy needs a buff.[/INDENT]
newb’s just something I picked up a decade or so ago, have been using it in ET pubs/ircgames/scrims/blah ever since, kind of just stuck with me.