The new Dev team should implement the performance/balance warning for >24 slot servers discussed in another thread.
I completely agree with you. We definitely discussed it at one of the meetings. It's not in the scope for 266, but I'm going to go put it in our wishlist!
i haven't really read this thread at all, because it's ridiculous, i mean 10 goddam pages, look at this thing, but something that i wish more people would realize:
most higher level competitive players almost never play in pub servers. i'm on a div 2 team and i can't bring myself to play in a pub. it just isn't interesting. nobody on my team plays pubs in any regular way, and I think most div 2 players don't (at least in the NA scene). and as you go into div 1 / premiere, those players are even less likely to pub. if anything they'll just want to get warmed up working on their aim or whatever, i usually join a combat server to do that or do some private warmups with a teammate.
i guess my point is this: blaming this on competitive players is missing the target. some competitive players pub stomp (wtf mikan, 500k? really?) but most want nothing to do with pubs. it actually usually makes us worse at the game. the guys you see pub stomping are usually not very involved with competitive, if at all. usually once people get into competitive they realize that pub stomping is dumb and nobody cares.
it's already a hard life being a competitive ns2 player. you have to wait around all day for pugs to get going, or until another team finally gets on so you can scrim. i wouldn't be surprised if i spend more time idling in mumble than i do actually playing ns2. we really do a lot for the ns2 scene, making sure there's structured high level play to watch, and most of the improvements to the game like ns2+ basically came out of the competitive scene. it's troubling when people blame us for pub stompers.
i haven't really read this thread at all, because it's ridiculous, i mean 10 goddam pages, look at this thing, but something that i wish more people would realize:
most higher level competitive players almost never play in pub servers. i'm on a div 2 team and i can't bring myself to play in a pub. it just isn't interesting. nobody on my team plays pubs in any regular way, and I think most div 2 players don't (at least in the NA scene). and as you go into div 1 / premiere, those players are even less likely to pub. if anything they'll just want to get warmed up working on their aim or whatever, i usually join a combat server to do that or do some private warmups with a teammate.
i guess my point is this: blaming this on competitive players is missing the target. some competitive players pub stomp (wtf mikan, 500k? really?) but most want nothing to do with pubs. it actually usually makes us worse at the game. the guys you see pub stomping are usually not very involved with competitive, if at all. usually once people get into competitive they realize that pub stomping is dumb and nobody cares.
it's already a hard life being a competitive ns2 player. you have to wait around all day for pugs to get going, or until another team finally gets on so you can scrim. i wouldn't be surprised if i spend more time idling in mumble than i do actually playing ns2. we really do a lot for the ns2 scene, making sure there's structured high level play to watch, and most of the improvements to the game like ns2+ basically came out of the competitive scene. it's troubling when people blame us for pub stompers.
I disagree with you almost entirely, unless I read something incorrectly.
I've been in multiple pubs where 1 or 2 div 1 or 2 have decimated the other side. This happened 2 nights ago, in fact.
The new suggestion also allows people to CHOOSE if they want a handicap.
But yes, as of now, there are few servers to play on so it's almost like telling good players to leave.
in my experience what you're describing is the exception. if a couple rounds a day get stomped by some comp players, i see that as a good thing. saying that pub games are usually not enjoyable because comp players are just constantly stomping people is invalid.
in my experience what you're describing is the exception. if a couple rounds a day get stomped by some comp players, i see that as a good thing. saying that pub games are usually not enjoyable because comp players are just constantly stomping people is invalid.
Just had 5 more rounds of stomping by 2 or 3 players . Needless to say, 5 f4s. Not all pub games are this way. But honestly, this handicap can't do any bad. Tbh, it'd balance things and increase skill (if player chooses to use it).
The handicap sounds good on paper but once you play a few games with it I think you will understand why its a bad idea... Sure the worst that can happen is people don't use it, but IMO it shows a lack of understanding for the true problem.
First, people need to be realistic. Any 'comp' player trying to challenge them-self in a pub is either full of ****, or making stuff up. Playing pubs only reinforces bad playstyles, outside of a few specific routines to try to improve awareness. Playing with 10% or 100% damage WONT make the game any more challenging, it just lessens your impact. While this would theoretically allow you to play your hardest and adjust your impact accordingly, it completely breaks any 'muscle memory' that you would have and or improve with, and therefore probably ends up being WORSE for practice than normal pubbing.
Then there's the fact that its optional, so your standard 'pubstomper' would never turn this on.
This would never be able to make games of NS2 'skill neutral', simply because it would require everyone to adjust their impact down to the worst player in the game... Most games have some kind of skill<>power curve, and by no means should that be completely removed. NS2 does allow for the individual to have more power than some games, but its real flaw is that it never teaches players how to appropriately counter that.
There's some merit to trying to fix this problem, but there is a good amount of misunderstanding here.. there is a clear difference between some playing who is just of higher skill than others in the game, and someone who is playing to pubstomp. They require different solutions, and this thread seems to treat them as one and the same.
Playing with 10% or 100% damage WONT make the game any more challenging, it just lessens your impact. While this would theoretically allow you to play your hardest and adjust your impact accordingly, it completely breaks any 'muscle memory' that you would have and or improve with, and therefore probably ends up being WORSE for practice than normal pubbing.
I dont think this is true.
I remember seeing a video of some comp-player (Wob?) practising with a shotgun vs a fade-friend with extra-low damage to train muscle memory.
How's that so different from pubbing-with-low-damage?
I think it might be good training really...
The handicap sounds good on paper but once you play a few games with it I think you will understand why its a bad idea... Sure the worst that can happen is people don't use it, but IMO it shows a lack of understanding for the true problem.
First, people need to be realistic. Any 'comp' player trying to challenge them-self in a pub is either full of ****, or making stuff up. Playing pubs only reinforces bad playstyles, outside of a few specific routines to try to improve awareness. Playing with 10% or 100% damage WONT make the game any more challenging, it just lessens your impact. While this would theoretically allow you to play your hardest and adjust your impact accordingly, it completely breaks any 'muscle memory' that you would have and or improve with, and therefore probably ends up being WORSE for practice than normal pubbing.
Then there's the fact that its optional, so your standard 'pubstomper' would never turn this on.
This would never be able to make games of NS2 'skill neutral', simply because it would require everyone to adjust their impact down to the worst player in the game... Most games have some kind of skill<>power curve, and by no means should that be completely removed. NS2 does allow for the individual to have more power than some games, but its real flaw is that it never teaches players how to appropriately counter that.
There's some merit to trying to fix this problem, but there is a good amount of misunderstanding here.. there is a clear difference between some playing who is just of higher skill than others in the game, and someone who is playing to pubstomp. They require different solutions, and this thread seems to treat them as one and the same.
I would never say handicap is the solution. I personally like the idea of a handicap system because it would allow me to train and teach and play together with rookies without having a too hugh impact on the game.
I'm not saying this fixes pub stombing in any way it just helps vets to avoid pub stombing.
Also it's not meant for pros to be used all the time because as you say that would reallly mess up their 'muscle memory'.
I agree with the fact that to stop pub stomb rookies have to learn how to stop those ppl, to learn that i would say that there should be a server environment where rookies can slowly learn and discover those things by their own ( rookie only servers ).
In the past i tried to make such a skill based server system possible but ended up that it was ways to hard to seed those servers. To solve this it would help to have a working skill rating and some kind of public matchmaking to fill those servers.
Overall i don't think that pub stombing can be "fixed" in any way. People who pubstomb imho do that mainly because the want to feel cool by their k/d. Anyone who really knows ns2 and really loves this game finds that boring anyway and the ppl who want to have high k/ds will always find a way to get those (pub stombing, cheating etc.)
Overall to avoid the feeling of unbalanced teams and to overpowered individuals we need different systems to lower that feeling.
1. Allow ppl to play and learn the game with even skilled players via a skill based server system.
2. Teach rookies how to stop those "overpowered" players (here the handicap system might get handy).
3. Maybe make it harder to pubstomb / reaching really high k/ds by balancing the ns2 skill/power system abit more.
TL;DR: Overall imho there is not that one thing to stop pubstombing at all, just a buch of things that can be done to lower the risk that pub stombing happens. PPL who want to pub stomb will always do so in some way. We can only make it harder for them.
The handicap system was never really addressed to fix pubstombing it's just a nice optimal way for vets having fun to play and teach rookies and lower skilled players while lowering their effect on the round.
Also it allows vets to show rookies their "goodwill".
Playing with 10% or 100% damage WONT make the game any more challenging, it just lessens your impact. While this would theoretically allow you to play your hardest and adjust your impact accordingly, it completely breaks any 'muscle memory' that you would have and or improve with, and therefore probably ends up being WORSE for practice than normal pubbing.
I dont think this is true.
I remember seeing a video of some comp-player (Wob?) practising with a shotgun vs a fade-friend with extra-low damage to train muscle memory.
How's that so different from pubbing-with-low-damage?
I think it might be good training really...
That is in the context of training. Not playing in an actual game where not only do you have to at least try to be an effective player (which means killing those fades, not just meatshotting them with handicapped shotgun blasts, which any mildly-competant fade should survive), but things actually have consequences (e.g. not getting your shotgun back when you die). When training low-damage shotgun vs fade - all you have to worry about is practicing getting your meatshots in. If you can hit your meatshots in practice you should be able to hit them in game, so the skill you're training translates over.
However, there are a few elements of gameplay where having a handicapped play would be bad training. For example, if you're used to being able to 1-shot a skulk with a shotgun at a greater distance than the handicap allows, playing with a handicap would force you to get used to letting the skulks get closer, which you wouldn't otherwise do. Thus you are training bad habits for non-handicapped play.
If the handicap reduces damage so much such that you can't even 1-shot a skulk even with all the bullets hitting, that would completely change the way you approach how you use the shotgun (e.g. there's no kill range, so you would see less of people letting skulks get into meatshot range before firing, as doing so won't prevent them from biting you at least once), and thus form bad habits.
Then there's LMG. When fighting multiple skulks you rely on your ability to judge that you've accurately tracked the enemy for enough bullets to kill one, so you can move from one enemy to the next in quick succession. Instead, with a handicap, you have to track an enemy much longer than you've trained yourself to, which can again, cause bad habits.
These issues are only really of concern to super-competitive players who don't want anything to effect their muscle memory and whatnot. Although one could argue that playing in a pub forms bad habits as it is.
Yea, for more or less the reasons @d0ped0g posted above, I'd never use the handicap. With lmg, you can compensate pretty easily imo. But shotgun battles requires a way too big adjustment.
well i just been trying out the handicap mod on the thirsty onos servers and i must say i really like it, i set the nerf at "40% nerfed" and it makes skulk bite do 45 instead of 75, provides more of a challenge especially when the marines tech up.
I should reiterate that I'm not against a voluntary handicap system. I was just responding to the debate on whether it could potentially be bad for muscle memory.
There's no reason to disclude a voluntary tool for handicapping players as long as the playerbase understands that there are perhaps plenty of reasons to not want to play with a handicap on - beyond 'lol lets stomp some scrubs' (which will only be a reason for a very very very VERY small minority)
If such a tool becomes official, let's try and avoid the next few threads on stacking/stomping being full of anecdotes about stompers refusing to handicap themselves. It needs to be their choice whether to handicap.
Playing with 10% or 100% damage WONT make the game any more challenging, it just lessens your impact. While this would theoretically allow you to play your hardest and adjust your impact accordingly, it completely breaks any 'muscle memory' that you would have and or improve with, and therefore probably ends up being WORSE for practice than normal pubbing.
I dont think this is true.
I remember seeing a video of some comp-player (Wob?) practising with a shotgun vs a fade-friend with extra-low damage to train muscle memory.
How's that so different from pubbing-with-low-damage?
I think it might be good training really...
The point of this drill is to extend the duration of the fight against a player with good movement to practice tracking and timing. Doing this during a pub game against players with poor movement just reinforces bad habits and breaks your timing.
Initially, I thought that the Handicap mod would help with players self-regulating. But thinking further, and reading some of the posts in here, its really not going to solve anything. The players that will use it already self-regulate by gorging, commanding, pistols only, etc. The players that really cause the problems don't want to handicap themselves, they want to see those huge kdrs and high scores.
The real solution has to be some form of matchmaking, functional tutorials, and server skill-labeling system. I do find it astonishing that so many players with hundreds of hours have so little game sense. Then I remember that they take a very different approach to the game than I do. I play to win, to figure out the most effective strategies to get things done. Most players play to play - meaning to fuck around for the most part. My point is, if we can figure out a way to design tutorials to make things like route-blocking 'fun', then we might find the entire situation improve drastically.
I do find it astonishing that so many players with hundreds of hours have so little game sense. Then I remember that they take a very different approach to the game than I do. I play to win, to figure out the most effective strategies to get things done. Most players play to play - meaning to fuck around for the most part.
I just wanted to pick out these few sentences from Golden to say that I also understand this about people; I just don't understand why the "fucking around" attitude should then lead to abuse to players who are beating them.
It's Super Effective!Join Date: 2012-08-28Member: 156625Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow
Until such a time that said tutorials, matchmaking and skill labeling system is created and perfected in NS2.
Also I'd like to note that players can plateau in terms of skill, so while we all want to believe that with training/understanding that a rookie player can eventually match a pro vet player, there are certainty people who have put enormous amounts of hours into NS2 or can't put as many hours into the game. As such these players might not be able to develop the reaction or eye hand coordination necessary to compete against people who are better than them.
And with a dwindling player base, I feel that the better players should take the initiative to bend over backwards if only a little to ensure that such players aren't turned off by the game so easily, at least until they have made the decision to put the time into tackling the learning curve.
Again, I don't see what harm this will do for NS2 as it is completely optional.
What I mean by that are things like dmg output reduction, hp reduction, energy pool reduction. Things like that that will be unnoticeable to the less skilled player so their experience doesn't change at the same time allowing the skilled player to be as try hard as they want. That is the only practical solution to this problem that I see. A first step would be completely player controlled using a console command "sv_damage x" where x can be a value from .1 to 1.0 and indicates the % damage you want to do that round. Might be a good first step at maintaining player retention since vets and noobs will always be in the same server.
Also, really? Are you honestly trying to use hive stats as a reliable measure of something? I could give a list of reasons of how or why you shouldn't do that, like egg locking or the algorithm utilized etc, but I don't think I have to even do that.. I think I can safely say that it's (unfortunately) universally accepted as a measure of nothing really, in its current form.
What @current1y said is spot on in every way, and I've always loved his voluntary handicap idea - it's an eloquent solution Imo.
Hell, even I have inadvertently emptied a server before because I didn't want to hold back. There is just such a skill gap allowed for by design.
Ok, so I guess these 3 'top'-players in hive didn't actually go on UWE official rookie servers and get 1000+ points every single game.
I really don't want to know who implemented this mechanics in the game if it can't even record the names of the last played servers properly and obviously the algorithm to calculate the points is so bad that these players (who played absolutely normal rounds an average servers) have an outcome of 1000+ every game.
I suggest you use your influence then to make UWE fix one last thing in this game and remove all the hive bulls*** again.
Also I don't get why noone is using their brains and try to adress the main problems of this comminuty. It has been mentioned hunderts of times in this thread now that the skill gap between players is the problem that leads to all this mess. Are you guys really that shortsighted and think a mechanics like a handicap will help this game? Do you really think it's a good idea to reward mistakes made by bad players by giving them the kill and a good feeling because they just 'pwned' or in their mind maybe even 'outplayed' a pro player? This way you even reward the ignorance of some players who just do not want to improve and learn the basics of the game. Of course this might lower the frustration of these players who normally get stomped because they play braindead, but in the end it leads to an even larger skillgap and even more braindeads on the servers.
Thank you and congratulations for giving a dying game its quietus...
The new Dev team should implement the performance/balance warning for >24 slot servers discussed in another thread.
I personally would disable this option (hack) completely but i think this is never happen.
Why?
Cause 80-90% of the players on these servers are new to the game.
How can they learn positioning if it doesnt matter?
How can they learn aim on an horrible rubberbanding server wich halfed fps?
Im sure these kind of servers are one reason why the pub playerskill is so low at the moment.
They should have just locked this game at 16/18 player slots a long time ago. Not only is it more balanced, it would stop a lot of client/server performance complaints, and it would populate more servers. I've never seen a server that can properly handle anything above that. There are a few decent 22/24 slot servers, but they also struggle under load when you have those crazy games that drag out forever and the entity limit is maxed on both sides.
As such these players might not be able to develop the reaction or eye hand coordination necessary to compete against people who are better than them.
Everyone seems to keep focusing on this type of statement.
THIS IS NOT THE AREA THAT WOB/ANZESTRAL/KING_YO/ETC. HAVE BEEN SUGGESTING PLAYERS NEED TO IMPROVE.
When I first started playing competitive NS2 (which is when I started playing the game) I was unable to compete on a strictly reactionary level with any of the players I competed against. I made up for it, and still do as my aim isn't the strongest these days, by trying to perfect my positioning (macro and micro) and out-thinking my opponent. If you've ever watched my stream or PUG'ed with me, you've probably heard me call out what the opposing team is going to do a good 10-12 seconds before they do it.
This is the kind of area where all the competitive players are suggesting that pub players improve. In pattern-recognition, in responding to situations faster, in learned the faster ways to cross the map, in positioning themselves in such a way that they don't have to shoot 30% accuracy to get a kill. You can buy yourself so much time to aim just by standing a little bit further back in the room. It isn't hard stuff.
The problem is that those of us that already know these things find it hard to impart our knowledge on people that have shown that they just don't want to learn. You mention some small change they could make to their play to improve by a large margin (10% on an arbitrary, made up skill curve), and what do they do? They argue with you. For 10 minutes. About how their way is better, or you're a no-life loser that can't get laid.
I don´t think a voluntarily handicap mechanic would fix the pub stomping problem but since it might reduce the impact of one player on the game it could help lessen the hostile attitude against (higher div) competitive players. I have to admit that I still think that matchmaking mechanics could help to solve this problem to an extent but alternatively we could create real rookie friendly server which we advertise to players. [DePara created one in previous posts and he told me it hasn´t been used at all]
Regarding new players as well as "bad" players:
1. FUN
Many people who start a sport just want to have fun. Depending on the complexity of the sport they only know a little to nothing about the sport. If the sport is fun, they continue to practise it and if not they stop doing so. /-> rookies on rookieserver get annhilated and leave the game.
Tried this game today...
...and am pretty disappointed. I got it from a sale a while back, but all i've gotten is two hours of annoyance and no desire to try it again.
I find the asymmetric sides interesting, but it doesn't feel very balanced. I've joined 3 different games, each time the marines were being slaughtered. I haven't even been able to play as alien yet, the team was always full.
2. ORGANIZATION / TRAINER
A lot of sports have a experienced player or paid trainer who organizes the training sessions and because King yo mentioned tennis I will refer to it as example.
Yes, it is indeed fun to hit the ball over the net. However, to do so one has to master the skill. Therefore, tennis players of all age groups and skill levels are teached basic movement / stroke techniques. Players try to learn the skill and often get feedback from their trainer and other players. With increasing time the challenges grow and people get a feeling of achievement. (Fun)
Next to this there exist HOBBY sport activities which often do not require you to be skilled. For them having fun is more important than improvement. Learning happens naturally and is not supervised. People do what they thinks works best. There is little to no supervison to help to get rid of a bad playstyle.
At some point both of these players will have mastered the art of hiting a ball over the net. Who do you think will have the better technique?
A lot of Natural Selection 2 players have left us because they belong to this FUN / HOBBY category and do not want to learn and do not use helpful material offered to them.
(I have teached people on servers walljumping / offered around 20+ people to teach them / created a rookie group collecting many Ns2 video guides)
I would love to have a mentor programm such as TF2 which is acessible and displayed on the main ingame screen. Let "teachers" help people before they feel like the guy I have quoted from the steam discussion forums.
The problem is that those of us that already know these things find it hard to impart our knowledge on people that have shown that they just don't want to learn. You mention some small change they could make to their play to improve by a large margin (10% on an arbitrary, made up skill curve), and what do they do? They argue with you. For 10 minutes. About how their way is better, or you're a no-life loser that can't get laid.
The problem, as I see it, is that they are not improving, the how doesn't really matter. It doesn't matter if everyone you approach listens to you and becomes a decent player, you just can't reach enough to make a difference. You are just changing whether they are with you or against you.
As I said before, I'm confident that if a server only has the same ~50 regulars playing, given time, the skill level will improve, especially with coaching. However, if the server attracts some hundreds or thousands of different people a week, the skill level is likely to be stagnant. Some people will improve, but if the traffic is too high, it doesn't really change your experience on the server.
Unless you have some miracle approach that really increases the skill level of everyone, I think segregation is the way to go. That's just me though, if I didn't think people will leave faster than people will join, I'd probably be arguing for a closed community where people can only join after they meet minimum requirements.
dePARAJoin Date: 2011-04-29Member: 96321Members, Squad Five Blue
edited June 2014
NS2 is no game for the masses and it never going to be one.
The design is against the trend of dumbed down games and this is great,
Im sure many of new players never played a game like NS or NS2 before where you have to invest time to learn the basics.
Maybe a "warning" @ 1st start can prepare them.
Something like "NS2 need some time to master. Dont give up and try to join rookie servers within the first 50hrs"
As such these players might not be able to develop the reaction or eye hand coordination necessary to compete against people who are better than them.
Everyone seems to keep focusing on this type of statement.
THIS IS NOT THE AREA THAT WOB/ANZESTRAL/KING_YO/ETC. HAVE BEEN SUGGESTING PLAYERS NEED TO IMPROVE.
When I first started playing competitive NS2 (which is when I started playing the game) I was unable to compete on a strictly reactionary level with any of the players I competed against. I made up for it, and still do as my aim isn't the strongest these days, by trying to perfect my positioning (macro and micro) and out-thinking my opponent. If you've ever watched my stream or PUG'ed with me, you've probably heard me call out what the opposing team is going to do a good 10-12 seconds before they do it.
This is the kind of area where all the competitive players are suggesting that pub players improve. In pattern-recognition, in responding to situations faster, in learned the faster ways to cross the map, in positioning themselves in such a way that they don't have to shoot 30% accuracy to get a kill. You can buy yourself so much time to aim just by standing a little bit further back in the room. It isn't hard stuff.
The problem is that those of us that already know these things find it hard to impart our knowledge on people that have shown that they just don't want to learn. You mention some small change they could make to their play to improve by a large margin (10% on an arbitrary, made up skill curve), and what do they do? They argue with you. For 10 minutes. About how their way is better, or you're a no-life loser that can't get laid.
Pardon me if I'm misunderstanding your method, but you seems to be saying "put time in and get better or too bad" after all if you could do it, then anyone can. (and I don't mean that to be offensive). Certainty there is a debate about Nature versus Nurture here, but I won't go into that.
As we all have preached, yes trial and error and practise is a solid route, but that takes times, and certainty with the inclusion of decent tutorials, match making, skill detection, etc will make everything honkey dorkey and get to the root of the problem, but they take time to make.
However, we all also know that they don't exist or are inadequate. No time is wasted in using this Handicap system as it is already created as a mod, and who knows how long it will take for the CDT or anyone to create a robust super solution, how much time are we willing to bank on NS2's future by hoping people will get better. I just feel there is more we can do rather than playing the tough love card.
What solution would you suggest that we can complete in the interim?, because "put time in and get better or too bad" is what we've been doing for a very long time, and looking at our player retention, it hasn't been working out.
As such these players might not be able to develop the reaction or eye hand coordination necessary to compete against people who are better than them.
Everyone seems to keep focusing on this type of statement.
THIS IS NOT THE AREA THAT WOB/ANZESTRAL/KING_YO/ETC. HAVE BEEN SUGGESTING PLAYERS NEED TO IMPROVE.
When I first started playing competitive NS2 (which is when I started playing the game) I was unable to compete on a strictly reactionary level with any of the players I competed against. I made up for it, and still do as my aim isn't the strongest these days, by trying to perfect my positioning (macro and micro) and out-thinking my opponent. If you've ever watched my stream or PUG'ed with me, you've probably heard me call out what the opposing team is going to do a good 10-12 seconds before they do it.
This is the kind of area where all the competitive players are suggesting that pub players improve. In pattern-recognition, in responding to situations faster, in learned the faster ways to cross the map, in positioning themselves in such a way that they don't have to shoot 30% accuracy to get a kill. You can buy yourself so much time to aim just by standing a little bit further back in the room. It isn't hard stuff.
The problem is that those of us that already know these things find it hard to impart our knowledge on people that have shown that they just don't want to learn. You mention some small change they could make to their play to improve by a large margin (10% on an arbitrary, made up skill curve), and what do they do? They argue with you. For 10 minutes. About how their way is better, or you're a no-life loser that can't get laid.
Pardon me if I'm misunderstanding your method, but you seems to be saying "put time in and get better or too bad" after all if you could do it, then anyone can. (and I don't mean that to be offensive). Certainty there is a debate about Nature versus Nurture here, but I won't go into that.
As we all have preached, yes trial and error and practise is a solid route, but that takes times, and certainty with the inclusion of decent tutorials, match making, skill detection, etc will make everything honkey dorkey and get to the root of the problem, but they take time to make.
However, we all also know that they don't exist or are inadequate. No time is wasted in using this Handicap system as it is already created as a mod, and who knows how long it will take for the CDT or anyone to create a robust super solution, how much time are we willing to bank on NS2's future by hoping people will get better. I just feel there is more we can do rather than playing the tough love card.
What solution would you suggest that we can complete in the interim?, because "put time in and get better or too bad" is what we've been doing for a very long time, and looking at our player retention, it hasn't been working out.
your numerous uses of certainty where i presume you mean certainly, misspelling of practice, and butchering of hunky dory... is troubling... please edit yourself in the future.
Comments
I completely agree with you. We definitely discussed it at one of the meetings. It's not in the scope for 266, but I'm going to go put it in our wishlist!
I will be testing Ghoul's Handicap mod on Survival of the Fattest tonight if people want to try it out.
most higher level competitive players almost never play in pub servers. i'm on a div 2 team and i can't bring myself to play in a pub. it just isn't interesting. nobody on my team plays pubs in any regular way, and I think most div 2 players don't (at least in the NA scene). and as you go into div 1 / premiere, those players are even less likely to pub. if anything they'll just want to get warmed up working on their aim or whatever, i usually join a combat server to do that or do some private warmups with a teammate.
i guess my point is this: blaming this on competitive players is missing the target. some competitive players pub stomp (wtf mikan, 500k? really?) but most want nothing to do with pubs. it actually usually makes us worse at the game. the guys you see pub stomping are usually not very involved with competitive, if at all. usually once people get into competitive they realize that pub stomping is dumb and nobody cares.
it's already a hard life being a competitive ns2 player. you have to wait around all day for pugs to get going, or until another team finally gets on so you can scrim. i wouldn't be surprised if i spend more time idling in mumble than i do actually playing ns2. we really do a lot for the ns2 scene, making sure there's structured high level play to watch, and most of the improvements to the game like ns2+ basically came out of the competitive scene. it's troubling when people blame us for pub stompers.
I disagree with you almost entirely, unless I read something incorrectly.
I've been in multiple pubs where 1 or 2 div 1 or 2 have decimated the other side. This happened 2 nights ago, in fact.
The new suggestion also allows people to CHOOSE if they want a handicap.
But yes, as of now, there are few servers to play on so it's almost like telling good players to leave.
If this Player Self-Imposed Handicap does go in then we can all get back to playing and enjoying NS2 the way we want and together regardless of skill.
Comp players, non comp players, rookies, it doesn't matter, please don't go down the blame game again, that's done.
First, people need to be realistic. Any 'comp' player trying to challenge them-self in a pub is either full of ****, or making stuff up. Playing pubs only reinforces bad playstyles, outside of a few specific routines to try to improve awareness. Playing with 10% or 100% damage WONT make the game any more challenging, it just lessens your impact. While this would theoretically allow you to play your hardest and adjust your impact accordingly, it completely breaks any 'muscle memory' that you would have and or improve with, and therefore probably ends up being WORSE for practice than normal pubbing.
Then there's the fact that its optional, so your standard 'pubstomper' would never turn this on.
This would never be able to make games of NS2 'skill neutral', simply because it would require everyone to adjust their impact down to the worst player in the game... Most games have some kind of skill<>power curve, and by no means should that be completely removed. NS2 does allow for the individual to have more power than some games, but its real flaw is that it never teaches players how to appropriately counter that.
There's some merit to trying to fix this problem, but there is a good amount of misunderstanding here.. there is a clear difference between some playing who is just of higher skill than others in the game, and someone who is playing to pubstomp. They require different solutions, and this thread seems to treat them as one and the same.
I dont think this is true.
I remember seeing a video of some comp-player (Wob?) practising with a shotgun vs a fade-friend with extra-low damage to train muscle memory.
How's that so different from pubbing-with-low-damage?
I think it might be good training really...
I would never say handicap is the solution. I personally like the idea of a handicap system because it would allow me to train and teach and play together with rookies without having a too hugh impact on the game.
I'm not saying this fixes pub stombing in any way it just helps vets to avoid pub stombing.
Also it's not meant for pros to be used all the time because as you say that would reallly mess up their 'muscle memory'.
I agree with the fact that to stop pub stomb rookies have to learn how to stop those ppl, to learn that i would say that there should be a server environment where rookies can slowly learn and discover those things by their own ( rookie only servers ).
In the past i tried to make such a skill based server system possible but ended up that it was ways to hard to seed those servers. To solve this it would help to have a working skill rating and some kind of public matchmaking to fill those servers.
Overall i don't think that pub stombing can be "fixed" in any way. People who pubstomb imho do that mainly because the want to feel cool by their k/d. Anyone who really knows ns2 and really loves this game finds that boring anyway and the ppl who want to have high k/ds will always find a way to get those (pub stombing, cheating etc.)
Overall to avoid the feeling of unbalanced teams and to overpowered individuals we need different systems to lower that feeling.
1. Allow ppl to play and learn the game with even skilled players via a skill based server system.
2. Teach rookies how to stop those "overpowered" players (here the handicap system might get handy).
3. Maybe make it harder to pubstomb / reaching really high k/ds by balancing the ns2 skill/power system abit more.
TL;DR: Overall imho there is not that one thing to stop pubstombing at all, just a buch of things that can be done to lower the risk that pub stombing happens. PPL who want to pub stomb will always do so in some way. We can only make it harder for them.
The handicap system was never really addressed to fix pubstombing it's just a nice optimal way for vets having fun to play and teach rookies and lower skilled players while lowering their effect on the round.
Also it allows vets to show rookies their "goodwill".
i think the handicap is a fine idea, but i think a real solution needs to be at the server level.
but were they comp players?
That is in the context of training. Not playing in an actual game where not only do you have to at least try to be an effective player (which means killing those fades, not just meatshotting them with handicapped shotgun blasts, which any mildly-competant fade should survive), but things actually have consequences (e.g. not getting your shotgun back when you die). When training low-damage shotgun vs fade - all you have to worry about is practicing getting your meatshots in. If you can hit your meatshots in practice you should be able to hit them in game, so the skill you're training translates over.
However, there are a few elements of gameplay where having a handicapped play would be bad training. For example, if you're used to being able to 1-shot a skulk with a shotgun at a greater distance than the handicap allows, playing with a handicap would force you to get used to letting the skulks get closer, which you wouldn't otherwise do. Thus you are training bad habits for non-handicapped play.
If the handicap reduces damage so much such that you can't even 1-shot a skulk even with all the bullets hitting, that would completely change the way you approach how you use the shotgun (e.g. there's no kill range, so you would see less of people letting skulks get into meatshot range before firing, as doing so won't prevent them from biting you at least once), and thus form bad habits.
Then there's LMG. When fighting multiple skulks you rely on your ability to judge that you've accurately tracked the enemy for enough bullets to kill one, so you can move from one enemy to the next in quick succession. Instead, with a handicap, you have to track an enemy much longer than you've trained yourself to, which can again, cause bad habits.
These issues are only really of concern to super-competitive players who don't want anything to effect their muscle memory and whatnot. Although one could argue that playing in a pub forms bad habits as it is.
+1 for the handicap mod
There's no reason to disclude a voluntary tool for handicapping players as long as the playerbase understands that there are perhaps plenty of reasons to not want to play with a handicap on - beyond 'lol lets stomp some scrubs' (which will only be a reason for a very very very VERY small minority)
If such a tool becomes official, let's try and avoid the next few threads on stacking/stomping being full of anecdotes about stompers refusing to handicap themselves. It needs to be their choice whether to handicap.
The point of this drill is to extend the duration of the fight against a player with good movement to practice tracking and timing. Doing this during a pub game against players with poor movement just reinforces bad habits and breaks your timing.
Initially, I thought that the Handicap mod would help with players self-regulating. But thinking further, and reading some of the posts in here, its really not going to solve anything. The players that will use it already self-regulate by gorging, commanding, pistols only, etc. The players that really cause the problems don't want to handicap themselves, they want to see those huge kdrs and high scores.
The real solution has to be some form of matchmaking, functional tutorials, and server skill-labeling system. I do find it astonishing that so many players with hundreds of hours have so little game sense. Then I remember that they take a very different approach to the game than I do. I play to win, to figure out the most effective strategies to get things done. Most players play to play - meaning to fuck around for the most part. My point is, if we can figure out a way to design tutorials to make things like route-blocking 'fun', then we might find the entire situation improve drastically.
I just wanted to pick out these few sentences from Golden to say that I also understand this about people; I just don't understand why the "fucking around" attitude should then lead to abuse to players who are beating them.
Yes. Div 1 and 2.
Can't blame them too much; there aren't too many populated servers.
Also I'd like to note that players can plateau in terms of skill, so while we all want to believe that with training/understanding that a rookie player can eventually match a pro vet player, there are certainty people who have put enormous amounts of hours into NS2 or can't put as many hours into the game. As such these players might not be able to develop the reaction or eye hand coordination necessary to compete against people who are better than them.
And with a dwindling player base, I feel that the better players should take the initiative to bend over backwards if only a little to ensure that such players aren't turned off by the game so easily, at least until they have made the decision to put the time into tackling the learning curve.
Again, I don't see what harm this will do for NS2 as it is completely optional.
Plus Match making with Hive ranking server , players no longer have to AFK and wait in server with low ping
Ok, so I guess these 3 'top'-players in hive didn't actually go on UWE official rookie servers and get 1000+ points every single game.
I really don't want to know who implemented this mechanics in the game if it can't even record the names of the last played servers properly and obviously the algorithm to calculate the points is so bad that these players (who played absolutely normal rounds an average servers) have an outcome of 1000+ every game.
I suggest you use your influence then to make UWE fix one last thing in this game and remove all the hive bulls*** again.
Also I don't get why noone is using their brains and try to adress the main problems of this comminuty. It has been mentioned hunderts of times in this thread now that the skill gap between players is the problem that leads to all this mess. Are you guys really that shortsighted and think a mechanics like a handicap will help this game? Do you really think it's a good idea to reward mistakes made by bad players by giving them the kill and a good feeling because they just 'pwned' or in their mind maybe even 'outplayed' a pro player? This way you even reward the ignorance of some players who just do not want to improve and learn the basics of the game. Of course this might lower the frustration of these players who normally get stomped because they play braindead, but in the end it leads to an even larger skillgap and even more braindeads on the servers.
Thank you and congratulations for giving a dying game its quietus...
They should have just locked this game at 16/18 player slots a long time ago. Not only is it more balanced, it would stop a lot of client/server performance complaints, and it would populate more servers. I've never seen a server that can properly handle anything above that. There are a few decent 22/24 slot servers, but they also struggle under load when you have those crazy games that drag out forever and the entity limit is maxed on both sides.
Everyone seems to keep focusing on this type of statement.
THIS IS NOT THE AREA THAT WOB/ANZESTRAL/KING_YO/ETC. HAVE BEEN SUGGESTING PLAYERS NEED TO IMPROVE.
When I first started playing competitive NS2 (which is when I started playing the game) I was unable to compete on a strictly reactionary level with any of the players I competed against. I made up for it, and still do as my aim isn't the strongest these days, by trying to perfect my positioning (macro and micro) and out-thinking my opponent. If you've ever watched my stream or PUG'ed with me, you've probably heard me call out what the opposing team is going to do a good 10-12 seconds before they do it.
This is the kind of area where all the competitive players are suggesting that pub players improve. In pattern-recognition, in responding to situations faster, in learned the faster ways to cross the map, in positioning themselves in such a way that they don't have to shoot 30% accuracy to get a kill. You can buy yourself so much time to aim just by standing a little bit further back in the room. It isn't hard stuff.
The problem is that those of us that already know these things find it hard to impart our knowledge on people that have shown that they just don't want to learn. You mention some small change they could make to their play to improve by a large margin (10% on an arbitrary, made up skill curve), and what do they do? They argue with you. For 10 minutes. About how their way is better, or you're a no-life loser that can't get laid.
Regarding new players as well as "bad" players:
1. FUN
Many people who start a sport just want to have fun. Depending on the complexity of the sport they only know a little to nothing about the sport. If the sport is fun, they continue to practise it and if not they stop doing so. /-> rookies on rookieserver get annhilated and leave the game.
2. ORGANIZATION / TRAINER
A lot of sports have a experienced player or paid trainer who organizes the training sessions and because King yo mentioned tennis I will refer to it as example.
Yes, it is indeed fun to hit the ball over the net. However, to do so one has to master the skill. Therefore, tennis players of all age groups and skill levels are teached basic movement / stroke techniques. Players try to learn the skill and often get feedback from their trainer and other players. With increasing time the challenges grow and people get a feeling of achievement. (Fun)
Next to this there exist HOBBY sport activities which often do not require you to be skilled. For them having fun is more important than improvement. Learning happens naturally and is not supervised. People do what they thinks works best. There is little to no supervison to help to get rid of a bad playstyle.
At some point both of these players will have mastered the art of hiting a ball over the net. Who do you think will have the better technique?
A lot of Natural Selection 2 players have left us because they belong to this FUN / HOBBY category and do not want to learn and do not use helpful material offered to them.
(I have teached people on servers walljumping / offered around 20+ people to teach them / created a rookie group collecting many Ns2 video guides)
I would love to have a mentor programm such as TF2 which is acessible and displayed on the main ingame screen. Let "teachers" help people before they feel like the guy I have quoted from the steam discussion forums.
Greetings,
Warforce17
The problem, as I see it, is that they are not improving, the how doesn't really matter. It doesn't matter if everyone you approach listens to you and becomes a decent player, you just can't reach enough to make a difference. You are just changing whether they are with you or against you.
As I said before, I'm confident that if a server only has the same ~50 regulars playing, given time, the skill level will improve, especially with coaching. However, if the server attracts some hundreds or thousands of different people a week, the skill level is likely to be stagnant. Some people will improve, but if the traffic is too high, it doesn't really change your experience on the server.
Unless you have some miracle approach that really increases the skill level of everyone, I think segregation is the way to go. That's just me though, if I didn't think people will leave faster than people will join, I'd probably be arguing for a closed community where people can only join after they meet minimum requirements.
The design is against the trend of dumbed down games and this is great,
Im sure many of new players never played a game like NS or NS2 before where you have to invest time to learn the basics.
Maybe a "warning" @ 1st start can prepare them.
Something like "NS2 need some time to master. Dont give up and try to join rookie servers within the first 50hrs"
Pardon me if I'm misunderstanding your method, but you seems to be saying "put time in and get better or too bad" after all if you could do it, then anyone can. (and I don't mean that to be offensive). Certainty there is a debate about Nature versus Nurture here, but I won't go into that.
As we all have preached, yes trial and error and practise is a solid route, but that takes times, and certainty with the inclusion of decent tutorials, match making, skill detection, etc will make everything honkey dorkey and get to the root of the problem, but they take time to make.
However, we all also know that they don't exist or are inadequate. No time is wasted in using this Handicap system as it is already created as a mod, and who knows how long it will take for the CDT or anyone to create a robust super solution, how much time are we willing to bank on NS2's future by hoping people will get better. I just feel there is more we can do rather than playing the tough love card.
What solution would you suggest that we can complete in the interim?, because "put time in and get better or too bad" is what we've been doing for a very long time, and looking at our player retention, it hasn't been working out.
your numerous uses of certainty where i presume you mean certainly, misspelling of practice, and butchering of hunky dory... is troubling... please edit yourself in the future.