T:A Server Settings Discussions

[Spinebuster]

I think we went with 50 because at 10 it really doesnt slow you down. From what we can already see, really fast back to fronts are still possible.

A quick question about chasing w/rage&lightweight. Is 290 easily achievable? Is there a consistent number that we know everyone is able to achieve when chasing?

Knowing these numbers would ultimately help balance the settings which is why feedback from our chasers and cappers is crucial.

[JaggedMarble]

260 is easily achievable with impulse pack and one disc jump on flat ground (full health chase under bad chasing conditions). Two disc jumps puts you around 340.

[Spinebuster]

So last night i decided to try the flag drag setting at 300/50 for all classes. After last weeks pickup game i got the impression that 275 wasnt quite enough? I guess we can continue to discuss and test this.

Also, are we happy with all of our current weapon/class bans? Personally, I could live without infiltrators, sentinnels, brutes and some of the automatics and hitscan weapons.

If it was completely up to me i would make some drastic changes that would clean up the gameplay without butchering it up too much. Have to keep balance and team play still into the equation without killing the fun factor. I think the biggest complaint would be with loadouts. Here are some of the things i would change.

Banned classes - Sentinnel, Infiltrator and Brute
Banned weapons - All 3 twinfusors, X1 LMG (Jugg), Pistol (Soldier), TCN4? (Tech), Rockwind TCN4 (Tech) and possibly a few other autos in the soldier and raider class.
Banned perks - Reach, quickdraw, Rage, Lightweight

Flag drag settings would need to be lower since Rage and Lightweight would be banned. Would need to be tested for balance.

Thats just if it was completely up to me.

[Donk-]

I think the only thing I can agree with would be the Infiltrator class. I'm not really a fan of getting rid of anything else weapons wise and especially the perks.

This game is broken in that chasing was nonexistent for the longest time until they added Rage. If you take Rage away, there literally would be zero point chasing unless the flag drag was like 150 because the amount of health I would have to give up, assuming I'm at full health and not lower due to Offense, all the capper would have to do is turn around and breathe on me.

If you get rid of Reach with how we have it currently set-up with all the DB mines/forcefields and what not, I would never offer to cap again. Because we just lowered the skill level on a HoF/Defense to almost nothing. Pretty much you would need a perfect clear every time or hope it's just the HoF there and you can knock him to the side without any trouble.

I understand people's problem with Lightweight, but if we increase the flag drag like we're doing I don't see it being too much of a problem because it encourages people to run good routes. But as a person who caps sometimes I can definitely see people's anger when you have to hope all the mines and forcefields are clear, weave around the Hof, then get chased down by LW because you slowed down to ensure a flag grab. Really sucks for a capper and I think we should look into that first.

I only run QuickDraw and LW as my secondary perks as LD so you already know my opinions there. If you start taking away some autos, you might as well take them all away. It would be highly unfair to take a tech's auto away and then they have to duel and someone else just melts them down with their auto. Now, I believe all the weapons should stay minus fractals and a few inf things because they supplement other things. For example, the Eagle Pistol for Soldier. I would use that if my ping was awful because then my auto's would be terrible. Hitscan weapons seem to suck, but have you ever tried playing with them? I can chain WAY easier than I can click a dot with them.

But anywho, I don't know how I wrote all of this and I may need to re-read it later to make sure it makes sense.

[OldeWolfe]

I understand your point of view Spine, and can agree with most but I also see Donk's point of view, it is difficult for me to take a side one way or another. I think it is terribly unfair for anyone with a low ping to have a distinct advantage with a machine gun but low pings are a part of any game I suppose and provide an advantage with any weapon. I could probably live with any decision you guys (the gang) would make concerning the server settings, and I would set up the CYGNUS server to accommodate them.

I can't chase, cap, or play mid-field in any class very well so my perspective is very limited. The one thing for sure that I would agree with is eliminating fractals. In my way of thinking...they are an unskilled way of clearing the flag, a gen room or taking over one. One other thought I have is that infiltrator knives are entirely too powerful...they're more like a pistol or single shot rifle.

I hope we get more input on this subject.

[Spinebuster]

Donk- Wrote:This game is broken in that chasing was nonexistent for the longest time until they added Rage. If you take Rage away, there literally would be zero point chasing unless the flag drag was like 150 because the amount of health I would have to give up, assuming I'm at full health and not lower due to Offense, all the capper would have to do is turn around and breathe on me.

Isnt that how it already is with rage and lightweight? I know you get a free disc jump but you still need to do another disc/nitron jump in order to be able to catch up to a capper. Then since your not using egocentric your gonna be roughly half health at most once you catch up. I dont think flag drag would have to be that low as without those two perks you can still easily achieve 200+.

Donk- Wrote:If you get rid of Reach with how we have it currently set-up with all the DB mines/forcefields and what not, I would never offer to cap again. Because we just lowered the skill level on a HoF/Defense to almost nothing. Pretty much you would need a perfect clear every time or hope it's just the HoF there and you can knock him to the side without any trouble.

I agree, something else would have to go to balance it out. Possibly mines?

Donk- Wrote:I only run QuickDraw and LW as my secondary perks as LD so you already know my opinions there. If you start taking away some autos, you might as well take them all away. It would be highly unfair to take a tech's auto away and then they have to duel and someone else just melts them down with their auto. Now, I believe all the weapons should stay minus fractals and a few inf things because they supplement other things. For example, the Eagle Pistol for Soldier. I would use that if my ping was awful because then my auto's would be terrible. Hitscan weapons seem to suck, but have you ever tried playing with them? I can chain WAY easier than I can click a dot with them.

The only people that would need an auto is chasers. LAR and AR i would think would be the only ones needed.

Fractals have always been an issue too even though they are not as bad as they used to be. I dont care for the one shot spinfusors brutes have either. Then add the insane amount of health the class gets and its enough to make you want to quit playing the game. Personally i think the brute class is for people not good enough to be a Juggernaut.

[JaggedMarble]

(07-21-2013 01:32 PM)Spinebuster Wrote:  Isnt that how it already is with rage and lightweight? I know you get a free disc jump but you still need to do another disc/nitron jump in order to be able to catch up to a capper.

This is only true if you're chasing in a straight line which unless it's a BtF chasers don't do. If I grab the flag going 320, Donk doesn't chase after me in a straight line, he goes to cut me off because unless I'm doing a BtF he knows that is his best way to stop me.

Quote:The only people that would need an auto is chasers. LAR and AR i would think would be the only ones needed.

We might all dislike auto spam but that's usually indicative of the other team having a strong defense and offense not coordinating properly. You don't need to dominate the enemy flag stand to get caps you just need to clear the stand and distract LD when cappers are on the way in not whenever you have the opportunity. If you keep getting gunned down then that means you need to change how you're doing things not change the rules of the game.

I apologize in advance but this is something that's been bugging me for a bit, and the following rant is directed at no one in particular but rather at all of us when we get frustrated.

Too often when we keep dying we get discouraged and that tends to effect our play. That simply means we're human but that's also when you need to calm down and think... talk to your team. I see both O and D get frustrated and rather then adjusting their gameplay they just kinda shutdown. Both O and D will keep doing the same shit over and over that keeps getting them killed and pissing them off. HoFs getting spammed out by multiple juggs and instead of cooling down and switching to say soldier on flag or just adding another LD they get angry. Don't get me wrong, I CAP I know how freakin annoying it is to DIE REPEATEDLY and feel like you're accomplishing nothing. However, this is when negativity starts to spread and people tend to keep doing the same thing over and over and expect a different result. The same way the hof will just keep running into mortar spam, HO will get killed by auto spam and not adjust their play style. They won't switch to a new spot, or clear in a different class like raider, brute or jugg (whatever class they AREN'T playing). Hell if 3 people come out to gun them down every time they get near they could even just wait until the capper is 5 out then go in and while the 3 LD are busy gunning down the HO the capper can get out clean. Hardly the ideal way to clear/distract but it still accomplishes the goal. Cappers are guilty of the same crap, they'll stick to the same route because it's what they know or their fastest route and not adjust their game play when things don't go well. This is something we're ALL guilty of and it doesn't mean something is wrong with the game it's that we're taking it too seriously and not looking at the obvious answer in front of us. If what you're doing isn't working then you should try doing it a different way, or doing something else.

Quote:Fractals have always been an issue too even though they are not as bad as they used to be. I dont care for the one shot spinfusors brutes have either. Then add the insane amount of health the class gets and its enough to make you want to quit playing the game. Personally i think the brute class is for people not good enough to be a Juggernaut.

Brute isn't meant to be played the way a juggernaut is, it isn't a matter of skill. If we're talking about say flag clearing then, brutes are meant to clear the stand from close range, juggs from long range simple as that. I honestly feel brutes have a decent amount in common with infs. It's easy to get cheap kills but it's hard to play effectively. Fractals clear deployables on the stand and mess with the HoF but they don't "clear" the flag. They kill cappers or leave them as nitron bait.

I'd be lying if I said I thought fractals were balanced. However, I don't think they're so broken as to warrant being disabled. If you keep dying to them then like I said earlier in this post instead of getting ticked off think about how you counter this. Do you really NEED the gens? If you do then a bow/titan doom bringer will shutdown most brutes. If they're entrenched then get some of your offense to help clear him out when they respawn. If you don't really need gens then let them have the gens, switch to general D for a round or two. When the brute is bored because he has nothing to kill he'll come out and then you can repair the gen.

[Donk-]

(07-21-2013 01:32 PM)Spinebuster Wrote:  

Donk- Wrote:This game is broken in that chasing was nonexistent for the longest time until they added Rage. If you take Rage away, there literally would be zero point chasing unless the flag drag was like 150 because the amount of health I would have to give up, assuming I'm at full health and not lower due to Offense, all the capper would have to do is turn around and breathe on me.

Isnt that how it already is with rage and lightweight? I know you get a free disc jump but you still need to do another disc/nitron jump in order to be able to catch up to a capper. Then since your not using egocentric your gonna be roughly half health at most once you catch up. I dont think flag drag would have to be that low as without those two perks you can still easily achieve 200+.

Don't Rage also gives you health/energy. It is very uncommon to have full health when a capper comes in. If I'm running ego and have about half health/energy, I get maybe one disc jump which puts me at like 150 speed? With that I won't catch a capper and I'll have to try llama down the field to try to cut them off but still very unlikely.

[Gorthaur]

I have also often thought of a more pure tribes game with pathfinders, soldier, jugg and raider as only classes. I worry about it scaring away people though because we have a fair number of people that play cloaker and brute a lot. I wonder if we could do it on another night like Wednesday or something and they would be smaller games like 5v5 to 7v7.

Your argument saying autos are only needed for chasers is incorrect. Because of the shitty 2 weapon system and health regen the autos are the defense's counter to heavies. Without a real grenade launcher, viable shocklance and mine-disking heavies can just keep spamming and running away unless there is an auto to stop their regen and deal damage from a distance. Raiders with autos are stupid though.

The main problem with banning weapons is that when players join and use their loadouts they have empty weapon slots right? The server doesn't give them the preferred weapons.

For example, if I had my choice I would get rid of the high damage variants of a lot of weapons like the gast rifle, arctic rhino, holdout shotgun etc. But those players will have to change their loadouts instead of the weapons being auto switched for them right?

[Spinebuster]

The only thing that defeats a brute in a gen room is another brute. So basically, you just enhance the retardedness.

The problem we have relates to how they made the game. Alot of things have been left unbanned to the servers simply because we dont normally have many issues with the gameplay that relate to the banned weapons other leagues would have. When newer players come into the mix, they bring in different play styles that we wouldnt normally see. Its the same style of gameplay that we have tried to stay away from simply because its not tribes. Its the same reason why so many people simply dont play this game anymore. They screwed this game up from the start and have now pushed it off to the side. The changes we make are intended to remove some of the stupid things hirez has implemented into the game. As long as we keep them under control the gameplay wont go to shit.

Until recently we havent had a big issue with gameplay. Last night i played in a match to where the other team was all autos. I finally had an explosive death with 2 minutes left in the game. im sure i wasnt the only one either. So basically what i am saying is if you invite in trashy gameplay and allow it to continue you will see the attendance dwindle. We want to keep the gameplay top notch so we can keep the attendance up. If we sit back and do nothing then the gameplay will be just as terrible as it is in the pubs.