Thank you for such a detailed and informative reply! That clears things up a bit. I do not possess any programming knowledge whatsoever, but I know I will be checking back here often to see how the mod continues. I do understand the performance issue, that is definitely of huge importance. I am hoping maybe the new Dynamic Infestation may open up some new options perhaps? One quick question though, will you post the information for the playtest here on the thread, or do you have a steam group or something to organize these?
<!--quoteo(post=1998607:date=Oct 27 2012, 03:07 PM:name=Chalarie)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Chalarie @ Oct 27 2012, 03:07 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1998607"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Thank you for such a detailed and informative reply! That clears things up a bit. I do not possess any programming knowledge whatsoever, but I know I will be checking back here often to see how the mod continues. I do understand the performance issue, that is definitely of huge importance. I am hoping maybe the new Dynamic Infestation may open up some new options perhaps? One quick question though, will you post the information for the playtest here on the thread, or do you have a steam group or something to organize these?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I am unsure about the dynamic infestation at the moment. I have done something similar (although theirs looks better than my implementation did) and was not too pleased with the results but perhaps they were able to fine tune it where I could not. I will be sure to thoroughly investigate all possible uses with the dynamic infestation. Even if you do lack in programming knowledge, ideas and thoughts are always welcome!
The information for the play test is posted in this thread, on our steam group page <a href="http://steamcommunity.com/groups/SanityMod" target="_blank">http://steamcommunity.com/groups/SanityMod</a>, and our workshop page. We typically use the steam group because of its group chat. Our next play test server will be up around noon est on sunday, oct 28th and the server will be called "Sanity Playtest". If you have any questions we will be in the sanity mod steam group chat and monitoring this thread for any replies.
Purge is a human evolution brought on by the virus invading the body. You can sacrifice a variable amount of your sanity to directly damage the infection that controls the bodies The Darkness take control of, it exudes in a wave, and it does function sort of like magic.
<!--coloro:#9ACD32--><span style="color:#9ACD32"><!--/coloro-->I will keep updating this post with other thoughts that may come up<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> ok here are my thoughs on todays PT I just want to be clear that I might not have a complete idea where this mod is heading and some of these thoughs might conflict with what you are trying to achive.
ok so I will throw out things I was thinking about.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Hunters or predators:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> the hunting team is weak they should feel powerful in some way, my problem with this is that most often you find yourself chased wich is something you shouldnt have if you want the horror factor, roles feel very mixed up right now. I want to point out that when I said powerful I dont mean like a tank these guys need to do enough damage and get away with it and not slowly go between a whole squad and massacure everyone or allmost everyone and be taken out by the last guy.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->power nodes:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> alot of time is spent on repairing/ distroying them and it got boring after couple of minuts, not sure what to do about them or what they are adding to the gameplay, for me the horror is all about being chased, hiding, venturing into darkness and scavanging for items that make your life just a little easier.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->bases: <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->the only thing I felt with these things is to serve an end match condition and didnt feel important at all they somwhow feel hindering
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Groups of marines walking together:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> not a big problem but still something dosnt feel right about it ,you need a way to split them sometimes, random spawns will make it feel better you spawn you look around for other survivors to group with, the horror factor can be lost very quickly when you are all grouped up on one place. there has to be disadvantages or more risks when grouping up. the more time spent alone or in twos the more afraid the players will be.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Upgrades:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> they didnt feel right I hate spending points on more dmg only to have my speed go down, not sure what is being done about these so I will keep an eye on future updates. personally I think you wouldn't even need them if you nail down a good set of abilites for the hunters.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Voting system:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> when each round end the game asks players who want to be the hunter if u want to stay of your team you dont vote yes if you do the game will randomly pick up 1-2 to put on the hunting team.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Weapons:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> I love the idea of looking around for weapons, ammo and items, buying stuff with res just dosnt feel right imho, allso this might help with grouping players, players would want to look where ever they like to find items rather then running with the crowd only to see your team mates picking all the goodies leaving you with nothing.
Also one more thing the more shooting there is the more main stream horror this will be ala resident evil 5 & 6 and left 4 dead 1 & 2, less shooting=more true meaning of horror it will be, players need to feel trapped in, they need to think twice before firing a shot or using anything they own. not sure what you guys have discussed in the group but I feel that you need to know wich of these two different types you are going with.
I would recommend that you try to find a sound guy they are much easier to find than modelers because imho in these kind of games sounds are a huge deal prolly more than anything else, Ive seen a couple of horror games where the art looks stright out of a game made in the early 2000 but the sound just bumped everything up.
damn I really should write things down when I am on a roll I am pretty sure I'm forgetting a couple of things that we discussed during the PT so please someone write them up if you remember.
We're still currently up and looking for anyone who wants to join us playtesting, just look for our 'Sanity Playtest' server and subscribe to our mod if you haven't already. Make sure you uncheck filter mod and open up your server performance or we may not show up on your list. Back up.
<!--quoteo(post=1999056:date=Oct 28 2012, 08:42 PM:name=Jibrail)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Jibrail @ Oct 28 2012, 08:42 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1999056"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec--><!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->power nodes:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> alot of time is spent on repairing/ distroying them and it got boring after couple of minuts, not sure what to do about them or what they are adding to the gameplay, for me the horror is all about being chased, hiding, venturing into darkness and scavanging for items that make your life just a little easier.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->bases: <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->the only thing I felt with these things is to serve an end match condition and didnt feel important at all they somwhow feel hindering
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Groups of marines walking together:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> not a big problem but still something dosnt feel right about it ,you need a way to split them sometimes, random spawns will make it feel better you spawn you look around for other survivors to group with, the horror factor can be lost very quickly when you are all grouped up on one place. there has to be disadvantages or more risks when grouping up. the more time spent alone or in twos the more afraid the players will be.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Strongly agree with these points.
If there was something else to do, like defending a MAC for 3 minutes while it constructed something, or carrying an object from one room to another...anything that isn't staring at a powernode. I know some people don't have a problem with powernodes but right now that's a huge part of this mod and its overbearing on the gameplay.
When there are objectives it's easy to split players up into different groups/individually in a logical way. Two players stay to guard an area, two others go to fetch something, etc.
So far, really enjoying the mod. Playtest has been great, and has really enlightened me on what this mod aims to be. Of course, it is EXTREMELY early in development, but that hasn't stopped me from having a blast. Ill edit this post to have my thoughts and impressions from the playtest as I have them.
<u>-<!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro-->Destroying darkness base is very strange.<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--></u> Having to run into the darkness base, while taking continual damage, and purging over and over again is probably not the best way to be doing it. Your actions do not seem to make much of a difference, nor are there any cues that you are. I wouldn't mind the base being a little more powerful, with some other ways to destroy it and defend it.
I want to thank everyone who came out to playtest, we had a massive e i g h t hours of server uptime and pulled 5+ hours of video. Lots of excitement from people who joined us, which was great to see. You've only experienced less than half of the features we already have planned, we've got at least two more lifeforms planned, two more primary and secondary weapons, new upgrades, new abilities, new gameplay, and we're even considering multiple game types, like capture and control and a twist on king of the hill. There is a lot more to come, we want to show it all off, we want your input, and we plan to implement any good ideas sent our way.
Now on to your suggestions and my feelings on each of them:
Hunters or predators: the hunting team is weak they should feel powerful in some way, my problem with this is that most often you find yourself chased which is something you shouldn't have if you want the horror factor, roles feel very mixed up right now. I want to point out that when I said powerful I don't mean like a tank these guys need to do enough damage and get away with it and not slowly go between a whole squad and massacre everyone or almost everyone and be taken out by the last guy.
- This is definitely important, but also difficult to get right. We've buffed void ms, but they will still be slow in the light, pushing them further into the ambush role they are meant to fill. This should lead to less being chased instances unless you get caught in the light, which should fall in line with exactly how we want things to go. I'm open to any recommendations besides these. We're planning on replacing stat upgrades with passives which should better enhance your unit as you kill them which should be your main job.
power nodes: alot of time is spent on repairing/ destroying them and it got boring after couple of minutes, not sure what to do about them or what they are adding to the gameplay, for me the horror is all about being chased, hiding, venturing into darkness and scavenging for items that make your life just a little easier.
- Nodes give you tres, which lets you access more items, you're scavenging for power basically. This being boring, is definitely an issue for us, sometimes the tension is fun, sometimes its not. Currently we're working on an idea where at least two players can interact in a powered down room and build a mac using tres from one(or both), the mac then autos to the nearest unbuilt node and begins building it. If you get too far from the mac it destructs, when its finished building, it destructs. On the opposite spectrum, to avoid you doing nothing but building uncontested nodes we had the idea of the Darkness sensing a power surge from a node coming up and warning them so they can get to the spot and contest it.
bases: the only thing I felt with these things is to serve an end match condition and didnt feel important at all they somehow feel hindering.
- There were a lot of ideas thrown around on this topic, including yours, having no static spawn portal and having to find your way to your team mates, which I found scary, but even moreso because people are so easy to pick off when alone. I think the Darkness spawn makes sense because if you get the lights on it slowly dies, it poisons you if you get close. I am considering making the endgame for the humans be the dropping of all power, rather than killing the base, we'd need to rebalance for that, but it's an idea.
Groups of marines walking together: not a big problem but still something doesnt feel right about it ,you need a way to split them sometimes, random spawns will make it feel better you spawn you look around for other survivors to group with, the horror factor can be lost very quickly when you are all grouped up on one place. there has to be disadvantages or more risks when grouping up. the more time spent alone or in twos the more afraid the players will be.
- Nobody can just venture off alone, or even in twos, that's the headline for this issue, 3 is the smallest moving group you should be in unless you're going for an artifact or something else incredibly important, because any less than 3 and you don't stand a chance at killing anything except maybe the architech. Horror is a factor, and our main one, but teamwork is a close second. We want a co-op horror mod, which is daunting, I know. That being said, I don't want 8 humans running in one massive group, so we will be coming up with a solution to split people into smaller units, schizophrenia was one suggestion that I liked, the more people the more heightened it becomes, too many units together become unstable as the concentration of virus reaches a peak and they do odd things like fire off random rounds, switch weapons, move in other directions. Another possibility I'd like to get input on, also involving the infected status that all humans have, is radiating dmg; in a large group where the virus is concentrated in a higher percentage, one attack radiates dmg onto surrounding units, through the virus. These effects might need to be slightly delayed and also persistent past splitting up, allowing you to still join forces briefly, like when you assault their base.
Upgrades: they didnt feel right I hate spending points on more dmg only to have my speed go down, not sure what is being done about these so I will keep an eye on future updates. personally I think you wouldn't even need them if you nail down a good set of abilites for the hunters.
- We tweaked them a bit so that they actually do something, but currently MS is best hands down. We plan on swapping them for lifeform specific passives instead and upping the kill cost to balance their usefulness, an ex. would be upgrading the horror teleport cd to 1.45 from 3 and costing 7 kills.
Voting system: when each round end the game asks players who want to be the hunter if u want to stay of your team you dont vote yes if you do the game will randomly pick up 1-2 to put on the hunting team.
- We are considering adding a team balance feature that prohibits spamming the alien team so everyone gets a chance. I don't know if I want to add voting.
Weapons: I love the idea of looking around for weapons, ammo and items, buying stuff with res just doesnt feel right imho, also this might help with grouping players, players would want to look where ever they like to find items rather then running with the crowd only to see your team mates picking all the goodies leaving you with nothing.
- I'm not incredibly happy with using pres for items either, my plan is to make them cost tres instead, and changing the tres system to issue a copy of the tres for as long as you are a member of the team(so you are in the game from the beg, tres is 430, you have 430 tres--you join 7 min late, tres is 430, you have 319 tres). We're also planning on changing the buy menu to be a personal upgrade menu so that you choose what you want to outfit yourself with (after the research is done), so you call out, "I'm going support, early fbangs and rifle later on," and you research those with your tres.
Also one more thing the more shooting there is the more main stream horror this will be ala resident evil 5 & 6 and left 4 dead 1 & 2, less shooting=more true meaning of horror it will be, players need to feel trapped in, they need to think twice before firing a shot or using anything they own. not sure what you guys have discussed in the group but I feel that you need to know which of these two different types you are going with.
- We want less shooting, which is why we limit ammo fairly well, we may need to slightly increase dmg and further limit ammo to get closer to that goal, not sure yet. This is more of a beta-ish tweak because it will probably be very difficult to reach the sweet spot.
I would recommend that you try to find a sound guy they are much easier to find than modelers because imho in these kind of games sounds are a huge deal prolly more than anything else, Ive seen a couple of horror games where the art looks straight out of a game made in the early 2000 but the sound just bumped everything up.
- We have an audio tech, he joined us just over a week ago and has already put together some ambient, he's going to try and handle all our sounds, we're always looking for more help on all fronts though. There is going to be a lot of focus on every kind of sound, it's just going to take us a bit.
Destroying darkness base is very strange. Having to run into the darkness base, while taking continual damage, and purging over and over again is probably not the best way to be doing it. Your actions do not seem to make much of a difference, nor are there any cues that you are. I wouldn't mind the base being a little more powerful, with some other ways to destroy it and defend it.
- We're working on this, we might even make it so that only the power at their base kills the base, but I doubt that's going to work. Your solution, making the base stronger and allowing all light based weapons to dmg it may be the better solution.
If you have any other ideas or comments please let me know, these are all important issues we want to address, some may be closer to the back burner than others, but we want to get to them all.
<!--quoteo(post=1999414:date=Oct 29 2012, 04:26 AM:name=Somnambulist)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Somnambulist @ Oct 29 2012, 04:26 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1999414"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->On the opposite spectrum, to avoid you doing nothing but building uncontested nodes we had the idea of the Darkness sensing a power surge from a node coming up and warning them so they can get to the spot and contest it.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Love that idea. There could be a sound effect (like ns2's beacon?) triggered when a node is repairing. It would put everyone on edge, waiting for the enemy to appear.
When I was in the play test I was only attacked while building a node once or twice, in the enemy spawn. After a while I stopped expecting the enemy. And because the enemy is so visible (I know you didn't intend those glowing regen effects) and slow I stopped fearing it.
And the fact I can keep my rifle/pistol out while I repair a node doesn't add to the horror. If my marine had to holster the weapon and use bare hands to repair it'd be scarier.
<!--quoteo(post=1999414:date=Oct 29 2012, 04:26 AM:name=Somnambulist)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Somnambulist @ Oct 29 2012, 04:26 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1999414"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- We want less shooting, which is why we limit ammo fairly well, we may need to slightly increase dmg and further limit ammo to get closer to that goal, not sure yet. This is more of a beta-ish tweak because it will probably be very difficult to reach the sweet spot.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yea, again really agree with this point about too much shooting. The combat should be high stakes rather than endless firing while chasing the enemy away. The Hidden does this well. You can kill the hidden very quickly, and he can kill you in seconds too, even instantly with one move. It puts everyone on guard, trying to spot his camouflage and cover their team mates.
Some ideas for the lamp: have a light on it turn red when you are damaging The Darkness, and make The Darkness cry out in pain when it's on them. It lets the player know they are hurting the enemy, and makes the lamp more different from the pistol attack.
secondary lamp mode - tracking. Alien (the film) style motion tracking, but not very accurate. It would give the players with lamps more defined roles. They are the players who help you see in the dark, who can shine light on targets and warn you of impending dangers.
Yes we do, we have one, but we already have three map concepts and our first map is at about 60-70%. Would love more mappers. If you haven't friended me yet on steam, go ahead, and send me a message. I'm on almost always. RSomnambulist on steam, or find me through the steam group.
If you need help making maps, i am willing. Use to make ns1 maps and started making map in ns2 when alpha was released but i gave up after seeing summit and how good it is. xD my steam dub_Kris_step
We'll be having a Playtest Sunday, 12pm Eastern Standard Time. Highlights include the new Architech lifeform, gameplay tweaks, including suggestions for fixes to the flashlight, possibly the laser secondary weapon, new upgrade system, and other features that are being worked on, to test tomorrow. Come and play, and influence the further progression of the mod.
We are progressing towards implementing a replacement for power nodes as well, since we got lots of feedback on this, but this change is going to take a while. Keep in mind that your voices were heard, and big 'power node' changes are on the way.
<!--quoteo(post=2008470:date=Nov 3 2012, 08:34 PM:name=Somnambulist)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Somnambulist @ Nov 3 2012, 08:34 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=2008470"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->We'll be having a Playtest Sunday, 12pm Eastern Standard Time. Highlights include the new Architech lifeform, gameplay tweaks, including suggestions for fixes to the flashlight, possibly the laser secondary weapon, new upgrade system, and other features that are being worked on, to test tomorrow. Come and play, and influence the further progression of the mod.
We are progressing towards implementing a replacement for power nodes as well, since we got lots of feedback on this, but this change is going to take a while. Keep in mind that your voices were heard, and big 'power node' changes are on the way.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I was going to ask when we could have another playtest but didn't want to pester :P
Awesome pictures and videos peregrinus! Thank you very much for sharing them!
Thank you to everyone who participated in the play test! If you have not already, please post feedback here or on our Steam Group page: <a href="http://steamcommunity.com/groups/SanityMod#" target="_blank">http://steamcommunity.com/groups/SanityMod#</a> Your feedback is important! Your feedback dictates the changes we make with sanity! Thank you for all the support as we continue to develop the mod further! :)
Subscribe to the mod on workshop and join our Steam Group to keep up to date on news and events!
Hey, I just picked this game up a couple of days ago. I was browsing the modding forums and noticed this mod, and it looks really cool! I'd love to show up for a playtesting session and see how far along it is.
I've already sent an email to Somnambulist about this, but I figured I'd reply in the thread as well. I have programming experience, but I am very new to modding. I'd love to help you guys out with any new features you have planned. Let me know.
I'll open an unofficial server tomorrow about 6pm UTC (roughly noon in North America) to record some stuff from the game. This is not an official playtest but we can play rounds or just mess about.
Please join because I need to record people playing!
Once you download Sanity from the workshop, remember to activate it in the in game mod menu, and then uncheck the mod filter in the server browser. Server name will be Sanity_unofficial. The ping may be sky high so don't set the ping or performance filter too strictly ^^'
It will be hosted on my regular PC so fingers crossed, heh.
Comments
One quick question though, will you post the information for the playtest here on the thread, or do you have a steam group or something to organize these?
One quick question though, will you post the information for the playtest here on the thread, or do you have a steam group or something to organize these?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I am unsure about the dynamic infestation at the moment. I have done something similar (although theirs looks better than my implementation did) and was not too pleased with the results but perhaps they were able to fine tune it where I could not. I will be sure to thoroughly investigate all possible uses with the dynamic infestation. Even if you do lack in programming knowledge, ideas and thoughts are always welcome!
The information for the play test is posted in this thread, on our steam group page <a href="http://steamcommunity.com/groups/SanityMod" target="_blank">http://steamcommunity.com/groups/SanityMod</a>, and our workshop page. We typically use the steam group because of its group chat. Our next play test server will be up around noon est on sunday, oct 28th and the server will be called "Sanity Playtest". If you have any questions we will be in the sanity mod steam group chat and monitoring this thread for any replies.
ok here are my thoughs on todays PT I just want to be clear that I might not have a complete idea where this mod is heading and some of these thoughs might conflict with what you are trying to achive.
ok so I will throw out things I was thinking about.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Hunters or predators:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> the hunting team is weak they should feel powerful in some way, my problem with this is that most often you find yourself chased wich is something you shouldnt have if you want the horror factor, roles feel very mixed up right now. I want to point out that when I said powerful I dont mean like a tank these guys need to do enough damage and get away with it and not slowly go between a whole squad and massacure everyone or allmost everyone and be taken out by the last guy.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->power nodes:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> alot of time is spent on repairing/ distroying them and it got boring after couple of minuts, not sure what to do about them or what they are adding to the gameplay, for me the horror is all about being chased, hiding, venturing into darkness and scavanging for items that make your life just a little easier.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->bases: <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->the only thing I felt with these things is to serve an end match condition and didnt feel important at all they somwhow feel hindering
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Groups of marines walking together:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> not a big problem but still something dosnt feel right about it ,you need a way to split them sometimes, random spawns will make it feel better you spawn you look around for other survivors to group with, the horror factor can be lost very quickly when you are all grouped up on one place. there has to be disadvantages or more risks when grouping up. the more time spent alone or in twos the more afraid the players will be.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Upgrades:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> they didnt feel right I hate spending points on more dmg only to have my speed go down, not sure what is being done about these so I will keep an eye on future updates. personally I think you wouldn't even need them if you nail down a good set of abilites for the hunters.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Voting system:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> when each round end the game asks players who want to be the hunter if u want to stay of your team you dont vote yes if you do the game will randomly pick up 1-2 to put on the hunting team.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Weapons:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> I love the idea of looking around for weapons, ammo and items, buying stuff with res just dosnt feel right imho, allso this might help with grouping players, players would want to look where ever they like to find items rather then running with the crowd only to see your team mates picking all the goodies leaving you with nothing.
Also one more thing the more shooting there is the more main stream horror this will be ala resident evil 5 & 6 and left 4 dead 1 & 2, less shooting=more true meaning of horror it will be, players need to feel trapped in, they need to think twice before firing a shot or using anything they own. not sure what you guys have discussed in the group but I feel that you need to know wich of these two different types you are going with.
I would recommend that you try to find a sound guy they are much easier to find than modelers because imho in these kind of games sounds are a huge deal prolly more than anything else, Ive seen a couple of horror games where the art looks stright out of a game made in the early 2000 but the sound just bumped everything up.
damn I really should write things down when I am on a roll I am pretty sure I'm forgetting a couple of things that we discussed during the PT so please someone write them up if you remember.
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->bases: <!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->the only thing I felt with these things is to serve an end match condition and didnt feel important at all they somwhow feel hindering
<!--coloro:#FF8C00--><span style="color:#FF8C00"><!--/coloro-->Groups of marines walking together:<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> not a big problem but still something dosnt feel right about it ,you need a way to split them sometimes, random spawns will make it feel better you spawn you look around for other survivors to group with, the horror factor can be lost very quickly when you are all grouped up on one place. there has to be disadvantages or more risks when grouping up. the more time spent alone or in twos the more afraid the players will be.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Strongly agree with these points.
If there was something else to do, like defending a MAC for 3 minutes while it constructed something, or carrying an object from one room to another...anything that isn't staring at a powernode. I know some people don't have a problem with powernodes but right now that's a huge part of this mod and its overbearing on the gameplay.
When there are objectives it's easy to split players up into different groups/individually in a logical way. Two players stay to guard an area, two others go to fetch something, etc.
Posted my other comments in the steam group.
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/EdfoBh.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
(you can see the beam is too narrow at close range)
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/dN81Oh.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/WKSzeh.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/k79L9h.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/03njLh.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/5YfE5h.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
<img src="http://i.imgur.com/GVIHQh.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
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<u>-<!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro-->Destroying darkness base is very strange.<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--></u>
Having to run into the darkness base, while taking continual damage, and purging over and over again is probably not the best way to be doing it. Your actions do not seem to make much of a difference, nor are there any cues that you are. I wouldn't mind the base being a little more powerful, with some other ways to destroy it and defend it.
Now on to your suggestions and my feelings on each of them:
Hunters or predators: the hunting team is weak they should feel powerful in some way, my problem with this is that most often you find yourself chased which is something you shouldn't have if you want the horror factor, roles feel very mixed up right now. I want to point out that when I said powerful I don't mean like a tank these guys need to do enough damage and get away with it and not slowly go between a whole squad and massacre everyone or almost everyone and be taken out by the last guy.
- This is definitely important, but also difficult to get right. We've buffed void ms, but they will still be slow in the light, pushing them further into the ambush role they are meant to fill. This should lead to less being chased instances unless you get caught in the light, which should fall in line with exactly how we want things to go. I'm open to any recommendations besides these. We're planning on replacing stat upgrades with passives which should better enhance your unit as you kill them which should be your main job.
power nodes: alot of time is spent on repairing/ destroying them and it got boring after couple of minutes, not sure what to do about them or what they are adding to the gameplay, for me the horror is all about being chased, hiding, venturing into darkness and scavenging for items that make your life just a little easier.
- Nodes give you tres, which lets you access more items, you're scavenging for power basically. This being boring, is definitely an issue for us, sometimes the tension is fun, sometimes its not. Currently we're working on an idea where at least two players can interact in a powered down room and build a mac using tres from one(or both), the mac then autos to the nearest unbuilt node and begins building it. If you get too far from the mac it destructs, when its finished building, it destructs. On the opposite spectrum, to avoid you doing nothing but building uncontested nodes we had the idea of the Darkness sensing a power surge from a node coming up and warning them so they can get to the spot and contest it.
bases: the only thing I felt with these things is to serve an end match condition and didnt feel important at all they somehow feel hindering.
- There were a lot of ideas thrown around on this topic, including yours, having no static spawn portal and having to find your way to your team mates, which I found scary, but even moreso because people are so easy to pick off when alone. I think the Darkness spawn makes sense because if you get the lights on it slowly dies, it poisons you if you get close. I am considering making the endgame for the humans be the dropping of all power, rather than killing the base, we'd need to rebalance for that, but it's an idea.
Groups of marines walking together: not a big problem but still something doesnt feel right about it ,you need a way to split them sometimes, random spawns will make it feel better you spawn you look around for other survivors to group with, the horror factor can be lost very quickly when you are all grouped up on one place. there has to be disadvantages or more risks when grouping up. the more time spent alone or in twos the more afraid the players will be.
- Nobody can just venture off alone, or even in twos, that's the headline for this issue, 3 is the smallest moving group you should be in unless you're going for an artifact or something else incredibly important, because any less than 3 and you don't stand a chance at killing anything except maybe the architech. Horror is a factor, and our main one, but teamwork is a close second. We want a co-op horror mod, which is daunting, I know. That being said, I don't want 8 humans running in one massive group, so we will be coming up with a solution to split people into smaller units, schizophrenia was one suggestion that I liked, the more people the more heightened it becomes, too many units together become unstable as the concentration of virus reaches a peak and they do odd things like fire off random rounds, switch weapons, move in other directions. Another possibility I'd like to get input on, also involving the infected status that all humans have, is radiating dmg; in a large group where the virus is concentrated in a higher percentage, one attack radiates dmg onto surrounding units, through the virus. These effects might need to be slightly delayed and also persistent past splitting up, allowing you to still join forces briefly, like when you assault their base.
Upgrades: they didnt feel right I hate spending points on more dmg only to have my speed go down, not sure what is being done about these so I will keep an eye on future updates. personally I think you wouldn't even need them if you nail down a good set of abilites for the hunters.
- We tweaked them a bit so that they actually do something, but currently MS is best hands down. We plan on swapping them for lifeform specific passives instead and upping the kill cost to balance their usefulness, an ex. would be upgrading the horror teleport cd to 1.45 from 3 and costing 7 kills.
Voting system: when each round end the game asks players who want to be the hunter if u want to stay of your team you dont vote yes if you do the game will randomly pick up 1-2 to put on the hunting team.
- We are considering adding a team balance feature that prohibits spamming the alien team so everyone gets a chance. I don't know if I want to add voting.
Weapons: I love the idea of looking around for weapons, ammo and items, buying stuff with res just doesnt feel right imho, also this might help with grouping players, players would want to look where ever they like to find items rather then running with the crowd only to see your team mates picking all the goodies leaving you with nothing.
- I'm not incredibly happy with using pres for items either, my plan is to make them cost tres instead, and changing the tres system to issue a copy of the tres for as long as you are a member of the team(so you are in the game from the beg, tres is 430, you have 430 tres--you join 7 min late, tres is 430, you have 319 tres). We're also planning on changing the buy menu to be a personal upgrade menu so that you choose what you want to outfit yourself with (after the research is done), so you call out, "I'm going support, early fbangs and rifle later on," and you research those with your tres.
Also one more thing the more shooting there is the more main stream horror this will be ala resident evil 5 & 6 and left 4 dead 1 & 2, less shooting=more true meaning of horror it will be, players need to feel trapped in, they need to think twice before firing a shot or using anything they own. not sure what you guys have discussed in the group but I feel that you need to know which of these two different types you are going with.
- We want less shooting, which is why we limit ammo fairly well, we may need to slightly increase dmg and further limit ammo to get closer to that goal, not sure yet. This is more of a beta-ish tweak because it will probably be very difficult to reach the sweet spot.
I would recommend that you try to find a sound guy they are much easier to find than modelers because imho in these kind of games sounds are a huge deal prolly more than anything else, Ive seen a couple of horror games where the art looks straight out of a game made in the early 2000 but the sound just bumped everything up.
- We have an audio tech, he joined us just over a week ago and has already put together some ambient, he's going to try and handle all our sounds, we're always looking for more help on all fronts though. There is going to be a lot of focus on every kind of sound, it's just going to take us a bit.
Destroying darkness base is very strange.
Having to run into the darkness base, while taking continual damage, and purging over and over again is probably not the best way to be doing it. Your actions do not seem to make much of a difference, nor are there any cues that you are. I wouldn't mind the base being a little more powerful, with some other ways to destroy it and defend it.
- We're working on this, we might even make it so that only the power at their base kills the base, but I doubt that's going to work. Your solution, making the base stronger and allowing all light based weapons to dmg it may be the better solution.
If you have any other ideas or comments please let me know, these are all important issues we want to address, some may be closer to the back burner than others, but we want to get to them all.
Love that idea. There could be a sound effect (like ns2's beacon?) triggered when a node is repairing. It would put everyone on edge, waiting for the enemy to appear.
When I was in the play test I was only attacked while building a node once or twice, in the enemy spawn. After a while I stopped expecting the enemy. And because the enemy is so visible (I know you didn't intend those glowing regen effects) and slow I stopped fearing it.
And the fact I can keep my rifle/pistol out while I repair a node doesn't add to the horror. If my marine had to holster the weapon and use bare hands to repair it'd be scarier.
<!--quoteo(post=1999414:date=Oct 29 2012, 04:26 AM:name=Somnambulist)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Somnambulist @ Oct 29 2012, 04:26 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1999414"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->- We want less shooting, which is why we limit ammo fairly well, we may need to slightly increase dmg and further limit ammo to get closer to that goal, not sure yet. This is more of a beta-ish tweak because it will probably be very difficult to reach the sweet spot.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yea, again really agree with this point about too much shooting. The combat should be high stakes rather than endless firing while chasing the enemy away. The Hidden does this well. You can kill the hidden very quickly, and he can kill you in seconds too, even instantly with one move. It puts everyone on guard, trying to spot his camouflage and cover their team mates.
Some ideas for the lamp: have a light on it turn red when you are damaging The Darkness, and make The Darkness cry out in pain when it's on them. It lets the player know they are hurting the enemy, and makes the lamp more different from the pistol attack.
secondary lamp mode - tracking. Alien (the film) style motion tracking, but not very accurate. It would give the players with lamps more defined roles. They are the players who help you see in the dark, who can shine light on targets and warn you of impending dangers.
Use to make ns1 maps and started making map in ns2 when alpha was released but i gave up after seeing summit and how good it is. xD
my steam dub_Kris_step
We are progressing towards implementing a replacement for power nodes as well, since we got lots of feedback on this, but this change is going to take a while. Keep in mind that your voices were heard, and big 'power node' changes are on the way.
I'll keep an eye on this one!
Good going guys!
We are progressing towards implementing a replacement for power nodes as well, since we got lots of feedback on this, but this change is going to take a while. Keep in mind that your voices were heard, and big 'power node' changes are on the way.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I was going to ask when we could have another playtest but didn't want to pester :P
Hope there will be another good turnout.
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Thank you to everyone who participated in the play test! If you have not already, please post feedback here or on our Steam Group page: <a href="http://steamcommunity.com/groups/SanityMod#" target="_blank">http://steamcommunity.com/groups/SanityMod#</a>
Your feedback is important! Your feedback dictates the changes we make with sanity!
Thank you for all the support as we continue to develop the mod further! :)
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I've already sent an email to Somnambulist about this, but I figured I'd reply in the thread as well. I have programming experience, but I am very new to modding. I'd love to help you guys out with any new features you have planned. Let me know.
Please join because I need to record people playing!
Once you download Sanity from the workshop, remember to activate it in the in game mod menu, and then uncheck the mod filter in the server browser. Server name will be Sanity_unofficial. The ping may be sky high so don't set the ping or performance filter too strictly ^^'
It will be hosted on my regular PC so fingers crossed, heh.
<b>And I will start the server in 20 minutes time for anyone who wants to join.</b> 4ghz, 8gb ram....let's hope it doesn't crash :D
If you can't join today, I'll probably be playing again on Saturday, so look out for the Sanity_Unofficial server.
Big thanks to all who joined in and to the devs who got a server running in spite of my awesome technical abilities.
Here's the spot on the map where I always get stuck.
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