Fades make for bad shooter gameplay
Imbalanxd
Join Date: 2011-06-15 Member: 104581Members
Join Date: 2011-06-15 Member: 104581Members
<div class="IPBDescription">fighting them that is</div>The greatest aspect of skill, and perhaps even enjoyment, to any shooter, is prediction. That's why we play games with rigid physics systems in them, and which implement many laws of motion which exist in reality. We can understand these rules, and then use them to predict where to shoot next. Essentially nobody uses actual position to shoot, many people think they do, but they don't. People don't identify objects, place their aimer at that objects position, and then continue to update their crosshairs position to match that of their targets. Instead, people identify a target and its trajectory, they place their crosshair on the target, then they apply the trajectory to their aimer. If people did it any other way, aim would be based almost entirely on reaction speed, and while their may very well be people with really good reactions, they aren't super human. There reactions will only ever be 5 or 10% faster than the average.
Why is this important? Well, the fade destroys all notion of prediction. It removes it almost entirely from the fight. The standard strategy that I have seen adopted by almost all fades who know what the are doing, is to almost NEVER attack unless it is directly preceded by a blink. Take into account that a fade is attacking 2 or 3 times a second, and you have a player whose position is changing almost constantly based on no identifiable pattern, allowing for no prediction. When I fight a fade directly, I can shoot it until it takes its first swing. After that, its just blink blink blink blink, until I don't know the ###### floor from the ceiling.
This problem seemed to have been identified with the very first implementation of blink, which gave absolutely no hints as to where the hell the fade had blinked to. The animation literally only involved the fade disappearing, after which he really could have gone in any direction. After that, the familiar purple streak was added, which was great, but unfortunately the cooldown on blink was removed. I am all for fades having blink, its an iconic ability, and I am all for sudden and unpredictable trajectory changes, its a great utility for avoiding damage, but you can't have it being used more often than standard movement. That just makes trying to fight such an enemy a chore and a random cluster ######.
In my opinion, the 1 second cooldown on blink needs to be brought back, or the energy usage on the ability needs to be doubled. Think of skulks and leap. If a skulk used leap to cover 3 whole rooms in order to get to a marine, by the time he got their he wouldn't have enough energy to bite him! Fades can blink around the entire map, kill a marine, and then still have enough energy to do one more lap around the map.
DISCLAIMER
I am not saying the fade is overpowered, or that it needs to be all out nerfed. I think the current fade is at a good place in terms of power, I just think its power is "misplaced". At the moment a fades survivability is 20% tanking damage, 80% incomprehensible and erratic movement. I think it should be brought more towards 50/50. This would also stop the situations where a fade does everything right, but just happens to catch a spray and pray shotgun directly to the face, killing it instantly.
Why is this important? Well, the fade destroys all notion of prediction. It removes it almost entirely from the fight. The standard strategy that I have seen adopted by almost all fades who know what the are doing, is to almost NEVER attack unless it is directly preceded by a blink. Take into account that a fade is attacking 2 or 3 times a second, and you have a player whose position is changing almost constantly based on no identifiable pattern, allowing for no prediction. When I fight a fade directly, I can shoot it until it takes its first swing. After that, its just blink blink blink blink, until I don't know the ###### floor from the ceiling.
This problem seemed to have been identified with the very first implementation of blink, which gave absolutely no hints as to where the hell the fade had blinked to. The animation literally only involved the fade disappearing, after which he really could have gone in any direction. After that, the familiar purple streak was added, which was great, but unfortunately the cooldown on blink was removed. I am all for fades having blink, its an iconic ability, and I am all for sudden and unpredictable trajectory changes, its a great utility for avoiding damage, but you can't have it being used more often than standard movement. That just makes trying to fight such an enemy a chore and a random cluster ######.
In my opinion, the 1 second cooldown on blink needs to be brought back, or the energy usage on the ability needs to be doubled. Think of skulks and leap. If a skulk used leap to cover 3 whole rooms in order to get to a marine, by the time he got their he wouldn't have enough energy to bite him! Fades can blink around the entire map, kill a marine, and then still have enough energy to do one more lap around the map.
DISCLAIMER
I am not saying the fade is overpowered, or that it needs to be all out nerfed. I think the current fade is at a good place in terms of power, I just think its power is "misplaced". At the moment a fades survivability is 20% tanking damage, 80% incomprehensible and erratic movement. I think it should be brought more towards 50/50. This would also stop the situations where a fade does everything right, but just happens to catch a spray and pray shotgun directly to the face, killing it instantly.
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
Sounds cool! So its not just me that thinks it is a little to unpredictable? Kinda why this wasn't really a suggestion, so much as an attempt to see if others felt the same way about it.
/thread
Humans can always be predicted. Mobility is the one advantage the aliens have. Without it, fades would be pretty much useless, even with a health buff.
Good write up though, and it makes sense. However practice will make it easy. You won't take a fade 1v1, you need teamwork. I think once HA/Exo is introduced it'll even it out even more.
Good write up though, and it makes sense. However practice will make it easy. You won't take a fade 1v1, you need teamwork. I think once HA/Exo is introduced it'll even it out even more.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Blink in NS1 didn't cause the phase shift that occurs in NS2. I know that the fade is still technically vulnerable when in his purple flash form, but at close range he is for all intents and purposes invisible. NS1 blink was just a turbo charged version of lerks fly to be honest. The fade essentially just got a jet boost in the direction it was facing in. Always visible.
<!--quoteo(post=1966716:date=Aug 25 2012, 10:37 PM:name=ChickenOfWar)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (ChickenOfWar @ Aug 25 2012, 10:37 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1966716"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->You honestly think theres never been a blink mechanic in a first person shooter before? Really?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Name it.
High latency. As for blink mechanics, a lot of single-player FPS's have them for enemies, but I can't think of any multiplayer FPS's that use them for players.
Give me an example. Chances are it'll be a one time thing, not 2 or three times a second like it happens in NS at the moment.
Fades are one of the most fantastic features of NS. It takes ALOT of skill to play as fade and ALOT of skill to be able to kill a good fade. Sounds like you need to L2Play.
If you think fades are to hard to kill, your probably playing against someone with 7 years of NS1 comp fade experience. Coming up against that, ofcourse your going to loose.
I'm sure if you could hold leap and randomly become invisible while also having control of your movement in all 3 axis without having to move in a logical or plausible way, people would find leap to be pretty silly as well.
If the fade's HP has to be buffed slightly to compensate for more predictable movement that's probably better for the game as well.
<a href="http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.se/2010/04/alot-is-better-than-you-at-everything.html" target="_blank">http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.se/2010/...everything.html</a>
I'm sure if you could hold leap and randomly become invisible while also having control of your movement in all 3 axis without having to move in a logical or plausible way, people would find leap to be pretty silly as well.
If the fade's HP has to be buffed slightly to compensate for more predictable movement that's probably better for the game as well.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Kinda agree and disagree with eh on this one. I agree that the Fade flight is a bit out of hand; The Fades in NS1 could be utterly lethal, but their movements utterly predictable.
But I'm finding, in my admittedly pub scrub career, that Fades in both cases only die when they either over-extend themselves or you ambush them. In that light, should the movement be changed when marines can attempt to out-smart the Fade instead?
It's fun. I may be in the minority but whatever it's F-ING FUN!!. Finally blink actually lets you do something you couldn't just do as a skilled skulk. I say keep the mechanic but if fades are really a problem tweak other things, such as blink speed, blink energy, mine damage, shotty damage or how much damage a fade does per swipe. You could add a turret that shoots flames (drains energy) so people could put it near doors and prevent fades from aggressively ransacking a base (fades would have to be very careful before going in and scout first).
In NS1 it was quite a while before people learned to reliably group together, have two marines hidden, block exits and kill a skilled fade. I suspect in NS2 it will also take some time figuring how to reliably kill good fades.
Is that actually planned for 217?
Or is that something you can't discuss?
Killing an Onos isn't as exciting though. Might be because of the way it dies.
The alternative would be the old "res4kill" system where the timings of life-forms were inconsistent due to the amount of kills a person had or didn't have.
I prefer the current system over that. Dealing with fades should be done as a team, though a jetpack will slightly even the grounds if you do it right.
The way I deal with fades is making sure I'm closer to the exit before the fade leaves to recover health.
The rest is sekrut....
RFK would smudge out the timing a bit, but there's no guaranteed gain unless the RFK spreads out uneven and the core issue is still there. The timing window where fades pop expands a bit, but you're still dealing with the same fade mass after a minute or two.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I prefer the current system over that. Dealing with fades should be done as a team, though a jetpack will slightly even the grounds if you do it right.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You're not going to respond to each of the 5 fades with a squad of your own. The reason why fade worked in NS1 was because it was such a limited lifeform. The marines were in big trouble if the fade count went over 1/3 of the team size before the whole marine team was set up with big time gear and upgrades.
Maybe somehow you can force big teamfights and overcome the massive fade count, but I think it's a very predictable path of gameplay if not anything else. Teams should be encouraged to spread out and control the map, not to for a crowd in 1 or 2 locations of the whole map.
Biggest problem with fade atm is the fact that blinking lets you move on all 3 axis with complete freedom, and that you bounce of off anything you come in contact with. It requires no precision, no smoothness, and no real scouting or awareness. NS1 fade required a tremendous amount of skill when playing against good marines, and arguably the NS2 fade needs to require MORE for it to be balanced correctly (since mass fades now possible). Moving to a NS1 blink system would greatly increase the skill req. in the class, along with limiting the use of shadowstep to be something used in combat occasionally (and intelligently) as an evasionary skill. Currently with adrenaline you just spam shift and both mouse buttons and basically become unkillable.
Fades are one of the most fantastic features of NS. It takes ALOT of skill to play as fade and ALOT of skill to be able to kill a good fade. Sounds like you need to L2Play.
If you think fades are to hard to kill, your probably playing against someone with 7 years of NS1 comp fade experience. Coming up against that, ofcourse your going to loose.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Everybody thinks you're a retard, what does that feel like?
I explicitly stated that I thought the power of the fade was adequate as is, and I never said it was hard to kill. I think you are projecting a little, and trying to overcompensate by looking like one of those elitist guys. You're just a moron man, you have no clue of what's going on in this game past your own HUD.
I explicitly stated that I thought the power of the fade was adequate as is, and I never said it was hard to kill. I think you are projecting a little, and trying to overcompensate by looking like one of those elitist guys. You're just a <b>moron</b> man, you have no clue of what's going on in this game past your own HUD.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Don't do that. Please.
Locked.