Post patch: Yes, I feel cheap...

[GooglyMoogly]

This'll be my last post... my use of the word ironic was spot on in this situation.

 

I have nothing against you Spider..I don't want this to degenerate into a cat fight. You are entitled to your opinion and play style...but can't you see how your actions (pre 1.03) directly affected what got changed in the patch?. Now you sit here and complain.

 

i·ro·ny Pronunciation Key (r-n, r-)

 

Incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs: “Hyde noted the irony of Ireland's copying the nation she most hated” (Richard Kain).

 

"Googly noted the irony of Spiders complaints about the game changes he himself caused to come about."

[Spider AL]

This'll be my last post...

 

Good, you added nothing but ignorance to the thread. Begone.

 

I have nothing against you Spider..

 

Could have fooled me... or do you always tell complete strangers to "shut up?" You insulting "person."

 

I don't want this to degenerate into a cat fight.

 

You scratched my face, I'll scratch yours. Meow.

 

but can't you see how your actions (pre 1.03) directly affected what got changed in the patch?. Now you sit here and complain.

 

Frankly no, your idea that people who won a lot affected the finished version of the patch is nonsensical. Those who WHINED affected this patch. The fact that people (like yourself) whine when I defeat them, is their fault, their problem and their character flaw. Whiners like yourself, are the people who are totally, and completely, to blame for the terrible monotony of version 1.03 of JO, in my opinion.

 

"Googly noted the irony of Spiders complaints about the game changes he himself caused to come about."

 

Wow Googly, you really are damn good at this irony thing. I think you should be given an honorary doctorate in ironical studies.

 

[Etz]

For some reason I feel this post will make me look bit stupid, none the less...

 

Spider Al, you can write, you're good player and most of all you seem smart. Now Raven is going to put another patch which will with no doubt tweak things again. It will probably kill the cheapness backsweep is right now and more. How ever I doubt they'll think of everything. That's the power we have, as there are only so many ppl working at Raven. Of course they'll have had lots of feedback from players and they've probably read some of the posts here at forums (but probably not all of them, there are just too many). How ever this is where you come in. Most people who write emails to Raven do it with good intention, but you know how to write well (if my english skills are worth anything ) so have you considered to write your own email to them?

 

What I fear is that Raven will make the changes too linear, they nerfed healing by making it less effective. Now with ppl saying it's not worth using anymore they may up the effect a bit, but do you think that will solve anything? Because what somebody said about healing in FFA fights was true, anything but red was rather useless (especially if you wanted to rack kills fast, which you I believe, want to do). So instead of just changing a numeric value (how much healing it does) why not forcing heal user to walk while healing, and remove the insta effect it now has. Make it heal gradually but still fast enough to be usefull. (No I didn't think about this overly much, so yes the above probably sucked in game, it's just an example )

 

Now the point of my post is not to lick thy arse, and much of what I say comes out rather cumbersomely (is that a word?) because I'm not native english speaker. What I'm suggesting is that why don't ppl like you (Spider Al), and few others on these forums who have actually written something intelligent compared to what most posters ramble, get together on an IRC channel or something (or on these forums), and put your heads together to think of good solutions for all the problems you see. And also to think what Raven (or even your selves) might not see at the first glance (like the backsweep problem we now have).

 

Then write a long and well articulated email to Raven. And no, I don't believe they'd just go "ooh, how wise these ppl are, let us just do what they say", but you might notice things they don't, and cause some more ideas to flow around at their end. No matter how professional game designers they are, they wont notice everything.

 

Just a thought.

[FW_anty_kryste]

well, Spidey old pal, i have to admit something here... you do abuse certain moves and combos for the sake of winning above all else... it's the corruption of tournament living, my friend. before the patch, you used DFA but complained about it being overused. now you do and say the same about the backswing. you've known me for years, and i've always had the same attitude... i'd rather enjoy losing an honset round than depise winning a cheap one. i understand your reasoning behind the need to match your opponents' moves, which regretably means matching cheap moves as well, in order to score... but if you think about it... what good are points which are only counted by yourself? my suggestion to anyone who has complaints about the game or patch as far as balance in strengths and weaknesses is to just relax, calm down, and play the game the way you'd like to play the game... if that means you do your best to piss everyone off, then you'll get voted out... if you do your best to play a good clean game, then win or lose you're bound to be shown some respect... but if all you want to do is rack up as many points as you can, then why not just wait for a tourney when the points actually count for something besides ego? a game is a game, and nothing more... it should be played as such... competition leads to the dark side, Spidey, but you already knew this.

[Spider AL]

*Spider AL squashes Anty*

 

Cheers Etz, I'll certainly write such an e-mail, but furthermore I'll organise as many people as I can to aid me in the cause. One voice alone in the wilderness, In space no-one can hear you scream etc. Ahem.

[Nill the Mean]

I'm all for listing what we think should be changed. I'll help you out if I can. I owe you for that last duel you played me at. Remember me? I had half your frags without any spamming. You said you were going, I challenged you to one last duel... and I beat you! I'm sure luck won't favor me next time .

I'm not quite clear as to what you think should be changed though. You indicated what is wrong quite clearly, but how do you suggest it should be fixed in the next patch? I presume you realise that saying we should go back to 1.02 combat will probably never happen, in case that might be what you want.

[Etz]

I doubt going back to 1.02 is possible (or even recommended) either.

 

One thing that bugs me is 'special moves'. I mean what the heck are these things? Perhaps they just named them poorly becaus the word that pops to my mind is 'manouver'. And why on earth does a backstab do more damage and goes through blocks more easily than a normal attack? Alright perhaps it's a "surprise" attack so the defender might not expect it and thus the higher probability of actually connecting with the hit. But if it turns the game into a backsweep / backstab rollercoaster... that's a game I'm not going to get into.

 

Another thing is Duel vs. FFA / CTF, these are two (possibly three) entire different kind of beasts when you consider game design. Even in real life (and this *is* a subject I know somethign about) rules of engagement for duels and mass battles were entirely different. 1.03 is great with duels, although no force duels would probably be better with out the throw ability as there aren't any real ways to counter it, except to throw your own saber.

 

How ever in FFA games I find that people are usually fighting in a big ball as almost every level has this one large open space which attracts people (rightly so, I can't understand what Raven were thinking of when they made that Raven labs level). I'm not claiming to be a great player but usually I most points I gather in such game are due wading in, swinging around wildly and usually hitting opponent who is already nearly dead due to someone else hitting him first. Trying to pursuit a specific enemy in FFA seems to be hopeless because there's so much health / shields around that with the blocking going on it's very easy to reatreat. Especially on servers with more ppl somebody else will usually kill your opponent from behind when you're chasing / fighting him.

 

Oh, and btw. I'm not playing to win so usually I don't use guns or any special moves except accidental backsweeps and occasional light / medium / heavy 'special move' when the oppoturnity calls for it.

[Spider AL]

Remember me?

 

Err... Were you under this name in-game? doesn't ring a bell I'm afraid...

 

You indicated what is wrong quite clearly, but how do you suggest it should be fixed in the next patch?

 

I'm glad you asked! Firstly the backstabs should indeed be lowered in damage, in my opinion. It would be hard to make them less desirable by other means, such as making the backstabber more prone to attack.

 

Secondly the two new "Force Weaknesses," Drain and Heal. I believe that Drain was disempowered too far in the right direction, so a small decrease from the original power would be enough of a change from 1.02. Heal on the other hand was likewise too far disempowered. Instead of nerfing the amount you heal, I believe Raven should restore the amounts in 1.04, and instead make the healing occur over time, and also include the "meditative stance" of Heal lv. 1 in Single player, as it would be an excellent deterrent for heal-happy-madmen to have to sit still with their sabre off for several seconds while healing.

 

Thirdly Absorb, as a lightsider it's tough for me to say this, but *gulp* I think the noise it makes should be audible over a wider radius, so that Darksiders at least have a chance to know there's an absorber appearing somewhere nearby.

 

Fourthly if grip-users are to be slowed to a walk, the damage the grip does should be increased. But really, I think a reversion is in order for this one, I don't understand why they slowed grippers down at all. It was never very powerful in the first place...

 

Fifth, blocking. The blocking radius is so wide that in FFA one simply has no incentive to waste time sabre fighting with someone in FFA when you could be backing into a group while backstabbing. To avoid cheapness, the allure of the cheap tactics must be removed, so I would therefore prefer that blocking be reverted to 1.02 methods in FFA, CTF, CTY and Team FFA, and I will be lobbying for precisely that.

 

There we have it, anyhoo.

 

Trying to pursuit a specific enemy in FFA seems to be hopeless because there's so much health / shields around that with the blocking going on it's very easy to reatreat. Especially on servers with more ppl somebody else will usually kill your opponent from behind when you're chasing / fighting him.

 

In a post full of excellent points, this is perhaps the best. The pace of FFA is, and should be fast. Since the only fast moves are now cheap moves, we'll be seeing a lot of them. The answer is not just to nerf the fastest moves, as this would slow the game to a positive crawl, where even if your sabre runs true at an opponent, they'll block it, and get killed by someone else from behind. 1.02 definitely had superior FFA, and I'll be lobbying for the restoration of the fast and furious feeling.

[Etz]

I think we need to keep this thread going as there has been lot of usefull discussion going on here. Below is what I replied to another thread, I decided to add it here because I'd like to know what Spider Al has to say about it. Most of it is not going to happen but let's see what we can think up.

 

I'm going to add my stick to the pile

 

Lightsabers by their very definition are lethal weapons, if you get cut with one, something will most likely drop off. I can see the reasoning behind light, medium and heavy stances, but lets face it. Having to slash someone multiple times with a weapon that can cut through steel isn't exactly realistic, but then games rarely are.

 

Somebody (quite few somebodies actually) mentioned that the arch with blocking should be smaller, I whole heartetly agree. Should Raven change this it would be very good indeed. Also although I mentioned above that lightsaber damage isn't very realistic at the moment I also understand that one shot kills aren't that fun either. How ever I think that you should be able to kill a person with 3-4 hits max. Now with shields added it can really take forever to bring a guy down. I don't remember seeing any personal shields in the movies, do you? Originally in Darkforces shields were simply a cool way of replacing armor that was used in games like Doom at that time. How ever now I feel it's more like a relic from that past age where three dimensional enviroments were only dreamt of and if I could make the choice, I would take them off alltogether.

 

Now most of you will probably flame me for saying that, and of course it will never happen so save your breath. But think about it, that would change the game quite a bit and although guns might be overpowered the lightsaber combat in FFA games and similar would become a lot more interesting. More tweaking in stance damages and blocking would be needed of course to balance things out.

 

Perhaps it would be better if actual armor rating would replace shields. It would work out exactly as now, except that lightsabers would pass it by as falling damage and kicking does now. People have said that double clicking jump makes kicking harder, it does. But it's not funny to see somebody to use only kicks. And why not? When you kick you'll by pass all defenses and shields. Five hits and the person is dead unless he gets medkit or has heal. Kicking is almost more effective than using your saber because while you kick you can still use block (except when you're upside down in the air). Using armor instead of shields would have the additional benefit to make kick more of a tool than a weapon. You could still kick someone over but armor would take the worst damage off.

 

That's the kind of stuff I would like to see implemented. And maybe I will, with the ability to create mods perhaps enough people would like to see that happen to make it possible. Do you?

 

There, I guess I could have posted link directly to the thread, but you've probably already read it.

[Spider AL]

Somebody (quite few somebodies actually) mentioned that the arch with blocking should be smaller, I whole heartetly agree. Should Raven change this it would be very good indeed. Also although I mentioned above that lightsaber damage isn't very realistic at the moment I also understand that one shot kills aren't that fun either. How ever I think that you should be able to kill a person with 3-4 hits max.

 

These are all very good points. Blocking is... Well, it's slowed FFA down. Right down. And to win intentionally, it's almost a given that you'll have to use the backswing.

 

I never really saw the point of the fast stance as it was pre-patch, the damage it did was abysmal. Now, I don't have a problem with it, but because of blocking, I can swing at someone with heavy stance (and hit them, in the side) and they'll somehow block it, and rail off a bunch of light stance spins at me. Of course I avoid them, but the blocking kinda ruins the Strong stance's normal strikes. So now that the Strong stance is redundant, one is forced to use the backswing, which is universally accepted as being cheap.

 

Note, NF duels are fine with this patch IMO, I don't have a problem with duels at all. I'm talking about FFA here.

 

The armour idea is an interesting one, workable, but I'd have to give it some thought before commenting... Shield belts have been a part of the DF series from day one...

[Etz]

Yeah shield belts have always been the trademark of the series among other things. In the original Dark Forces it just didn't matter as no one used lightsabers. Basically it was the same thing as armors in other games, just with a different name. They sticked with it in Dark Forces II and now it's here.

 

As for how to implement a personal forcefield? I'd rather see it as bonus item that for a given time (30 sec as other items I'd guess, until the battery runs out ) would either absorb percentile amount of damage from energy weapons or make the user immune to them complitely.

 

This would add a twist in FFA and CTF, you would actually have to use another weapon or use force to kill or avoid the person with the shield belt. I honestly believe that the armor idea would work better than the current one. But even if Raven would miracolously come to the same conclusion they would never change it, it's too late for that. Besides it's only my opinion and that doesn't really make it true. We'd would need to make a mod just to test it. That might be easy though, just make lightsabers to ignore shields for starters and see how that would affect the game. Probably very simple to implement.

 

As for heavy stance being ruined, I'm not the best person to talk about that as I rarely use it except as a bait to get the other person attack me. The way I see it you really need skill to use red stance now. First hit is almost always blocked, but the person you hit is also staggered for a second or two so with 2 and 3 hit combos you should be able to land some solid hits as well. Of course with the target moving around this would be no easy job.

[Spider AL]

As for heavy stance being ruined, I'm not the best person to talk about that as I rarely use it except as a bait to get the other person attack me.

 

Absolutely, an excellent tactic... however, in FFA nobody has time to bait other people, it's all a big mishmosh. Someone comes in and backswings, end of game. This is unacceptable, and without the backswing, it would all just slow down. I'll be lobbying for removal of the new parries/knockaways in a toggleable 1.021/1.03 version style arrangement in the next patch.

[Aiee]

Originally posted by Spider AL

I never really saw the point of the fast stance as it was pre-patch, the damage it did was abysmal. Now, I don't have a problem with it, but because of blocking, I can swing at someone with heavy stance (and hit them, in the side) and they'll somehow block it, and rail off a bunch of light stance spins at me. Of course I avoid them, but the blocking kinda ruins the Strong stance's normal strikes. So now that the Strong stance is redundant, one is forced to use the backswing, which is universally accepted as being cheap.

 

I beg to differ. Strong style did receive an upgrade in the form of chainable attacks. While it takes a little more timing, it is very easy to chain up to 3 attacks after one another, and the two that follow the first execute at about the same speed as a medium style slash. Furthermore, the red stance attacks do an excellent job of shattering defenses, leaving players open for a while after the initial slash for your two follow-ups. A well-timed 3-hit combo can, in fact, kill a player who is at full health.

 

Somebody (quite few somebodies actually) mentioned that the arch with blocking should be smaller, I whole heartetly agree. Should Raven change this it would be very good indeed. Also although I mentioned above that lightsaber damage isn't very realistic at the moment I also understand that one shot kills aren't that fun either. How ever I think that you should be able to kill a person with 3-4 hits max.

 

An alternative, which I also mentioned in another thread would be to keep the arc of blocking the same (roughly +/- 90 degrees from center, allowing players to block attacks from the side), but instead reward players for their accuracy in blocking. that is, make the percentage of attacks blocked inversely proportional to the angle they hit relative to the center of the player. that is to say, if someone attacked a player and their saber hit right in front of the player (at a 0 degree angle from center), 100% of their slashes would be blocked, unless the attacked player had left an opening, either by having his/her saber deflected, or by being in the middle of executing an attack. If someone attacks a player, and their saber hits them at an angle of say, 45 degrees, 55% of all attacks would be blocked. this would be halfway between right in front of a player and directly to the side, and a skilled swordsman (which a Jedi would have to be to use a lightsaber in the first place) could reasonably parry or block a large amount of attacks, even at this angle. If a player is hit directly on his/her side, only 10% of all attacks would be blocked (IE: almost none), reflecting that any blocks here would be due to sheer luck. While this may sound like a lot of blocking, and a very forgiving system initially, it is important to remember that nearly no saber attacks hit dead on center as it is, and I beleive that on a player who doesn't keep turning to face his player, roughly 1/3rd of all attacks would connect. At this rate, a few light swings to soften up, followed by a medium and a heavy would bring most players down. However, a skilled player could technically keep blocking indefinately.

 

Another thing that would be nice to see is blocking related to a players movement. I would suggest that in additional to said radius-related blocking, the players movement at the moment of attack would have an effect on the chance to block. If we say a player has 100% chance of blocking (I'm assuming a head-on attack here) while standing still, movement penalties could be induced that would reduce this to 90% if he was walking forwards or diagonally forwards. 85% if he was walking sideways or backwards, 80% if he was running forwards or diagonally forwards, 75% if he was running sideways (strafing) and 70% if he was running backwards. The logic behind this being that a person running sideways or backwards will need to concentrate on the placement of his/her legs, and some of the concentration needed to maintain an effective defense would be transferred to the legs. The lowered defense rating when moving backwards, along with the lowered defense when hit on the side or back would help discourage players from running backwards when fighting. Similairely, the lowered defense when running would perhaps encourage people to switch to walking in confined areas to increase their chance of blocking, adding another layer of thought to the current fighting model.

 

If the above is too complex, another way to discourage people running around backwards would be to bring in a feature from another game, the Baldur's Gate series: The backstab multiplier. The concept is remarkably simple, in the Baldurs Gate series, if you manage to sneak up on someone (using the hide in shadows feature) and attack their exposed back area, your attack will do vastly more damage. If a swift strike to the back in medium stance suddenly does double or triple damage, I'm sure you'll see far less people willing to risk running around backwards.

 

Regarding heal and drain, I would suggest that drain would be slowed down. Slowed down in the way that it would take less mana to use, but it would also sap the opponents mana and regenerate health at a slower rate. Also, if a player uses absorb, being drained would add mana to their force meter at a slower rate.

 

For heal, I would suggest that heal at level 3 would still take 50% of your force meter, but also heal 50hp. the catch being that rather than healing a player instantly, the health would regenerate over a short period of time, similairely to single-player. During this time, a player would have to stand completely still. If a player begins to run, healing would be interrupted, and the excess mana would be wasted. This would encourage players to heal between fights, rather than run around and hit heal repeatedly.

 

I do not use grip myself, by my impression of it is that it was fine in 1.02. I have force push bound to mouse3, and people rarely manage to cause much damage before I push them away. Why it was reduced in power is beyond me.

 

I like absorb as it is now. Personally, I don't beleive it should make any sound or have any visual effect while inactive, but instead make a loud sound and flash as soon as it absorbs anything. This worked fine in the original Jedi Knight (absorb had a very distinctive sound), and anyone with but a little sense in their heads would stop gripping/draining/lightening (I know that's not a word, but bear with me) as soon as they see it. To balance it out, my suggestion is to make drain sap less mana for attacks that cannot be aoirted, such as push and pull.

 

Regarding the weapons, the ammo costs were increased because of people spamming the alt repeater and flechette randomly, hoping to score a few quick kills. the problem the increased ammo consumption created was that there isn't enough ammo to go around anymore. My suggestion for solving this problem would be to increase the amount of ammo gained from an ammonition pickup. This would leave ammo for everyone to use, but still penalize people who wish to spam the alt fire. Someone with a halfway decent aim would still get 12 alt shots with the repeater rifle at full ammo (which would be easier to get if ammonition in pickups was increased), which should be enough to stop a retreating flag carrier.

 

Finally, while this has been suggested before, I would like to add some further weight to the argument of reducing the speed of running backwards. In CTF, part of the argument of needing to use secondary fire is that a backpedalling carrier in light stance with absorb can deflect everything else back at the pursuers. If you reduce the speed at which a player runs backwards, a flagrunner will be forced to either:

A) running backwards (you could add a further penalty to force speed when running backwards, but that's just a random thought-fart) and having the chasers catching up with him and using their sabers or primary-fire flechette at a range where he can't push.

Or B) Running forwards at full speed, leaving his back exposed to primry fire shots from the repeater, crossbow or pretty much any other weapon. In this case, of course, he will have to rely on his skill at dodging, as well as covering fire from his teammates to survive.

[Spider AL]

I beg to differ. Strong style did receive an upgrade

 

Any upgrade it may or may not have received is vastly outweighed by its inferiority to mindless spinning in a group, and/or strong backswing in a group. Pre-patch you could hit someone twice with the strong style normally, and kill them. This meant that you had options to kill people quickly other than shoving them down and backswinging them. All the speed and pace of FFA is gone, unless one behaves cheaply. No fun at all.

 

Another thing that would be nice to see is blocking related to a players movement. I would suggest that in additional to said radius-related blocking, the players movement at the moment of attack would have an effect on the

 

etc. etc. In my opinion it was overly contrived thinking like this that has left FFA and CTF players in the position they're in right now. Pre-patch, if you got hit, you got hit. It was your fault for not dodging. Now, even if someone's skilled enough to hit you, you may block it. That does not reward skill, it rewards a lack of skill.

 

And before anyone says it no, I have no problem winning sabre duels post-patch, and I don't even have to use the backswing. The point stands, that automatic blocking of this radius and type is merely a shield that those who cannot dodge, fall back on.

 

I do not use grip myself, by my impression of it is that it was fine in 1.02. I have force push bound to mouse3, and people rarely manage to cause much damage before I push them away. Why it was reduced in power is beyond me.

 

Absolutely true and apt, I too have no idea why they nerfed grip to this extent. Now, darksiders have no weapons with which to fight me. This is saddening, as all the challenge of defeating darksiders is now gone.

 

I also agree that running backwards should mean a further reduction in speed.

[Aiee]

And before anyone says it no, I have no problem winning sabre duels post-patch, and I don't even have to use the backswing. The point stands, that automatic blocking of this radius and type is merely a shield that those who cannot dodge, fall back on.

 

While you have a valid point in that, I would like to point out that some of us do not like the idea of constantly hitting roll. I come from a background of playing JK2 where you did, in fact, move out of the way rather than block. What I found there, and in pre-patch JKO was that most of the time, opponents were running around, fighting a fight where there were constantly a gap of 10-20 feet or more between them. In my opinion, sabers are melee weapons. Melee weapons are weapons in which you have to get in close to a player to do damage. So it makes sense that to damage a player, you would have to be close to them for an extended period of time, which is what blocking requires of you. You'll find that if you do a diagonal swing at an opponent, your saber will often hit them in a 30-45 degree angle. If they were running around at the time of the collision, the system I suggested would leave them with roughly a 50% chance of blocking an attack - a vast reduction of the current rate of 80-85%.

 

What I am trying to say is that some people - me included - like the idea of more blocks, deflections and parrys. They make duelling - a game mode which previously consisted of running away from your opponent 80% of the time so you would't be struck by the tip of a saber you couldn't block with your own, even if you saw it coming a mile away. I understand that the changes have made FFA slower (although I find the idea that a player should be expected to dodge all attacks made from 4 or 5 opponents mplaced all around them a little silly), so I suggested a way that would hopefully allow us to experience the best of both camps. In FFA, you will be assaulted from all sides, and while the arc percentage and movement percentages may help you block attacks from one specific opponent, they will be far less efficient in fights against two or more, hopefully restoring some of the quick kills FFA players prefer.

 

1.02 was well-liked by CTF-players and FFA-players to a large extent, but many duellists complained because many of the moves that gave speed to CTF and FFA were being abused and made duelling less fun. 1.03 has changed many of these, offering a very good feel to dueling, at the expense of those who like to play FFA and CTF. What I'm trying to do is suggest changes that will please all 3 camps; Duellists, FFA and CTF players alike. Thus, making changes that increase the longevity of battles only if you focus your efforts on a single player seems to be the logical solution.

 

If you have any suggestions that will restore the pace to FFA and CTF, while still allowing me to have a good, long duel with an opponent where I use timing, blocks and deflections to trick my opponent into leaving himself open so I can move in for a finishing kill, I would love to hear them. Just please bear in mind that for every player who desires an intense 30 seconds where he through a few rolls and a well-timed sweep slays 3 opponents, there's another person whi likes 2 minutes of staying close to his opponent, trying to get an opening, and both players opinions are equally important - they paid the same for the game after all.

[Nill the Mean]

I agree with Spider Al that players now seem to bundle into a ball on one part of the map. I have seen it happen too often for it not to be true.

 

Two people fight.

A third arrives, starts fighting.

Fourth person arrives, thinks: "Lots of people here!" and starts fighting.

Since no-one is dying as quiclky anymore, player five, six, seven, etc... turn up and pile up with the rest. Since everyone is in one spot, why bother going somewhere else? This game is about combat, not avoiding it.

 

Then some "backslash whore" turns up and kills of the people who weren't paying enough attention.

 

I like Aiee's idea to reduce the chance of blocking the further away the attack is from the front of the player. Sounds good. It would put more point in trying to outmaneuvre your opponent again. Footwork is just as important in a fight as blocking afterall.

Stuff directly in front would have a 100% chance of getting blocked, stuff further away than 90 degrees from your front should NEVER be blocked (I'll get back to this).

 

I think that on top of that, they need to remove a lot of the saber clashing at the beginning/end of the attack animations but leave it the same in the middle of the swing. This would make counterattacking more important and would reward timing. The blocking system that we are thinking about would prevent "jousting matches". blocking then counterattacking would be really worth it.

 

I also say that the damage should be upped for all styles. I think having to hit him 3-6 times should be enough. I don't know exactly what the deal is with medium now... I can't seem to get anything right with it. If I swich to light I get a lot more hits that seem to do more damage than medium would. This is undoubtedly not the case, but that is what it feels like sometimes.

 

Finally, I don't agree that they should up the damage you get from being hit in the back. Imagine how crappy this would be in FFA if someone shoots you in the back with a rocket/repeater/flechette... SPLAT!

To counter the backstab they should just make it obviously less effective than attacking in front of you. I also have noticed that some of my attacks that I make at someones back now also get blocked. I'm not blind, I know what I saw... I attacked him in the back and my saber bounced back and I didn't hear a pain noise from either of us. Happened to me at least 15 times already. This should NEVER happen.

 

I would also like a better solution for people who push, knock you over, then push again to send you over an edge. You can stand up slowly and this prevents you from being pushed again, but sometimes you just flip up again without touching anything. I suggest they let you get up faster the more you click the jump button. If you would press it A LOT you could avoid being hacked whilst lying down more easily. Also, sometimes when I still have force to counter and am standing still, I still get pushed, why? Stick in the cool counter animation from SP.

 

On the topic of alternative animations, they stuck in the SP animation for the person being gripped. Looks very cool. Now I think they should put in the normal walking animation for the gripper, not the slow run you have now. I think you should be able to do more damage faster, move slightly faster, but be not be able to do it for as long as you can now.

 

Remove the pain sound for anything below 10hp damage. This way you would know if you just glanced him or actually hit him.

 

Add the fists you can get by playing about in the console in SP.

 

If the changes we are dicussing now were implemented into 1.04, we would get a nice balance between what made both 1.02 and 1.03 so great without losing out on too much of either.

I think...

[Aiee]

Finally, I don't agree that they should up the damage you get from being hit in the back. Imagine how crappy this would be in FFA if someone shoots you in the back with a rocket/repeater/flechette... SPLAT!

 

To clarify my remark, I only meant for the added damage to the back to occur if you hit someone with a lightsaber. It was, again, to discourage overuse of backstab and place empahsis on getting behind your opponent and placing your saber smack in the middle of his spine. I guess I could've worded that a little better.

[Spider AL]

If you have any suggestions that will restore the pace to FFA and CTF, while still allowing me to have a good, long duel with an opponent where I use timing, blocks and deflections to trick my opponent into leaving himself open so I can move in for a finishing kill, I would love to hear them.

 

I'm glad you asked. I'd like at least toggleable SP/1.03 style combat for server administrators in the next patch. This would mean that FFA and CTF server admins could lower ammo cost for CTF, and up the speed of FFA, at will. Duel admins could choose whether to make their servers SP style or not.

 

I'll be lobbying for just that.

[Orangina_Rouge]

LOL ...if even u The infamous cheap bastard feel lame .....there is no hope for this game

[LooNBB]

WOW! A "I don't like the Patch" thread with maturity and real discussion...

 

While I do like the patch quite a bit (being a NF dueler) I can agree with most of the points here, and completely understand Spider's original intent. I also tend to abuse things that i know will get me the kill.

 

It really does amaze me that somehow the absolute best tactical position in a saber fight (being directly behind an opponent) has been made into an absolute No No due to the backstab moves.

 

It would make sense to me if the move was reversed... 1 hit kill if the attacker is behind the attackee... but the other way around?

 

While I am chop-chop-choping at some guy he magically does a super spin and I am out for the count? It doesn't fly for me.

 

Why wouldn't you spam it? If it works use it! The developers in their quest to make a great game should look to make a balanced game that is fun and exciting and doesn't involve some inane exploits.

 

Great posts

[Aiee]

I, for one, could live with that. One thing I would stress, however, is that a clearly visible icon should be added that shows wether a server is using 1.02 or 1.03 style in the server browser. Currently, the community seems to be divided into two camps, and I suspect a player would be annoyed if he enteret a server, only to find that blocking ws the opposite of what he expected.

 

However, I would advise caution in implementing a feature such as this. It is important to remember that we are, indeed a community, and having two vastly different approaches to saber fighting could possibly divide the community in two, with name-calling, flaming aplenty of people who use another style than yourself and further difficulties in patching and fixing two different game experiences to follow.

 

On the topic of backstabs, I beleive the original reason they were made unblockable instant-kills were because they were intended as a surprise maneuvre. I mean, if an opponent was not prepared at all, a stab in the stomach would be sure to kill. Unfortunately, they didn't anticipate that players would run around backwards, as if trying to fart the dodging players to death and totally removing the surprise on the backstab.

 

Today, however, I did a move and experienced another that really did add surprise to the backstab move and justified the instant kills (because the element of surprise were there, and the saber did in fact go withy through the other guy, without the stabber turning to aim (Further clarification: I mean that the instant kills were justified in these two specific cases, not in general)).

 

The one I pulled off hapened while I was running at my opponent in the light stance and he was running at me. When we were getting close to each other, he hit roll and rolled past me. I hit backstab, and he got the saber placed right into his spine, because he got up right behind me.

 

The one that happened to me saw my opponent jumping over my head in a sommersault. As soon as he landed, he pulled the backstab maneuvre, and hit me in the stomach as I turned to face him. Again, this capitalized on the backwards stab as a surprise maneuvre, and his win of the duel was well-deserved in my eyes.

 

Another possible fix to the backwards-stab would be to keep the unblockable aspect of it (like in DFA) but tone the damage down slightly (again like in DFA) and remove the ability to turn during the move (amazingly again like DFA). Finally, changing the animation so all styles would use the light stance backstab. This would still make it a deadly move if you spin around and perform it at the right time, but it also leaves your front and sides wide open to a counterattack, and requires you to aim properly when using it.

[Nill the Mean]

Getting rid of the ability to turn whilst doing a backstab would be good. It would require more "skill" to pull it off like that. way. I don't think they should tone the damage down that much though. You don't want it to be nerfed so it is totally usesless. With the other things I sugegsted it would be much more rewarding to attack things in front of you thus making it less tempting to backslash every five seconds. Afterall, why backstab when you are getting more kills fighting "normally"?

I find it strange that no-one responded to my ideas of toning down saber clashing at the beginning and end of attack animations. I thought this was a good idea myself.

And we should all ask for the hit sounds to be changed the way I said earlier, I bet this would be a great way of telling if you hit him or not.

In respect to having serverside options for 1.02 or 1.03 for certain game types...

I think that would be cool, however I would rather that Raven concentrate their efforts on 1.04 to make it better than 1.02 & 1.03 instead of them bringing back the old things.

Sounds rationable, no?

[LooNBB]

Nill... we didn't respond because we were dumfounded by the brilliance you displayed

[Nill the Mean]

Originally posted by LooNBB

Nill... we didn't respond because we were dumfounded by the brilliance you displayed

 

Hahahaha... why thank you.

 

[Spider AL]

I also tend to abuse things that i know will get me the kill.

 

The temptation is horrible, and I'd rather it wasn't available to me at all. I played a game tonight, fully intending to analyse my kills-per-minute when I wasn't using the backstab at all... But I folded when someone called "Maybe2stoned" did it to me. I went on a rampage. Waahhhh.

 

Getting rid of the ability to turn whilst doing a backstab would be good.

 

Hmm, yes, but turning doesn't make much difference to the all-round effect of the Strong style backswing. It's hellish. I can't really see any way of making it less of a one-hit-kill unless it's either slower, (much slower, which would defeat the point of it) or toned down in damage.

 

In respect to having serverside options for 1.02 or 1.03 for certain game types... I think that would be cool, however I would rather that Raven concentrate their efforts on 1.04 to make it better than 1.02 & 1.03 instead of them bringing back the old things. Sounds rationable, no?

 

Well, let me put it this way... as a veteran FFA player (as veteran as one can be in a game that was released little more than a month ago) I'd say there was only one thing that needed to be changed in FFA: The DFA. My ideal patch for FFA would be 1.02 with only the DFA nerf added. For CTF, the same. This patch is wonderful for duelling, so for v.1.04 I'd like to see these different needs reflected for the different styles of play. However, this may be a tall order for Raven. Implementing different rules for Multiplayer and Single player is one thing... but different rulesets for six different modes of play? A lot of work. It may actually be easier for them to implement a 1.03/1.02 toggle... so that's what my requests are based on. I'd LOVE to see different rulesets for all the different modes in 1.04, but I think that may be like asking Santa for a small country. I could be wrong there though.

 

With the other things I sugegsted it would be much more rewarding to attack things in front of you thus making it less tempting to backslash every five seconds. Afterall, why backstab when you are getting more kills fighting "normally"?

 

Precise and to the point Nill. This is the crux of the matter... in 1.02 you didn't see backstabbing because ALL blows cut through blocks. People backstab now, because it's simply the most effective blow. In 1.02 I got plenty of kills with normal forward strong strikes. So I didn't need to backstab.

 

I find it strange that no-one responded to my ideas of toning down saber clashing at the beginning and end of attack animations. I thought this was a good idea myself.

 

It is a good idea, and would undoubtedly make the sabre combat feel more fluent... but I for one would like a vastly lower blocking radius in FFA. Vastly.

 

And we should all ask for the hit sounds to be changed the way I said earlier, I bet this would be a great way of telling if you hit him or not.

 

True, that should definitely go on the list.

 

I, for one, could live with that. One thing I would stress, however, is that a clearly visible icon should be added that shows wether a server is using 1.02 or 1.03 style in the server browser.

 

Oh definitely. It wouldn't be much use to anyone if you couldn't tell what version of server you were joining on the ingame browser. All seeing eye does have such an icon I believe, though I have never had occasion to use it.

 

Another possible fix to the backwards-stab would be to keep the unblockable aspect of it (like in DFA) but tone the damage down slightly (again like in DFA) and remove the ability to turn during the move (amazingly again like DFA). Finally, changing the animation so all styles would use the light stance backstab. This would still make it a deadly move if you spin around and perform it at the right time, but it also leaves your front and sides wide open to a counterattack, and requires you to aim properly when using it.

 

I agree with this completely. I hadn't thought of making all styles use the light stance backstab, but now that you mention it it would be excellent. I much prefer the look if the thing, personally, and it would mean that the backstab could only be used on one... POSSIBLY two people at any one time, making it a non-mop-maneuver.