Kills are strategic; K/DR is a vital statistic


(FrankieGodskin) #1

Since before Brink released, the general consensus here and at the Bethesda forums was that “Most Kills” is not the focus of this game, and that Kill/Death Ratio is meaningless in a team game. I strongly, strongly disagree.

While I started out playing Brink as a Medic (which was how I played BFBC2), I tried out a Heavy Soldier with a Gerund and Carb and fell in love. Due to Gerund ammo consumption, playing as any class other than a Soldier isn’t really viable, since there’s no way a teammate could keep up with my ammo usage and sustain themselves and the rest of my fireteam.

Anyway, I fit right in with this combination and began racking up a huge amount of kills. There are definitely times when I “hang back” and just lay down suppressive/covering fire for my teammates, as well as times when I just spawn kill or camp a bottleneck.

Playing as the Slayer is an important role. By killing my opponents, my teammates face less resistance. For example, on security tower, rescuing the hostage is very difficult when you get to the second half of the level, from the ramp through the end corral section. Instead of having my teammates hurl their corpses at the objective, hoping to inch him further, I stay back and high and kill the enemies as they exit their spawn. I spam flashbangs and Molotovs, I mow people down as they exit the spawn, and I make sure I stay alive. Why? Because if I’m dead, I’m not helping my team.

K/DR shows how productive you were in a match. Yes, as an Operative, you may have died 15 times trying to hack an objective. Certainly your hacking is critical to the team’s success. But why did you die 15 times? Instead of running up to the objective and advancing the timer by 5 seconds before dying, why not hang back and clear out the room? Isn’t it more efficient to only die 5 times and not waste time either on the respawn screen or DBNO?

After the first week I played Brink, I stopped changing my class to suit the current objective. With limited skill points and the inability to change characters or body types during a match, you’re basically stuck with what you bring to the game. My high level characters are Soldier/Medics, so I’m not going to switch to an underpowered Operative to complete an objective. And since I’m always a soldier, my job is clear: kill as many people as I can without dying, and keep myself and my teammates stocked with ammo.

Unfortunately, since giving ammo is a pain, I don’t do that as often as I should. Usually, I’ll have 1 pip of supplies left, and I’ll face a teammate with low ammo, hold down X, and instead I’ll give ammo to the wrong person. Now I make sure that I only give ammo to someone if there’s no one else within 10 feet of them. In many situations, this is so difficult that I don’t even try.

So where does this leave me? As a lone wolf. I keep myself alive and kill everything I see. When it’s convenient, I help my team. But at the same time, by acting as the Slayer, I’m helping my team. They’re able to achieve objectives unopposed, they don’t get spawncamped, they’re bailed out of trouble when they’re surrounded, and they’re able to get through bottlenecks and chokepoints far easier than if I wasn’t helping them.

In a game based around shooting and killing, isn’t K/DR the most important stat? Isn’t it true that the only way you can achieve a goal in Brink is to be alive and kill your enemies? And if that’s the case, why regard K/DR as something only “noobs” want?

And before you check my Gamercard, let me assure you, I haven’t played a COD game since MW1, and I rarely touch Halo. I’m also one of the few people who loved Shadowrun, which was the most balanced FPS ever released on a console and VERY similar to Brink–only 9 maps when released, only 1 viable gametype, heavily team-oriented, and class/race based.


(Oschino1907) #2

I could barely read anything, need to fix your post. But even without reading here is a quick answer.

YES, Kills are very strategic and important to the game, derp, how else do you win without killing enemies?

NO, KDR is not vital at all, it has more negatives then positives, its def helps ruin the strategic part of just Kills?


(FrankieGodskin) #3

[quote=Oschino1907;331469]I could barely read anything, need to fix your post. But even without reading here is a quick answer.

YES, Kills are very strategic and important to the game, derp, how else do you win without killing enemies?

NO, KDR is not vital at all, it has more negatives then positives, its def helps ruin the strategic part of just Kills?[/quote]
I fixed it while you were posting. I’d rather not respond to you until you’ve read the post, since it addresses what you’re talking about.


(Nail) #4

“When it’s convenient, I help my team.”

wrong answer


(Glyph) #5

The OP’s entire post shows how they are more interested in farming kills than completing objectives or supporting their team. They even admit to not using the Soldier’s ammo ability due to it possibly giving the ammo to the wrong player yet neglect to mention that they can simply scavange supplies from bodies if they really are getting all of these kills. Seriously?! The OP has proven that even thinking about your K/D ratio directly affects how you play Brink, even without having one. This is exactly why a K/D ratio should not be added to Brink.


(Oschino1907) #6

Ok wow i totally stick to what i said but would also like to add some things.

  • Your exactly the kind of guy i was hoping to get away from by playing this game

  • I use many of the tactics you do and on the regular, but having said that i also respond whenever a teammate asks for help or when i can see myself that my team is in need, TEAM MORALE and COHESION are way more important then my KDR or personal glories.

  • Your examples only show that you have much much much to learn about this type of game and exactly how to play it in the way its makers intended. You can play however you want to but to assume its the correct and proper way just shows your narrowmindedness and lack of experiance outside of COD/HALO style of games.

  • Besides death in this is very objective, i mean really, you could die 5-6 times in one spot repairing or defending the guy repiaring but get revived over and over while making steady progress repairing/defending and getting the job done without having to respawn at all but still having all the deaths and possibly no kills depending on your role and if you were going for kills to hold enemy back or helping others so they could all together work for the kills or hey even being a bullet sponge distraction why your team flanks or finishes an objective.

  • KDR can show some things or help in certain ways with judging a player but thats assuming you know exactly how they play and what their battle tactics are. Any douche can pad his KDR just to look better, not like its a hard to sit back (similar to yourself) and just pad your stats looking out for yourself first. Also downgrading someone else because they may be willing to sacrifice themselves for their team more then others is just going to ruin the whole teamplay concept of the game.
    KDR is a vanity stat and nothing more in this kind of a game, its only for gloaters and fart mops who like to down talk others based solely on numbers. This commnity can be something incrediable but people like you or who support you are the only thing holding it back.

  • Pretty much just shut up now cause honestly youre going to get ripped apart by the true fans of this game who HATE players like yourself contaminating the game with your Lone Wolf look out for Myself First attitude.


(zenstar) #7

The game is based around shooting, killing, helping your team and completing objectives. The only important thing is did you win the round?

Why would you add K/D when it’s extremely biased to the soldier? Sure it may be better to not die as an operative to get a 1% increase on the hack and wait for your team to help clear out the room but having a public KDR is just going to encourage some people to play and operative and hang around disguised for 99% of the match so that he never dies. Then he can sneak a couple of kills and his KDR is godly. Was that useful to the team? Not at all. But he did beat the soldier’s KDR even though the soldier was trying to cover his teammates the entire game and beats him on XP which is rewarded for all the ammo he handed out and the HE objectives he completed.

Generally people don’t like public KDR because it encourages selfish play and the kinds of people who wave their KDR like a big… flag are the kinds of people you’d like to kick in the flag.

I can see why you’d want to see your personal KDR to see how you’re improving. Other than that I don’t see what adding KDR adds to the game. I can see where it may detract from it however (promoting solo’ing instead of teamplay which is the lynchpin of Brink).

Lets say that it is important to soldiers… then we have to find some other ratios to add for the other classes. What about a medic’s Heal/Damage ratio? Not really useful. An Operatives Disguise/spotted ratio? these sorts of stats just don’t really fit in with the teamwork atmosphere. Or we blanket KDR across all classes. Then the best KDR class will be the only one people want to play. Not really what the rest of Brink is trying to encourage.


(jazevec) #8

I can summarize OP’s reasoning this way:


Cat has tail.
Dog has tail.
Therefore, cat and dog are the same.

(In Brink’s terms: 1) Hostile players can interfere with completing objectives. 2) Hostile players can no longer interfere with completion of objectives if they’re dead. 3) Therefore, you should kill lots of players)

Can you spot a hole in this reasoning ? I can. Not all enemies actually get in the way. Lots of them are engaged in irrelevant skirmishes all over the map. A typical sniper siting on a tower optimizes for his safety, not for damage. A more useful sniper (on offense) would progress through a map and try to take out key defensive players. Would spend most of his time unscoped. By killing players that aren’t anywhere close to the objective area, you get an illusion of being useful.

Killing players can be important. It doesn’t follow that it always is. Another flaw of K/D not yet mentioned here is that players on defense invariably get more kills. So to get any sort of meaningful stats you’d have to keep separate score list for both teams. This means instead of cooperating, teammates would be competing for highest scores.


(Aristotle) #9

I think you missed the point of a TEAM based FPS.

Actually no. You can personally achieve goals in Brink without killing anybody. All you have to do is escort/plant charge/hack. And when you’ve planted you just have to hold off the other team long enough. None of that actually means you have to kill anybody.

I remember in Quake Wars there was a guy named, if I remember correctly, “Forgive me Father” that literally had 0 kills and still had over 500 objectives completed, proof that you don’t actually have to kill somebody to complete an objective.

K/D Isn’t a requirement for FPS games to have, it’s a bonus. It’s not really a big deal if they’re incorporated or not. Most of the time when they are incorporated, you have people off doing their own thing getting easy kills on players who aren’t as good, while the team struggles to advance in the map. You yourself said that you prefer killing everything you can, and while that has the potential to help, if you’re not at the objective killing the enemies, your team isn’t guaranteed to complete it.


(brbrbr) #10

for “players”, concluded/decided thats number of kills and rest statistic/statswhoring is “vital”/“strategic”, isn’t vital nor strategic for both Brink gameplay/online and SD[which made different game for different gamers].
BF/COD/CS useless statswhores safely can go back !![&other random SD/Brink/ET/QW-nazism].


(Ero-Sennin) #11

Oh boy! Oh boy! Did the op noticed how bad the xp is on kills only!!! The functions of your classe makes more xp than anything else. Just playing an operative (unpowered class ?!), by throwing CALTROPS & STICKY NADES, spotting with HOMING BEACON, shooting a MARKED player, HACKING COMS FOR RADAR DISPLAY OF ENEMIES, MINES, AND TURRETS, Planting HACK BOXES, HACKING turrets and taking a DISGUISE I made 8798 xp !!! I had like maybe between 10-15 kills, all done by shooting in the back while disguised or else. So now does that K/D ratio seems important really? HELL! A soldier will make better xp just by feeding ammos and throwing flashes or molotovs. But not killing…:eek:

Every game that follows an objective based gameplay (like RTCW, WOLF ET, ET QuakeWars and… BRINK! Long life SD!) can be won by simply going on objectives, and that without any kills at all. So does K/D ratio is really necessary, when you can just incap a players and , let say. steal the Hydro, running away from enemies and delivering it and make them lose more ground? Hummmm, im not sure its relevant. Games like COD, UT, MOH, CSS are Deathmatch games, which pursue that coolness that is due to a very high K/D ratio. But not Brink my friend. Objectives like escort and guarding gives steady amounts of xps and im pretty sure that a soldier’s awesome K/D ratio like the Op’s doesnt gives at all as much xp than any other style of play.

So keywords here : Objectives, Class functions, Teamplay. Thats what is Brink. **** K/D ratio!:stroggbanana:

ps: stop saying COD/Halo style games, Its called DEATHMATCH GAMES for Christ’s sake!:mad:


(Erich Sturmovik) #12

Ignore everything these idiots are saying, getting kills is important to Brink as is capturing objectives. Nonetheless I can see why public KDR isn’t shown. I see nothing wrong with being able to see your KDR, though, in fact I hate the fact that I can’t.

Also I want to talk about something that everyone in this thread has totally neglected: fun. The whole point of gaming is to have fun, right? And what’s more fun, disguising as an operative, sticky bombing some people, hacking some turrets, killing the engineers who built them, meleeing some people, and then killing whoever finally managed to take you down with a suicide bomb? Or getting 1 kill to get a disguise, going over to the objective, and then staying in 1 spot, holding down a key until a little bar gets from one side to the other.

Did we lose? I don’t care- I had fun, and made plenty of people call me a hacker while I was at it!

Did we win? I get satisfaction in the fact that it probably had something to do with the fact that I had all their engineers ignoring objectives and trying to hunt me down the whole game while I spotted their landmines, hacked their turrets, and knifed them in the back.

Did I not get very much exp? I don’t care- abilities are nice, but skill counts for more. Besides, I’ll get access to all the abilities eventually, whether it’s today or tomorrow doesn’t matter that much to me.

“Why give someone a gun if they shouldn’t use it?”

Note to ragers/flamers/qqers: I have never played Halo, COD, etc. ever before in my life.


(JaxDad08) #13

Please no K/D ratio. I bought Brink because SD specificaly said they were going to stay away from those types of things. However, eaiser to read objective based and team support stats would be nice.


(Oschino1907) #14

[QUOTE=Ero-Sennin;331527]

ps: stop saying COD/Halo style games, Its called DEATHMATCH GAMES for Christ’s sake!:mad:[/QUOTE]

Get over it!

Whats so wrong about using todays most “popular” and well known games to make my point, and also sorry but they arent Deathmatch only games, people just play them that way.

Here is a consolation Tapir to help ease the pain :stroggtapir:


(brbrbr) #15

anyone requesting k/d-related stats should be er-radicated !![said from metallic barrel]
death to statswhores !! mwhahahaha ![random Evil laugh here :-P]


(Dorian Gray) #16

@OP

Whatever you have to tell yourself to sleep at night. lol

The fact that a team of people with all negative K/D ratios can win the match in Brink completely nulifies your point, sorry, K/D means NOTHING in this game.


(Dorian Gray) #17

[QUOTE=Erich Sturmovik;331534]Ignore everything these idiots are saying, getting kills is important to Brink as is capturing objectives. Nonetheless I can see why public KDR isn’t shown. I see nothing wrong with being able to see your KDR, though, in fact I hate the fact that I can’t.

Also I want to talk about something that everyone in this thread has totally neglected: fun. The whole point of gaming is to have fun, right? And what’s more fun, disguising as an operative, sticky bombing some people, hacking some turrets, killing the engineers who built them, meleeing some people, and then killing whoever finally managed to take you down with a suicide bomb? Or getting 1 kill to get a disguise, going over to the objective, and then staying in 1 spot, holding down a key until a little bar gets from one side to the other.

Did we lose? I don’t care- I had fun, and made plenty of people call me a hacker while I was at it!

Did we win? I get satisfaction in the fact that it probably had something to do with the fact that I had all their engineers ignoring objectives and trying to hunt me down the whole game while I spotted their landmines, hacked their turrets, and knifed them in the back.

Did I not get very much exp? I don’t care- abilities are nice, but skill counts for more. Besides, I’ll get access to all the abilities eventually, whether it’s today or tomorrow doesn’t matter that much to me.

“Why give someone a gun if they shouldn’t use it?”

Note to ragers/flamers/qqers: I have never played Halo, COD, etc. ever before in my life.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for making my point for me: It’s not “FUN” playin an objective based game with a bunch of K/D whores.


(Ero-Sennin) #18

euuuuuhhhhh oooook… Im 32 years old oschino, ive played ALL the FPS games that was worth trying on PC. I had a clan for years, played in others, played in CAL, and played the First COD the day it came out… and you know what? Call me retarded , but when you create/join a server, its written deathmatch (free for all on the map) and team deathmatch (kill the enemy team on the map). Jedi knight 2 outcast, written deathmatch in server menu. Same for Unreal tournanment since the first title i used to play on a 486 processor. Same for COD. Same for all the titles of Medal of Honor. Same for … **** that, you seem the retarded to me when you say" games likes Halo/COD style" when “deathmatch games” is only 2 words and less letter to punch on your keyboard LOL. Nway playing objective is so fun! Ive played SO MANY HOURS of Deathmat… eerr games likes COD/Halo/JK2/MOH/COMBAT ARMS/UT/JKA style (written that way so oschino and other kiddos can understand) that i got damm tired of those K/D games. Remember BF series? K/D is important to reduce the billets numbe of the opposing team. But not Brink, nor RTCW, nor ET:Wolf, nor ET QW. Noticed maybe SD hands in these titles? They got all in commun?.. Objective play. sheeeeesh some wont never understand…


(fearlessfox) #19

I agree with the OP that staying alive is very important. And efficient teams will be clearing areas and taking objectives with as little deaths as possible, and efficient players who know how to build efficient teams will have strong hidden K/D ratios.

Anyone saying K/D means absolutely nothing is wrong, if we could see them (and I’m not saying we should be able to see them) we could tell a lot about a player when correlating with all the other stats.

An operative who hacks the objectives constantly /and/ maintains a positive K/D is better than the operative who hacks the objectives constantly and doesn’t. In fact, as the OP explained, an operative who is killing well will likely be surviving longer and doing more good for the team.

I main Soldier too, and I switch to other classes very rarely if I’m absolutely needed. I always invite all human players to my fireteam even if they have no mic so I can take on the role of team captain if need be, and delegating tasks to others while I sit back and clear rooms has worked very well as a strategy so far. It’s even better on the rare occasion a balanced team is built and more than a couple of people have mics…

Anyway, for the the soldier in the above situation maintaining a positive K/D is /essential/. Not for the K/D itself, but for the fact that if you’re killing more and dying less your team will be progressing much faster.

Killing more and not dying as much is /always/ important in FPS titles, no matter the focus. The point is that in Brink you can be just as helpful to your team if you’re notas suited to killing as you are timing and tactically taking objectives, or supporting others.

(And no, support and objective taking are not lesser roles. Knowing which team member to hand your last pip of stock to and when to run from cover foe the objective are strong tactical skills. Not everyone has the capacity for it.)

Don’t concentrate on securing a high-positive K/D ratio is the point, if you’re worried about it then your not going to be focusing on the important things and might start chasing down unneeded kills instead of holding a choke point or protecting a medic en route to a revive chain, etc…

IMO, the best Briink teams have the following:
Pure Killers
Supporters
Objective Takers

If I could build an ideal team, I’d go for:
2 Medics concentrating on healing the team.
1-2 soldiers concentrating /purely/ on killing the enemy.
1 Operative working the fringes and using the bodies to secure intel
1-2 engineers buffing things
2 players who flit between classes constantly to achieve objectives.

It’s no good being the strongest killer on your team, clearing the room, placing a charge, then being gunned down in the final seconds… much better to clear the room and keep it clear while engineers and medics support you and those playing to work the objectives switch to soldier to to lay the charge for you.

Brink is not about OBJ, and it’s not about K/D, it’s about BALANCE.


(HomersGhost) #20

Yeah … I enjoy the K/D ratio in my FPS games even when I’m not playing an offense class. Sometimes, I might get just four kills in a given a match while providing a ton of support and it’s nice to see it juxtaposed along with my score. In Brink, I noticed, you pretty much got XP points for picking your nose, so a K/D ratio is a nice balance to that.

It doesn’t have to be like COD where people live and die by their K/D ratio, but removing is a little heavy handed. Even Team Fortress 2 gives you the magic number.

Let’s face it … people like stats about themselves and they shouldn’t have to leave the gameworld to access them.