Havoc's analogy of NFL players in a little-league game should be instructive. If you were an NFL player (or FIFA, whatever) joining a pick-up game in the neighborhood playground, what would you do to keep things fun for everyone, both yourself and the kids? If you can't or won't do that, why would you even consider playing in the first place?
...except it isn't "instructive" at all. NFL pros get paid to play, and they can play against other pros as much as they want. Good ns2 players pay to play and have very limited opportunities to play against other good players.
At this point there isn't really a whole lot more to say in this discussion. If people don't realize how patently ridiculous it is to say that there's no difference between hackers and good players with regards to who should be allowed to play on public servers, you may as well put a bucket on your head and start singing.
But consider this: they get nothing out of playing a pub. They get no legitimate practice, no training, they do not improve in any way. Their competition simply isn't skilled enough to benefit them, and they are too skilled to allow the competition any legitimate practice either. Obviously they have somewhere they can hone their skills and people they can play against and get better by doing so, or else they would never have gotten that good in the first place, so it's clear to me that these people DO have somewhere to play, it just isn't pubs.
If you were an NFL player (or FIFA, whatever) joining a pick-up game in the neighborhood playground, what would you do to keep things fun for everyone, both yourself and the kids? If you can't or won't do that, why would you even consider playing in the first place?
Picked a few random quotes, out of many, that lambaste "pro" players for destroying pubs but fail to acknowledge that anyone good enough to shut down a pub is.... not playing seriously in a pub. I can shut down my fair share when I'm having a good day and lots of times I even impose limits on myself, I'll stay Skulk an entire round rather than going Fade, or I'll refuse to get Celerity or I'll try to end every kill with a pistol rather than finishing with my LMG...
Being good doesn't mean you're taking it seriously. It means you're just simply better. Serious gamers play casually too. I do it to unwind after work.
To the NFL analogy... it's bad. It's a poor example of faulty logic from players trying to justify their inability to handle getting beat up in a video game by players who are better. Ok that isn't what it really is, but it feels that way.
If you (a pro athlete) showed up to a pick-up game in the neighborhood playground, no matter how much you nerf yourself you're going to be better than the other players by an almost insurmountable level. There are no series of limits (short of no hands use for football, etc.) that are going to handicap effectively enough to even that balance out. You risk serious injury playing with a professional athlete in a physical sport, something you don't have a chance of here. At worst, a bruised ego. Further more, the public/casual players on the receiving end of a beatdown, nerfed or not, serious or casual, from a pro/competitive player in any professional sport would be excited they're playing with that person. They'd view it as an opportunity to learn, ask questions or just simply get better against tougher competition. It wouldn't be an opportunity to rage to the community about how unfair it is he is there.
All this despite the fact what people are whining about as "pro" is just "competitive" and ANYONE could go play gathers and become 10 times the player they'd be in a pub, in a month with the exact same time invested. They'd have higher quality games, a new level of depth to the game itself and otherwise would probably enjoy it more. They're open to the public. Why not?
Good ns2 players pay to play and have very limited opportunities to play against other good players.
When you paid for NS2, that was a transaction between you and UWE, and it entitled you to run the software. It didn't entitle you to actually play a game. To play a game, you have to find teammates and opponents who are willing to play with you. Nobody owes you a match. And since most people don't like to play games that are horribly mismatched, then yeah, someone as good as you are will have trouble finding a lot of people who want to play with you.
The chess grandmasters of yore would take on anyone of any skill and would make it an even match by offering handicaps: playing down a knight, or queen, or queen and rook, or whatever. If they didn't do that they'd never get games from anyone besides other grandmasters... because why would anyone bother when it was a forgone conclusion?
NS2 doesn't have an official handicap system. But you're a smart guy. Surely you can figure out a way to play in pubs without alienating the very people you're trying to play with.
Why is being shitty at this game encouraged? Are you kidding me? I get called out CONSTANTLY and fortunately it's just in jest, because people recognize me, but for anyone that isn't noticed and you are genuinely good at the game- God help you. I've seen 3-4 servers that ban for a KDR higher than 3. This is natural selection, only the strong survive, not [INSERT POLITICAL FIGURE HERE]'s SUPER FUN WELFARE PARTY SAFARI, WHERE EVERYONE HAS FUN AND IS LOVED
I actually played with you earlier, you were good - and you definitely caused whatever team you were on to win by a landslide. We threw joking accusations of hacks at you, hopefully you knew they were jokes. I did not mind playing with you at all, I think you were a good sport about it and tried to keep the teams as even as possible. Nobody got mad that I could tell. I think at one point you realized you were swaying the game every round so you left to find a server where you 'fit in', which I tip my hat to you for.
I have also had the misfortune of playing with people who are probably 10x as good as you, in rookie friendly servers . At that point it is truly absurd. Whats worse is that kind of guy will usually have 1-2 of his buddies with him, and they keep stacking one team. So you have 1 team dominate over and over, nobody on the losing team has a k:d ratio over 0.25.. this goes on round after round until the server clears out. Whenever I see this I always ask the stackers to split up, someone join the other team ffs. Most of the time they laugh about it and claim "watch maybe you'll learn something" "only way you'll get better" etc .. wrong. What I'm learning is if I ever see you three dickheads in a server, its time to find a new server.
The sad fact is, many of the 'pros' are poor sports (Not directing this at you communist). They love stomping pubs. They don't want to even the teams. If they were good sports about it and tried not to team stack, or maybe switch teams partway through the round to even it out, I think you wouldn't have so many people complaining like this. And to stomp in a rookie friendly server absolutely deserves a ban IMO. There is no excuse for this. You know you and your buddies are very good. You know this server is inviting rookies in to learn the game. You know whats going to happen if you play in that server. And ultimately, you know you are being an a$$hole, but just don't care.
To those of you saying "Oh so cause I'm good I can't play in a rookie server?" Yes you're g'damn right. Its ridiculous. Just as ridiculous as if a rookie tried to compete with pros in a tournament.
So what do we do about it? I think there should be a rating system, sort of a way where players can anonymously 'rate' another players skill level, say a 1 - 100 rating system. Of course it would require dozens of votes before it would amount to anything, this way a few greifers could'nt mess up your rating. But with this "skill rating", over time, servers could set skill limits. This way noobs would'nt be allowed into intermediate or pro servers since they just get in the way (we've all seen this happen). And vice versa, omg pro l33t players would not be allowed to play in servers meant for rookies. But there would still be a good cross cut of skill levels since the skill ranges would be vast for servers - like 1-30 for rookie servers, 20-75 for intermediates, and 50-100 for pro servers. This would really solve the problem unless large groups of people collaborated to artificially influence a persons skill rating by voting them up or down from where they should be.
Good ns2 players pay to play and have very limited opportunities to play against other good players.
When you paid for NS2, that was a transaction between you and UWE, and it entitled you to run the software. It didn't entitle you to actually play a game. To play a game, you have to find teammates and opponents who are willing to play with you. Nobody owes you a match. And since most people don't like to play games that are horribly mismatched, then yeah, someone as good as you are will have trouble finding a lot of people who want to play with you.
But you're a smart guy. Surely you can figure out a way to play in pubs without alienating the very people you're trying to play with.
Maybe you can figure out a way to realise some people are better than you and you should use teamwork + tactics to take them down rather than alienating these players and whining how people who are better than you should not play.
This whole topic is now ridiculous. There are good players, and there are bad players. If you are bad you will get stomped. ADAPT and learn some of these skills for yourself. This isnt farmville, you have to work to win and in overcoming the challenge lies the fun (which most people dont seem to understand these days).
We dont need a rating system, we dont need any action from UWE or admins. Playing people who are better than you will make you improve. Even if they are miles ahead of you, you will learn their tricks. I would take any opportunity I had to play with the likes of Fana and Tane, it is not often you get to pit yourself against someone of that calibre where you can really learn a lot and improve.
Fana and the majority of the competitive community (who are the pro players you whine about) have given a huge amount of dedication and support to UWE for 9+ years. It is these people who helped made NS1 the success it was which allowed NS2 to be created. You are now telling these people that they are not welcome in public servers because of their dedication and experience. Wow.. just wow.
Is the concept of playing games against evenly-matched opponents really that hard to grasp?
When does this happen on pubs, ever? Pubs are random in their population. The best chance to find "evenly matched teams" is to become a regular on a server or join a league. And even the latter is unlikely to afford you an "even match". There is always going to be someone better than you, and if there isn't then you are just the type of person being ostracized in this thread.
What is there to discuss really? Public servers are there for the public, which incl even the top players. If the server admin bans you for being too good, fine it's their money spent renting the server which they want to keep as skill equal as possible (in reality this doesn't really happens often regardless if a pro is on the server or not), although I find it a bit childish. You can't expect pro players to always have pcws or gathers available to play, it's unrealistic.
The only real "solution" is matchmaking, which wouldn't really work too good with a small player base such as NS2.
I have been accused many times for aimbotting, and also wallhacking recently to the point where I get frusterated when I get accused each time, the worst part about it is its not just one person on the other team, its about 2-4 people
Good ns2 players pay to play and have very limited opportunities to play against other good players.
When you paid for NS2, that was a transaction between you and UWE, and it entitled you to run the software. It didn't entitle you to actually play a game. To play a game, you have to find teammates and opponents who are willing to play with you. Nobody owes you a match. And since most people don't like to play games that are horribly mismatched, then yeah, someone as good as you are will have trouble finding a lot of people who want to play with you.
But you're a smart guy. Surely you can figure out a way to play in pubs without alienating the very people you're trying to play with.
Maybe you can figure out a way to realise some people are better than you and you should use teamwork + tactics to take them down rather than alienating these players and whining how people who are better than you should not play.
This whole topic is now ridiculous. There are good players, and there are bad players. If you are bad you will get stomped. ADAPT and learn some of these skills for yourself. This isnt farmville, you have to work to win and in overcoming the challenge lies the fun (which most people dont seem to understand these days).
We dont need a rating system, we dont need any action from UWE or admins. Playing people who are better than you will make you improve. Even if they are miles ahead of you, you will learn their tricks. I would take any opportunity I had to play with the likes of Fana and Tane, it is not often you get to pit yourself against someone of that calibre where you can really learn a lot and improve.
Fana and the majority of the competitive community (who are the pro players you whine about) have given a huge amount of dedication and support to UWE for 9+ years. It is these people who helped made NS1 the success it was which allowed NS2 to be created. You are now telling these people that they are not welcome in public servers because of their dedication and experience. Wow.. just wow.
I see your logic but it fails when the player base spans such vastly different skill levels. Regardless of what you think, a rookie getting rolled by 'pros' does not teach him anything. Nothing. You can't learn advanced theoretical physics calculations if you are still in basic algebra class learning to add 2+2.
Secondly, advanced players get tired of being accused of hacks by newer players.
Uneven matches RUIN this game, regardless of what you may think or experience on whatever servers you play on. Most of the servers I play on are a waste of time due to such uneven teams.
This game DOES need a matchmaking service of some sort if it will be successful in the long run. It DOES need a ranking system to make sure players are at least on the same planet skill wise. It needs something because right now I would say 70% of the games I play are pointless. One team is always getting rolled. I find that when I am on the losing team getting crushed, I just give up, its pointless when 2-3 players on the opposite team have 50:2 ratios while me and my whole team are 5:6 . Just like its boring as crap when I am one of those guys going 50:2 because the enemy team is all noobs. Its boring and I feel like I'm wasting my time.
I play this game every day just hoping for the "Even match". Its like the golden egg, the needle in the haystack etc. . about once every 8-10 games I finally get into an evenly matched game and it reminds me why I play this game.
Not SureJoin Date: 2013-01-06Member: 177758Members
I gotta agree with this guy^. When I'm getting well and truly stomped, the only thing I'm learning is "that guy is waaaaaaaaaaay better than me." You -might- pick up some small things that will improve your play, but getting killed by a guy with super good reflexes isn't going to do that much to improve your own reflexes, and if you spend 2/3 of the game dead, well, you're really not getting much practice at all.
Based on what was described in the OP, I'd say that's pretty suspicious. I never go off of score when "hax" triggers in my mind, because I know how insanely good some people can be. However, as many others said, good marines don't crouch and sit unmoving when attacked. That, coupled with the obviously extremely fast tracking caused by his animations definitely seems pretty suspect.
Lots of nerd raging here, yipes. Given I've gotten my first "compliment" on a server lately, I feel compelled to respond. Constructive solution inc:
In ut2k3/4 we had a server for folks who wanted to pub with decent players. Was called "The Factory" IIRC. There was usually an aliasing member of a pro clan(or wannabe pro clan) in there at all times. It was still a pub, and it didn't guarantee a good game, but at least you had a place to TRY to have fun. Granted, the skill tiers in UT were vastly different from NS. Get together a server, join it regularly if you're very good at the game, and advertise it as such to those you scrim with. No worries about newbs calling you out, just good fun. We can bicker and argue about pub servers, but pubs really are for new players. Become a responsible gaming community and organize yourselves. Beyond pubs, #ns2.gather and #ns2.search have hardly any activity. Get your act together!
(PS: If gather and search are dead channels and people actually talk and respond in other places, I'd love to know where. IRC seems DEAD, which isn't good news for a game which was just released. PM me or respond here if some of this is already in place and we just need to better advertise it.)
(PS: If gather and search are dead channels and people actually talk and respond in other places, I'd love to know where. IRC seems DEAD, which isn't good news for a game which was just released. PM me or respond here if some of this is already in place and we just need to better advertise it.)
The IRC channels are the place to go, and they're not dead. They're not used as much as we'd like them to be used, but not joining because one thinks they're dead doesn't help solve the problem. Most of the scrims/pcws we have come from #ns2.search
@quakenet
#ns2.search for mixes/clans looking for a bout
#ns2.gather for everyone (and I do mean EVERYONE regardless of skill level) looking for a good game experience in a more competitive setting
(PS: If gather and search are dead channels and people actually talk and respond in other places, I'd love to know where. IRC seems DEAD, which isn't good news for a game which was just released. PM me or respond here if some of this is already in place and we just need to better advertise it.)
The IRC channels are the place to go, and they're not dead. They're not used as much as we'd like them to be used, but not joining because one thinks they're dead doesn't help solve the problem. Most of the scrims/pcws we have come from #ns2.search
@quakenet
#ns2.search for mixes/clans looking for a bout
#ns2.gather for everyone (and I do mean EVERYONE regardless of skill level) looking for a good game experience in a more competitive setting
Hmmm this sounds like what I'm looking for... I couldn't work out ENSL when I had a look on there and I haven't used IRC for about 15 years. What clients are people using for that these days?
It's becoming ridiculously obvious there is a ton of wallhackers in NS2 by Feb, I can go from server to server in Aus alone and see people with barely 100-200 hours played who have this complete 6th sense as marines, an inability to ever walk into rooms where aliens are waiting for them, I continually see night after night people with 250+ ping in aus/NZ server firing before I even get around the corner when the complete opposite should be happening, I should notice they don't fire in the first second then the damage catches up as they start sending info back to the server 200+ ping wise, not them firing when I should go around a corner after I leap and swing into the wall, if there's one great benefit about air control in this game it's beyond easy as fuck to bait wallhackers into prefiring on you coming around a corner.
4th result of 'NS2 hacks' in google is a working wallhack (3+ months now), the thread has 5500 views last time I checked, this game had 2100 concurrent players yesterday, doesn't take a mathematician or a forum wizard to note even taking out repeat views and some F5 spam that's an incredible amount of people being given the easiest inject in the world to use, I could post dropbox pictures of a different wallhack people are using that I'm not even aware of that makes all the walls invis, they're probably just editing game files in spark at this point.
I went to play a game or 2 of NS2 tonight but between obvious 4-6 player stacking in some servers, to people I've never heard of always on marines going 50-4 but playing like complete idiots macro wise there wasn't a game to played, add in the 2-3 squad 250+ pingers firing before people get around corners every other night, this is the third night in a row where there's no fun to be had in playing NS2.
The only official response I've ever seen to hacking was summed up like 1) we put VAC in and 2) communities can police their own, oh and 3) lets hope this game doesn't become popular enough to hack. As if population was ever a good reason to make a hack or not, the only online competition I know of ENSL (or even CG in Aus if it's actually running) don't even ask people to use EAC or any other anti hacking tool, call me jaded but I've played far too many previous FPS games to take people online for their good intentions. Being an admin on a 1.5 server back in 2003/04 we would add anywhere between 5-20+ people a week just casually using walls or aimbots to ruin peoples nights (the ones not even trying to hide it), in NS2 it's like some don't ask don't tell policy, hacking doesn't exist (nor has it ever existed) and you just need to get good (QQ umadbro), just because someone regularly goes 50-5 as marines but can not skulk to save them self somehow doesn't warrant suspicion anymore.
Don't even get me started on watching people go from pub rand, to pub rand with fluros and pistol script who can now aim 50% better then last night and picks up 5+ more kills per round with automatic pistol, to pub rand going 7:1 KD and always playing marines, pub rand now has a clan tag with 200+ hours played but still can't play a single higher alien life form (lerk or fade). Pub rand now spends every night stacking pubs on steam friends, in fact I just inadvertently described a NS2 clan in Aus, 1 of about 5 active at most.
tl;dr: Obvious wallers are walling nowdays, every online competition just uses a comp consistency checked server, you're basically asking to have your game ruined by leaving the door open on this issue. VAC is about as useful as putting your finger up your arse, only you know it feels good, delayed bans are absolute fucking garbage for solving the immediate problem of people using hacks in game and were a band aid remedy for a problem in a galaxy far far away called CS 1.5.
The only official response I've ever seen to hacking was summed up like 1) we put VAC in and 2) communities can police their own, oh and 3) lets hope this game doesn't become popular enough to hack. As if population was ever a good reason to make a hack or not, the only online competition I know of ENSL (or even CG in Aus if it's actually running) don't even ask people to use EAC or any other anti hacking tool, call me jaded but I've played far too many previous FPS games to take people online for their good intentions. Being an admin on a 1.5 server back in 2003/04 we would add anywhere between 5-20+ people a week just casually using walls or aimbots to ruin peoples nights (the ones not even trying to hide it), in NS2 it's like some don't ask don't tell policy, hacking doesn't exist (nor has it ever existed) and you just need to get good (QQ umadbro), just because someone regularly goes 50-5 as marines but can not skulk to save them self somehow doesn't warrant suspicion anymore.
I've not seen walls as obvious as what you describe, I have seen some shady players lately but nothing 100% obvious yet. Take some recordings and post them up! Because you know in about 5 seconds theres going to be a flurry of posts calling you out, and please don't do the "I don't care if nobody believes me" thing, that never works. "Video or it didn't happen"
Video of what? A third person view of a player with no input on what they can and can't detect? A decent set of headphones and a working set of brain cells will let anyone operate a self-made wallhack. That is why it's so frustrating and dismissed outright.
Of course there are hacks and people hacking. For every 1 correct hackusation there are 1,000's made, driven by ignorance, bruised egos or stupidity. It's especially frustrating because the people keep posting anecdotal evidence and seem to lose perspective that they are the public server idiots getting petulant about a "hacker" that is 99.9999% of the time a higher skilled player. They're part of the problem, crying wolf and diluting any serious discussion because they are too ignorant of what kind of skills players can develop.
This is a stupid debate. You have two realities on opposite ends of the spectrum, everything in between applies also.. 1. Hackers are (or are becoming) rampant, a huge problem that needs to be addressed, ASAP. 2. They're few and far between, but disruptive when they're around. The end result, no matter where reality lands on that scale is the exact same no matter what: UWE will either enact greater anti-cheat measures or server operators will. The hack makers themselves will tweak their cheats to bypass them, then UWE/server admins will catch up and adjust accordingly..... and so on... and so forth as it's been forever.
Sick of hackers? Take up coding, start writing an anti-hack program. PunkBuster was started by a competitive TFCer in clan U-238.
If you can't code, then you're stuck waiting for other people to do something about it. That's it. The whining isn't accomplishing anything but making people sick of hearing about a no-proof story of terrible people playing a game unfairly.
tlrdr; if you're making a hackusation, you're probably wrong and an idiot. If you're right, there is nothing you can do and you, unfortunately, blend in with the previously mentioned idiots who are wrong.
who have this complete 6th sense as marines, an inability to ever walk into rooms where aliens are waiting for them
I've witnessed this a few times too. I've never been one hundred percent sure when I've been a victim of it on aliens. But a couple of times now I have walked in to a room as marine, and watched as another dude has come in and instantly picked aliens off the dark ceiling. I couldn't see them even as they were being shot. There was no way in hell you would know they were there unless you had at least a neon texture with oversized models, or more likely a wall hack. I questioned the guy at the time, he said he had a feeling they were there... Yeah right.
Getting a decent balanced pub in Aus is getting harder. I have made a sticky note on my second screen of people I know are using skulk texture mods, when I see them stacking marines I usually find a new server or game to play.
It doesn't help that getting stomped as aliens is probably 100x worse than getting stomped as a marine.
Yes, it's exists. My working wallhack + visual improvements in order to detect enemy with ease even in darkness. I just edited some game files (like textures, etc) that don't cause a VAC ban and passes a default consistency check. Server operators may extend a consistency check, but some mods from workshop will not work.
There was no way in hell you would know they were there unless you had at least a neon texture with oversized models, or more likely a wall hack. I questioned the guy at the time, he said he had a feeling they were there... Yeah right.
Just sounds like a good player. There are only so many places in the current maps that a skulk can feasibly hide in, and an experienced player knows every single one of them. And knowing them means you check them every time. Try to spectate an experiences player, and you will see him walking into empty rooms with his arms flailing, checking every ceiling and crack. And when you walk into an empty room, it should be a no-brainer to look to your left, right and especially up.
And a dark spot is a moot point, since tweaking the gamma (or just using your flashlight) makes every skulk visible without hacks.
1) pistol instant fire = all bullets are fired simulatenously
2) hover aimbot - not a targeting aimbot but an aim-assitance that will automatically fire your weapon when the crosshairs are lined up on an alien.
it sounds like what you saw was a new exploit in testing, true aimbot.
The pistol does not fire all of it's bullets at one time, if you can prove that feel free to submit a video. But I've played around with scripts as much as possible and unless your fps is a solid 120 or so you're not going to be firing it any faster than it was intended. And really even then you only gain about .02 seconds.
This "hover aimbot" you're talking about would be something that looks for specific pixels which would require model textures to be changed to a bright color that is a different color than anything else, bright pink or green would be a good example. A dll is then either injected or hooked on that will detect the pixel color at whatever location on the screen and should aim and/or shoot for you. A similar way involves a separate program taking screenshots and checking the pixel that way. Both are pretty old ways of doing things, and both are detected by VAC just about any way you do it. Now your claim that someone would take the time to make a program that doesn't aim but just pulls the trigger is simply ridiculous. Obviously aiming is the hard part, once you get that down it's just learning how to click.
This "hover aimbot" you're talking about would be something that looks for specific pixels which would require model textures to be changed to a bright color that is a different color than anything else, bright pink or green would be a good example. A dll is then either injected or hooked on that will detect the pixel color at whatever location on the screen and should aim and/or shoot for you. A similar way involves a separate program taking screenshots and checking the pixel that way. Both are pretty old ways of doing things, and both are detected by VAC just about any way you do it. Now your claim that someone would take the time to make a program that doesn't aim but just pulls the trigger is simply ridiculous. Obviously aiming is the hard part, once you get that down it's just learning how to click.
Forgive me if I am wrong, but this seems like an incredibly stupid way to write an aimbot.
The client must know the locations of the other entities otherwise it would be unable to render the scene. So why check on the screen after the rendering has occurred for a certain pixel value when the client has each entity's location in memory at any given timestep?
Using simple 3d geometry (dot product of aiming vector with the normal to facing planes on the entity hitbox (if I remember my 3d rendering classes correctly)), you can determine when your crosshair is over an enemy. Its then trivial to fire. Alternatively, you can write a more standard aimbot.
With your method you would not need to inject a dll, and you could potentially run it all using third party software. As soon as we start messing with the client components and memory space, then you may as well go all the way.
The pistol does not fire all of it's bullets at one time, if you can prove that feel free to submit a video. But I've played around with scripts as much as possible and unless your fps is a solid 120 or so you're not going to be firing it any faster than it was intended. And really even then you only gain about .02 seconds.
I think most people tend to complain about pistol scripts (myself included) because it makes what used to take individual actions to fire and allows the user to do 1 action (press and hold a key) and have it fire all 10 shots making it an automatic weapon. IMHO that is when the line is crossed. I do not care how you choose to fire your pistol as long as you are required to manually operate a key for every shot you take.
Comments
At this point there isn't really a whole lot more to say in this discussion. If people don't realize how patently ridiculous it is to say that there's no difference between hackers and good players with regards to who should be allowed to play on public servers, you may as well put a bucket on your head and start singing.
Picked a few random quotes, out of many, that lambaste "pro" players for destroying pubs but fail to acknowledge that anyone good enough to shut down a pub is.... not playing seriously in a pub. I can shut down my fair share when I'm having a good day and lots of times I even impose limits on myself, I'll stay Skulk an entire round rather than going Fade, or I'll refuse to get Celerity or I'll try to end every kill with a pistol rather than finishing with my LMG...
Being good doesn't mean you're taking it seriously. It means you're just simply better. Serious gamers play casually too. I do it to unwind after work.
To the NFL analogy... it's bad. It's a poor example of faulty logic from players trying to justify their inability to handle getting beat up in a video game by players who are better. Ok that isn't what it really is, but it feels that way.
If you (a pro athlete) showed up to a pick-up game in the neighborhood playground, no matter how much you nerf yourself you're going to be better than the other players by an almost insurmountable level. There are no series of limits (short of no hands use for football, etc.) that are going to handicap effectively enough to even that balance out. You risk serious injury playing with a professional athlete in a physical sport, something you don't have a chance of here. At worst, a bruised ego. Further more, the public/casual players on the receiving end of a beatdown, nerfed or not, serious or casual, from a pro/competitive player in any professional sport would be excited they're playing with that person. They'd view it as an opportunity to learn, ask questions or just simply get better against tougher competition. It wouldn't be an opportunity to rage to the community about how unfair it is he is there.
All this despite the fact what people are whining about as "pro" is just "competitive" and ANYONE could go play gathers and become 10 times the player they'd be in a pub, in a month with the exact same time invested. They'd have higher quality games, a new level of depth to the game itself and otherwise would probably enjoy it more. They're open to the public. Why not?
full of TERRORS.. come on GoT...
When you paid for NS2, that was a transaction between you and UWE, and it entitled you to run the software. It didn't entitle you to actually play a game. To play a game, you have to find teammates and opponents who are willing to play with you. Nobody owes you a match. And since most people don't like to play games that are horribly mismatched, then yeah, someone as good as you are will have trouble finding a lot of people who want to play with you.
The chess grandmasters of yore would take on anyone of any skill and would make it an even match by offering handicaps: playing down a knight, or queen, or queen and rook, or whatever. If they didn't do that they'd never get games from anyone besides other grandmasters... because why would anyone bother when it was a forgone conclusion?
NS2 doesn't have an official handicap system. But you're a smart guy. Surely you can figure out a way to play in pubs without alienating the very people you're trying to play with.
I actually played with you earlier, you were good - and you definitely caused whatever team you were on to win by a landslide. We threw joking accusations of hacks at you, hopefully you knew they were jokes. I did not mind playing with you at all, I think you were a good sport about it and tried to keep the teams as even as possible. Nobody got mad that I could tell. I think at one point you realized you were swaying the game every round so you left to find a server where you 'fit in', which I tip my hat to you for.
I have also had the misfortune of playing with people who are probably 10x as good as you, in rookie friendly servers . At that point it is truly absurd. Whats worse is that kind of guy will usually have 1-2 of his buddies with him, and they keep stacking one team. So you have 1 team dominate over and over, nobody on the losing team has a k:d ratio over 0.25.. this goes on round after round until the server clears out. Whenever I see this I always ask the stackers to split up, someone join the other team ffs. Most of the time they laugh about it and claim "watch maybe you'll learn something" "only way you'll get better" etc .. wrong. What I'm learning is if I ever see you three dickheads in a server, its time to find a new server.
The sad fact is, many of the 'pros' are poor sports (Not directing this at you communist). They love stomping pubs. They don't want to even the teams. If they were good sports about it and tried not to team stack, or maybe switch teams partway through the round to even it out, I think you wouldn't have so many people complaining like this. And to stomp in a rookie friendly server absolutely deserves a ban IMO. There is no excuse for this. You know you and your buddies are very good. You know this server is inviting rookies in to learn the game. You know whats going to happen if you play in that server. And ultimately, you know you are being an a$$hole, but just don't care.
To those of you saying "Oh so cause I'm good I can't play in a rookie server?" Yes you're g'damn right. Its ridiculous. Just as ridiculous as if a rookie tried to compete with pros in a tournament.
So what do we do about it? I think there should be a rating system, sort of a way where players can anonymously 'rate' another players skill level, say a 1 - 100 rating system. Of course it would require dozens of votes before it would amount to anything, this way a few greifers could'nt mess up your rating. But with this "skill rating", over time, servers could set skill limits. This way noobs would'nt be allowed into intermediate or pro servers since they just get in the way (we've all seen this happen). And vice versa, omg pro l33t players would not be allowed to play in servers meant for rookies. But there would still be a good cross cut of skill levels since the skill ranges would be vast for servers - like 1-30 for rookie servers, 20-75 for intermediates, and 50-100 for pro servers. This would really solve the problem unless large groups of people collaborated to artificially influence a persons skill rating by voting them up or down from where they should be.
Maybe you can figure out a way to realise some people are better than you and you should use teamwork + tactics to take them down rather than alienating these players and whining how people who are better than you should not play.
This whole topic is now ridiculous. There are good players, and there are bad players. If you are bad you will get stomped. ADAPT and learn some of these skills for yourself. This isnt farmville, you have to work to win and in overcoming the challenge lies the fun (which most people dont seem to understand these days).
We dont need a rating system, we dont need any action from UWE or admins. Playing people who are better than you will make you improve. Even if they are miles ahead of you, you will learn their tricks. I would take any opportunity I had to play with the likes of Fana and Tane, it is not often you get to pit yourself against someone of that calibre where you can really learn a lot and improve.
Fana and the majority of the competitive community (who are the pro players you whine about) have given a huge amount of dedication and support to UWE for 9+ years. It is these people who helped made NS1 the success it was which allowed NS2 to be created. You are now telling these people that they are not welcome in public servers because of their dedication and experience. Wow.. just wow.
When does this happen on pubs, ever? Pubs are random in their population. The best chance to find "evenly matched teams" is to become a regular on a server or join a league. And even the latter is unlikely to afford you an "even match". There is always going to be someone better than you, and if there isn't then you are just the type of person being ostracized in this thread.
The only real "solution" is matchmaking, which wouldn't really work too good with a small player base such as NS2.
I see your logic but it fails when the player base spans such vastly different skill levels. Regardless of what you think, a rookie getting rolled by 'pros' does not teach him anything. Nothing. You can't learn advanced theoretical physics calculations if you are still in basic algebra class learning to add 2+2.
Secondly, advanced players get tired of being accused of hacks by newer players.
Uneven matches RUIN this game, regardless of what you may think or experience on whatever servers you play on. Most of the servers I play on are a waste of time due to such uneven teams.
This game DOES need a matchmaking service of some sort if it will be successful in the long run. It DOES need a ranking system to make sure players are at least on the same planet skill wise. It needs something because right now I would say 70% of the games I play are pointless. One team is always getting rolled. I find that when I am on the losing team getting crushed, I just give up, its pointless when 2-3 players on the opposite team have 50:2 ratios while me and my whole team are 5:6 . Just like its boring as crap when I am one of those guys going 50:2 because the enemy team is all noobs. Its boring and I feel like I'm wasting my time.
I play this game every day just hoping for the "Even match". Its like the golden egg, the needle in the haystack etc. . about once every 8-10 games I finally get into an evenly matched game and it reminds me why I play this game.
My two cents.
In ut2k3/4 we had a server for folks who wanted to pub with decent players. Was called "The Factory" IIRC. There was usually an aliasing member of a pro clan(or wannabe pro clan) in there at all times. It was still a pub, and it didn't guarantee a good game, but at least you had a place to TRY to have fun. Granted, the skill tiers in UT were vastly different from NS. Get together a server, join it regularly if you're very good at the game, and advertise it as such to those you scrim with. No worries about newbs calling you out, just good fun. We can bicker and argue about pub servers, but pubs really are for new players. Become a responsible gaming community and organize yourselves. Beyond pubs, #ns2.gather and #ns2.search have hardly any activity. Get your act together!
(PS: If gather and search are dead channels and people actually talk and respond in other places, I'd love to know where. IRC seems DEAD, which isn't good news for a game which was just released. PM me or respond here if some of this is already in place and we just need to better advertise it.)
The IRC channels are the place to go, and they're not dead. They're not used as much as we'd like them to be used, but not joining because one thinks they're dead doesn't help solve the problem. Most of the scrims/pcws we have come from #ns2.search
@quakenet
#ns2.search for mixes/clans looking for a bout
#ns2.gather for everyone (and I do mean EVERYONE regardless of skill level) looking for a good game experience in a more competitive setting
Hmmm this sounds like what I'm looking for... I couldn't work out ENSL when I had a look on there and I haven't used IRC for about 15 years. What clients are people using for that these days?
Roo
4th result of 'NS2 hacks' in google is a working wallhack (3+ months now), the thread has 5500 views last time I checked, this game had 2100 concurrent players yesterday, doesn't take a mathematician or a forum wizard to note even taking out repeat views and some F5 spam that's an incredible amount of people being given the easiest inject in the world to use, I could post dropbox pictures of a different wallhack people are using that I'm not even aware of that makes all the walls invis, they're probably just editing game files in spark at this point.
I went to play a game or 2 of NS2 tonight but between obvious 4-6 player stacking in some servers, to people I've never heard of always on marines going 50-4 but playing like complete idiots macro wise there wasn't a game to played, add in the 2-3 squad 250+ pingers firing before people get around corners every other night, this is the third night in a row where there's no fun to be had in playing NS2.
The only official response I've ever seen to hacking was summed up like 1) we put VAC in and 2) communities can police their own, oh and 3) lets hope this game doesn't become popular enough to hack. As if population was ever a good reason to make a hack or not, the only online competition I know of ENSL (or even CG in Aus if it's actually running) don't even ask people to use EAC or any other anti hacking tool, call me jaded but I've played far too many previous FPS games to take people online for their good intentions. Being an admin on a 1.5 server back in 2003/04 we would add anywhere between 5-20+ people a week just casually using walls or aimbots to ruin peoples nights (the ones not even trying to hide it), in NS2 it's like some don't ask don't tell policy, hacking doesn't exist (nor has it ever existed) and you just need to get good (QQ umadbro), just because someone regularly goes 50-5 as marines but can not skulk to save them self somehow doesn't warrant suspicion anymore.
Don't even get me started on watching people go from pub rand, to pub rand with fluros and pistol script who can now aim 50% better then last night and picks up 5+ more kills per round with automatic pistol, to pub rand going 7:1 KD and always playing marines, pub rand now has a clan tag with 200+ hours played but still can't play a single higher alien life form (lerk or fade). Pub rand now spends every night stacking pubs on steam friends, in fact I just inadvertently described a NS2 clan in Aus, 1 of about 5 active at most.
tl;dr: Obvious wallers are walling nowdays, every online competition just uses a comp consistency checked server, you're basically asking to have your game ruined by leaving the door open on this issue. VAC is about as useful as putting your finger up your arse, only you know it feels good, delayed bans are absolute fucking garbage for solving the immediate problem of people using hacks in game and were a band aid remedy for a problem in a galaxy far far away called CS 1.5.
I've not seen walls as obvious as what you describe, I have seen some shady players lately but nothing 100% obvious yet. Take some recordings and post them up! Because you know in about 5 seconds theres going to be a flurry of posts calling you out, and please don't do the "I don't care if nobody believes me" thing, that never works. "Video or it didn't happen"
Of course there are hacks and people hacking. For every 1 correct hackusation there are 1,000's made, driven by ignorance, bruised egos or stupidity. It's especially frustrating because the people keep posting anecdotal evidence and seem to lose perspective that they are the public server idiots getting petulant about a "hacker" that is 99.9999% of the time a higher skilled player. They're part of the problem, crying wolf and diluting any serious discussion because they are too ignorant of what kind of skills players can develop.
This is a stupid debate. You have two realities on opposite ends of the spectrum, everything in between applies also.. 1. Hackers are (or are becoming) rampant, a huge problem that needs to be addressed, ASAP. 2. They're few and far between, but disruptive when they're around. The end result, no matter where reality lands on that scale is the exact same no matter what: UWE will either enact greater anti-cheat measures or server operators will. The hack makers themselves will tweak their cheats to bypass them, then UWE/server admins will catch up and adjust accordingly..... and so on... and so forth as it's been forever.
Sick of hackers? Take up coding, start writing an anti-hack program. PunkBuster was started by a competitive TFCer in clan U-238.
If you can't code, then you're stuck waiting for other people to do something about it. That's it. The whining isn't accomplishing anything but making people sick of hearing about a no-proof story of terrible people playing a game unfairly.
tlrdr; if you're making a hackusation, you're probably wrong and an idiot. If you're right, there is nothing you can do and you, unfortunately, blend in with the previously mentioned idiots who are wrong.
I've witnessed this a few times too. I've never been one hundred percent sure when I've been a victim of it on aliens. But a couple of times now I have walked in to a room as marine, and watched as another dude has come in and instantly picked aliens off the dark ceiling. I couldn't see them even as they were being shot. There was no way in hell you would know they were there unless you had at least a neon texture with oversized models, or more likely a wall hack. I questioned the guy at the time, he said he had a feeling they were there... Yeah right.
Getting a decent balanced pub in Aus is getting harder. I have made a sticky note on my second screen of people I know are using skulk texture mods, when I see them stacking marines I usually find a new server or game to play.
It doesn't help that getting stomped as aliens is probably 100x worse than getting stomped as a marine.
1) pistol instant fire = all bullets are fired simulatenously
2) hover aimbot - not a targeting aimbot but an aim-assitance that will automatically fire your weapon when the crosshairs are lined up on an alien.
it sounds like what you saw was a new exploit in testing, true aimbot.
Just sounds like a good player. There are only so many places in the current maps that a skulk can feasibly hide in, and an experienced player knows every single one of them. And knowing them means you check them every time. Try to spectate an experiences player, and you will see him walking into empty rooms with his arms flailing, checking every ceiling and crack. And when you walk into an empty room, it should be a no-brainer to look to your left, right and especially up.
And a dark spot is a moot point, since tweaking the gamma (or just using your flashlight) makes every skulk visible without hacks.
The pistol does not fire all of it's bullets at one time, if you can prove that feel free to submit a video. But I've played around with scripts as much as possible and unless your fps is a solid 120 or so you're not going to be firing it any faster than it was intended. And really even then you only gain about .02 seconds.
This "hover aimbot" you're talking about would be something that looks for specific pixels which would require model textures to be changed to a bright color that is a different color than anything else, bright pink or green would be a good example. A dll is then either injected or hooked on that will detect the pixel color at whatever location on the screen and should aim and/or shoot for you. A similar way involves a separate program taking screenshots and checking the pixel that way. Both are pretty old ways of doing things, and both are detected by VAC just about any way you do it. Now your claim that someone would take the time to make a program that doesn't aim but just pulls the trigger is simply ridiculous. Obviously aiming is the hard part, once you get that down it's just learning how to click.
Forgive me if I am wrong, but this seems like an incredibly stupid way to write an aimbot.
The client must know the locations of the other entities otherwise it would be unable to render the scene. So why check on the screen after the rendering has occurred for a certain pixel value when the client has each entity's location in memory at any given timestep?
Using simple 3d geometry (dot product of aiming vector with the normal to facing planes on the entity hitbox (if I remember my 3d rendering classes correctly)), you can determine when your crosshair is over an enemy. Its then trivial to fire. Alternatively, you can write a more standard aimbot.
With your method you would not need to inject a dll, and you could potentially run it all using third party software. As soon as we start messing with the client components and memory space, then you may as well go all the way.
I think most people tend to complain about pistol scripts (myself included) because it makes what used to take individual actions to fire and allows the user to do 1 action (press and hold a key) and have it fire all 10 shots making it an automatic weapon. IMHO that is when the line is crossed. I do not care how you choose to fire your pistol as long as you are required to manually operate a key for every shot you take.