Team Play

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Thrax Panda
04-12-2003, 23:59
We've had a variety of hot-points thru development, including our stance on team play. I just ran across a great crystalization of this idea in one of our design documents:

Team play is a natural byproduct of pitting one group of skilled individuals against another.

Discuss.

(note: I didn't write that. I'll give credit to the person who did after the 24th)

Sir Lucius
04-13-2003, 00:12
What's to discuss? That's it dead on.

I'll come up with a cool analogy to clairify.


What's cooler? Having 16 army grunts working together to take 16 other army grunts, or having an eliete specialized team of GI Joe vs. the underhanded tactics of Cobra? In either case whenever 1 person is cornerd they're usually in lots of trouble, but there are still times when Hawkeye can make a cowboy run and save the bioweapons scientist on his own with out having the entire Joe team backing him up.
Now picture if it was just Destro vs. a bunch of army grunts guarding some secret data files. Destro would DESTROY them. If it was something like Tribes2 base rules tho he wouldn't stand a chance b/c t2 base put numbers before skill.

R@ND0M
04-13-2003, 00:41
I prefer Teamplay to Teamwork.

Rabid Poop
04-13-2003, 00:52
okay, call the next game:

Tribes: Team play is a natural byproduct of pitting one group of skilled individuals against another...











ON AN EPIC SCALE

Wils
04-13-2003, 01:07
We've had a variety of hot-points thru development, including our stance on team play. I just ran across a great crystalization of this idea in one of our design documents:

Team play is a natural byproduct of pitting one group of skilled individuals against another.

Well, "byproduct" makes it sound like the author doesn't consider it one of the main aims of a new Tribes game.

If you throw one team of skilled players against another, of course you're going to get some team play. The important part is what form it takes - do you want the precise timing/positional team play of high level Quake CTF, or, say, the more sweeping tactics/plays/maneuvres/whatever of Tribes/Team Fortress?

An alternative approach to the topic is the whole T1 vs T2 argument, where the T1 players go on about how T1 contains just as much teamwork as T2, and that cowboy capping doesn't make the game based solely on individual skill, and the T2 players try to hide the fact that their game has soup-for-air physics and bases that disappear twelve miles underground.

Alexander
04-13-2003, 02:39
I prefer Teamplay to Teamwork.

Excellent distinction.

Teamplay should allow your group to succeed beyond what it could hope to accomplish alone, but 10 skilled guys each doing their down thing in a server should still be able to get the job done.

In that regard, one sums up the difference between competition and pubbing.

Locke355
04-13-2003, 04:42
Teamplay is a group of individuals all simultaneously accomplishing individually smaller goals in order to achieve one larger objective.

Teamwork is 5 guys killing a mobile base, while dave g tells you you are having fun.

Fidelio
04-13-2003, 04:43
Team play is a natural byproduct of pitting one group of skilled individuals against another.


I think a key element which is missing from this statement is that of an objective.

Maybe it should read.

Team play is a natural byproduct of pitting one group of skilled individuals working towards a common objective against another.

Thus indicating the common objective is both more than merely elimiating the opposing forces and that the objective is larger than could be accomplished by a single individual no matter how skilled.

While it is possible to have teamplay with the sole objective of eliminating opfor you mentioned "our stance" on teamplay and I would hope that any product based on the Tribes franchise would include a more complex objective.

Fidelio
04-13-2003, 04:52
damn you Locke. :mofo: while i was typing/thinking you said it more succinctly.

late = slow thought process (est for me).

ParoxysM
04-13-2003, 05:11
damn you Locke. :mofo: while i was typing/thinking you said it more succinctly.

late = slow thought process (est for me).

Locke355
04-13-2003, 05:20
wtf.. i told dave g that long ago.. and he said i was an idiot :(

TeckMan
04-13-2003, 05:33
Forced teamwork has been an element much too prevelant in a lot of games recently. It's usually a byproduct of an unbalanced game, where one player must rely on their team in order to get anything done. Not only is this frustrating for the individual in a pub situation, it also puts a skill cap on the game. For instance in BF1942 a ground soldier is at the mercy of an airplane, and must rely on his teammate to protect him, but the pilot cannot accomplish the main objective of the game (capturing the capture points). This forced "teamwork" makes it so that one player, no matter how skilled, cannot have a large impact on the game. It is what leads people to get bored so quickly with their games.

However a game like Tribes 1 pits all the players on equal footing. Any player is capable of at any time accomplishing any of the tasks in the game. And this, combined with the 3 dimensional aspect of the game, is what gives it its nearly limitless skillcap.

Also, forced teamwork rarely has any depth to it, and only servers to frustrate pub players. Any non retarded clan knows how to give out ammo at the beginning of a round in RTCW, have players in the sky in Tribes 2/BF1942 etc etc. The more natural teamwork elements of timing, dynamic roles, etc. are what allow games to have a high level of replayability and competitiveness.

rage_sniper
04-13-2003, 08:18
I feel forced team work is a nec. evil, atleast on a public server (Tribes 2). I feel it helps to teach the new people coming to the game. I also feel that the forced team work on tribes 2 is not at too high a level. There is an armor class that can defeat any vehicle and if just two people work together on defence the power should stay up and the flag remain secure. Team work is also rewarded by victory. As for BF1942 I have never played it and do not plan to.

Sir Lucius
04-13-2003, 08:49
I feel forced team work is a nec. evil, atleast on a public server (Tribes 2). I feel it helps to teach the new people coming to the game. I also feel that the forced team work on tribes 2 is not at too high a level. There is an armor class that can defeat any vehicle and if just two people work together on defence the power should stay up and the flag remain secure. Team work is also rewarded by victory. As for BF1942 I have never played it and do not plan to.


On pubs is when you have it the worse.

Thanks to the turrets and slow skiing you HAVE to use teamwork to capture, and to such a rediculos degree that it will never happen on a pub. To load up a havoc to get your heavies over you HAVE to use teamwork. Defending in Tribes2 was never a problem -- people weren't using teamwork when they were defending the base or the flag. It's just it was too retarded to get up and go on O so no one botherd.

Another thing about teamwork is that to pull it off you need a leader. If there's no one directing you're going to have too many plans crashing together. There are no such things as leaders in pubs, and even if there was a guy called "leader" who was supposed to lead, people either wouldn't listen to him or think he's an idiot.

And THEN you try to say every balance issue can be solved by teamwork (not you, dave g.) which is such an utter load of bull****. Shrikes are too stong -- use teamwork! Turrets are too tough -- use teamwork! It's just stupid.

rage_sniper
04-13-2003, 09:42
It seems that mods attempt to address the above issues by creating more powerful weapons. I think some weapons do help balance the game, but much too often the creator of the mod takes it too far. The weapons are insanely powerful and the only thing accomplished is killing. I think it is necessary to have some powerful weapons on a public server due to the lack of teamwork, but on the other hand if i wanted to kill and die constantly I would play Quake(YUCK).

Wils
04-13-2003, 10:21
You don't kill and die constantly in a game of Quake will skilled players, though. The whole game is centred on staying alive and building up for attacks on areas of the map (either to retake them or to kill the players trying to hold them). This is even more true of CTF in Quake, which gets reduced to hit and run gameplay as teams try to wear each other down and pull players out of position.

On a completely different tangent, the main issue with Tribes 2 is that any teamwork is so vague and the feedback from accomplishing something so difficult to guage that you never feel like you've accomplished anything. There's a lot to be said for smaller teams - as one player out of eight or ten, you feel much more valuable to your team than you do if you have fifteen or more teammates, and the level of feedback/reward for fullfilling your role is much more apparent.

Rilke
04-13-2003, 14:10
We've had a variety of hot-points thru development, including our stance on team play. I just ran across a great crystalization of this idea in one of our design documents:

Team play is a natural byproduct of pitting one group of skilled individuals against another.

Discuss.

(note: I didn't write that. I'll give credit to the person who did after the 24th)

Thraxle,

I know that I will shock you here, but I am going to take a contrary position. The statement quoted only makes sense in a sentimental, not practical application, if it isn't completely ambiguous, out of context, and illogical. Yes, skill is important, but as a developer, you have precarious control over the skill of those playing your game. Pitting skilled groups against one another in such a simple, mathematical way is a resource you do not have; therefore you cannot incarnate the "natural byproduct" thereof.

The greatest control a developer has upon teamwork is an approximation at best. Perhaps it is by establishing the particular rules of your game that you do most to define teamwork as an element of your game. But, that alone is not sufficient. A game that is most teamwork oriented might also sit upon the shelf if it does not find an audience. In other words, not only are the rules of the game a huge factor in defining teamwork in your game, but also particularizing those rules in innovative ways that tutor your audience into teamwork.

A few terms I'm sure you are most familiar with in the game industry are "skill ceiling" and "learning curve." Theoretically, a skill ceiling is a limit imputed upon an audience by the developer, a valve that the developer uses, deliberately or not, to define the potential room for improvement in skill according to the rules of the game. One of the knocks against Tribes 2, a game which allegedly required more teamwork than Tribes 1, is that the skill ceiling was made too low, ostensibly in an effort to create an enourmous but somewhat level playing field. It is almost as if Sierra subjugated the rules of the game that define teamwork to Vivendi's battle on Wall Street.

One of the knocks against Tribes 1, on the other hand, was that the learning curve was too high. Theoretically, a learning curve is defined by the rate at which the average player can reach the skill ceiling. If William the Weekend Warrior spawns in his base and dies and spawns and dies and spawns 6 times in a row before he even experiences the confusing splendor that is Snowblind, William the Weekend Warrior will not be playing your game, and it won't be because he has no potential skill or teamplay ability. So, while I think it's irresponsible on the developer's part to factor Wall Street into the teamwork defining rules of the game, I recognize wholeheartedly the importance of finding reciprocity on Market Street.

At the risk of making something that appears simple, more complex, I would revise the statement in your design documents as such: the developer must do their part to foster an environment of team play, using the tools at their disposal, which are: the rules of their game, the skill ceiling defined by those rules, and the learning curve defined by those rules. By finding an attractive and enjoyable combination of these things, the developer can establish reciprocity on Market Street, and in turn, satisfy Wall Street.

Good Luck.

Thrax Panda
04-13-2003, 14:36
I think a key element which is missing from this statement is that of an objective.I think Objective is implied. Without some objective they couldn't be pitted aginst another group.

Thrax Panda
04-13-2003, 14:46
I feel forced team work is a nec. evil, atleast on a public server (Tribes 2). I feel it helps to teach the new people coming to the game. I also feel that the forced team work on tribes 2 is not at too high a level. There is an armor class that can defeat any vehicle and if just two people work together on defence the power should stay up and the flag remain secure. Team work is also rewarded by victory. As for BF1942 I have never played it and do not plan to.That's backward. Why on earth should you require teamwork in the place where it's least likely to happen, a public server? Pubs are clear evidence that forced teamwork is not fun, while the freedom to get more skilled is fun.

It's also very important to note that nobody is saying that there shouldn't be teamplay, or that teamplay shouldn't be a powerful force in the game. A well coordinated team will always be better than an individual (witness counterstrike, where 4 guys playing together will almost always win the map). We're simply saying that designing rules to force people to coordinate their actions does not produce the best possible game.

Thrax Panda
04-13-2003, 14:56
Thraxle,

...the developer must do their part to foster an environment of team play, using the tools at their disposal, which are: the rules of their game, the skill ceiling defined by those rules, and the learning curve defined by those rules. By finding an attractive and enjoyable combination of these things, the developer can establish reciprocity on Market Street, and in turn, satisfy Wall Street.

:ftardkill