Maniaplanet Forum

Really good post Rodounet, and I also confirm the need to deeper testing that brought us to make it in B2. In fact, I doubt I would have had a good post like your without this.

I will explain the motivations of the +0 if some positive and constructive player would like to search for answers.

1. I feel that it would be positive if a fight can happen in the open: the attacker would decide to expose himself and more surely go toward a defender: meaning that he would first try to avoid the shoots, then if one arrive on him, use the laser to parry it at last moment and resume the attack. At the moment, he hides, get out to fire and hide again. This being said, dodging with a more fast paced move would create trouble online, based on ping. To sum up this point, it is the goal to have some sort of parry.

2. For the diversity of the action, I think it is positive to have projectile interactions. When I connect to a game, I think it is positive if something rare can happen. To deny a rocket or a nucleus after a quick move, to survive, can be a nice move. It is somewhat related to the arsenal of the attacker you are saying.

3. Rocket or nucleus users can use this to cover themselves. So, they are firing double use projectiles. It is moving shield. I think that in some months, some players will be able to do great thing out of it.

Now, there are issues I feel I have with this:

4. Too much difficult to predict. Clearly, there are many +0 that was not expected before firing. I knew this, but I did not had time enough to include the delay, but this is why I quickly suggested to test with a delay according to the fear I had. The thing is that we tested it more in LAN here, and I think it is not hell-ping.

5. Someone with the laser often have only a very narrow window to trigger because he his moving fast or the defender is only making a small mistake. This window can be cancelled by a rocket and remove the successful opportunity the attacker had. I don't really have a solution for this, unless the number of rocket that are spammed is reduced. I know some players are against rocket spamming, but some find this more interesting. On this point, it is difficult: if players are for spamming, this point should less be a trouble, if they are against, then the solution is more to remove them.

So, without entering the debate of rocket spamming, the best option would be to have a replacement that brings diversity and things like I said in 1 to 3.

You have a good way to express quality for a game, like using the flow, and I quite agree it must be kept. Yet, do not mix 'flip of a coin' and uncertainty in sport. In soccer, there is maybe 10 seconds for the goal that makes the difference in a 90 minutes match and no flip coin. What makes the +0 random is more based on the ping than on the concept itself: you don't yet see that your opponent fired a rocket that your laser is shot. With a delay, the choice to fire or not will be in the hand of the attacker and will have nothing to do with randomness. The firing of rockets, which described as random by some players is more about uncertainty. The fact that if you leave a wall and can't see them coming before hand could be even diminished by the +0. I offered to some players to have a sound in front of the rockets in order to warn they are arriving, but some players disagreed. And about the current sound, it was some sort of a mistake based on a focus maid on the type of sound more than the balance, brought a little by the postpone of the ambient sound balance that would take us too much time right now compared to other features, even if I know it is positive and would like to do it one day.

About menus, we are still working on it and I think that it will be ok for the release, to welcome players. The front desk is made after the back desk. I know we have lost many players there, but at least, I think we are good on the 'get into the game' factor. Once the menus are clear and the free entry available, I suspect it to look like Trackmania, which did prove some right numbers.

I think sound, menus, +0 question will be fixed for release.
The camera move, is it flip coin or difficulty according to your experience?
About netcode, it is long debate. In fact, the maximum ping allowed can be set, and the game is just going faster when it can. I made a post here and we made some good optimizations since then. But I intend to look at maybe some other options in the future. Either it is a question of taste based on choices, either it is pure quality. On the later, we can more easily do it after release. On choice, it is difficult because they are many various likes and dislikes about time nudge, lag compensation and other tricks on the netcode. But like I said, it is deep question and sometimes a question of taste.

What about progressive jumps? I think they are even more of an annoyance and have more of an impact on game imbalance than even +0's. The delayed feel and complete removal of risk when jumping needs to be addressed before release. It's just frustrating to run around by yourself let alone in the middle of a fight. Progressive jumps make the game feel clunky and slow.

Thanks a lot for your answer Hylis. I am sure you will find a solution that will meet your thoughts, the players' expectations and is technically viable.

Regarding your question about the camera movement when jumping: It feels uncomfortable and makes aiming mid/long-range targets a more difficult during the beginning of upwards motion.

I would like to add onto what I stated before, I do think that the biggest issue with +0 is that its mostly random. When I am on attack and I shoot at a player and instead get a +0 when expecting a +1 its very disappointing. As you said before Hylis, there are very short windows for attackers and for a split second opportunity to get a kill is taken away by a rocket that was mere spam is very discouraging. Then the same goes for when I am on defense and I get saved by a rocket shot I feel like I am just lucky rather than anything remotely skilled. I think the only real time a +0 is rewarding is when you have a that moment of being medium distance to defenders and are able to shoot your way out of spray to an actual shot but you don't see this very often due to the fact many players are too used to just having to worrying about landing a shot rather than the multiple variables you are throwing into the chaos. +0 would possibly work if you had released it when rockets were slower but I still dislike the idea of it in game play. Ways to possibly improve on +0 would be to create a smaller registry box for rockets and make it so you cannot shoot rockets until they have traveled 3m from the defender that way there is a balance of rocket blocks from up close while keeping the small ill timed spams from saving a defenders life who has already made the mistake of being exposed.

Suggestions of mine for new content (my ideas):
Create new interactive map content as follows
- Wind tunnels or air vents that speed you up
- Static Fields
- Tar or some sort of slowing agent
- Create a script that allows you to skip across water when traveling a high enough speed
- A hook like pulling mechanic similar to spider man where you can pull yourself to places
- A dodge or roll mechanic for attackers, uses stamina and you cannot shoot during the movement
- Teleporting might be a cool idea as long its not like portals or anything
- Make the sliding mechanic on wood ramps more natural, currently you can jump up and down but there is no difference in the speed and ect. a full backslide would be really cool where you are all the way on your back and shooting

Map Making Improvements:
- More unique map blocks that aren't just one block - Either where you can place smaller objects like trash bins, gas lines or or larger items like fallen tree trunks and cars
- Make more urban blocks like buildings
- Make more metal blocks and structures
- Make grappling hook hubs place able on any wall or corner (would be cool to swing around a corner and pick a laser or something similar)
- Make more wood ramps like ones that have curved walls so we can make some wild turns while flying down them
- Raining map type (makes you slide and lose a little bit of friction on metals and ect.
- Snowing map type (frozen lakes and frozen over areas that cause massive sliding which would probably be for of a more casual fun game type)
- Map type that starts you in a large cube with stadium lighting rather than natural light
- Make blocks so you can make an enclosed dome like roofing
- Map type that starts you in a large cube with stadium lighting rather than natural light
- More Trees or plant life as you might call it
- Make lifts or moving platforms to add some variance in the maps

This is all just from about 30 mins of brainstorming. Let me know if I should keep them coming ^^

your bloc brainstorm is efficient, your suggestion about +0 is already what I suggested, I also talked about the grappling hook plateform that would enable you to fire a hook that pulls you.

maybe you can explain
- Static Fields
- Tar or some sort of slowing agent

maybe things can not be done for sophisticated reasons, but your brainstorm is in the spirit of shootmania, so you can continu if you wish. I wrote down two things to add on the list, even if not on top at the moment.

I just saw that a movement that I liked in beta 1 seems to be very difficult to do in beta 2:
Jumping on the top of a vertical grid to jump again from there.

This movement was easy enough to be integrated in maps (ie: http://sm.mania-exchange.com/maps/2756 ).
I used to almost always succeed this jump but now I almost always fail this jump.

Hylis wrote:your bloc brainstorm is efficient, your suggestion about +0 is already what I suggested, I also talked about the grappling hook plateform that would enable you to fire a hook that pulls you.

maybe you can explain
- Static Fields
- Tar or some sort of slowing agent

maybe things can not be done for sophisticated reasons, but your brainstorm is in the spirit of shootmania, so you can continu if you wish. I wrote down two things to add on the list, even if not on top at the moment.

Yea I didn't read through all of the posts. That would of taken around an hour of itself lol.

Static fields could be anything like something that can damage you for running into or a wall that acts as a barrier but can be switched on with a rocket or lazer hit and if run into it kills or does damage.

Tar would be just like as it sounds, something that is a pit or spill that slows you are could be an oil spill where you slide and lose control of your movement for a short time.

I would really love to see moving environments. Like floating paths or moving lifts. Would make for some interesting gameplay and a turn of events in some cases.

Some things that I really do dislike:

"+0". It's making the game random, and we don't need random. It's preventing people from being awarded when they're making nice runs and some random rockets is fired.

The sound, you can barely hear anything and imo it's a skill to make use of the sound. Fix the sound so you can actually hear them!

The "little" jump. At first I liked the idea but after playing some I find it very annoying. It's no point to have it imo.

My 2 cents

// fnatic/luxxiz

-the sound shall be fixed in the next version
-the +0 will have test elements, such as delay before the rocket can be blown and smaller and grayer and darker +0
-about the progressive jump, I met many players saying the opposite: dislike at first and like it very much after. So, we are providing a key binding for full jump, even if the most recent one. Some players may then use two keys instead of one to jump, I don't know. But somebody would not be disadvantaged with only one, as long as he plays well. It does not fix the wish of being under risk when jumping but many comments have been made also on the previous full jump. It is really a situation of some wishes being opposed by one and others there. One of my idea was to have the fulljump of before on one surface, such as dirt (on the castle) but it would maybe be to strange.

I think in any case there should still be a minimum jump height. It seems artificial to jump 1mm to sprint; either you should be able to sprint without jumping or there should be a minimum jump height.