I like Power Sets because...
By
Ad Astra,
Posted on: 2009-10-04 14:30 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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As someone who ran a CS server for several years and examined the server logs weekly, that is incorrect.|
Originally Posted by Eisregen_NA
As an old-school Counter-Strike player I'd have to disagree. I've known a lot of people who were unstoppable dervishes with an MP5 and used it to a much better effect than the M4. Me, I used the AK-47. At close range, you were dead anyhow, and at long range I'd headshot you with a double tap. Can't do that with the M4. On sniper rifles, most people gravitated to the Arctic Warfare, but people who took the time to learn how to use the G3 to effect casually outperformed them. There definitely wasn't a best gun.
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The AWP was the best sniper by far, the AK was the best terrorist gun by far, the Colt was the best CT gun by far. The MP5 was next 'best', mainly because it was the cheapest gun that didn't suck and the default choice when people were poor in the early rounds or when their team hit a losing streak. The Deagle was the best pistol by far.
As to your hilarious anecdote about the G3...LAWL.
No AWP sniper with a pulse could ever be out-dualed by anyone sporting a G3. The SCOUT was better than the G3 if you could aim worth a damn.
It makes me wonder if you've ever actually played the game, or if you just glanced over the Wiki for some names.
I liked the G3, but for the same reason I liked the Mac 10- it was so inaccurate you could get headshots without being able to aim.
My personal experience with the game is years out of date, but LITERALLY looking at the first set of server stats that came up on Google and checking out the details for their #1 player, guess what weapons top his chart?
CS's buy system periodically forces players to use 'weak' guns, which artificially increased diversity. But given their druthers all the 'good' players always picked the same guns.
As a longtime player, I realize that they were choosing the most effective options available to them.
How do you explain their behavior?
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That's actually kinda scary. |
Originally Posted by Perfect_Pain
She is a Chihuahua Pomeranian mix...
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A true open system, and the one that should have and should be built is one where you spend points buying your mechanical advantages: attacks and the amount of damage they do and the type of damage; defenses; resistances; protections; mezzes; buffs and debuffs; speed; etc... on a diminishing returns scale.
Then, for each click or toggle or passive or charge-up attack/defense/mez/buff you have, you customize how it looks. You choose the animation, it's emanation, and it's colors.
Then the Devs build the NPCs and their AIs to function as not-insurmountable challenges to the mechanics the players have available to them.
Done.
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To be fair, Electricity does have a PBAOE attack Sparkstorm that is similar to Lightning Field in effect, but does a lot of damage and is more of a click power. It is my character's primary attack. It is not a melee attack, but you have to be in melee range to be effective.|
Originally Posted by Sigium
Nope. No Melee attacks for Fire, Ice, Electric, Force (We call it Energy), or Darkness. It bugged the HELL out of me.
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Darkness also has a melee ranged attack that does lots of damage and transfers health to you. Kind of like Siphon Life.
So while there are no elemental melee attacks, there are elemental melee ranged attacks.
My character started out (in open beta) as a copy of a pen & paper character that was really strong and could teleport and used a baton to beat people up. But you only have single sword, with no weapon customization. So already my concept was blown, and once I found out how good Sparkstorm was, I totally abandoned the original concept.
So while you do have a certain freedom of exploring different concepts, for me it was too much of a temptation to min/max.
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I have that exact power on one of my characters and I can assure you, it hits out of melee distance. Not only this, but it does, as it mentions 'Sphere' radius of damage.|
Originally Posted by UberRod
To be fair, Electricity does have a PBAOE attack Sparkstorm that is similar to Lightning Field in effect, but does a lot of damage and is more of a click power. It is my character's primary attack. It is not a melee attack, but you have to be in melee range to be effective.
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Originally Posted by UberRod
Darkness also has a melee ranged attack that does lots of damage and transfers health to you. Kind of like Siphon Life.
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Originally Posted by UberRod
So while there are no elemental melee attacks, there are elemental melee ranged attacks.
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Originally Posted by UberRod
My character started out (in open beta) as a copy of a pen & paper character that was really strong and could teleport and used a baton to beat people up. But you only have single sword, with no weapon customization. So already my concept was blown, and once I found out how good Sparkstorm was, I totally abandoned the original concept.
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Originally Posted by UberRod
So while you do have a certain freedom of exploring different concepts, for me it was too much of a temptation to min/max.
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Yeah, this right there makes me totally want to keep talking to you.|
Originally Posted by Nethergoat
It makes me wonder if you've ever actually played the game, or if you just glanced over the Wiki for some names.
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I'm holding my (also very out of date) empirical evidence against yours. Since neither of us can prove our claims, this is pretty much it. I definitely don't have any videos from 10 years ago, but if I tell you I've known guys who (admittedly in close quarters) could circle-strafe okay players dizzy and kill them with their MP5 without getting hit once and that these players never cared to touch a Colt or AK, you'll have to take it at face value. I've also known people who racked up insane amounts of kills with knives only, but admittedly that is more a psychological issue than one of knives' in-game performance.
Likewise, the Colt and the lesser Assault Rifles are great for people with a bad aim cause they give you chances to correct your problems. The AK is much more powerful but requires you to know what you're doing. Which one of them is the best gun you speak of? In your post, you've already attached conditions. This is the best for them, this is the best for the other team. Which one is that 'best' gun you postulate in the post I was replying to? So far you've mentioned three possible options plus the AWP.
Speaking of the AWP. The G3 Scenario is again based on empirical evidence I've gathered in my time. You can disbelieve it, but that doesn't change the fact that I've seen it. Now, you can be a cnut about this and try to attack my character or you can accept that I've played with different people than you know.
No argument, the Colt, MP5 as well as the basic CT pistol are easiest to make work. The AK, Deagle and AWP require you to aim a bit more since the rate of fire is lower. My point was that people can use other guns just as efficiently, or use one of the above more efficiently than people would give it credit for. People will go the path of least resistance, because they're lazy *****, but, and this is what I tried to get at, this doesn't invalidate the alternatives.
In CO, by comparison, there really are no alternatives. It's like having the choice between a Colt and a bag of oats to throw at your enemies, not the choice between a Colt and an AK.
"If you're going through hell, keep going."
Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
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Somebody give the man a cigar. Mostly because I like him, but also because he's smarter than the entire ******* CO Dev team taken together.
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Originally Posted by Zombie Man
A true open system, and the one that should have and should be built is one where you spend points buying your mechanical advantages: attacks and the amount of damage they do and the type of damage; defenses; resistances; protections; mezzes; buffs and debuffs; speed; etc... on a diminishing returns scale.
Then, for each click or toggle or passive or charge-up attack/defense/mez/buff you have, you customize how it looks. You choose the animation, it's emanation, and it's colors. Then the Devs build the NPCs and their AIs to function as not-insurmountable challenges to the mechanics the players have available to them. Done. |
"If you're going through hell, keep going."
Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Dungeon Runners has an interesting iteration of an open system. A character's starting class only determines at what level skills become available, and you are greatly encouraged to diversify. What really defines a character's strengths are a set of passives that modify the effectiveness of attributes. To put it in CoX terms, imagine a passive power that increases ranged damage while decreasing hitpoints and buff/debuff effectiveness. If your character has that power it is more or less a blaster. A general purpose character with no AT-like passive powers would likely be self-sufficient, but no where near as effective as a more specialized one at any single role. Taking more than one defining passive would allow for really far out builds, but would take up a power pick that might be better spent on an attack/control/buff/etc.
Such an approach could avoid some usual problems but would still require a lot of work.
I'm beginning to understand more and more what people mean when they say CO should have been a console game instead of an MMO.
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Originally Posted by Perfect_Pain
After experiencing some new and different things, I have learned that I really do like Power Sets. I like picking say, Electric and having 9 powers to chose from inside the set... and then chosing Fire, and having 9 other powers to chose from. I really like the way defences is done in this game. Where I can have multiple Toggles of Defence or Damage Resistance on at the same time.
I think this game found a great balance in how it lets us chose powers. I think having absolute freedom is not so good, because in my experience all my powers end up being kind of the same. I have SnowStorm on 6 characters for example. And no... they are not all Ice people... ugh. i dislike that much Freedom tbh. Anyways, I can't wait for Going Rogue. I hope they give more announcements about it soon. |
Oh my GOD, CO has turned her BRITISH!
DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!
Open power systems are superior, hands down. That you can't make every power equal is easy to solve. Just make each ttake up a certain number of points, and adjust points rather than powers.
A game is not supposed to be some kind of... place where people enjoy themselves!
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Like me!
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Originally Posted by Eisregen_NA
Other people only care for the numerical benefit and gladly slap Hasten on anyone and anything.
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I have Hasten on all my characters here. I also have Swift Health Stamina on ALL my characters here. But, I look at those as Minor Powers. Those are not my MAIN powers here. I get to chose between real power sets with real choices here. I love that.
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That's kind of like saying that the national debt is easy to get rid of; just print more money. It doesn't solve the problem so much as move it around.|
Originally Posted by ChaosExMachina
Open power systems are superior, hands down. That you can't make every power equal is easy to solve. Just make each ttake up a certain number of points, and adjust points rather than powers.
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Open point based systems are inherently more complex than a class-based system. They require mechanics that take into account magnitudes more options, and as these options are added, the potential for game-breaking capability increases exponentially. If you're capable of dealing with that, then yes, an open system will be superior (if you take more options to be superior). But it's so much easier to screw up that it tends not to be worth the trouble.
We'll always have Paragon.
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just skip this unless you're an ex-CounterStrike junkie, it won't make any sense.
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You're spouting nonsense, so my interest in continued communication is limited.|
Originally Posted by Eisregen_NA
Yeah, this right there makes me totally want to keep talking to you.
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| I'm holding my (also very out of date) empirical evidence against yours. Since neither of us can prove our claims, this is pretty much it. |
Anyone who cares to can hit Google, find some CS server stats and check out the top players on ANY of them. You'll see the same weapons over and over- AWP, M4, AK47. MP5 would be the #1 smg, deagle will be the #1 pistol.
It isn't something someone you can have a rational discussion about, because there's only one correct interpretation of the data. Which is publicly available- pick a random server, check out the top players. The vast majority of their kills will be with one of the Big Three.
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| I definitely don't have any videos from 10 years ago, but if I tell you I've known guys who (admittedly in close quarters) could circle-strafe okay players dizzy and kill them with their MP5 without getting hit once and that these players never cared to touch a Colt or AK, you'll have to take it at face value. |
That didn't make it a good gun.
You could rack up kills with anything- we had a clan that only use the TMP. There was a weekly contest to see who could get the most kills with the pump shotty. We would occasionally fire up Adminmod and have a Scout only round.
But there were "best" guns.
Everybody knew which ones they were, and most players used them exclusively most of the time.
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| I've also known people who racked up insane amounts of kills with knives only, but admittedly that is more a psychological issue than one of knives' in-game performance. |
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| Likewise, the Colt and the lesser Assault Rifles are great for people with a bad aim cause they give you chances to correct your problems. |
Again, check server stats- the information is out there.
"Crappy players use some other guns so the AK isn't really the best" is an amusing but fundamentally flawed argument.
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| Speaking of the AWP. The G3 Scenario is again based on empirical evidence I've gathered in my time. You can disbelieve it, but that doesn't change the fact that I've seen it. |
I've charged a crummy sniper with an AWP down the long tunnel on Dust from the bomb site to the sniper balcony and killed him with a knife- he fired at me three times and missed them all.
By your logic that means the knife is better than the AWP?
The G3 is a fun gun, but a piece of junk compared to the AWP.
How many G3 kills were tallied in the last CPL tourney, assuming they still do things like that?
Good players use the 'best' guns.
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| My point was that people can use other guns just as efficiently, or use one of the above more efficiently than people would give it credit for. |
Server stats don't lie.
AK, M4, AWP were ALWAYS the top 3 killers.
Every week for several years.
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| People will go the path of least resistance, because they're lazy *****, but, and this is what I tried to get at, this doesn't invalidate the alternatives. |
They're more efficient, they're deadlier, that's why everyone uses them.
If CS weapons were "balanced" in the way you claim they are it wouldn't matter what people used, so they'd use whatever.
Instead, they used the colt, the AK and the AWP in overwhelming numbers.
Gosh, I wonder why?
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| In CO, by comparison, there really are no alternatives. It's like having the choice between a Colt and a bag of oats to throw at your enemies, not the choice between a Colt and an AK. |
I've been commenting on your attitudes about 'open' balance systems and your claims that CS weapons were balanced.
Which they absolutely are not.
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Finally found some competition stats.
Clicked some random guys and everyone gets their kills with the Big Three, with a smattering of other guns. If you find ANYONE who got a kill with a G3, let me know.
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My City Was Gone
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I haven't ever played the game in question, but the above quotation caught my eye.|
Originally Posted by Nethergoat
It isn't something someone you can have a rational discussion about, because there's only one correct interpretation of the data.
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Data can always be interpreted in many ways. In fact, data can be created or altered to support nearly any supposition. So, your assertion that there is only one correct inerpretation (yours, go figure), strikes me as an incredibly ridiculous position to maintain.
Also, since you have posted none of this supposedly infallible and conjecture obviating data... it is hard to agree with you on those grounds. At least it would be, if I were involved in this "argument."
[Edit: I see you posted some data. I can't see it, since the site is blocked at work, so I will assume it is cohesive, wholly representative of years of play, and without any ambiguity at all.]
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I seriously beg to differ. This is like saying 'The best way to deal with a child with ADD is to give him AS MUCH stuff as he'll ever need to play with'. If you ever look at the CO population, you might just see how close and accurate that is. :P
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Originally Posted by ChaosExMachina
Open power systems are superior, hands down. That you can't make every power equal is easy to solve. Just make each ttake up a certain number of points, and adjust points rather than powers.
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For stupid fun rounds, I never found anything that beat Scouts + knives only.
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Originally Posted by Nethergoat
We would occasionally fire up Adminmod and have a Scout only round.
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Interestingly, this has apparently always been a big issue in the Champions pen and paper RPG. In the brief time I attempted to play it, I learned that most GMs have to define maximum Offense and Defense limits for a campaign, as well as rein in players using spreadsheets (along with math formulas and derived secondary stats) - all in order to keep the min-maxing to merely superheroic levels. |
Originally Posted by Nethergoat
the problem with an 'open' power system is the same as the problem with letting players make their own missions- the majority of players are going to gravitate to the most efficient choices.
In a pen and paper RPG played with friends that isn't a problem- there's no benefit for the PCs all taking the same hyperefficient, min-maxed powers because the GM can trump it whenever they want. |
The Champions point-based system lends itself to min-maxing far more than class&skill based games like D&D. (Ran into several articles on UseNet back in the day, for example, which explained how to generate infinite points on a character, by purchasing certain main stats and then buying back down the secondary derived stats that were increased by that main stat. It was all very silly.
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Well, they are quite close to getting it onto the X-Box |
Originally Posted by Nightphall
I'm beginning to understand more and more what people mean when they say CO should have been a console game instead of an MMO.
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This presumes that every power has a value that can be uniquely determined irrespective of any other powers the character might have. Which is absolutely not true in any system complex enough to be interesting.
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Originally Posted by ChaosExMachina
Open power systems are superior, hands down. That you can't make every power equal is easy to solve. Just make each ttake up a certain number of points, and adjust points rather than powers.
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If you want elemental melee attacks, you need power replacers, and the majority of those are for single- and double-blade. They take up your primary offense slot, which can be a fairly large opportunity cost in other ways (say, stats). |
Originally Posted by Mr. NoPants
CO has no elemental melee attacks?
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And they have low chances to proc the elemental damage.
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I urge everyone to check the stats of the top players on any fairly busy server, or competition stats for any 'big' organization.|
Originally Posted by Thirty_Seven
I haven't ever played the game in question, but the above quotation caught my eye.
Data can always be interpreted in many ways. In fact, data can be created or altered to support nearly any supposition. So, your assertion that there is only one correct inerpretation (yours, go figure), strikes me as an incredibly ridiculous position to maintain. Also, since you have posted none of this supposedly infallible and conjecture obviating data... it is hard to agree with you on those grounds. At least it would be, if I were involved in this "argument." [Edit: I see you posted some data. I can't see it, since the site is blocked at work, so I will assume it is cohesive, wholly representative of years of play, and without any ambiguity at all.] |
CS players declare the "best" weapons over and over in every case.
My dismissive attitude is born of playing for hours every night for several years and pouring over the server logs and stats at the end of every week. Claiming that CS players hadn't settled on "the best" guns is complete and utter nonsense.
The weapons weren't balanced at all. There were a couple of really good ones, a couple of okay ones and a bunch of crummy ones nobody ever used except as a joke.
An analogy from this game for the G3/AWP comparison would be saying that an an emp/dark defender solos just as well as a bs/regen scrapper.
They can both solo, but one is light years faster than the other and the answer is obvious to anyone who's played for a while.
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The key to good open systems is not to link (too many) stats to each other. If lots of skills are linked to a certain stat, then the min-maxer has a vested interest to max out that whole set of skills, which just brings you back to a class based system.
The other key is to use diminishing returns. It's less drastic than caps, but serves the same purpose: to keep min-maxers from breaking the formulas.
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In the open beta I took the martial arts because I wanted to see how it did ranged attacks.
The over powered long range jump kick was the only attack I used after I got it. Soloing the hanging judge by trapping him under the gallows was hilarious but it was hard to jump kick him to death in the time limit.
I didn't even think to check out the elemental stuff because my play time was so limited.