Hey folks,
I’d be interested to know how those who played yesterday found the highlander rules (one Merc limit per team). Did it feel too restrictive? Did it make the meta more interesting? Anything surprise you about it?
It’d be good to get some feedback on this as it impacts quite a few parts of the game, from Merc balance through to the potential for some kind of draft mode.
Thanks
it was a lot more enjoyable, there was a lot more gunplay, even vs v586 it didn’t feel like I was just getting instagib naded around every corner
only problem with it really was that there was no actual game imposed merc limit which resulted in me and a teammate accidentally both taking fragger at one point (and so i had to k out and wait 20 seconds)
From a spectating perspective is more interesting, no doubt.
From a players perspective (even if I didn’t play) I liked that we saw more of the mercs that I personally enjoy playing, so I like that I’d be able to play a merc that better suits me without putting my team at a disadvantage, because the situation would be exactly the same for the other team.
I’d be interested to see what SD’s ideas are for tackling this situation, because I do like the idea of keeping the ability to switch mercs rather than locking down players to a single merc for the duration of the map.
I watched the stream (final) together with +1000(!) other people and for me it is way more interesting to see 5 different mercs. 3 fraggers and 2 sawbonez is boring, lets be honest. This rule also allows for more synergies to happen between different mercs and can also be taken into account when creating merc abilities.
As a player having a draft system would be very cool. Each team can ban 1 merc for the opposing team. All other mercs are available to take up in a team. Maybe it could be an idea to just chose 10 mercs as a team rather then as a player for the duration of the map. Next there is a system in place which prohibits you from changing into one of the mercs when it is being played by a teammate. (you can also choose between the 10 mercs chosen by the team and not only the 3 every players is chosing you get more like a merc “pool” for the match.
the drafting system would be cool because you can have a neat system showing of skins etc + information.
Load out card problem? yes this is a problem. But in my oppinion there shouldnt be load out cards in competitive. every merc is the same for both teams without percs and what not.
Also give us weapon skins! I have a low cfg to get a bit more FPS, but my player models and gun models stay in higher resolution! having guns that look nice is cool aswell as looking to others players special skins. To make guns more visible: when you get killed you already see the player position who killed you etc, it would be cool to there add the gun from that player: this will allow everyone to see your weapon skin, without the need to pick those guns up!
I typed this in 5 minutes and havnt reread, but I hope it is understandable.
I still personally hope for a full draft mode in future.
However, until the Merc numbers reach that point where its a really viable option, Highlander could be perfect. What could be done with Highlander is have all the Mercs cool downs for a team being global. So if you swap to Skyhammer after a team mate was using him, you would have the cooldown he was left on when you first spawn.
I suppose the big standout problem with Highlander is that would need to load 5x more loadout cards into a match (something we have heard SD list as a problem a few times now). Having each player having a default loadout card for each merc in highlander and upto 18 Mercs seen by the public so far. I suppose its really going to come down to either removing loadout cards from Highlander completely OR waiting for a full on draft mode where only one card per player would be needed (could actually make the game run better as well). Obviously the 3rd option is that SD develop around them limitations (if possible).
Very interested to see what happens in future 
There shouldnt be any load out cards in competitive play… Only player skins and weapon skins
From a spectator standpoint, the 1 merc rule was more fun to watch than the no limitations tourney. I liked the variety of Mercs, rather than the 2 x fragger, 2 x sawbonez + utility setup from the first tourney.
I think this ruleset will be a lot better when more mercs are available. It forces a variety of mercs and spawns more of a variety of strats as a result (at least, when we can actually practice strats on private servers!). With the current balance no one is going to choose other mercs if fragger and sawbonez are unrestricted.
It was fun to watch and looking forward to scrimming with this ruleset.
[QUOTE=Kroad;528003]
only problem with it really was that there was no actual game imposed merc limit which resulted in me and a teammate accidentally both taking fragger at one point (and so i had to k out and wait 20 seconds)[/QUOTE]
This was a very basic feature of ETPro - hopefully we’ll see hard caps where “mercs in use” are greyed out and made unavailable to other members of the team.
For the record, I don’t support any system that would restrict me to a single merc for an entire round.
I do understand what you are saying mate but over the years it has shown that the closer the public game is to the competitive mode, the higher the viewership is in events…
One thing that CS:GO, LoL, Dota2, Starcraft 2, Street Fighter, World of Tanks, Smite and Quake all share is that their competitive modes have minimal changes over their public versions.
The issues with the loadout cards right now is how long it can theoretically take to get one of each due to no customisation. If Splash Damage manage to change this or address it in some way then I have a feeling it could all work out well. Right now the loadout cards may be balanced but they are just pretty bad too be honest, possibly the reason why not players have complained about them in competitive.
If you was to remove loadout cards from the public version of a highlander / draft mode, you basically tell the player base that loadout cards are worthless and at the same time segregate your player base massively.
As soon as we get to a point where we are limiting individual aspects of the game away from competitive is the day you lose control and the competitive community starts to collapse in on itself. Basically, lets give SD a few more months to try and work in the current features in a workable fashion before just point blank saying it should not be here
I agree on that. Just sucks if you are a player/team with fewer interesting loadout cards?
Missed the game, but sounds like it was eventful!
You’re then making one of DB’s revenue streams redundant in the competitive scene.
Currently the problem with this rule is that aura is quite useless, except for some passive positions on defense. Teams need to have two medics so this rule is forcing every team to have an aura even though nobody would play aura if they could have 2x sawbonez.
Personally I don’t see that the use of any other merc besides fragger would need to be limited. So if you want to limit something, I’d suggest just limiting fraggers to one per team.
In relation to loadout cards my feelings on the problem are that they are too grindy (i.e. impossible) to get, rather than should be removed/banned completely.
Some have suggested that all loadouts should be unlocked, I don’t agree with this because I still subscribe to the mantra of keeping comp games as close to public games as possible.
That said, I’ve been saying right from the start that a particular card should be easily attainable and with a knowable length of time to achieve said card (i.e. crafting) and not just pot luck (i.e. crate opening).
On a related note, merc unlocks are still too long, should be less than 1 week, not over 3 weeks. I’m happy with more ways to earn credits than lower credit buy prices, but lets see it, or at least say what these more ways will be.
Actually when compared to many free to play games (excluding Valves Dota2)
The accessibility of loadout cards is quite good.
There are a few exceptions like Aura who has a card that can only be found at the GOLD level that happens to be her strongest card. More of a problem right now is the cost of the Mercs themselves. They could certainly improve the card system to make sure competitive players are not at a serious disadvantage.
Even games like Battlefield 4, CoD and many more would require hundreds of hours to unlock all the weapons and attachments.
If the game stayed on a 2xFragger + 2xSawbones meta for instance, I would be pretty confident in saying you could get BOTH a Fragger and Sawbones card + unlock the Mercs themselves in around 30 - 40 hours. You basically get one for free after a couple of levels as a new player anyway.
Personally I feel it would be cool if the Developers would maybe work with the current competitive community and very experienced players to work out a new set of loadout cards 2-3 for each Merc that would be less down to RNG to unlock but require more direct grinding… Basically have the cards in a special case you can buy from the store and one special feature of the case is that it will never unlock a duplicate. Charge like 20,000 per case have 3 different cases (or as many cases as you have sets) Adds a collectable into the game + you know its a good card + its a more direct path to getting what you want. Instead of having a case for each set you could have a case for each role or brand them in special ways like we had in early versions of the game, like “Demo Case” and stuff.
I personally feel that right now SD are so concerned with either saving the best cards for last (and last may never come) or are literally trying to hard balance the loadout cards resulting in a pretty “meh” feeling no matter what card you get. Either way I hope for better cards in future with less concern given to balance directly. That said, one of the things I suppose SD do need to worry about is nerfing cards once they are in the hands of the public later down the line. No one wants to work up to that perfect card and then have it nerfed badly. I still think there is a fair amount of wiggle room in the augment system to allow personal choice to be a factor when picking a card but I don’t think SD have located it just yet.
Was more fun to watch, but 1 merc … I much prefer the old rules saying “1 heavy only”
In looking over the video’s it looked like another great cup. The idea of Highlander is a very interesting on but needs to be done in the correct way to accommodate SW and great Esports play.
Two Quotes really stick out in this Thread:
How I see Highlander Working is if you have access to all the mercs that you have unlocked. Picture this, when you TAB you have the honeycomb of mercs to select. Some mercs are shaded red which means someone on your team is either currently playing them or has them selected for their next spawn.
Thats basically it! You really only need a good merc selector that also red’s or gray’s out unavailable mercs.
Same system in Ranked MM to keep coding the same. Also ranked MM and Comp shouldnt be that different.
I found it a bit odd at first seeing Gold in competitive but I guess the cards won’t be changed.
Found enjoyable albeit camera angles weren’t in action at times.
Basically thats what I consider Highlander to be… All the Mercs available with them being blocked out if someone on your team is using. Obviously have a “request” change button as well to allow you to swap with a team mate or at least take their Merc and them choose a new one with minimal effort.
Where I believe me and Prophett disagree is I would also like to see a Draft Mode in future that would lock you into a merc for the entire match. I am a big advocate for having a game that forces them hard decisions. By no means am I saying the game should be decided in the pick/ban stage, just simply entice more unique and throughout strats. Simple things like having to take a FO on attack on Chapel would most likely remove a Fragger slot. Having to have a Engineer on defense also would change things up massively.
I suppose one way of putting it is… I want this game to force players and myself to play outside of our comfort zones! Having to use a sniper in a position that its really weak in order to have it for later on in a map where it can become the game changer. Having the option to take 2 field ops on chapel attack so you have them on defence later. Having the Engineer role and playstyle change with what engineer you choose. Right now people love Proxy cause of her speed and mines on defense and certain parts of attack. However, if you had to keep with that engineer, maybe some players would consider fletcher a better pick due to the ability to clear defences, have more hp and do heavy AOE damage.
My issue with having freedom is that you will always do each section of each objective on each map with the best setup. Meta will become stale quickly and I imagine games becoming boring to watch for none competitive players.
but hey…
I am just one person
I don’t see why a drafting system couldn’t let each team pick 3 or so reserve mercs and then work the same way as described above, i.e. anyone can switch to any of the free mercs, or request a swap.
I think the very fact that over the course of a match the map changes, the objectives change, as so on, necessitate the facility for merc switching mid-game, and that exiting games implementing drafting feel like they’ve been designed with the exact opposite in-mind to allow the single choice option to be viable.
Notwithstanding I find more enjoyment in the tactical depth of when and which mercs to switch mid-game rather than the depth introduced by ensuring you pick correctly at the start.
We argued about this a couple of weeks back on TS. I stand by having more mercs available for use will translate into more strat variety
ie;
I can choose between fragger, skyhammer, and sawbones = more strats/more unique strats, capitalizing on the strength of each of your selected mercs depending on the situation.
I am locked to Skyhammer = While I might be forced to find more creative ways to make him more effective in less than ideal situations, it translates into less variety in strats.
[QUOTE=Mustang;528058]
Notwithstanding I find more enjoyment in the tactical depth of when and which mercs to switch mid-game rather than the depth introduced by ensuring you pick correctly at the start.[/QUOTE]
Agree - Players/teams should be able to switch mercs and use their strengths to the fullest potential, and not be locked to a single merc being restricted/forced to make the best out of a bad situation.
Don’t worry I know the majority of players don’t agree with me on this so the likely hood of it happening is minimal.
However, my mind is stuck fast…
I personally don’t really like Dirty Bomb the way it is. I find it to be one of the most shallow FPS experiences out there and I try again and again to find the route of that problem in my mind and it almost always comes back to stuck fast metas. The very things you say facilitate and to some degree mean a Merc switch is important is the exact same things I see as the reason why there should be no Merc switch.
From my own personal experience, when a game lacks mechanical depth (something that DB lacks massively) a meta establishes very quickly and it becomes all about skill and very little about tactics and in some cases even team work. We see it in Tribes, Black Light, Firefall, Shootmania, TF2, CoD and Battlefield. Each objective will be worked out what the best option is with maybe the odd variation (ie, take a sniper maybe, try a redeye for the smoke or proxy vs bushwhacker) but the core will always remain the same because you have the option to take the “most effective” combo for each objective. Soon as you add 3 reserve Mercs (unless it was pick and ban with 1 of each merc across both teams) you end up being able to cover almost every objective with a optimal pick. Once the optimal picks are worked out there is no tactical depth… It switches into a skill / timing effort. Tactics get left at the door again.
You end up in a situation where only 2 or 3 teams in the whole game have the ability to play tactically because they are the only ones capable of breaking and advancing the meta.
I also believe you limit your competitive player base to the players that can play one or two mercs really well. Where with a full lock in system we could see players just really unable to play X merc at Y objective so decides to play Merc Z instead. All of a sudden we have a team running a Sparks because they could not handle the Aura on the EV objective.
Ahhh **** it, im rambling again…
Basically, I hope for a more balanced skill to tactical experience compared to what we have now, skill skill skill.