[T3] What I'd like to see return and why

Ben Reed
04-21-2003, 14:38
- The three armor classes - They'll most likely be back, but I personally hope the heavy looks more like its T1 self than its T2 self. By the way, just my opinion on aesthetics - holding the weapon in one hand, even on a heavy, looks dorky. In my opinion, the heavy would look a lot more badass if it held its guns with both hands like the other armors.

Cliff's Notes version of the below: I think we should bring back all the T1 weapons in their T2 classic incarnations (with slight variations on some), with perhaps a 10-20% reduction in ammo capacity for all weapons with limited ammo except the disc launcher. Below is a full explanation of why I think each individual weapon should be brought back.

- The blaster - Most players save newbies and the super-hardcore may still shy away from it due to the fact that it drains energy to fire and doesn't have the killpower or specialized usefulness of the laser rifle or ELF gun, but I think, given a small extra edge, it may find itself back in common use in at least a defensive capacity. Perhaps it could be given the ability to hold down the fire button and charge up a more powerful shot for a greater energy drain, a la Jedi Knight 2's blaster?

At the very least, it ought to come back because it is a well-rounded weapon if used carefully. It has greater range and killpower than the ELF gun, an unlimited ammo supply, no spread over distance, and if it retains the shot-bouncing from T2, enterprising players could surely find good use for it in bases with narrow corridors.

- The plasma rifle - What's there to be said? It's a great weapon for indoor offense and defense, and one of the mainstays of the HO arsenal. It's the flamethrower of the Tribes series, and it needs to come back.

- The chaingun - Most likely will be coming back, but I'll say it anyway. Even if those of the LPB persuasion still have an advantage in using it, it's still a well-balanced weapon for offense and defense, with a much greater offensive bent due to its wind-up and its lack of energy drain.

I believe the T2 spread is much more balanced than the T1 spread, and should be retained for TNTG...the weapon always struck me as a weapon for pursuing or otherwise engaging at close range, not for blazing away into the air from one's base as the enemy capper escapes, relying on the narrower T1 spread to catch the enemy with sheer luck and drop him from the sky. That's what I always believed the laser rifle was for.

- The disc launcher - Already confirmed to be coming back. I have full confidence that neither Thrax nor any of his development cohorts will ever come up with the absurd idea of disc spread ever again. :) Keep disc jumping, too, while you're at it.

- The grenade launcher - Not much to be said here. It's the poor man's mortar with a faster projectile, faster detonation, and faster rate of fire for the low, low cost of reduced attack power. Leave it out, and you seriously nerf light and medium offense.

- The laser rifle - Not much to be said here, either. It's the longest-range weapon in the games, and a staple of capable defense, and in some cases, capable offense. It's newbie-friendly, it's vet-friendly, and it'll most likely be coming back, so I won't blather on about it. :)

- The ELF gun - A black sheep like the blaster, but it has its uses...I for one ought to get more practice in with it so that I can exploit those uses. I vote we bring it back with slightly greater range than the T1 ELF gun, but not as much as the original T2 range.

- The mortar - Well, it'll most likely be coming back, but I for one would particularly like to see a reduced ammo count on this puppy, something that I think would help cut down on pub spam. Ten shots on a non-ammo-packed heavy seems like a little much for something with so much killpower...one generally well-placed shot can kill or seriously injure practically everyone inside a DX/Tombstone-size flag base, blow up most deployables, and put a serious dent in turret shields. Surely a 2-to-3-shot ammo capacity decrease wouldn't seriously nerf HO?

(Or perhaps we could also implement map-specific "spamming zones" in a wide radius around spammable structures, where if a player does not move rather noticeably from one spot to another farther away when firing off rapid mortar shots, the game will make note of it and then server-specified penalties and notifications could be made.)

- Other weapons -

Cliff's Notes version: Keep the frag and concussion grenades, screw the whiteouts. Don't bring back mine-discing, the whole point of HD is that you shouldn't be able to crack it in one shot. Either seriously nerf the missile launcher and remove flares or completely remove both. The shocklance could be kept in without being useless, but it's not crucial.

- Grenades - Frag grenades, of course, can stay, as assuming mine-discing is left out (which I hope it is), it adds a great deal of killpower to the light and medium armors' smaller arsenal. Concussion grenades can probably be kept too. I never used them much in the rare occasions I played T2, but they never struck me as a gamebreaking clearing tool. Whiteouts could stand to go, the reasons why have already been articulated in another thread. Flares really need to go, they make the missile launcher and missile turrets pointless and reduce all the other grenades to second tier.

- Mines - A staple of defense, they naturally need to be kept. I believe that game balance would be better in the long run if mine-discing was still left out, though. The biggest merit of HD, in my opinion, comes from the fact that though you're big and slow and wily cappers can sling you from the flag with well-placed grenades, discs, and concs, there's not a weapon in the game, not even the mighty mortar, that can kill you in one shot. Mine-discing removes that edge, and it also reduces the use of other weapons in the player's arsenal. The question of whether a fragile but nimble light capper can defeat a burly but slow heavy defender becomes little more than the issue of who can M/D first and better.

- The missile launcher - Considering the missile launcher and flares essentially cancel each other out, either the missile launcher needs to be seriously nerfed and flares removed, or both need to be removed altogether. I vote that the missile launcher be retained as an anti-vehicle weapon at the very least; missile turrets aren't always operational to take down fast flying vehicles, and not everybody can draw a good bead on a full-speed Shrike.

- The shocklance - Much as I may lament its shortcomings in the cool-looks department, the shocklance could probably stand to be kept, although it's not essential to game balance or the spirit of the brand that it be kept. It's got short range but good killpower, it's useful for base defense if nothing else, and in the hands of skilled players it gains major cool points for use in duels and active offense. In the hands of those who don't use it on heavy-armor defense, it is a master's weapon, the weapon of the Tribal elite, which is really the core of my argument for a cooler, blade-type melee weapon...something that you can shove up a player's ass in a way that says "i rock @ TNTG".

Of course, if the shocklance somehow ACCIDENTALLY *cough, cough* turned into a cool-ass BLADE THINGY at some point during development, assuming it was retained, I wouldn't be heartbroken per se...

- Deployables - Fine as-is. TNTG will probably be faster and more offensively oriented than T2, so the deployables most likely won't be an overpowering defensive element.

I don't know about changing the turret barrels, though, sticking one's neck out in medium armor with a deployable on one's back to change a plasma turret to a missile turret or AA turret or whatever always struck me as needlessly hazardous. Maybe we could bring back the command station and allow turret monkeys to access it during a pause in enemy offense and change base turret configurations from inside the base?

- Vehicles - Tough call on what to do with them until we get an idea how fast the on-foot action is in TNTG. I don't think we need more than four at the most (I'm thinking at least a heavy transport and a light flyer, maybe with the MPB and tank)...perhaps we could get some greater use out of them with more base maps designed to milk their potential (i.e. lots of water, rough terrain, maybe really tall flag towers to encourage approach via flyer).

dunce_boy
04-21-2003, 15:12
you say you want the hvy armor to look more like T1's than T2's? Why or why would you want it to look like something thats 5 years old?!

Ben Reed
04-21-2003, 15:15
you say you want the hvy armor to look more like T1's than T2's? Why or why would you want it to look like something thats 5 years old?!

I didn't mean in terms of polycount, I meant in terms of having a more sunken head, bigger shoulders, and dumpier-looking arms and legs...the T2 heavy's 'astronaut on horse steroids' just doesn't work for me like the T1 heavy's look did.

Destiny
04-21-2003, 16:29
ummm ... i hope we get a new game ... only thing i want again is the jetpack ... everything else is up for discussion.

TeckMan
04-21-2003, 16:45
no vehicles, missile launchers, or deployables

disc/GL/blaster only

:rawr:

Beren
04-21-2003, 23:42
seriously, i don't think we need to have all these things from t1/t2 there. I think plenty of it will return, because it is in the franchise, and it makes designing the new game easier.

But that said, if they removed everything except jetpacks and teams i would still be pre-ordering the game and firing it up and putting hours into playing it. All I want is a game that is a hell of alot of fun; the main things which gave me that in t1/t2 which was so different to everything else, was the style of teamplay and the ability to fly in a fps.

Ben Reed
04-21-2003, 23:56
seriously, i don't think we need to have all these things from t1/t2 there. I think plenty of it will return, because it is in the franchise, and it makes designing the new game easier.

But that said, if they removed everything except jetpacks and teams i would still be pre-ordering the game and firing it up and putting hours into playing it. All I want is a game that is a hell of alot of fun; the main things which gave me that in t1/t2 which was so different to everything else, was the style of teamplay and the ability to fly in a fps.

I'm not so easily swayed.

I know what I want, and if I heard official word that all that was returning was the jetpack and the disc launcher, I'd be rather skeptical, and I doubt that I'm alone on that one.

Beren
04-21-2003, 23:58
I'm not so easily swayed.

I know what I want, and if I heard official word that all that was returning was the jetpack and the disc launcher, I'd be rather skeptical, and I doubt that I'm alone on that one.

Well, i didn't say i wouldn't be skeptical if they changed the game in a large way. I am saying i would still buy it and give it a go. If dramatic changes were made, and the game was really bloody fun to play, i wouldn't loose a wink of sleep over things that didn't get carried through to t3. Someone would make a mod, i could give it a go, and then head back to base.

Inspin
04-23-2003, 07:49
the only thing i hvae time to comment on this morning is:

"- Mines - A staple of defense, they naturally need to be kept. I believe that game balance would be better in the long run if mine-discing was still left out, though. The biggest merit of HD, in my opinion, comes from the fact that though you're big and slow and wily cappers can sling you from the flag with well-placed grenades, discs, and concs, there's not a weapon in the game, not even the mighty mortar, that can kill you in one shot. Mine-discing removes that edge, and it also reduces the use of other weapons in the player's arsenal. The question of whether a fragile but nimble light capper can defeat a burly but slow heavy defender becomes little more than the issue of who can M/D first and better.
"

Rarely anyone ever ever dies from landing on a mine..they'd be useless
no HoF would ever kill any good capper without mine disc'ing, it would be practically impossible. I have no idea how people got the idea that players are running around mine discing everyone..it just doesnt happen and i play everyday. A capper cannot kill a HoF with one mine disc..it takes 3 Mines and a disc to kill a Heavy with no shield. Mine disc'ing just like MA's, skiing, etc is a skill that makes tribes that much more interesting than anyother game.

and for LD..how are they going to kill incoming HO..lol..i cant imagine playing a map like RD in a match as an LD..it be BB the HO and 15 discs..mine disc's should stay just the way they are I think

r0gue3
04-23-2003, 08:32
you must be playing in the wrong pub then. When I play, I see it every single minute.

sg
04-23-2003, 08:41
no vehicles, missile launchers, or deployables

disc/GL/blaster only

:rawr:

Agreed. I thought the whole vehicles thing was gay. I think t3 needs to get back to more of a t1 style.

fb
04-23-2003, 08:49
Agreed. I thought the whole vehicles thing was gay. I think t3 needs to get back to more of a t1 style.
I think YOU're gay.

Inspin
04-23-2003, 11:39
{sarcasm}you must be playing in the wrong pub then. When I play, I see it every single minute. {/sarcasm}

i hope

r0gue3
04-23-2003, 11:48
That was NOT sarcasm.

Edit: Anyway.. I've seen a ton of players use the shocklance successfully in Classic. To kill a HO going 300KPH with the SL you have to be damn good.

I don't like the Mine Disk thing. I use it. I think that sometimes its not necessary and its wayyy over used.