From my perspective, the "new" targeting system is not meant to provide situational awareness. Instead, it is a micromanagement tool, used to prioritize certain targets over others. When playing as commander, the single target closely resembles the mechanics of an RTS game, where you issue orders one at a time. A good commander would use this thing called communication to inform his team about the amount of hostile forces in the area. I personally don't mind this system, but I do not want multiple targets to come back.
I don't care whether we get multi targets or no targets, but right now it just doesn't feel right. People all over the map are calling for targets but you can't give them targets, you can only give them a target. That is of course if you don't choose to clone your attack orders using the commander ui and control groups. THE EVOLUTION OF HOW MUCH OF A PAIN IN THE ASS THE COMMANDER ROLE IS, 2.0-PRESENT 2.0 Multi target attack orders placing targets over all enemy entities not using scout hide or squad hide. Pros: no need for mic when giving team intel Cons: baddies and campers got owned by targets 2.24 Attack location orders only. Pros: no need for drawing red boxes all the time Cons: the commander needed to talk a lot more 2.4 Single target Attack orders. Pros: baddies and campers get owned by targets less Cons: the commander needs to talk more and needs to draw even more red boxes than he did in 2.0-2.4 tl;dr, current system is worse than all previous implementations.
At least it's on a list of things to do at the present. With the limited time coders have, that's the best you can ask for atm.
where did that guy go who wanted to learn coding to help get the gui overhauled? Did you guys scare him off by showing him a horrible code segment?
yet the following pros and cons list is heavily biased. tl;dr whole discussion is about you want mass targets back. all this are constructed arguments - ofc you now can own "baddies and campers" better with direct targets as in comparison to 2.24 - but less well then you could in 2.0 because you could see all of them. and you now need less talking then in 2.24, but more then in 2.0 - the comparisions are "as they fit your needs" 2.0 targeting was completely over the top - sadly i miss the screenshot of xroads i posted in discussions preceeding the change in 2.24 - i too was among those argueing against targets as a whole back then. but after i tried what we ended up with now as replacement for the anti-ninja-show-everything-on-the-minimap nonsense that replaced 2.0 mechanics, i feel that concerning targeting empires now reached a very decent reasonable middleground. you can direct target the random lone-wolf engi/scunt/gren or hmg-camper, but once its a bigger group attacking - like you said too - you simply cant target everyone anymore. people will need to get used to that. the only issue is that it still is like a wallhack, but if, like trickster said earlier, a delay gets added, this will disappear too. empires players come from various countries and speak a whole bunch of languages. so it also cant be that the only option for comms is to talk either or you exclude a whole lot of probably even very decent comms because they cant express themself as well as you as native speaker can - especially not in stressful situations where you cant look up words in a dictionary and care about pronounciation - even intonation is different. if it takes me half a minute to describe what i see where, its probably too late already ... edit: but in the end this still is no discussion of being right. empires would work either way - with, without and with limited targeting abilities - the only difference would be how empires plays, and this is a matter of taste. if this "needs to be decided" it could only be done by devs (either by themselfs or a poll or idk), there is no objective better.
Did you notice that except for the cons of 2.0, the cons of the other 2 versions aren't really "bad" cons? Freak's reply pretty much covered this.
2.0 was never the beginning. There was a time between 1.0 and 1.05 or maybe 1.07 when 99.9% of comms had no idea about mass targets.
My main concern when it comes to targets wasn't about person being targeted or person given the target. On big server with multi attack order spam you have half of your team shouting about them all the time. I don't find it fun to lose because your commander is slower at spamming mindless orders. So it's not just a balance between the person with the wallhack and the person that wallhacker can see.
I joined a day after the launch of 2.0 and my first impression of empiresmod (after spectating a sudden death round of emp_canyon because I couldn't spawn after joining a team) was that it was Twisted Metal: Source. Since then, I have learned the intricacies and complexities of each class, the commander role, research strategy, and have even invented, championed and pioneered new and effective methods of playing the game. I have faced against countless enemies and scrimmed with BSID, EPIC, JPL and the Consortium as well as against CW, JPL, EPIC, BSID, MEG, and paradox. My experience playing the game extensively on the pub level and on the competitive level makes me one of the best qualified players of this mod to criticize its gameplay and design. This is not just ego, this is fact. In this thread I am trying to reconcile that I liked how targets nullified the (subjectively non-fun) tactic of waiting around a corner to get a kill resulted in both teams being more engaged in fighting each other instead of finding each other with the fact that the design direction of the mod shows that waiting around a corner to get a kill ought to be a valid tactic in a game with RTS overtones and that finding ought to be more important than fighting. Yes flasche, I am 'subjectively' biased. Objectively, however, my bias is informed by more expertise than yours. I'm right and you're wrong. I'm good and you're bad. I'm American and you're European. None of the above three statements have anything to do with each other and yet, they are all objectively true. Then why bring targets back now despite their crippled and dysfunctional current implementation? All of the things that the people in the anti-targets camp like about the current implementation of targets were done better in 2.24-2.4. Nowadays it is even more so the case that it is "just a balance between the person with the wallhack and the person that wallhacker can see."
Single targets makes it easier for me as a commander to tell people when I want a high priority target dead. I can do the job that squad leaders are mostly not doing in pubs now. to me it is about prioritization, I don't think most people wait around corners to get kills... Except on district. There usually aren't any corners. Single attack orders allow me as a commander to bestow my increased situational awareness to my team and give them specific orders. It is far less frustrating to me and the other players than trying to describe it to them. static attack orders suck because things move. multiple attack orders are not orders, they are wall hacks (whether this is good for fps or not doesn't matter, its still a very bad way of having wall hacks) single attack orders do the job. when I command I feel that single attack orders make my life easier than either none or multiple. They are the best tool for the job out of the 3 options there
Given your win/loss ratio when it comes to scrimming, I'm not quite sure what makes you think your opinion is worth any more than anyone else's opinion. You don't exactly have a history of glorious victories. I on the other hand...
This is my line, who stole my script? Anyway, if you want to be qualified to write this statement. Name me some fields that you are/were topping? Engineer? Grenadier? Rifleman? Commander? Vehicle combat? ..etc Or things that you "invented". Also, I've finally decided to pick a side, I vote single target, maybe some modifications, but yah. Because wallhacking is too mainstream.
Ah, the inevitable empiresmod forums circlejerk. It's not like I'm the only one in this tier of bad-ass empiresmod players. It's just that flasche isn't. This isn't to say that flasche is a bad person or anything though. He just doesn't play a certain videogame on the same level as we do, and thus has difficulty seeing the bigger picture when it comes to balance and design.
The best part about targets used to be with gren, being able to place your mortars in the best spots without having to guess where people were. Targets for everyone really sped up gameplay, and made it much less frustrating. It made the game feel more RTS than FPS. Visibility in an RTS would be anything within a radius of the player's units, which is supported by the spam target system. Overall, I think that system was a bit more functional for tactical gameplay, as it took an extraordinary amount of skill or luck to sneak past people. The games I've played with single targets aren't as much fun to me. You don't know what the fuck is going on, and you are always being shot from behind. It is much easier to position yourself as a group of infantry, and to flank and other things as well. This isn't as interesting to me. If I want to run around on a battlefield with no clue what's happening and constantly being shot from behind or what not, I'd go play planet side 2, assuming they fix those crash bugs. I think the commander roll is a lot more active with the target spam, as it gives you something you should be constantly doing, and it forces you to constantly be scanning the entire map for units that don't have vision. I tend to lean towards making empires more of an RTS, with the effect of skill from individual units much more predictable. In the end, there are plenty of large scale FPS's out there that individuals can do what they want, and buy vehicles and work together to accomplish goals. however, there are very few that are a hybrid FPS / RTS. In those hybrids, most of them tend to lean one way or another, putting an extreme amount of focus on the commander and research, or the players and skill. Empires had this unique blend of a level playing field, where having resources and such did not necessarily mean a win. It had this balance where an extremely skilled group of people could end games, regardless of balance or the current situation. Without the target spam, it's turned into much more of an FPS, with a commander who just happens to be there, and then tanks. I just think the 'wall hacks' actually improved the flow of gameplay and made people move a bit more, dulling down the skill gap potential in most cases. Playing the game more recently, it just feels like it's impossible to really get a good grasp on the situation and the layout. It's kind of frustrating tbh.
No. To compensate, they are given hit points and stats to represent how well they aim. There is a difference between instant perfect kills with an aimbot and units attacking each other. The point that you missed so well is that I like the RTS hybrid mix as it was with targets.
What? I was ACTUALLY asking : Why are you qualified to write such aggressive statement. I did expect some positive answer. ( I really did, srsly.) In case you wonder why I am asking this....it's because my impression of you is you are "good" at most fields, a generally decent player, this however isn't good ENOUGH to fit your aggressive statement. I might have overlooked a lot of things you've done though. So if you want to change my(OUR?) impression, throw me some examples.
Played today. Gave single targets today. Used single targets to great effect today. Used a mic to supplement said targets today. Won every round I commanded today. scrubs
