Yes, 100% more irritating. NS is a fast paced FPS. You get approx 4-5 seconds of combat time max before making the decision to either run away or die. That's how melee vs ranged works and has to work otherwise ambushing is pointless.
<!--quoteo(post=1922967:date=Apr 7 2012, 11:04 PM:name=MuYeah)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (MuYeah @ Apr 7 2012, 11:04 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1922967"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Yes, 100% more irritating. NS is a fast paced FPS. You get approx 4-5 seconds of combat time max before making the decision to either run away or die. That's how melee vs ranged works and has to work otherwise ambushing is pointless.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
So, why would shortening that even further by removing all debilitating attacks and focussing entirely on the 'kill people really quickly' attacks improve the game? You'd get even less combat time. The game would turn into modern warfare with people spending all their time running around before getting shot out of nowhere from the other side of the room.
Debilitating ablilities allow you to have combat that doesn't instantly result in death. You can have situations where skulks try to parasite marines without being seen, or marines trying to find said skulks, you can have lerks doing spore sweeps on rooms to prepare for attacks, and marines reacting to said lerks, you can have marines pinging rooms, and aliens trying to assemble to counter the incoming attack without relying on their stealth abilities.
A status effect changes the nature of the way you play, it isn't outright combat, but it also isn't business as usual, you have to react to the status effect and change your playstyle to combat it, being on infestation means you know the aliens know you're there, and you have to be extra careful of attacks, this is reinforced by the fact that you can't sprint, you are forced to play cautiously. Fighting under observatory cover forces aliens to rely on speed, finesse, and cooperation between classes, not ambushing and stealth.
Without variety like this, the game becomes instagib UT if you're lucky, and MW2 if you're unlucky.
<!--quoteo(post=1922969:date=Apr 7 2012, 10:10 PM:name=Chris0132)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Chris0132 @ Apr 7 2012, 10:10 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1922969"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->So, why would shortening that even further by removing all debilitating attacks and focussing entirely on the 'kill people really quickly' attacks improve the game? You'd get even less combat time. The game would turn into modern warfare with people spending all their time running around before getting shot out of nowhere from the other side of the room.
Debilitating ablilities allow you to have combat that doesn't instantly result in death. You can have situations where skulks try to parasite marines without being seen, or marines trying to find said skulks, you can have lerks doing spore sweeps on rooms to prepare for attacks, and marines reacting to said lerks, you can have marines pinging rooms, and aliens trying to assemble to counter the incoming attack without relying on their stealth abilities.
A status effect changes the nature of the way you play, it isn't outright combat, but it also isn't business as usual, you have to react to the status effect and change your playstyle to combat it, being on infestation means you know the aliens know you're there, and you have to be extra careful of attacks, this is reinforced by the fact that you can't sprint, you are forced to play cautiously. Fighting under observatory cover forces aliens to rely on speed, finesse, and cooperation between classes, not ambushing and stealth.
Without variety like this, the game becomes instagib UT if you're lucky, and MW2 if you're unlucky.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Melee vs ranged works much differently to CoD type ranged/ranged instagibbing as you must know. Do you make a habit of constantly changing the point you're making, by the way?
Combat time can be lengthened through abilities which challenge both sides with an equal skill curve - i.e. movement and aiming. Debilitating the opposing team reduces the challenge and mastery of the game to both sides. It reduces the skill needed to beat the opponent and that is rubbish.
Not that it's particularly pertinent to the point of the OP. Again, what matters is that it's really annoying for most skills to restrict you or the opponent in some way and I would argue that being "debilitated" is, by definition, not playing the game.
Edit: re: your edit, the OP is not concerned with anything like auto-parasite on infestation, regular parasite, scanner sweep or anything of that manner. I can personally vouch that many of the people agreeing with the OP's point appreciate non-combat skills and abilities transforming the field of battle. It is the manner in which it happens that is worrying. I don't want to come off as condescending, but you're explaining FPS/RTS basics to some of the best NS players in the world. If you or anyone can make a decent case for the extent of the inclusion of all these restricting abilities based on more than platitudes like "otherwise it's just MW" then I will happily change my mind.
How does debilitation reduce the challenge? <i>Especially</i> when you are apparently not talking about the automatic debilitation mechanics?
It doesn't just magically happen, you yourself said that a lot of the time, the debilitating effects aren't followed up on are are used incorrectly. Meaning that you are required to invest effort into applying them.
So, you invest effort into applying the debuff, then you invest effort into following up on it, the follow up may be easier than if you just tried to attack directly, but the overall attack is still quite difficult because it involves two parts.
How it should work, is that applying debuffs beforehand, or in groups, makes the combat slightly easier overall, but the time-difficulty ratio leans more in favor of time.
It should be hard to attack without any preparation, but fast, whereas using the debuffs takes say, twice as long, but makes combat overall 25% easier. You are more guaranteed a win, but the fight takes longer and more happens during it. Stuff happening is what makes the game fun, and you are encouraged to take the route that involves more stuff happening because it is the more reliable route.
All of the things you're endorsing, Chris, are things I endorse too. I just don't think they have to be achieved through the current number of debilitating abilities.
I don't oppose status effects. I oppose having 20+ status effects that limit the ways I can interact with the game.
I love strategy. I just don't think that strategy needs to come at the cost confusion, stunning, slowing and so on, nor does it have to.
I love variety. Variety can be achieved in a billion other ways.
I love combat time. I don't think that the second or so of extra combat time is worth the feeling of being held back.
I love teamwork. I don't see any reason to believe that teamwork is reliant on impairment.
I also sense that maybe you think i'm some noob or something. Just assume that i'm not.
<b>I just don't find the retardation of my senses and physical movement FUN. That's my only point.</b>
At a glance, combat in NS1 was about biting/shooting each other, while combat in NS2 is about stunlocks, blinding and AOE damage, once you leave the early game. Without doing a really in-depth analysis, that sorta sucks.
Yeah, yeah. It would <i>help</i> when you had access to each particular counter but what I keep trying to say is that there's just too many, at least for my liking. The game is already complicated as it is so, if anything, I'd rather see a return to some really good and robust mechanics rather than a constant rehashing and overloading of 'cool' things. Sometimes I think that the sign of a bad feature is one that demands a further feature just to balance it. Obviously this isn't always true but I think the powergrid is a good example of this. NS2 has put so much time and effort into the powergrid system, a feature that has consistently created more problems than its worth. It's a false 'negative' layer/rule (it's physically restricting the commander in this case) just so that there is supposedly some great strategy that springs forth as a result. In reality, commanders don't really think about it much, except to note how vulnerable it is - cue defensive strategy, stale-mates and turtling.
Rarely, if ever, will I ever make an interesting decision because of the powergrid. We still haven't answered the tedium that is powernode biting/building and the only answer UWE can find, so far, to the lack of variety in structure placement that it incurs (just one of its problems..) is the reintroduction of <b>another</b> feature, namely the powerpack - yet another thing to balance and invest needless time in. It's telling that a feature that was itself previously deemed messy and unpopular is the answer to another messy and unpopular feature. So restricting is the powergrid, that those who hated the powerpack (myself included) won't mind it being reinserted. Forgive me if I *le sigh*, though!
Crap, i'm derailing my own thread now. The take-away message is that saying there is or might be a feature that counters just ONE of the MANY negative abilities isn't enough to persuade me that they aren't a problem when it comes to my enjoyment of the game.
This is something that is very easy to miss. If you look at most of the games that have lasted for years (Like starcraft 1, quake 3, counter strike) you see that the players have complete control whats happening around him in 99% of the game. He has only himself to blame if he dies or does not perform well enough. When you start adding to many things that prevent players to play like they want to (stuns, slows, pushback etc) you start getting the feeling you are not in control and its really frustrating. This also allows everyone to use this abilities to pick out even the best players without them having any chance.
Now I'm not saying ns2 should not have abilities that do stun or slow, they just need to be careful. They probably already have to many such abilities and I think there are more abilities to come that has this effect.
Minor changes like give aliens small speedboost on infestation instead of marines being slow down goes a long way. In my opinion it would be enough for infestation to block sprint.
<!--quoteo(post=1922189:date=Apr 5 2012, 12:16 PM:name=Yuuki)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Yuuki @ Apr 5 2012, 12:16 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1922189"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->If the goal of slow on spit is to allow the gorge to escape from a single marine then the positive solution is to speed up the gorge (better belly slide) instead of slowing down the marine.
If the goal of slow on spit is to kill the marine the positive solution is to increase spit dps.
If the goal of slow on spit is to irritate the marines then it's perfect.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I think the goal of spit to provide support that doesnt focus primarily on dmg. Also why did you * umbra in ns2 but not in ns1, they do the same thing from what I recall. Heck if anything ns2 is more of a buff since it sticks around you outside of the cloud. Frankly I am more annoyed by fade then by onos, lerk and gorge combined.
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
Grissi, why do you say so many smart things? I think you changed my mind slightly in that matter. <!--coloro:#696969--><span style="color:#696969"><!--/coloro-->damn logic.<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
But i still warn: abilities like screening or obscuring are a valid tactic in combat irl and in games, just like *cringes bringing it up* Counter strike. So we shouldnt be too hasty to write off said approaches - <b>there's a thin line here</b>, as evidenced by the opinion variance in this thread here.
Without exosuit it's hard to say how things are going to continue to be with fades.
As for the blindingness of certain alien attacks.. yes I agree they need some rebalancing but I'm not sure how it's possible without raising late-game HP for aliens in some manor simply because.. if you can see them and essentially target them <i>better</i> with level 3 weapons they aren't going to last long, so if it's changed that we have greater visibility it plays a large role in how that system works. I.E. a lerk that's gas goes transparent quicker is more vulnerable even to rifles, not just high tier + exo. I saw a suggestion for thermal vision but idk it seems like sacrilege creating an engine and then overlaying it with singular color shaders @_@
Add to the negatives the lerk bilebomb: - Way too easy to constantly harass marine base mid-game - Huge area of effect, lots of repairs needed - DOT for both buildings and marines (noises for buildings taking damage for a couple seconds, hit indicators on marine for a couple seconds, awfully confusing) - Can't weld while DOT is active
Personally I feel the bilebomb should have stayed on the gorge the way it was. Actually, I still prefer Gorilla patch to the changes made afterwards (fades at 2 hives with no exploitable shadowstep for quasi-instant traveling, onos at 3 etc.)
<!--quoteo(post=1923036:date=Apr 8 2012, 05:18 AM:name=Grissi)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Grissi @ Apr 8 2012, 05:18 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923036"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->This is something that is very easy to miss. If you look at most of the games that have lasted for years (Like starcraft 1, quake 3, counter strike) you see that the players have complete control whats happening around him in 99% of the game. He has only himself to blame if he dies or does not perform well enough. When you start adding to many things that prevent players to play like they want to (stuns, slows, pushback etc) you start getting the feeling you are not in control and its really frustrating. This also allows everyone to use this abilities to pick out even the best players without them having any chance.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I'd say it's all about counters provided in the game as long you can do something against it that works, it's not annoying.
Though in general the whole skill thing is a bit difficult here since ns is not symetrical. Onos is supposed to win 1vs1 for example, and it's very frustating if you end up in 1v1 situations against a very bad player (eg someone you've been killing over and over and over as skulk/lerk/fade) and can't really do anything about it (yes teamwork, but that is not that much about individual skill anymore).
matsoMaster of PatchesJoin Date: 2002-11-05Member: 7000Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Squad Five Gold, Reinforced - Shadow, NS2 Community Developer
<!--quoteo(post=1923036:date=Apr 8 2012, 04:18 AM:name=Grissi)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Grissi @ Apr 8 2012, 04:18 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923036"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->This is something that is very easy to miss. If you look at most of the games that have lasted for years (Like starcraft 1, quake 3, counter strike) you see that the players have complete control whats happening around him in 99% of the game. He has only himself to blame if he dies or does not perform well enough.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
NS2 is based on teamwork, strategy and individual soldier skill. So if you die, you can blame poor strategy, poor teamwork or poor personal skill.
If the only games that survives for years are games where strategy and teamwork don't really matter, then NS2 as a concept is dead on arrival.
So I for one am hoping you are wrong, and that there is a niche for games where playing for the team and thinking strategically actually matters.
Stuns and slowdowns can be manageable if the game is designed with such in mind. DotA and CS are good examples of that. Meanwhile liberally slapping slowdowns into a game that is pretty much built on top of a very movement based game is way more controversial, there are plenty of things that can go bonkers.
Soul_RiderMod BeanJoin Date: 2004-06-19Member: 29388Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue
Knockback and stunss make it annoying, not just for the marine getting knocked back/stunned, but in the case of gore, makes it very frustrating for onos.
As an example, this is Grissi's Marine vs My Onos, 1on1, albeit with a lot of comm support.
Tell me why it should be this hard for an Onos to kill a marine... (getting stuck on the gorge near the beginning was a minor inconvenience!)
fanaticThis post has been edited.Join Date: 2003-07-23Member: 18377Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue
edited April 2012
<!--quoteo(post=1923472:date=Apr 9 2012, 11:48 AM:name=matso)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (matso @ Apr 9 2012, 11:48 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923472"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->NS2 is based on teamwork, strategy and individual soldier skill. So if you die, you can blame poor strategy, poor teamwork or poor personal skill.
If the only games that survives for years are games where strategy and teamwork don't really matter, then NS2 as a concept is dead on arrival.
So I for one am hoping you are wrong, and that there is a niche for games where playing for the team and thinking strategically actually matters.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> None of the negative abilities discussed in this thread enhance the aspect of "playing for the team" or "thinking strategically", unless your idea of those concepts boils down to "everybody has to move in a tight blob all the time or you will die horribly".
<!--quoteo(post=1923056:date=Apr 8 2012, 05:52 AM:name=ironhorse)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (ironhorse @ Apr 8 2012, 05:52 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923056"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->But i still warn: abilities like screening or obscuring are a valid tactic in combat irl and in games, just like *cringes bringing it up* Counter strike. So we shouldnt be too hasty to write off said approaches - <b>there's a thin line here</b>, as evidenced by the opinion variance in this thread here.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Not the best example, considering Counter-Strike only has two of those abilities, both of which can blind both teams and are finite use, and one of which can be avoided simply by turning away from the grenade for a fraction of a second.
<!--quoteo(post=1923472:date=Apr 9 2012, 12:48 PM:name=matso)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (matso @ Apr 9 2012, 12:48 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923472"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->NS2 is based on teamwork, strategy and individual soldier skill. So if you die, you can blame poor strategy, poor teamwork or poor personal skill.
If the only games that survives for years are games where strategy and teamwork don't really matter, then NS2 as a concept is dead on arrival.
So I for one am hoping you are wrong, and that there is a niche for games where playing for the team and thinking strategically actually matters.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Sorry, but your point is somewhat irrelevant to what Grissi or Tweadle said. Teamwork and strategy are not opposites of staying in full control over your own actions. Just look at NS1 where all those things are highly important, yet the players are generally not affected by stuns, slows, knockback and similar stuff, with the exception of a few late game abilities.
I think the OP goes too far, saying that silence, invisisility, umbra blink and even spores are negative effects because they stop people from killing other players. You might as well say that celerity disables people from tracking, or that allowing jumping/any movement disables you from killing things more easily.
There's as psychology at work in fps games that restricted movement feels incredibly frustrating - but I don't think that psychology applies to things like lerk gas/umbra because these are perceived as changes in the environment. As long as the connection between keyboard/mouse and player movement is unimpeded the effect should be fair.
So i'd agree with Grissi that you have to be sparing with knockbacks and pshysical speed reductions - with the one caveat that the devs said a speed boost on infestation is perceived as a speed reduction on normal ground. Imagine you start every round running fast and then slow down once you leave hive rooms - that is much more frustrating for Aliens than the current situation where Marines only take the speed reduction when they are deep in enemy territory.
matsoMaster of PatchesJoin Date: 2002-11-05Member: 7000Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, Squad Five Gold, Reinforced - Shadow, NS2 Community Developer
edited April 2012
<!--quoteo(post=1923497:date=Apr 9 2012, 01:15 PM:name=Raza.)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Raza. @ Apr 9 2012, 01:15 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923497"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Sorry, but your point is somewhat irrelevant to what Grissi or Tweadle said. Teamwork and strategy are not opposites of staying in full control over your own actions. Just look at NS1 where all those things are highly important, yet the players are generally not affected by stuns, slows, knockback and similar stuff, with the exception of a few late game abilities.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
His point, as I read it, was that games with staying power are the games that lets people have complete control over their own fate. I just said that if that's true, NS2 is doomed.
The lesser principle - that the actual ability to control your own character is what is important - I would mostly agree with. And UWE mostly agrees, as well. Mostly.
If that's the case though, I can't see what umbra, spore cloud, silence, cloak to name a few are doing in the negative column - it doesn't impede your ability to control your character.
It does impede your ability to kill the other team. But then, so do their health, armor and your own damage output.
You could permaweb people for five years of ns, this stuff needs to be nipped in the bud.
As for strategy, personal skill, and teamwork etc, I don't think any of them are really relevant to stuns and snares in NS2. Silence was very good at helping a skulk take down a marine who had exceptional aim, especially in conjunction with teamwork (using bait), but could be beaten by very good awareness and personal skill from the marine, ie checking behind them a lot. Cloak was harder to counter with individual skill and relied on scans or hand grenades to counter, but was rarely an issue in competitive play anyway. Stomp was almost entirely used to force the enemy team to get jetpacks, and could be dodged to some extent based on the map anyway. Web was very powerful, mostly because of the bugged clip detection, but still mostly only used to counter jetpackers at 3 hives.
I think for the mostpart, anything that stuns or hinders a player should be counterable by a reasonable amount of skill. As Fana said, flashbangs could be dodged somewhat by decent positioning and looking away from them. Stun grenades in CoD are horrible and more annoying to play against than flashbangs because they affect your mouse sensitivity, and they have less of a detonation time so they can't realistically be dodged. This is an example of how not to do stuns in FPS games. A stun is a free kill, and NS2 should definitely not use this logic. A stun or a slow should give one player an advantage, as long as it is balanced in terms of skill put in vs effectivness, in the same way that being a fade vs being a marine is balanced around that (fade has a big advantage but will still take anything from 1-100% damage while the fight is taking place, so a great marine can kill a terrible fade). The advantage should have the option of being mitigated by teamwork though, so a group of marines could kill a fade and some skulks in NS1, just like a teammate could weld you and remove the web, or scan and uncloak the cloaked skulk.
An example of an unbalanced skill put in vs effect in NS1 would be stomp devour, which any idiot could do and took the marine out of play for 34 seconds, and was virtually undodgable. This wasn't a huge issue in classic because onoses weren't there that often, but in combat it happened all the time and although it only took 5 seconds to devour someone, it was still a free kill for zero skill from the player.
Matso: I feel like it might be worth reiterating what I starred and why because either my original post wasn't clear enough or the "physical <i>and sensual</i> impairment" that floats above every page of this thread isn't obvious. I regard spore, cloak, silence, umbra, blink etc. as negative abilities in the sense that they prevent you, the player, from applying your senses in the game. I don't dislike any of these abilities <i>per se</i>, but I'm worried that the sheer number of them is making for a game that I feel more powerless than I would like to. I can argue that umbra is barely negative, just like everyone else but that would be missing the point; that it is <b>one</b> of <b>many</b> things that lead to visual obscuration that we have to contend with. Objectively, I can show you why not being able to hear/see/move leads to powerlessness and why it is absolutely not necessary for teamwork, skill, survivability, strategy or variety. Only subjectively can I tell you that this is bad.
What I would say though is that your logic that follows from Grissi's post is worrying. From his assertion that games without physical restrictions last longer, it looks like you feel compelled to remind him that NS2 is based on strategy, teamwork and skill as if that was a rebuttal. It's actually entirely irrelevant because being restricted is not a requirement for any of those things, nor did he suggest that being in control of your character was in any way related. You, for one, hope he is wrong - about what exactly? This whole notion that strategy is dependent on these things is utterly bogus and I wish we could all realise that.
The argument boils down to whether you like being blinded, confused, stunned, slowed or not. It's really quite simple. None of it is necessary and none of it is a prerequisite for strategy, teamwork or anything else. Even if it *did* correlate, there are alternatives. If you like it, just say so. If you want to compile a decent argument of why my not seeing things is so deeply intertwined with what we all value and how alternatives are impossible, please, be my guest.
<!--quoteo(post=1923526:date=Apr 9 2012, 03:00 PM:name=matso)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (matso @ Apr 9 2012, 03:00 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923526"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->His point, as I read it, was that games with staying power are the games that lets people have complete control over their own fate. I just said that if that's true, NS2 is doomed.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
How so? Is one of the design goals to make sure that you never have control over your own fate and always need rely on other players? If so, that is a recipe for a bad game and I hope UWE will see this sooner rather than later. Often the argument for this approach is that it forces you to work together as a team, but you don't need to FORCE players to work together, they will do that on their own. The team that has the most teamwork will always win, even if their are no mechanics that give you a big disadvantage for not working as a team.
From my reading of the design goals document, it seems like UWE are actually trying to create a game where all guns and classes are reasonably balanced. Some of their goals include making sure that no class or weapon becomes obsolete. So far they haven't achieved that goal, but with more work I think they can get there.
I think you need to be really careful with these types of stun and blinding abilities because they can affect the balance in a big way. If the ability is easy to use and completely stuns the other player then the game just feels unfair and this causes frustration.
I hate always reading people saying "X should be able to kill Y" since this doesn't make any sense. I always think, the better player should be able to kill the other. Yes, some things should be a little more powerful, but not the the extent where it is super easy for one player and almost impossible for the other, or that it is expected that the player with the more powerful weapon will win 9 times out of 10. In my opinion this just leads to frustrating gameplay and it is bad design.
ScardyBobScardyBobJoin Date: 2009-11-25Member: 69528Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
<!--quoteo(post=1923879:date=Apr 10 2012, 12:21 PM:name=Wilson)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Wilson @ Apr 10 2012, 12:21 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923879"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->How so? Is one of the design goals to make sure that you never have control over your own fate and always need rely on other players? If so, that is a recipe for a bad game and I hope UWE will see this sooner rather than later. Often the argument for this approach is that it forces you to work together as a team, but you don't need to FORCE players to work together, they will do that on their own. The team that has the most teamwork will always win, even if their are no mechanics that give you a big disadvantage for not working as a team.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> The obvious counterexample to this is l4d1/2, which contain tons of negative gameplay elements, as defined by the OP, but still manages to be a well-played game. In fact, l4d1/2 does the 'stick together or die' gameplay even more severely then NS2. I think Valve pretty much proved you can include a large amount of player-restricting elements in a successful game.
Of course, the caveat is that Valve had years, millions of dollars, and an untold number of programmers/playtesters to hone the various negative abilities down such that they balance very well. That's not to say that UWE couldn't the same, but that it is more difficult get them to work well than just including mostly positive game elements.
In L4D, you don't have to run back to spawn every time a hunter gets to the Safe Room. Hindering mechanics snowball horribly when combined with battle for map control and maneuverability differences.
<!--quoteo(post=1923893:date=Apr 10 2012, 07:53 PM:name=ScardyBob)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (ScardyBob @ Apr 10 2012, 07:53 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923893"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->The obvious counterexample to this is l4d1/2, which contain tons of negative gameplay elements, as defined by the OP, but still manages to be a well-played game. In fact, l4d1/2 does the 'stick together or die' gameplay even more severely then NS2. I think Valve pretty much proved you can include a large amount of player-restricting elements in a successful game.
Of course, the caveat is that Valve had years, millions of dollars, and an untold number of programmers/playtesters to hone the various negative abilities down such that they balance very well. That's not to say that UWE couldn't the same, but that it is more difficult get them to work well than just including mostly positive game elements.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> Once again, stuns and slowdowns are manageable when you design the game to support them. L4D is a co-op that pretty strictly controls the nature of fights and makes sure you've always got teammates to help you out. It also sacrifices a lot of the higher skill elements as it's not really designed to be a competetive game. That's totally fine for a co-op game, it has very purposeful design that gives you a lot of group interaction. In general I'm not a huge fan of Valve shooters these days, but I certainly do appreciate how much of very purposeful and professional design goes into them, L4D being no exception.
Meanwhile in NS2 I don't think there's any clear contribution or connection to the key elements of the game. What kind of purpose in the grand scheme do all these 'negative abilties' serve?
<!--quoteo(post=1923893:date=Apr 10 2012, 08:53 PM:name=ScardyBob)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (ScardyBob @ Apr 10 2012, 08:53 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923893"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->The obvious counterexample to this is l4d1/2, which contain tons of negative gameplay elements, as defined by the OP, but still manages to be a well-played game. In fact, l4d1/2 does the 'stick together or die' gameplay even more severely then NS2. I think Valve pretty much proved you can include a large amount of player-restricting elements in a successful game.
Of course, the caveat is that Valve had years, millions of dollars, and an untold number of programmers/playtesters to hone the various negative abilities down such that they balance very well. That's not to say that UWE couldn't the same, but that it is more difficult get them to work well than just including mostly positive game elements.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Bacillus is right. I played L4D1 competitively for a little while when it first came out, but it certainly wasn't designed for versus/competitive play at all. All of the mechanics in L4D were designed primarily with co-op in mind (playing with friends against AI). It is not a particularly skilful game and the competitive community had to make big changes to the default settings as it was far too easy for survivors. The L4D1 competitive scene only had a few tournaments and then died after a year.
I also would point out (as I have done before when L4D comes up as a counter example) that L4D1 was notorious for rage quitting. It is probably one of the most frustrating and rage inducing games that I have played. Whole teams would quit out after making 1 mistake etc. While it is a great co-op game, it really isn't a brilliant versus game and has lots of flaws and frustrating elements.
Another point to remember is that in L4D the team that can be effected by all the negative abilities is waaay more powerful than the team that can use them. The survivors only have 1 life each, but they have lots of heath compared with the infected team. IMO using these types of abilities in a game where both teams have similar HP and life spans is not a good idea.
I think that a lot of the negative abilities within L4D are reasonably balanced within that game mode. You can always stop hunters and smokers from grabbing you if you are good enough. You are faster than the tank so you can out manoeuvre him if you are clever. The boomer makes a huge amounts of noise so you can easily dodge the puke if you react in time. Overall the game feels a lot more balanced and fair than NS2 in it's current state.
Comments
So, why would shortening that even further by removing all debilitating attacks and focussing entirely on the 'kill people really quickly' attacks improve the game? You'd get even less combat time. The game would turn into modern warfare with people spending all their time running around before getting shot out of nowhere from the other side of the room.
Debilitating ablilities allow you to have combat that doesn't instantly result in death. You can have situations where skulks try to parasite marines without being seen, or marines trying to find said skulks, you can have lerks doing spore sweeps on rooms to prepare for attacks, and marines reacting to said lerks, you can have marines pinging rooms, and aliens trying to assemble to counter the incoming attack without relying on their stealth abilities.
A status effect changes the nature of the way you play, it isn't outright combat, but it also isn't business as usual, you have to react to the status effect and change your playstyle to combat it, being on infestation means you know the aliens know you're there, and you have to be extra careful of attacks, this is reinforced by the fact that you can't sprint, you are forced to play cautiously. Fighting under observatory cover forces aliens to rely on speed, finesse, and cooperation between classes, not ambushing and stealth.
Without variety like this, the game becomes instagib UT if you're lucky, and MW2 if you're unlucky.
Debilitating ablilities allow you to have combat that doesn't instantly result in death. You can have situations where skulks try to parasite marines without being seen, or marines trying to find said skulks, you can have lerks doing spore sweeps on rooms to prepare for attacks, and marines reacting to said lerks, you can have marines pinging rooms, and aliens trying to assemble to counter the incoming attack without relying on their stealth abilities.
A status effect changes the nature of the way you play, it isn't outright combat, but it also isn't business as usual, you have to react to the status effect and change your playstyle to combat it, being on infestation means you know the aliens know you're there, and you have to be extra careful of attacks, this is reinforced by the fact that you can't sprint, you are forced to play cautiously. Fighting under observatory cover forces aliens to rely on speed, finesse, and cooperation between classes, not ambushing and stealth.
Without variety like this, the game becomes instagib UT if you're lucky, and MW2 if you're unlucky.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Melee vs ranged works much differently to CoD type ranged/ranged instagibbing as you must know. Do you make a habit of constantly changing the point you're making, by the way?
Combat time can be lengthened through abilities which challenge both sides with an equal skill curve - i.e. movement and aiming. Debilitating the opposing team reduces the challenge and mastery of the game to both sides. It reduces the skill needed to beat the opponent and that is rubbish.
Not that it's particularly pertinent to the point of the OP. Again, what matters is that it's really annoying for most skills to restrict you or the opponent in some way and I would argue that being "debilitated" is, by definition, not playing the game.
Edit: re: your edit, the OP is not concerned with anything like auto-parasite on infestation, regular parasite, scanner sweep or anything of that manner. I can personally vouch that many of the people agreeing with the OP's point appreciate non-combat skills and abilities transforming the field of battle. It is the manner in which it happens that is worrying. I don't want to come off as condescending, but you're explaining FPS/RTS basics to some of the best NS players in the world. If you or anyone can make a decent case for the extent of the inclusion of all these restricting abilities based on more than platitudes like "otherwise it's just MW" then I will happily change my mind.
It doesn't just magically happen, you yourself said that a lot of the time, the debilitating effects aren't followed up on are are used incorrectly. Meaning that you are required to invest effort into applying them.
So, you invest effort into applying the debuff, then you invest effort into following up on it, the follow up may be easier than if you just tried to attack directly, but the overall attack is still quite difficult because it involves two parts.
How it should work, is that applying debuffs beforehand, or in groups, makes the combat slightly easier overall, but the time-difficulty ratio leans more in favor of time.
It should be hard to attack without any preparation, but fast, whereas using the debuffs takes say, twice as long, but makes combat overall 25% easier. You are more guaranteed a win, but the fight takes longer and more happens during it. Stuff happening is what makes the game fun, and you are encouraged to take the route that involves more stuff happening because it is the more reliable route.
I don't oppose status effects. I oppose having 20+ status effects that limit the ways I can interact with the game.
I love strategy. I just don't think that strategy needs to come at the cost confusion, stunning, slowing and so on, nor does it have to.
I love variety. Variety can be achieved in a billion other ways.
I love combat time. I don't think that the second or so of extra combat time is worth the feeling of being held back.
I love teamwork. I don't see any reason to believe that teamwork is reliant on impairment.
I also sense that maybe you think i'm some noob or something. Just assume that i'm not.
<b>I just don't find the retardation of my senses and physical movement FUN. That's my only point.</b>
Without doing a really in-depth analysis, that sorta sucks.
(eg, escape mechanisms)
which btw..
what if adren packs can later clear impeding effects
and something else required to clear lerk gas
Rarely, if ever, will I ever make an interesting decision because of the powergrid. We still haven't answered the tedium that is powernode biting/building and the only answer UWE can find, so far, to the lack of variety in structure placement that it incurs (just one of its problems..) is the reintroduction of <b>another</b> feature, namely the powerpack - yet another thing to balance and invest needless time in. It's telling that a feature that was itself previously deemed messy and unpopular is the answer to another messy and unpopular feature. So restricting is the powergrid, that those who hated the powerpack (myself included) won't mind it being reinserted. Forgive me if I *le sigh*, though!
Crap, i'm derailing my own thread now. The take-away message is that saying there is or might be a feature that counters just ONE of the MANY negative abilities isn't enough to persuade me that they aren't a problem when it comes to my enjoyment of the game.
When you start adding to many things that prevent players to play like they want to (stuns, slows, pushback etc) you start getting the feeling you are not in control and its really frustrating. This also allows everyone to use this abilities to pick out even the best players without them having any chance.
Now I'm not saying ns2 should not have abilities that do stun or slow, they just need to be careful. They probably already have to many such abilities and I think there are more abilities to come that has this effect.
Minor changes like give aliens small speedboost on infestation instead of marines being slow down goes a long way. In my opinion it would be enough for infestation to block sprint.
If the goal of slow on spit is to kill the marine the positive solution is to increase spit dps.
If the goal of slow on spit is to irritate the marines then it's perfect.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I think the goal of spit to provide support that doesnt focus primarily on dmg.
Also why did you * umbra in ns2 but not in ns1, they do the same thing from what I recall. Heck if anything ns2 is more of a buff since it sticks around you outside of the cloud.
Frankly I am more annoyed by fade then by onos, lerk and gorge combined.
Sadly, ns2 needs a bit of a redesign and this may push back release of the game. But it will be be better off for it.
I always thought that it was better to remove damage upgrades and instead only have armour upgrades(this is just one example).
I think you changed my mind slightly in that matter.
<!--coloro:#696969--><span style="color:#696969"><!--/coloro-->damn logic.<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
But i still warn: abilities like screening or obscuring are a valid tactic in combat irl and in games, just like *cringes bringing it up* Counter strike.
So we shouldnt be too hasty to write off said approaches - <b>there's a thin line here</b>, as evidenced by the opinion variance in this thread here.
As for the blindingness of certain alien attacks.. yes I agree they need some rebalancing but I'm not sure how it's possible without raising late-game HP for aliens in some manor simply because.. if you can see them and essentially target them <i>better</i> with level 3 weapons they aren't going to last long, so if it's changed that we have greater visibility it plays a large role in how that system works. I.E. a lerk that's gas goes transparent quicker is more vulnerable even to rifles, not just high tier + exo. I saw a suggestion for thermal vision but idk it seems like sacrilege creating an engine and then overlaying it with singular color shaders @_@
- Way too easy to constantly harass marine base mid-game
- Huge area of effect, lots of repairs needed
- DOT for both buildings and marines (noises for buildings taking damage for a couple seconds, hit indicators on marine for a couple seconds, awfully confusing)
- Can't weld while DOT is active
Personally I feel the bilebomb should have stayed on the gorge the way it was.
Actually, I still prefer Gorilla patch to the changes made afterwards (fades at 2 hives with no exploitable shadowstep for quasi-instant traveling, onos at 3 etc.)
When you start adding to many things that prevent players to play like they want to (stuns, slows, pushback etc) you start getting the feeling you are not in control and its really frustrating. This also allows everyone to use this abilities to pick out even the best players without them having any chance.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Regarding CS: Flashbangs, Smokes, OnHit slowdown, OnHeadshotHit recoil
I'd say it's all about counters provided in the game as long you can do something against it that works, it's not annoying.
Though in general the whole skill thing is a bit difficult here since ns is not symetrical. Onos is supposed to win 1vs1 for example, and it's very frustating if you end up in 1v1 situations against a very bad player (eg someone you've been killing over and over and over as skulk/lerk/fade) and can't really do anything about it (yes teamwork, but that is not that much about individual skill anymore).
NS2 is based on teamwork, strategy and individual soldier skill. So if you die, you can blame poor strategy, poor teamwork or poor personal skill.
If the only games that survives for years are games where strategy and teamwork don't really matter, then NS2 as a concept is dead on arrival.
So I for one am hoping you are wrong, and that there is a niche for games where playing for the team and thinking strategically actually matters.
As an example, this is Grissi's Marine vs My Onos, 1on1, albeit with a lot of comm support.
Tell me why it should be this hard for an Onos to kill a marine... (getting stuck on the gorge near the beginning was a minor inconvenience!)
<center><object width="450" height="356"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/fvw8t6LgkPg"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/fvw8t6LgkPg" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="450" height="356"></embed></object></center>
If the only games that survives for years are games where strategy and teamwork don't really matter, then NS2 as a concept is dead on arrival.
So I for one am hoping you are wrong, and that there is a niche for games where playing for the team and thinking strategically actually matters.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
None of the negative abilities discussed in this thread enhance the aspect of "playing for the team" or "thinking strategically", unless your idea of those concepts boils down to "everybody has to move in a tight blob all the time or you will die horribly".
<!--quoteo(post=1923056:date=Apr 8 2012, 05:52 AM:name=ironhorse)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (ironhorse @ Apr 8 2012, 05:52 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1923056"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->But i still warn: abilities like screening or obscuring are a valid tactic in combat irl and in games, just like *cringes bringing it up* Counter strike.
So we shouldnt be too hasty to write off said approaches - <b>there's a thin line here</b>, as evidenced by the opinion variance in this thread here.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Not the best example, considering Counter-Strike only has two of those abilities, both of which can blind both teams and are finite use, and one of which can be avoided simply by turning away from the grenade for a fraction of a second.
If the only games that survives for years are games where strategy and teamwork don't really matter, then NS2 as a concept is dead on arrival.
So I for one am hoping you are wrong, and that there is a niche for games where playing for the team and thinking strategically actually matters.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Sorry, but your point is somewhat irrelevant to what Grissi or Tweadle said.
Teamwork and strategy are not opposites of staying in full control over your own actions. Just look at NS1 where all those things are highly important, yet the players are generally not affected by stuns, slows, knockback and similar stuff, with the exception of a few late game abilities.
There's as psychology at work in fps games that restricted movement feels incredibly frustrating - but I don't think that psychology applies to things like lerk gas/umbra because these are perceived as changes in the environment. As long as the connection between keyboard/mouse and player movement is unimpeded the effect should be fair.
So i'd agree with Grissi that you have to be sparing with knockbacks and pshysical speed reductions - with the one caveat that the devs said a speed boost on infestation is perceived as a speed reduction on normal ground. Imagine you start every round running fast and then slow down once you leave hive rooms - that is much more frustrating for Aliens than the current situation where Marines only take the speed reduction when they are deep in enemy territory.
Good point about sprint though.
Tricky business this fps/rts combo...
Teamwork and strategy are not opposites of staying in full control over your own actions. Just look at NS1 where all those things are highly important, yet the players are generally not affected by stuns, slows, knockback and similar stuff, with the exception of a few late game abilities.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
His point, as I read it, was that games with staying power are the games that lets people have complete control over their own fate. I just said that if that's true, NS2 is doomed.
The lesser principle - that the actual ability to control your own character is what is important - I would mostly agree with. And UWE mostly agrees, as well. Mostly.
If that's the case though, I can't see what umbra, spore cloud, silence, cloak to name a few are doing in the negative column - it doesn't impede your ability to control your character.
It does impede your ability to kill the other team. But then, so do their health, armor and your own damage output.
As for strategy, personal skill, and teamwork etc, I don't think any of them are really relevant to stuns and snares in NS2. Silence was very good at helping a skulk take down a marine who had exceptional aim, especially in conjunction with teamwork (using bait), but could be beaten by very good awareness and personal skill from the marine, ie checking behind them a lot. Cloak was harder to counter with individual skill and relied on scans or hand grenades to counter, but was rarely an issue in competitive play anyway. Stomp was almost entirely used to force the enemy team to get jetpacks, and could be dodged to some extent based on the map anyway. Web was very powerful, mostly because of the bugged clip detection, but still mostly only used to counter jetpackers at 3 hives.
I think for the mostpart, anything that stuns or hinders a player should be counterable by a reasonable amount of skill. As Fana said, flashbangs could be dodged somewhat by decent positioning and looking away from them. Stun grenades in CoD are horrible and more annoying to play against than flashbangs because they affect your mouse sensitivity, and they have less of a detonation time so they can't realistically be dodged. This is an example of how not to do stuns in FPS games. A stun is a free kill, and NS2 should definitely not use this logic. A stun or a slow should give one player an advantage, as long as it is balanced in terms of skill put in vs effectivness, in the same way that being a fade vs being a marine is balanced around that (fade has a big advantage but will still take anything from 1-100% damage while the fight is taking place, so a great marine can kill a terrible fade). The advantage should have the option of being mitigated by teamwork though, so a group of marines could kill a fade and some skulks in NS1, just like a teammate could weld you and remove the web, or scan and uncloak the cloaked skulk.
An example of an unbalanced skill put in vs effect in NS1 would be stomp devour, which any idiot could do and took the marine out of play for 34 seconds, and was virtually undodgable. This wasn't a huge issue in classic because onoses weren't there that often, but in combat it happened all the time and although it only took 5 seconds to devour someone, it was still a free kill for zero skill from the player.
What I would say though is that your logic that follows from Grissi's post is worrying. From his assertion that games without physical restrictions last longer, it looks like you feel compelled to remind him that NS2 is based on strategy, teamwork and skill as if that was a rebuttal. It's actually entirely irrelevant because being restricted is not a requirement for any of those things, nor did he suggest that being in control of your character was in any way related. You, for one, hope he is wrong - about what exactly? This whole notion that strategy is dependent on these things is utterly bogus and I wish we could all realise that.
The argument boils down to whether you like being blinded, confused, stunned, slowed or not. It's really quite simple. None of it is necessary and none of it is a prerequisite for strategy, teamwork or anything else. Even if it *did* correlate, there are alternatives. If you like it, just say so. If you want to compile a decent argument of why my not seeing things is so deeply intertwined with what we all value and how alternatives are impossible, please, be my guest.
How so? Is one of the design goals to make sure that you never have control over your own fate and always need rely on other players? If so, that is a recipe for a bad game and I hope UWE will see this sooner rather than later. Often the argument for this approach is that it forces you to work together as a team, but you don't need to FORCE players to work together, they will do that on their own. The team that has the most teamwork will always win, even if their are no mechanics that give you a big disadvantage for not working as a team.
From my reading of the design goals document, it seems like UWE are actually trying to create a game where all guns and classes are reasonably balanced. Some of their goals include making sure that no class or weapon becomes obsolete. So far they haven't achieved that goal, but with more work I think they can get there.
I think you need to be really careful with these types of stun and blinding abilities because they can affect the balance in a big way. If the ability is easy to use and completely stuns the other player then the game just feels unfair and this causes frustration.
I hate always reading people saying "X should be able to kill Y" since this doesn't make any sense. I always think, the better player should be able to kill the other. Yes, some things should be a little more powerful, but not the the extent where it is super easy for one player and almost impossible for the other, or that it is expected that the player with the more powerful weapon will win 9 times out of 10. In my opinion this just leads to frustrating gameplay and it is bad design.
The obvious counterexample to this is l4d1/2, which contain tons of negative gameplay elements, as defined by the OP, but still manages to be a well-played game. In fact, l4d1/2 does the 'stick together or die' gameplay even more severely then NS2. I think Valve pretty much proved you can include a large amount of player-restricting elements in a successful game.
Of course, the caveat is that Valve had years, millions of dollars, and an untold number of programmers/playtesters to hone the various negative abilities down such that they balance very well. That's not to say that UWE couldn't the same, but that it is more difficult get them to work well than just including mostly positive game elements.
Of course, the caveat is that Valve had years, millions of dollars, and an untold number of programmers/playtesters to hone the various negative abilities down such that they balance very well. That's not to say that UWE couldn't the same, but that it is more difficult get them to work well than just including mostly positive game elements.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Once again, stuns and slowdowns are manageable when you design the game to support them. L4D is a co-op that pretty strictly controls the nature of fights and makes sure you've always got teammates to help you out. It also sacrifices a lot of the higher skill elements as it's not really designed to be a competetive game. That's totally fine for a co-op game, it has very purposeful design that gives you a lot of group interaction. In general I'm not a huge fan of Valve shooters these days, but I certainly do appreciate how much of very purposeful and professional design goes into them, L4D being no exception.
Meanwhile in NS2 I don't think there's any clear contribution or connection to the key elements of the game. What kind of purpose in the grand scheme do all these 'negative abilties' serve?
Of course, the caveat is that Valve had years, millions of dollars, and an untold number of programmers/playtesters to hone the various negative abilities down such that they balance very well. That's not to say that UWE couldn't the same, but that it is more difficult get them to work well than just including mostly positive game elements.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Bacillus is right. I played L4D1 competitively for a little while when it first came out, but it certainly wasn't designed for versus/competitive play at all. All of the mechanics in L4D were designed primarily with co-op in mind (playing with friends against AI). It is not a particularly skilful game and the competitive community had to make big changes to the default settings as it was far too easy for survivors. The L4D1 competitive scene only had a few tournaments and then died after a year.
I also would point out (as I have done before when L4D comes up as a counter example) that L4D1 was notorious for rage quitting. It is probably one of the most frustrating and rage inducing games that I have played. Whole teams would quit out after making 1 mistake etc. While it is a great co-op game, it really isn't a brilliant versus game and has lots of flaws and frustrating elements.
Another point to remember is that in L4D the team that can be effected by all the negative abilities is waaay more powerful than the team that can use them. The survivors only have 1 life each, but they have lots of heath compared with the infected team. IMO using these types of abilities in a game where both teams have similar HP and life spans is not a good idea.
I think that a lot of the negative abilities within L4D are reasonably balanced within that game mode. You can always stop hunters and smokers from grabbing you if you are good enough. You are faster than the tank so you can out manoeuvre him if you are clever. The boomer makes a huge amounts of noise so you can easily dodge the puke if you react in time. Overall the game feels a lot more balanced and fair than NS2 in it's current state.