Team Fortress Two: Comments and ideas on the game and what'd you'd like to see in future updates.

[Chickenfeed]

Yes I have, where do you think I learned about the flamethrower that shoots fireballs and can project a stream of flame? Because I fought one. Yeah they work together, as I run around as the medic trying to get the half dead allies to hold still so I can heal them and run into the room guarded by three fully upgraded sentry turrets and die anyway, and then yell at me because it's apperently my fault for not healing them as they rush through there (No I didn't have the ubercharge ready at the time). Also, the only thing that makes TF2 unique is the artstyle and humor.

Yesterday I started playing Team Fortress 2 again after about a year, so obviously I didn't have any of the new weapons or hats, I didn't even know about most of them all, especially most of the seemingly secret ones.

Yet still, I was not ONCE beaten simply because the other play had an unlockable weapon that I haven't got. Of all the weapons I unlocked previously, and those I unlocked through the random drops, I still choose to switch them out for the basic, vanilla ones, because they work. If you're getting beaten by someone, stop blaming it on their unlocked weapons and blame it on your own skill. Seriously, my friend started playing it yesterday, and he has never played it before, so had none of the unlockable weapons, yet he still scored highly and in most cases earnt a win for the team.


And while we're talking about the players who buy stuff having a better advantage, I'd like to point out Battlefield: Bad Company 2. In a DLC for BC2, it allowed a player to unlock every single weapon in a specific class, without needing to level up at all. THAT was unbalanced, as the higher tier weapons on that game are actually more powerful than the lower, this is nothing.

 

[Analogy]

I've always been opposed to any game mechanic in a competitive multiplayer game that gives any player access to abilities that another player doesn't have access to. In order for a game to serve as a legitimate competitive platform, all players must have the same set of options available to them.

I loved TF2 when it first came out. It was incredibly well-balanced and a lot of fun, and it became my primary multiplayer game... Until they introduced the achievement-based unlocks.

Now, all of a sudden, other players had competitive options that I didn't have access to, and couldn't have access to unless I played the game in an arbitrary way in order to grab achievements. I hate that. I don't give a shit about achievements, I play competitive games for the thrill of achieving victory and denying it to my opponents who wish to do the same against me. To force me to purposely play a game in a sub-optimal way in order to farm the achievements necessary to get the full spectrum of competitive options available to me is, from my point of view, the worst game design decision that has ever been made in the history of competitive gaming.

I stopped playing TF2 for a couple years because of this. I played Dystopia instead, until the community for that game died to the point where it just wasn't interesting anymore. I'm back to playing TF2 since I've found a local group of friends who play from the same LAN every week, but I'm still bitter about what I see as a very bad design decision for a competitive game.

I would be fine if they gave you all the weapons up front and only had to unlock the cosmetic aspects like hats and whatnot. Like I said, I only care about the actual competitive gameplay, let all the random casual players care deeply about shit that doesn't matter. Hey look, a special hat for getting all the achievements in the game. I'd be totally down with that if it didn't change the competitive options you had against me. The folks who want to work for irrelevant shit can go after that. Just give me a game that I can install and immediately be on a level playing field with everybody else.

 

[archvile93]

Yes I have, where do you think I learned about the flamethrower that shoots fireballs and can project a stream of flame? Because I fought one. Yeah they work together, as I run around as the medic trying to get the half dead allies to hold still so I can heal them and run into the room guarded by three fully upgraded sentry turrets and die anyway, and then yell at me because it's apperently my fault for not healing them as they rush through there (No I didn't have the ubercharge ready at the time). Also, the only thing that makes TF2 unique is the artstyle and humor.

Yesterday I started playing Team Fortress 2 again after about a year, so obviously I didn't have any of the new weapons or hats, I didn't even know about most of them all, especially most of the seemingly secret ones.

Yet still, I was not ONCE beaten simply because the other play had an unlockable weapon that I haven't got. Of all the weapons I unlocked previously, and those I unlocked through the random drops, I still choose to switch them out for the basic, vanilla ones, because they work. If you're getting beaten by someone, stop blaming it on their unlocked weapons and blame it on your own skill. Seriously, my friend started playing it yesterday, and he has never played it before, so had none of the unlockable weapons, yet he still scored highly and in most cases earnt a win for the team.


And while we're talking about the players who buy stuff having a better advantage, I'd like to point out Battlefield: Bad Company 2. In a DLC for BC2, it allowed a player to unlock every single weapon in a specific class, without needing to level up at all. THAT was unbalanced, as the higher tier weapons on that game are actually more powerful than the lower, this is nothing.

I didn't play BC2's multiplayer (it never worked and I gave up on it) so I can't comment on that. Still I can see the stats of other wepaons (mannconomy) and they all seem much better than mine. flaregun or shotgun (yeah I learned how they shoot fireballs for real now, sorry my mistake) gee i wonder what I'd rather have. Or maybe the backburner could be worse than the starter since you can use the fart or whatever it's called effectivly if your reflexes are better than god's. By the way, I won't blame it on skill since in other online shooters I tend to always score within the top three (some good stories in Resistance when I still had a PS3 and some very good ones in CoD4 and L4D, I know that last one doesn't have a K/D ratio but I tend to kill the most enemies and make the most saves, R6V2 also has some good times). I also won't blame it entirely on better weapons since there's also the issue of encountering enemies my class wasn't designed for, like sniper vs Pyro, or soldier vs scout, or heavy vs anything.

 

[Chickenfeed]

I didn't play BC2's multiplayer (it never worked and I gave up on it) so I can't comment on that. Still I can see the stats of other wepaons (mannconomy) and they all seem much better than mine. flaregun or shotgun (yeah I learned how they shoot fireballs for real now, sorry my mistake) gee i wonder what I'd rather have. Or maybe the backburner could be worse than the starter since you can use the fart or whatever it's called effectivly if your reflexes are better than god's. By the way, I won't blame it on skill since in other online shooters I tend to always score within the top three (some good stories in Resistance when I still had a PS3 and some very good ones in CoD4 and L4D, I know that last one doesn't have a K/D ratio but I tend to kill the most enemies and make the most saves, R6V2 also has some good times). I also won't blame it entirely on better weapons since there's also the issue of encountering enemies my class wasn't designed for, like sniper vs Pyro, or soldier vs scout, or heavy vs anything.

I can see where you're coming from, and I can understand your view. But the way I see it, is that all the weapons are the same, but it's down to personal opinion if they are specifically better or not.

For example the Pyro's Backburner. It has a 100% chance to crit someone from behind, which, at first glance, makes it considerably over powered. When I chose to use it, however, I switched back very soon after. This isn't down to the normal flame-thrower being any better, but it suits my play style much more. I don't often find myself behind the enemies, so that advantage is redundant straight away. And I find the I use the compression blast (The fart) very often, but not particularly how it's expected to be used. Rather than reflecting rockets to kill my enemies, I use it to blow away sticky bombs, or to blow the demo-man's grenades away from my team mates.(Blowing them turns them to your team, so that they won't harm team-mates.)

I haven't got many of the other classes unlocks so I cannot comment on them, however I do have a few of the early unlocks (Before everything went abit unlock crazy), and I can say that the only one I do willingly use is the Scouts shotgun (I don't know what it's called, but it's the one that pushes them away) which I only use to push a Pyro away from me, or to launch me that bit further in a double jump. The other unlocks just do not appeal to me, especially the medic and spy ones. I don't play as sniper so I can't comment on that.

So, I can fully understand what you mean. When you see the stats, it is easy to believe that they are superior to your own weapons, but the reality is that it all comes down to your own personal play style. When you find a load-out your comfortable with, you will be able to defeat anyone using the unlocked weapons with ease, you just need to know how to play with it.

P.S.: I'd just like to point out that I have only just started playing again since yesterday, and so far haven't seen any stat boosting hats, so I cannot comment on them. I'm simply talking about weapon unlocks.

EDIT: Oh, and to comment on what you said about the Flaregun or Shotgun. I choose shotgun, because when I come up against another pyro, it's much easier to kill them because they are invulnerable to fire. I find that when I limit myself to only use flame based weapons (Flame-thrower, Flaregun and Axtinguisher) I do not do nearly as well as usual.

 

[Andy of Comix Inc]

I've always been opposed to any game mechanic in a competitive multiplayer game that gives any player access to abilities that another player doesn't have access to. In order for a game to serve as a legitimate competitive platform, all players must have the same set of options available to them.

I loved TF2 when it first came out. It was incredibly well-balanced and a lot of fun, and it became my primary multiplayer game... Until they introduced the achievement-based unlocks.

Have you tried playing on a legit competitive pub/scrim server with all the unlocks disabled? It's rather awesome.

Highlander is also great.

 

[GWarface]

Just make the offline training not VAC secured...
I was VAC banned some years ago because of a stupid friend of mine cheated in CS:S, and i havent been able to play the game since at all..

 

[Analogy]

Also, the more people you put on a single project (assuming you can maintain its organization, wgich I'm pretty sure Valve can) the faster it goes. That's pretty basic logic.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Hahahahahaha.

Hahaha.

Haha.

Ha.

Go read "The Mythical Man-Month" and get back to me. Anybody who has ever managed any kind of project will tell you that you can't just throw people at a problem and expect it to get solved faster. The fact that you even think this tells me you've never organized any kind of significant project.

take out mannco store

I honestly don't have a problem with the mannco store in principle, but as I mentioned, it pisses me off that a competitive game requires you to do extra work just to be on a level playing field. Give everybody the weapons right off the bat, use mannco store for hats/badges/whatever. Heck, I don't mind if mannco/drop system gives you weapons that are equivalent to existing weapons, but just serve as a badge of pristege. Hell, I don't care, as long as every single player has absolutely equal options from a competitive perspective.

I'm also not too much of a fan of these weapons that turn classes into things that they're not. I'm not philosophically opposed to things that enable new tactics (as long as they're available to everybody), but being able to identify what tactics an enemy has available to them is the key. TF2's original design focused so much on being able to instantly identify someone's class, and therefore possible tactics (since the game space was so much narrower back then) that it's just silly to me that we now have classes that can effectively be more than one class, so you now have to spend special effort to identify which of the possible sub-classes your opponent is playing... Heck, chargin' targe demo is a subclass that's impossible to identify until he's already charging you, and then it's too late. Huntsman sniper's a little easier to identify, but come on, we already had 5 run-and-gun classes, why did we need another one?

I'll believe you when everything isn't horribly overpriced. $17 for a hat I, with no coding experience whatsoever, could probably figure how to code into the game in a day, and then once I learned how pump out another one every minute?

Hahahahahahahaha. That fact that you think the relevant skill here is coding tells me you have no fucking clue what you're talking about. If you really think that you could do it that successfully... Well, why don't you? Someone who could produce AAA-quality art at the rate you're talking about could make huge bucks in the industry. I'll give you a hint: The relevant skills here are modeling and texturing, which are actual art forms which take just as much skill and dedication to learn to do proficiently as any other form of art.

 

[Analogy]

Have you tried playing on a legit competitive pub/scrim server with all the unlocks disabled? It's rather awesome.

Highlander is also great.

Do you have any server IPs I could check out? That sounds pretty cool.

Also, the new Beta client looks pretty appealing since everybody has access to all the weapons... The downside being having to play with more experimental gameplay features.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Yes I have, where do you think I learned about the flamethrower that shoots fireballs and can project a stream of flame? Because I fought one. Yeah they work together, as I run around as the medic trying to get the half dead allies to hold still so I can heal them and run into the room guarded by three fully upgraded sentry turrets and die anyway, and then yell at me because it's apperently my fault for not healing them as they rush through there (No I didn't have the ubercharge ready at the time). Also, the only thing that makes TF2 unique is the artstyle and humor.

Hahahhahahhahhahha. Honestly, you nearly had me going for a moment. Now I know that you're just pretending to have played it.

Please leave others threads alone in future. Derailing is frowned upon.

 

[Andy of Comix Inc]

Do you have any server IPs I could check out? That sounds pretty cool.

...unless you're in Australia the ones I have wouldn't do you much good.

 

[Squilookle]

I like the idea of TF2, but the only way they'd ever seal the deal for me is by having bots that could go toe to toe with UT bots, and available on all modes and maps.

And also.... more modes and maps.

 

[archvile93]

Also, the more people you put on a single project (assuming you can maintain its organization, wgich I'm pretty sure Valve can) the faster it goes. That's pretty basic logic.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Hahahahahaha.

Hahaha.

Haha.

Ha.

Go read "The Mythical Man-Month" and get back to me. Anybody who has ever managed any kind of project will tell you that you can't just throw people at a problem and expect it to get solved faster. The fact that you even think this tells me you've never organized any kind of significant project.

take out mannco store

I honestly don't have a problem with the mannco store in principle, but as I mentioned, it pisses me off that a competitive game requires you to do extra work just to be on a level playing field. Give everybody the weapons right off the bat, use mannco store for hats/badges/whatever. Heck, I don't mind if mannco/drop system gives you weapons that are equivalent to existing weapons, but just serve as a badge of pristege. Hell, I don't care, as long as every single player has absolutely equal options from a competitive perspective.

I'm also not too much of a fan of these weapons that turn classes into things that they're not. I'm not philosophically opposed to things that enable new tactics (as long as they're available to everybody), but being able to identify what tactics an enemy has available to them is the key. TF2's original design focused so much on being able to instantly identify someone's class, and therefore possible tactics (since the game space was so much narrower back then) that it's just silly to me that we now have classes that can effectively be more than one class, so you now have to spend special effort to identify which of the possible sub-classes your opponent is playing... Heck, chargin' targe demo is a subclass that's impossible to identify until he's already charging you, and then it's too late. Huntsman sniper's a little easier to identify, but come on, we already had 5 run-and-gun classes, why did we need another one?

I'll believe you when everything isn't horribly overpriced. $17 for a hat I, with no coding experience whatsoever, could probably figure how to code into the game in a day, and then once I learned how pump out another one every minute?

Hahahahahahahaha. That fact that you think the relevant skill here is coding tells me you have no fucking clue what you're talking about. If you really think that you could do it that successfully... Well, why don't you? Someone who could produce AAA-quality art at the rate you're talking about could make huge bucks in the industry. I'll give you a hint: The relevant skills here are modeling and texturing, which are actual art forms which take just as much skill and dedication to learn to do proficiently as any other form of art.

1. I know that, like I said, you need to keep them well organized or it won't go faster. The reason it stops going faster is because it gets to the point that they're not all up to date about everything on the project. if you can keep everyone up to date on what the others are doing it goes faster.

2. Not going to argue that one, I agree with it actually.

3. Don't even try to tell me it take more time to create a hat as opposed to a well designed and thought out map, or a new well balanced class.

 

[archvile93]

Yes I have, where do you think I learned about the flamethrower that shoots fireballs and can project a stream of flame? Because I fought one. Yeah they work together, as I run around as the medic trying to get the half dead allies to hold still so I can heal them and run into the room guarded by three fully upgraded sentry turrets and die anyway, and then yell at me because it's apperently my fault for not healing them as they rush through there (No I didn't have the ubercharge ready at the time). Also, the only thing that makes TF2 unique is the artstyle and humor.

Hahahhahahhahhahha. Honestly, you nearly had me going for a moment. Now I know that you're just pretending to have played it.

Please leave others threads alone in future. Derailing is frowned upon.

Yeah my mistake, it's actually the flare gun I just looked that up. Although it still is giving a short range class a long range weapon, kind of like giving a shotgunner a high accuracy pistol. Seriously, you already have a short range weapon why would you ever take a shotgun?

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Yeah my mistake, it's actually the flare gun I just looked that up. Although it still is giving a short range class a long range weapon, kind of like giving a shotgunner a high accuracy pistol. Seriously, you already have a short range weapon why would you ever take a shotgun?

The flaregun was introduced on June 19th 2008 though. Problem being that with the flare gun, it requires accuracy, doesn't do as much damage close range, is a lot slower, and is halved in effectiveness if you're carrying the Degreaser - which is needed for the Attendant costume.

Also, without the Backburner/Axtinguisher, setting a Heavy/Soldier alight is sure to result in your death. Against the Scout, the shotgun is far more useful at medium range and can take down the Spy with ease. Shottie/Flaregun is often quite a tough choice.

 

[archvile93]

Yeah my mistake, it's actually the flare gun I just looked that up. Although it still is giving a short range class a long range weapon, kind of like giving a shotgunner a high accuracy pistol. Seriously, you already have a short range weapon why would you ever take a shotgun?

The flaregun was introduced on June 19th 2008 though. Problem being that with the flare gun, it requires accuracy, doesn't do as much damage close range, is a lot slower, and is halved in effectiveness if you're carrying the Degreaser - which is needed for the Attendant costume.

Also, without the Backburner/Axtinguisher, setting a Heavy/Soldier alight is sure to result in your death. Against the Scout, the shotgun is far more useful at medium range and can take down the Spy with ease. Shottie/Flaregun is often quite a tough choice.

I hope you don't think that by saying this I think you're a moron, but that would not be even close to a tough choice for me. Yes the flaregun isn't as useful at short range but if your engaging an enemy at close range why would you use it when you have a flamethrower? Why would you use the shotgun either? I also never found any point that the shotgun was useful, maybe they nerfed the flamethrowers last time I checked, about a year ago, though I did start again long enough to check out the new store and didn't play a match, but the flamethrower has only slightly less range and is far more powerful. I killed plenty with the flamethrower but rarely killed with the shotgun seeing as how many shells it took to the face to kill even a scout.