No point arguing with an Be polite. -Talesin
I'd just like some minor changes put in so that new players can experience the intended game size and experience. As mentioned by someone else, it's quite easy for people to stumble into 24 player servers and leave with a foul taste or no desire to come back. Nobody is taking away your zerg mode but it would be nice for it to be known as something that is not default.
Be polite. -Talesin
Ok, I'll continue being the Be polite. -Talesin who has firsthand knowledge on the subject matter, along with running one of the most popular 24 player servers in the game.
A mate who I refused to join in there told me tick rate was under 15 unsurprisingly.
I want the 20+ slot servers classed as modified for performance reasons as much as game play.
Many of them do not run very well and it's a pretty bad introduction to a new player. They will probably blame their hardware and then rage about system requirements in here...
Larger servers are the best place for a new person to start. In anyone's first couple games they are likely to be worse than worthless, on a larger server that is more likely to go unnoticed. Smaller servers lead to rookies getting yelled at more, which is by far the worse experience for them.
The less skilled a player is, the larger the server they should generally favor. Not simply to be carried but so that they can rely on teamplay and or brute force over personal skill which they don't have.
Also I'd like to point out that the game is more balanced at higher playercounts. Marines benefit more strongly from having more players and therefor the win rates become more even.
On the topic of server performance, player count is actually a fairly minor concern. Most server issues basically stem from buildings one way or another, and while more players certainly doesn't help matters a good 80% of the "problem" is the same regardless.
All excellent points. Only when the entity count on my server starts approaching that 1,500 limit does it even begin to hiccup. And from the graphs I've posted, that doesn't happen as frequently as people would think. I think there were 3 sub-20 tickrate drops not related to map changes/round endings over a 12 hour period.
TalesinOur own little well of hateJoin Date: 2002-11-08Member: 7710NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators
Okay, spent a bit of time cleaning this up as I do believe that the discussion can continue in a civil manner.
That said, if people go back to personal insults again for any reason, they should consider themselves already warned.
Now, my own thoughts on the original matter. 24-player servers swing the balance of the game significantly in the favor of the Marines.
While easier for newbies, it also does not prepare them for the dev-intended gameplay, or going into a 16-slot server. While it's fine for an intro-to-the-game type of scenario, it's the same reason many people disliked Combat mode for the original NS; there were a number who stuck with it as it required next to zero teamplay or coordination, and dumbed down the game enough to appeal to the CS-chugging masses. It was meant as a time-waster on an almost-empty server, to prevent 3v3 rolls.
Unfortunately, it was carried forward from almost a tutorial into a full game-mode; it stopped being a bootstrap, and turned into essentially the same charlie-foxtrot noted above. Because it incorporated very few/none of the deeper strategic elements, it resulted in a divide, rather than being a stepping stone to the full, actual game. Thankfully, larger servers don't contribute to this as directly.
As we go forward and balance is established, last I'd heard the initial point was going to be aimed at a 16-slot, with alterations made from there to bring larger and smaller servers into line.
Could a game like NS2, which is asymmetric in such a fundamental way (primarily range vs melee), ever hope to be balanced in terms of force multipliers?
Outside of your opening comment about reintroducing civility to thread, of which I admit I'm also at fault, nothing else you said really brings anything new or insightful to the discussion besides basically reiterating the same points brought up by a very few others who don't have firsthand experience playing on good 24 player servers.
I also continue having a hard time accepting this "dev-intended gameplay" argument, when it was the devs themselves, as I have stated, who allowed for up to 24 player servers in the first place, while limiting others. I am certainly aware they didn't wish to go higher with it due to performance, but if they truly wished EVERYONE to play this game at some mandated player population limit they could have just made it that way as well.
I'm also going to continue to rail against points being made about "dumbed down gameplay" or marines being significantly overpowerd against similiar skilled alien teams. I've deliberately shuffled teams manually to balance known good players equally among teams and have seen EPIC games come from this. I've seen good marine teams attempt to exploit one of the viewed alien weaknesses on high pop server early game by attempting to egg lock, only to be thwarted by smart alien commanders putting a shift somewhere reasonably close to the hive (but out of danger) to push back, while the marines have effectively surrendered the rest of the map, much the same as I would expect on lower pop servers.
I've seen videos and streams of 6v6 matches and 16 player servers. I've not seen anything radically different except the fact you simply have less people in a given area for the bulk of the map. Teamplay, one of the most important attributes of this game, is seen hugely, and I'd wager moreso on servers like mine. I'd say if that isn't what the devs intended then clearly I don't have a clue, apparently.
Outside of your opening comment about reintroducing civility to thread, of which I admit I'm also at fault, nothing else you said really brings anything new or insightful to the discussion besides basically reiterating the same points brought up by a very few others who don't have firsthand experience playing on good 24 player servers.
Therein unfortunately lies the problem. No one here is having a go at your server, but take it from those of us who have tried plenty of other 24p servers, what you describe is not actually representative of what's out there. There are many awful 24p servers, with no communication or teamwork, and horrendous late game performance. How is a new player to know that your server is not like them?
Please don't take this so personally! While I personally really dislike the 24p experience, I've no doubt that you are running yours responsibly and genuinely care about player satisfaction, and that is great.
But the same logic certainly applies to smaller servers as well Roobubba, I'm sure there's awful 20- servers also, but yet I don't cast the same coat of paint on all of them.
The argument seemed to revolve around a general pasting of 24 player servers altogether with some very misguided notions as it applies to "dev intended gameplay" (which I admit is my biggest hanging point in all of this) as well as exactly how it balances out in general, such as people viewing aliens as underpowered. Those are the things that bother me and I feel the need to correct, or, at the very least tell people to try it on a server with a decently skilled set of regulars to see how it actually plays out rather then quoting some experience from some godawful server somewhere and saying "that must be how they all are".
There are many awful 24p servers, with no communication or teamwork, and horrendous late game performance. How is a new player to know that your server is not like them?
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There are just as many awful servers that run less players that have no communications and no team work..... the only argument you can make for this line of reasoning is perhaps late game performance.
No one here is having a go at your server
Not I, I pretty much only play on mavick's server now after having experienced the great community of regular players that play there.
dePARAJoin Date: 2011-04-29Member: 96321Members, Squad Five Blue
edited February 2013
Its always funny to see how you US guys want to push your servers. Fact is: 70-80% of the US-community servers are http://ns2servers.com servers.
So they based on the same hardware: i5 4,4ghz.
To say: Server A is faster than Server B is nonsense.
Here is a list of servers that running on the exact same hardware like mavericks one for example:
NS2Commander.com - Guides and Videos
PunchYouInTheFaceBIG | Classic #1
Creeping Feature [i5@4.4]
Madhouse | No Lag
NANOGRID.ca [i5 @ 4.4 Ghz]
NS2 Goons Central | 4.4 Ghz
I forgot TBG, KingKahuna, -[]><[]- National Gaming . org: All running on the same hardware.
This is ok, really. But please stop to say: My server is faster than the other.
Well I had a go earlier on HBZ's 24p server. Now I like HBZ normally
These HBZ servers, were great but the (new?) admin is very immature.
He kick you if you kill him, i have no clue which of the HBZ Member it was, because he was hidding behind his "ADMIN" nick.
But last time it was the guy called [HBZ]ChuckNorris (yeah, the nickname shows everything...he fells incredible and thats why he abuse admin rights...)
dePARAJoin Date: 2011-04-29Member: 96321Members, Squad Five Blue
edited February 2013
One of the problems with 24 slot servers is the current alienspawn system, wich favors the marines much in the current state.
The mods we are running are normally only UI mods wich dont change any balance.
Atm we are running charlies balance mod on the 18 slot and UWE.sewleks alien spawn mod on the 24slot.
With the modified alienspawn,aliens have a much better time on an 24 slot.
So these balance changes are "official" and im sure one of the 2 versions are in version 240.
And mods are evil of cource. Specially servermods. Its ok to have clientmods, its only me that see the green glowing skulks. But servermods? No way.
Btw. there is a small hotfix from UWE. Murphy avaible for example to fix the dying startharvester. Thats Crap for sure. With this mod the game isnt actual anymore.
Outside of your opening comment about reintroducing civility to thread, of which I admit I'm also at fault, nothing else you said really brings anything new or insightful to the discussion besides basically reiterating the same points brought up by a very few others who don't have firsthand experience playing on good 24 player servers.
I also continue having a hard time accepting this "dev-intended gameplay" argument, when it was the devs themselves, as I have stated, who allowed for up to 24 player servers in the first place, while limiting others. I am certainly aware they didn't wish to go higher with it due to performance, but if they truly wished EVERYONE to play this game at some mandated player population limit they could have just made it that way as well.
I'm also going to continue to rail against points being made about "dumbed down gameplay" or marines being significantly overpowerd against similiar skilled alien teams. I've deliberately shuffled teams manually to balance known good players equally among teams and have seen EPIC games come from this. I've seen good marine teams attempt to exploit one of the viewed alien weaknesses on high pop server early game by attempting to egg lock, only to be thwarted by smart alien commanders putting a shift somewhere reasonably close to the hive (but out of danger) to push back, while the marines have effectively surrendered the rest of the map, much the same as I would expect on lower pop servers.
I've seen videos and streams of 6v6 matches and 16 player servers. I've not seen anything radically different except the fact you simply have less people in a given area for the bulk of the map. Teamplay, one of the most important attributes of this game, is seen hugely, and I'd wager moreso on servers like mine. I'd say if that isn't what the devs intended then clearly I don't have a clue, apparently.
I would have thought the abundance of OFFICIAL 16 player servers could have aided you in your understanding of dev-intended gameplay. OR the fact that there is a near requirement to go shift first on 24player games because there is simply not enough eggs coded into the software to cater for regular numbers of deaths. But since your thought patterns don't extend past anything but how awesome your server is it comes of no surprise that logic is lacking in other areas.
Just because a game lets you run or do something does not mean it's intentional or by design.
I think the battle for servers with reasonable player counts is lost in Aus. Last night there was monash 18 (I waited over 10minutes for a spot here and gave in), 22 chomp, 24 monash, 24 ON3network and 24 Fishys.
Really can't stand the 24 servers. Alien tactics involve shift first and staying alive until a shift is up, followed by yelling for everyone to meet in one spot and rush something in a group.
Hopefully people start playing 16 again, game will be dead to me soon otherwise. The other problem with 24 slotters is that with all those people on them (in Aus), its less servers to choose from. If they were all 16, we could have another couple of servers to flick through.
Outside of your opening comment about reintroducing civility to thread, of which I admit I'm also at fault, nothing else you said really brings anything new or insightful to the discussion besides basically reiterating the same points brought up by a very few others who don't have firsthand experience playing on good 24 player servers.
Really, what I've mostly seen is you championing 24p servers (or your own, at least), and verbally browbeating anyone who has another opinion. Including all the way down to direct insults, which are a no-go.
I also continue having a hard time accepting this "dev-intended game-play" argument, when it was the devs themselves, as I have stated, who allowed for up to 24 player servers in the first place, while limiting others. I am certainly aware they didn't wish to go higher with it due to performance, but if they truly wished EVERYONE to play this game at some mandated player population limit they could have just made it that way as well.
Yes, because the point of Spark is to have fun. It's the same reason it's so intentionally moddable.
It's a bit like lego, really; you can buy a bag of bricks and just build whatever (Spark), you can buy a kit and build that (the 'dev-intended game-play' mentioned), or you can build the kit and change it up in a way that you think looks cooler or is more fun to play with (mods, higher player-count, lower player-count).
I'm fairly certain that the 24-cap is not a 'suggested limit', but the point at which any further would cause (a) significant problem(s) with the engine/performance.
16 is still the intended balance point to which the game is being tuned at the moment. Fewer players will swing the balance toward Kharaa. More players will swing the balance toward Marines. It's due to the difference between melee and ranged attacks; a ranged attacker can exert influence over a VERY wide area. A melee attacker is restricted to only what is IMMEDIATELY adjacent to them; even with a greater movement speed, it does not compare with the ability to instantly switch to a new target anywhere within the field of view. As a result of this, the more Marines are in a given area, the more collective damage they have the potential to inflict in a shorter time.
This is also why 1v1 combat tends to favor Kharaa. 2v2 is fairly equal, and 3v3 and higher is in favor of the Marines. A high-pop server DRASTICALLY increases the frequency of these large matchups; with the additional human resources, Marines move in larger groups and there is less requirement to send 'rambos' out to take care of a given task, as happens with some frequency on standard-pop and low-pop servers.
Your own earlier argument about how a high-pop server means less drudge work and more shooting stuff is a perfect example. As a Marine you are NOT meant to feel 'safe'. You're supposed to be worried (or terrified) that while you're building, a Skulk is going to sneak up behind you and chew you to pieces, losing the room you're in as a result. With a raised-pop server, 9/10 there's someone there to watch your back and keep that from happening.
I've seen videos and streams of 6v6 matches and 16 player servers. I've not seen anything radically different except the fact you simply have less people in a given area for the bulk of the map. Teamplay, one of the most important attributes of this game, is seen hugely, and I'd wager more-so on servers like mine. I'd say if that isn't what the devs intended then clearly I don't have a clue, apparently.
You appear to be misunderstanding the difference between 'massive mob' and 'teamwork'. With a mob, there IS significantly less teamwork and coordination required. You just follow the herd, and everyone shoots as soon as a target presents itself. On the Kharaa side this would be valid, as to overcome the ranged advantage (which still applies while in close-combat with a single Marine, as EVERYONE ELSE in the mob can also damage you) you absolutely must charge at once with good teamwork to spread the damage out over multiple targets.
Assuming only 7 bullets to kill a Skulk means that with perfect focused fire, each skulk goes down in the time-span it takes to fire two bullets. Even if almost half miss, that only raises it to three bullets per Marine; less than half the normal lifespan of a Skulk. Now carry it forward, and those four skulks have become a meat milkshake in short order.
This can happen on a 16-slot server. It just rarely does, as most of the time (unless performing a base push or rush) Marines are moving around in three groups; either three-three-two (comm/base def), or more commonly three-two-two-one. Ramping that up and tossing an extra four players in bumps that to four-four-three-one. Even against four marines, six Skulks tend to be the rough parity point. If you have a seven-four-one, there is very little in a vanilla-unit sense that will be able to match a Marine mass like that. Even if you had all twelve Skulks there, the seven Marines would make short work of them, leaving five Marines to pursue other goals.
Of course the values change as upgrades come into play (most especially the Lerk umbra/spores and Onos stomp, less-so with Fades). The problem is that the larger number of Marines leads to an exponential growth. Which, while an intended part of the game-play, goes entirely off the rails on high-pop servers. I will hands-down guarantee that a 12v12 competitive scrim would be locked down overwhelmingly on the Marine side. If nothing else, the only thing they would need to do a majority of the time is leave four to six Marines to guard the chair, while the remainder steamroll to (and through) the Hive.
Really, what I've mostly seen is you championing 24p servers (or your own, at least), and verbally browbeating anyone who has another opinion. Including all the way down to direct insults, which are a no-go.
That's because you and some others have misconceptions about 24 player servers and he is not on his own either.
Also, EVERYTHING you typed is theoretical gameplay, none of which you described actually happens on a 24 player server (at least on Mavick's server).
You seem to be under the impression that Marines win far more than Aliens in 24 player server which is simply not the case. If Mavick kept track of win/loss ratios you would probably be dumbfounded that your theoretical nonsense meant nothing.
Also, the server browser speaks for itself on what the majority of people find more fun.... (*cough* more filled 24 player servers than anything else). People wouldn't be going to them if they didn't find them fun, even if you think it's only because "that's where the people are at". Ya, they are there because it is more fun.
TalesinOur own little well of hateJoin Date: 2002-11-08Member: 7710NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators
No, I'd say that if he tracked win/loss, he would find it significantly closer to parity at the moment than occurs on 16-player servers. It's already acknowledged that at the moment, balance is tipped in the favor of the Kharaa as far as the intended gameplay is concerned. If player count had no bearing on balance, his server would be seeing the same win/loss ratios as on most 16-slot servers; if memory serves, around a 60/40 in favor of Kharaa (or worse; I've seen claims as high as 75/25 in-favor).
What his 24-slot is effectively doing is adding in an unintended balancing measure, which (when the intended balance point is corrected) will result in a significant Marine advantage. I do not have access to his round statistics, so I can't really say one way or the other as to if the increased count just pushed the ratio back toward parity, or into the Marines' favor.
I do know for certain though that an increased playercount benefits Marines. Almost exponentially, in fact.
What I'm saying is that if the game was properly balanced for 16 players (which it is NOT at the moment), that Marines would most definitely win decisively on a 24-slot.
Yes, I'm discussing theoretical gameplay. Because I understand game theory, from a design standpoint. You start off comparing apples to apples (base units, in this case) and add in situational modifiers later, to help keep complexity down while developing the foundation.
If you want to argue based on group mentality, I'll just offer Justin Bieber as an example of just how terrible an idea 'merit by popularity' really is. Or any product designed by committee.
Biggest problem with non-24 player servers is that they die The servers that aren't 24 player right now at least need to switch to a format in where it's 8v8 with a spectator queue. I play mostly on 24 player servers for pubbing, and it's entirely because I don't like having to switch servers 5-6 times in one play session. Making 8v8 servers with an 8 person spectator queue would go a long way to bridging the gap between the two.
They are there because it comes up at the top of server lists. Humans by nature will just follow the crowd. If I was a new player and went to launch my first game I'd almost guarantee I'd be going to a 24 player server. It displays at the top, there's more chance of empty slots, I assume that more people is better gameplay and I just simply wouldn't know any better.
You're throwing the exact same mentality into your argument that got people there in the first place. BIGGER NUMBER BETTER. Britney Spears sold 45million albums, MUST BE GOOD MUSICIAN.
If comp play was 12 v 12, you'd be seeing a unanimous marine advantage. There is enough length driven corridors on each map where a high density of ranged units essentially denies or kills any number of melee units.
Yes, I'm discussing theoretical gameplay. Because I understand game theory, from a design standpoint. You start off comparing apples to apples (base units, in this case) and add in situational modifiers later, to help keep complexity down while developing the foundation.
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I understand game theory as well. I will tell you that what you believe in theory here is different than what I have experienced in ACTUAL PLAY. This means that your theory is wrong or has a flaw(s).
You're not wrong for having fun in a 24 player server, but realize that 24 player NS2 is not the same game as 16 player NS2. 24 player servers dumb the game down, give you less options, and make the game incredibly marine favored. The only reason you don't see marines completely steamrolling aliens in 12v12 games is because they typically lack any organization or strategy beyond "make a big ball of marines and hold out till we can make an exo train."
Being a marine commander in a 24 player server is quite possibly one of the most frustrating gaming experiences ever, seeing as you have more than double the amount of players on the field than usual, but can only accomplish about 1/4 of would get done in a 6v6 game because your marines either can't aim, or insist on staying in a giant pack and moving as a unit, leaving vast swaths of the map completely open to early alien expansion.
Being an alien commander in a 24 player server gives you approximately ZERO options as far as strategy. Shift hive first is mandatory, shift before spur is mandatory, using the shift to buy eggs is mandatory. That's basically all of your starting res that's already been spent before the game even starts. Second hive pretty much has to be crag, and you pretty much have to get carapace because there are so many goddamn marines that your higher lifeforms can be taken out in the blink of an eye. You can count on having approximately 100% more gorges than you need on your team as well, and out of those 12 people on your team you might have one person who can go fade and not die instantly, because guess what? You can't afford blink. You had to spend the res you would've used for that on a shift and eggs.
The aliens will pretty much only win through attrition or exploiting holes in the marine defense, and the marines will only win if they sack up and actually do something instead of being scared of dying in a video game. 24 player servers largely take individual skill out of the equation and rely on mass numbers to get things done.
TalesinOur own little well of hateJoin Date: 2002-11-08Member: 7710NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators
Unfortunately, 'actual play' is practice. Not theory. It adds in a large number of modifiers and other variables, some of which cancel each other out.
In this case, the current Kharaa balance advantage is being cancelled out by the larger player-count. So as noted, a parity is reached.
HOWEVER. As soon as the intended gameplay balance is corrected to be fair/even at 16 players, the 'counterweight' currently in effect on raised-pop servers will have nothing to act against, and will simply become clear advantage instead.
Following this to a logical conclusion, of COURSE you won't see it for now in gameplay. This is why you have to pay attention to the theory behind it, rather than saying 'whatever, it seems like it's working, so it must be right'.
They are there because it comes up at the top of server lists.
So if 16 player servers were at the top of the lists you would find them more full than 24 player servers? Doubtful.
You also degrade most PC gamers into believing they are all dumb. The more likely scenario is that they'll do what everyone does and search the list by best ping first, then pick a server. Which doesn't put 24 player servers at the top (obviously unless they all have the best ping first.).
You're throwing the exact same mentality into your argument that got people there in the first place. BIGGER NUMBER BETTER. Britney Spears sold 45million albums, MUST BE GOOD MUSICIAN.
Tell that to those fans of 45million that she is a bad musician....... Just because you don't like it doens't mean a great deal many people do like it. You are taking your position as "my way is the best way".
If comp play was 12 v 12, you'd be seeing a unanimous marine advantage.
Once again, all "theory" and no actual data to back it up. Also, we are not talking comp play here. It's pub servers.
This is NS2 as such people expect an experience bigger in scale compared to NS1. Sadly Spark can't support that desire right now due to performance issues, thus we are still stuck with playernumbers lower than what NS1 could actually run, that's also kind of an accomplishment for an sequel... If i want to play MP FPS games with small playernumbers, i can play FPS games with P2P hosting on friggin consoles or any crappy FPS game on PC that does not support dedicated servers. But the reason i play games on PC is because PC games can go bigger and expand in scale as they are not limited by decade old closed off hardware.
I also think it's kinda cute how people keep on pretending that smaller playernumers promote "more tactical gameplay", no they do not. People with game sense promote more tactical gameplay and you can have those on 12 player servers or on 24 player servers or you could just as well have a 12 player server full of idiots where no coordination at all exists, it's completely independent from the playernumbers of a server and depends on the actual players themselves.
Yes playernumbers do impact balance, but that's nothing new and also held true for NS, let's also not ignore that there are ways to lessen this impact (See dePARA post about this, which somehow people just ignore) . But in the end many people don't care about balance, they care about having a good time and lots of action, the latter usually can be had more easily on bigger servers with more players.
If comp play was 12 v 12, you'd be seeing a unanimous marine advantage.
Once again, all "theory" and no actual data to back it up. Also, we are not talking comp play here. It's pub servers.
Er, yes. There's no data because no one bothers to try to set up that large of a scrim. Because it's a one-sided stomp, even WITH the current balance. There's nothing to really 'test' about it, other than how quickly the Marines will win a round on average.
'It's pub servers' comes across a lot like 'they need it to be easier'. Or alternately 'it's okay, because they don't know how to take full advantage of this significant, utterly crushing potential advantage'. Don't bother balancing because people don't know how to play the game? Don't expect people to learn, or accept sucking for a while as new players?
No.
What I see happening (in the long term) is that balance will be re-adjusted to match 16-player servers. 24-player servers will turn into a Marine stompfest. As a result, they'll start to churn faster, and we may see some player-base loss as a result (it happens) as their favorite communities become un-fun places to play. Players will migrate to smaller servers organically. Large servers will exist as a niche, with many reducing to 16-18 slots to recover lost player-base.
During this (or before), UWE will be working on a method to scale gameplay based on player count. After the game becomes equally challenging regardless of player-count, raised-pop servers will regain popularity for more casual players and newbies (as noted previously under the 'more people = more fun' mentality above), while competitive teams will move toward small-pop games (for ease of coordination/scrimming/scheduling if nothing else). The majority of players will likely migrate somewhere in the middle.
Amusingly, a lot of this already happened during the development/growth of the original NS.
Er, yes. There's no data because no one bothers to try to set up that large of a scrim. Because it's a one-sided stomp, even WITH the current balance. There's nothing to really 'test' about it, other than how quickly the Marines will win a round on average.
Why would you have to setup scrims? All you have to do is collect data from 24 player pub servers. I'm telling you after... TONS of rounds I have played on mavicks 24 player pub server, it is not a marine stomp fest period. Aliens still win more on average than marines.
Not sure whats worse. Banging head against brick wall or arguing with someone who thinks Britney Spears is a great musician and that 12 v 12 won't benefit marines.
At least the brick wall makes sense I guess.
Amusingly, a lot of this already happened during the development/growth of the original NS.
Amusingly NS1 actually had a whole extra mode to play for large population servers: siege maps
And those had been pretty populated, so NS1 could actually support both types of gameplay without UWE having to rebalance individually for every possible playercount, especially after the addition of combat to support sub 12 player rounds.
That was actually a god-sent because NS1 suffered and still suffers from the same scaling problems, large population servers gave and give Marines an advantage while small ones gave an advantage to Kharaa. Siege maps and combat actually turned these imbalances into whole separate gamemodes for players to enjoy.
Not sure whats worse. Banging head against brick wall or arguing with someone who thinks Britney Spears is a great musician and that 12 v 12 won't benefit marines.
At least the brick wall makes sense I guess.
First off, I didn't say britney spears is a great musician....... which would be an opinion and I never gave my opinion about that.
Second of all, I and Mavick have more experience about how marines play in 24 player servers than you or talesin. It is why we keep talking about our experience, rather than your guy's theories.
Comments
Ok, I'll continue being the Be polite. -Talesin who has firsthand knowledge on the subject matter, along with running one of the most popular 24 player servers in the game.
All excellent points. Only when the entity count on my server starts approaching that 1,500 limit does it even begin to hiccup. And from the graphs I've posted, that doesn't happen as frequently as people would think. I think there were 3 sub-20 tickrate drops not related to map changes/round endings over a 12 hour period.
That said, if people go back to personal insults again for any reason, they should consider themselves already warned.
Now, my own thoughts on the original matter. 24-player servers swing the balance of the game significantly in the favor of the Marines.
While easier for newbies, it also does not prepare them for the dev-intended gameplay, or going into a 16-slot server. While it's fine for an intro-to-the-game type of scenario, it's the same reason many people disliked Combat mode for the original NS; there were a number who stuck with it as it required next to zero teamplay or coordination, and dumbed down the game enough to appeal to the CS-chugging masses. It was meant as a time-waster on an almost-empty server, to prevent 3v3 rolls.
Unfortunately, it was carried forward from almost a tutorial into a full game-mode; it stopped being a bootstrap, and turned into essentially the same charlie-foxtrot noted above. Because it incorporated very few/none of the deeper strategic elements, it resulted in a divide, rather than being a stepping stone to the full, actual game. Thankfully, larger servers don't contribute to this as directly.
As we go forward and balance is established, last I'd heard the initial point was going to be aimed at a 16-slot, with alterations made from there to bring larger and smaller servers into line.
I also continue having a hard time accepting this "dev-intended gameplay" argument, when it was the devs themselves, as I have stated, who allowed for up to 24 player servers in the first place, while limiting others. I am certainly aware they didn't wish to go higher with it due to performance, but if they truly wished EVERYONE to play this game at some mandated player population limit they could have just made it that way as well.
I'm also going to continue to rail against points being made about "dumbed down gameplay" or marines being significantly overpowerd against similiar skilled alien teams. I've deliberately shuffled teams manually to balance known good players equally among teams and have seen EPIC games come from this. I've seen good marine teams attempt to exploit one of the viewed alien weaknesses on high pop server early game by attempting to egg lock, only to be thwarted by smart alien commanders putting a shift somewhere reasonably close to the hive (but out of danger) to push back, while the marines have effectively surrendered the rest of the map, much the same as I would expect on lower pop servers.
I've seen videos and streams of 6v6 matches and 16 player servers. I've not seen anything radically different except the fact you simply have less people in a given area for the bulk of the map. Teamplay, one of the most important attributes of this game, is seen hugely, and I'd wager moreso on servers like mine. I'd say if that isn't what the devs intended then clearly I don't have a clue, apparently.
Therein unfortunately lies the problem. No one here is having a go at your server, but take it from those of us who have tried plenty of other 24p servers, what you describe is not actually representative of what's out there. There are many awful 24p servers, with no communication or teamwork, and horrendous late game performance. How is a new player to know that your server is not like them?
Please don't take this so personally! While I personally really dislike the 24p experience, I've no doubt that you are running yours responsibly and genuinely care about player satisfaction, and that is great.
The argument seemed to revolve around a general pasting of 24 player servers altogether with some very misguided notions as it applies to "dev intended gameplay" (which I admit is my biggest hanging point in all of this) as well as exactly how it balances out in general, such as people viewing aliens as underpowered. Those are the things that bother me and I feel the need to correct, or, at the very least tell people to try it on a server with a decently skilled set of regulars to see how it actually plays out rather then quoting some experience from some godawful server somewhere and saying "that must be how they all are".
There are just as many awful servers that run less players that have no communications and no team work..... the only argument you can make for this line of reasoning is perhaps late game performance.
Not I, I pretty much only play on mavick's server now after having experienced the great community of regular players that play there.
TBG Calgary Server
TBG Chicago Server
TBG Calgary Combat Only Server
So they based on the same hardware: i5 4,4ghz.
To say: Server A is faster than Server B is nonsense.
Here is a list of servers that running on the exact same hardware like mavericks one for example:
NS2Commander.com - Guides and Videos
PunchYouInTheFaceBIG | Classic #1
Creeping Feature [i5@4.4]
Madhouse | No Lag
NANOGRID.ca [i5 @ 4.4 Ghz]
NS2 Goons Central | 4.4 Ghz
I forgot TBG, KingKahuna, -[]><[]- National Gaming . org: All running on the same hardware.
This is ok, really. But please stop to say: My server is faster than the other.
He kick you if you kill him, i have no clue which of the HBZ Member it was, because he was hidding behind his "ADMIN" nick.
But last time it was the guy called [HBZ]ChuckNorris (yeah, the nickname shows everything...he fells incredible and thats why he abuse admin rights...)
The mods we are running are normally only UI mods wich dont change any balance.
Atm we are running charlies balance mod on the 18 slot and UWE.sewleks alien spawn mod on the 24slot.
With the modified alienspawn,aliens have a much better time on an 24 slot.
So these balance changes are "official" and im sure one of the 2 versions are in version 240.
And mods are evil of cource. Specially servermods. Its ok to have clientmods, its only me that see the green glowing skulks. But servermods? No way.
Btw. there is a small hotfix from UWE. Murphy avaible for example to fix the dying startharvester. Thats Crap for sure. With this mod the game isnt actual anymore.
Memo to me: Next time use the quote function.
I would have thought the abundance of OFFICIAL 16 player servers could have aided you in your understanding of dev-intended gameplay. OR the fact that there is a near requirement to go shift first on 24player games because there is simply not enough eggs coded into the software to cater for regular numbers of deaths. But since your thought patterns don't extend past anything but how awesome your server is it comes of no surprise that logic is lacking in other areas.
Just because a game lets you run or do something does not mean it's intentional or by design.
Really can't stand the 24 servers. Alien tactics involve shift first and staying alive until a shift is up, followed by yelling for everyone to meet in one spot and rush something in a group.
Hopefully people start playing 16 again, game will be dead to me soon otherwise. The other problem with 24 slotters is that with all those people on them (in Aus), its less servers to choose from. If they were all 16, we could have another couple of servers to flick through.
Yes, because the point of Spark is to have fun. It's the same reason it's so intentionally moddable.
It's a bit like lego, really; you can buy a bag of bricks and just build whatever (Spark), you can buy a kit and build that (the 'dev-intended game-play' mentioned), or you can build the kit and change it up in a way that you think looks cooler or is more fun to play with (mods, higher player-count, lower player-count).
I'm fairly certain that the 24-cap is not a 'suggested limit', but the point at which any further would cause (a) significant problem(s) with the engine/performance.
16 is still the intended balance point to which the game is being tuned at the moment. Fewer players will swing the balance toward Kharaa. More players will swing the balance toward Marines. It's due to the difference between melee and ranged attacks; a ranged attacker can exert influence over a VERY wide area. A melee attacker is restricted to only what is IMMEDIATELY adjacent to them; even with a greater movement speed, it does not compare with the ability to instantly switch to a new target anywhere within the field of view. As a result of this, the more Marines are in a given area, the more collective damage they have the potential to inflict in a shorter time.
This is also why 1v1 combat tends to favor Kharaa. 2v2 is fairly equal, and 3v3 and higher is in favor of the Marines. A high-pop server DRASTICALLY increases the frequency of these large matchups; with the additional human resources, Marines move in larger groups and there is less requirement to send 'rambos' out to take care of a given task, as happens with some frequency on standard-pop and low-pop servers.
Your own earlier argument about how a high-pop server means less drudge work and more shooting stuff is a perfect example. As a Marine you are NOT meant to feel 'safe'. You're supposed to be worried (or terrified) that while you're building, a Skulk is going to sneak up behind you and chew you to pieces, losing the room you're in as a result. With a raised-pop server, 9/10 there's someone there to watch your back and keep that from happening.
You appear to be misunderstanding the difference between 'massive mob' and 'teamwork'. With a mob, there IS significantly less teamwork and coordination required. You just follow the herd, and everyone shoots as soon as a target presents itself. On the Kharaa side this would be valid, as to overcome the ranged advantage (which still applies while in close-combat with a single Marine, as EVERYONE ELSE in the mob can also damage you) you absolutely must charge at once with good teamwork to spread the damage out over multiple targets.
Assuming only 7 bullets to kill a Skulk means that with perfect focused fire, each skulk goes down in the time-span it takes to fire two bullets. Even if almost half miss, that only raises it to three bullets per Marine; less than half the normal lifespan of a Skulk. Now carry it forward, and those four skulks have become a meat milkshake in short order.
This can happen on a 16-slot server. It just rarely does, as most of the time (unless performing a base push or rush) Marines are moving around in three groups; either three-three-two (comm/base def), or more commonly three-two-two-one. Ramping that up and tossing an extra four players in bumps that to four-four-three-one. Even against four marines, six Skulks tend to be the rough parity point. If you have a seven-four-one, there is very little in a vanilla-unit sense that will be able to match a Marine mass like that. Even if you had all twelve Skulks there, the seven Marines would make short work of them, leaving five Marines to pursue other goals.
Of course the values change as upgrades come into play (most especially the Lerk umbra/spores and Onos stomp, less-so with Fades). The problem is that the larger number of Marines leads to an exponential growth. Which, while an intended part of the game-play, goes entirely off the rails on high-pop servers. I will hands-down guarantee that a 12v12 competitive scrim would be locked down overwhelmingly on the Marine side. If nothing else, the only thing they would need to do a majority of the time is leave four to six Marines to guard the chair, while the remainder steamroll to (and through) the Hive.
That is all.
That's because you and some others have misconceptions about 24 player servers and he is not on his own either.
Also, EVERYTHING you typed is theoretical gameplay, none of which you described actually happens on a 24 player server (at least on Mavick's server).
You seem to be under the impression that Marines win far more than Aliens in 24 player server which is simply not the case. If Mavick kept track of win/loss ratios you would probably be dumbfounded that your theoretical nonsense meant nothing.
Also, the server browser speaks for itself on what the majority of people find more fun.... (*cough* more filled 24 player servers than anything else). People wouldn't be going to them if they didn't find them fun, even if you think it's only because "that's where the people are at". Ya, they are there because it is more fun.
What his 24-slot is effectively doing is adding in an unintended balancing measure, which (when the intended balance point is corrected) will result in a significant Marine advantage. I do not have access to his round statistics, so I can't really say one way or the other as to if the increased count just pushed the ratio back toward parity, or into the Marines' favor.
I do know for certain though that an increased playercount benefits Marines. Almost exponentially, in fact.
What I'm saying is that if the game was properly balanced for 16 players (which it is NOT at the moment), that Marines would most definitely win decisively on a 24-slot.
Yes, I'm discussing theoretical gameplay. Because I understand game theory, from a design standpoint. You start off comparing apples to apples (base units, in this case) and add in situational modifiers later, to help keep complexity down while developing the foundation.
If you want to argue based on group mentality, I'll just offer Justin Bieber as an example of just how terrible an idea 'merit by popularity' really is. Or any product designed by committee.
Biggest problem with non-24 player servers is that they die The servers that aren't 24 player right now at least need to switch to a format in where it's 8v8 with a spectator queue. I play mostly on 24 player servers for pubbing, and it's entirely because I don't like having to switch servers 5-6 times in one play session. Making 8v8 servers with an 8 person spectator queue would go a long way to bridging the gap between the two.
You're throwing the exact same mentality into your argument that got people there in the first place. BIGGER NUMBER BETTER. Britney Spears sold 45million albums, MUST BE GOOD MUSICIAN.
If comp play was 12 v 12, you'd be seeing a unanimous marine advantage. There is enough length driven corridors on each map where a high density of ranged units essentially denies or kills any number of melee units.
I understand game theory as well. I will tell you that what you believe in theory here is different than what I have experienced in ACTUAL PLAY. This means that your theory is wrong or has a flaw(s).
Being a marine commander in a 24 player server is quite possibly one of the most frustrating gaming experiences ever, seeing as you have more than double the amount of players on the field than usual, but can only accomplish about 1/4 of would get done in a 6v6 game because your marines either can't aim, or insist on staying in a giant pack and moving as a unit, leaving vast swaths of the map completely open to early alien expansion.
Being an alien commander in a 24 player server gives you approximately ZERO options as far as strategy. Shift hive first is mandatory, shift before spur is mandatory, using the shift to buy eggs is mandatory. That's basically all of your starting res that's already been spent before the game even starts. Second hive pretty much has to be crag, and you pretty much have to get carapace because there are so many goddamn marines that your higher lifeforms can be taken out in the blink of an eye. You can count on having approximately 100% more gorges than you need on your team as well, and out of those 12 people on your team you might have one person who can go fade and not die instantly, because guess what? You can't afford blink. You had to spend the res you would've used for that on a shift and eggs.
The aliens will pretty much only win through attrition or exploiting holes in the marine defense, and the marines will only win if they sack up and actually do something instead of being scared of dying in a video game. 24 player servers largely take individual skill out of the equation and rely on mass numbers to get things done.
In this case, the current Kharaa balance advantage is being cancelled out by the larger player-count. So as noted, a parity is reached.
HOWEVER. As soon as the intended gameplay balance is corrected to be fair/even at 16 players, the 'counterweight' currently in effect on raised-pop servers will have nothing to act against, and will simply become clear advantage instead.
Following this to a logical conclusion, of COURSE you won't see it for now in gameplay. This is why you have to pay attention to the theory behind it, rather than saying 'whatever, it seems like it's working, so it must be right'.
So if 16 player servers were at the top of the lists you would find them more full than 24 player servers? Doubtful.
You also degrade most PC gamers into believing they are all dumb. The more likely scenario is that they'll do what everyone does and search the list by best ping first, then pick a server. Which doesn't put 24 player servers at the top (obviously unless they all have the best ping first.).
Tell that to those fans of 45million that she is a bad musician....... Just because you don't like it doens't mean a great deal many people do like it. You are taking your position as "my way is the best way".
Once again, all "theory" and no actual data to back it up. Also, we are not talking comp play here. It's pub servers.
This is NS2 as such people expect an experience bigger in scale compared to NS1. Sadly Spark can't support that desire right now due to performance issues, thus we are still stuck with playernumbers lower than what NS1 could actually run, that's also kind of an accomplishment for an sequel... If i want to play MP FPS games with small playernumbers, i can play FPS games with P2P hosting on friggin consoles or any crappy FPS game on PC that does not support dedicated servers. But the reason i play games on PC is because PC games can go bigger and expand in scale as they are not limited by decade old closed off hardware.
I also think it's kinda cute how people keep on pretending that smaller playernumers promote "more tactical gameplay", no they do not. People with game sense promote more tactical gameplay and you can have those on 12 player servers or on 24 player servers or you could just as well have a 12 player server full of idiots where no coordination at all exists, it's completely independent from the playernumbers of a server and depends on the actual players themselves.
Yes playernumbers do impact balance, but that's nothing new and also held true for NS, let's also not ignore that there are ways to lessen this impact (See dePARA post about this, which somehow people just ignore) . But in the end many people don't care about balance, they care about having a good time and lots of action, the latter usually can be had more easily on bigger servers with more players.
'It's pub servers' comes across a lot like 'they need it to be easier'. Or alternately 'it's okay, because they don't know how to take full advantage of this significant, utterly crushing potential advantage'. Don't bother balancing because people don't know how to play the game? Don't expect people to learn, or accept sucking for a while as new players?
No.
What I see happening (in the long term) is that balance will be re-adjusted to match 16-player servers. 24-player servers will turn into a Marine stompfest. As a result, they'll start to churn faster, and we may see some player-base loss as a result (it happens) as their favorite communities become un-fun places to play. Players will migrate to smaller servers organically. Large servers will exist as a niche, with many reducing to 16-18 slots to recover lost player-base.
During this (or before), UWE will be working on a method to scale gameplay based on player count. After the game becomes equally challenging regardless of player-count, raised-pop servers will regain popularity for more casual players and newbies (as noted previously under the 'more people = more fun' mentality above), while competitive teams will move toward small-pop games (for ease of coordination/scrimming/scheduling if nothing else). The majority of players will likely migrate somewhere in the middle.
Amusingly, a lot of this already happened during the development/growth of the original NS.
At least the brick wall makes sense I guess.
Amusingly NS1 actually had a whole extra mode to play for large population servers: siege maps
And those had been pretty populated, so NS1 could actually support both types of gameplay without UWE having to rebalance individually for every possible playercount, especially after the addition of combat to support sub 12 player rounds.
That was actually a god-sent because NS1 suffered and still suffers from the same scaling problems, large population servers gave and give Marines an advantage while small ones gave an advantage to Kharaa. Siege maps and combat actually turned these imbalances into whole separate gamemodes for players to enjoy.
First off, I didn't say britney spears is a great musician....... which would be an opinion and I never gave my opinion about that.
Second of all, I and Mavick have more experience about how marines play in 24 player servers than you or talesin. It is why we keep talking about our experience, rather than your guy's theories.