Which body type is your favourite? (part 1)

(shirosae) #121

Your problem is this:

I have no way of knowing which bodytype to pick before I join a game. As such, if I’m being fairly casual and join some random game it’s reasonably likely that my team will consist of a random selection of bodytypes. This is pretty much guaranteed if the teams all swap about each map in order to sort the storyline-order of maps out.

If the choice of bodytype is advantageous, then this advantage will be randomly distributed. My team might happen to have an easy time because we’re built to the task, or our balance might be hugely off.

If the bodytype is not advantageous, then no-one will care because by definition it doesn’t matter.

If you don’t let people change bodytype dynamically as a tactical response, then you’re left with two options:

  1. Bodytype is simultaneously unimportant and random.
  2. Bodytype is simultaneously important and random.

In scenario (1), you may as well drop the bodytype thing entirely because no-one will care.

In scenario (2), people will change characters and rejoin with a bodytype that works. If they can’t do this, they’ll disconnect entirely and join another server over and over until they get a combination that does work. Don’t underestimate how snobbish scrubs can get about how everyone else on the team didn’t pick the right bodytype.

Look at Random Arenas in Guild Wars to see this in effect. Look at what happens when four Elementalists end up in the same random team - they all quit and immediately rejoin in the hopes of getting a plausible team build. Randomness doesn’t work when it’s applied to anything important.

(tokamak) #122

Or look at WoW where player put on fire resistant gear when they saw fire mages, frost resistance when they saw frost mages, and shadow when they saw warlocks. Naturally blizzard locked gear after players started to tun the game in such a travesty.

Let players relog into a different character if they don’t like it, they’l lose the endurance they’ve built up during the match and that way newcomers who have no clue what the set up might be won’t be punished for switching.

(Ragoo) #123

[QUOTE=tokamak;202805]There’s nothing tactical about being able to select body types on the fly though. I rather see body types as way of adding texture to a game, it’s a random variable that both teams need to adapt to accordingly.
[/QUOTE]

It’s not only about body type (which imo seems very important) but also about which abilities you have unlocked with a character.
So if you have an extreme medic character coming into a game with only medic characters that sucks.
Basically just think about the examples I gave and also those of shirosae and add the fact that it’s not only body type you will want to change but also all the abilities you have unlocked on a certain character.

About your last post: Look at ET:QW where people choose sniper class to counter an enemy sniper or look at wc3 where people choose Panda when enemy goes sorcerers or whatever. To adapt to your enemy is part of tactical play. And if everyone in your team is playing with a character that is not suited for his class or the objective/situation because of his abilities and body type and you are playing against a team which is specialized you will fail if teams are equally skilled (at least that is what I guess will happen).

But as I said, since you would give the option to change characters we only discuss theory here because practically we want the same game :wink:

(tokamak) #124

[QUOTE=Ragoo;202813]It’s not only about body type (which imo seems very important) but also about which abilities you have unlocked with a character.
So if you have an extreme medic character coming into a game with only medic characters that sucks.
Basically just think about the examples I gave and also those of shirosae and add the fact that it’s not only body type you will want to change but also all the abilities you have unlocked on a certain character.[/QUOTE]

Good point. That makes it even more important to lock/penalise changing characters as it would make building and specialising a character completely meaningless.

Brink would simply turn into another COD instead of having a shooter where you can develop an actual character.

Even with your example of QW, body types are only changing the focus of your class. A heavy medic and a light medic are still both medics, but they work in different ways. From what I can conjure out of the rumours is that heavy medics are focussed on quantity healing (high proefficiency, big guns to clear out a room before recovering teammates) and light medics are focussed on selective emergency recoveries (for example on someone who was about to complete an objective). They’re both required, they can both try to imitate each other but in the end, not having the right body at the right moment isn’t as disastrous as not having the right class at the right moment.

Bodies only augment the role you play, they don’t decide it.

This all under the disclaimer of knowing absolutely squat about what SD is planning to do.

(kilL_888) #125

[QUOTE=tokamak;202816]

A heavy medic and a light medic are still both medics, but they work in different ways. From what I can conjure out of the rumours is that heavy medics are focussed on quantity healing (high proefficiency, big guns to clear out a room before recovering teammates) and light medics are focussed on selective emergency recoveries (for example on someone who was about to complete an objective). [/QUOTE]

man, thats such an easy thing to come up with, but i didnt realize until now. i sure know there are different body types with different abilities, but i always just thought your body type would affect the weapons you can carry and the hp you have. so, my thoughts basicly were limited to the soldier class which hasnt a supporting role, he just kills people and blows stuff up.

i would never have thought about different medic abilities with different body types. even its so logical.

that leads to more questions. whats the benefit of having a heavy body type when playing a spec ops (or what are they called in brink?). what can a light body engineer do a heavy guy cant? will only the heavy engineer guy be able to plant turrets? do i have to select light to plant mines? so much more questions. im getting more interested every day i read stuff like that.

(tokamak) #126

It’s from a really vague comment that is already quite old but they said that heavy players will have more proefficiency, or whatever resource Brink is using. I’m imagining it’s like the ‘power’ bar in W:ET, so the heavy guys will probably have a larger pool of that, so they can do more in one go.

Though an alternative could be that ‘power’ means completing objectives faster. A heavy operative will hack faster than a light one (rain man anyone?).

To translate to engineers, a light engineer can place turrets very far into the enemy zones and on annoying places, but because of his low proefficiency, will have trouble keeping it there for long. A heavy player will have a hard time getting there but an easier time keeping it where it is.

And medics will have to ways of reviving players. The only two ways I can think of are those of Quake Wars, the instant revives by GDF and the slow revives by Strogg. To balance this out, the fast revives could be costly and the slow revives could be cheap. Or if you go for the second alternative, a light medic will have slower cheap revives than the heavy guy.

Anyway, this is just me clutching at the few straws that have been given so far.

The point is that I’d rather see players improvise tactics based on what they have, then changing what they have to suit their tactics. It brings so much more depth to the game. Quake Wars and W:ET both are filled with pre-made tactics. It’s just teams doing the tried-and-tested stuff all the time. Can’t blame them. But if you add a random texture in talents to those teams, people will have to combine pre-made tactics with whatever they think suits the current scenario the best.

It is cool to be handed a role that might not suit your character. Locked body types will mean that you can sometimes expect a mega-fat solid snake behind enemy lines stabbing and interrogating everyone. You simply won’t get that if all body types are available, simply because if it’s even slightly less ideal than another combination, people simply won’t do it.

(kilL_888) #127

OR, a light medic revives you with, lets say 50% hp, a medium guy gives you 75% and a heavy gives you 100% and with a special perk/ability you get a short armor boost that only the heavy guy can give you… :slight_smile: or the first damage you receive will be absorbed by the medic that revived you, or, or … …

im excited :slight_smile:

(Rahdo) #128

yup, there’s basically 6 elements that change about you depending on which body type you are:

health: bigger equals more hitpoints
weapons: bigger equals heavier weapons
speed: bigger equals slower
climbing: bigger equals less ability to climb
power: bigger equals longer power meter (can do more class abilities)
size: bigger equals easier to be shot

i tend to look at the choice of body type kind of like playing a CCG like Magic the Gathering. When you’re about to play a match, you make the best choice about what deck you want to use, because once the match starts, you’re stuck with that deck. So it’s a very important high level decision, and it’s meaningful because mid-way through the match, you can’t just throw it away and change, you’ve got to live with your decision. During the match, the cards you’ve got in your hand and in play determine the round to round choices you have to make. Those are the same as Brink’s changing class. You’re making decisions all the time in the action about what to do (what card to play, what class to be, what route to take, what monster to attack with, etc), but you do it within the context of the deck you chose before the match started, or in our case, the body type.

I’m a big fan of choices being meaningful, instead of throw away. Hence the thing about picking a body type and seeing the match through with it (and toka actually lists several other good reasons above too).

The big thing is, all 3 body types have very strong advantages and disadvantages, and each one is useful in every situation, in a different way. Sure, a big guy takes longer to get to the front line, but once he’s there, he’s tougher than anyone else, brings the pain, and also can do more revives/ammo hand outs/weapon buffs/etc. etc. than anyone else. Otoh, a little guy can get there super fast, but he’s only going to have a few abilites he can do before he’s out of power. But he’s going to be able to reach areas that others can’t, and if he’s smart, he’s going to be a really tough guy to hit, since he moves so fast. Medium guys is the happy inbetweener.

You’ll never be useless to your team because you’re big and slow, or weak but fast. You just have to change your moment to moment tactics in a match based on that big choice you made up front (and what choices your teammates and the enemy made).

Trust me, it works really well in our internal playtests at the moment :slight_smile:

(tokamak) #129

Another point is, if you don’t like the risk of not fitting the situation, you can always go medium with a very conservative build, that way you’re never out of place.

health: bigger equals more hitpoints
weapons: bigger equals heavier weapons
speed: bigger equals slower
climbing: bigger equals less ability to climb
power: bigger equals shorter power meter (can do less class abilities)
size: bigger equals easier to be shot

Awesome, we didn’t really have any clear comments on that yet.

(shirosae) #130

Yes, but the deck you need to live with through the match is the deck that you and only you picked in advance, with various tactics in mind.

What you don’t do is go ask another seven random people to pick cards randomly for the other 7/8 of your deck that you don’t get to see before the match starts, and hope that the luck of the draw gives you a combination that makes any sense.

It’s an important high level decision that I have absolutely no way of making an informed choice on, because I get to do it only once and before the game starts.

Essentially, I randomly pick whatever bodytype I feel like and be damned with the consequences. People did this in ETQW with classes, which is when we got six covops per team-itis.

I think the problem I have with this is this:

People are approaching this bodytype idea as if the only person it affects is you. You want to play a certain kind of character, so you pick your choices and do it.

Here’s the kind of character I want to play: One that fits best with the tactical situation as my ability to perceive it dictates, which includes the behaviour and composition of the other and my team.

So for me with the setup described here, I am forced to pick a bodytype playstyle that I don’t actually care in the slightest about, but don’t get to choose a bodytype which best suits the needs of the tactical situation, which is the only thing I care about.

This forces me to make a decision I can see reasons to make, but at a time and in a way that destroys my ability to make it mean anything.

(tokamak) #131

[QUOTE=shirosae;202852]Yes, but the deck you need to live with through the match is the deck that you and only you picked in advance, with various tactics in mind.

What you don’t do is go ask another seven random people to pick cards randomly for the other 7/8 of your deck that you don’t get to see before the match starts, and hope that the luck of the draw gives you a combination that makes any sense.
[/QUOTE]

And that means you will have to adapt your style to what the rest has come up with. Making the best out of the team composition is a matter of skill, not luck.

[QUOTE=shirosae;202852]Essentially, I randomly pick whatever bodytype I feel like and be damned with the consequences. People did this in ETQW with classes, which is when we got six covops per team-itis.
[/QUOTE]

That’s strange, you’re using an example where players are free to chose on the spot.

(Rahdo) #132

I definitely get your point, but I think this is where the fundamental disagreement stems from. To me, there is no one best bodytype for any situation. All three of them are valuable, all bring something different, and all are useful in any tactical situation. A team of all heavies is well set to take on any situation, as is a team of all lights; the two teams would just handle the situations differently. And that’s what I really like about the system right now, that the combinations that come about because of the unpredictable mix of body types really helps keep every situation fresh and unique.

As an example of what I don’t want to see happen, I believe that if players could change body type at any time in a match, the majority of players would always go all heavy every time while on defense, because they’d believe (incorrectly) that it was the ‘best possible’ thing to do. “stay put, hunker down, outlast the enemy”. And that owuld make situations less interesting because you’d always run into the same wall of tanks defending core objectives. But because player have to make that choice and stick to it for the whole match (or both matches in stopwatch), you get more interesting and dynamic situations because of the unexpected mixes of classes and body types available.

(tokamak) #133

For example, an overweight Sam Fisher.

(darthmob) #134

I had the same doubts as shirosae.

[QUOTE=Rahdo;202867]As an example of what I don’t want to see happen, I believe that if players could change body type at any time in a match, the majority of players would always go all heavy every time while on defense, because they’d believe (incorrectly) that it was the ‘best possible’ thing to do. “stay put, hunker down, outlast the enemy”. And that owuld make situations less interesting because you’d always run into the same wall of tanks defending core objectives.[/QUOTE]This sort of convinces me it may be the right thing to not be able to switch the body type because it totally would be like that. The extreme combinations of bodytypes in a team do have to work out well, though.

(Ragoo) #135

[QUOTE=Rahdo;202867]I definitely get your point, but I think this is where the fundamental disagreement stems from. To me, there is no one best bodytype for any situation. All three of them are valuable, all bring something different, and all are useful in any tactical situation. A team of all heavies is well set to take on any situation, as is a team of all lights; the two teams would just handle the situations differently. And that’s what I really like about the system right now, that the combinations that come about because of the unpredictable mix of body types really helps keep every situation fresh and unique.
[/QUOTE]

Yeah but if you only have characters which are specialized Soldiers in one team? That’s just a handicap.
And I would really like to trust you that every team can handle every situation but even if there are lots of different ways to accomplish an objective equally good, there will be lots of combinations that just don’t work. I mean if Team A happens to have a good balance of characters (different body types/abilities) and Team B has mostly the same body type+specialization, I don’t think that the odds are 50:50…

And as shirosae pointed out, this is a team game so your choice of character should fit with the rest of the team and I can see myself getting pissed off when random unbalance happens.

(DarkangelUK) #136

You seem to be under the illusion that people are going to know something you don’t and figure the best over all body type, and you’ll join a game where they’re all the same and steam roll. Rahdo just said there’s no one overall best body type for all situations, so regardless of the team you should still perform well… the only thing that changes is you strategy according to body type.

Can you explain the random unbalance you refer to?

(Ragoo) #137

The problem is that I can hardly believe that this is true.

It is of course a matter of balancing and because it is something very essential I would like to see a beta (now that the game is delayed and there is plenty of time to do it) so there is some testing about this issue :slight_smile:

edit: And I don’t think that one body type will be the best. I just said that some combinations of body types in a team could be better than others.

(Rahdo) #138

AH HA! So this is really all about getting into a beta! You sly dog, Ragoo! :slight_smile:

Yeah, it will definitely be tested a lot over the coming year. We’ve had the system this way for our internal playtests for the last 5 or 6 months, and it’s been working fine. There are guys who love being a big heavy, and guys who love being light. Most of us opt for medium, surprisingly. Using Smart movement REALLY well requires a lot of finese, like Aubrey, whereas being a big guy means you’re really well suited for support, but you’ve got to know the levels really well to make up for your slower speed (Jamie is our resident medic, and is always a big lumbering guy watching our backs. Our stats have shown he’s gone entire matches firing less than 20 rounds, and yet whatever team he’s on really excels).

So it’s been working really well so far, but I’m sure this topic won’t die, and I’ll continue to let you guys know how it’s working in playtests as we get more and more features working in the game! :smiley:

(tokamak) #139

Awesome, I rather be the ‘man behind the curtain’ as well. Biggie it is.

(Dormamu) #140

Let the body type be chosen at the CP, we will have 8vs8. In my opinion the best team will be 2 heavy 4 medium 2light. If the team has already 2 heavy, block the player from choosing the heavy body and make him chose medium or light. Or let him chose heavy with lower health+lower weapons he can carry, it will be pointless to chose heavy then and he will go for the medium/light.
my 2 eurocents :smiley: