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The T:A general survey
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MaishidonPatch Joined: Wed Nov 02, 2011 7:25 pm Posts: 126	The T:A general survey Hello Tribe: Ascend forums. In an attempt to unite the community and achieve Hi-Rez transparency, I've spent a few good hours putting together this survey and thread. The survey compiles as many of the current T:A issues that I could think of into one place. This is to help us get a full look at what the general playerbase opinions are right now. Survey link: http://www.opensurveys.org/surveypassword.php?SID=559 Survey password: NeoTribes To community members: Please answer every question in the survey. If the question has to do with an issue that you're unfamiliar with, please check out my question overviews below. I would also appreciate it if those of you who take this survey would bump the thread and spread it to other users who don't necessarily visit the forums; I'm looking for maximum community coverage here. I would appreciate it if for the survey's sake, this thread could remain free from flame wars. To Hi-Rez staff: I've seen, and agreed with a lot of complaints about the community being left in the dark lately. I'm only asking a small favor of you guys. Please give the survey a couple days to be filled out, then take a look at the results and provide commentary for the questions that have a 66% majority consensus on change being necessary (That means a total of 66% when the various yes options are added together). All I ask is that you give us either an A, B, or C on each question that meets this requirement. A. The proposed change has been rejected and will not happen at this time B. The proposed change is being considered but there is no decision as of now C. The proposed change has been accepted and will probably be addressed at some level in a future patch Keep in mind that I'm not asking for a concrete answer, I know that things change as the development process advances. All the community wants is a glimpse into what's going on at Hi-Rez right now. Below, I have included a complete list of explanations for the questions on the survey. Each number corresponds with a question, and includes necessary information along with brief arguments for either position. This is mainly here to allow people who don't necessarily interact with the forum community to still submit informed opinions on each question. Further information can be found by searching the forums. 1. "Projectile Inheritance (or simply inheritance) is a mechanic in Tribes: Ascend which causes projectiles you fire to "inherit" some of your current velocity. T:A currently has 50% inheritance on all projectile weapons. This means that if you fire a Spinfusor perpendicular to yourself while traveling at 200 km/h, the shot's end-point will be a trajectory taking into consideration its firing speed, aiming angle, and 100 km/h worth of inheritance in the direction you were moving. Without inheritance, it becomes difficult to hit enemy players during a high-speed chase. While one alternative solution is simply to increase the base speed of all projectiles, this makes low-speed duels less interesting as it means the projectiles become difficult to dodge. Inheritance gives the best of both worlds, making high-speed chasing viable while keeping low-speed duels interesting. The downside is that it becomes harder to hit stationary targets such as Base Turrets if the attacker is not stationary himself." -tribesascendwiki.com For: Higher inheritance is more intuitive, and makes disc fights at high speeds an actual possibility. This could help make chasing a more viable role, and help improve the feel and utility of the spinfusors. Older Tribes games featured higher values, and some popular mods even had 100% inheritance. Against: Higher inheritance may seem intuitive, but real life projectiles dont defy gravity, and have air drag. Increasing inheritance leads to anomalies such as projectiles fired from high speeds having incredibly strange paths, and discs floating along at 20kph if launched backwards from a fast moving player. Hi-Rez's internal testers report that 100% inheritance feels especially weird. 2. Same as number one, but on chainguns. For: The faster projectile speed makes 100% inheritance look more normal. All previous tribes games had 100% on their chainguns. Against: Chainguns are powerful enough; they dont need to be any easier to use than they already are. 3. Self explanatory For:Older Tribes had much higher thrust and recharge rates. The rates in this game are far too restricting especially on heavies. Better jetpacks would be necessary if the other physics issues were resolved. Against:This is a new game with new dynamics; we cant rely on wildly different games to determine what would work best. Changing this would require far too large an investment of effort because the rest of the game would have to be changed around it. 4. The jetpack can only provide forward thrust up to 72 kph. Once you exceed that speed, then the jetpack can only push the character upwards and wont increase the players horizonal speed. For:The 72 kph cap makes it impossible for flag chasers to pick up the speed required to catch up to a capper. It would be impossible to gain speed with the cap in place if the other physics changes were made Against:Removing the cap makes gaining momentum far too difficult, skiing should be a challenge. 5.self explanatory For:picking up the flag at 350 kph is overpowered and should not be allowed or encouraged. Skiing fast is too easy without air drag. Against: Tribes is a game about going fast, and as such we should allow players to achieve high speeds. Why did we have the alpha speed caps removed if we were just going to impose air drag in their place later on? 6.Thrust vectoring means that the jetpack has a much greater effect on a players horizonal momentum. When jetless midair control is removed, thrust vectoring would be necessary to allow the player to control their trajectory in the air. For: Jetless air control destroys predictability and makes midair shots too difficult. Jetless air control is unrealistic and unintuitive. Jetless air control allows the player to change their trajectory without using any energy to do so. Against: Jetless air control makes midair shots more difficult and valuable. Jetless air control has become more intuitive thanks to it's almost universal use in other video games. 7. self explanatory For: Chainguns have a higher ease of use and higher DPS than projectile weapons. They make old tribes style combat irrelevant, especially in longer distance duels. Against: Chainguns have always been a popular weapon in tribes. They are an important part of the game, and nerfing them would make chasing even more irrelevant than it already is. 8. Hitbox is the virtual size of a projectile. Larger hitboxes allow larger margins of error when it comes to accuracy. For:Old tribes weapons had hitboxes much larger than the current projectile weapons. Implementing them would make projectile weapons more relevant against chainguns by increasing the ability to combat enemies that are in the air. Against: Midairs are already easy enough, and we shouldn't make them any more commonplace then they already are. This game has fast enough kill times, we should focus our balancing on making battles last longer. Older tribes games didn't have one-hit-kill spinfusors. 9.Self explanatory (Arguments here are too anecdotal to concisely cover) 10.Self explanatory (Arguments here are too anecdotal to concisely cover) 11.Self explanatory For: Two hidden drop jammers can cover almost the entire base on some maps and prevent infiltrators from doing their job with no effort at all. Against: Drop jammers require constant replacement and are easy enough to destroy. The infiltrator has powerful enough weapons to effectively duel without cloak. 12.Self explanatory question For: The Sabre Launcher is a weapon devoid of any skill that serves only to annoy other people in the game. The weapon does not serve it's intended purpose (anti capper, anti vehicle) and buffing it would only give more free kills to players expending no effort. Against: The Sabre fulfills the necessary role of area denial to cappers and vehicles. This role could not be fulfilled by any other weapon design. The weapon does not have to be effective in competitive play, the Doombringer will get an alternative secondary that will be more relevant, and fulfill a slightly different role; no point in scrapping what's already in the game. 13.Self explanatory For:The current design leaves classes ignored and irrelevant for months at a time. Updates need to be more general to keep everything balanced Against:The current design has focus, and brings classes into the spotlight during the updates. The current system can flesh out a new role for any given class in one move, which allows classes to be more complete. 14.Self explanatory New maps:New maps are specifically tailored for this game and it's needs. New maps allow the devs to get a better understanding of what works for the future Old maps:Old maps have proven gameplay quality, and T:A is similar enough to its predecessors for successful maps to transfer well. Revived maps that already have good gameplay help make T:A more popular and a better Esport. Please tell me if any of the post is written in a way that doesn't make sense, or if I've left something out.
Sat May 05, 2012 1:37 am

pushbiscuitdeath Joined: Tue Aug 16, 2011 3:25 pm Posts: 723	Re: The T:A general survey Bumping. For those wondering there's only 15 questions and it takes all of one minute to finish this. _________________ T:A Soundtrack: http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBAC1B18024809938&feature=view_all Tribes channel: http://www.youtube.com/tribesmovies555
Sat May 05, 2012 1:44 am

NKuga Joined: Thu Apr 15, 2010 12:55 pm Posts: 308	Re: The T:A general survey MaishidonPatch wrote: achieve Hi-Rez transparency Ha ha ha. Ha. My sides.
Sat May 05, 2012 1:55 am

Xaraxitor Joined: Sat Jul 09, 2011 7:25 pm Posts: 376 Location: Sitting at computer.	Re: The T:A general survey NKuga wrote: MaishidonPatch wrote: achieve Hi-Rez transparency Ha ha ha. Ha. My sides. Yeah me too. What makes you think Hi Rez give a sh*t what we think? To date basic problems are yet to get fixed and all they do is introduce more unbalanced rubbish to the game. There was a poll thread showing 78% wanted machine guns gone, so what did Hi Rez do? NOTHING While you guys live in hope this will improve, I'm away playing other games that are balanced and without bugs. Ready for release my as.s!
Sat May 05, 2012 5:09 am

Crossflippe Joined: Thu Mar 01, 2012 12:43 pm Posts: 486	Re: The T:A general survey Good try, but I think they'll probably turn a blind eye to this, like all the other pages and pages of details regarding the same topics... _________________ SentBringers. Gotta love 'em.
Sat May 05, 2012 5:14 am

raqyee Joined: Fri Mar 30, 2012 5:52 am Posts: 1914	Re: The T:A general survey I'm dissapointed _________________ Feel free to add me on steam \| Member of conclave.cc
Sat May 05, 2012 5:30 am

ArxBuster Joined: Thu Oct 06, 2011 11:07 pm Posts: 936	Re: The T:A general survey Last edited by ArxBuster on Wed Jul 04, 2012 7:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Sat May 05, 2012 5:38 am

infectedsoundsystem Joined: Wed Mar 07, 2012 7:07 am Posts: 24	Re: The T:A general survey Imho, there should have been an additional option for "Yes, except the DMB's chaingun" for this one:
Sat May 05, 2012 8:54 am

Pharlan Joined: Tue Jun 02, 2009 2:28 am Posts: 66	Re: The T:A general survey infectedsoundsystem wrote: Imho, there should have been an additional option for "Yes, except the DMB's chaingun" for this one: No that needs a nerf as well, they need to add a MUCH better secondary if they are going to do it though. So far he is the only class that is forced to take a very basic load out. Even the grenade options seems a downgrade to the mines instead of a sidegrade.
Sat May 05, 2012 12:27 pm

infectedsoundsystem Joined: Wed Mar 07, 2012 7:07 am Posts: 24	Re: The T:A general survey Pharlan wrote: No that needs a nerf as well, they need to add a MUCH better secondary if they are going to do it though. So far he is the only class that is forced to take a very basic load out. Even the grenade options seems a downgrade to the mines instead of a sidegrade. You're welcome to disagree with me, sure that is what the poll is for - but I was pointing out that the poll was missing an option that reflects my own opinion. It is a bit of a loaded question.
Sat May 05, 2012 1:02 pm

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The T:A general survey

Author

Message

MaishidonPatch

Joined: Wed Nov 02, 2011 7:25 pm
Posts: 126

The T:A general survey

Hello Tribe: Ascend forums. In an attempt to unite the community and achieve Hi-Rez transparency, I've spent a few good hours putting together this survey and thread. The survey compiles as many of the current T:A issues that I could think of into one place. This is to help us get a full look at what the general playerbase opinions are right now.

Survey link: http://www.opensurveys.org/surveypassword.php?SID=559
Survey password: NeoTribes

To community members: Please answer every question in the survey. If the question has to do with an issue that you're unfamiliar with, please check out my question overviews below. I would also appreciate it if those of you who take this survey would bump the thread and spread it to other users who don't necessarily visit the forums; I'm looking for maximum community coverage here. I would appreciate it if for the survey's sake, this thread could remain free from flame wars.

To Hi-Rez staff: I've seen, and agreed with a lot of complaints about the community being left in the dark lately. I'm only asking a small favor of you guys. Please give the survey a couple days to be filled out, then take a look at the results and provide commentary for the questions that have a 66% majority consensus on change being necessary (That means a total of 66% when the various yes options are added together). All I ask is that you give us either an A, B, or C on each question that meets this requirement.
A. The proposed change has been rejected and will not happen at this time
B. The proposed change is being considered but there is no decision as of now
C. The proposed change has been accepted and will probably be addressed at some level in a future patch
Keep in mind that I'm not asking for a concrete answer, I know that things change as the development process advances. All the community wants is a glimpse into what's going on at Hi-Rez right now.

Below, I have included a complete list of explanations for the questions on the survey. Each number corresponds with a question, and includes necessary information along with brief arguments for either position. This is mainly here to allow people who don't necessarily interact with the forum community to still submit informed opinions on each question. Further information can be found by searching the forums.

1. "Projectile Inheritance (or simply inheritance) is a mechanic in Tribes: Ascend which causes projectiles you fire to "inherit" some of your current velocity. T:A currently has 50% inheritance on all projectile weapons. This means that if you fire a Spinfusor perpendicular to yourself while traveling at 200 km/h, the shot's end-point will be a trajectory taking into consideration its firing speed, aiming angle, and 100 km/h worth of inheritance in the direction you were moving.
Without inheritance, it becomes difficult to hit enemy players during a high-speed chase. While one alternative solution is simply to increase the base speed of all projectiles, this makes low-speed duels less interesting as it means the projectiles become difficult to dodge. Inheritance gives the best of both worlds, making high-speed chasing viable while keeping low-speed duels interesting. The downside is that it becomes harder to hit stationary targets such as Base Turrets if the attacker is not stationary himself." -tribesascendwiki.com
For: Higher inheritance is more intuitive, and makes disc fights at high speeds an actual possibility. This could help make chasing a more viable role, and help improve the feel and utility of the spinfusors. Older Tribes games featured higher values, and some popular mods even had 100% inheritance.
Against: Higher inheritance may seem intuitive, but real life projectiles dont defy gravity, and have air drag. Increasing inheritance leads to anomalies such as projectiles fired from high speeds having incredibly strange paths, and discs floating along at 20kph if launched backwards from a fast moving player. Hi-Rez's internal testers report that 100% inheritance feels especially weird.

2. Same as number one, but on chainguns.
For: The faster projectile speed makes 100% inheritance look more normal. All previous tribes games had 100% on their chainguns.
Against: Chainguns are powerful enough; they dont need to be any easier to use than they already are.

3. Self explanatory
For:Older Tribes had much higher thrust and recharge rates. The rates in this game are far too restricting especially on heavies. Better jetpacks would be necessary if the other physics issues were resolved.
Against:This is a new game with new dynamics; we cant rely on wildly different games to determine what would work best. Changing this would require far too large an investment of effort because the rest of the game would have to be changed around it.

4. The jetpack can only provide forward thrust up to 72 kph. Once you exceed that speed, then the jetpack can only push the character upwards and wont increase the players horizonal speed.
For:The 72 kph cap makes it impossible for flag chasers to pick up the speed required to catch up to a capper. It would be impossible to gain speed with the cap in place if the other physics changes were made
Against:Removing the cap makes gaining momentum far too difficult, skiing should be a challenge.

5.self explanatory
For:picking up the flag at 350 kph is overpowered and should not be allowed or encouraged. Skiing fast is too easy without air drag.
Against: Tribes is a game about going fast, and as such we should allow players to achieve high speeds. Why did we have the alpha speed caps removed if we were just going to impose air drag in their place later on?

6.Thrust vectoring means that the jetpack has a much greater effect on a players horizonal momentum. When jetless midair control is removed, thrust vectoring would be necessary to allow the player to control their trajectory in the air.
For: Jetless air control destroys predictability and makes midair shots too difficult. Jetless air control is unrealistic and unintuitive. Jetless air control allows the player to change their trajectory without using any energy to do so.
Against: Jetless air control makes midair shots more difficult and valuable. Jetless air control has become more intuitive thanks to it's almost universal use in other video games.

7. self explanatory
For: Chainguns have a higher ease of use and higher DPS than projectile weapons. They make old tribes style combat irrelevant, especially in longer distance duels.
Against: Chainguns have always been a popular weapon in tribes. They are an important part of the game, and nerfing them would make chasing even more irrelevant than it already is.

8. Hitbox is the virtual size of a projectile. Larger hitboxes allow larger margins of error when it comes to accuracy.
For:Old tribes weapons had hitboxes much larger than the current projectile weapons. Implementing them would make projectile weapons more relevant against chainguns by increasing the ability to combat enemies that are in the air.
Against: Midairs are already easy enough, and we shouldn't make them any more commonplace then they already are. This game has fast enough kill times, we should focus our balancing on making battles last longer. Older tribes games didn't have one-hit-kill spinfusors.

9.Self explanatory
(Arguments here are too anecdotal to concisely cover)

10.Self explanatory
(Arguments here are too anecdotal to concisely cover)

11.Self explanatory
For: Two hidden drop jammers can cover almost the entire base on some maps and prevent infiltrators from doing their job with no effort at all.
Against: Drop jammers require constant replacement and are easy enough to destroy. The infiltrator has powerful enough weapons to effectively duel without cloak.

12.Self explanatory question
For: The Sabre Launcher is a weapon devoid of any skill that serves only to annoy other people in the game. The weapon does not serve it's intended purpose (anti capper, anti vehicle) and buffing it would only give more free kills to players expending no effort.
Against: The Sabre fulfills the necessary role of area denial to cappers and vehicles. This role could not be fulfilled by any other weapon design. The weapon does not have to be effective in competitive play, the Doombringer will get an alternative secondary that will be more relevant, and fulfill a slightly different role; no point in scrapping what's already in the game.

13.Self explanatory
For:The current design leaves classes ignored and irrelevant for months at a time. Updates need to be more general to keep everything balanced
Against:The current design has focus, and brings classes into the spotlight during the updates. The current system can flesh out a new role for any given class in one move, which allows classes to be more complete.

14.Self explanatory
New maps:New maps are specifically tailored for this game and it's needs. New maps allow the devs to get a better understanding of what works for the future
Old maps:Old maps have proven gameplay quality, and T:A is similar enough to its predecessors for successful maps to transfer well. Revived maps that already have good gameplay help make T:A more popular and a better Esport.

Please tell me if any of the post is written in a way that doesn't make sense, or if I've left something out.

Sat May 05, 2012 1:37 am

pushbiscuitdeath

Joined: Tue Aug 16, 2011 3:25 pm
Posts: 723

Re: The T:A general survey

Bumping. For those wondering there's only 15 questions and it takes all of one minute to finish this.

_________________
T:A Soundtrack:
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBAC1B18024809938&feature=view_all
Tribes channel: http://www.youtube.com/tribesmovies555

Sat May 05, 2012 1:44 am

NKuga

Joined: Thu Apr 15, 2010 12:55 pm
Posts: 308

Re: The T:A general survey

MaishidonPatch wrote:

achieve Hi-Rez transparency

Ha ha ha.

Ha. My sides.

Sat May 05, 2012 1:55 am

Xaraxitor

Joined: Sat Jul 09, 2011 7:25 pm
Posts: 376
Location: Sitting at computer.

Re: The T:A general survey

NKuga wrote:

MaishidonPatch wrote:

achieve Hi-Rez transparency

Ha ha ha.

Ha. My sides.

Yeah me too.

What makes you think Hi Rez give a sh*t what we think?

To date basic problems are yet to get fixed and all they do is introduce more unbalanced rubbish to the game. There was a poll thread showing 78% wanted machine guns gone, so what did Hi Rez do? NOTHING

While you guys live in hope this will improve, I'm away playing other games that are balanced and without bugs.

Ready for release my as.s!

Sat May 05, 2012 5:09 am

Crossflippe

Joined: Thu Mar 01, 2012 12:43 pm
Posts: 486

Re: The T:A general survey

Good try, but I think they'll probably turn a blind eye to this, like all the other pages and pages of details regarding the same topics...

_________________

SentBringers. Gotta love 'em.

Sat May 05, 2012 5:14 am

raqyee

Joined: Fri Mar 30, 2012 5:52 am
Posts: 1914

Re: The T:A general survey

I'm dissapointed

_________________

Feel free to add me on steam | Member of conclave.cc

Sat May 05, 2012 5:30 am

ArxBuster

Joined: Thu Oct 06, 2011 11:07 pm
Posts: 936

Re: The T:A general survey

Last edited by ArxBuster on Wed Jul 04, 2012 7:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Sat May 05, 2012 5:38 am

infectedsoundsystem

Joined: Wed Mar 07, 2012 7:07 am
Posts: 24

Re: The T:A general survey

Imho, there should have been an additional option for "Yes, except the DMB's chaingun" for this one:

Sat May 05, 2012 8:54 am

Pharlan

Joined: Tue Jun 02, 2009 2:28 am
Posts: 66

Re: The T:A general survey

infectedsoundsystem wrote:

Imho, there should have been an additional option for "Yes, except the DMB's chaingun" for this one:

No that needs a nerf as well, they need to add a MUCH better secondary if they are going to do it though. So far he is the only class that is forced to take a very basic load out. Even the grenade options seems a downgrade to the mines instead of a sidegrade.

Sat May 05, 2012 12:27 pm

infectedsoundsystem

Joined: Wed Mar 07, 2012 7:07 am
Posts: 24

Re: The T:A general survey

Pharlan wrote:

You're welcome to disagree with me, sure that is what the poll is for - but I was pointing out that the poll was missing an option that reflects my own opinion. It is a bit of a loaded question.

Sat May 05, 2012 1:02 pm

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The T:A general survey