These two subjects are only related through the slimmest of notions but I didnt want to make two threads. Everyone agrees Jeeps are usless. Sure, they are great for getting around the map but why waste the res? How can we change this so that Jeeps are more usful? With x16 maps coming soon the ability to get around the map quickly will be even more important and so somthing needs to be done. I was thinking we could make them a very low price but at the price of customizability (ie cant change engine or armor, just a vanilla Jeep). Or, and I like this one better, we allow the Commander to spawn a certain number of Jeeps at his lesuire. These could be com customizable or just vanilla. Ofcourse the notion of adding weapons to the Jeeps has been pitched and we love it but dont have the development resources to under take that right now. These leads me to the second part of the topic, Commander power. I com-ed for the first time the other day (I normaly like to be an engy) and found the experience frustrating. No one would obey me, they wouldnt even build the barracks back after it blew up. Now to some extent this is due to n00bs or lone wolves, granted, but how can you, as a commander, bring those people inline? I want punishment. I wanted very much to vaporize the disobedient players and I think this is a great idea. Lets allow the Com to vaporize players who dont obey them. After a player is vaporized he can respawn like normal and is offered the chance to initiate a kick vote against the Com (to prevetn n00b coms from randomly poofing people from exsistance). Another, less severe penalty, could be flogging (reduce health of offending player) or Brig time (delay player's respawn). I know this is a dangerous path to take adn thats why Im posting this here for everyone to discuss. Ofcourse, Krenzo is of the other mindset which is effective but not nearly as fun for the com; reward good players rather than puniching bad ones. The com could place a flag as a target area for rally, attack, defend, etc with diffrent flags representing diffrent goals. Players around these flags recieve bonuses in somthing such as accuracy, health, ammo, points, whatever. Flags would have a life time and an area of effect. I think this is a great idea and would love to see it coupled with my punishment ideas. What are some other potential rewards for players or ways that a Commander can encourage cooperation? Keep in mind this is just another brain storming session to see what the community thinks.
VF control. The comm could have a checkbox-list of the people on the team, and, like some kind of Empires-Santa, could uncheck the naughty ones. One possible comm "reward" (or punishment) would be to allow up-ranking or down-ranking of a player. Basically, the comm could GIVE someone a free skill, or take a skill slot away as punishment. I dunno.
I proposed some VF checklist some time ago, but it got rejected Giving and taking free slot skills would be pretty frustrating for the players; they've worked their asses off to get it, and then it gets taken away I think that in the tutorial, you REALLY need to stress the importance of working together with your team to win, because currently there are indeed a lot of lone wolves or nubs who haven't the faintest idea of teamwork.
i like the jeep ideas.. but i can see things goin very bad with the comm being able to kill his own team.. what if your about to ninja the enemey cv and right before u place the last mine your commander kills you cause your not building somthing even tho your a gren..
In that case the Com warrents being kicked and the player can initiate a kick vote. Its in the best interest of a com not to kill off his team as he will loose, it should only be used to keep players in check and a good com would know when to vaporize them.
I agree that punishment will lead to abuse of Comm powers too quickly. However the rewards could be exploited also, so you'd need major tweakage in order to achieve balance.
I always wanted a "Shock" Button for the commander, where the offending player will be "Zapped" but not killed... (It is up to the players to revolt against a commander who is zapping people with no reason, so the current system is fine; except the eject com button should be a bit more prominent) Also the reward system could also help; instead of waypoints why not a "Pillar of light" marks a certain area; Green is defend current location- Anyone around the pillar, gets 25% extra health, and a slow regeneration; attack pillars are red, and anyone beside it gets increased RoF and higher accuracy; yellow are build; anyone building near this pillar will get a 25% repair speed increase and infinate calc ammo... Sure those seem too powerfull but... you can only have one active at any moment; and they take 5 seconds to "Initilize" and 10 second "Deinitilize" to prevent constant spam swiching. Bonuses THAT strong will never be ignored and this forces the commander to use strategy, so even during the late game, a good combination of "Pillars" will plow through the enemy lines...
maybe have half the team be able to vote comm out? cause somtimes there will be 1 or more people who dont know how or dont want to
I guess what needs to be done is to look at other games which have good teamwork, and look to see why that happens. Then just modify that to empires if possible
what about player class controll... If someone is being naughty restrict them to lets say engi-class only or restrict his skills to something that would onlu benefit the team OR a combination of both... that will teach those irritating people not to disobey too much!
Going on what I said a few minutes ago, in NS, I guess that people will build the buildings and stuff, as then they can get better weapons/jetpacks etc. Maybe if some classes were locked until the armoury is built, or some researches etc. were completed, so that there is an incentive for the team to work together to benefit themselves.
Im not talking about team work here, Im talking about the Commander being obeyed. Few other games are multiplayer RTS/FPS so we dont have alot to go on here. In NS, the closest example, the Com is the caretaker, he gives out weapons, without him you cant even play very long. This sorta thing would not work very well with Empires as the com is going to be busy directing an army. The flags would be doing the same thing as the pillars of light, but they would be flags and not pillars of light :-)
but obeying the comm IS teamwork.. Teamwork is working together towards one goal, which the comm decides (and also the game developers ) and as I said, giving the comm the power to restrict a players class or skills to something that only benefits the team directly will help, cause the player will want to do anything that wont restrict his class or skill options
Going back to the jeep for a second, why not instead make it a multipurpose vehicle instead? With all that new room from the 16x map support, a configurable jeep just might work better, you could decide on a jeep configuration like a support jeep with a mounted machine gun instead of the passenger seats. Or a utilitarian vehicle with ammo and healing crates. Just make the jeep highly customizable, allow them to add AT weapons or something for cheap, ultra light support and defense forces. Of course jeeps with that kinda configuration would cost quite a bit more. You can be assured that when x16 support kicks in sneak and hit-and-run tactics are going to play in a larger part of the game play.
The comm-made jeep idea is a great idea. It would work best if a jeep became availible every 30 seconds or so. (to prevent spam) I think the only way that a comm rewards system would work without being abused would be if the player had to successfully complete an order from the comm (attack this target, etc) before the comm could reward him (or her). As for the punishment system, the only good punishment is the brig time. The slay/slap would be abused too much.
I usually got people to obey me by giving them waypoints from start, telling them my plan, communicating a lot and telling them how we are gonna pwn the shit out of the other team, everybody likes a good plan except lamers and griefers. So please no punishment system, because those are just to good to be true, as in everyone is gonna abuse em, its like pressing the shiny red button. Also I think I'm probly one of the only clan players that actually think jeeps can be very usefull, I say don't change em untill they can have weapons equipped, a jeep is a jeep, and when your soldiers die at an important spot, they should be able to get the jeep like it is right now. APC's are nice, but you dont want people spawning in them if you only need 1 or 2 persons at where the jeep is heading. You also dont want people to use a transport as some infantry killing, tank ramming, base rushing block of metal, thats why you get your troops a jeep, so they stay focused, instead of getting them an apc and watch them mess up your plan and teamwork. Also I made some suggestions a few months ago about rewarding players and giving your troops more reasons to follow your commands, but these got shot down by FalconX. Not sure in which thread they were, but basicly it was about having the commander use his rank points for his troops, as idd some kind of bonusses. The commander would get his rank points for instance by troops building the structures he dropped, meh, I wrote a lot which im not going to repeat here, I thought it sounded pretty full proof and I believe FalconX did agree with a detail, but yeh, I guess im done talking out of my ass now
I love that idea! make the jeep the most costumizable vehicle in the game, although they wont be very effective except for scouting. Jeeps would be used much more often if they could carry ammo/healing crates, maybe replace the APC a bit, except for the mobile spawn part. The only thing the developers need to look out for is that they dont make the jeeps more effective at for example destroying tanks than an heavy tank would be
one time when i was comm my whole team was scouts for some reason.. and they wouldnt listen to anything i said
and at those times it comes in handy to restrict players class selection, you just tell them if they want to be scouts they need to build that GOD**** VF first.
Perhaps some sort of "auto-slap" feature. For example let say your ordered your unit to build the radar, if he/she doesn't start building within two minutes, that player will get auto slapped, & will continue to get auto slapped every two minutes until he/she gets the point & starts building.
