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Aeon Amadi
Edimmu Warfighters
Gallente Federation
5452
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Posted - 2014.04.06 11:55:00 -
[1] - Quote
Alright so, lemme just iron this out right now. Redline sniping wasn't always a problem. In fact, it never actually became a problem until after two separate accounts: The build where we first saw Manus Peak and the second implementation of Ashland.
Now, to elaborate more on this - let me explain. I fully 100% believe that redline sniping/railgunning is not a problem of bad game design (well, it is, but not with the weapons). It's a symptom of edge-case, arena style maps that have had problem areas persist for several builds that have had openings for areas of opportunity which encourage this behavior. More importantly: The maps are designed to allow for it and some of these maps weren't always designed that way.
Secondly, I want to establish that the role of the sniper is -IMPORTANT- in a First Person Shooter. 23,000 years of technological advancement, I'm surprised we don't have automated sniper drones at the point for people to complain about, but speculation aside; there it is. The fear associated with a sniper doing his job has led to some less than spectacular design choices to limit the sniper's role and as a result, they've -BECOME- the KDR padding menace that the community always accused them of being as a side effect of measures put in place to limit that behavior.
Finally, I want to say this: If you have the enemy team 5-capped and redlined... You automatically waive your right to complain about redline snipers. Just saying.
Moving on.
Closed Beta: Where the problem rarely existed.
Skirmish 1.0 was a concept that just worked. There's no other way to explain it. The forward momentum created by having only one team have an MCC (the attackers) with a flowing concept of battle where the frontline constantly moved forward or outright stiffled was a good idea. Skirmish 2.0? Not so much. Anytime you have two teams squaring off and making a rush for arbitrary objectives in the center of the map, you're bound to create problems; but that's not what this about.
Crater Lake was good because ultimately, only one team had a redline: The Attackers. You could chill back in the redline all you wanted but you surely weren't going to win, thus the incentive to move forward became apparent. Just as well, there weren't many areas that offered good line of sight on anything important and there were -NONE- that you could snipe from and not receive return fire. As the battle progressed, if you were still in the redline; you weren't getting kills because the battle was taking place 500-600m away, over a hill and behind several dozen terrain barriers.
Another thing that made sniping difficult is that all objectives could be hacked from any direction, which allowed the player to move to the other side and use the objective itself as cover when under fire. This was a good concept and as I'll demonstrate later, removing it in favor of a mono-directional hacking point wasn't the best idea, in my opinion.
Manus Peak: The infamous Sniper map.
Everyone says that snipers are terrible in this map, and I believe it. Since it's inception, the map has had issues with snipers becoming a problem in the redline and it was the first real case we ever saw where redline sniping was a thing.
Here's a picture of the map from closed beta. Note that this is not the original map as it was first introduced, but it does display the same problem areas. The problem areas have been highlighted with red and green hexagons/stars. The red hexagons are areas that were in the redline and were not accessible to the other team; leaving it fairly one-sided as a whole as people on the attacking team could go up to the mountain and freely snipe utilizing the infamous Head-Glitch which made them invincible. This was later corrected.
CCP heard our feedback and decided to make some changes........ by turning the map into Manus Plateau. Incidentally, it didn't solve much of anything other than that one problem area on the peak itself. Ironically, the changes to the redline structure opened up areas for the -OTHER TEAM- to redline snipe. Just as well, they made a critical map change when they could have just moved the redline a little bit and fixed the problem immediately. Further more, changes to the map allowed the south-side team to freely fire on Alpha without problem and that has persisted even to this day, despite being one of the oldest maps the game offers.
Ashland: The Original Sin of Map Changes
Originally called Fetalis North Ward, this map first came out during Chromosome, it was brutal to say the least. Combat was mostly infantry based as tanks had recently received some hits due to Marauders being incredibly over-powered and nigh unkillable. It's design was very compact and claustrophobic, with little area of opportunity for snipers; which was also balanced out by the fact that Infantry Sharpshooter and Sharpshooter Proficiency would allow Assault Rifles to deal full damage out to 100m.
But the map design was... quite focused. As opposed to how it is today where the redline has been opened up on both sides to allow some pretty critical problem areas - albeit, they're the only areas snipers can really engage from at long distance and have any real impact on the battle.
(continued in next post)
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Aeon Amadi
Edimmu Warfighters
Gallente Federation
5452
|
Posted - 2014.04.06 11:55:00 -
[2] - Quote
Reserved
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Aeon Amadi
Edimmu Warfighters
Gallente Federation
5453
|
Posted - 2014.04.06 12:07:00 -
[3] - Quote
xxwhitedevilxx M wrote:So, don't you think there's another problem? Any other game has some kind of limitation on range, or at least falloff, window of opportunity in BF etc. Wouldn't it be one of many problems?
Battlefield 3 had a lot of balancing aspects to it. Operation Firestorm was pretty much a bigger version of Ashland where both the US and RU had areas where snipers could shack up and put rounds down range. However, Battlefield 3 also had falloff which mitigated the rifles to having to land at least two shots or a single headshot regardless of range (unless you're playing hardcore). It also had some nifty bullet-drop to make them more skill intensive, but Dust 514 doesn't have this (and rightly so because it's railgun tech after all). Ultimately, it comes down to scope sway to balance it all out and I've been a strong supporter of implementing scope sway even while crouched, which would open up opportunities to touch up on the Sniper Rifle's balance as a whole.
And, for the record, Battlefield 3 had no real limitations on range  http://youtu.be/j2bA98PQ6WI?t=42s
Just saying, Shotgun Snipers were a thing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oiv82LUAkqk
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Aeon Amadi
Edimmu Warfighters
Gallente Federation
5454
|
Posted - 2014.04.06 12:11:00 -
[4] - Quote
aden slayer wrote:This is a very hard topic to reply to but there is one thing you can relate to when it come to this issue.
And that is the people who made this a problem.
The Redline snipers, the Players killed over and over again by redline sniping and CCP Game Designers.
Remember, Redline snipers never made the problem. They just took advantage of an opportunity given to them by Game Design. Ultimately, it's up to CCP to decide how they make their maps - if they want redline sniping to be a thing, have at it. We can't bash them on their creative license.... but we can surely suggest otherwise.
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Aeon Amadi
Edimmu Warfighters
Gallente Federation
5454
|
Posted - 2014.04.06 12:33:00 -
[5] - Quote
aden slayer wrote:Aeon Amadi wrote:aden slayer wrote:This is a very hard topic to reply to but there is one thing you can relate to when it come to this issue.
And that is the people who made this a problem.
The Redline snipers, the Players killed over and over again by redline sniping and CCP Game Designers. Remember, Redline snipers never made the problem. They just took advantage of an opportunity given to them by Game Design. Ultimately, it's up to CCP to decide how they make their maps - if they want redline sniping to be a thing, have at it. We can't bash them on their creative license.... but we can surely suggest otherwise. A fair opinion. But overall it is just the general thinking of all FPS Players that snipers are Lazy A***oles. So i really think that all 3 sides are at fault here. It is the redline snipers fault for overusing this advantage. It is the new players fault for making this part of the game an issue. And it is CCP fault for giving in to the new players as they want their playerbase to grow.
Well, taking a look at those maps -where else can they honestly snipe from if not from the occasional socket?
xxwhitedevilxx M wrote:Aeon Amadi wrote: However, Battlefield 3 also had falloff which mitigated the rifles to having to land at least two shots or a single headshot regardless of range (unless you're playing hardcore). It also had some nifty bullet-drop to make them more skill intensive, but Dust 514 doesn't have this (and rightly so because it's railgun tech after all). Well, but Railguns do have falloffs, they have to! Lasers might not have bullet falloff (but still have some kind of range limit), but rail guns are just like any other bullet weapon. They just use magnets instead of gunpowder. So, yes, the maps are a really big problem, but still, if they don't change anything is sniping mechanics, sniper rifle will be the easy isk-farmer.
"Also, by firing at greater velocities, railguns have greater range, less bullet drop, less time to target, and less wind drift, bypassing the physical limitations of conventional firearms: "the limits of gas expansion prohibit launching an unassisted projectile to velocities greater than about 1.5 km/s and ranges of more than 50 miles [80 km] from a practical conventional gun system."" ~ David Allan Adams, US Navy
Edit: Albeit, using real-life examples is never a good standpoint for good gameplay. I'm cool with Railguns having falloff if it's done correctly, but I think there's other ways to balance this out that should be explored first and in small steps. Not all at once.
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