Some Suggestions for Improving Dirty Bomb

(M) #1
  1. Custom Match, which I think necessary to have this option, why when entering the Server Browser is full of empty servers with few players online, and I think Custom Match would be required to decrease the amount of empty servers, create a new server where you can customize the game your way and this would be great for players who add new challenges in the game. And the custom Match bar would allow the player to create his own game / server by placing the region he wants. And have the option of private server adding password.
    You would have the map options that you could select or deselect the maps you want to stay at random.
    And another good option would be the restriction of classes that could restrict a class that could not be used in the game. And under that option would have Merc restriction that could choose 5 or 7 Mercs that could not be used in the match.
    The choice of which way you want to play Objective / Stopwatch.
    The amount of players that would have in the match, which could at least get to have 3vs3 and the maximum up to 8vs8.
    And the option of restricting weapons and skills would be available. This option would be useful for anyone who has difficulty playing with secondary weapons and Melee, the Skills option would be to restrict medical support and fire support by prohibiting the use of Air Attack, Crawlers and Heavy Weapons (Minigun, Grenade Launches Bomb Squall etc. .)
    And a last option would be the Hardcore mode, which allows the players to play without the aim and take out the blue and red lighting that surrounds the players Allies and Enemies and also the objects that are played by the allied and enemy players, which distinguishes of who is the ally or the enemy. For example the Proxx mines or the Skyhammer Air Strike flag.
    And No Mercy mode that allows you to shoot the ally.
  2. The Weapon Modification option: this option would help improve weapon status by increasing the damage it has, by changing the weapon’s aim, changing the weapon’s support, adding a muffler to the weapon, and changing the gun’s weapon frequency by changing from semi-automatic to automatic and adding the gun customization cards.
  3. React when it is downplayed in the middle of the game: When the player is shot, give the chance that he will draw his secondary weapon to continue firing. And the example I took was from L4D2 that when an ally was shot he pulled the pistol to continue firing.

These suggestions I made to help the developers a little improve the game. And I do not know how to speak English or write in English anymore if you have any errors I used google translator to translate.

(Nail) #2

1 is coming, 2 and 3 aren’t and hopefully won’t

(Muddy Muddy Mud Nade) #3

Please God no. That would completely change the way Dirty Bomb is played. Gunplay is supposed to come down to who has the better aim at the end day, but the attachments would give advantages and disadvantages when there wouldn’t be.

(Press E) #4

Weapon modification is a bad idea. The main reason is that it really wouldn’t add anything meaningful to the game. All it would really do is complicate things. As it is, it’s possible to easily memorize how many shots it’ll take to kill an enemy, what a weapon sounds like, etc. Overcomplicating that for no real reason wouldn’t actually improve anything.
Weapons are also balanced around not having customizations. The dreiss has such a high damage because it’s semi-auto. The blishlok has a really good sight because it’s otherwise outpreformed by other SMGs. Giving other guns good scopes or making the dreiss full auto would take away the tradeoffs, meaning only a few weapons would be viable, rather than all of them. SD isn’t great with balance either, so rebalancing those weapons around that wouldn’t be fast or smooth
Minor cosmetic only upgrades, sure, but nothing that actually changes stats. If you want modifications, DB isn’t the game for it.

Also not sure what your 3rd suggestion is since I’ve never played L4D2. Does that just mean you’d be able to shoot with your secondary when downed? I don’t see why it’s necessary, the game is fine without that. And having to kill a player twice before they stop being a threat, in a game where the time-to-kill is already so high would just be weird.
Plus it would be bad for medics, since finishing downed players would become a higher priority, meaning less people to revive.

(AlbinMatt) #5

I wholesomely agree with the others. 1 is a mandatory feature for any game worth its salt if it claims to be able to cater to its community

2 is just kinda gimicky and it leaves open a spot for unattentive folks to point at as being pay to win

3 is just detrimental to the overall balance because, let me remind everyone, Fletcher can hold an SMG that is stronger than any of Phoenix’s primaries as a sidearm.

(M) #6

Thanks for the comment you made on this post.
I made these suggestions in these post to know the opinion of the players of the game on whether they would work or not, why I kept wondering more about 2 and 3 if it would work or not in the game.
And thank you very much for your opinions that you left in the comments of the post.

(Chris Mullins) #7

Hey there. Thanks for putting your ideas together and sending them over to us! I’ll drop some responses below for you:

  • Custom Matches: These are coming in the form of rentable Community Servers and should hopefully go live this week. If not, then very soon after
  • We would never add anything to weapons which improve their stats in this manner as this would be considered pay-to-win. We have considered side-grades in the past like muzzle breaks and different sights, but we’re not working on anything like that at the moment
  • The idea of a ‘last-stand’ mechanic has been discussed, but it’s not something we would implement. Perhaps a future Merc could as a part of their ability set (similar to Nader’s Martyrdom, but that would be the extent if anything

Again, thank you for sharing!

(pHine4s) #8

Let engineers be the only ones to be able to plant/repair/disarm,
let Medics be the only ones to be able to revive.

Agreed: Make restrictions in amount of same mercs (or even merc class) per team.
Maybe the system can even make suggestions which merc/class is needed, with reward as incentive.

Make FF standard.

Stop that silly 5vs5, give us 8vs8. Clusterfuck? ya, because there is no (PUG-)Teamplay in DB. It’s usually just a bunch of loners - especially quite a few of the Top-fraggers (too Pro to TP) - running in the same direction, except medics and objective monkeys. Why caring for the engineer, when i can plant as any class anyway? See first point.

Details of the above might be discussed, but as a rough direction it would improve the focus on Teamplay imho.

I don’t want to fancy the past but the commonness of complete strangers playing sudden organized TP was so much higher in ET and QW. Even Brink made ppl care more for each other due to the buff-my-teammate-system

PS: Spec-slots would be nice, too.

(Press E) #9

Character versatility is a big selling point of DB. Forcing only certain characters to do objs/revive is counter-intuitive. Not sure why you’d even want that anyways. Not like the current way hurts anything. Attacker teams with no engi are still at a disadvantage, you don’t need to force it more. If you want characters with specific playstyles, go play something like Overwatch

Making FF standard is a terrible idea. There are a lot of people who actually prefer playing FF off. FF on in public servers is just a clusterfuck of getting blown up and bad collision, especially on those 8v8 servers you want. Give people the option, don’t force it just because you want it, because not everyone does.

I prefer 8v8, but ranked is gone. You’re not forced into one category, just pick a server you want. And when rentable servers come, you’ll be able to. 8v8 is a bit much for comp though, 6v6 would be far better.

(AlbinMatt) #10

That’s the whole point of having a Forum. Welcome, DKaz.

Sorry, bud, but that’s a no-no for the simple fact that DB isn’t designed to lock you in. Imagine what this means for the meta if we were to assume that 5v5 or 6v6 is the standard. We already have a mandatory meta of two medics because of the “one is none, two is one” rule. Forcing an engineer in there is taking up another spot which may not even be needed in say, EV Defense or when you want to push against the attacker rather than defusing the bomb.

I wholesomely agree with your proposal to increase the player cap, especially for casual. Having only four or five other people on your team that could be a newbie, lagging, or just being a dick can really hamper the game. Less so if you have more players- provided we have merc caps.

(pHine4s) #11

@STARRYSOCK & @AlbinMatt

Playing SD-teamshooters from beginning, it was always my understanding that teamplay is the core-essence of an objective-based shooter.
If you watch back, you will see, that FF and ability-lock always was part of the game. Players sticked together, engineers always were protected and helped by the rest of the team, mission was: Get that objective-monkey to the opbjective to progress.

What we have now in DB is that ppl don’t even care, if there is an engineer at all, and if so, it’s very rare that you see anyone covering your back. Intersting: if you are covered as engie it’s not unusual, that it’s a player i already saw on ET and QW servers.
For me, that’s the spirit of SD-Teamshooters.

Since the beginning i always played medic or engineer, mostly engineer.
What i see most of the time on DB-Pugs is much more like Overwatch or actually TDM-like playstyle.

But hey, maybe i’m expecting just too much. K/D still rules in this game, useless fights while the repaired EV stands still with ppl even strafing around it not understanding that kamikaze-escorting is much better than dying anyway but not having done anything for the objective (oh, my precious K/D), front-running Pros being top of the board but all in all useless to the mission …

So all of the points you marked i can give right back to you.
8vs8 would be no clusterfuck, if TP would take place.
And the “meta” would be one, as there is no meta respective to the claim given the game.

Don’t get me wrong:
I still think DB is the best (Team-)shooter out there, even after more than 3.5 yrs playing it.

After all the changes over time and you named it, the impact Overwatch made when released, i’m afraid DB is becoming more and more a second Overwatch. The simplicity of the genuine concept of SD-mpfps fades with every fancy new merc surprisingly similar to Overwatch-mercs. A real improvement would be a fair amount of new maps after all those years, not new mercs.

A pity that the USP of DB get lost in the end by becoming just another me-too-DTM-shooter due to economic necessity.
Sign of the times, i’m a romantic old-skool-player, ya, right …

(Press E) #12

Don’t get me wrong, I understand what you mean, and I like the team feel of things like ranked too. But not everyone wants to play an FF on heavily team oriented game, and even the people who do don’t want to play it constantly.

Having FF is fine, and there should be more FF servers. But forcing it on everyone will only annoy players. DB has had FF off for so long that most of the people it’s attracted enjoy the game as it is. Forcing FF on on 8v8 servers doesn’t magically make everyone pros at team communication either, especially in public servers, where a skyhammer is liable to airstrike you from spawn.

TL;DR, It’s fine to want a classic team shooter, but DB never really has been one. Changing DB’s core gameplay mechanics is unfair to the people who started playing the game because they like it how it is. Giving us options to play how we want is great, forcing us to play one way or the other would only hurt the game.

(pHine4s) #13

Hmm, didn’t say any word 'bout FF in my last post.
So excuse me, having to write such long posts to explain my opinion.
TL;DR - just another thing these days …

To be short:
I quite like DB,
a real improvement would be much more maps, imho.

(Press E) #14

Don’t get angry at me lol. This is a reply to all your comments here in general, not specifically what you said in that comment.

My point being, implementing your previous suggestions would be unfair to the people who like DB as it is currently.

(Muddy Muddy Mud Nade) #15

Replying to the “Make a certain class be the only one that can do a certain thing” idea, I think it is not a very good one. Dirty Bomb is an objective-based game, and if only class could actually play the objective (Engineer), then that would always force someone to be have to play Engineer even if they don’t want to. If there’s not an Engineer on the team, then the attacking team literally can not win. I understand the concept of “if you want to even have a chance of winning, you gotta suck it up and play what the team needs sometimes,” but taking away the classic “If you’re good enough, any team comp can work” would even annoy me, someone who usually mains both Engineers and Medics.

(pHine4s) #16

Exactly! Now you understand! It worked perfect in W:ET, ET:QW and these are the games making the rep of an objective-based TEAMPLAY-shooter. It’s the core-concept. Search for that matter in posts 2 or 3 yrs before and you will see: that and FF were the first things discussed by the vets, anyone having played these games surely prefers that. Otherwise is kindergarden, as said in an older post …

(Ptiloui) #17

As @phineasfreak mentioned, Enemy Territory had objectives that only engineer could complete and it worked perfectly. There’s absolutely no reason at all it wouldn’t work in Dirty Bomb. And yeah, the “if you’re good enough, any team comp can work” completely kills the purpose of having objectives and classes chars…

And to go further, I would even say that making the EV vulnerable only to fire support abilities would be more interesting, so no one destroying the EV just by shooting it (I mean, come on, it’s supposed to be an armoured vehicle).

(Muddy Muddy Mud Nade) #18

@phineasfreak @Ptiloui Yeah, well this isn’t Enemy Territory. Quake Wars, ET, and all those other games had their time, but now is Dirty Bomb and now it’s a different game. And in this game, if you don’t want to play a certain class then you shouldn’t have to. The game was designed to where you don’t need to have a medic next to you to get healing and you don’t need to have a fire support on your team to get ammo when you run out. You may see that as a negative against team play, but I see that as a positive towards fun for the individual player. I would not want to play if SD took out ammo boxes and nobody had a fire support in their squad or just didn’t want to play one, nor would I wanna play if I was permanently stuck at 20 health because my team didn’t have a medic. I wouldn’t want to play if the only way to destroy the EV was if we had a fire support and we just straight up didn’t have one on the team. I understand that all this would force teamplay upon players, but I don’t think the game basically taking away the option of playing Assault or Recon just out of fear of the team not having a medic, engie, or fire support is good for anyone. Imagine if the game simply just gave out an auto-loss to a team because they didn’t have an Engineer or Fire Support loaded in. The game could auto-lock someone to play a certain class, but that would be awful for that person being literally forced to play that class.
A loss should come from a lack of skill, not from a lack of compliance.

(Ptiloui) #19

Well, the major difference between ET and DB is the squad system, which honestly is more restrictive than useful. In ET, if you were lacking a class, you could respawn as any of this class. Here in DB, if you lack a “class”, you’re stuck for the whole game.

Of course, people should play what they want to. But this is still an objective team based shooter with defined role. If no one wants to fill the roles needed to win, people shouldn’t rant about losing. If they managed to win without those needed roles, then they just outskilled the opposite team, which means than it’s a balance problem. OR it is big flaw in the game design.

(Muddy Muddy Mud Nade) #20

Fair enough.