You Need to do Something About the Running in Circles

[AZAN]

Put plainly above, it needs to be sorted out, it has effectively killed all open maps (you're now getting complaints about the final remaining one) and mixed maps are sure to follow next.

I think I fully understand the reason why it happens now, but I want to explain the consequences first, see if you agree.

Effect
The result of everyone running round in circles, taking the longest way around away from the opponent means cav have an easy time of it, there are always stragglers you can gang up on and kill. Normally (because IG is anything from normal nowadays) cav would be blocked at choke points by infantry and forced away from defensive positions by rangers, because of the constant running neither of these happen. This is why people were feeling so overpowered and helpless against cav hence the 10 second extra spawn time for cav. I don't agree with that extra time but I understand why it was done even though it's treating a symptom not a cause.

The second thing that happens with the running in circles is that archers struggle to do anything. They rarely have time to sit and shoot and are often simply chasing the infantry round so they don't get killed.

Finally the infantry themselves are unable to attack, since you really need to attack as a single mass as infantry having most of your team run off constantly makes this futile.

Cause
The cause for all this is actually rather simple, a lot of the people playing infantry don't want bad scores. From the individuals point of view if they aren't a strong infantry player then heading into the meatgrinder will result in zero kills and a lot of deaths. So their choices are to either switch class (oops can't do that, class limits) or to play in a more passive ambush style approach. However that style of play means deliberately not killing people head on, usually waiting round corners or simply coming up behind people.

The result is that enough people who don't want to fight head on run as far round as possible away from the opponent.

The reason they can do this is that the battle format lacks any structure until the flags spawn. They literally have a choice between surviving and having a hope for a kill and dying immediately with a much smaller chance for a kill.

Solution
You need to increase the reward for infantry players during the early stages of an engagement. This could come in the form of larger gold payouts, more kills on the scoreboard for each kill, deaths not counting for the first minute or maybe first blood giving a large reward of some sort. The point is that you need to make the game economical for a greater range of the players who play infantry.

Either that or get rid of the class limits and go back to having camping every other round, not that that's much better.

[Osiris]

The way crpg kind of dealt with this problem is introducing points for damage. This.means you can top the board with 1-3 kills if you are doing a lot of damage, I wonder if this is feasible for native and giving extra gold based on points scored and not just kills. It would also provide an incentive to play spearman (which even in competitive gives you very little credit)


Scoreboard still counts kda but has an extra coloumb for points (again I can't mod or code so don't know how much effort it took them to do it)

[AZAN]

The points for damage thing is potentially possible, although you would have to put that in the kills column.

Points are only available in other game modes like conquest, so it would require you to completely rebuild native battle within the conquest or CTF gametypes while keeping it compatible with the client side. This is actually possible since I did a lot of similar work when I made the conquest supremacy mod (code lost unfortunately), although it would be a big effort for a small feature.

[Oliveran]

I will get back to you on this shortly. We're currently re-arranging some server-management issues, but I'll get back to you on this in roughly a week or two.

Meanwhile, keep in mind these things and please tell us if you got any ideas on these issues (if at all possible):

• We want the server to stay as competitive as possible (things like bonus gold for early kills, getting free equipment etc is therefor not acceptable solutions)
• It's not only infantries that needs to be aggressive. The archery and cav classes can be equally aggressive (we all know how deadly an archer in a far-up position is when you can't get to him easily), so if possible, find a reason for more than only infantries to move up to get quick kills
• I know you're against the delayed cav spawn-timer, but the current competitive maps doesn't offer a solution for people who want to make drops (even if done quick), who need 4-5 extra seconds to spawn (had this issue on my old laptop sometimes - with lag during spawn), so for now the delayed timer will stay on based on that the spawnrushing was a big issue for many people (until a better solution can be provided)

[AZAN]

1. This is not even remotely true and hasn't been for some time, you run maps that are not in competitive tournaments and you enforce class limits which directly stop people from practising the classes they need to play. Additionally you play 5 round setups, have no reduced round time and actively disrupt the cav spawn times so they don't have any practise with the timings. The system is already nothing like competitive and plays nothing like it, so adding a small incentive to encourage gameplay that is more like competitive play is not something that is going to make it less competitive.

2. Don't know what you mean about archers being aggressive, they're reliant on inf to push or hold areas. I am quite sure most rangers would like nothing better than to take solid positions and put some shots in but they rarely get the opportunity. Cav are plenty aggressive enough, that's why you introduced the different spawn times isn't it? The point is to change score mechanics to encourage inf to do something else, if the other classes play normally already then there isn't much point adding mechanics.

3. The drops are fine if people don't entirely abandon whole flanks of the map, used to be that cav simply got killed coming into the spawns simply because of the density of players there. A simple 1-1 drop takes only a second anyway. If you're doing elaborate multi jav-shield drops then you deserve to be punished for it. Another way you could fix this is simply adding a 3 second period of invincibility after spawning, that effects no timing issues and prevents a player from dying instantly on spawning.

[Triari]

I am quite sure most rangers would like nothing better than to take solid positions and put some shots in but they rarely get the opportunity.

Yep, I can agree with this. As an archer you actually have to run with your infantry group if you want to survive and can't just hold a valuable position on the map like you can in matches. But would some gold bonus for infantry really solve the problem? For me it feels like there are always 2 big infantry groups chasing each other and those who are too slow and fall behind get killed.

I guess it's pretty hard to have players act like they would do in matches. Spreading all the 25 players across the map is not really working, you always have a higher chance of surviving within a big group and this group can only take one direction. Even with higher rewards for infantries this behaviour wouldn't change.


We are always open for suggestions and want to improve our server constantly. If there is any mod we can test out we would gladly do it.

[Kekn]

At late hours when there are less than 15-20 people on the server this stops being an issue. We're talking about herd behavior, it's not more scientific than that. Reduce the number of players on the same server and it will naturally be more viable to do your own thing and not simply be part of the crowd.

[AZAN]

I don't know, people choose to go one way for a reason, it's not random or inconsistent. The only reason the effect drops off as numbers go down is that the relative strength of an individual increases, so it becomes more viable for them to not go with the crowd and fight alone or in smaller groups.

It's also not an effect seen on other servers, check out US servers, there's no running in circles there.

I also don't have any interest in this being like competitive matches, running at each other is not anything like competitive. I simply want this current behaviour to end without going back to the 25 ranger camps we used to have before. When there are enough aggressive inf on both sides you get great engagements which don't take 5 minutes but which all the classes are able to contribute properly, so I think with a little encouragement and reward of aggressive inf play we can get this more.

[OurGloriousLeader]

You could have insta flag spawns to encourage direct clashes, archers would see what positions are viable, and cav would have less free roam amongst the backlines.

[Oliveran]

Some maps would be 100% broken if the flag spawns unluckily. Insta flag is a bad idea by default (for an example, take Ruins and the flag spawns at the left side of village spawn - yeah just hold stones, infs will stand on flag, gg).

I lowered the time, and temporarily removed the delayed spawn on cav. If the issue persists, please tell me - but give it a few days.

[OurGloriousLeader]

Dunno most flags are pretty pushable imo.

[Osiris]

any way to massively slow the rate of flag raising?

[OurGloriousLeader]

afaik Azan did it

[AZAN]

Yes you can slow them server side, that's possible on battle.

[Badluckfarmer]

My observations:

1. some maps "force" the running. sandiboush in my humble opinion the worst map for 30+ people. there is not enough space for big group fights, so some have to try to get behind the enemy line, but are usually too late to reinforce their team.
a plain open map would be better. nord town is better. what happened to port assault?

2. experienced clan players are usually the first to flee. not so experienced more casual players try to hold the line but get overwhelmed and killed. so they decide to run with the experienced clan players, and half of the team gets backstabbed by cav.

3. people who spawn late get almost instantly killed by couched lances. in my humble opinion the late cav spawn served this problem.

4. cav is way too easy, at least in not organized battles. i dont think thats even possible in native, but in my humble opinion horses hit points should be reduced. if thats not possible back to class limit. a good inf can usually defend himself against 1 or 2 cavs, but not against 4 or 5. cav is so easy because they are so many, its impossible for the inf to have his eyes everywhere, and even if inf could stop all the cav, they will just slash the inf, knowing that their horse can take more hits than the inf.