eh? Holding or pressing crouch in the air at any time does not change your hitbox or model at all. What you see is what you hit, and there is no animation or model spazzing. The only time crouch changes your model and hitbox is when you're on the ground.
When chaining jumps, the effect is not permanent, and is pretty much negligible in the overall scheme of things. All that happens is your fade will insta crouch as you touch the ground, then go back into a jump, which isn't abusive or exploitative imo.
That picture shows the fade on the ground. I'm pretty sure when in the air the jump animation overrides and does not blend with the crouch animation. The hitbox is based entirely on the model, so if they are crouching and on the ground it will appear "smaller" but in the air the hitbox should look exactly like the jumping animation. All the crouch holding effectively does as I have see it is shrink the collision box allowing you to pass under low hanging ceilings.
I have honestly never seen the crouch animation play while using jump, and it was common thing to do on the SS-DJ fade in previous builds.
edit: That said, for science I will record a third person view of the fade after I am off work here and post the results.
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
edited July 2013
It does @industry, i just checked.
Also, i tested the hitbox and it is also effected by crouching.
This is because the fade doesn't use his jumping animation (which would be ideal, considering it makes him a larger target) he instead uses his walking animation while blinking.
Here's an example:
250 didn't change anything as far as crouching with your fade goes... it's always been a good idea to crouch while fading. It's the same thing as using strafe while walljumping. It's unnecessary and a little harder to do, but it gives you a slight advantage.
I just rebound crouch to M4... that solved the problem for me
I use jump for M1, shadowstep for m2, crouch on m4, and blink is ctrl. I should probably swap the shadowstep and blink around though, that's what I was using for the old fade movement but I guess I've just gotten used to it now. Having crouch and jump bound to mouse makes it a lot easier to play fade though.
It does @industry, i just checked.
Also, i tested the hitbox and it is also effected by crouching.
This is because the fade doesn't use his jumping animation (which would be ideal, considering it makes him a larger target) he instead uses his walking animation while blinking.
Here's an example:
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
edited July 2013
@industry : that whole presentation is invalid because the "thirdperson" cheat command does not properly display world view animations.
Try it with onos to see what i mean.
But yes, when you tap jump on the ground it will over ride crouch.
But this doesn't mean you cant enter a room from blink (Which you frequently do) holding crouch.
The solution is for blink to use the jump animation like it used to.
This blends /transitions better with the blink > jump jump > blink mechanics
Its an easier target to see and track
It forbids any crouch animation from occurring
As a bonus it looks far better than the walking in air visual we currently have.
@industry : that whole presentation is invalid because the "thirdperson" cheat command does not properly display world view animations.
Try it with onos to see what i mean.
But yes, when you tap jump on the ground it will over ride crouch.
But this doesn't mean you cant enter a room from blink (Which you frequently do) holding crouch.
The solution is for blink to use the jump animation like it used to.
This blends /transitions better with the blink > jump jump > blink mechanics
Its an easier target to see and track
It forbids any crouch animation from occurring
As a bonus it looks far better than the walking in air visual we currently have.
I redid it having a friend record from his perspective on a live server, no cheats, no console commands. It looks the same (only I did the blinkhop slowwwwwwww as hell)
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
edited July 2013
Lol.. it completely depends on how you use it, considering the only time the animation changes to crouch is in blink.
Look, the way i see it is:
Relying on a "Don't get stuck" button that is not intuitive or communicated anywhere is poor design and completely avoidable.
A momentary spasm of an animation that changes the size of the target you're tracking as well as lessening the size of it's hitbox, that is not intuitive or communicated anywhere, is a bug at best and an exploit at worst.
There's no reason to have this mechanic.
Make blink use the jumping animation and either make the fade's collision box "crouch sized" all the time, or only when going faster than X speed.
I see no downside to this proposal, do you?
[*]Relying on a "Don't get stuck" button that is not intuitive or communicated anywhere is poor design and completely avoidable.
Crouch is not a "don't get stuck" button. It does exactly what you would expect it to do intuitively. Pressing crouch makes you.. crouch. It's still up to the player to "not get stuck", and for the most part you can blink around maps like summit perfectly fine without crouch. Infact, the only thing unintuitive about the current system we have is actually the opposite - that your model does not appear to crouch in the air when you press crouch (out of blink).
Along with wasd/space/shift/weapon numbers, cntrl is very much a part of the universal standard set way back by games like HL when it comes to FPS movement. You can't get anymore intuitive. It really is the equivalent of saying marines should not be able to crouch because jumping over boxes is unintuitive (crouch makes you crouch, not apply a coat of anti stick). Any player should be able to hop into a game and straight away have wasd, cntrl, shift, space do exactly what they'd expect without reading manuals or keybind options. The game should neither hand hold through automation nor remove these functionalities, especially when it comes to a PC game. Consoles get a free ticket because well.. controllers - you don't get many auto-cover based FPS games hitting it big in the PC market.
[*]A momentary spasm of an animation that changes the size of the target you're tracking as well as lessening the size of it's hitbox, that is not intuitive or communicated anywhere, is a bug at best and an exploit at worst.
Don't think it's really that big in the overall scheme of things since holding down blink is so ineffective and inefficient. If you are minimising damage from sg, you want to be permanently crouching during blink - crouch spazz is not to your benefit. If you are minimising damage from lmg, crouch spazz doesn't change the fact that your still easy as hell to track due to limited blink air control.
It might be a minor problem for some people though, so i don't see the harm in using jump animation only during blink. For consistency sake anyway (since you can't crouch animation in air out of blink)
Make blink use the jumping animation and either make the fade's collision box "crouch sized" all the time, or only when going faster than X speed.
I see no downside to this proposal, do you?
- The first solution is ok with very little potential downside. Though i personally don't really see much need to implement it, yea it would probably be a good improvement. The last two solutions however will be very problematic.
- Perma crouch collision size will mean marines easily jumping over fades, hiding in fades, model clipping etc. Or rather from your view, jumping through your face. Then when you try to blink into a vent, you end up bouncing off because your collision box is way below your camera. You have either these problems, or you make FP view constantly the same height as a gorge or however high crouched fade is.
- It is very unintuitive to have a speed line (that you as a player have no feedback of without debug speed) that suddenly makes your collision box smaller. Not to mention such a mechanic actively biases the game against new players (who cannot yet go fast enough).
twilitebluebug stalkerJoin Date: 2003-02-04Member: 13116Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue
edited July 2013
I agree that Fades need their collision boxes made smaller while blinking (to its crouching size). It's quite a nuisance having to crouch, even when blinking, before a Fade can squeeze into a vent.
It was enlarged (nerfed) to its standing hitbox size a while ago, which was suppose to enable marines to "block Fades from escaping" (lol).
Any player should be able to hop into a game and straight away have wasd, cntrl, shift, space do exactly what they'd expect without reading manuals or keybind options. The game should neither hand hold through automation nor remove these functionalities, especially when it comes to a PC game.
Who said anything about preventing the user from crouching? :-0
- Perma crouch collision size will mean marines easily jumping over fades, hiding in fades, model clipping etc. Or rather from your view, jumping through your face. Then when you try to blink into a vent, you end up bouncing off because your collision box is way below your camera. You have either these problems, or you make FP view constantly the same height as a gorge or however high crouched fade is.
These things already occur?
Marines are currently able to go over as well as through, crouching and even non crouching fades, depending on latency.
But that being said: The box would only be reduced in width to match the crouched box size?
This means the crouched collision box's alignment to the FP view does not need to be adjusted, it'd be at the same exact position as it's in, except now you would always be able to fly into vents regardless of crouching.
This does not impact the height of the collision box what so ever, and would not create scenarios where marines would be able to suddenly jump over or walk under fades, because the height of either box is not being altered - only it's width:
All i see is a collision box which is obviously being drawn wrong. Either that, or it really is bugged. Horizontal (diagonally too) instead of vertical. Although i'm more inclined to believe it's the former, since the last time i can remember running through fade legs as a skulk or sinking into the ground as a fade was like never.
Why we're even bothering trying to discuss collision reduction in the context of an already horribly broken, or wrongly represented collision box is beyond me.
*There is a third possibility
Collision in ns2 makes no sense, since contact with map geometry is somehow being determined without the help of collision boxes (from your pictures, that would be the floor). If so, then I think I'll leave this discussion for more technically minded people.
I normally agree with your posts ironhorse, but don't on this one.
I just don't see how crouching to make yourself smaller while bhopping is unintuitive, crouching to make yourself smaller makes perfect sense to me. Want to get in that small vent? Crouch. Want to bhop through that tight corridor with a low ceiling? Crouch. I've been doing it without even thinking about it before this thread popped up.
I normally agree with your posts ironhorse, but don't on this one.
I just don't see how crouching to make yourself smaller while bhopping is unintuitive, crouching to make yourself smaller makes perfect sense to me. Want to get in that small vent? Crouch. Want to bhop through that tight corridor with a low ceiling? Crouch. I've been doing it without even thinking about it before this thread popped up.
Thats just it though, you dont make yourself smaller during normal travel, or hopping. See industry's video above.
You only crouch while blinking, because the blink animation moved from displaying the jumping animation to the walking animation when the new movement code was brought in.
Its a bug.
One that provides a tiny bit of benefit to a user who knows what they are doing, and is only momentary and visually inconsistent if not. Its not a huge deal, but should be fixed.
As far as the collision pill goes, there would be no downside to lessening the width of it to match the crouching size, other than the inability to block fades ... which.. doesn't really happen too often anyways, especially with increasing word of mouth to crouch.
You really shouldn't have to ever hold crouch to not get stuck on things in the world that are to your left and right of you. Thats not remotely intuitive or communicated.
edit: unless of course what elodea said is correct, and the collision shapes are shown incorrectly, in which case another solution is needed.
I hope they're shown incorrectly... In the top left picture, the standing collision pill looks like it should be rotated 90º. It appears to be using the fades vertical height as a horizontal collision pill, and its width as the vertical collision pill
I really have no idea what I'm talking about when it comes to these sorts of things, so I could totally be wrong... but those pictures definitely don't look right lol.
This is yet another time I'm glad started using odd controls years ago. Holding the space bar to crouch forever is so simple, and all the other fade movements (other than wasd of course) are on the mouse so a bit of practice should bring me up to speed on the new fade (still have < 2 hours fading in 250).
After reading this discussion the only thing I see that needs fixed is the blink animation needs reverted back to the fade's jump animation (unless in a vent). Crouching as always been very intuitive... Been like that from the first fps to use it and doesn't need changed. I enjoy ns2 because it brings back memories of older great fps, not because its realistic. Quit trying to fix things that work and how about we fix things that are broken...
IronHorseDeveloper, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributorJoin Date: 2010-05-08Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
edited July 2013
@side1bu2rnz9 Argh.. people keep using that "crouch has always been intuitive" argument... I am not proposing crouch stops making you go down, either in direction or animation.
People aren't using it to go down, or hardly even to make themselves a smaller target, (though its possible) they recommend it to not get stuck as much on the things to the left and right of you.
Tell me one game where crouching makes you not collide with things to the left or right of you, ignoring height, that would have otherwise?
@side1bu2rnz9 Argh.. people keep using that "crouch has always been intuitive" argument... I am not proposing crouch stops making you go down, either in direction or animation.
People aren't using it to go down, or hardly even to make themselves a smaller target, (though its possible) they recommend it to not get stuck as much on the things to the left and right of you.
Tell me one game where crouching makes you not collide with things to the left or right of you, ignoring height, that would have otherwise?
@IronHorse I don't know where the left or right thing fits in... Honestly I don't use crouch often unless I need to fly into a vent or over a clog wall. I sometimes use it when it makes sense to crouch when going thru a doorway that's lower than the floor (exit of Atrium towards Reactor). But that makes sense to me... If you were a flying creature trying to fly through a low ceiling door wouldn't you crouch to avoid hitting your head? Silly example and question but I honestly don't get the argument to auto-crouch or something like that. Why not just make aliens auto-jump or Lerks auto-glide?
The issue i have is that crouch makes your collision smaller width wise, not just height wise, and that is what i find to be completely unintuitive about it.
No one would expect the "duck" key to make you magically thinner.
This doesn't mean i advocate for crouch to be removed, though. I just want the collision fixed so that it won't be needed for that use, and can be used instead for movement and vents etc.
Crouch does change your model, even in air, because the fade's crouch animation plays. Makes him a smaller target.
The actual difference is not as big as it seems, though... at least when you approach the Fade from the side. The diameter of the model is smaller when crouching, yes, but overall "surface to hit" is about equal. The only difference is a slightly larger overlap of legs and claws, but it's not too dramatic.
@side1bu2rnz9 Argh.. people keep using that "crouch has always been intuitive" argument... I am not proposing crouch stops making you go down, either in direction or animation.
People aren't using it to go down, or hardly even to make themselves a smaller target, (though its possible) they recommend it to not get stuck as much on the things to the left and right of you.
Tell me one game where crouching makes you not collide with things to the left or right of you, ignoring height, that would have otherwise?
I would really like to get clarification on the horizontal collision box.
Also, crouch is recommended so that you don't hit your head on the ceiling, and absolutely not to avoid hitting things on your left and right.
*I too would like the horizontal box fixed and realigned into a vertical box if that be the case.
So crouching during blink decreases hitbox and collision box? And crouching after blink (i.e. while jumping to conserve momentum) decreases collision box but not hitbox? Just trying to clear this up.
I think the "crouch being unintuitive" thing is probably directed at skulks instead? I really dunno (cause I don't understand how it applies to fades if you're talking about colliding with things left or right, but this topic's about fades so who knows...). If so, yeah, pressing a key that is designated to crouching in order to unattach a wall (or to prevent attaching to walls) doesn't make immediate sense - really though, it probably only has that function because it beats having an entirely seperate key for it, so may aswell designate an already commonly used key to do this that isn't otherwise used for the lifeform. Otherwise, Ctrl would just be an empty unused key when playing skulks (or lerks). May as well give the key a function, rather than having people press N or something.
Comments
The fade's crouching animation does play, making him a smaller target.
I've recommended that the animation simply not play when going over X speed.
When chaining jumps, the effect is not permanent, and is pretty much negligible in the overall scheme of things. All that happens is your fade will insta crouch as you touch the ground, then go back into a jump, which isn't abusive or exploitative imo.
Makes him a smaller target.
I haven't tested the hitbox. See newer posts below.
Just saying the fade is a smaller target as a result of this method.
I have honestly never seen the crouch animation play while using jump, and it was common thing to do on the SS-DJ fade in previous builds.
edit: That said, for science I will record a third person view of the fade after I am off work here and post the results.
Also, i tested the hitbox and it is also effected by crouching.
This is because the fade doesn't use his jumping animation (which would be ideal, considering it makes him a larger target) he instead uses his walking animation while blinking.
Here's an example:
I use jump for M1, shadowstep for m2, crouch on m4, and blink is ctrl. I should probably swap the shadowstep and blink around though, that's what I was using for the old fade movement but I guess I've just gotten used to it now. Having crouch and jump bound to mouse makes it a lot easier to play fade though.
For your viewing pleasure.
http://www.twitch.tv/industrylol/c/2556921
Try it with onos to see what i mean.
But yes, when you tap jump on the ground it will over ride crouch.
But this doesn't mean you cant enter a room from blink (Which you frequently do) holding crouch.
The solution is for blink to use the jump animation like it used to.
This blends /transitions better with the blink > jump jump > blink mechanics
Its an easier target to see and track
It forbids any crouch animation from occurring
As a bonus it looks far better than the walking in air visual we currently have.
I redid it having a friend record from his perspective on a live server, no cheats, no console commands. It looks the same (only I did the blinkhop slowwwwwwww as hell)
http://www.twitch.tv/pajamazlol/b/428703606
Look, the way i see it is:
There's no reason to have this mechanic.
Make blink use the jumping animation and either make the fade's collision box "crouch sized" all the time, or only when going faster than X speed.
I see no downside to this proposal, do you?
Along with wasd/space/shift/weapon numbers, cntrl is very much a part of the universal standard set way back by games like HL when it comes to FPS movement. You can't get anymore intuitive. It really is the equivalent of saying marines should not be able to crouch because jumping over boxes is unintuitive (crouch makes you crouch, not apply a coat of anti stick). Any player should be able to hop into a game and straight away have wasd, cntrl, shift, space do exactly what they'd expect without reading manuals or keybind options. The game should neither hand hold through automation nor remove these functionalities, especially when it comes to a PC game. Consoles get a free ticket because well.. controllers - you don't get many auto-cover based FPS games hitting it big in the PC market.
Don't think it's really that big in the overall scheme of things since holding down blink is so ineffective and inefficient. If you are minimising damage from sg, you want to be permanently crouching during blink - crouch spazz is not to your benefit. If you are minimising damage from lmg, crouch spazz doesn't change the fact that your still easy as hell to track due to limited blink air control.
It might be a minor problem for some people though, so i don't see the harm in using jump animation only during blink. For consistency sake anyway (since you can't crouch animation in air out of blink)
- The first solution is ok with very little potential downside. Though i personally don't really see much need to implement it, yea it would probably be a good improvement. The last two solutions however will be very problematic.
- Perma crouch collision size will mean marines easily jumping over fades, hiding in fades, model clipping etc. Or rather from your view, jumping through your face. Then when you try to blink into a vent, you end up bouncing off because your collision box is way below your camera. You have either these problems, or you make FP view constantly the same height as a gorge or however high crouched fade is.
- It is very unintuitive to have a speed line (that you as a player have no feedback of without debug speed) that suddenly makes your collision box smaller. Not to mention such a mechanic actively biases the game against new players (who cannot yet go fast enough).
It was enlarged (nerfed) to its standing hitbox size a while ago, which was suppose to enable marines to "block Fades from escaping" (lol).
Who said anything about preventing the user from crouching? :-0
Neither do i, but its worth fixing still, especially for competent andren fades.
These things already occur?
Marines are currently able to go over as well as through, crouching and even non crouching fades, depending on latency.
But that being said:
The box would only be reduced in width to match the crouched box size?
This means the crouched collision box's alignment to the FP view does not need to be adjusted, it'd be at the same exact position as it's in, except now you would always be able to fly into vents regardless of crouching.
This does not impact the height of the collision box what so ever, and would not create scenarios where marines would be able to suddenly jump over or walk under fades, because the height of either box is not being altered - only it's width:
Any downsides you still see?
Why we're even bothering trying to discuss collision reduction in the context of an already horribly broken, or wrongly represented collision box is beyond me.
*There is a third possibility
Collision in ns2 makes no sense, since contact with map geometry is somehow being determined without the help of collision boxes (from your pictures, that would be the floor). If so, then I think I'll leave this discussion for more technically minded people.
I just don't see how crouching to make yourself smaller while bhopping is unintuitive, crouching to make yourself smaller makes perfect sense to me. Want to get in that small vent? Crouch. Want to bhop through that tight corridor with a low ceiling? Crouch. I've been doing it without even thinking about it before this thread popped up.
You only crouch while blinking, because the blink animation moved from displaying the jumping animation to the walking animation when the new movement code was brought in.
Its a bug.
One that provides a tiny bit of benefit to a user who knows what they are doing, and is only momentary and visually inconsistent if not. Its not a huge deal, but should be fixed.
As far as the collision pill goes, there would be no downside to lessening the width of it to match the crouching size, other than the inability to block fades ... which.. doesn't really happen too often anyways, especially with increasing word of mouth to crouch.
You really shouldn't have to ever hold crouch to not get stuck on things in the world that are to your left and right of you. Thats not remotely intuitive or communicated.
edit: unless of course what elodea said is correct, and the collision shapes are shown incorrectly, in which case another solution is needed.
I really have no idea what I'm talking about when it comes to these sorts of things, so I could totally be wrong... but those pictures definitely don't look right lol.
This is yet another time I'm glad started using odd controls years ago. Holding the space bar to crouch forever is so simple, and all the other fade movements (other than wasd of course) are on the mouse so a bit of practice should bring me up to speed on the new fade (still have < 2 hours fading in 250).
People aren't using it to go down, or hardly even to make themselves a smaller target, (though its possible) they recommend it to not get stuck as much on the things to the left and right of you.
Tell me one game where crouching makes you not collide with things to the left or right of you, ignoring height, that would have otherwise?
@IronHorse I don't know where the left or right thing fits in... Honestly I don't use crouch often unless I need to fly into a vent or over a clog wall. I sometimes use it when it makes sense to crouch when going thru a doorway that's lower than the floor (exit of Atrium towards Reactor). But that makes sense to me... If you were a flying creature trying to fly through a low ceiling door wouldn't you crouch to avoid hitting your head? Silly example and question but I honestly don't get the argument to auto-crouch or something like that. Why not just make aliens auto-jump or Lerks auto-glide?
Exactly what i wasn't referring to
The issue i have is that crouch makes your collision smaller width wise, not just height wise, and that is what i find to be completely unintuitive about it.
No one would expect the "duck" key to make you magically thinner.
This doesn't mean i advocate for crouch to be removed, though. I just want the collision fixed so that it won't be needed for that use, and can be used instead for movement and vents etc.
Still, +1 for no crouch animation while blinking.
Also, crouch is recommended so that you don't hit your head on the ceiling, and absolutely not to avoid hitting things on your left and right.
*I too would like the horizontal box fixed and realigned into a vertical box if that be the case.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=o-50GjySwew#t=17s
I think the "crouch being unintuitive" thing is probably directed at skulks instead? I really dunno (cause I don't understand how it applies to fades if you're talking about colliding with things left or right, but this topic's about fades so who knows...). If so, yeah, pressing a key that is designated to crouching in order to unattach a wall (or to prevent attaching to walls) doesn't make immediate sense - really though, it probably only has that function because it beats having an entirely seperate key for it, so may aswell designate an already commonly used key to do this that isn't otherwise used for the lifeform. Otherwise, Ctrl would just be an empty unused key when playing skulks (or lerks). May as well give the key a function, rather than having people press N or something.