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[SUGGESTION] Make instagib/overkill = official

#1
Instagib/overkill is what 95% of the people play
Instagib/overkill is what 95% of the people want
Instagib/overkill is the identity of Xonotic to 95% of the people

Why do we keep trying to force vanilla as the official mode? Yes sure, some of us really enjoy it, but is that enough to ignore the opinion of the vast minority?

Let's have a look at what makes instagib/overkill successful:
+ easy to learn, still progress pays off on the scoreboard
+ you die, you spawn fully equipped = dying is way less frustrating
+ relatively strong, dedicated community, even after all these years
+ variety of active servers, with mods, huge selection of maps

That's what it takes to keep a game alive nowadays. Can we achieve the same with vanilla? Yes! But only with drastic changes: Way reduced gamespeed, less weapons, easy to use weapons. Will that happen? No, no one dares to change vanilla gameplay like that. The logical consequence is that vanilla will not be popular on public servers.

So what should happen with vanilla? If no one dares to make those drastic changes that are required to fit it to public gamers, then keep it fast and hardcore and call it promode.

tl;dr why ignore what 95% want to push something that won't work anyway without strong changes that no one dares or is willed to make?
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#2
I strongly dislike that the point you make here seems valid to me.
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#3
Translation: Halogen agrees.

I think that turning towards minsta/overkill can be a good decision for Xonotic.
[Image: 0_e8735_c58a251e_orig]
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#4
I loathe overkill because it makes no sense gameplay-wise. The biggest A-hole wins. Wait until your team dies, grab the flag and run. Noobs are slow as F anyway.
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#5
That is really sad, but true...

That is because vanilla is too hard for most new players, and most of the true vanilla players are very skilled, so they often creep newbs out of that balance. And so only a few new players decide to play much vanilla. Sure, some of us teach them a bit, but still they only get Asskicked, as even if they know how they should play, they can't automatically. That of course needs practice, and getting killed all the time don't motivates you and if you get totally raped you can't learn much, as the good players pretty much deny everything you try.

Veeery sad....
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#6
I have seen capable players pick it up after a match or two. Even if they didn't use movement.
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#7
Lets hope not even through I like my shotgun server which for the most part is insta kill its get boring pretty fast after say 4 maps. Same with Minsta or Overkill. Overkill would be awesome with jetpack if the jetpack was developed a bit more and you could have

The best combo for Vanilla is Vehicles. Gives new players or players not skill in weapons a change to use Vehicles to stay relevant in the game but it has its limitations and making a good Vehicle map takes some mapping skill to make it look like a map and not a gimmick.
[MoFo] Servers - North America - Hosted in Montreal Canada - Admin DeadDred [MoFo]
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#8
As a player that 90% of the time plays minsta, 5% overkill, 5% weapons i can say the following:

Considering that i'm not a total noob but still got owned 90-95% of the time i'm playing weapons except when playing with people that are new to the game:

When you are a new player

On minsta/overkill you have a fairly easy to use weapon you have a dot, you hit the enemy, and 1 or 2 hits later they are killed.

They may not know how to use the hook, but usually they ask and 2 or 3 respond "e" "use e" "e for hook". Hook is hard to master but easy to use.

On a standard match since is easy to kill and from time to time you get some points then you grasp how to kill easily and conclude that you need to play more to get better. It's really hard to see a player that played a full match on a normal map with 0 kills, even on DM you can get 4 o 5 kills if you are really bad, on CTF is even harder, so only half of the players is aiming at you, so it's easier to get more kills.

On big matches a new player can stand and kill some players who are aiming at other people. On small matches an extra player even if he is new can mark the difference, i can't count how many 3vs2 or 4v3 i have lost because an inexperienced joined the other team.

On weapons there are a lot of weapons, so far i can use fairly well the vortex, the machinegun and that's it, i can grasp the ark, the shotgun, the electro, i still have no idea how to use the granadelauncher, i miss almost all of my rocket and crylink shots, and i have never killed someone with the hagar except with infinite ammo. You can see why that's worse with a new player

On a standard match is not unusual to have players with negative kills, you are shooting the rocket, electro or other weapon, you hit the ground and you take damage, you get killed, i don't think anyone enjoys seeing -3 points as score.

Also if you are playing with someone who is a little better than you on weapons this happens a lot, you are fighting, the two of you get low hp you hear the sound that the other player is also with low hp, since the other one is a little better you get killed then he gets all the hp and shield he can grab while you respawn and usually refills all his health. Also he now has more weapons than you and you have to find the weapons again, and i'm not even talking about duel, i'm talking about usual ctf/dm/tdm matches.

A new player on ctf does not makes any difference, if you can't hit enough the player that just got the flag and ran away or even worse the player with low health who is running away because your aim isn't so good... is frustrating.

But the thing that stills enrages me is when you have a lot more health, hit one player, you hear that he is on low health, you hit him again, he still not dies, and then he gets away. That's logical well you hit him, you hit him again, and since he knows how to move better he gets away, but when that happens to you 3 or 5 times, you don't think well i need to improve my skills so he can't get away, you think something like this: F**k this, this isn't fun, you can all go F**k yourselves, and then you rage quit.

A total noob/newbie can get at least a kill against a really good player on minsta, a lucky shot is enough, when you kill someone who plays better than you, you feel good, you know that you may not win, but at least you got him this time. On weapons a noob gets totally owned by the experienced player, if he does some lucky shots that's not enough to kill him, he can get health again come back and kill you without him dying so it isn't fun.

I think that everyone here agrees that if you got owned most of the time it isn't so fun, but if you get owned ALL the time, it's never fun, why bother playing again? There are other games out there that are fun.

I have to admit that weapons are fun when playing with someone who has the same skill level as you(or someone who plays bad on purpose), but that's a rare event.

I ceirtainly enjoy a lot more weapon arena, than normal weapons, getting out of ammo is frustrating, even more if you don't have idea of where to get more weapons, and my favorite mode on weapons is Last man standing, not because i win more(i don't) but because then you can't get more health and shield so if i find you: i can shoot you again and you are dead! There is no way to escape and then coming back to kill me after grabing health and shield.

My skill level is medium, or i guess so i'm not bad on minsta, but neither i'm too good, i still got owned from some players like kromatic, floxy, mario etc... I don't play weapons most of the time for the reasons explained above, weapons is too frustrating, i can't kill a thing against players better than me, against players who are worse than me i feel bad, they can't kill me and i know how much it sucks when that happens, so i avoid grabing shield and health or let them kill me some time so it don't suck as bad, and finally on the rare event that i'm on a balanced weapons match against people of my skill level, then a player who is a lot better than us joins and spoils all the fun.
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#9
Why not learn from OK and why it's so popular? Let's see what is different in OK:
  • Spawn with weapons
  • Only very few pickups, but the ones that are on the maps have huge impact if you pick them up
  • You spawn with your teammates, this leads to less spawnkills
  • If someone dies they drop an armor cell
  • You don't have to switch to laser, so movement is faster since you can laser jump more often and more safely

I think all three points here are obviously great for beginners. I don't know how but doesn't it make sense to integrate these ideas into vanilla? Then we could have OK community and vanilla one play together.
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#10
If we go this route, surely CTS/Defrag has an even better and longer track record than overkill. Let's just make Xonotic a Defrag-only game.

Case closed.
"Yes, there was a spambot some time ago on these forums." - aa
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#11
Quote:Why not learn from OK and why it's so popular? Let's see what is different in OK:
Spawn with weapons
Only very few pickups, but the ones that are on the maps have huge impact if you pick them up
You spawn with your teammates, this leads to less spawnkills
If someone dies they drop an armor cell
You don't have to switch to laser, so movement is faster since you can laser jump more often and more safely

I think all three points here are obviously great for beginners. I don't know how but doesn't it make sense to integrate these ideas into vanilla?

Excellent suggestions to be honest. Also in line with Ari's experience as a "vanilla newbie".
But as I said in the first post, I don't see anyone willing to change vanilla like that. If you suggest it, you'll earn snappy responses, e.g.:

Quote:If we go this route, surely CTS/Defrag has an even better and longer track record than overkill. Let's just make Xonotic a Defrag-only game.

Case closed.

@Ari
thanks for taking the time to share your experience with Xonotic here.

@Devs/whoever cares for vanilla
if you wonder why vanilla is basically dead and think I am talking bs, at least read Ari's post.
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#12
Thanks Ari for sharing your experience, but to those who criticize vanilla balance:
Let's just wait and see what happens with 0.8... we have worked hard for the past few months to come up with a fun balance that proves to work well in public matches, a cooldown period before starting the attacking and radical change suggestions would be greatfully accepted.
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#13
This is not meant as a balance thread actually, my excuses if it appeared as such. Whether a gun deals 10% more or less damage is pretty much irrelevant for this discussion. It's about the identity of Xonotic. In my opinion there is a clash here, between how it is presented publicly (xonotic.org, forums, youtube and so on) and how the game really is experienced by the players. How does it make sense to show videos of gameplay that 95% of the players don't touch? I think if you want to play Xonotic, you have two options: 1. play insta/overkill/defrag casually or somewhat competitively 2. play duel/tdm/ca matches vs experienced players.

1. is usually fun right from the start
2. takes patience and anger management to become halfway decent (unless you have a background in a similar game, e.g. quake, ut or warsow)

Nevertheless, there are playerbases for 1. as well as 2., but Xonotic officially does not aim at them. And my question is, why? Instead, it is being advertised as a all-weapons game which is fun for casual players. Why advertise something that is not true? Wouldn't it be reasonable to tell people exactly what they can expect, thus actually targeting possibly interested players (who like either 1. or 2. or both)?
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#14
There is no instagib game because nobody would develop or play it. How can you even advertise it?
Any game that is just a bit complex will deter people. There will always be a better player who you can't kill. Getting rid of half of the game won't fix it.
How is Warsow now btw? Basically the same last time I checked.

@Ari - there is a tutorial somewhere, rocket launcher is the easiest weapon to kill someone with
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#15
(01-11-2015, 07:00 AM)asyyy Wrote: But as I said in the first post, I don't see anyone willing to change vanilla like that. If you suggest it, you'll earn snappy responses, e.g.:

Quote:If we go this route, surely CTS/Defrag has an even better and longer track record than overkill. Let's just make Xonotic a Defrag-only game.

Case closed.

Personally, I only care about CTS these days. I couldn't care less if the game was shotgun only from now on. Make overkill or minsta default, I literally could not give a rats arse about that as long as it remains the sandbox it is where you can make what you want on your own server.

But I am still genuinely annoyed by how CTS/Defrag community and servers have been treated in the past as inferior parts of the game and player base by certain influential people. Just like Minsta and overkill are often treated mostly with disdain. A certain dev didn't stop contributing for nothing.
"Yes, there was a spambot some time ago on these forums." - aa
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#16
(01-11-2015, 09:50 AM)frostwyrm333 Wrote: There is no instagib game because nobody would develop or play it. How can you even advertise it?
Any game that is just a bit complex will deter people. There will always be a better player who you can't kill. Getting rid of half of the game won't fix it.
How is Warsow now btw? Basically the same last time I checked.

@Ari - there is a tutorial somewhere, rocket launcher is the easiest weapon to kill someone with

There actually is a InstaGib game, called Ratz InstaGib, and it got greenlight on steam, and there is already a fanbase. Just wanted to say.
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#17
Quote:But I am still genuinely annoyed by how CTS/Defrag community and servers have been treated in the past as inferior parts of the game and player base by certain influential people.

I know what you are talking about. And like instagib, defrag has so many fans worldwide who atm do not even know that they can enjoy their favorite mode in Xonotic.

Quote:Any game that is just a bit complex will deter people. There will always be a better player who you can't kill. Getting rid of half of the game won't fix it.

No, you got it wrong. I did not suggest getting rid of vanilla, I suggested calling it promode. As promode in other games is just that: fast, hardcore, harsh learning curve. There are people who love that, and those should be attracted to the game.

Devs probably think I am crazy anyway but I suggest advertising Xonotic as follows:
  • Fun, sandbox game based on oldschool arena fps mechanics
  • Create your own server, with a huge selection of mods and customization
  • Casual and competitive instagib with an endless amount of maps
  • Fan of CPM, quakeworld or warsow? Join the Xonotic promode community
  • Like defrag? Try the Xonotic speedrunning servers
  • Free, opensource (GPLv2) and cross-platform (Windows/Linux/Mac)
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#18
(01-11-2015, 12:37 PM)asyyy Wrote:
Quote:But I am still genuinely annoyed by how CTS/Defrag community and servers have been treated in the past as inferior parts of the game and player base by certain influential people.

I know what you are talking about. And like instagib, defrag has so many fans worldwide who atm do not even know that they can enjoy their favorite mode in Xonotic.

Quote:Any game that is just a bit complex will deter people. There will always be a better player who you can't kill. Getting rid of half of the game won't fix it.

No, you got it wrong. I did not suggest getting rid of vanilla, I suggested calling it promode. As promode in other games is just that: fast, hardcore, harsh learning curve. There are people who love that, and those should be attracted to the game.

Devs probably think I am crazy anyway but I suggest advertising Xonotic as follows:
  • Fun, sandbox game based on oldschool arena fps mechanics
  • Create your own server, with a huge selection of mods and customization
  • Casual and competitive instagib with an endless amount of maps
  • Fan of CPM, quakeworld or warsow? Join the Xonotic promode community
  • Like defrag? Try the Xonotic speedrunning servers
  • Free, opensource (GPLv2) and cross-platform (Windows/Linux/Mac)

Yeah, that sounds good to me. And also there should be screenshots of Overkill, Insta and promode. That would be good i think.
[Image: 22172.png]
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#19
Clan/weaponarena is the best way to advertise vanilla mode, anything casual that involves vanilla weapons is a good way to advertise vanilla mode. And speaking of which, where's the amphitheatre and endif of Xonotic Huh

I've seen a lot of activity usually in servers that don't take themselves too seriously that are played by people who also don't take it too seriously, eg. Jeff & Julius and some of those jetpack+weaponarena servers. It is through crazy shit like that how most of us competitive gamers got into the competition in earlier games in the first place, because that's essentially how it all started +20 years ago. It takes a special kind of mind to get into the competitive side by actually starting it off with the competitive modes.

(01-11-2015, 10:29 AM)dRty_ Wrote: There actually is a InstaGib game, called Ratz InstaGib, and it got greenlight on steam, and there is already a fanbase. Just wanted to say.
Heh, I got banned from the browser version few days after joining. They do not appreciate rape obviously, not sure I care enough to check this v2.0 thing.
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#20
(01-10-2015, 08:06 AM)asyyy Wrote: Instagib/overkill is what 95% of the people play
Instagib/overkill is what 95% of the people want
Instagib/overkill is the identity of Xonotic to 95% of the people

Why do we keep trying to force vanilla as the official mode? Yes sure, some of us really enjoy it, but is that enough to ignore the opinion of the vast minority?

For most who know me, this won't be a surprise that I agree with this, but it has nothing to do with personal preference. Its things I've seen to be true and how they match with what asyyy is saying. I've read a good amount of the forum threads in regards to the future of this game and what needs to be adjusted in order to make it exceptional, and yet little of it, if any, has to do with the most popular portions of the game. That's not to say that what work/effort that being put into the vanilla is unimportant, because that's not true at all. But what I see is game that has multiple important parts ( vanilla, overkill, minsta, defrag, etc.) and is only using one of them to push the entire game further. To make an analogy, that's like a human being using only their head to attempt to move around, disregarding the other limbs to offer help. Why not use what you have available as a whole to progress the game much quicker, reaching a wider variety of people? There is no game i've seen that compares to this one, but how it's presented (vanilla only), you wouldn't really know it.

My suggestion is to have the other game modes make some short demos, have them be advertised along with the vanilla demos, and see what kind of interest can be generated. I would be happy to help in any way with this, if that is something you guys think would make sense.
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#21
(01-11-2015, 04:09 PM)Smilecythe Wrote:
(01-11-2015, 10:29 AM)dRty_ Wrote: There actually is a InstaGib game, called Ratz InstaGib, and it got greenlight on steam, and there is already a fanbase. Just wanted to say.
Heh, I got banned from the browser version few days after joining. They do not appreciate rape obviously, not sure I care enough to check this v2.0 thing.

Ok, that is strange and funny at the same moment.
I played a few matches and all matches i played, i raped my opponents, but nothing happened.
But I at least will try the next version out. Looks quite fun, but i wanna wait for it to be finished until i will play it for real.
[Image: 22172.png]
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#22
(01-10-2015, 08:06 AM)asyyy Wrote: Instagib/overkill is what 95% of the people play
Instagib/overkill is what 95% of the people want
Instagib/overkill is the identity of Xonotic to 95% of the people

Why do we keep trying to force vanilla as the official mode? Yes sure, some of us really enjoy it, but is that enough to ignore the opinion of the vast minority?

SIgh.... When you put it that way it sounds sadly right...
erebus minstanex erebus Angel
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#23
I know of many players who play those modes only because the vanilla servers are empty (though, when we try to play vanilla with those same players, they just leave...)

A trailer or something could show off more modes than vanilla, yes, but our work must be aimed mostly at vanilla if there's any chance of making it enjoyable.
The other modes are stable, while the core game is unfinished, so they don't need as much attention (this doesn't mean the devs are fully against these modes).

The idea is to supply the game with a promode and casual balance, not mark vanilla in its entirety as promode. We have not started work on the casual balance yet, but it is planned for the next release.
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#24
I am partly to blame here for the following reasons:

- I'm 99% a vanilla player
- I'm in charge of the website
- I make (or have made) a lot of so-called "marketing" videos

If you put the three of those together, no wonder we have such a preponderance of all-weapons stuff. It's because that's what I like and enjoy! That being said, when others make good content I do feature them w/ posts and such.

What I think would be reasonable here is to change the verbiage of the server browser after 0.8 (maybe 0.8.5?) to make it more focused on the different core types asyyy mentioned above. The sorting could also change to put the most popular server types at the top of the list (still below "favorites", of course). I still think the delineation of all-weapons/instagib/overkill needs to be made, though - just what the labels are need to be less like "vanilla and then everything else".

I'm also wary of any larger changes like making the "create" menu create instagib games by default. Going "all-out" on insta/overkill would mean a lot of people glossing over weapons gameplay altogether. I think changing our marketing content and server browser labeling would be enough.
asyyy^ | are you releated to chuck norris?
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#25
About what is casual-friendly:
  • 8 weapons with secondary modes / only 3 of them hitscan + 8 armor/health pickup items + ultra fast movement system IS NOT casual nowdays.
  • 3 weapons max / all hitscan + 2 pickup items (if at all) + slow movement IS casual nowadays.

And now the important part:
  • Xonotic is not focused on competitive / promode players (you get flamed for being competitive, as if it is a crime to try to master a game, which has been proven not only on irc but also on this forum)
  • Xonotic is not focused on overkill (feels more like a disease that Xonotic has to carry with it, instead of an appreciated addition)
  • Xonotic is not focused on instagib (the minsta+hook community has been stronger than vanilla for years, yet no one ever mentions that part of Xonotic anywhere)
  • Xonotic is not focused on speedrunning (see PinkRobot's comment on that)

Instead, Xonotic is focused on casual all-weapons gameplay, but it does not deliver that. And with the 0.8 release being close, I strongly doubt that it will offer that any time soon (no, it cannot be fixed by changing the weapon balance alone). I think it is about time that Xonotic stops taking and advertising itself as a casual-friendly all weapons game OR takes the effort to revolutionize its vanilla gameplay (see machine's post for some suggestions).

And as Antibody said, the things that people love are already there. They just need to be appreciated as a part of the game and be presented by labeling them accordingly.
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