As I said, hours played is not a good indicator of skill level and should never be used as such,
What it could b used for is a basic understanding of the game for everyone maybe it would help in a way to help even teams out so they have an even amout of hours played?
Making games not as stacked as much as players would know who has plate the game and should know what to do etc.
Plus it's a nice reward for dedicating slot of hours to playing ns2
This won't be an issue soon* when the new skill-tracking system comes into play, and will allow much more balanced teams for pub and pug play.
* I don't know how soon soon is, but the CDT are working on it!
I think, as you said in your last sentence, the main benefit of a badges-for-hours-played system would be an incentive for people to keep playing, afterall it's essentially an achivement and as Steam has shown us, achievements can be highly motivational for some people. Just look at the Commander Badge.
From my perspective adding badges that uses steam hours will drive ppl to have game ON but not playing (harvesting hours). Commander badge should be elastic to. IT should count wins and hours commanded weekly or monthly and be removed if player isn't commanding any more, that would show that this player is a dedicated commander not hoping into chair just to get a badge. Badges allready determine if team is stack or not, even if players with badges are not so great. We should not add more badges i think it all should go in direction of steam achivements... in case of badge for different ns2 versions we have constelation badge so why not? ppl deserve to show that thay did support the game a litle more than a hamble bundle sale...
From my perspective adding badges that uses steam hours will drive ppl to have game ON but not playing (harvesting hours). Commander badge should be elastic to. IT should count wins and hours commanded weekly or monthly and be removed if player isn't commanding any more, that would show that this player is a dedicated commander not hoping into chair just to get a badge. Badges allready determine if team is stack or not, even if players with badges are not so great. We should not add more badges i think it all should go in direction of steam achivements... in case of badge for different ns2 versions we have constelation badge so why not? ppl deserve to show that thay did support the game a litle more than a hamble bundle sale...
Actually, most of the people decided to play Commander to get the badge, that's 100% true. But if the said guy suddenly stops to play in the chair, I don't know the delay but his badge will be removed later, if you don't play Commander anymore, you're not Commander & your badge is revoked, you just need to keep playing as Commander to save it.
Badges for people depending their playtime is just an excellent idea. For sure, you can possess 2000 hours or maybe more & do not have the same skill level as someone with only 500 hours, but in general, even if you're not so strong as him, you know the game, strategies, you listen your Commander and orders, to summarize, you're not stupid when you play. Someone with 500 hours isn't necessarily like this, but it seems logical someone with more hours than another one plays better & is stronger.
It could prevent stack teams, it cannot avoid it entirely, we all agree with this but contributes to improve the experience of the game, if rookies are aware of this system of badges, 1. they will know why they're stomped sometimes, 2. they definitely would like to get one of these badges.
As already mentioned, nobody is forced to wear these badges, but if they want, they could. I do not think showing how many hours that guy or that other guy played NS2 is a mistake because it proves how the said guy loves the game. It's a tiny bit like a Steam Achievement or something else: "You just reached 1.500 hours, well done, you received a new badge, congratulations!". So what's really wrong with this kind of system? The only thing that could be boring is too many badges, but since the incorporation of the Commander badge, + all Reinforced & NS2WC badges, it's already done, + the mod Badges+ that so many servers already installed.
So maybe something like a badge that updates.. Starts out with 50 hours, then 250, 500, 750, 1,000+ It could just be one badge that would change color.
Maybe like...
50 hours - White
250 - Blue
500 - Bronze
750 - Silver
1,000 - Gold
I dunno. We'd have to talk it over with the CDT. I'm not opposed to the idea.
Why not base it on skill instead of playtime (once Ghoul finished rework on it)?
hour-based badge certainly has the issue of some people going afk just to get it. when based on steam time people can even idle in the main menu to get that.
basing it on skill puts a lot of pressure on it: i think people like achievements because they can sort of collect them, at their own pace and without it ever being taken away again (i imagine losing/downgrade of a badge could be very frustrating for several people). if you prevent the downgrade, people might still feel not being able to live up to the expectations after having a lucky skill-peak once.
so how about this: make it based on ingame score. i know it's not the perfect measure to see how good / experienced someone is, but i think it would work out nicely:
-hive already keeps track of accumulated score, so adding the badges should be rather easy and people don't have to start from scratch to get these badges
-dragging out a game when on the winning side to get more score can be denied by surrender vote and those people get "punished" by not getting a chance to wreck a base filled with score-heavy buildings
-people who try to "harvest" badges in the lamest but most efficient way will not totally screw up the game (especially compared to afkness)
-basically every playstyle will eventually give you the badge (except commanding, but that comes with the commander badge plus there could be an artificial score-bonus for a commander at the end of the game, that would be a fair thing to introduce anyway)
-having it based on score actually requires some player effort other than just being present: it will feel more meaningful and good players get the badge a bit faster
for this, i'd suggest adding a score-reward at the end of the game. i'm pretty sure this is rather easy to implement as it's just some formula changing a single number that is often changed by various sources already. the reward would be higher for the winning team, higher for commanders. if required, things like skill, match-length and playercounts can also be incorporated so this is quite flexible. apart from contributing to the badge computation, this reward also remains on the scoreboard between rounds.
the purpose of this reward would be to compensate commanding and to encourage people to keep their focus on playing for the greater good, which is winning the round.
@Laosh'Ra Score rank is not very meaningful. A Gorge can easily amass Score by spamming structures, Lerks also easily get high Score just for spicking everything etc.
Score doesn't corrolate with winning or loosing a game or showing some kind of effort towards development or UWE.
Basing it on skill might be pressure for some, but it's motivation for many others. See rankeds in SC2 or LoL.
If we had these badges based on new skill system, we'd see at first glance if teams are somewhat balanced or not.
Score doesn't corrolate with winning or loosing a game or showing some kind of effort towards development or UWE.
don't understand the part with effort, could you paraphrase that?
as for not correlating with winning/losing, i disagree. but i get your point that it's not always representative which is why i suggested adding a bonus for the winning team.
if the new system is applied automatically, people don't need any badge information. if they sort it out manually, i'd rather have the actual skill value displayed, especially also as the current sum for the team (sek servers do that) instead of using discretized badges.
Basing it on skill might be pressure for some, but it's motivation for many others. See rankeds in SC2 or LoL.
If we had these badges based on new skill system, we'd see at first glance if teams are somewhat balanced or not.
ranked games in LoL are optional and only for players who reached maximum level. our equivalent would be gathers i guess. i don't think turning ns2 entirely into one huge league is a good idea, especially with the big gaps between vets and rookies.
So maybe something like a badge that updates.. Starts out with 50 hours, then 250, 500, 750, 1,000+ It could just be one badge that would change color.
Maybe like...
50 hours - White
250 - Blue
500 - Bronze
750 - Silver
1,000 - Gold
reflecting a bit more on this, i think the main issue with badges being used as indicator for balance is not the badges themselves.
the actual problem is that "force even teams" is not working too well, most people even prefer "randomize ready room".
so i'd say we give the new system a chance and see how frequently people make use of it. if they use it very often, then it does not really matter what badges we introduce, because teams will be balanced automatically anyway.
if it doesn't work for some reason, then badges directly based on it will most likely also not work.
as for a different approach to deal with afkness for hour-based badges: only count playtime of games in which a player somehow proves that he's not afk, like improve your score at least once every 3 minutes, or something else that's super easy to do even for a rookie.
From my perspective adding badges that uses steam hours will drive ppl to have game ON but not playing (harvesting hours).
Of course but it'll be a minority, and who cares ? There isn't a lot of new players.
Plus it's the easier way to quickly evaluate the skill of a player. We see how ns2stat is inaccurate. This a FPS and RTS game, the skill of a player is overdependent to your team, your upgrade, your com ect.
And even if we have a new ELO system, this could lead to more stack : stack = easy win = farming = more point
This'll be a badge to avoid stack and encourage new player to play more, we don't want a badge to show "look how good i am with my 1200+ skills points". ENSL seasons and playoffs is your ranked system
so how about everyone that has played the game to this point with there hours would be awarded the correct badge, any new players would then have to play the hours but also it could be award in rounds completed after 3+mins (in other words they have to be playing a round for over 3+ mins and not leave untill the winner is displayed and all players are back in the readyroom) no wins or loss, it wouldnt matter, this in turn would do a few things, it would stop most players raging from the server, stop players from F4ing (there for games will be played out alot more, rather than the 1st sign of a team taking the lead, they give up)
Yes it would take a bit of work to figure the best route for something like this, but this would be one way to reward players that stick around and put the hours/rounds into NS2.
The 187combat servers did this, for the amount of hours your played. whereas you start with one icon and then every landmark hour (10,25,50,100,150) you get another color of an icon, after so many hours it added a halo to the icon(was a grey type alien head).
Not sure if I like this idea of colored icons to begin with. Athough it likely would be great for captains mode as if you didn't know the capacity of the player you would at least know the amount of hours played which would give you an idea of who to pick. Neat tip would be to having a moving cap for the highest played icon, ie 1% of the active player base has 1000 hours played, everybody beyond that gets one icon, instead of doing an icon for say 1000, 2000, 3000, 4000 or anything inbetween. After six months lets say 1% of the player base now has 1500 hours played, they get the same icon but now to qualify for it you have to hit that mark. This might be too esoteric for this size of game/playerbase though, it could go in the other direction too if 1% of the most played people have 800 hours played that becomes the top of the line icon that used to go to the 1000 or more players.
Surely it would be better to wait the fixing of the match making system?
With such a high skill ceiling and competitive players appearing on public servers, hours really don't tell the true story, someone can be owning pretty hard then along comes someone else who is just in a different league - so now the other team is 'stacked' (by one player, lol) and suddenly all your hours mean nothing as you are essentially learning from zero again against whatever NS2 god happened to drop by today ...
Comments
* I don't know how soon soon is, but the CDT are working on it!
I think, as you said in your last sentence, the main benefit of a badges-for-hours-played system would be an incentive for people to keep playing, afterall it's essentially an achivement and as Steam has shown us, achievements can be highly motivational for some people. Just look at the Commander Badge.
Actually, most of the people decided to play Commander to get the badge, that's 100% true. But if the said guy suddenly stops to play in the chair, I don't know the delay but his badge will be removed later, if you don't play Commander anymore, you're not Commander & your badge is revoked, you just need to keep playing as Commander to save it.
Badges for people depending their playtime is just an excellent idea. For sure, you can possess 2000 hours or maybe more & do not have the same skill level as someone with only 500 hours, but in general, even if you're not so strong as him, you know the game, strategies, you listen your Commander and orders, to summarize, you're not stupid when you play. Someone with 500 hours isn't necessarily like this, but it seems logical someone with more hours than another one plays better & is stronger.
It could prevent stack teams, it cannot avoid it entirely, we all agree with this but contributes to improve the experience of the game, if rookies are aware of this system of badges, 1. they will know why they're stomped sometimes, 2. they definitely would like to get one of these badges.
As already mentioned, nobody is forced to wear these badges, but if they want, they could. I do not think showing how many hours that guy or that other guy played NS2 is a mistake because it proves how the said guy loves the game. It's a tiny bit like a Steam Achievement or something else: "You just reached 1.500 hours, well done, you received a new badge, congratulations!". So what's really wrong with this kind of system? The only thing that could be boring is too many badges, but since the incorporation of the Commander badge, + all Reinforced & NS2WC badges, it's already done, + the mod Badges+ that so many servers already installed.
Is this happening or are you making a request?
basing it on skill puts a lot of pressure on it: i think people like achievements because they can sort of collect them, at their own pace and without it ever being taken away again (i imagine losing/downgrade of a badge could be very frustrating for several people). if you prevent the downgrade, people might still feel not being able to live up to the expectations after having a lucky skill-peak once.
so how about this: make it based on ingame score. i know it's not the perfect measure to see how good / experienced someone is, but i think it would work out nicely:
-hive already keeps track of accumulated score, so adding the badges should be rather easy and people don't have to start from scratch to get these badges
-dragging out a game when on the winning side to get more score can be denied by surrender vote and those people get "punished" by not getting a chance to wreck a base filled with score-heavy buildings
-people who try to "harvest" badges in the lamest but most efficient way will not totally screw up the game (especially compared to afkness)
-basically every playstyle will eventually give you the badge (except commanding, but that comes with the commander badge plus there could be an artificial score-bonus for a commander at the end of the game, that would be a fair thing to introduce anyway)
-having it based on score actually requires some player effort other than just being present: it will feel more meaningful and good players get the badge a bit faster
for this, i'd suggest adding a score-reward at the end of the game. i'm pretty sure this is rather easy to implement as it's just some formula changing a single number that is often changed by various sources already. the reward would be higher for the winning team, higher for commanders. if required, things like skill, match-length and playercounts can also be incorporated so this is quite flexible. apart from contributing to the badge computation, this reward also remains on the scoreboard between rounds.
the purpose of this reward would be to compensate commanding and to encourage people to keep their focus on playing for the greater good, which is winning the round.
Score doesn't corrolate with winning or loosing a game or showing some kind of effort towards development or UWE.
Basing it on skill might be pressure for some, but it's motivation for many others. See rankeds in SC2 or LoL.
If we had these badges based on new skill system, we'd see at first glance if teams are somewhat balanced or not.
as for not correlating with winning/losing, i disagree. but i get your point that it's not always representative which is why i suggested adding a bonus for the winning team.
if the new system is applied automatically, people don't need any badge information. if they sort it out manually, i'd rather have the actual skill value displayed, especially also as the current sum for the team (sek servers do that) instead of using discretized badges.
ranked games in LoL are optional and only for players who reached maximum level. our equivalent would be gathers i guess. i don't think turning ns2 entirely into one huge league is a good idea, especially with the big gaps between vets and rookies.
3000 - Obsidian/Black (like the black armor).
the actual problem is that "force even teams" is not working too well, most people even prefer "randomize ready room".
so i'd say we give the new system a chance and see how frequently people make use of it. if they use it very often, then it does not really matter what badges we introduce, because teams will be balanced automatically anyway.
if it doesn't work for some reason, then badges directly based on it will most likely also not work.
as for a different approach to deal with afkness for hour-based badges: only count playtime of games in which a player somehow proves that he's not afk, like improve your score at least once every 3 minutes, or something else that's super easy to do even for a rookie.
Of course but it'll be a minority, and who cares ? There isn't a lot of new players.
Plus it's the easier way to quickly evaluate the skill of a player. We see how ns2stat is inaccurate. This a FPS and RTS game, the skill of a player is overdependent to your team, your upgrade, your com ect.
And even if we have a new ELO system, this could lead to more stack : stack = easy win = farming = more point
This'll be a badge to avoid stack and encourage new player to play more, we don't want a badge to show "look how good i am with my 1200+ skills points". ENSL seasons and playoffs is your ranked system
Yes it would take a bit of work to figure the best route for something like this, but this would be one way to reward players that stick around and put the hours/rounds into NS2.
- Helping develop the game (playtest, maptest, squad5,...)
- Buying stuff (conestellation, reinforced, championship)
- Unlockable by playing (commander)
I meant the first two types.
Not sure if I like this idea of colored icons to begin with. Athough it likely would be great for captains mode as if you didn't know the capacity of the player you would at least know the amount of hours played which would give you an idea of who to pick. Neat tip would be to having a moving cap for the highest played icon, ie 1% of the active player base has 1000 hours played, everybody beyond that gets one icon, instead of doing an icon for say 1000, 2000, 3000, 4000 or anything inbetween. After six months lets say 1% of the player base now has 1500 hours played, they get the same icon but now to qualify for it you have to hit that mark. This might be too esoteric for this size of game/playerbase though, it could go in the other direction too if 1% of the most played people have 800 hours played that becomes the top of the line icon that used to go to the 1000 or more players.
With such a high skill ceiling and competitive players appearing on public servers, hours really don't tell the true story, someone can be owning pretty hard then along comes someone else who is just in a different league - so now the other team is 'stacked' (by one player, lol) and suddenly all your hours mean nothing as you are essentially learning from zero again against whatever NS2 god happened to drop by today ...