twilitebluebug stalkerJoin Date: 2003-02-04Member: 13116Members, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue
edited July 2016
When were the hitboxes changed?
From looking at the "new" alien hitboxes, they seem way too large. However, I do like the idea of enlarging hitboxes of body parts which undergo rapid wide motion, such as Marine legs, fade claws, and skulk feet.
FrozenNew York, NYJoin Date: 2010-07-02Member: 72228Members, Constellation
Even in competitive it was too hard for alot of better teams to really learn how to play aliens, so they would just resort to pack play, and it sort of just became meta. But realistically what was intense about the game was the 2-2 splits and knowing that you're entering a room as marine to 2-3 skulks, not just 50/50 rush with whole team pack play.
In the 2-2 split meta you would see one side win and that would apply pressure to your other side to adjust accordingly. Which eventually became pack play crushing all over the place.
Point being I agree with @MoFo1 above on his point about cheesy alien victories making the game feel pointless and not rewarding win or lose.
I posted this in the other thread, but it's relevant here as well. Here's an update on the balance situation:
Out of curiosity, do you have any more specific stats?
I'd love to see winrates on various game lengths, maps, playercounts and possibly skill levels if possible. The overall winrate is such a general thingy that it easily hides most horrid stuff and still looks ok.
On a side note, now that the comp scene is down for a count anyway, I don't think any kind of strict 50-50 target is even a necessary goal right away. You can get away with a bit of 60-40 or so as long as the rounds justify that by being meaningful and eventful and giving both teams a good feel that they have a fair winning chance and enough means to influence the outcome.
I've just begun to play matches with ATV, so I'm inexperienced... but in CS there were several comp maps that favoured one team over the other. de_train anyone?
So even with comp play in mind, having 60-40 W:L ratio is fine. We do switch sides, right?
EDIT:
But that spike in the graph.... this change is godawful. And I totally agree with @Bacillus that the aggregated stats can obscure serious flaws
This is by far the worst change I have ever seen made to this game, worse than 9 minute onos, worst than instant killing res biters, worst than adding and making them hmgs basically useless.
DC_DarklingJoin Date: 2003-07-10Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
First of can everyone who hasnt seen a ns2 server up close in any realistic fashion please refrain from posting about servers and their performance.. It clearly shows they know nothing of the topic.
On the actual topics topic, I see I got some disagrees of people who should know better, so perhaps to much opinion snuck in, in my story.. lets try again.
And no, there is no TLDR.
I had some chats with folk from the PT/PDT/CDT group so it got a bit more clear as to why this change was made.
From what I understand it was made mostly as a QoL improvement and not related to a balance fix.
Skulk edge was hit and the hitbox around that edge was meh.. Looking at certain angles at the old skulk, I can sort of see what they mean. (I TLDR this down significantly.)
So onwards on that note, I spot a few complaints which boil down to:
The fix is excellent. (a rare opinion, but probably what most devs uphold.)
The change is unneeded, there was nothing to fix.
A fix is needed but the change is not fixing what it is supposed to fix.
The change is fixing what it is supposed to fix, but the end result in total isn't worth it.
Now if we include the the above reasoning I got while talking it over we get the following results:
It can not be excellent. There is a clear negative result. So this 'problem' is incorrect.
There are examples of a somewhat problematic hitbox edge, so in essence a problem did exist. So this 'problem' is also incorrect.
The thing they wanted to fix is indeed fixed by enlarging hitboxes. You no longer have model parts overlapping the model. SO this 'problem is also incorrect'.
Which leaves the last 'problem'. The problem it should fix has been fixed, but here IS a significant negative downfall.
Ok so lets elaborate on that further. What is this collateral damage of negative results?
For that we need a little backstory.
For reasons the NSL scene exploded and near ended overnight a while back. Some NSL teams (Like ATV which im part of), still try.. but mostly comp matches are gone.
Due to the above reason most experienced players either need to play pub or not at all. (Gathers and pcw happen but rarely due to reasons.
A new influx of rookies has emerged in NS2 for a while now. On that regard PDT results seem to work.
Above mentioned rookies are in most cases of a lesser 'quality' then earlier rookie waves. Their willingness and aim to improve to a experienced player seems small. (Note I do not necessarily mean competitive player.)
Due to lack of skilled players (read fun matches) in pub, and the nsl going explosive, veterans are stopping to play. Skill is pubs is dropping.
Ok that was the situation before the hitbox patch.
Pub game quality was at a all time low. It was possible to get a few good matches on a day if enough reasonable skilled players joined both sides and over all strategy and communication happened on a light basis. As much as expected in pub. (Which in case anyone wonders, is not much at all. I am talking about a very low bar, NOT a standard you would expect in comp but much lower.)
Then a weird thing happened. Alien teams started to lose, almost every match.
When experienced players could usually do enough for the team to at least guide it into a reasonable match, this suddenly became problematic.
After all, no matter the carry player.. one player does not a good match make. While new players had been playing absolutely abysmal for a long while now, they suddenly seemed to hit a wall. Playing marines got even easier.
Rookies on marine side could suddenly devastate rookies on alien side.
Rookies on marine side could slightly easier kill experienced players.
Experienced players on marine side would just massacre compared to before.
3min egg locks became a thing.
Locking aliens on 1RT became much more doable.
As players got more annoyed, they played even more crap, which was amazing to see to begin with. (As in, that it could even be lower)
Which brings us down to this topic. So the hitbox changed.
It made it easier to shoot skulks. TO easy for the level of skill currently in public.
Most of the players in pub are in the inexperienced rookie category. In this category with rookie vs rookie, it just got a lot easier to play marine. Wins rarely to never happen.
Even experienced alien carries simply can not carry the alien team to victory, regardless of player role.
While buffing only rookie marines, and not rookie aliens, it also buffed experienced marines. The wrecking has increased.
While aliens needed some nerfs in certain fields, a overal nerf to alien basic lifeforms especially hurting the rookies, is a much to big a nerf. Most ideal would have been something affected mostly experienced players.
But it was not even MEANT as a nerf.. it was ment as a QoL improvement and sadly, while it fixed the specific issue, it made the overal quality A LOT worse.
So much that it is amazing that we did not read in these patch notes 'we tested this and it proved to not work as intended on the grand picture'.
What is happening? WHY?
I asked.
Few I spoke said they did not experience in pub what I just described.. interesting because it is everywhere.
* So do we/I use "Join now"?
Well yes, sometimes.. but usually its not needed. If only 2 to 3 servers are not full or empty then its easy to pick by recognising player names.
* "Do you join on friends?"
Of course. It is much more fun to play with teams with a good number of skilled players. Note here, and this is important, that when both teams have a certain minimum of skill on average in skilled players, that the issue at hand simply.. does not exist.
The person(s) I spoke to did not swap pub server to pub server & have many join on them.
Then yes, that IS the ideal situation. You wont end up in oceans of rookies.
Sadly, this is not always possible. If the not full servers have mostly rookies, you can either wait who knows how long, or simply join and make for the best. So their pub experience is skewed.
Also it brings to wonder how stats are read. Stats without proper interpretation mean nothing.
If most pub games see extreme alien defeat but overal stats look fine, it makes you wonder how they monitor. Is the fine part of the same servers at later time?
Did you check skill variations? Etc
Because simply playing multiple days on multiple pubs (in eu) shows exactly the opposite of fine. There is no fine.
The best pub match I had in months was on a RU server. I speak 0 russian. I can not talk to them. Even so, their overal play (and for me lack of communication) was milestones ahead of 'normal pub' because normal pub can simply not become worse. (feel free to lookup earlier post I made on the matter.)
I seriously hope more devs now at least are interested and more willing to inevstigate, or even see it is not fine.
Keep the changes if you want, but at least fix balance to the utmost minimal so that matches are doable again at any skill level.
Just played seven marine stomps in a row this morning, not even close to balanced and very frustrating, even though the teams kept changing and the best players weren't stacking every game. The fact that the previous hitboxes did not cover 100% of the skulk model seems to me to be a reason to fix the hitboxes in those areas, not a reason to just oversize the whole thing entirely.
From what I understand it was made mostly as a QoL improvement and not related to a balance fix.
Reduce the model then.
Seriously. If you didn't want any balance to change, reduce the model to "better" suit the hitbox. It would have a substantially less effect on balance. The only thing would change is that people might find it harder to perceive a smaller target, but aiming itself would actually be the same.
In case people had forgotten, all bullet traces were already adjusted previously to be a 'box'. So you could miss the model by about 2mm with most guns by default (and others much more *railgun*). This has the same effect as increasing the hitbox of everything.
So anyone saying you missed by the tiniest of amounts is generally incorrect, the game already allowed some leniency.
In case people had forgotten, all bullet traces were already adjusted previously to be a 'box'. So you could miss the model by about 2mm with most guns by default (and others much more *railgun*). This has the same effect as increasing the hitbox of everything.
So anyone saying you missed by the tiniest of amounts is generally incorrect, the game already allowed some leniency.
Whenever people complain about hitreg I always just said "you weren't aiming at the center of your target"
This is true and I keep telling that to myself, too, when I'm missing.
You could overcome allegedly bad hitreg by aiming at the center, but if the model is not properly covered by hitbox, then it kind of seems like an unfair noob trap.
Ironhorses screenshot
Now, I don't know if what dragon said is enough to fix the issue completely, but when in doubt I'd definitely give the benefit to the shooter though.
How many times do you see a skulk from the side at eye level? He would have to be jumping before you, tangential to your line of sight. That is a nuisance....
And yeah, since we don't have headshots, aiming anywhere but the center of mass is bad gameplay, as @Frozen said.
Also, see the bulge at the head? The legs? What about those? I even see logic behind enlarging the torso hitbox, but why would they enlarge legs and scythes? They should be as large as the model at max. A good patch would've been to fix those, not blow up (almost) everything
How many times do you see a skulk from the side at eye level? He would have to be jumping before you, tangential to your line of sight. That is a nuisance....
All the time when the skulk circle jumps around you.
Also, see the bulge at the head? The legs? What about those? I even see logic behind enlarging the torso hitbox, but why would they enlarge legs and scythes? They should be as large as the model at max. A good patch would've been to fix those, not blow up (almost) everything
Dunno, maybe something with animations. In any case Remi said he'd review it.
Whenever people complain about hitreg I always just said "you weren't aiming at the center of your target"
This is true and I keep telling that to myself, too, when I'm missing.
You could overcome allegedly bad hitreg by aiming at the center, but if the model is not properly covered by hitbox, then it kind of seems like an unfair noob trap.
Ironhorses screenshot
Now, I don't know if what dragon said is enough is enough to fix the issue completely, but when in doubt I'd definitely give the benefit to the shooter though.
Fix the problems with that hitbox instead of screw up all of it?
How many times do you see a skulk from the side at eye level? He would have to be jumping before you, tangential to your line of sight. That is a nuisance....
All the time when the skulk circle jumps around you.
Right, you got me thinking there. Good skulks change vertical velocity as much as horizontal...
And yeah, since we don't have headshots, aiming anywhere but the center of mass is bad gameplay, as @Frozen said.
Then there should be a hint that tells people to only shoot at the center, because there's no guarantee to hit, when you're aiming at its back.
Yes, there should be a tutorial explaining that there are no critical areas to hit. Every shot connected worths the same, head, torso, tip of the clawnail.
Also, see the bulge at the head? The legs? What about those? I even see logic behind enlarging the torso hitbox, but why would they enlarge legs and scythes? They should be as large as the model at max. A good patch would've been to fix those, not blow up (almost) everything
Dunno, maybe something with animations. In any case Remi said he'd review it.
Let us hope they really do that, like in the near future
Every time I see that picture of the old skulk hitbox I think "really... you screwed up so much to fix like a quarter centimeter of the skulk that wasn't covered?
Then they call it a "QoL" change that wasn't supposed to affect balance.... really?
From what I understand it was made mostly as a QoL improvement and not related to a balance fix.
Reduce the model then.
Seriously. If you didn't want any balance to change, reduce the model to "better" suit the hitbox. It would have a substantially less effect on balance. The only thing would change is that people might find it harder to perceive a smaller target, but aiming itself would actually be the same.
QoL fixed with negligible balance change.
So I call the devs liars and bar stewards.
Something along these lines makes the most sense. If the intention wasn't to change balance, then given that this very obviously *did* change balance (despite what that chart may seem to show), make some compensating change buffing alien survivability. Revert to old hitbox with better fitting models, or perhaps buff effective hp to adjust for the increased number of bullets landing. (Both would reduce instances of bullets *seeming* to hit while failing to actually register; the latter may be more enjoyable for new players.) Alternatively, if you did intend to change balance, then let's hear the rationale.
DC_DarklingJoin Date: 2003-07-10Member: 18068Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver
You know I thought a bit how to narrow this down even more clear and came up with a analogy.
Lets say you have a big beautiful red tapestry. Light red, dark red etc.. Its beyond superb and enthusiasts come from far and wide.
But a hole snuck in. Obviously this is a issue. It can spread, doing more damage and needs fixing.
So you take a yellow wire and fix the hole.
Now your problem is solved. The hole is fixed.
You notice the colours match well and decide to start planning out a multi-month plan to make yellow illustrations on said tapestry.
But right NOW you have a red tapestry, with a botched up hole fix. Right now, its ruined.
Enthusiasts coming to see the marvel of its creation now scream and wonder why this blasphemy has been performed.
I do not mind that much that the devs want that yellow illustration.
But can we rip out the yellow and put in some red until the whole picture is like done?
If such a small portion of the skulks hitbox was not that accurate, why not just adjust that small portion to fix it?
This was obviously not the intended purpose of this change, otherwise the size increase of the hitbox would have been smaller or they could of done what I just said.
But like I said before, I find it very hard to ascertain their motivations.
When I first tried NS2 in alpha days, I told a friend the skulk design was ridiculous because skulks seemed more like bulky dogs than the small and agile base lifeform they were meant to be. I got used to it over time, and skulk movement got a bit more fluid and slick, but my point still stands to a certain extent.
I like the idea of shrinking the skulk model but keeping the new hitbox. Proportionally, that is.
I went through different skulk positions in the viewer, took some screenshots and marked the parts I consider either too small in the old version or too big in the new version. I've tried to position the camera so that these parts are seen at their worst, while still being in a realistic shooting angle.
old hitbox
Not sure if you could actually miss when you shoot right there in the center.
new hitbox
The head needs a few more knots around the eyes. The mouth is too much.
I'd say that the legs were generally better in the old version. They already were a bit giving in the old.
back is too much
Even if the tracer does have a 2 mm tollerance, some areas would still be be unjustly more forgiving than others.
In case people had forgotten, all bullet traces were already adjusted previously to be a 'box'. So you could miss the model by about 2mm with most guns by default (and others much more *railgun*). This has the same effect as increasing the hitbox of everything.
So basically now NS2 is the NS2:Turbo mod, but without Onocide. You know what must be done (add Onocide)
@Bicsum yeah, we got it... but blowing up the boxes significantly instead of fixing the missing spots still makes no sense to a lot of us =/
Easier and faster to achieve?
Achieve what? Stomping? Skill ceiling? Or total boredom due to lack of further capacity to improve?
You guys make no sense at all, use us as beta testers after we've payed a fair amount for the game, and ignore every feedback that does not align with your preconceptions.
Pure madness. There should be an "Echo Chamber" hanging on the doors of UWE
Comments
From looking at the "new" alien hitboxes, they seem way too large. However, I do like the idea of enlarging hitboxes of body parts which undergo rapid wide motion, such as
Marine legs, fade claws, and skulk feet.
In the 2-2 split meta you would see one side win and that would apply pressure to your other side to adjust accordingly. Which eventually became pack play crushing all over the place.
Point being I agree with @MoFo1 above on his point about cheesy alien victories making the game feel pointless and not rewarding win or lose.
Out of curiosity, do you have any more specific stats?
I'd love to see winrates on various game lengths, maps, playercounts and possibly skill levels if possible. The overall winrate is such a general thingy that it easily hides most horrid stuff and still looks ok.
On a side note, now that the comp scene is down for a count anyway, I don't think any kind of strict 50-50 target is even a necessary goal right away. You can get away with a bit of 60-40 or so as long as the rounds justify that by being meaningful and eventful and giving both teams a good feel that they have a fair winning chance and enough means to influence the outcome.
So even with comp play in mind, having 60-40 W:L ratio is fine. We do switch sides, right?
EDIT:
But that spike in the graph.... this change is godawful. And I totally agree with @Bacillus that the aggregated stats can obscure serious flaws
On the actual topics topic, I see I got some disagrees of people who should know better, so perhaps to much opinion snuck in, in my story.. lets try again.
And no, there is no TLDR.
I had some chats with folk from the PT/PDT/CDT group so it got a bit more clear as to why this change was made.
From what I understand it was made mostly as a QoL improvement and not related to a balance fix.
Skulk edge was hit and the hitbox around that edge was meh.. Looking at certain angles at the old skulk, I can sort of see what they mean. (I TLDR this down significantly.)
So onwards on that note, I spot a few complaints which boil down to:
Now if we include the the above reasoning I got while talking it over we get the following results:
Ok so lets elaborate on that further. What is this collateral damage of negative results?
For that we need a little backstory.
Ok that was the situation before the hitbox patch.
Pub game quality was at a all time low. It was possible to get a few good matches on a day if enough reasonable skilled players joined both sides and over all strategy and communication happened on a light basis. As much as expected in pub. (Which in case anyone wonders, is not much at all. I am talking about a very low bar, NOT a standard you would expect in comp but much lower.)
Then a weird thing happened. Alien teams started to lose, almost every match.
When experienced players could usually do enough for the team to at least guide it into a reasonable match, this suddenly became problematic.
After all, no matter the carry player.. one player does not a good match make. While new players had been playing absolutely abysmal for a long while now, they suddenly seemed to hit a wall. Playing marines got even easier.
Rookies on marine side could suddenly devastate rookies on alien side.
Rookies on marine side could slightly easier kill experienced players.
Experienced players on marine side would just massacre compared to before.
3min egg locks became a thing.
Locking aliens on 1RT became much more doable.
As players got more annoyed, they played even more crap, which was amazing to see to begin with. (As in, that it could even be lower)
Which brings us down to this topic. So the hitbox changed.
It made it easier to shoot skulks. TO easy for the level of skill currently in public.
Most of the players in pub are in the inexperienced rookie category. In this category with rookie vs rookie, it just got a lot easier to play marine. Wins rarely to never happen.
Even experienced alien carries simply can not carry the alien team to victory, regardless of player role.
While buffing only rookie marines, and not rookie aliens, it also buffed experienced marines. The wrecking has increased.
While aliens needed some nerfs in certain fields, a overal nerf to alien basic lifeforms especially hurting the rookies, is a much to big a nerf. Most ideal would have been something affected mostly experienced players.
But it was not even MEANT as a nerf.. it was ment as a QoL improvement and sadly, while it fixed the specific issue, it made the overal quality A LOT worse.
So much that it is amazing that we did not read in these patch notes 'we tested this and it proved to not work as intended on the grand picture'.
What is happening? WHY?
I asked.
Few I spoke said they did not experience in pub what I just described.. interesting because it is everywhere.
* So do we/I use "Join now"?
Well yes, sometimes.. but usually its not needed. If only 2 to 3 servers are not full or empty then its easy to pick by recognising player names.
* "Do you join on friends?"
Of course. It is much more fun to play with teams with a good number of skilled players. Note here, and this is important, that when both teams have a certain minimum of skill on average in skilled players, that the issue at hand simply.. does not exist.
The person(s) I spoke to did not swap pub server to pub server & have many join on them.
Then yes, that IS the ideal situation. You wont end up in oceans of rookies.
Sadly, this is not always possible. If the not full servers have mostly rookies, you can either wait who knows how long, or simply join and make for the best. So their pub experience is skewed.
Also it brings to wonder how stats are read. Stats without proper interpretation mean nothing.
If most pub games see extreme alien defeat but overal stats look fine, it makes you wonder how they monitor. Is the fine part of the same servers at later time?
Did you check skill variations? Etc
Because simply playing multiple days on multiple pubs (in eu) shows exactly the opposite of fine. There is no fine.
The best pub match I had in months was on a RU server. I speak 0 russian. I can not talk to them. Even so, their overal play (and for me lack of communication) was milestones ahead of 'normal pub' because normal pub can simply not become worse. (feel free to lookup earlier post I made on the matter.)
I seriously hope more devs now at least are interested and more willing to inevstigate, or even see it is not fine.
Keep the changes if you want, but at least fix balance to the utmost minimal so that matches are doable again at any skill level.
Reduce the model then.
Seriously. If you didn't want any balance to change, reduce the model to "better" suit the hitbox. It would have a substantially less effect on balance. The only thing would change is that people might find it harder to perceive a smaller target, but aiming itself would actually be the same.
QoL fixed with negligible balance change.
So I call the devs liars and bar stewards.
So anyone saying you missed by the tiniest of amounts is generally incorrect, the game already allowed some leniency.
but muh satisfaction
This is true and I keep telling that to myself, too, when I'm missing.
You could overcome allegedly bad hitreg by aiming at the center, but if the model is not properly covered by hitbox, then it kind of seems like an unfair noob trap.
Ironhorses screenshot
Now, I don't know if what dragon said is enough to fix the issue completely, but when in doubt I'd definitely give the benefit to the shooter though.
And yeah, since we don't have headshots, aiming anywhere but the center of mass is bad gameplay, as @Frozen said.
Also, see the bulge at the head? The legs? What about those? I even see logic behind enlarging the torso hitbox, but why would they enlarge legs and scythes? They should be as large as the model at max. A good patch would've been to fix those, not blow up (almost) everything
Then there should be a hint that tells people to only shoot at the center, because there's no guarantee to hit, when you're aiming at its back.
Dunno, maybe something with animations. In any case Remi said he'd review it.
Fix the problems with that hitbox instead of screw up all of it?
Right, you got me thinking there. Good skulks change vertical velocity as much as horizontal...
Yes, there should be a tutorial explaining that there are no critical areas to hit. Every shot connected worths the same, head, torso, tip of the clawnail.
Let us hope they really do that, like in the near future
Then they call it a "QoL" change that wasn't supposed to affect balance.... really?
because the fade puts his arms up when blinking away, so theres no reason to increase chances of hitting a missed shot, that wasnt broken
because it increases the chances of meatshotting JUST the scythe, and that shouldn't happen. It's not dead space
Something along these lines makes the most sense. If the intention wasn't to change balance, then given that this very obviously *did* change balance (despite what that chart may seem to show), make some compensating change buffing alien survivability. Revert to old hitbox with better fitting models, or perhaps buff effective hp to adjust for the increased number of bullets landing. (Both would reduce instances of bullets *seeming* to hit while failing to actually register; the latter may be more enjoyable for new players.) Alternatively, if you did intend to change balance, then let's hear the rationale.
I eagerly await my lerk hp buff.
Lets say you have a big beautiful red tapestry. Light red, dark red etc.. Its beyond superb and enthusiasts come from far and wide.
But a hole snuck in. Obviously this is a issue. It can spread, doing more damage and needs fixing.
So you take a yellow wire and fix the hole.
Now your problem is solved. The hole is fixed.
You notice the colours match well and decide to start planning out a multi-month plan to make yellow illustrations on said tapestry.
But right NOW you have a red tapestry, with a botched up hole fix. Right now, its ruined.
Enthusiasts coming to see the marvel of its creation now scream and wonder why this blasphemy has been performed.
I do not mind that much that the devs want that yellow illustration.
But can we rip out the yellow and put in some red until the whole picture is like done?
This was obviously not the intended purpose of this change, otherwise the size increase of the hitbox would have been smaller or they could of done what I just said.
But like I said before, I find it very hard to ascertain their motivations.
I like the idea of shrinking the skulk model but keeping the new hitbox. Proportionally, that is.
old hitbox
new hitbox
The head needs a few more knots around the eyes. The mouth is too much.
Even if the tracer does have a 2 mm tollerance, some areas would still be be unjustly more forgiving than others.
So basically now NS2 is the NS2:Turbo mod, but without Onocide. You know what must be done (add Onocide)
Easier and faster to achieve?
Could you please read my post entirely?!
Achieve what? Stomping? Skill ceiling? Or total boredom due to lack of further capacity to improve?
You guys make no sense at all, use us as beta testers after we've payed a fair amount for the game, and ignore every feedback that does not align with your preconceptions.
Pure madness. There should be an "Echo Chamber" hanging on the doors of UWE
@Bicsum I have...
EDIT: grammar