Thought I would keep this feedback private as it is not super relevant and probably a bit verbose for the main feedback thread. I’m not even sure it is useful..
[QUOTE=Clawfist;183492]The thing in CS is, however, that one side will always give up a round if both teams were locked in inaction. Since you have the additional asymmetrical win condition outside of kills there is automatically a drive there, if you don’t attempt to do xyz you lose. Plus in a regular match you get the added bonus of attack/defense dynamics shifting on the fly for both teams which is nice.[/QUOTE]
As long as there is an odd number of vials or odd number of vial groups one player will be “ahead”. On ASDF if players split belt and jacket+pads and one gets vials, they will be +1. On solo there are 10 vials in 3/3/4? In order to “tie” each player needs to pickup one lot of three then half of the remaining vials – unlikely to occur. On these maps someone will be ahead.
On deck there are four groups of four vials, so a “tie” will occur if both players manage to take two groups. On tuba there are no vials so neither player has any advantage until damage is taken.
Without vials I was assuming that at some point, even with the current setup, someone will deal damage and have the advantage. At which point the other player has to do something. I agree that if noone deals any damage and there are no vials/keg on the map there may be a problem..
Does it currently use total health+armor or just health for deciding the winner? If the player health (not total stack) is used additional importance (regardless of a maps armor loadout) could be pushed onto vials as players can secure early “advantage”. This would be especially true when vials are not on route to weapons. A player going out of their way early to get the vials on deck near pulse and ripper for example would be possibly giving up other weapons, ammo, pickups to do so.
Side idea: Rather than a HUD element to denote lead use a player based, through floor flag-carrier style glow, this also assists with aggressive play from the player not in the lead.
[QUOTE=Clawfist;183492]
I still feel like map style is missing a bit from the currently ongoing discussion. I.e. defensiveness is not nearly as much of an issue on Tuba vs Solo. Same with armor stack(s) – yes one person might get a 100 armor bump, but they had to give up something else that’s powerful in return. [/QUOTE]
I’ve played 20-30 Showdown games. About half would have been on ASDF, the rest split relatively evenly between solo, deck and tuba. A lot of my prattle on this particular topic is based on playing ut99 duel with instant armor spawns, which is similar in many ways, exception is players are setting up for the rest of the game/next spawn rather than the next few minutes.
Giving things up applies on asdf and solo as well. It applies to any map. 200 starting health + ammo restriction makes going for weapons ahead of armor a viable option. Ignoring the current item layouts, a similar situation could be engineered on asdf by swapping out the belt for amp. Not the same exactly because of boots, option for self damage and whatnot, but jacket vs amp is still there.
My qualms with the [URL=”http://arenafps.com/ut99-duel-ut4-now/#amp”]amp in duel[/URL] don’t apply to showdown. The “run away for duration” in SD is interesting and allows the amped player to possibly take more other resources because of it. imo this adds to the gametype for the very reason it detracts from duel. Alternatively the boot player could save charges to try to use it later for aggressive pushes.
Each section on tuba feels like a small arena where different style fights can occur, which is fun and surely spectator friendly. Having said that the boots are abusive and in conjunction with the big tower are somewhat offensive in the current incarnation of SD. Not to say a map like tuba could never work, but if the option to go up on the tower is there then it will be abused in competitive to win and in lower level games because “it is fun”. For one party only. The same applies to the rocks above flak and another, further out rock if one player has both the shock and sniper.
As far as tuba being less defensive I would have to disagree. Unless maps are designed like 1v1 RA arenas the later section of the game will be +back heavy irrespective of the map. Get flak, shock or rockets. Go to any of number of strong points* after most pickups are gone and wait. For close in defense anyway.
Tuba has a “feature” that the other maps do no emphasis as much. Long range. On tuba a player can get shock + rifle (probably using boots) and after most other pickups are gone hang around the boot island. If they can sweep mini too their opponent has no way of effectively pressuring them. If they have boots they can opt to wait. From a showdown perspective with a map like this I think having both the sniper and shock located so closely is not ideal. Make the boot player spend more time getting the sniper. having two health packs where the player can hang out may also be less than ideal, however the player doesn’t need
*For tuba: Health above mini/looking down to jacket, rocket side of the bio room with the health pack, top of flak ramp, bottom of either lift provided you position yourself to be difficult to approach from above.
[url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bg6neou9sAo&index=5&list=PLmREtI5vnFs4hSJqPINPb5nb1NQ73rOSu[/url] – first 2:30 or so for the idea of strong points.
While the map and pickups obviously influence how the game plays, I don’t think the map alone can solve all sd. ASDF is good, followed by tuba. Deck plays weird (might be duel experience talking) but the amp seems to work better here than tuba and while I like solo for duel I dislike it for sd.
To be honest the small, “1v1” maps that shipped with 2k3/4 (can’t remember which title) and were never really played would probably be fairly well suited to 1v1 SD.
[QUOTE=Clawfist;183492]
Hence the actually interesting part of spawn choice and run plan at the beginning of a round vs endless circling in an emptied out Solo which allows plenty of avoidance one the map is void of resources and there are no more locational motivators besides evasion.
[/QUOTE]
Your points about tuba being more iconic, watchable and spec friendly are spot on. With this in mind its understandable why you guys want tuba played.
Spawn choice/run plan is as important on asdf, solo and deck. Realistically it is important on every map for SD. If you want specific items you need to plan. If you want to play aggressively you need to do it as early as possible to obtain more.. stuff. At the risk of sounding like a broken record early aggression when items are still up will be important (even if players are not doing this yet). Having jacket play off against boots/amp is not much different to belt vs jacket/pads on the other maps. Both players get a beneficial item.
From your other post:
[I]- Everything either has very long travel telegraphs or is visible from a variety of spots[/I]
To me this just means rifle/shock primary is buffed. Contesting pickups only occurs at the start of the game, it doesn’t really matter that I can see my opponent pick up the jacket since I can hear it from anywhere almost. With competent players I don’t even need to see or hear the pickup, if ~10 seconds have elapsed and I have not been near it/near the other player you can almost guarantee it has been taken. Players don’t need the pickup time because they will never revisit the item, so being able to see it from long range is unimportant for that. The longer travel times and less audio queues from your opponent due to distance make initial aggression harder. As previously noted if a player has boots, shock, sniper they can sit out on the boot island and plink away at their opponent. Maybe the mini can contest but its not a sure thing by any means. Because this is essentially a hard counter it is possibly less interesting than a stand off on asdf.
It is different but I don’t know if it offers much more to SD than just being different – which is fine.
[I]- Takes either 2 charges of boots or lots of travel and one boot charge or weapon self damage to reach / You most likely don’t want to pick it up straight away either unless you already have shock[/I]
Mini spawn is pretty safe to go amp. Listen on spawn for where the other dude is (either shock pickup, water noise or some other pickup towards rocket/flak), if he is not at shock you are safe to hammer. However this will change when the spawn map is implemented as you will know exactly where they are.
[I]- boots being pretty powerful in this map and allowing you faster access to all the other bigger pickups [/I]
With the way tuba is setup currently the boots main purpose is to get sniper + amp quickly from the lower spawns. And escape if/when attacked later.
[I]- There’s only one armor pickup (chest) – This wouldn’t work well if it only had a belt since that (IMO) only works when there is a counter option (at least another chest) – It only being chest armor makes it an actul interesting choice but not an obligation (i.e. boots or armor, 99% of the time not both)
[/I]
If the jacket is ok vs 200 health opponent (200v300) then the counter option requirement for belt is pads (250v350)? Maybe I misinterpreted what you mean.
[B]Opening[/B]
A big part of this gametype is the start. Epic are assigning quite a lot of weight to it and it is an aspect of ut99 duel that I enjoy which is sadly less relevant in later titles. The problem is that this can be very fixed, especially for 1v1. It becomes even more so once map spawn selection is introduced as the degree of uncertainty is reduced.
[url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3mmwI6lhy8[/url] Jump to ~7:20. Most duel games open like showdown, the exception is players use the resources for the next point of conflict – the first round of spawns.
My fear is starts, while interesting now, are something that can be min-maxed easily in a similar manner to ql openings.
However team openings will be amazing. So looking forward to TSD.
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