Recent content by Die Foodswaffe

EbdanianAdmiral said:

If a game is balanced and fun for the highest level of play, its balanced for every other level of play.


Here is an amazing video on the subject

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This seems, awfully ideal. The take of the video that is. The is no guarantee that the balance will keep in mind the mid and low tier players and his assumption about the bell curve supposes that the "casual" high tier players are close to the level of esports pros, they are definitely not.The gap in skill between a "newbie"/upstart pro and a veteran pro is ,in most games, larger than the gap between the lowest tier players and upstarts pro. So when balancing for the competitive level you are balancing for the less than 1% of your playerbase. I do agree that, if the devs keep in mind that there casual players out there, and take into account their feedback as well when balancing, and they make smart choices, it might lead to a better experience.

My experience comes, however, from LoL, and you might think that since it's still growing all is good, but I know some 30 people that used to play, all having started before 2015. Since the full acquisition of Riot Games by Tencent in ''15, and even earlier since they already owned stocks there, there have been a focus on teamplay, decision making and team composition, with teams that can choose champions that synergise well with each other dominating even when the opposing team is on average better skill-wise.

The only people that could reliably use all the existing synergies, plays and counter-plays in a way that made me think the game was enjoyable, were those pro ones, at the tournaments and some of the guys in challenger and master tiers (tiers for essentially the want-to-be-pros, numbering a few hundred people out the millions of each server). For the rest of the community, trying to replicate what we saw in tournaments, was not feasible,we were usually complete strangers, with nowhere near the mechanics (speed and accuracy of move execution and ability -the champion's- casting), with much less knowledge about what to do when, how and why. End result, the game slowly moved away from what made it fun for me and those 30 people I mentioned. With every patch that focused more on teamplay, the potential contribution of the individuals was taken away, after a certain point, we were no longer able to infuence the outcome.

In a game where you are 1/5 people in you team and still being unable to change the outcome in most cases, is not fun, it's not to be replicated. And despite the success of the brand, I feel justified in that at least I'm right that the game used to be fun for us older players, but it changed and no longer was for us since we knew how it had been. Newer players, still find joy in it, because they don't have the experience of what it used to be, thus unable to make the comparison.

So I will always want to put the average player before the pro, and I feel it's easier since the game has at least some realism tied to it. My suggestions, seem to me, to be a compromise between realism and game restrictions and balance.

FearSpear said:

I agree, we should remove skill based directional blocking entirely because even with a block delay, casual players just cant keep up and it ruins their fun. We should allow an auto-block system to take over for people in order to equalize all difficulty.

Also, aiming is sometimes challenging for members of the great and wide playerbase, so we should add a sort of "lock on" system where you select a target and your character automatically aims for you, this would prevent people from feeling left out just because they cannot hover their cursor over a target (we had to already take out that confusing arrow drop mechanic and put in a 3rd person perfect drop autocorrect system).

Also for captains mode, it would be great if we just made shields completely invincible because when you select a shield infantry unit you didnt select a unit without a shield, and it really destroys the fun when you cannot form a good looking shield wall because some of youre men's shields were broken!

Also another cool mechanic we could add that would really appeal to the great and wide casual playerbase -- traps! We could have certain factions be able to lay invisible rows of punji sticks/beartraps/falltraps/deadfalls that instantly killed anybody who stepped in their kill zone, imagine how much fun people could have with this (also it is realistic!)

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I get the sarcasm, let me see if I got it right.

Taleworlds already have taken the middle of the road approach, not too complicated, not too simplistic. Probably the misunderstanding was because I said "wide playerbase". I did not mean to imply casual gamers, normies, or the type that is in favour of dumping down the "complicated" mechanics. Directional combat and all the rest make Bannerlord part of the M&B series, not having such integral parts would turn it into a different game the likes of which are already plentiful.

The way I understand the term competitive, it refers to the e-sports and pro gamer level. A game that tries to balance things based off of the opinions of people who devote part of their life to it, will eventually lose touch with the rest of the community, which I referred to as "wide playerbase".

I see my suggestions as a refinement and the next logical extension of the current system. I understand that it might not be the cup of tea to people who are used a balance and way of experiencing the game from Warband, but I'm always the a proponent of realism. However it is a game, thus things will be simpler than IRL.

Where that line is depends of the game and specific feature. Case in point shock cav is supposed to be the king of the battlefield, yet it's hardly a consideration to anyone but archers. Infantry with shields in a formation have been the core of most european armies up until firearms appeared. Not being able to cover yourself while attacking is wrong, because the main melee infantry is rendered useless by ****ing naked barbarians. Same for being able to tell the archers to shoot at something specific and not the closest unit. If I were to generalise somewhat, my grudge is that the current system feels like rock-paper-scissors-muzzleloader, where ranged beat 2h,2h beat shields, shields beat ranged, and cav is the muzzleloader which is a hit-or-miss glasscannon wildcard. I want to see more tactical options open up, and for that changes have to be made. The important thing is that they make the game better.

FearSpear said:

Aww captains mode, how quaint..

Anyway at this point lets just let 2h crush through everything, every block, shields, 100% of the time... I do not care anymore.. This game is a meme, and with the state of archers and cav and throwing weapons, 2h users would still get picked apart in competitive games.

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Since when do we care about competitive? The game should be first and foremost, be made fun for the wide playerbase, and simple where the cost of realism isn't too great. I mean that's the whole reason the game is here. They have managed to improve the physics system from the first title.

Right now 2H weapons are al but impossible to deal with in captain mode at least, which is 90% of what I've played and everything I say next is also in regards to that.

Nothing other than another 2-hander can lock in melee with 2-handers and win. So excluding,2H vs 2H and given that it's wrong that you can't tell your archers to aim at a specific unit, although understandable to some extent, shields can tank any archers and close the gap, while 2H stay behind them no even scratched.

On the matter of 2H vs shields, units with 2H,are faster, have longer reach,and their swing speed comparable enough for it to make little difference to the AI, and armour plays little role in general, even more so from a swing from a 2H. Units with shields should be able to use their weapon,without exposing their whole body by moving their shield to the side, in order for the attack animation to play. It takes away so much from the usefulness of the shield, resorting to some retarded swinging and movement patterns. Using the shield, while attack would solve the main issue with the shield units acting as either a pin cushion or a roadblock. If 2H manage to flank them, it's game over,but if the shields are anchored to some good terrain and can hold their shieldwall facing the enemy they should at least hold. If (even some) 2H can smash the shields, then the 2H should be made destructible too. You cannot swing a menavlion or a glaive against or while riding a horse at full gallop and expect to be left standing afterwards, or the 2H weapon whole, in either scenario. Lances usually broke after the first charge, and that was while the counter force was along the axis of the lance. Anything with a similar lenght that makes contact at high speeds should break, except for the lances, as that would leave shock cav completely out of options. Also, 2H should break if you keep blocking with them. 10-20 hits from a sword and 1-2 from head of a great axe, should break the handle.

And since I'm on the topic of balancing, armour should be much more effective against arrows. Heavy cav in particularlar suffers from not being able to charge and completely destroy a units of archers,unless it does some bona fine manouvering.

I don't mind getting recked if the something that is recking me would realistically indeed reck me, but archers i.e. not shooting 5 degrees higher to kill the naked barbarians that are the much more serious threat, is not right.

Aaaaand now I feel like a complete buffoon.Peculiar it never happened on SP or when ordering to fire at will but I tested it and it looks to be that.
Thank you.

PS: for anyone else using VoiceAttack, as of version 0.6 of Screamerlord there is a disable commands if alt is pressed function.