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Defense?
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illerFFN Joined: Wed Apr 14, 2010 6:52 pm Posts: 1174	Re: Defense? Frostiken wrote: Nerf cappers. Capping +Velocity increase from Self-Damage would do this in one fell swoop. Watch some "Route" Videos or just watch a consistent capper. Very little of what they do actually takes full advantage of the geometry. Most of what they do just comes down to popping Nitrons on themselves multiple times and then sailing over the flagstand with Reach. There's no skill required, no finessing the Slopes to gradually build up speed. HiRez has a big secret here they're hiding from everyone. Which is: They don't want TeamWork. Teamwork makes upgrades and MicroTrans purchases less potent. If they want to sell the most stuff, they have to focus everything on the individual and how much stuff that individual has to dominate with. And being the best capper who always has credits to spend on strikes means getting kills while capping and that means unlocking more stuff than any other class too. We just saw this with buffs to the LAR and insufficient reductions to the BL's power. Nearly all Offensive additions in the patch notes, and Defensive failures come back to this. Tricking people into giving up on teamwork... It's very manipulative and quite effective too.
Sun May 13, 2012 5:11 am

Tharnes Joined: Sun Feb 12, 2012 8:36 am Posts: 382	Re: Defense? Tartarus is the first map which makes me really mad (drydock is also terrible). s*** on HoF'ing, I go all offensive DMB/Nj4-Raider on this map and try to turn away as many midfield-people as possible form the game while spamming: "Really nice map to defend on." Seems to work quite well. They really need to get Defending / HoF'ing balanced. I rarely see anyone on the flag. And why would they? There is no use to it. _________________
Sun May 13, 2012 5:48 am

Oroibahazopi Joined: Mon Jan 30, 2012 9:26 pm Posts: 1139	Re: Defense? If people defended in a non dumb way you wouldn't have half the PTH making it through. Relying on deployables is dumb. Just 5 people standing on the flag stand is better. 90% of the problems I have when capping are actual people in the way, TCN turrets are a joke, mines and claymores just get blown up, and forcefields can be dodged most of the time. SLD, TCN, BRT all have aoe weapons that can one shot an incoming PTH, just learn to aim... Also thinking that just standing on the flag with super heavy is enough is also wrong.
Sun May 13, 2012 7:58 am

BmanOldFarticus Joined: Mon Mar 28, 2011 1:47 am Posts: 103	Re: Defense? Chasing was broken in Tribes Vengeance and its broken in Tribes Ascend. Do any of you notice a pattern? Now you know why people loathed the announcement that Unreal would be the engine for Tribes Ascend. Add to that no team damage, auto regeneration and health regen. Most ascend cappers dont depend on good routes and gathering speed for a clean grab. Instead they simply grab at any average speed and boost away with a nitron (ala boost grenades in shifter/renegades). On top of that LD is pretty lame. Chasing is lame. You cant stop a capper on the flag like you could in T1/T2. (you think people could cap so easily with good LD and some mine discing ability?) Yes history has taught me that its become a waste of time participating in a beta for anything Tribes post Dynamix. _________________ Denny Crane...
Sun May 13, 2012 8:12 am

Tamburlaine Joined: Sun Dec 04, 2011 2:13 am Posts: 1859	Re: Defense? I just had a f* fantastic time HoFing on Tartarus of all places. Ungodly amounts of offencive pressure. f* mortars and MIRVs everywhere and disk sniping and osniping and raiders going over my head unloading grenade launchers and so many god d* pathfinders crashing my useless f* stand. But our techs and our brutes and our vehicles... so god d* good, those guys were. As soon as a mole popped up, they whacked it down. You ever stick a shovel into a nest of wasps? It's an amazing sight. Jam the blade in to the ground, and for a moment, nothing. Another moment, nothing. You bend over, and then, then you see them. And they rise from that hole in the earth like the blade of your shovel cracked open a passage to hell. Like blood spurting from a wound. Like the return stroke of a bolt of lightning. That's what my defenders were like, and it was f* awesome, and in turn, I was f* awesome. I saw those pathfinders, and I shattered them. If this game had blood, my stand would have pushed it in to an Adults Only rating. If this game had blood, I would have looked like I just stepped out of a Garth Ennis comic. In time I found that the true challenge was not fighting my enemy, it was fighting the urge to wake my roommates with a cry of, "I AM BULLETPROOF!" After some of the bloodiest god d* capture-the-flag I've seen in a long time, it was 4-4. An enemy pathfinder then called in a tac while doing a back-to-front and capped the flag in a matter of seconds. ... ... _________________ oh god where does this link go how did it get here I am not good with computer
Sun May 13, 2012 11:25 am

Oroibahazopi Joined: Mon Jan 30, 2012 9:26 pm Posts: 1139	Re: Defense? That map is just dumb for offence, I'll admit. JUG can pelt the flagstand from a lot of very far away, very high up places.
Sun May 13, 2012 11:39 am

Pingles Joined: Wed Sep 30, 2009 8:28 pm Posts: 1733	Re: Defense? Anyone done stats on scores? I keep meaning to. I'll start and see what I get after a week. I play on NA West. _________________
Sun May 13, 2012 12:05 pm

Zantetsu Joined: Sun Feb 12, 2012 7:51 am Posts: 39	Re: Defense? Have to admit, when I first started playing the game, I saw people flat out ignoring defense. Not performing upgrades, no one on the flag, generator and defenses being destroyed and left that way, and I thought it was happening because most of the players were brainless. Having played the game a fair bit though, I am coming to realise that it is pretty pointless caring about these. Most games devolve into flag chasing, and it is far too easy to hammer a bases defenses from a long distance. I'm in agreement with a lot of the others in this thread, base defenses, especially the Radar and Flag Stand, need a lot more cover. It should take a co-ordinated attack to clear the stand ready for a capper to zip in. DMBs are almost worthless as HoF (I geared one up simply because no one else seemed to bother playing HoF, now I know why). Orbital strike is just flat out retarded as well, one person being able to clear an open flag stand at long range is pretty much everything that is wrong in a team based game, unless it happens incredibly rarely. Also from a TCN point of view, I also think a perk needs to be added (or an existing one altered) to increase the range of repair tools. Having to practically stand on top of the item you are repairing makes it pointless to repair defenses up top. Anyone who is Spinfusor sniping can kill you and destroy the structure without needing to change their aim. This is often because the structures are raised, meaning you need to hug them to be close enough to repair, which causes you to take more damage. That being said, Spinfusor damage to structures needs to be severely reduced, it is pretty retarded that over half the classes in the game can skill-lessly take out defenses at long range in a handful of shots. Either that or it needs to be made more difficult to achieve (gravity affecting shots, or lower damage at extreme range etc). I might start playing CnH instead and hopefully find some enjoyment there, but at the moment TDM is just flat out rubbish, and CTF is too unbalanced in the wrong direction to enjoy long term.
Sun May 13, 2012 1:28 pm

Renthrak Joined: Thu Dec 29, 2011 2:05 pm Posts: 180	Re: Defense? The current game balance allows for good defense. It actually does. The problem is that it doesn't happen, because it's incredibly frustrating and almost completely unrewarding. Half a dozen turrets, a couple force fields, mines scattered everywhere, a decent sniper or two watching the area, a HoF with technicians supporting and maybe a Shrike flying around to chase . . . that's going to require a fair portion of the enemy team to break through, while still leaving half of the friendly team to go for the flag. I see defense like this about twice a day, compared to dozens of games without it. Certainly a part of it is that when people join a team, they start out doing what they feel like doing, with no clue what the rest of their team has planned. So games often start with 6 pathfinders, 3 raiders, 3 infiltrators, 2 juggernauts, and a technician. That kind of team can't defend a hole in the ground. I've been that lone tech, spamming "Defend the Flag!" "The enemy is in our base!" "Secure our base!", and getting a couple disks from passing team members on their way to do their own thing. People don't want to switch over to defense if they're geared up for flag runs, and few people start out on defense. One of the reasons for this, I think, is that you earn vastly more XP by constantly throwing yourself at the enemy base, killing as many as you can, blowing up any assets and maybe touching the flag. Compare that with standing around near the flag, waiting for something to happen, and hoping that of the four or five guys attacking that incoming pathfinder, you happen to get the kill shot for some points . . . it's no contest. Repairing the entire base, turrets sensors and generator, gets about as many points as one or two kills. Unless your turret gets the kill shot, you get nothing for putting up flag defense as a tech. Playing HoF only works if you have support, which rarely appears. Beyond the XP bonus for winning the round, there is literally no incentive to use teamwork compared to lone-wolf play. Your flag runner just dropped the flag in front of you. Do you secure the area until a good runner gets there, do you call out the flag position, do you stand aside and let the flag runner's escorts take it in? Nope. You grab it for the XP and hope for the best. Your base is completely overrun by the enemy team. Do you charge in and fight them all off? Do you call for support and look for ways to help the defenders? Do you switch to jug and start dropping mortars on your base to clear it? Nope. You ski for your life towards the enemy base to find someone vulnerable to kill. Why is this? Because in the time it takes to do something meaningful for your team, you could score three times as much XP doing your own thing, and have twice the fun in the process. I'm sure this doesn't hold true for everyone, but for every team player, there are ten lone wolves. That doesn't put good odds on a public game.
Sun May 13, 2012 4:27 pm

illerFFN Joined: Wed Apr 14, 2010 6:52 pm Posts: 1174	Re: Defense? Renthrak wrote: That kind of team can't defend a hole in the ground. FYI..... the Flag would be a lot easier to Defend if it WAS sitting in a hole in the ground
Sun May 13, 2012 4:37 pm

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Defense?

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illerFFN

Joined: Wed Apr 14, 2010 6:52 pm
Posts: 1174

Re: Defense?

Frostiken wrote:

Nerf cappers.

Capping +Velocity increase from Self-Damage would do this in one fell swoop.

Watch some "Route" Videos or just watch a consistent capper. Very little of what they do actually takes full advantage of the geometry. Most of what they do just comes down to popping Nitrons on themselves multiple times and then sailing over the flagstand with Reach. There's no skill required, no finessing the Slopes to gradually build up speed.

HiRez has a big secret here they're hiding from everyone. Which is: They don't want TeamWork. Teamwork makes upgrades and MicroTrans purchases less potent. If they want to sell the most stuff, they have to focus everything on the individual and how much stuff that individual has to dominate with. And being the best capper who always has credits to spend on strikes means getting kills while capping and that means unlocking more stuff than any other class too. We just saw this with buffs to the LAR and insufficient reductions to the BL's power. Nearly all Offensive additions in the patch notes, and Defensive failures come back to this. Tricking people into giving up on teamwork... It's very manipulative and quite effective too.

Sun May 13, 2012 5:11 am

Tharnes

Joined: Sun Feb 12, 2012 8:36 am
Posts: 382

Re: Defense?

Tartarus is the first map which makes me really mad (drydock is also terrible). s*** on HoF'ing, I go all offensive DMB/Nj4-Raider on this map and try to turn away as many midfield-people as possible form the game while spamming: "Really nice map to defend on."
Seems to work quite well.

They really need to get Defending / HoF'ing balanced. I rarely see anyone on the flag. And why would they? There is no use to it.

_________________

Sun May 13, 2012 5:48 am

Oroibahazopi

Joined: Mon Jan 30, 2012 9:26 pm
Posts: 1139

Re: Defense?

If people defended in a non dumb way you wouldn't have half the PTH making it through.

Relying on deployables is dumb. Just 5 people standing on the flag stand is better. 90% of the problems I have when capping are actual people in the way, TCN turrets are a joke, mines and claymores just get blown up, and forcefields can be dodged most of the time.

SLD, TCN, BRT all have aoe weapons that can one shot an incoming PTH, just learn to aim...

Also thinking that just standing on the flag with super heavy is enough is also wrong.

Sun May 13, 2012 7:58 am

BmanOldFarticus

Joined: Mon Mar 28, 2011 1:47 am
Posts: 103

Re: Defense?

Chasing was broken in Tribes Vengeance and its broken in Tribes Ascend. Do any of you notice a pattern? Now you know why people loathed the announcement that Unreal would be the engine for Tribes Ascend. Add to that no team damage, auto regeneration and health regen. Most ascend cappers dont depend on good routes and gathering speed for a clean grab. Instead they simply grab at any average speed and boost away with a nitron (ala boost grenades in shifter/renegades).

On top of that LD is pretty lame. Chasing is lame. You cant stop a capper on the flag like you could in T1/T2. (you think people could cap so easily with good LD and some mine discing ability?)

Yes history has taught me that its become a waste of time participating in a beta for anything Tribes post Dynamix.

_________________
Denny Crane...

Sun May 13, 2012 8:12 am

Tamburlaine

Joined: Sun Dec 04, 2011 2:13 am
Posts: 1859

Re: Defense?

I just had a f*** fantastic time HoFing on Tartarus of all places. Ungodly amounts of offencive pressure. f*** mortars and MIRVs everywhere and disk sniping and osniping and raiders going over my head unloading grenade launchers and so many god d*** pathfinders crashing my useless f*** stand. But our techs and our brutes and our vehicles... so god d*** good, those guys were. As soon as a mole popped up, they whacked it down.

You ever stick a shovel into a nest of wasps? It's an amazing sight. Jam the blade in to the ground, and for a moment, nothing. Another moment, nothing. You bend over, and then, then you see them. And they rise from that hole in the earth like the blade of your shovel cracked open a passage to hell. Like blood spurting from a wound. Like the return stroke of a bolt of lightning.

That's what my defenders were like, and it was f*** awesome, and in turn, I was f*** awesome. I saw those pathfinders, and I shattered them. If this game had blood, my stand would have pushed it in to an Adults Only rating. If this game had blood, I would have looked like I just stepped out of a Garth Ennis comic. In time I found that the true challenge was not fighting my enemy, it was fighting the urge to wake my roommates with a cry of, "I AM BULLETPROOF!"

After some of the bloodiest god d*** capture-the-flag I've seen in a long time, it was 4-4. An enemy pathfinder then called in a tac while doing a back-to-front and capped the flag in a matter of seconds.

...

...

_________________
oh god where does this link go how did it get here I am not good with computer

Sun May 13, 2012 11:25 am

Oroibahazopi

Joined: Mon Jan 30, 2012 9:26 pm
Posts: 1139

Re: Defense?

That map is just dumb for offence, I'll admit. JUG can pelt the flagstand from a lot of very far away, very high up places.

Sun May 13, 2012 11:39 am

Pingles

Joined: Wed Sep 30, 2009 8:28 pm
Posts: 1733

Re: Defense?

Anyone done stats on scores?

I keep meaning to.

I'll start and see what I get after a week. I play on NA West.

_________________

Sun May 13, 2012 12:05 pm

Zantetsu

Joined: Sun Feb 12, 2012 7:51 am
Posts: 39

Re: Defense?

Have to admit, when I first started playing the game, I saw people flat out ignoring defense. Not performing upgrades, no one on the flag, generator and defenses being destroyed and left that way, and I thought it was happening because most of the players were brainless.

Having played the game a fair bit though, I am coming to realise that it is pretty pointless caring about these. Most games devolve into flag chasing, and it is far too easy to hammer a bases defenses from a long distance.

I'm in agreement with a lot of the others in this thread, base defenses, especially the Radar and Flag Stand, need a lot more cover. It should take a co-ordinated attack to clear the stand ready for a capper to zip in. DMBs are almost worthless as HoF (I geared one up simply because no one else seemed to bother playing HoF, now I know why). Orbital strike is just flat out retarded as well, one person being able to clear an open flag stand at long range is pretty much everything that is wrong in a team based game, unless it happens incredibly rarely.

Also from a TCN point of view, I also think a perk needs to be added (or an existing one altered) to increase the range of repair tools. Having to practically stand on top of the item you are repairing makes it pointless to repair defenses up top. Anyone who is Spinfusor sniping can kill you and destroy the structure without needing to change their aim. This is often because the structures are raised, meaning you need to hug them to be close enough to repair, which causes you to take more damage.

That being said, Spinfusor damage to structures needs to be severely reduced, it is pretty retarded that over half the classes in the game can skill-lessly take out defenses at long range in a handful of shots. Either that or it needs to be made more difficult to achieve (gravity affecting shots, or lower damage at extreme range etc).

I might start playing CnH instead and hopefully find some enjoyment there, but at the moment TDM is just flat out rubbish, and CTF is too unbalanced in the wrong direction to enjoy long term.

Sun May 13, 2012 1:28 pm

Renthrak

Joined: Thu Dec 29, 2011 2:05 pm
Posts: 180

Re: Defense?

The current game balance allows for good defense. It actually does. The problem is that it doesn't happen, because it's incredibly frustrating and almost completely unrewarding. Half a dozen turrets, a couple force fields, mines scattered everywhere, a decent sniper or two watching the area, a HoF with technicians supporting and maybe a Shrike flying around to chase . . . that's going to require a fair portion of the enemy team to break through, while still leaving half of the friendly team to go for the flag.

I see defense like this about twice a day, compared to dozens of games without it. Certainly a part of it is that when people join a team, they start out doing what they feel like doing, with no clue what the rest of their team has planned. So games often start with 6 pathfinders, 3 raiders, 3 infiltrators, 2 juggernauts, and a technician. That kind of team can't defend a hole in the ground.

I've been that lone tech, spamming "Defend the Flag!" "The enemy is in our base!" "Secure our base!", and getting a couple disks from passing team members on their way to do their own thing. People don't want to switch over to defense if they're geared up for flag runs, and few people start out on defense.

One of the reasons for this, I think, is that you earn vastly more XP by constantly throwing yourself at the enemy base, killing as many as you can, blowing up any assets and maybe touching the flag. Compare that with standing around near the flag, waiting for something to happen, and hoping that of the four or five guys attacking that incoming pathfinder, you happen to get the kill shot for some points . . . it's no contest. Repairing the entire base, turrets sensors and generator, gets about as many points as one or two kills. Unless your turret gets the kill shot, you get nothing for putting up flag defense as a tech. Playing HoF only works if you have support, which rarely appears.

Beyond the XP bonus for winning the round, there is literally no incentive to use teamwork compared to lone-wolf play. Your flag runner just dropped the flag in front of you. Do you secure the area until a good runner gets there, do you call out the flag position, do you stand aside and let the flag runner's escorts take it in? Nope. You grab it for the XP and hope for the best. Your base is completely overrun by the enemy team. Do you charge in and fight them all off? Do you call for support and look for ways to help the defenders? Do you switch to jug and start dropping mortars on your base to clear it? Nope. You ski for your life towards the enemy base to find someone vulnerable to kill.

Why is this? Because in the time it takes to do something meaningful for your team, you could score three times as much XP doing your own thing, and have twice the fun in the process.

I'm sure this doesn't hold true for everyone, but for every team player, there are ten lone wolves. That doesn't put good odds on a public game.

Sun May 13, 2012 4:27 pm

illerFFN

Joined: Wed Apr 14, 2010 6:52 pm
Posts: 1174

Re: Defense?

Renthrak wrote:

That kind of team can't defend a hole in the ground.

FYI..... the Flag would be a lot easier to Defend if it WAS sitting in a hole in the ground :mrgreen:

Sun May 13, 2012 4:37 pm

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Defense?