<!--quoteo(post=1811839:date=Nov 29 2010, 08:33 PM:name=Asraniel)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Asraniel @ Nov 29 2010, 08:33 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1811839"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->It would probably also lead to situations where one team is trapped in its base and the commander will give "useless" tasks in the hope that the gained XP for his soldiers will help him to break out.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I covered this in my original pitch for the "orders for xp" idea - did you read it? It would require playtesting to iron out all the abuse cases but this is by no means an impossible task. Second, the xp for players would never result in turning a game around - that is decided by individual skill and map position (i.e., the macro game). Finally, having teams on the ropes earning xp for a sustained "defend this area" order might be good morale boost for the frantically defending team. But will it save them? No.
<!--quoteo(post=1811839:date=Nov 30 2010, 12:33 AM:name=Asraniel)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Asraniel @ Nov 30 2010, 12:33 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1811839"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->i forgot to mention.
It would probably also lead to situations where one team is trapped in its base and the commander will give "useless" tasks in the hope that the gained XP for his soldiers will help him to break out.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Not sure what you mean by that? Griefing would have to be dealt with, time/distance/importance of tasks given.
But the comm at the moment can be abusive no matter what. He could just jump into the game and not even build anything, so any argument in that direction has no ground.
AsranielJoin Date: 2002-06-03Member: 724Members, Playtest Lead, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Retired Community Developer
while i agree that the commander needs an important role, i don't like the proposed solutions (for reasons i mentioned).
Now i think in NS1 it worked quite well, sure it could have been better, but natural selection is different from other shooters so people have to learn it first, listening to your commander is one of those things you have to learn.
Balancing a game with "minor" bonus stuff for people that follow orders will only increase the complexity of the balancing, so lets think about other solutions, if there are any needed.
I would say, or example the building part, it just needs to be clearer, like in ns1, that a building needs to be built, people will get that and help the mac, or help finish a building if the mac died. As they said, that will be done.
now perhaps a warning sign if you don't go into the direction the commander ordered could help too. In the end, if the commander is not able to motivate his troops, all is lost anyway. That is why i think commanding in NS is so challenging and interesting. Sometimes it is not clear where you have to go if the commander sets a waypoint, or you forget.
So, i would try to have non game changing ideas, that really try to make it clear to the player what he has to do. if he does not, well, then the team is lost, but that is the beauty of NS, teamplay at its best.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->i don't like the proposed solutions<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd--> +1
All i read is i want a reward task whatever system, but how this should work/be implemented... i read nothing. I cant think of a way to implement it right. I think its useless and only makes simple things just more complicated to manage as a commander.
The commander is a very important task, and I think it gets completely overlooked by people on here. Or that the answer is to water down the role because there is no way to deal with such a complex and deep role in the game.
But you are probably right. :P What probably just needs to happen is excellent communication and clarity of instructions fed to players. I still think that the comm (as a game play mechanic) will fail if it does not include some sort of 'ping bar' with access to all players, locations and status displayed on it. Etc.
Looking forward to seeing how the devs approach this.
AsranielJoin Date: 2002-06-03Member: 724Members, Playtest Lead, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Retired Community Developer
absolutely :)
actually in NS1 i rarely played com, now i really play starcraft2 a lot, and with my currently bad FPS i'm only playing alien com in NS2, so i really hope that the commander mode will be as good as possible.
Yes, some way to quickly access all players would be nice. In SC2 you can't do that, because you can have up to 400 units (zerglings), but there is no reason not to have a easy way to access them in NS2.
But anyway, they mentioned that they redo the commander interface, looking forward to that (and that i can use the hotkeys, they work 1 in 2/3 times currently).
Personally i found at least the alien commander role fun :) (i have less fps as a marine, and i play with esdf and not wasd, so i have right walking flashlight as marine..)
I still think my 5-star rating idea for the players is the best idea. It's very simple and not hard for the commander to do, and keeps newbs/rambo's away from precious resources. All the players start with 1 star, as they do good things or work as a team, commander gives them more stars.(stars can show up on their player model) Now there will also be a global +1 star to all players. so when an upgrade completes comm doesn't have to go around giving everyone a star etc. But he can go around and pick out the couple rambos and reduce them back to 0 or 1 stars so they can't buy shotguns or flamethrowers etc...Player with one star goes to the armory, no weapons for him just ammo. Zuruki suggested that this just hurts the marine team, cause some newb will be running around with an lmg. There should not be enough resources for the whole team to go flamthrower in the first place, there will ALWAYS be marines with lmg's even in late-game jus tlike there are still skulks late game. It's better to have the newbs have the lmg's rather than the good players get stuck with them because rambo keeps hogging the resources. Not to mention everyone would play nice. trying to get 5-star all over their character model.
how about if you go the opposite direction from your order (or some other condition set) your entire screen gets tinted red and you get a message saying
"MOVE TO YOUR WAY-POINT SOLIDER"
? :P
That's a less abusable stick.
A serious suggestion: Why just to give points on the score board (in the same way a mac kill is +2) for following orders... okay not everyone will do it as it doesn't buff you, but some people will like trying to make that score as high as possible even if it doesn't turn into a direct reward.
Yeah, I never like a final score based on kills and that would be excellent for publics. They seem to be introducing a 'kill assist' points system. It would be good to see the final outcome decided on a combination of:
Orders follow Squad work Kills Kill Assists Damage
Hardcoded punishments/rewards for following orders probably wouldn't work. There's always going to be ways to abuse the system, or conversely, the system may work against you. For example, Commander's don't always give orders explicitly using waypoints, and waypoints don't always mean "move there" (for example, marking hives with waypoints). And of course, players rarely need to actually "touch" the waypoint to complete it.
Why i think the waypoint system could be improved upon, to make it easier for marines to follow orders.
For example let the comm place markers on the map that are squad based, or ffa, show through walls for easy spotting. Could even go as far as letting commanders give specific route commands for marines by dragging the mouse on the map and it shows on the ground as a glowing line or something.
Markers would be generated based on what the commander clicks, for example if its a building that is not yet finished it shows a "needs help in construction" marker, or if the building was complete, it would add a "defend" marker, and add the "xp" bonus for completing the desired action. This of course would be hard to implement on attack based markers, since its hard to make the area clear where you would get said xp boost. But even if it would be just for helping the commander build stuff or defending a certain room the idea seems plausible to me.
I think it would be really cool for the way points to be shown as decals on the floor.
So if there is a 'hold position' order given, on the floor it actually says that. So anyone (even if not selected) can see it.
Also if build bots are being sent to a location, some sort of 'build bot on point' text on the floor.
If you are not in the room, it can just be as it is currently as floating triangles. Though I think there need to be vocal suggestions, like "hold position at point" rather than just a beep or something.
Comments
I covered this in my original pitch for the "orders for xp" idea - did you read it? It would require playtesting to iron out all the abuse cases but this is by no means an impossible task. Second, the xp for players would never result in turning a game around - that is decided by individual skill and map position (i.e., the macro game). Finally, having teams on the ropes earning xp for a sustained "defend this area" order might be good morale boost for the frantically defending team. But will it save them? No.
It would probably also lead to situations where one team is trapped in its base and the commander will give "useless" tasks in the hope that the gained XP for his soldiers will help him to break out.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Not sure what you mean by that? Griefing would have to be dealt with, time/distance/importance of tasks given.
But the comm at the moment can be abusive no matter what. He could just jump into the game and not even build anything, so any argument in that direction has no ground.
Now i think in NS1 it worked quite well, sure it could have been better, but natural selection is different from other shooters so people have to learn it first, listening to your commander is one of those things you have to learn.
Balancing a game with "minor" bonus stuff for people that follow orders will only increase the complexity of the balancing, so lets think about other solutions, if there are any needed.
I would say, or example the building part, it just needs to be clearer, like in ns1, that a building needs to be built, people will get that and help the mac, or help finish a building if the mac died. As they said, that will be done.
now perhaps a warning sign if you don't go into the direction the commander ordered could help too. In the end, if the commander is not able to motivate his troops, all is lost anyway. That is why i think commanding in NS is so challenging and interesting.
Sometimes it is not clear where you have to go if the commander sets a waypoint, or you forget.
So, i would try to have non game changing ideas, that really try to make it clear to the player what he has to do. if he does not, well, then the team is lost, but that is the beauty of NS, teamplay at its best.
+1
All i read is i want a reward task whatever system, but how this should work/be implemented... i read nothing. I cant think of a way to implement it right. I think its useless and only makes simple things just more complicated to manage as a commander.
But you are probably right. :P What probably just needs to happen is excellent communication and clarity of instructions fed to players. I still think that the comm (as a game play mechanic) will fail if it does not include some sort of 'ping bar' with access to all players, locations and status displayed on it. Etc.
Looking forward to seeing how the devs approach this.
actually in NS1 i rarely played com, now i really play starcraft2 a lot, and with my currently bad FPS i'm only playing alien com in NS2, so i really hope that the commander mode will be as good as possible.
Yes, some way to quickly access all players would be nice. In SC2 you can't do that, because you can have up to 400 units (zerglings), but there is no reason not
to have a easy way to access them in NS2.
But anyway, they mentioned that they redo the commander interface, looking forward to that (and that i can use the hotkeys, they work 1 in 2/3 times currently).
Personally i found at least the alien commander role fun :) (i have less fps as a marine, and i play with esdf and not wasd, so i have right walking flashlight as marine..)
<img src="http://images.macrumors.com/article/2008/10/28/091124-rating.jpg" border="0" class="linked-image" />
;)
"MOVE TO YOUR WAY-POINT SOLIDER"
? :P
That's a less abusable stick.
A serious suggestion: Why just to give points on the score board (in the same way a mac kill is +2) for following orders... okay not everyone will do it as it doesn't buff you, but some people will like trying to make that score as high as possible even if it doesn't turn into a direct reward.
Orders follow
Squad work
Kills
Kill Assists
Damage
So that the 'all round' player is rewarded.
For example let the comm place markers on the map that are squad based, or ffa, show through walls for easy spotting. Could even go as far as letting commanders give specific route commands for marines by dragging the mouse on the map and it shows on the ground as a glowing line or something.
Markers would be generated based on what the commander clicks, for example if its a building that is not yet finished it shows a "needs help in construction" marker, or if the building was complete, it would add a "defend" marker, and add the "xp" bonus for completing the desired action. This of course would be hard to implement on attack based markers, since its hard to make the area clear where you would get said xp boost. But even if it would be just for helping the commander build stuff or defending a certain room the idea seems plausible to me.
Or just mod it
So if there is a 'hold position' order given, on the floor it actually says that. So anyone (even if not selected) can see it.
Also if build bots are being sent to a location, some sort of 'build bot on point' text on the floor.
If you are not in the room, it can just be as it is currently as floating triangles. Though I think there need to be vocal suggestions, like "hold position at point" rather than just a beep or something.