Nethgilne
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Posts posted by Nethgilne
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Since the new strategy will be focusing more on the single player aspects of the game, I was wondering if BW devs have ever thought about some changes to subtler game play elements. Specifically, adding questing areas where there are not path, and quest markers.
Last night as I was playing a second toon through Rishi, I noticed that i had just turned on the minimap to get myself to the next quest point. Considering I had upgraded to a gaming PC from a 3 year old laptop in the meantime, It was a damn shame I didn't take the time to really explore and get a feel for the environment.
Then I remembered this
:To summarize: It's a comparison of Thief from 1999 to it's 2014 reincarnation, and pointed out a part of what made the older game fun was the lack of minimaps and quest markers. It forced the player to really explore the environment, appreciate it, and then master it.
I'd like some of that out of SWTOR
If Bio-ware is in the process of adding new areas, I hope they consider aspects of this philosophy and add areas designed not to use Minimaps and/or quest markers. Tell us general direction and distances where quest objectives are and we'll figure it out ourselves. Once again we'd feel a little like exploring instead of following a predetermined path. In addition, this will make seeker droid and micro-binocular quests that much more satisfying.
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So that's a new ability at 61, 62, 64 and 65? And here I thought they were trying to fix ability bloat
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Replace evasion with having to lead the target and gunships would have a lot bigger problems targeting things which moved fast. That, and resistance to drain/debuffs and shield piercing.
Pretty much this too. I don't know if rail guns are insta-hit weapons now or just very fast projectile speed, but if evasion stat is dumped, then I suppose rail guns bolts will need a travel time now. But, that is an entirely different topic
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Some kind of turnbased minigame based on random collectibles from dropped loot or cartel market. Either Sabacc or Dejarik
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Are save points and MMO's mutually exclusive? This is an interesting point that I've been thinking about for a while.
Actually, I have an exceedingly vague memory of something about character slots mentioned in a cantina tour sometime back. The statement was about expanding character slots, but the BW rep ( i forget who) also mentioned something about expanding something else in regards to how they saved player information. This memory of a memory is driving me nuts because I can't figure out if it's something I legitimately heard or just dreamed up somewhere along the way.
Anyway.... my point is, there are probably only so many meaningful character choices along the length of a season's worth of story. So let's argue that at the end of the season a player can make 4 meaning choices along the way with 2 options each. So, along the way, the player's possible world state multiplies, go from 1 -> 2 -> 4 -> 8 - > 16.
So in the end of a particular chapter there are 16 possible combinations of states the player could be in. A lot, but not exactly mind boggling. Now let's say that for each character slot, BW has expanded the character save architecture to allow the character to revert back to a previous chapter. Character will maintain all it's gear and stats, the only thing that will be reverted are that character's instanced world states, which will probably only involve switching off and on different instanced areas that were in game anyway.
I'm the furthest thing you can get from a game dev and software engineer, but I believe something like this would give a player the illusion of save points without blowing up servers with useless extra data like the inventory and gear for multiple copies of the same character.
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its fine in Tie Fighter because the shots arent instant allowing you to dodge them, but that's basically what evasion is for in this game. its automatic instead of player reacting.
I think this highlights one of the limitations of a game like GSF in the current engine. I always assumed that the RNG hit system was put in place to compensate for the engines inability to do any sort of reasonable hit detection. I can only guess that the dev's solution was to make all the ship's hit boxes similar in size and program different defense values to simulate the evasion capabilities of a small fast scout, vs the slow- easy to hit bomber.
Pretty clever actually, but when the devs also decided on the speed and boost capabilities of each ship, they didn't realize how much that would compound to make the scout that much more effective than the strike fighter. That is to say ship surviveability scales a lot better with speed x Boost capacity x evasion, than Armor x shield capacity.
Frankly, I'd really like to see how a game plays out when you simply turn off the evasion stat.
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If possible... I'm thinking of not using or not just using tracking/targeting but also aiming... gunships are known to target things they aren't shooting to spoof their targets also all/most? weapons seem to hit their targets nearly instantly when fired so knowing if someone has their cross-hairs on your carrot would be useful intel.
In a dogfight, there is less time to react to someone shooting at you, but if they are aiming from a far any warning is better then what we have now. Although it would ruin some sneak attack runs unless the pilots are good at aiming at the last second.
A lock on indicator is not a bad idea, but might add even more information overload for a new player. Not to mention making GS's even MORE of a pain to sneak up on (in strike fighters) Maybe leave it as a equipment slot for strike with some added benefit of extra defense or shielding?
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I like your idea Kaiser, I had a similar one a while ago. But instead of the strike having one of these drones the "Bomber" gets this offensive turret probe that auto targets nearest threats and instead of having mines these "bombers" are given the slow targeting, but verly powerful AoE missiles that are used for clearing out mine fields and cap point defenses.
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My biggest complaint about bombers is actually a complaint about how the cap points are designed. Their LoS antics around the base of the satellites keep them alive much longer than they should. I believe that many of these complaints against bombers evaporate if the cap point were an open structure like a large open box, but then I suppose GS antics would become much more prominent.
le sigh.
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Just started up GSF again lately just to get a feel for it again. Strike fighters have always been my main goto since GSF came out. In my opinion, the frentic speed of the game is what really hurts the strike fighters the most in it's current state. Any weapon that requires any sort of sustained DPS is severely handicapped by the rapid closing speeds. 1000m can pass by in a literal blink of an eye and thus bursty damage weapons like burst cannons and rail guns are going to win out over quad lasers and rapid fires. This is compounded by the strikes inability to keep pace with most anything that's trying to get away with it, save the bomber, which will simply drop a mine or LoS indefinitely.
Hyper-unrealistically (and a bit selfishly), My suggestion to fix the strike fighter would be to slow gameplay by entirely dumping the boost system and slowing turn rates. Rework both the strike and the scout into one role that is fast and excels at hit and run tactics, and the other slower but maneuverable. I say selfishly, because this would boil the game down to something a little more that I would prefer, something that gives me a little more time to consider the board state, such as, the vector and speed that targets are traveling, and how to maneuver accordingly. Granted that all is sorta there as the game is now, but happens a little too fast for my shriveled brain to take in fast enough.
More realistically. My suggestion would be much like anyone else's. Buff the strike fighter's damage and surviveability.
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As someone that's started playing around with EMP missiles, I like suggestion 3 a lot. They're nice to have when a node is mined up and absolutely useless any other time.
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There was a time i would disagree with adding joystick control. But as of late I've come to appreciate the need for more control options.
One stepping stone to implementing joystick controls would be to put in a reticule sensitivity or range limiter.
That is, a slider setting that controls the max distance from which the cross hairs can be move away from the center line. At 100% range the controls will behave as they do already and at 0% the cross hairs will essentially be locked in place. Anything in between sorta adjusts how "stiff" or "loose" the responsiveness would feel.
Next step would be to map X, Y input to joystick controls which would conceivably translate better at lower settings.
Yes, lower setting would not allow one to track targets, but I think it's a worthy trade off to have a tighter control over where your reticule is at all times and might be off-set by the forced decrease in tracking penalties.
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I'd also chime in and say that simply giving players tools to communicate may not be enough. Putting in an in-game system that rewards cooperative behavior would be the way to go with this. Difficult? Sure. But I wholeheartedly believe that it would be the way to go with this game, adding a new layer of depth that would go beyond simply adding more maps and ship variants.
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I've thought another option would be to implement Battlefield's commo rose. It's simple, relatively easy to grasp, and avoids any of the problems of people trolling on voip. Done right it would give solos pretty much all of the basic communication options you need and the only thing you'd still need chat for are things like more elaborate strategy.
EDIT: not that I would turn down a built in voip mind you.
Absolutely agree with this thread. GSF needs more ingame options for PUG communication. I also agree with quick-key commands as being the way to go with this and drafted my own ideas on how such a system could ultimately be integrated into the game. Granted, much of it is pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking. But I think at the very least, having a "help" key, which highlights enemies currently targeting you to your squad members would be a HUGE step in the right direction. Maybe have it on cool down to prevent spamming or something....
anyway, here is a link to my original thread: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=736819
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Bull, Being in a group does not make you fly better, aim better, have better grear, turn better, or dogfight better. You can scream "INC C" in voice chat all day but that doesn't make your teammates get their any faster either.
Premades are comprised of players just like solo queue'ers. Being in a group does not make you any better than if you queue'ed solo, and if your losing to some group its because that group is made of much better players than you.
Except a group in communication with each other can almost instantly callout a target and focus fire. Are you going to tell me that's not a significant advantage over a group of strangers not talking to each other? If you're going to tell me that a pre-made group offers no advantage, why are you so quick to defend any criticism against it?
Yes it requires team work on the part of the group on teamspeak. And I also realize that it doesn't make people magically better (so cool your jets). But what it does do is give the TS teams a higher potential for coordination and effectiveness that can't possibly be matched by someone that just dropped into a random game.
And again. I. AM. NOT. speaking against pre-mades. It's a totally legit and fun way to enjoy the game. But I'd also like for some of you that acknowledge that finding a group and jumping onto a mumbler server isn't for everyone. I don't know their reasons and neither do you. But I strongly believe that it isn't healthy for the game if those players are repeatedly dominated by coordinated teams. What's being created is a zero-sum situation where you either invest the time and energy to join a team or expect to lose. I only propose that there be some kind of tool that opens up a middle ground between the two.
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*Ahem* I'll just leave this here for Mr. Brass http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/developing-fantastic-friendships.seriesId-331927.html
I will repeat myself as I have ad nauseum.
Pre-mades are not an unfair advantage. You have just as much power to start one as anybody else.
Interesting benefits of making friends include:
- No longer being so lonely
- People who care about you at your funeral
- People to care about at their funerals
- Greater success in your career.
- Greater success in your love-life
- Lesser chance for severe heart failure due to high blood pressure.
- Feel motivated to wake up in the morning.
- Have a safety net to fall on when your tinfoil hat finally sets your house on fire and you're left homeless.
- Have a support net to fall on when your gaming addiction is finally realized and you need to kick it.
These are just a few of the benefits of having friends. You can have all of this for the price of 12.99 or a pitcher of cream ale at your local pub.
Friends have no link to the friends tv show, friends may cause stupid random crap to happen to you when you least expect it, please socialize responsibly.
I apologize in advance if I am misunderstanding something. But a pre-made group (assuming that they have voice communication) has an OVERWHELMING advantage over pick up groups.
As for the friends thing, I'm probably the last person in my guild that plays GSF any more. I still like the game, but I only play erratically, maybe a game or two a couple nights a week. It's not really worth the trouble to find a new guild i'd hardly play with or convince the few guildies that are on to drop what they're doing to play a mini-game they no longer care for.
I strongly feel that there are enough people in situations similar to mine for BW to enact some kind of in game communication system to even the playing field between pugs and pre-mades. Especially if they're trying GSF for the first time, having some kind of instruction from a veteran player would do a lot to ease that learning curve.
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-Have the player clear a minimum of 5 introductory gsf missions. One of the more suprising aspects of GSF is the lack of understanding how it works and/or the deep learning curve it presents. More often than not, players are not even aware there's a tutorial. Having simulated gsf instances with AI allies/enemies and putting them as a must need to do before they can play the actual gsf would make this pvp less daunting for new players.
They really could use a better tutorial. One with moving targets. I know that 3D AI is tough to produce but even setting up something that flies around in a fixed pattern is better than no movement at all.
And once they have that, make it mandatory for all players before they start playing.
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No what's *really* going to kill GSF is the 5-ship pilots vs the 2-ship newbies not playing nice. I'm not suggesting that you let the newbies kill you or let them win the match, but if they cannot learn how to play they will not continue to play. And there goes the population down the drain.
Handicap yourselves somehow meaningful but that won't affect the overall outcome of the game. Instead of using your mastered Flashfire/Quarrel/OtherFavShip, try a drone carrier bomber and ONLY USE LASERS! You'll still win vs noobs, but they will learn the basics of chasing someone (as a bomber you cannot out-maneuver them so fast that they won't know what's happening) and perhaps they'll come back for more. Once you have seen the same pilot's name in several matches, start throwing in some missile locks and make them learn how to evade.
There are many ways to handicap yourselves without changing the outcome. I challenge you all to come up with your own ways and have little competitions in those matches to see how you can do. If you are one of "those pilots" who only brings one ship to the fight (I'm looking at you, Scrab), suck it up and bring the one you hate the most, and learn it - you'll become a better pilot for it.
We, as a community, are the primary factor in new players having a fun (note I did not say successful, that will come as they learn the game) experience in the beginning. This is the only thing that will keep them coming back for more matches. Who knows maybe you'll make a new friend and become a new pilot's mentor.
When you know the outcome of the match based on pilot names/ship count, don't fly like your life depends on destroying the opposition, because if you do... you will.
This is a noble attitude, and good for the community in general but so hard to enforce. Once that blood is in the water is hard to get that feeding frenzy to stop.
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Reticule lock is the main reason why joystick controls are not in the game, I have heard the dev's say something about it being difficult to implement with the engine (or some such statement)
At any rate, you can change the sensitivity on your desktop and it will translate into GSF, I would love to see a sensitivity slider in game though. This is pretty standard fare for most games, not sure why it hasn't made its way in yet.
Slowing down the targeting reticule would help a lot of players tracking ability (I adapted, but not everyone can effectively)
The whole thing about reticule lock being difficult in this engine is news to me. I'd like to find out more about that. Time for some internet digging.
Sorry real work. looks like you're taking the back seat again
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I try not to shoot at anything that's too far off my center line, but pointing my nose at a target that's moving across at a high angle of attack usually requires me to move the cursor off to the far end. By the time i've got my nose lined up, I've lost the shot in the 100th's of seconds it takes for me to drag the cursor back over the target.
How would you all feel about the option to customize the sensitivity of the directional controls relative to the cursor? If I had my way, I'd set it way high so that I wouldn't have to move the cursor more than 5 degrees to get to max turn rate. Would it drastically affect the balance of the game?
Sorry if this has been brought up before.
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Agreed on both points.
Hopefully this is more of a short term shift than a long term one. We know, after all, that they have plans for new game modes. Hopefully they will switch focus on those once Strongholds is done.
On the other hand, I have to admit I'm pretty psyched about GSH, as it is a huge deal for us RPers (though I know this puts me in the minority in this forum).
And as you said, the infiltrators were probably going to be a mess to balance properly, which could very well be why they decided to shelve them for now, the cost/benefit was just not worth it. Personally I'm a LOT more interested in new maps and game modes, and hopefully those remain on the roadmap for the long term.
I'm going to lean towards this line of thinking. I would guess that if it were simply a matter of shifting resources away from GSF, they'd say that the infiltrator is postponed rather than shelved indefinitely.
I mean, the concept has been in the works since the start of the project (as far as i can tell from the datamined stuff), If they can't get it to function after that long maybe it was just time to accept that it just wasn't going to work. I just wonder how big of a bump this is for the GSF teams plans.
I'd imagine the design, testing, tweaking and redesign of this role took up a large portion of their time, especially trying to get it in by the 2.8 deadline. Shelving this project will invariably result in a vacuum of content. I'm curious to see how the team bounces back from this and where they decide to spend their efforts on now.
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The one thing that I see that could work is, single button, meaning "help". You press it, there is a popup message like "<Name>: Help at <Name's current coordinates>!" The area would blink several times on minimap, and that's it. Maybe, just maybe, enemies in the area could yield 10% or 20% extra req for 60 seconds or something.
If that would work out, then we'd see if it is enough, or if there is more needed. I don't think it is a good idea to make overly complicated systems straight at the beginning.
I think that would be a great way to start. In the end it might be all that's needed.
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I get what you mean, and I understand why you're asking for the changes. But can they be done? I'm asking because I have little experience in Ops activities other than GSF - I think I've grouped once in Ops form to take down Bigass McGee on Hoth (the one who isn't Snowblind - I forget his name). Do we have capabilities like what you suggest already in use somewhere else?
If so, this might be feasible. If not, we're looking at adding a pile of code - and I don't think Bioware's got time to do that this year. -bp
I guess the ultimate question here is would be if this is WORTH doing.
Obviously I think so. It would make the GSF or any PVP experience that much richer and strategically transparent.
And I agree, nothing like this could possibly be implemented soon. I only wanted to get the dialogue on something like this started. Maybe encourage a dev to put this up on their wall of crazy. If they could put a system like this for all PvP, it would be a pretty significant update in my eyes.
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Radial menus? Hot keys? No.
Most people won't use them or watch for them, its just another distraction. The answer is in-game VOIP for teams. There are third party VOIP systems that can be added to a game; EVE Online added one years ago and despite initial issues it works well now. With VOIP you only need one key, don't need to look for text messages and can issue any message you want.
An in game VOIP system would also solve a lot of problems for all PUGs from FPs and Ops to ground pvp.
I have to respectfully disagree with VOIP for three reasons. 1) can't really integrate VOIP into a HUD warning. Hearing someone call out for help and not knowing where that person is isn't helpful. My proposal would integrate the hotkey with Heads up indicators. A new player would know who to follow and a squad will know who is being attacked and where.
2) people are not compelled to listen to VOIP commands either. Granted they're not normally compelled to follow a hot key commands either but a hotkey system would be much easier to integrate with a revised scoring system. For example, calling for help could tag all of the enemy currently attacking that squad member in need, making them worth extra req when you score hits on the attacker. This is not something that can be done with VIOP
3) You don't always want to hear what your team has to say. Hot keys limits the communications to the gameplay at hand. You've all seen general chat. now imagine it with VOIP.
Let's talk about Strike Fighters
in Galactic Starfighter
Posted
Huh, good point. How would rail guns be affected if they too had to aim for a lead indicator instead of the ship itself? It'll probably only make it a little harder to hit.