Next patch is in beta!

[Credge]

Originally Posted by Jiggles

Well, I don't think we're being "elitist," because we want people to experience it rather than just seeing it as a dry entry on a changelog. However, we can't make everybody's version of FF. Even if we somehow could, the games wouldn't be compatible

The whole idea that you guys didn't ask us about things and included them... And then the attitude that "WHAT WE HAVE IS IN STONE REGARDLESS" is pretty elitist =\.

It's not really about making everyones version of FF.

That being said, we're not ignoring anyone in this thread. It's just that we'd like to see how some of our ideas play out before instantly shooting them down as unworkable, game-breaking, or whatever. Again, not to be elitist, but I think you can see why most "real" game developers refrain from posting directly on their own forums. And those that don't often end up like Derek Smart. It's no fun to see your hours and hours of work being trashed in a few sentences (or many, depending )

What about asking the community first? Surely you're making the mod for the community and not yourselves? And if you are making it for yourselves, you wouldn't post changelogs up.

That's the sort of thing I'm talking about.

Even further, because I haven't seen any "This is how beta is going so far" threads or posts, videos, pictures of new things, accuracy in all areas (soldier and demoman explosion radius, for example), and other things... it's kind of disheartening.

I can understand that not everything is set in stone... but then again I can't because that's sort of the attitude that is conveyed.

There are also some other, more serious issues, that should be addressed before, say, scouts ever even thought of getting jump pads. Something like adjusting pyros more than just lowering IC damage (makes them even less of a threat than they were before) or playing with caltrops before trashing them completely.

Edit:

All what secrecy? We posted pretty much our entire work-in-progress changelog. Releasing screenshots really wouldn't do justice to most of the changes, and videos of decent quality take a while to produce (and videos of not-so-decent-quality make FF look bad).

Screens of new things (jump pads are a major one), videos of it in action, etc. I can make a list of things that are missing (later in post). Quality is irrelevant as they would be for the community. Simply having videos of tests out doesn't do a thing to make a mod look bad. It actually shows that the crew is doing things.

I can make a changelog for any mod, but it doesn't mean a thing without some evidence to support it.

A list of things that would be nice to have so the community can give feed back:

1. Pictures of the jump pad (for size referencing). This is useful so people can see of how and where it can be placed as well as possible spots and ideas that should be tested before release.

2. Videos of the jump pad in action (for reference). It doesn't matter if the variables aren't set in stone yet. Seeing how it behaves plays a big role in how the community reacts to it. You can word something and make it seem like bubble gum and sun shine when it really just turns out to be bland or bad.

3. Videos of the new concing mechanism in work (for reference). It doesn't matter if the variables aren't set in stone yet. Seeing how the mechanism behaves plays a big role in how the community reacts to it. Etc.

4. Pictures of the difference in explosion radius for both the demo and soldier (for reference). This allows for the community to collectively decide if it should be larger, smaller, or if they are just right. Simply showing the explosion isn't good enough. Having comparison screens with rough-numbers and hue's to show the damage radius (or just radius of the explosion) are a great way to get feedback.

5. Videos or pictures of the tossable medpacks in action so the community can properly gauge it to see if it is even worth it or not. It may need tweaks... such as making it toss further, having more arch, etc.

6. Pictures of any new models to be put into the picture section of the website.

7. Pictures of any new action to be put into the picture section of the website.

8. Videos of any new action to be put into the video section of the website (does this even exist?).

Label it "2.0 beta".

The biggest killer for people looking at this mod is the lack of updates. There aren't daily updates. There haven't been any new pictures in the picture part of the website. The only videos made are by non-official people. Everything screams 'dead mod' when looked upon at first glance. The only thing that makes this mod not appear dead is the forum.

Not many people look at forums when they are glancing around at mods.

All in all, unless you are 'in the know', you aren't in anything with this mod. That's a ton of secrecy. This isn't cloverfield. Show us some pictures or videos of the monsters you have created. It has nothing to do with anticipation. It has everything to do with allowing the community to judge.

Every beta tester and dev says one of two things.

"You'll see when it's done."

"You'll like what we are doing."

This is the same sort of attitude that FSS and Sigil had when making Hellgate: London and Vanguard... respectively. Both of those turned out poorly.

[squeek.]

Originally Posted by Credge

The biggest killer for people looking at this mod is the lack of updates. There aren't daily updates. There haven't been any new pictures in the picture part of the website. The only videos made are by non-official people. Everything screams 'dead mod' when looked upon at first glance. The only thing that makes this mod not appear dead is the forum.

What about the huge news post talking about everything that is currently going on with the mod from THREE DAYS AGO? (It's called "Next patch is in beta!")

Every beta tester and dev says one of two things.

"You'll see when it's done."

"You'll like what we are doing."

How about, "It's being tested." Any pictures or videos of anything would be premature because it is still very, very susceptible to change (or is already planned to be changing). Check your FF steam community events. There's a huge 2.0 playtest tomorrow.

[mixer]

i really hope you rethink the SG-weakening and the enhanced power of nailgrens to destroy them. Engi-class is really more and more ridiculed ... i remember pickups and pub-games where, as an engi you were always running around, couldnt get the SG up to lvl2 or lvl3 ... you were killed building it,, killed on your way back to supply, killed (by your own teams spam aswell) killed on your way back from supply to your gun, which was destroyed again because a lvl1 is a non-issue for any offender ... if you are in the dominating team, and your def is stable, all is fine, but once theres a bit of chaos the engy is rendered useless and cannot help to get the def into a working condition ... i wonder if it was thinkable to scrap lvl1 SG and have it lvl2 right from the build ... or shorten the build-time ... there are countless variables to tweak and give that class a bit back.

[Lt Llama]

Originally Posted by AfterShock

RE: Wall friction - this has now been fixed. Concajumpers rejoice! We've emulated the 'walls don't cause slowdown' ala TFC, so concmaps should be playable again.

/me *concajumping up and down*

Does that mean all surfaces or just vertical ones? I hope to see maps with large drops being done now, but depends on some other small things to, but really, can't wait to test this.

Originally Posted by AfterShock

Also if you are on the ground when hand-held concing (and you don't jump), then you will perform a small conc jump rather than nothing happening. This will make it much easier for new players to understand what's going on, and less frustrating to switch between floor concs and HH concs.

But standing on a spot on the ground and jump right up and conc hasnt changed? I mean, you still get propelled faster upwards than if you stood still?

Originally Posted by AfterShock

New splash screen to tell you about any updates to FF if you are playing an old version.

Thats so going to make people not leave without knowing why their FF don't work. Maybe have it in some major languages? Or can you build a language sensitive splash screen?

Originally Posted by AfterShock

We're aiming to get everything locked down this weekend then a patch a week later, so hopefully first week in february-ish!

This comes high up in arguments for server renewal for another year .

I'll schedule an event when 2.0 is out so people in our community get to know about this as as soon as possible.

p.s. About helping newbs. Just an idea. I added a /help command with a plugin on my tfc servers. When used a menu pops up where you can chose differant topics. A hud message reminds people tha they can say /help. This has been very useful. Many have no clue what to do on a conc server but when they read the basic motd tutorial they at least get the idea and how to do to get started. Some sort of ingame help system like this would be great for FF I think. Just an idea which is probably not even new .

[SoBe Green]

Or most of the beta testers could just stay quiet and leave the talking to the dev team. That would be great too.

[Nezumi]

Oh, I should say that getting the push-on-ground working for the SG is good, but I really felt that SGs werer underpowered despite the nerfed nails. I had a really hard time getting up a l3 sentry, even with competent D teammates. I also felt that enemy sentries could largely be ignored. On top of all that is the havok a loose spy can wreak on a sentry.

I think all the spy stuf is great, as it adds a lot to the game, but I'd think that sentries would need all the more help to cope with it. Like getting more HP.

[mixer]

Originally Posted by Nezumi

Oh, I should say that getting the push-on-ground working for the SG is good, but I really felt that SGs werer underpowered despite the nerfed nails. I had a really hard time getting up a l3 sentry, even with competent D teammates. I also felt that enemy sentries could largely be ignored. On top of all that is the havok a loose spy can wreak on a sentry.

depending on the map, the enemey offender is faster from his respawn into your fr than you are from your _own_ respawn in to your fr, its absurd. At least, so far, the enemy solys are slowed down enough not to do so ... unlike etf/q3f where they were flying into your fr as well ... and it seems ff is heading into that direction now ... i just hope the devs make sure that they arent letting their personal preferences sneak into the class-development ... not even unconscious ...

[Nezumi]

I think that the improved (really, honestly improved) movement in FF meant that the D needed a little help to compensate, which they got, except for the sentry which got nerfed just a little bit. Playing as engi now feels just a little bit frustrating.

[bokko]

Sobe and Credge: If you want more insight then you should apply for beta testing, oh shit I forgot you have severe attitude problems!
Can all the whining kiddies just ragequit already? Good riddance!

[Iggy]

Originally Posted by chilledsanity

Well there's only 2 A/D maps right now v. 10 or more CTF ones.

As for spamming, the final stretch of dustbowl they don't have mirvs or grenades, and the ones prior to that, it's only at one location where grenades can get picked up. Yes, you can lay down pipes, but there's not much point in doing that past the start (until the flag advances) because you want to keep a constant suppressive force, not sit and wait. I don't think demomen stand a chance now at the gates because the offense all have 2 grenades for every life, which they'll be able to toss farther than blue bombs.

Well I thought's what I did, I listed reasons why I thought it was going to break some gameplay modes. Again, has anyone tried the new version on dustbowl or cornfield where they were able to prevent the offense from capping? I mean if the game is balanced, that should only happen about half the time.

That's part of the map design. It's been that way since the first Dustbowl. I've often thought about it needing more nades for the D. I suppose you(or anyone else, really) could edit the map-code and put another nadebag in it somewhere, and give it a different name(Dustbowl-nades) and spread it around. I'm sure people would play it.
As for the number of maps, hit the Mapping forums down the list and see if you can request someone make one or two. Lots of TFC maps are being re-made...and I really don't remember TOO many A/D maps from TFC. I'm contemplating trying out Hammer, and seeing if I can make a map.

[Hammock]

Originally Posted by chilledsanity

Well there's only 2 A/D maps right now v. 10 or more CTF ones.

As for spamming, the final stretch of dustbowl they don't have mirvs or grenades, and the ones prior to that, it's only at one location where grenades can get picked up. Yes, you can lay down pipes, but there's not much point in doing that past the start (until the flag advances) because you want to keep a constant suppressive force, not sit and wait. I don't think demomen stand a chance now at the gates because the offense all have 2 grenades for every life, which they'll be able to toss farther than blue bombs.

Well I thought's what I did, I listed reasons why I thought it was going to break some gameplay modes. Again, has anyone tried the new version on dustbowl or cornfield where they were able to prevent the offense from capping? I mean if the game is balanced, that should only happen about half the time.

I think you're forgetting half the story though. Not just blue scouts will have a jump pad. Your red team will have them too. This could actually make scouts usefull on D for dustbowl, being able to setup jump pads at strategic positions for faster runs back after death or faster resupplys.

Think about it, round 2 that nade pack respawns like once every 10-15 seconds. It's fast way faster than TFC's. Two scouts with 1 jump pad facing each direction, could let a demoman run mirvs faster than he's ever ran mirvs before. Get two demo men working in tandem, and boy you could have non stop mirv spamming.

I don't see why jump pads just have to help offense, when both teams can enjoy scouts on D for once.

Atleast removing radar and giving the jump pad can be a trade off. The radar thing I used way more often as defensive scout to catch spys, than I ever did on O. But now the scout can help defense out too with this pad.

[chilledsanity]

I'm sure people would play it.

Oh come on man, I'm lucky to find more than 2 servers with more than one person playing in them at any given time. In terms of numbers I think FF is gasping for air. Go logon now and see how many servers have people playing v. emtpy ones?

I think you're forgetting half the story though. Not just blue scouts will have a jump pad. Your red team will have them too. This could actually make scouts usefull on D for dustbowl, being able to setup jump pads at strategic positions for faster runs back after death or faster resupplys.

Think about it, round 2 that nade pack respawns like once every 10-15 seconds. It's fast way faster than TFC's. Two scouts with 1 jump pad facing each direction, could let a demoman run mirvs faster than he's ever ran mirvs before. Get two demo men working in tandem, and boy you could have non stop mirv spamming.

I don't see why jump pads just have to help offense, when both teams can enjoy scouts on D for once.

Well speaking from a pub perspective, I think that's a hell of a lot of cooperation assuming 2 scouts will make those pads, two demomen will know to spam the gate, AND there won't be other people lined up to get grenades in the first place.

As for both sides having them, I think that would only be a valid argument for something like warpath (which isn't even made for FF) where the offense/defense works both ways. Sure you can get guys to the front lines quicker, but for dustbowl the offense only needs to cap once and that round is over. I imagine this as an all too likely scenario:

1. Gates open, there is some initial spamming until demomen get killed from the offense since their range is much smaller now and they have to get so close to the explosions.

2. a scout builds a jump pad right at the start, sending someone with the flag to rocket past the front gate while the sg's are distracted by other players spilling out (and with less people playing engi because sg's have been weakened).

3. Flag carrier has just passed over half the team's defense, player caps in under a minute.

Of course there are ways of slowing this down, but I'm just talking about a normal pub server. Yes, the defense would have a slight advantage being able to get to the front lines quicker, but now offense has a huge advantage in being able to cap.

EDIT: How about making it so flag carriers on A/D maps can't use the jump pads? It wouldn't solve the demoman problem, but it would help prevent mind-numbing fast caps.

[SoBe Green]

bokko you haven't made a solid point since the release of FF. Go play on myspace and pretend people care about your opinion on things.

[Jiggles]

Originally Posted by Credge

The whole idea that you guys didn't ask us about things and included them... And then the attitude that "WHAT WE HAVE IS IN STONE REGARDLESS" is pretty elitist =\.

We've got a whole forum devoted to ideas and suggestions. We read it. We're not going to follow every suggestion, however; we're not making everyone's version of FF. And "set in stone,"? Hardly.

Originally Posted by Credge

It's not really about making everyones version of FF.

Well, from your point of view it's about making your version of FF. However, we've got lots of people all with their own ideas about were FF should go; just because we don't say "hey that's a great idea!" every time doesn't mean we dismiss each idea outright.

Originally Posted by Credge

Surely you're making the mod for the community and not yourselves?

Now that's just bordering on insulting. Again, we've got an I&S forum for any and all suggestions. That being said, aren't we allowed to have an idea of where we want our game to go? Or is that being "elitist" again?

Originally Posted by Credge

Even further, because I haven't seen any "This is how beta is going so far" threads or posts, videos, pictures of new things, accuracy in all areas (soldier and demoman explosion radius, for example), and other things... it's kind of disheartening.

lol AS has posted more updates about this patch than we've had about any previous patch. Accuracy in all areas? The exact values are meaningless because they change as we test them. We're not going to post an update every time we try a new value.

Originally Posted by Credge

I can understand that not everything is set in stone... but then again I can't because that's sort of the attitude that is conveyed.

Again, it's not set in stone. But if you don't believe us at this point...I don't see the point in responding further.

Edit:

Originally Posted by SoBe Green

bokko you haven't made a solid point since the release of FF. Go play on myspace and pretend people care about your opinion on things.

This is a warning for anyone beyond this point slinging insults: don't.

[greenday5494]

no one listened to my comments

[Hammock]

Originally Posted by chilledsanity

Oh come on man, I'm lucky to find more than 2 servers with more than one person playing in them at any given time. In terms of numbers I think FF is gasping for air. Go logon now and see how many servers have people playing v. emtpy ones?

Well speaking from a pub perspective, I think that's a hell of a lot of cooperation assuming 2 scouts will make those pads, two demomen will know to spam the gate, AND there won't be other people lined up to get grenades in the first place.

As for both sides having them, I think that would only be a valid argument for something like warpath (which isn't even made for FF) where the offense/defense works both ways. Sure you can get guys to the front lines quicker, but for dustbowl the offense only needs to cap once and that round is over. I imagine this as an all too likely scenario:

1. Gates open, there is some initial spamming until demomen get killed from the offense since their range is much smaller now and they have to get so close to the explosions.

2. a scout builds a jump pad right at the start, sending someone with the flag to rocket past the front gate while the sg's are distracted by other players spilling out (and with less people playing engi because sg's have been weakened).

3. Flag carrier has just passed over half the team's defense, player caps in under a minute.

Of course there are ways of slowing this down, but I'm just talking about a normal pub server. Yes, the defense would have a slight advantage being able to get to the front lines quicker, but now offense has a huge advantage in being able to cap.

EDIT: How about making it so flag carriers on A/D maps can't use the jump pads? It wouldn't solve the demoman problem, but it would help prevent mind-numbing fast caps.

You're arguing the skill factor of your team and enemy team. Not the usefullness of the object for either side. I've played many rounds of DB, where I've held off the enemy single handedly with pyro at the nade pack. I've played matches where the flag was almost near the cap at round two when I joined and as pyro I pushed them back to their gate, my team noticed and pushed up themselves. They were within inches of capping, and our team had them pinned at the gate at round 2 for the rest of the map.

You'd be surprised how people learn the tricks and strategies once they're shown or discovered by them. Look at tele's in TFC. They didn't even exist, but by the end of it's life it was mandatory for engies to have teles up before sg's, and if you didn't you were insulted.

Same thing could eventually become reliant on scouts. Scouts get your pads up! Of course it would be a balance issue too many scouts and you'd have a weak team. But the scouts could change classes as the flag advances, the pads would be usefull for sending faster reinforcements to the first yards.

My god people read one thing and panic, and think it's the end of the world. I haven't even seen 2.0 beta, and I'm already thinking of ways the thing could be used strategically.

[Rutabeggar]

Originally Posted by greenday5494

no one listened to my comments

That's because everyone is too busy raging each other instead of praising the dev. team for actually giving a shit.

A little more STFU and a lot less /cry FF isn't being fixed for me /cry would go a long way.

It's no wonder this mod hasn't had direction until now, all the community does is bitch at the dev. team. Yea HAI! They could put a clown with a nose that honks as a defensive class in and we really COULDN'T do a DAMN thing. They have the last say, we're entitled to our opinions, and if they choose to listen and implement part of our ideas, great! But I would say that they know best. If you think you're ideas are better, apply for beta! Otherwise STFU and enjoy the ride. I don't think Aftershock wants to pull this car over and beat your ass...actually at this point in time it wouldn't surprise me if he did.

[Firefox11]

I think that what they meant with the inability to spam with the demo in AvD maps is that currently the demo has 8 pipes, 6 grenades and up to 4 frags and 2 MIRVs, if he's lucky to have a nade bag. I remember that in TFC, for instance in Dusbowl's CP2 gates, a demo was able to pipe the exit to catch spies and spam grenades, frags and MIRVs together, giving the D almost 10 - 15 seconds of time to resupply/rebuild or whatever they needed. He could do this without needing to be near the gates (in fact, you could do this from the right building entrance and all explosives would detonate inside the hole). A good demoman could hold the offense by himself in a small game if he had the nade bag just for private use and knew how to spam.

In FF however, the grenade toss is smaller, so he has to get near the gate to do a successful spam, but this means that:
a) He is an easier target to random frags or enemies that manage to get out the hole,
b) The spam time will be delayed, since he has to get back to the bag nade which happens to be slightly farther away, since he has to get closer to the gate.
If the grenade launcher's timer is shortened, this will even make his situation worse since he will have to be still near the gates to hold a got spam (don't know if even closer than with the actual V1.11 situation). The only counters that come to mind are:
1) Have an extra demoman to run a second wave of spam,but this will waste an extra player that could be spy-checking or keeping an SG up, not counting that this may cause even further delays in the spam if they spam too quickly.
2) Make use of a D scout and the jump pad to help the demoman to get to the nade bag or in position faster,but this will waste another player, the scout who has to be rebuilding the jump pad (and I don't even know if you get one per life or which are it's limitations)

Hope this makes sense now. I know that in CTF sometimes you have to DM as Demoman, but in AvD, as demo, you just usually spam and a longer grenade launcher fuse helps to keep it up, since you'll probably just use the GL only to try to catch snipers/airborne jumpers. (Or at least that's what I've seen, and I mostly play AvD in TFC)

[bokko]

I would just like to point out that I find SobeGreen's reply highly insulting.
I don't even have myspace, I use facebook and for the record people value my great insights!

[MightyLotu]

good work devs, keep it up!

to those bitchin about jump pads and other stuff, wait till you actually see it in game.. IF it would really play bad, they can always improve/remove
new stuff like this will only help keep ff interesting and fun