Drag the time limit out to at least 8 mins, I'd prefer 10 since unless the game is horribly stacked there's no way it could be over by the 10 min mark, playing on NA servers recently I went through 9 concedes in a row, nearly all around the 5-6 min mark.
There wasn't any rage, most of the concedes were by marines on 2 bases 3-4 extractors, they just decided the game didn't start as well as they wanted it to so it was gg (I was also told Americans love to vote) but it was staggering after playing on AU/JP servers to see multiple games conceded in a row across different servers.
I thought the whole point of the feature was to end games at the 20+ minute mark that are being dragged out by the winning team when the losing team has no chance, they've been stuck on 1 base vs 2-4 base opponents who just aren't ending the game, I've seen it used for everything but.
That dude saying nobody used to quit in NS1, dunno what NS 1 you played but the amount of F4 rage quitting in NS 1 was insane in Australia, servers would shut down when games ended by F4 multiple times in a row and everyone would start leaving frustrated/disgusted, this was a nightly occurrence.
Vote concede is fine, but the actual ending experience probably needs adjusting. My thoughts are
- Show each team how close they are to a successful vote concede
- Change the ending from instant to quickly inevitable (e.g. disabling spawning, stopping res flow, increasing damage taken for team that concedes)
Concede is fine, agree.
Show how each team is close ? No, make your own mind, vote.
Change the ending once concede is voted, I don't think so, once you resigned, it's done. But introducing a random kinda humoristic shame annoucement would be fine.
If you can live 10+ minutes as fade, there is something wrong with the marine team.
And I bet that problem started since minute 1.
Not really, surviving as a fade really just comes down to not biting off more than you can chew. Keep your engagements small and preferably use silence to take them by surprise and you can survive indefinitely.
Pub-Only Mario Kart rules. If a team falls behind in Total Earned TRes by a ratio (arbitrarily let's say 2:1. Non-arbitrarily let's say "The point just before we know by looking at resources the game is over") it will earn a multiplier (let's call this one 2x) on its TRes and all members PRes on every tick until it has pulled within that ratio again. Discuss.
Actual comebacks are pretty rare though. Evenly tied match ups that go on for +30min, until some team makes a critical mistake or decisive move, are not that common as well. The bulk of NS2 pub games are decided within the first 5 min. Sure, you could play on for another 10 to 15 minutes and ultimately get blown away by superior tech/lifeforms, but if it's already painfully obvious the opposing team has far better players, I'd rather concede early, randomize the teams and try again.
2) NS2 has some serious design flaws that make proper comebacks(not talking about WIN button) like sneaky pgs/hivedrops virtually impossible and even normal shifts in map-control/dominace are not very common.
This goes to the point where you can tell the outcome of most games at the 2 or 3 minute mark. So there are multiple reasons why a concede option is a MUST (see 1) )
In my opinion 5 min is already too mcuh of a cooldown. 30 or 40% of all games even could use concede before the game even starts because teams are stacked beyond repair.
So people conceding very early in the game actually are not at all the cause for bad games. They merely are the symptoms of flaws in game design.
I remember NS1 as a game with awesome 4 hour games over and over again. Everyone gave 150% until the end. Comebacks were legendary and the player spirits high. Even losing a round was surprisingly fun. Remember to "lose" a game after 12 mins and still manage to build a whole base into a vent system, hold a single RT for 30 mins, research HAs and HA train rush the alien hives? Yes, turning a lose into a victory was able in many ways back then and even doing a screwed up but funny relocate leading to utter defeat was a challange, something new and fun! We played those rounds and not a single guy would get his annoyingly loud voice out and spam concede demands after the first RT got destroyed. Those games where decided by skill AND fighting spirit. A concede option destroys that spirit and teaches to choose the easy way out. But to be fair:
Well, NS2 is not as fexible as NS1. It is more frustrating when you lose and you lose in the first 5 mins when you do only one or two things wrong. It seems to be a very linear game experience compared to NS1 and the lack of crazy things like rushing a marine base with a Lerk piggybacking a gorge, dropping a hive, using hive teleport to clear that room or lose with a smile on your face etc. makes it boring to lose. Combined with the lack of patience, self dictated timepressure in real life and no ballz of steel - or lets just say - another way of setting priorities in life, people concede. Why not, it is just a game and you can have fun in another round, right?
---> I played on a server where people, everytime the same guys, ended three rounds with concede because all the little lambs voted when the loud voice called for it. In the end I left the server, because I knew I won't get an amazing fight out of these guys or lose with my head up. Give the other team a hard time winning and feeling rewarded for their "work". In short: I am against concede, because it takes away the last bit of fun that was left in NS2, but I understand why people demand it and use it. It is just not the way I play.
I think my future lies in a classic mod in 1-2 years, when only the hardcore nucleus of the community remains. Or when the officials add more stuff and versatility/flexibility into the gameplay (I don't mean different weapons for the Exo by that, who cares if you win by standing in a corner using miniguns or a railgun to shoot everything that moves or not, this game needs the charme of NS1 to interest me for years; only my opinion).
^ Very well said, I miss dearly the days of NS1, the players, the long ass rounds, the funny ENDINGS, etc. However we must remember NS2 is still pretty new, I hope they remove it personally, wouldn't mind trying a few tweaks to concede, but overall I would like to see it removed.
Anyone else notice how the maps are getting a little too big and dark? For example Compare these:
NS1
NS1
with this
NS2
NS2
Enough negativity just wanted to vent a bit, excuse me while I build a love shack, oh shit that's right gorges cant build OC/MC/DC/RT anymore
I have been playing NS2 for 114 hours and have only had ONE maybe 2 games last an hour, I started after concede was implemented. In any event the focus of this thread is how to achieve those games and debate how concede effects game play, without sounding like an ass.
Think of it as ideas, sure you will get the odd one or two that get mad, but the best way to get your thoughts/ideas across are via these forums, and without doing so NS would be a pretty boring game. Has this thread ran its course? I hope a dev does consider what has been said. Thanks for all of your opinions.
You see UWE, you have this problem of rounds being decided way too fast for pub players to react or learn anything. This results in this "pubstomping" which results in marine turtleing or alien egglocking, both very frustrating experiences. That makes players F4.
So what did you do to fix that? In order to "even" the teams, you have this autoteambalance feature that punishes the winning team if the losers give up, dragging out the game even longer and frustrating the winning team as well.
So what did you do to fix that? You added the concede vote, another mechanic on top of it all without reacting to the root of the problem. Now you have rounds being thrown at the first sight of a loss.
What comes next? Time limits, only to see one team give up at 5 minutes and wait it out for another 10 so they can concede?
Adding more stuff will not solve the inherent problems the game has:
Respawntime is too fast -> Zerging on both sides, killing players is almost meaningless.
Aliens spawn in waves, Marines not -> Causes the egglock frustration and making it way too hard to kill a defended hive without arcs (at least in pubs). Causes skulkrushes to be more effective than they should be (when marines would spawn in waves).
The Khammander does not need his team to expand -> The marines are screwed if they dont hinder alien expansion in the first 5 minutes. If marines start to fight over hives/outposts, they are already losing.
The GL is terribly ineffective at killing structures while doing too much damage to lifeforms.
LMG fire rate is too fast, making the weapon very unforgiveable for newbies - they waste all their bullets into the walls and then get picked off when reloading.
Concede vote is way better than F4ing. With concede-voting, players are still in the game playing. With F4, players exit back to the ready room which is a lot less fun for them and for their team.
I remember NS1 as a game with awesome 4 hour games over and over again. Everyone gave 150% until the end. Comebacks were legendary and the player spirits high. Even losing a round was surprisingly fun. Remember to "lose" a game after 12 mins and still manage to build a whole base into a vent system, hold a single RT for 30 mins, research HAs and HA train rush the alien hives? Yes, turning a lose into a victory was able in many ways back then and even doing a screwed up but funny relocate leading to utter defeat was a challange, something new and fun! We played those rounds and not a single guy would get his annoyingly loud voice out and spam concede demands after the first RT got destroyed. Those games where decided by skill AND fighting spirit. A concede option destroys that spirit and teaches to choose the easy way out.
The reasons those epic comebacks *FOR MARINES* happened in NS1 was due primarily to the following:
a) res for kills meaning you really could hold down a single res node and stack up HA/HMG
b) not requiring tech points or power nodes for a CC (so you could hold the best possible camping spot/hardest to attack spot for aliens)
c) not requiring 2 tech points for HA/JP
It's still possible for marines to do epic comebacks in NS2, though this is more rare for the reasons above.
I never saw anything like the same number of comebacks for aliens in either NS1 or NS2. It is SO MUCH EASIER for a dominant marine team to finish aliens off in both NS1 and NS2 than it is for aliens, all other things being equal. The power node and tech point system actually helps aliens finish games a fair bit in NS2, but they do still need some game ending tech updates.
The concede option is a bit frustrating when you're preparing to storm the last hive and win in a blaze of glory as marines, but it's a victory: you've pushed the other team to 'tapping out' - well played. I've not yet seen it used prematurely (others have it seems, but I wonder how prevalent that is?). It's FAR better than F4, which forces long respawns on the winning team which drags the game on longer, or recycling, which is most often just trolling by 1 fed up marine. Concede is a good thing to have available.
I would like to see some mechanism by which comebacks can occur more easily when the balance of power is still shifting in a game - ie don't have such a predictable slippery slope, which is the least fun for aliens but still not great for marines when it happens. To counter this, I would like to see a dominant team get REAL game ending tech when their opponents are down to 1 tech point and they hold at least 3.
Great feature, I hate wasting my time on games that are already lost and just drag on for another 20 minutes. This way comms dont have to sell the IPs anymore or people ragequit or just F4. I totally support it.
Marines cant really come back so it needs to be in.
Even on aliens where comebacks are possible due to power nodes, gorge bile rushes being dirt cheap and marine base vulnerability to a single lifeform i'd rather concede because a victory from way behind feels cheap.
DC_DarklingJoin Date: 2003-07-10Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
concede is the best option at the moment for a team which really does not want to continue, while still giving the other team some time to finish it. (as most of the time, not everyone concedes at once)
Concede has spoilt NS2 for me. It was bad enough with all the players going f4 and comms recycling everything because "they" thought the game was over regardless how the rest of their team felt about it. I have never known people giving up so easily in any other game.
I play an hour or two per night and can count on one hand how many games have been played through to their natural conclusion since concede was introduced. It annoys me as either team and whether we are winning or losing. I have had some great games where we lost. So what if you do. We play for fun yes? Or just for the win to boost our egos? I hope your answer is fun or what is the point of playing games in the first place?! I see people shouting, raging and hurling abuse and giving up over a bunch of pixels on a monitor. Its meant to be entertainment.
During the hours I have played NS2 I have seen some long epic fights with amazing comebacks for both teams but fear those are a thing of the past as people are giving up too easily. Played a game through the week where our comm insisted we concede because at the 4 minute mark we "only" had 4 RTs and didn't have a second CC. I played a game where at about the 8 minute mark someone said "Fade in Data Core, we might as well concede". And they did. Even though marines had 2 CCs and over half the map in our control.
UW have made an amazing game in NS2. Its a shame that since concede was put in, most new players will never get to see or play as Onos or Exo or any of the later game stuff as games don't often last more than ten minutes these days if that. And they certainly wont get in the practise as higher life forms or Marines as the games never last long enough so new players especially will never get better.
I play 5-a-side football every Saturday morning. We play for an hour sometimes more. Sometimes one team runs away with it and after even 30 minutes or less it seems that the game is lost or won. But I have never never seen a day where one team just stops playing or walks off in a rage because they are losing at any point in the game. That is because we play for fun and always to the natural end of the game. Why cant we do this in NS2, win or lose? And yes, often the team miles behind start scoring goals and sometimes end up winning. That certainly would never happen if one team just gave up and left.
Solutions?
Personally I would take concede out and the option to f4 to make players play to the end as it should be. I would also programme the game so that important builds for the marines like IPs cannot be sold to stop comms dictating to me when I should stop playing. I have always said that if you are not having fun then don't play. Same goes with anything surely?
At least make the point at which the option to concede is longer. Say 20-30 minutes and stop the marine comm recycling important builds as not only is that not democratic but its also open to abuse.
In the past weeks after vote concede was added, about 75% of the games I have played have ended with concede. I cannot express how frustrating this is to me. People just hate to lose. It's one thing to concede if a team is just messing with you and you want to get to the next game, but games never get to that point anyways because of it. I do not understand the point of adding concede into the game when there was already f4'ing. Was it to encourage players not to ragequit? Because quite honestly I would rather have the players who concede EVERY GAME to just leave the server. You win some, you lose some, but that is not the point of the game. I think vote concede just needs to be taken out. If a round wants to be ended, simply F4 or let the game end. This function has not improved my experience a bit, and has actually quite degraded it. I want to be able to play full games again.
Your analogy to your Saturday football games is misplaced.
When you concede a game of NS2, you don't "stop playing" or "walk off in a rage". You keep on playing, you just do it by immediately starting a new game. Conceding a game is a way to make more of your gameplay time meaningful and enjoyable, not a way to reduce your gameplay time.
Because it's more fun to play when the outcome is uncertain than when it's no longer a contest.
Concede has spoilt NS2 for me. It was bad enough with all the players going f4 and comms recycling everything because "they" thought the game was over regardless how the rest of their team felt about it. I have never known people giving up so easily in any other game.
I play an hour or two per night and can count on one hand how many games have been played through to their natural conclusion since concede was introduced. It annoys me as either team and whether we are winning or losing. I have had some great games where we lost. So what if you do. We play for fun yes? Or just for the win to boost our egos? I hope your answer is fun or what is the point of playing games in the first place?! I see people shouting, raging and hurling abuse and giving up over a bunch of pixels on a monitor. Its meant to be entertainment.
During the hours I have played NS2 I have seen some long epic fights with amazing comebacks for both teams but fear those are a thing of the past as people are giving up too easily. Played a game through the week where our comm insisted we concede because at the 4 minute mark we "only" had 4 RTs and didn't have a second CC. I played a game where at about the 8 minute mark someone said "Fade in Data Core, we might as well concede". And they did. Even though marines had 2 CCs and over half the map in our control.
UW have made an amazing game in NS2. Its a shame that since concede was put in, most new players will never get to see or play as Onos or Exo or any of the later game stuff as games don't often last more than ten minutes these days if that. And they certainly wont get in the practise as higher life forms or Marines as the games never last long enough so new players especially will never get better.
I play 5-a-side football every Saturday morning. We play for an hour sometimes more. Sometimes one team runs away with it and after even 30 minutes or less it seems that the game is lost or won. But I have never never seen a day where one team just stops playing or walks off in a rage because they are losing at any point in the game. That is because we play for fun and always to the natural end of the game. Why cant we do this in NS2, win or lose? And yes, often the team miles behind start scoring goals and sometimes end up winning. That certainly would never happen if one team just gave up and left.
Solutions?
Personally I would take concede out and the option to f4 to make players play to the end as it should be. I would also programme the game so that important builds for the marines like IPs cannot be sold to stop comms dictating to me when I should stop playing. I have always said that if you are not having fun then don't play. Same goes with anything surely?
At least make the point at which the option to concede is longer. Say 20-30 minutes and stop the marine comm recycling important builds as not only is that not democratic but its also open to abuse.
Sal
It's not always fun fighting to the last minute. If your teams just getting stomped around the map but the other team won't finish it the concede makes a lot of sense. If your hold up in one room but the other team aren't good enough to deal the final blow, but you can't leave the room concede makes a lot of sense. Also even if your still having fun if you concede quickly once the game is pretty much lost you can start up a new game and possibly have more fun that you would of done in the losing game.
Football is a bad example to compare to. The chance of your team scoring a goal is pretty consistent through out the game. In NS2 your chance of doing anything useful starts to drop as your team loses. At the end of a football match the losers can still score, at the end of an NS2 match the losers are being cooped up into one room and being insta gibbed as they try to get out.
Concede is not a problem, its how its used in the game, i think it should only become available after a certain event in the game, like aliens get 3rd hive for x amount of time, or aliens go down to 1 hive after x amount of time etc there for if there is an epic ending or comeback for either side it can happen, and players wont vote concede right away,
Or take it out and go back to NS1 style of F4'ing/ Recycle to IPs
If you can live 10+ minutes as fade, there is something wrong with the marine team.
And I bet that problem started since minute 1.
Not really, surviving as a fade really just comes down to not biting off more than you can chew. Keep your engagements small and preferably use silence to take them by surprise and you can survive indefinitely.
but that's exactly the point I'm trying to make here, if marines get demolished early game, they don't have the means to kill a decent fade in mid game, he can probably 1v3 and win.
On the other hand, if they have like a1/w3 and shotguns, if the fade screws up his movement, he's dead.
Concede is not a problem, its how its used in the game, i think it should only become available after a certain event in the game, like aliens get 3rd hive for x amount of time, or aliens go down to 1 hive after x amount of time etc there for if there is an epic ending or comeback for either side it can happen, and players wont vote concede right away,
Or take it out and go back to NS1 style of F4'ing/ Recycle to IPs
Concede has spoilt NS2 for me. It was bad enough with all the players going f4 and comms recycling everything because "they" thought the game was over regardless how the rest of their team felt about it. I have never known people giving up so easily in any other game.
I play an hour or two per night and can count on one hand how many games have been played through to their natural conclusion since concede was introduced. It annoys me as either team and whether we are winning or losing. I have had some great games where we lost. So what if you do. We play for fun yes? Or just for the win to boost our egos? I hope your answer is fun or what is the point of playing games in the first place?! I see people shouting, raging and hurling abuse and giving up over a bunch of pixels on a monitor. Its meant to be entertainment.
During the hours I have played NS2 I have seen some long epic fights with amazing comebacks for both teams but fear those are a thing of the past as people are giving up too easily. Played a game through the week where our comm insisted we concede because at the 4 minute mark we "only" had 4 RTs and didn't have a second CC. I played a game where at about the 8 minute mark someone said "Fade in Data Core, we might as well concede". And they did. Even though marines had 2 CCs and over half the map in our control.
UW have made an amazing game in NS2. Its a shame that since concede was put in, most new players will never get to see or play as Onos or Exo or any of the later game stuff as games don't often last more than ten minutes these days if that. And they certainly wont get in the practise as higher life forms or Marines as the games never last long enough so new players especially will never get better.
I play 5-a-side football every Saturday morning. We play for an hour sometimes more. Sometimes one team runs away with it and after even 30 minutes or less it seems that the game is lost or won. But I have never never seen a day where one team just stops playing or walks off in a rage because they are losing at any point in the game. That is because we play for fun and always to the natural end of the game. Why cant we do this in NS2, win or lose? And yes, often the team miles behind start scoring goals and sometimes end up winning. That certainly would never happen if one team just gave up and left.
Solutions?
Personally I would take concede out and the option to f4 to make players play to the end as it should be. I would also programme the game so that important builds for the marines like IPs cannot be sold to stop comms dictating to me when I should stop playing. I have always said that if you are not having fun then don't play. Same goes with anything surely?
At least make the point at which the option to concede is longer. Say 20-30 minutes and stop the marine comm recycling important builds as not only is that not democratic but its also open to abuse.
Sal
It's not always fun fighting to the last minute. If your teams just getting stomped around the map but the other team won't finish it the concede makes a lot of sense. If your hold up in one room but the other team aren't good enough to deal the final blow, but you can't leave the room concede makes a lot of sense. Also even if your still having fun if you concede quickly once the game is pretty much lost you can start up a new game and possibly have more fun that you would of done in the losing game.
Football is a bad example to compare to. The chance of your team scoring a goal is pretty consistent through out the game. In NS2 your chance of doing anything useful starts to drop as your team loses. At the end of a football match the losers can still score, at the end of an NS2 match the losers are being cooped up into one room and being insta gibbed as they try to get out.
Well you simply cant win every game. If people only play to win then they are missing the point of games which is to have fun regardless.
My football example was simply just that....an example. If people gave up on everything so easily well nothing would be achieved in their lives. And I was talking about 5-a-side football where games teams dont finish like 3-2 in 11 a side. Its a high scoring smaller scale game where games often finish for eg: 36-29. I have played games where one team is being beaten by 20 or more goals but dont just walk off in a rage because they are losing.
It's shocking, because I know there are some pretty intelligent people on these forums. The fact that something like this has had this many comments is a bit sad.
In a nutshell, what you guys are discusssing is a feature that WE as PLAYERS control. It's not like the game forces concede on a team, the players do that. If there truly are enough people that agree with it being a bad feature, it would not be used. If it is being used, then obviously more people do not agree, accept it and move on with your life.
And yes, I know there are those people that are going to throw in the towel at the first sign. Nothing you say is going to change that except you and a few other resourceful people showing them that comebacks are possible. But even then, there are always going to be those types of people. It's a fact of life, deal with it.
Yeah it is player controlled, the feature doesn't bother me, players do, that can't be changed obviously, but it's a thread for DISCUSSION about concede, and imo, sometimes it sucks. Still a good feature though.
No, let's be more honest about this, it's a thread to bitch about the feature while overlooking the fact that it's completely player controlled.
Comments
And I bet that problem started since minute 1.
Or the hit reg.
There wasn't any rage, most of the concedes were by marines on 2 bases 3-4 extractors, they just decided the game didn't start as well as they wanted it to so it was gg (I was also told Americans love to vote) but it was staggering after playing on AU/JP servers to see multiple games conceded in a row across different servers.
I thought the whole point of the feature was to end games at the 20+ minute mark that are being dragged out by the winning team when the losing team has no chance, they've been stuck on 1 base vs 2-4 base opponents who just aren't ending the game, I've seen it used for everything but.
That dude saying nobody used to quit in NS1, dunno what NS 1 you played but the amount of F4 rage quitting in NS 1 was insane in Australia, servers would shut down when games ended by F4 multiple times in a row and everyone would start leaving frustrated/disgusted, this was a nightly occurrence.
Concede is fine, agree.
Show how each team is close ? No, make your own mind, vote.
Change the ending once concede is voted, I don't think so, once you resigned, it's done. But introducing a random kinda humoristic shame annoucement would be fine.
Not really, surviving as a fade really just comes down to not biting off more than you can chew. Keep your engagements small and preferably use silence to take them by surprise and you can survive indefinitely.
/orwecouldaddblueshells
2) NS2 has some serious design flaws that make proper comebacks(not talking about WIN button) like sneaky pgs/hivedrops virtually impossible and even normal shifts in map-control/dominace are not very common.
This goes to the point where you can tell the outcome of most games at the 2 or 3 minute mark. So there are multiple reasons why a concede option is a MUST (see 1) )
In my opinion 5 min is already too mcuh of a cooldown. 30 or 40% of all games even could use concede before the game even starts because teams are stacked beyond repair.
So people conceding very early in the game actually are not at all the cause for bad games. They merely are the symptoms of flaws in game design.
the function is completely redundant.
Well, NS2 is not as fexible as NS1. It is more frustrating when you lose and you lose in the first 5 mins when you do only one or two things wrong. It seems to be a very linear game experience compared to NS1 and the lack of crazy things like rushing a marine base with a Lerk piggybacking a gorge, dropping a hive, using hive teleport to clear that room or lose with a smile on your face etc. makes it boring to lose. Combined with the lack of patience, self dictated timepressure in real life and no ballz of steel - or lets just say - another way of setting priorities in life, people concede. Why not, it is just a game and you can have fun in another round, right?
---> I played on a server where people, everytime the same guys, ended three rounds with concede because all the little lambs voted when the loud voice called for it. In the end I left the server, because I knew I won't get an amazing fight out of these guys or lose with my head up. Give the other team a hard time winning and feeling rewarded for their "work". In short: I am against concede, because it takes away the last bit of fun that was left in NS2, but I understand why people demand it and use it. It is just not the way I play.
I think my future lies in a classic mod in 1-2 years, when only the hardcore nucleus of the community remains. Or when the officials add more stuff and versatility/flexibility into the gameplay (I don't mean different weapons for the Exo by that, who cares if you win by standing in a corner using miniguns or a railgun to shoot everything that moves or not, this game needs the charme of NS1 to interest me for years; only my opinion).
Anyone else notice how the maps are getting a little too big and dark? For example Compare these:
NS1
NS1
with this
NS2
NS2
Enough negativity just wanted to vent a bit, excuse me while I build a love shack, oh shit that's right gorges cant build OC/MC/DC/RT anymore
You know that these games did not exist in NS2 before concede right?
The reasons those epic comebacks *FOR MARINES* happened in NS1 was due primarily to the following:
a) res for kills meaning you really could hold down a single res node and stack up HA/HMG
b) not requiring tech points or power nodes for a CC (so you could hold the best possible camping spot/hardest to attack spot for aliens)
c) not requiring 2 tech points for HA/JP
It's still possible for marines to do epic comebacks in NS2, though this is more rare for the reasons above.
I never saw anything like the same number of comebacks for aliens in either NS1 or NS2. It is SO MUCH EASIER for a dominant marine team to finish aliens off in both NS1 and NS2 than it is for aliens, all other things being equal. The power node and tech point system actually helps aliens finish games a fair bit in NS2, but they do still need some game ending tech updates.
The concede option is a bit frustrating when you're preparing to storm the last hive and win in a blaze of glory as marines, but it's a victory: you've pushed the other team to 'tapping out' - well played. I've not yet seen it used prematurely (others have it seems, but I wonder how prevalent that is?). It's FAR better than F4, which forces long respawns on the winning team which drags the game on longer, or recycling, which is most often just trolling by 1 fed up marine. Concede is a good thing to have available.
I would like to see some mechanism by which comebacks can occur more easily when the balance of power is still shifting in a game - ie don't have such a predictable slippery slope, which is the least fun for aliens but still not great for marines when it happens. To counter this, I would like to see a dominant team get REAL game ending tech when their opponents are down to 1 tech point and they hold at least 3.
Roo
Even on aliens where comebacks are possible due to power nodes, gorge bile rushes being dirt cheap and marine base vulnerability to a single lifeform i'd rather concede because a victory from way behind feels cheap.
I play an hour or two per night and can count on one hand how many games have been played through to their natural conclusion since concede was introduced. It annoys me as either team and whether we are winning or losing. I have had some great games where we lost. So what if you do. We play for fun yes? Or just for the win to boost our egos? I hope your answer is fun or what is the point of playing games in the first place?! I see people shouting, raging and hurling abuse and giving up over a bunch of pixels on a monitor. Its meant to be entertainment.
During the hours I have played NS2 I have seen some long epic fights with amazing comebacks for both teams but fear those are a thing of the past as people are giving up too easily. Played a game through the week where our comm insisted we concede because at the 4 minute mark we "only" had 4 RTs and didn't have a second CC. I played a game where at about the 8 minute mark someone said "Fade in Data Core, we might as well concede". And they did. Even though marines had 2 CCs and over half the map in our control.
UW have made an amazing game in NS2. Its a shame that since concede was put in, most new players will never get to see or play as Onos or Exo or any of the later game stuff as games don't often last more than ten minutes these days if that. And they certainly wont get in the practise as higher life forms or Marines as the games never last long enough so new players especially will never get better.
I play 5-a-side football every Saturday morning. We play for an hour sometimes more. Sometimes one team runs away with it and after even 30 minutes or less it seems that the game is lost or won. But I have never never seen a day where one team just stops playing or walks off in a rage because they are losing at any point in the game. That is because we play for fun and always to the natural end of the game. Why cant we do this in NS2, win or lose? And yes, often the team miles behind start scoring goals and sometimes end up winning. That certainly would never happen if one team just gave up and left.
Solutions?
Personally I would take concede out and the option to f4 to make players play to the end as it should be. I would also programme the game so that important builds for the marines like IPs cannot be sold to stop comms dictating to me when I should stop playing. I have always said that if you are not having fun then don't play. Same goes with anything surely?
At least make the point at which the option to concede is longer. Say 20-30 minutes and stop the marine comm recycling important builds as not only is that not democratic but its also open to abuse.
Sal
When you concede a game of NS2, you don't "stop playing" or "walk off in a rage". You keep on playing, you just do it by immediately starting a new game. Conceding a game is a way to make more of your gameplay time meaningful and enjoyable, not a way to reduce your gameplay time.
Because it's more fun to play when the outcome is uncertain than when it's no longer a contest.
It's not always fun fighting to the last minute. If your teams just getting stomped around the map but the other team won't finish it the concede makes a lot of sense. If your hold up in one room but the other team aren't good enough to deal the final blow, but you can't leave the room concede makes a lot of sense. Also even if your still having fun if you concede quickly once the game is pretty much lost you can start up a new game and possibly have more fun that you would of done in the losing game.
Football is a bad example to compare to. The chance of your team scoring a goal is pretty consistent through out the game. In NS2 your chance of doing anything useful starts to drop as your team loses. At the end of a football match the losers can still score, at the end of an NS2 match the losers are being cooped up into one room and being insta gibbed as they try to get out.
Or take it out and go back to NS1 style of F4'ing/ Recycle to IPs
but that's exactly the point I'm trying to make here, if marines get demolished early game, they don't have the means to kill a decent fade in mid game, he can probably 1v3 and win.
On the other hand, if they have like a1/w3 and shotguns, if the fade screws up his movement, he's dead.
Well you simply cant win every game. If people only play to win then they are missing the point of games which is to have fun regardless.
My football example was simply just that....an example. If people gave up on everything so easily well nothing would be achieved in their lives. And I was talking about 5-a-side football where games teams dont finish like 3-2 in 11 a side. Its a high scoring smaller scale game where games often finish for eg: 36-29. I have played games where one team is being beaten by 20 or more goals but dont just walk off in a rage because they are losing.
Sal
No, let's be more honest about this, it's a thread to bitch about the feature while overlooking the fact that it's completely player controlled.