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H/SCM - 02

Tue, 01/27/2004 - 13:19 by vicmitkal

Hopefully you have read Part 01 of the Human/Spartan Combat Model (H/SCM), if not please read up. The topic of this next blog will be how gameplay will be affected via this free-form class structure.

Proficiency Based Gameplay:

Ultimately the goal of this mod is to provide players a chance to jump into combat with little to no previous experience of Halo and end up with a character customized to meet their own strengths. Weapons, vehicles, maps and gametypes will all have their own balancing factors. The bonuses that players get from these items only helps to improve their own individual characteristics when using them. What this translates to is that if a player does not use a given weapon/vehicle, expect a player that does to be much better when using it.

Unlike most Role-Playing Games (RPGs) these skills will build up rather quickly. Considering that most matches last 20-30 minutes, you would expect players to gain a proficient level when using a single weapon after a very limited time. This is not to say that higher levels would be easy to attain, but only that shorter periods of time are needed to gain the most basic upgrades.

Example: A player begins the game with a pistol and proceeds to gain a few quick kills. If the requirement for the first pistol proficiency upgrade was 5 kills using that weapon, a player could easily attain it at a rather quick pace. Note that only the killing shot must be from the pistol, so feel free to use any other weapon to weaken your opponent first. After reaching 5 kills the player goes from skill 0 (zero) to skill 1 with the pistol and a bonus, such as an extra clip of ammunition is added to the pistol every time the player picks one up. Keep in mind that these bonuses are quite arbitrary at this point and only the general concept is important.

As a player's proficiency increases with a given item, it would be easier for them to gain that next skill level when using that item. Of course, the curve for attaining the top levels will be much harder than the more basic ones, so the rewards or benefits will be much better as well.

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Human/Spartan Combat Model - 01

Mon, 01/26/2004 - 19:57 by vicmitkal

After posting a few of my personal viewpoints in a recent thread, I have finally decided to catalogue my ideas for public opinion. These ideas will be formed from an ongoing series of blogs that will be refined and broken down into simple sequences of information. Refining and extrapolating of individual ideas will occur on a regular basis, but hopefully I can maintain a focussed and informative dialog from my ramblings.

Overview:

The basic idea is to create a realistic combat modification (mod) that places human soldiers fighting alongside Spartan class models. The difference here is that human soldiers lack shields and would likely be more vulnerable to death. Likewise they would also be faster than your normal Spartan. Spartans act exactly like the Master Chief, but are limited to say 1 per every 4 players on the Human/Spartan side (possible server-side setting).

As I would prefer to avoid class-based structuring I think it would be necessary to incorporate a skill based system in the game. This would work by encouraging players to assume roles and then gain improvements based upon their performance within that role.

An example would be a basic class sniper. Imagine a player that picks up a sniper rifle and then proceeds to gain kills with his new rifle. As the player gains kills using his sniper rifle, he also improves his reload time and decreases his body movement while scoped-in.

Instead of limiting the player to the class of sniper, the system works to encourage players to work together and support one another. This is not to say that upon dying you lose your abilities, so a player could and should take multiple roles upon themselves throughtout a battle in order to improve their own skills.

Pilots/drivers could allow their vehicles to take more damage before being destroyed based upon the distance they travel in them. Gunners gain more accuracy from their weapons while hitting targets from a vehicle. The structuring is somewhat free-form in this regard. If medkits could be equipped you could even add a field medic role into the mix, etc. There could even be smaller bonuses for players such as increased speed or stamina (if running is possible) for traveling a given distance on foot.

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Game Types, Roles and Tactics

narcogen's picture

Sat, 01/24/2004 - 08:44 by narcogen

I'll be up-front about this: I hate Free For All (FFA) games, especially Slayer, so I don't really have much to say about them. If there are some high ping FFA players out there that are having luck with certain tactics, feel free to email me and I'll put them here. I tend to prefer team games, as well as games with non-slaying objectives like Oddball, King of the Hill, Race and Capture the Flag, so I'll comment here on how dealing with lag affects those games and your role in them. Capture the Flag You've got a choice when playing CTF as a high ping bastard: do you want to play effectively, or do you want to go for the glory and risk being hated by your teammates? There's no question that players with high pings are better suited to defending than attacking; especially if you have a vehicle such as a Ghost or Warthog, or even a Shade turret, to help you. (Teammates, of course, are even better.) Grenades are your friend while defending, if you can work out with your fellow defenders where you're going to throw so they don't rush in for a melee kill as you're lobbing one. (Work this out in advance of the battle, in the lull between attacks, not just as you throw one, unless you're using some sort of voice commo-- which for the high pingers, is pretty much ruled out as it eats up your bandwidth). If you die (which you may) in most CTF games you'll spawn relatively close to your own base, giving you another shot at the flag carrier before he makes a clean getaway. If you assume that high ping players are going to die more often (and in my experience, they do) it's better to have them defending; they know what's going on back at the base, and they know which way the attackers went, so they know how to respond when they respawn. If an attacker dies and respawns back at the base, he's not of any immediate use there unless he knows the situation, and more likely he's just going to be focused on getting back on the attack. As a high latency player, if you're involved in a coordinated attack you run the risk of upsetting the plan by dying early, driving poorly, or creating unintended friendly fire, and thereby drawing attention to your high ping in a negative way.
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Weapons

narcogen's picture

Sat, 01/24/2004 - 08:41 by narcogen

As with the vehicles, the nature of each weapon sometimes makes it more or less suitable for players on slow connections. Again, in increasing order of utility: Needler This weapon is fairly useless in multiplayer anyway, barely better than the plasma pistol which is the default weapon on many maps. One good thing about it: the projectiles track, like the plasma pistol's secondary fire, meaning accuracy is not as important as with other weapons. However, the projectiles are slow and relatively easy to dodge or take cover from. If you're toe-to-toe with a single opponent, you might as well melee him with it, it'll do about as much good. If you're in a group with multiple targets, in can do damage, as your opponents won't be able to give their full attention to the miniscule threat you pose. Sniper Rifle If you're badly lagged and trying to hit someone with a sniper rifle, you'd better hope they're standing still-- because that's going to be your only chance. Most likely you're also standing more or less still while sniping; but if not, you may find yourself "warping" while zoomed in at 10x and having difficulty keeping your quarry in the crosshairs. Probably the only players you've got a chance at killing this way are either standing still with their backs to you (teammates, perhaps?) or other snipers, in which case they're probably going to react more quickly and kill you before you get off a shot (this happens a lot in the upper base lofts on Sidewinder). Add to that the small clips and long reload time, and you've got a nightmare for high ping players unless you're very well hidden. Pistol Most good players consider this the most powerful weapon in the game, and it usually is. In the right hands, even a player with full shields and health can be dropped to the ground with three accurate headshots. The problem is, if you've got a lot of lag, getting those three headshots is probably going to use up your clip. However, as a medium-range weapon the pistol can still be useful because of its scope (the sniper really isn't good for anything but long range for a high ping player, as closer in the "warp" effect plus player movement is going to keep you from drawing a bead on them). However, I suggest going for body shots to make every bullet count, rather than trying for head shots and a quick kill.
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Vehicles

narcogen's picture

Sat, 01/24/2004 - 07:27 by narcogen

In order from worst to... least bad, these are the vehicles available to high ping bastards in Halo multiplayer: Banshees The "warping" effect that happens when the server corrects your client seems to affect Banshees particularly badly. It also manifests itself when getting in and out of vehicles or structures and using ladders. The kind of endless-spiral dogfights that Banshees tend to cause are especially bad if you are on a slow connection; a short delay can widen your circle enough to let your opponent get behind or under you and get in enough shots for the kill. What's more, the throttle-down and drop technique that many good pilots use also seems to initiate the "warp" effect. If there are no other good pilots in the game you're in, you can still use the Banshee as a good strafing weapon; but beware Shades. Unlike in single player, they don't tip over when hit by the Banshee's FRG, and the gun itself seems to shield players from damage far better than in the single player game. I recommend diving runs against players, shades and vehicles while firing the primary weapon until you can line up a shot with the secondary; then break off, look for cover-- either by flying behind a structure or going above the Shade, out range of return fire-- and wait for the FRG to reload before circling around again. Note you can only attempt this if there's nothing else shooting at you (like another Banshee). The diving melee attack that many Banshee pilots use is also a lot less effective if you're lagged; you can end up circling on the ground trying to hit a dodging target, all the while a sitting duck yourself (and also looking quite foolish). This works if the target doesn't see you coming and where the terrain is flat. UPDATE: vector40, author of the Banshee Handling article here at R.net (of which a second installment is forthcoming, I understand) doesn't care whether or not I credit him with this technique he passed on, which is to eschew diving runs and simply hover over the Shade. The gun's maximum elevation doesn't allow it to fire at targets almost directly above it, so you can hover there and "fire with impunity" as he put it. The dive-bombing technique is to be reserved for "heavily armored ground targets".
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High Ping Bastard's Guide To Halo

narcogen's picture

Sat, 01/24/2004 - 07:25 by narcogen

Now that Halo is available for ordinary Macs and PCs, and not just the Xbox with its dedicated broadband connection (or, at least, the jack for one) its inevitable that people with Internet connections that aren't quite the best are going to try their hand at the game, myself included. However, if you try to play the same way those on high speed, low-latency connections do, you'll find yourself staring at your own corpse more often than not.
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