[T:V] The sensor system

Considering how many dajackals i saw, I think it is safe to say that most of the players in T1 did not exactly have a game manual that they could refer to about what the deployables actually did.

Only people who played in the first year ever experienced any of that anyways since clustering was a superior strategy to gearing up.

mikey my point is that in the old system if you saw an enemy sensor then you killed it, you didnt have to go scouring the earth finding them. So it was just a task a an aware player would do on their normal routine.

My thinking is the old system involved a couple moments here and there of mundane activity per map and i feel like the proposed system demands map long mundane behavior from both teams.

Remember i said the old system was boring, but it was just 3 minutes of boring per map. Having someone parked next to a sensor with a repair pack while it gets shelled by mortars for an entire map seems pretty agonizing.

Yeah, and on the flip side, who wants to be the poor sucker running around trying to find and destroy the enemy's deployed sensors? If people really find this to be fun, please speak up.

If the deployable sensors aren't too powerful, then they'll only be useful if they are near common routes. There's no point in hunting for sensors in the far corners of the map if no one goes near them.

This is a good compromise (minus shielding deployable sensors):
Not sure if this has been suggested before, but what about a compromise:

- give the main sensor less range (maybe 75% of the map? would make it easier for defenders by default, but a deployable sensor or two would take care of that)
- add deployable sensors (either indestructible or very difficult to destroy...perhaps shielded)
- if the main sensor goes down, all deployable sensors go down with it (and then become easier to destroy...e.g. shields disappear)
I'm all for a weaker main sensor (not much stronger than T1's) because I don't want defenders seeing incoming enemies everywhere in the map. As I said earlier, a lot of strategy is removed from capping if enemies know you're coming long before you're a threat. Then it just comes down to running the fastest possible route instead of using more creative routes that keep you out of view longer.

Dont know if this question has been asked before, but do deployable turrets have sensors?. Maybe a compromise in that T:V turrets are both turret and short range sensor, that way u have a backup for your main sensor and ppl always like deploying and hunting down turrets so it cuts a bit of the extra deploying/hunting tedium out. You could even make them still function as sensors till destroyed even if they where disabled/not firing, so on d u could stick some futher out from base and be sneaky and damage them yourself so they wouldnt fire and give away their position as much :P

Only problem I have, besides making defense run around like chickens with their head cutof trying to defend everything, is that people are really hard to see on terrain sometimes, a red marker when enemies are close does not add aggregate confusion when this is taken into account. If the single player missions can't teach someone what a sensor NET is, I seriously doubt they have the attention span for tribes in the first place. It's not like newbs miss out on not knowing how the sensor-NET works. There could even be a limit on deployable sensors. Like, say, 1 or 2. Just on the cap routes.

And it's not like it's that complicated:

Objective in SP: Destroy enemy pulse-sensor:

"Oh, when I distroy this, the enemy cannot see me at great distances, COOL!"

Vs.

Fact of MP: Your pulse sensor goes down:

"WTF, is that a friendly or an enemy? Oh great...now he's blended into that pixelated terrain that is 500m away and impossible to pick out. God, now I gotta go and repair the sensor...

edit: screw below argument, just redundant.

A friend wanted me to post this:

<Noxville> -----------------------------------
<Noxville> I think they should desgin the sensor system similar to t2. You should always know where the flag is and where important objectives are (gens, enemy sensor) when the sensor is up. When the sensor is down, then you no longer can see where the flag is and how far you are from it or any of the objectives
<Noxville> -------------
<Noxville> <Noxville> another thing they can do with the sensor is allow designated team members to waypoint objectives or any area of the map (kind of like the waypoints in planetside)
<Noxville> <Noxville> say a capper may be near dead and he wants to know where the nearest escort is... he can visually see the waypoint that the closest escort made (because the sensor was up) and he'll know which way to head
<Noxville> ----------------------------

-end-

But that's irrelevant. The point is that making the sensor a major point of interest adds, well, a major point of interest to a map. One more thing to defend and destroy. The rocket turret on raindance was awesome, because it was something to attack and defend other than the generators and the flag. It was a key to the map, and I for one loved playing the defender role for the RT on RD. While it was up it was hard to cap. While it was down it was easy(er) to cap. A grunt position that was important to the outcome of the game. That's great IMO.

In small games, the rocket turret is always kept down and rape is not allowed. If you rape or repair the rocket turret, you'll probably end up getting kicked after complaints (although now there are scripts preventing rape/turret repair).

How is the powerful sensor going to play out in small games? In a 3 vs 3 game, people might have to HO just to take out the sensor. Then what? It's against the rules to rape, so the heavy won't have much other use.

Almost everyone here (including some devs) seems to agree that something needs to be changed about the sensor system. This is definitely something that can be tweaked during beta.

Until then, here's my opinion: I think the sensor is too important now. It shouldn't be as important as something like the gens because as some people have been saying, it would be pretty boring to sit around repairing it all game. I think the compromise should be something like having flag locations on the radar all the time, and no actual icons on the flags ever. Also there should always be IFF's on enemies in your LOS. So the only thing the sensor would be for this way would be the locations of people on the radar.

If it turns out that the sensor is not important enough this way, you could also get rid of flag locations on the radar when the sensor is down.


I agree with KP when he says that going around looking for small deployable sensors is boring, which is why I think they shouldn't exist. It reminds of how boring it is looking for the tiny turrets, cameras, and sensors in T2. It gets very boring and very annoying, but you have to do it for your team to win, which makes winning not very fun. The things you should need to do in order to win should be fun, like capping and HOing can be, but looking for little things that can be hidden anywhere is not fun. And usually you're not just spending a few minutes doing it because the enemy can keep deploying them once they're destroyed.

I think writers idea for the sensor net is the best one so far. :signed:

The point is that making the sensor a major point of interest adds, well, a major point of interest to a map. One more thing to defend and destroy.

That's fine, but given the power of radar with the sensor up, I'd think it would be required that you take down the enemy's sensor, and defend yours. And then maps start all playing like Desiccator, where its really not viable to grab until you get this other objective destroyed.

I think people will adjust to no IFFs just fine, if it happens that the sensor is down a lot. The radar bit is much scarier IMO.

How many times have you played T1, including pubs? Of those times, how often did either team deploy any sensors? How often did you play maps with more than one base sensor? I'll suggest to you that if you think about it, you might be accustomed to playing something like all-or-nothing already,
KP

I can live with that, although I do hope it is tweaked somewhat. My main beef is with the perm flag finder.

Thanks for the response.

noone wants another point of interest

we spend enough time and energy just trying to bring the flag home

and if someone doesnt have an IFF, they they're an enemy since friendlies always have green ones

No offense, but what new item haven't you been against?

None taken. I liked the grappling hook. :shrug:

I can live with that, although I do hope it is tweaked somewhat. My main beef is with the perm flag finder.

Thanks for the response.

it's not perm though is it? it's only on when the sensor is up. If you think it's a huge advantage then keep their sensor down.

Another comment: who says the deployable sensors have to be hard to find? Make them tall spindly wavey radar-like things.

A slight modification to what I said earlier in terms of destroying and repairing a sensor. Booty is pretty much dead on that if it's not changed somehow, someone's going to get stuck with the crappy job of sensor duty.

Let's take the durability suggestion one step further. Make the sensor a very durable asset that takes a fair amount to take down. Give it some type of regeneration health wise while its up. When it goes down, make it automatically come up at full health a set amount of time after it goes down. This makes defense of the sensor related to how well the defense can kill the offense, rather than the defense taking a passive role repairing.

Again, it's just a thought, but as boot said, I don't think anyone really wants to play repair bitch.

I agree with KP when he says that going around looking for small deployable sensors is boring, which is why I think they shouldn't exist. It reminds of how boring it is looking for the tiny turrets, cameras, and sensors in T2.
Who says it needs to be boring? Who says they need to be tiny? Make them visible enough and it won't be that hard to find them. Especially since they need to be placed within range of something that's worth detecting, e.g. a cap route.

It gets very boring and very annoying, but you have to do it for your team to win, which makes winning not very fun. The things you should need to do in order to win should be fun, like capping and HOing can be,
Not everyone finds capping and HOing the be-all and end-all of Tribes. I never got good enough at either to really enjoy them. LD was more my style. I'm not trying to be contrary, just pointing out that you need more than just cappers and HO to make a welll-rounded game. The cappers and HO need someone to fight, after all.
Giving defenders something to do while their team is handing it to the enemy (such as deploying sensors) is not bad.

but looking for little things that can be hidden anywhere is not fun.
Again, let go of the image of tiny little sensors. Heck, we could make it so they're rather large, have good range, but you only get 2 of them, total.

And usually you're not just spending a few minutes doing it because the enemy can keep deploying them once they're destroyed.
...which keeps one of the enemy players occupied, which in itself is a decent objective.

I used sensors a lot in T1 and T2, enjoyed destroying them too ('cause they were so easy to destroy, and I knew I was annoying/occupying some defender on the other side). The main thing for me, though, is that deploying stuff is fun...and it helps personalize the map (this is MY territory, these are my objects which I will protect, etc.). IMO the more stuff we have to deploy, the better.

If they're large they'll just be destroyed very quickly. Now here's the question you have to pose to yourself. Do you want to spend the entire map redeploying the sensor every 30 seconds or so? Does the other guy want to spend the map killing that sensor every 30 seconds? Personally I'd rather have a major objective than something that mindlessly goes down and up more than the stock market.

Who says it needs to be boring? Who says they need to be tiny? Make them visible enough and it won't be that hard to find them. Especially since they need to be placed within range of something that's worth detecting, e.g. a cap route.

If they're large they'll just be destroyed very quickly. Now here's the question you have to pose to yourself. Do you want to spend the entire map redeploying the sensor every 30 seconds or so? Does the other guy want to spend the map killing that sensor every 30 seconds? Personally I'd rather have a major objective than something that mindlessly goes down and up more than the stock market.

The sensors would probably be placed in locations that would be loosely defended. Kind of like a forward-field defense.

Or have one of your team members wait near the enemy base, then deploy the sensor just before an attack starts. The enemy sees the sensor go up, has to decide whether to take it out (deserting the base) or just prepare for a suspected attack.

I think it would allow for more strategic creativity to have deployable sensors (heck even just ONE deployable sensor) than to have a single static mother-of-all-sensors back at your base.

I like the idea of the sensor being extremely durable, regenerating, and having a set down time of like 3 minutes.

I would also like to see this sensor not cover the entire map but have limited range. Keep deployable sensors in the game but also give them a shield and make them extremely durable themselves, once the main generator is down the deployables stop working, the shields go down and they are easy to take out.

Bleh too many different ways this can be done, looks like a lot of different variations are going to be tested though.