Assist kills and res
Racer1
Join Date: 2002-11-22 Member: 9615Members
Join Date: 2002-11-22 Member: 9615Members
<div class="IPBDescription">How should it work?</div>Say a marine pops into a room with two skulks and a gorge. The marine takes 75% of damage from skulk 1, and another 25% from skulk 2. Skulk 1 dies and skulk 2 then makes the kill. All along, the gorge is heal spraying the skulks, but never actually damages the marine.
Should skulk 1 and/or the gorge be given an assist kill? Also, how should the kill res be distributed?
- The simplest thing to do would be to give a percentage to the one who makes the kill, and distribute the rest evenly to any teammate in the area at the time the kill was made. Teammates who died recently in the area could also get a cut. Anyone else who got res would be given an assist kill.
- An alternative method would be to record how much damage was given by which aliens, and distribute res accordingly. This means gorges would have a hard time getting res since they can't deal a great amount of damage. Gorge-built towers could be used to offset this.
Should skulk 1 and/or the gorge be given an assist kill? Also, how should the kill res be distributed?
- The simplest thing to do would be to give a percentage to the one who makes the kill, and distribute the rest evenly to any teammate in the area at the time the kill was made. Teammates who died recently in the area could also get a cut. Anyone else who got res would be given an assist kill.
- An alternative method would be to record how much damage was given by which aliens, and distribute res accordingly. This means gorges would have a hard time getting res since they can't deal a great amount of damage. Gorge-built towers could be used to offset this.
Comments
The problem is that with rfh (res for heal), the overall game will be an unsteady state system, there'll be generation - effectively, teams will gain res from thin air. If you kill someone or something from the enemy team, you are effectively claiming that 'mass' or whatever, and it is both logical and well-balanced to gain res for it.
Taking a cut of the rfk due to combat effectiveness on the other hand would be okay. So if you take into account "combat effectiveness", i.e. a true contribution, rather than only %damagedealt being the modifier, you'd also somehow take into account assists and that would change the modifier, and the %rfk all participants would gain. It'd all depend on how you calculate contributions, and it's probably more complicated than games should be.
The thing with this, is that you'd probably have to scale this particular resource up. So for example, all things cost 10x more and give 10x more (rfk) - that way you don't end up with the gorge heal with the lowest contribution getting 0 rfk, rounded down from 0.9 rfk. Or rather than scaling everything up, you could have a single decimal place.
Or you could keep things simple and just leave it as it is, with only the killer gaining the RFK. It's intuitive, at least. Killstealers are just a fact of life, I guess.
Or another idea which would still be simple but have RFK distributed... have %RFK related directly to assists. Let's say that the minimum the killer gets is 50% of the RFK, and the rest is distributed to anyone who got an assist for that kill depending on their contribution - the other skulk who dealt damage, and the gorge who healed them. The killer should probably gain a greater % of RFK if there are less contributors, though. It's still a little unwieldy though, calculating contributions. :/
Actually, I guess you could have it like this...
%RFK = A%*[kill:{0,1}] + B%/[number of contributors:{1,2,...}]
E.g. A=50%, B=50%, so with 3 contributors, the killer gets 66%, and the other 'assisters' get 17% each.
Yeah, I think I like this distribution best. A and B can be tweaked however, but I like 50/50.
There are way too many "ors" in my post...
Killer gets most of the points, assister gets some for helping out.
See TF2.
Killer gets most of the points, assister gets some for helping out.
See TF2.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I thought TF2 gave assists for anybody that helped out.
Do we have to design strategy side of the game so that it motivates self centered players that don't co-operate unless you set them a directly beneficial boon? I'd much rather have the teamwork in a setting where people genuinely enjoy doing it and do it without necessarily having some kind of completely individualistic motivation for it. The artificial reward systems can create a slight illusion of teamwork, but it usually doesn't manage to form any kind of spirit of co-operation any further.
I'd always like to see these things considered from a more strategical viewpoint. What kind of RFK distribution would create interesting and challenging aspects to the unforced teamwork? Usually I tend to think that grouping up should be a big enough advantage as its own, there's no need to give out extra RFK just because there were more players involved. If the grouping up for some reason needs extra reward, group RFK seems like a possiblity.
Do we have to design strategy side of the game so that it motivates self centered players that don't co-operate unless you set them a directly beneficial boon? I'd much rather have the teamwork in a setting where people genuinely enjoy doing it and do it without necessarily having some kind of completely individualistic motivation for it. The artificial reward systems can create a slight illusion of teamwork, but it usually doesn't manage to form any kind of spirit of co-operation any further.
I'd always like to see these things considered from a more strategical viewpoint. What kind of RFK distribution would create interesting and challenging aspects to the unforced teamwork? Usually I tend to think that grouping up should be a big enough advantage as its own, there's no need to give out extra RFK just because there were more players involved. If the grouping up for some reason needs extra reward, group RFK seems like a possiblity.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You can either rewrite all humans on the planet to be naturally cooperative and thoughtful indiivduals, or you can throw candy at them to get them to do things, which is easier?
We shouldnt care, we should do the one that makes the game better and it isnt the latter.
By your analogy: Throwing candy costs money, isn't good for anyone's health in the long run and people will still only do things if you throw candy at them. Good luck running a long term business on that.
I know my viewpoints are somewhat utopian sometimes, but I don't want this kind of artificial rewarding to be the basic response and starting point. It may be a necessary trick and final solution, but I'd like to see the downsides at least discussed and people trying to find some kind of middle ground instead of going directly to the point where everything needs to be perfectly agreeable for everyone.
I think it has a few thresholds (one pistol bullet 10 seconds ago won't net you an assist), and the kill notification of who killed and assisted only picks out one assister.
I haven't watched closely enough to see if you can get 5 assists off 1 kill. Someone confirm?
Distributed RFK isn't designed to promote/discourage teamwork. It simply attempts more fairly distribute res based on the situation. So, if a single player takes out 3 enemies, he would get all of the res. Alternately, if three teammates take out one enemy, giving all the res to one player is obviously unfair -- so we try to distribute it to the others as fairly as we can, without getting to complex. Its not perfect, but its better.
Except you can't actually do one of them, the question was rhetorical.
<i>Practically speaking,</i> either you can continue to wish that people would naturally be inclined to work together, which some people simply aren't and have no interest in, or you can hand out prizes for doing useful cooperative things, thus making more people more helpful in more games, which sounds pretty much like improving the game to me.
Given the choice between someone who is going to join the game for five minutes, not be helpful, get nothing out of the game, and then leave, and someone who is going to join, realise they get cool stuff for welding me (thus making my experience better because I stay alive longer) and maybe stay and populate the servers for a while longer, I will choose the second one.
I don't give a buggery why you do something as long as you do it, prizes for helping can only go so far, but the small distance they can go can make a very big difference in practice.
There is nothing which precludes people who are already inclined to work together from doing so in a system which rewards you for doing so, the only thing you lose is perhaps a sense of smug superiority becuase you're the only person who is helpful, and maybe you'll feel undervalued if all the other people are being helpful too, and only people with pure altruistic intentions deserve to be noted/rewarded for being helpful.
Personally I have no time for it, more helpful people = better, why they are helpful is irrelevant.
Why is it better? Right now the only clearly beneficial value I see for it in the gameplay is how it creates diversion in the timings and thus creates variable decisions and possibly rewards teams that are able to direct frags to certain players. The less diverse the RFK sharing gets, the less valuable the whole feature becomes. Also, it gets kinda messy if everyone involved gets fractions of a single res point or a single kill can provide 5+ res just because there are more people involved.
There may be good alternative and fair solutions and it's not the end of the world in any way, but I think I was a little bothered how nobody even considered if there were some downsides in the new systems.
I've allways thought that was a flawed system tho.
I'm all for the advancement of my team mates etc. but if I've been gnawing at a Heavy Marine for some time til he's near death and along comes one of my dear lucky team mates and makes the final swipe killing said marine, well then I feel like I'm entitled to some of that res for the kill me having done all the work.
Easiest way would be for the game to detect how much damage you've dealt to a combatant and if that marine dies within a certain timeframe since your last damage on him you'll get your fair share of the res. If you die before the marine has died then you shouldn't get any res because lets face it, you failed. But if you're still alive and the marine dies in time you are alotted your res.
I'm all for the advancement of my team mates etc. but if I've been gnawing at a Heavy Marine for some time til he's near death and along comes one of my dear lucky team mates and makes the final swipe killing said marine, well then I feel like I'm entitled to some of that res for the kill me having done all the work.
Easiest way would be for the game to detect how much damage you've dealt to a combatant and if that marine dies within a certain timeframe since your last damage on him you'll get your fair share of the res. If you die before the marine has died then you shouldn't get any res because lets face it, you failed. But if you're still alive and the marine dies in time you are alotted your res.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I like the idea that a "free kill" could be left for one play as part of the team play, res is obviously more valuable on certain roles. Illusion called "frag steal" is going to be present always however instead of number in the score board, people should look how the frags effect gameplay on large scale.
I dont see point in rewarding failure, both alien and marine gameplay should instead be positioning, timing and coordination. My point is that shared rfk encourages people rushing for the 1 bite instead of decoying (harden to shoot) and aiming for bigger reward which is successful ambush.
Actually, that makes me realize, the easiest remedy (which I don't think it needs a fix since) would be to let players drop their guns for other players. A team of 15 shotguns is better than one guy who can buy a shotgun over 15 lives. Like I said, I don't think it needs a fix. Plus, if this community has shown me anything, it's that a good portion don't even care about kills, so an assist system still screws them over.
I respectfully disagree there. Proportional doling out of res based on % damage dealt can get a little computationally sticky. Simplifying the model a bit whether via thresholds or the binary kill+1 assist model would be better in my mind.
Plus, TrC brings up a good point that maybe some people would intentionally let someone get the killing blow. I do this all the time in DotA. This might be walking into edge-case territory since it can be hard in a FPS game to track how much hp is left for the kill and coordinating who gets it.
I do agree that there has to be a timeframe - especially when you consider that people can heal in this game.
Bacillus: It's more like conditioning people to be team players by giving them direct incentives other than long-term incentives. Kinda like getting a kid to brush his teeth. He doesn't see the long term benefit of having clean white teeth and fresh breath (the win), he just sees the chore that he has to do in brushing his teeth (healspray), but if you give him a, say monetary, reward (a portion of RFK) then he's more than happy to. Eventually it'll just become a good habit/routine, and people will learn to value winning and appreciate the beneficial effect that being a team player has on winning. (Who's being utopian in their world-view now?)
A pretty common scenario like this for instance. Someone takes down an enemy to like 10%, then the Medic+>insert class here< comes in they both take your kill. Compared to for example, Onos+Gorge healer steals kills from a Fade which takes someone down to 10% (no res for Fade)
I dunno, I think Return to Castle Wolvenstein used a good point system, might be usable as a res dispenser. I think it was percentage based. Still has that thing where you get res for healing people though, which could be abused somehow...
Ok, this isn't a platformer game, so I don't expect (or necessarily want) this to be in the base game. However, it would be fun to try as a mod.
Ok, this isn't a platformer game, so I don't expect (or necessarily want) this to be in the base game. However, it would be fun to try as a mod.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Or, to make it less crash bandicootish (sounds dirty,) maybe a stand over the body and BODY HARVEST. Maybe I just like the term body harvest.
<!--quoteo(post=1797963:date=Sep 8 2010, 01:14 PM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Sep 8 2010, 01:14 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1797963"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->spellman23: So, exactly the same ###### as what I said, really. Just with one (only) assister (that's the only difference). The thing is, I was just under the impression that in modern games more than one person can get assists on a kill. Won't some people feel they've been shafted?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--quoteo(post=1797970:date=Sep 8 2010, 01:32 PM:name=Kouji_San)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Kouji_San @ Sep 8 2010, 01:32 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1797970"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->TF2 (with one main and one assist kill), the Medic+>insert class here< does steal a lot of kills from others.
A pretty common scenario like this for instance. Someone takes down an enemy to like 10%, then the Medic+>insert class here< comes in they both take your kill. Compared to for example, Onos+Gorge healer steals kills from a Fade which takes someone down to 10% (no res for Fade)<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Geez Harimau, no need for filtered words. Yes, I like a one assister only system. It makes computation easy and simple.
Kouji I think brings up the biggest problem that I'm sure we all know about from TF2. Granted, I don't think this will happen as much in NS2 since it's hard to constantly be healing someone while they get the kill in NS due to being in melee, but in general how do we factor in healing into the assist system? Gorges want res too!!!!
My proposed system is barely more complicated though, but allows for multiple assisters.
<!--quoteo(post=1797093:date=Sep 1 2010, 09:14 PM:name=Harimau)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Harimau @ Sep 1 2010, 09:14 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1797093"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->%RFK = A%*[kill:{0,1}] + B%/[number of contributors:{1,2,...}]
e.g. A=50%, B=50%, so with 3 contributors, the killer gets 66%, and the other 'assisters' get 17% each.
A and B can be tweaked however, but I like 50/50.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Looks complicated, but the math and logic are easy.
Also, the platformer style pick-up res thing amused me. I'd love to see it in a mod. While you're at it, you could have res towers fountain res, and have worker peons gather it up... or players could stand under and take it. Terrible, but awesome.
Throw in some lerk spores and the whole assist business gets both more complex and more necessary - if RFK is important then I'd expect a lot of whining about kill stealing unless assists work. Not quite the atmosphere you want - making sure the big nasty alien dies should be more important than getting the final bit of damage.
Throw in some lerk spores and the whole assist business gets both more complex and more necessary - if RFK is important then I'd expect a lot of whining about kill stealing unless assists work. Not quite the atmosphere you want - making sure the big nasty alien dies should be more important than getting the final bit of damage.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
RFK seems to be part of the game so that individuals, likes Marines, can buy their own guns.
Dunno what the Aliens spend it on yet. We don't have all their tech stuff in our version.
But yeah, RFK is necessary so that individuals can have their own pool from which to draw in order to buy <i>personal</i> upgrades and equipment. It's less micromanagement for the commander, which can be invested in other areas. I don't think it takes a *whole* lot away from the RTS side, maybe it dulls the Rock-Paper-Scissors mechanic, but the field players should personally know how to counter units anyway, so it would just slow the response a little. Although in most cases, they know better because they're the ones fighting on the field, and if they couldn't get their own equipment they'd be telling the commander to give them certain equipment anyway. Or most likely, commander and field marines would both know, and you're just streamlining the process.
The commander could of course ask players to get certain equipment, but the choice would still be up to them. Alternatively, you could provide an incentive to use that equipment, i.e. "free" weapons (paid for by the commander). That's of course a risk that the commander would have to take. Not necessary, though.
it could be done with % of health taken from the enemy.
like call of duty.