ET: Campaign Change Proposal, Tourney Beginnings

[neuro]

lo troops,

I'm thinking about changing/shuffling the campaign maps so that we play different maps on wednesdays than we do on sundays. What's yer thoughts and/or map recommendations?

Also, I've started a page on the wiki for a proposed ET tourney at LRL2006. Again, feel free to make comments on the talk page.

[mrben]

I'm thinking about changing/shuffling the campaign maps so that we play different maps on wednesdays than we do on sundays. What's yer thoughts and/or map recommendations?

Wunderbar!

Can I suggest that you divide the current campaign in 2, with an even mix of new and old maps in each campaign? The current campaign is, IMHO, too long for the average amount of time people play (60-90 minutes). Halving it and spreading the maps should mean we get to play all the maps.

Oh, and, it being wintertime, we should roll out North Pole again

[nikopol]

Ja! Gute idee Herr Neuro.

Another good idea would be to either set formal rules for heavy weapons (and maybe spawns) or set the server to limit them to zero if less than a given amount of players.

[mrben]

Another good idea would be to either set formal rules for heavy weapons (and maybe spawns) or set the server to limit them to zero if less than a given amount of players.

Jahaha Sehr Gut!

[s_ward]

I think the campaign should be shortened, but not halved. Some of us do play after the weak go to sleep and I for one like to continue the campaign. Saying that, we still hardly ever get to play the last map. The public 6 map campaigns work well for time, so I'd suggest around 6-8 maps in a campaign.

I'm all for a different campaign on a Sunday to a Wednesday. I haven't played SupplyDepot or others we have on the server but not in campaigns with that many players, and would at least like to find out how good/bad they are.

By all means, limit heavy weapons, but please don't ban them. They are part of the game, and those who whine should stop whining, and think of different strategies instead.

I think a sensible limit is probably one on each side for at least 10 players total -- that is, if both sides have at least 5 players, they can have a heavy each. 5v4 == no heavies at all. After 10 players, I haven't thought much about how to limit heavies - I suppose if we go linear 20 players -> 2 heavies each.

And now, the shuffle rant(ish):

One other thing I'd like to see, if possible, is a limit on XP shuffling. I just get pissed off when people insist on shuffling every bloody map. Shuffling also tends to not work that well a lot of the time, with the balance shifted over to the other side, rather than equalised.

Firstly, there is little point in shuffling after just the first map, especially when before the give starting time of 20:00 (http://clan.lugradio.org/) and we're supposed to be warming up (I note the server/map cycle doesn't restart at 20:00 like it did previously -- maybe that should be re-implemented, or the site changed to say we start at 19:30). There has just not been enough play. Maybe stop the shuffling until the 2nd or 3rd map is finished, if possible?

Similarly, there is little point in shuffling after every single map. Maybe prevent shuffling except after every 2-3 maps, if possible, preferrably just the once, midway through the rest of the campaign.

Finally, maybe shuffle only when there is an imbalance of players (due to players leaving, for example), or there really is a big difference in XP.

[mrben]

Re: Heavy weapons

OK - I was one of the whiners (but by no means the only one), and my reasoning is as follows: In small teams it becomes possible for a single member of a team to wipe out the entire opposite team in a single blow without much effort, and certainly little skill, particularly when there is a focus on a single objective, like the final gun in Oasis. This makes it massively onesided, and IMHO just allowing another heavy weapon on the other side doesn't really even it up that much.

Notice when people talk about 'heavy weapons' what they usually mean is flamethrowers and panzerfausts. You rarely here mention of portable MG42s or Mortars - these are much more difficult weapons to use properly, and thus rarely get used. Hence the tagging of flamers and panzers as 'n00b' weapons.

Personally I don't see much use for them in teams of anything much less than 10 (ie 20 people playing). If you want heavy weapons, then there are always airstrikes and fixed MG42s available on every map.

But opinions vary, and I promise I will accept the majority rule.


With regards to XP shuffling, I would agree to an extent. Especially for the first hour or so, XP is not normally an indication of experience, but rather time in the game. It's only after people have all been there for a reasonable length of time that XP becomes a good indication of skill.

However, I can also understand the benefit, at times, as I have seen some very onesided games.

[neuro]

just to piss you all off, i'm investigating turning off heavy weapons completely as of tonight. muhaha.

[davee]

Couple of thoughts:

- Having a long campaign is fine - some people want to play for a long period of time.

- Having the same maps in the same order, every time we play, is getting boring TBH.

Neuro - are the campaign files just flat text files? If so, could the campaign map-order be randomly-generated, so that we get something different each time? In particular, having some of the earlier maps (such as Caen) played later when people have more XP would be an interesting change.

I'd happily write such a campaign-generator script if necessary.

[s_ward]

just to piss you all off, i'm investigating turning off heavy weapons completely as of tonight. muhaha.

I'm not playing.

[s_ward]

In small teams it becomes possible for a single member of a team to wipe out the entire opposite team in a single blow without much effort, and certainly little skill, particularly when there is a focus on a single objective, like the final gun in Oasis. This makes it massively onesided, and IMHO just allowing another heavy weapon on the other side doesn't really even it up that much.

I think the answer to that is not necessarily to fight back with another heavy weapon (although flamethrower might be effective at keeping axis engies away from the dyna'd gun), but to take out the freakin' heavy launcher. Use yer noggin', it might come in useful.

Notice when people talk about 'heavy weapons' what they usually mean is flamethrowers and panzerfausts. You rarely here mention of portable MG42s or Mortars - these are much more difficult weapons to use properly, and thus rarely get used. Hence the tagging of flamers and panzers as 'n00b' weapons.

I count airstrikes too -- big instakill (unless you have a flak jacket, then you might just survive, only to twist your ankle and die) 'splosive spread around an area, certainly heavy?

[davee]

I don't think banning 'heavy weapons' makes sense. I disagree a single heavy-weapon-using person can defend an objective from a well-organised group of attackers: the person using heavy weapons has distinct disadvantages for general play - recharge time between heavy weapon uses for example.

The only time that a single heavy-weapon-using defender takes out a whole group of attackers is if the attackers are standing close together. Which is, of course, a silly tactic.

In a 1v1, I'd much rather face a soldier with a panzerfaust than almost anything else. 1v1 against a panzerfaust player should be a simple victory - they lack flexibility.

[nikopol]

I think some maps they are necessary to successfully defend against the inexorable advance of the enemy (on breakout for example) so I'm unhappy playing without being able to resort to them at all (given that the allies almost always win on that map goes to show you how difficult it is to defend anyway) and I agree with Davee in that if your tactics are BS then they become problematic. They do have their downsides too. What I find more irritating than a panzer is Fire for effects which are far more devastating if well placed than a panzer.


However, if it is a majority rule or even a server rule set by Neuro, I'm happy having them banned but what I'm less happy with is having them being sometimes banned, sometimes not banned on the whim of someone whingeing about them (or not). Same goes for talk kill - often you can't see the icon from far away so it's nae luck in my book if you get caught with your pants down. it's part of the risk you take trying to communicate with your team... Last week there was an issue over someone using a flamer which was indeed irritating but that's just how the game works I guess...

Neuro - how flexible are the settings to allow for this?

[s_ward]

how flexible are the settings to allow for this?

Not flexible enough to do anything like what I said

The cvar g_heavyWeaponRestriction sets the percentage of a team that can have each heavy weapon, and the number is rounded up. It is also only based on the maximum number of players, and not the number currently playing. So, for g_heavyWeaponRestriction = 1, even if max clients is 10: 1% × 10 = 0.1, rounds up to 1 of each heavy weapon on each team, regardless of the real number of players.

With the ETPro mod (which the server uses), rifle grenades, flamers, mg42s, mortars and panzers can be limited separately. These limit the maximum number of each, regardless of the number of players.

See: http://www.rtcw.jolt.co.uk/content/enem ... tions.html

[Nightwish]

for one, i think someone should remind me of ET.
not really, since for the next few weeks i'll have to finish the unstarted college work. yeah, i think it's about time i finish this...

[mrben]

I think some maps they are necessary to successfully defend against the inexorable advance of the enemy (on breakout for example) so I'm unhappy playing without being able to resort to them at all (given that the allies almost always win on that map goes to show you how difficult it is to defend anyway) and I agree with Davee in that if your tactics are BS then they become problematic. They do have their downsides too. What I find more irritating than a panzer is Fire for effects which are far more devastating if well placed than a panzer.

OK - I'm willing to admit that I might be wrong on heavy weapons.

In my defense, on the night in particular, at the time when the flamethrower came out, the team I was in was down to 3 people from the original 5 (one dropped out, the other with connection difficulties; this left use with 5v3), and one of those was only playing for the second time. Once you add that to the difficulty of try to arrange tactics over text chat, you can (hopefully) understand my frustration. At the time I converted to a soldier and used a panzerfaust myself to oust the flamethrower out of the objectivepoint, but was then lacking an engineer to arrive on the scene before the flamethrower arrived back at the point freshly spawned.

Teamspeak has been talked about previously - it might be something we should look into more extensively, as it could change this massively.

Oh - big difference between airstrikes and heavy weapons is that airstrikes are a lot easier to dodge (IME).

It would be interesting to hear from somebody who plays on public servers a lot more, and find out what the generally accepted norms are.


Oh, and lastly, I've played Breakout a number of times as Axis and won. It requires a bit of coordination, but it is possible. The first choke point is in the tunnel, and you need to keep that nicely mined, and the tank out of commission. You need an on-the-ball covert ops to keep destroying the assault ramp, and stop the shack from being a spawn point. You can hold them there for 10-15 minutes at times. The next big choke point is actually on the raised section by the bridge - you can normally hold off there for a while, especially if you have a medic. Much easier with a bigger side, so that you can have the extra classes, but it definitely is possible.