2 ideas..

[jmc0b]

Morale -

some sort of morale feature...

when you stray further away from you squad and are alone , your morale goes down .. not knowing where your squad is or where you are.. affecting your speed , aim and over all performance..

closer to the squad or squad leader the better your morale and better your performance..

pros -
when you are near your squad your more focused.. your accuracy is increased , say 10%...
puts a lot more focus on team work.. a nice 10% increase bonus if you "sqaud stick together"

cons -
when you stray and want to go on your own , i dont need anyone else to do this.. i own.. your jog speed is reduced a little.. -10% on your overall perfomance...


Pressure Under Fire -
this can relate back to morale.. when your running around trying to figure out your next move to take the objective.. out of no where is an mg42 raining bullets over your head and your squads position... cuasing fear and frustration...

if you are with your squad.. you are cool and collected knowing the end result could easily outcome in your guys planning a move that flush's the mg out.. one guy runs across to the other crater , mg focus's on him , your Piat stands up and rockets him the F outta there..

no penalties.

if you are running around solo - as soon as you hear that mg fire and see the tracers bullets whizzing over your head.. since you are not with your squad, your nerves are going crazy , heart racing and overall fear takes over.. knowing there are at least 2 or 3 germans on the other side. one with the MG , other feeding bullets and changing barrel and you have to assume an mg wouldnt set up solo....

with all those factor's you loose 10% of your overall performance..

anyways just a quick rant about those 2 ideas..

sorry if my choice of words arent correct.. i arent that smart...

if those feature's were there maybe make them map specific .. there are bound to be objectives that need a man to go solo and flank left and take the objective..

[Defpotec]

I really don't like the idea of artificial morale in MP games. Morale for NPC's in SP games are fine, but not MP. Why you ask? Because I'm a real human being. I already know that if I've gotten seperated from my squad that I'm screwed, this mentality will already affect my performance, I don't need an artificial response as well. Same goes for suppressing fire. If a load of bullets are coming my way and whizing over my head (this mod needs goof bullet whiz sounds) then I'm already hitting the dirt and am gonna have trouble trying to take aim with all these bullets landing around me while I'm trying not to get hit.

[ceacar99]

personally i hate moral stuff. i played america's army alot in the past and it pissed me off. an enemy mg would just pound in your general direction and thus you couldnt shoot! you'd have a fuckin clear shot, he doesnt see you at all and you cant hit the guy cus your "scared". things happen to soldiers in combat cus they get scared, they piss thier pants or even sing country music but they practice so much that shooting/throwing and all that is gut instinct. only fresh recruits have severe problems of freezing up or being unable to operate under fire.

suppressing fire realy worked because the soldier knew better than to get up into the mass of fire. if the mg didnt do a good enough job suppressing the enemy he just made himself a target and one of the guys he is trying to suppress will start to pick at him back.

play dod with a mg42. its my favorite weapon in the game. you can suppress whole damn squads with the thing no problem. however just like real life, you try to keep it up too much and stay in one spot someone who is a decent shot is just gonna pop out and kill you.

[Jed]

We've looked at ideas similar to these already and are discussing ways to implement it as an incentive to stick together.

At the moment we're tweaking gameplay as if you were on your own and then looking to give you a little "boost" if you stick together in small groups.

[Defpotec]

Have you looked at what the insurgency mod is doing with squads? Organizing people on a platoon level into fire teams, I really like that idea.

[Pierog]

we'll be navigating the thin line of forcing teamwork and promoting it cautiously.

[ceacar99]

lets face it, some people are commandos. hell im a commando, i love my machinegun(in dod and other games with them) and ill go "commando" with it. its pretty funny to see in dod source a lone machinegunner beat back the enemy team after all his allies die. NOT hold them but beat them back.

make it so people supporting each other get either minor bonuses or just plain more opertunities to score points when with allies(i dunno how that'd be done though...) but DONT penalise commandos. they win the game for teams too. they are the guys who either snipe the enemy or sneak around to kick the bad guys in the ass. they are an inportant part of gameplay. penalize them and you penalize the whole game...

also lets face that in pubs there will NEVER be extreemly good teamplay. there will be teamplay but it wont be high quality. the real teamplay takes place in clan matches. in pubs people are just looking for a game and a good time. they'll help a machinegunner who needs ammo but not likely form perminant squads.

[Defpotec]

It depends where you go really. My DoD clan (www.powdod.com shameless plug!) has a 32 person server and most of the time it's really good team play. Just most, not all. Depends whose one, what time of day, etc. But get a good server going with frequent regulars and teamplay catches on.

[Das-W00t]

Morale -
Lots of factors that are uncontrolable by the player that have proven to be horrible horrible ideas in past mods/games

Sounds great!

But seriously, if any of the above is implemented, I know I will not play HaJ. Performance factors that the player cannot compensate for/control NEVER go over well, especially in the extreme here. I mean, just look at how bad the DoD:S inaccuracies went over with the player base, and those are minor. If you want to promote teamwork and team cohesion, that needs to be accomplished by the map and their respective objectives.

Plus, I don't know, it just seems painfully unrealistic and gimmicky. You're forcing one performance/psychological profile on every soldier. Uh no. The "penalties" come from the player deciding to play on his own, not some arbitrary code. Ya, sure, if he runs into another solo player, they both have equal odds and the better will survive. Now if he runs into two or three players, his odds drop, BUT he can still come out on top if he's the better player, and why not? The better players should win, period. If a player is capable of taking on groups of three at a time, then he deserves that ability. No one wants to play a game that limits them in how good they can be. The incentive to stick together will come when players realize they stand a better chance if they move in groups.

There are plenty of other negative factors in imposed penalties. New players will never be able to keep up with the more experienced groups, leaving them to be penalized for simply being new. This kicks the learning curve higher than it needs to be, and will be amazingly frustrating. More experienced players will become frustrated with their less experienced teammates slowing them down and not going where they want, causing frustration and eventually having everyone going off their own respective ways.

There are no redeeming qualities for this type of system, because it doesn't work. And even if it did keep people together, at what cost? Frustrated players all around and a clunky pub play experience. Blech.

[Pierog]

oh believe me people, it won't be

"you can't hit anything unless you stick with your team, and you reload half the speed since you are so scared"

lets just say if we do it, itll be benefiting the team player, but if you go on alone, you won't be hindered.

Think

"It'll be easier for a team player to be with the team"

not

"I need to be on a team to make the game easier"

[Pierog]

and since you really can't score any points unless you are with your squad, commandoing has really diminished in testing, and me being a heavy ramboing assaulter, i have noticed this.

Some people play against the scoreboard, and thats not possible anymore

[Ginger Lord]

I've noticed that in the testing too, at first it was all single people running around, now when you spawn you tend to stick to groups of 3+ and wander the woods.

[Tostig]

In my opinion teamplay should be encouraged by scores/objectives/a squad system, but grouping together should have advantages beyond a simple stat boost.

[jackx]

I think the question here is "what is teamplay"?
Is the lone SMG/LMG guy doing a flank rush while his team is pitted in a head-on firefight against the enemy team not engaged in "teamplay"?
Are the 3 new players that stick together because they don't really know where to go yet exercising a kind of "teamplay" that should warrant a bonus?

Teamplay for me is deliberate cooperative action by a group of players to achieve a certain goal and is in not related to the proximity of these players on the map.
The one guy camping/providing distraction on a sideroute is as much part of the "teamplay" as the main assault party...he might even be the most important player on the team, depending on the situation...
Player count is another important factor... in a 6vs6, you might have to send a "lone wolf" or "commando" to a certain position because you can't spare a 2nd player, whereas in a 10v10+ you'll probably never find yourself truly alone, whichever route you decide to take - but why would this make the players sticking closer together for relative lack of space eligible for some sort of "teamplay" reward?



Suggestion: If you implement a bonus for sticking together, don't label it as a "teamplay" bonus, but perhaps as a "squad" bonus or smth...

[DarkAvenger]

I agree with jackx, if there is a proximity bonus, its just that... a proximity bonus, but if you impliment a type of squad set up (such as Operation Flashpoint multi player) with squads - more like fire teams - of upto maybe 4 players, where they get the bonus of have a sqaud and have just that much more situational awareness... i.e. squad bonus..

Another question, what would the "teamplay"/group/proximity bonus actually do for the player? More stamina... slightly better accuracy... etc. ?

[jmc0b]

well it was just a thought :)

something i thought of real quick , i dunno after playing dod for so many years im just sick of the run and gunners who run right by a 2 person flag cap when there is already a team member sitting there..

was just thinking about differnt ideas to help promote teamplay is all..

but after reading some of the response's i guess over all it is a bad idea or wouldnt be well implemented.. i tend to blurt things out without giving them much thought ....



jmc0b wrote:
Morale -
Lots of factors that are uncontrolable by the player that have proven to be horrible horrible ideas in past mods/games


Sounds great!

cute :)

[Rome]

[delete - double post]

[Rome]

The only thing I could say about squads is maybe joining one with people and having those players overheads tagged some color in game so you know who they are.

I had two ideas, you could:

A) Pick your weapon and join some group of people who've formed their squad slot. Maybe an option to "make new squad" and have a maximum number like 4. Since if there's 16 players on your side, 4 for each squad would be the max.

B) I used to play close combat, and I know some of you people have too. Form squads and weapons around their usage.

Examples:
PIAT team = Rocket, SMG/Rifle
Sniper team = Sniper
Recon team = 3 SMGs
MG team = MG, SMG/Rifle, SMG/Rifle (or only one person w/ the MG as a spotter/cover man)
Mortar team = Mortar, SMG/Rifle, SMG/Rifle (or only one person w/ the mortar)

Or for the bigger...
Ad Hoc team = 4 rifles, or 1 SMG + 3 rifles
Bren team = 1 Bren, 1 SMG, 2 rifles
Rifle Squad = 6 people (various, but mostly rifles)

I haven't played Close Combat 2 in a while, so I wouldn't really remember, but I liked the small organization.

I know that option B would be a real pain to implement, and I wouldn't even call it a feasable idea, let alone if it would work correctly. Although I do like the idea that it encourages people to stick with someone, and cover them. Oh and the mortar team idea, I assume there is no mortar weapon, so scratch that Idea.

Anyways, it could also be useful for directing people if you simply name them by squad. We could not only have tags for your own squad, but for the people who want a real overview of the situation, use different colored tags for every squad on the team so that it's easier to spot which squad is placed where for those who like to really direct strategy. – red, blue, bright green, orange, yellow, bright purple ---> Of course, all this only the people on your team could see.

For actually joining the squad, in the loading screen where you choose your class, there should be a follow up screen for choosing which squad to go to. PIAT, MG/Bren, and Sniper (although Sniper is alone) would come up as seperate ones, and someone (or several) could join their team to form a squad around that weapon and fill in slots (w/ of course a max amount of slots). The others who are rifles and SMGs could be put in thrown in their own slot I guess, maybe someone can start a squad.

Or the team starts a squad list first, and players are given choices to fill in those squad slots and are assigned a weapon or given a choice if they can - first come first serve sort of deal, the same as classes. Assuming this game wants more rifles than SMGs. Maybe these squad slots would be pre-determined based on the map (historically, mission, or level design based), who knows.

Again, this is a very far-fetched idea. I do not expect anyone to implement this in the game, because it sounds very very hard/tricky to do and I personally have no experience with that kind of work. It's only my take on if there were squads.


Edit: Another Weird Idea I had.

since no one is getting points for kills, an importance could be placed on kills for the team and for both sides to try and stay alive... as more men on a team start to die, their ammunition starts to decrease at their respawn. This can go down to the bare minimum of equipment. (of course I would expect this to be a SLOW process)

However, capturing objectives, or getting more victory points, starts to increase it back up again.

Or you can do this with time to respawn, or both.

I also thought, for paramaps, you could have parachute dropped supply tankers (I don't know the names for them) that if captured by the paratroops would provide more (or special class) equipment/ammunition for the team. Maybe a side bonus objective... or as a way to an objective (obtaining a PIAT/explosives)... or as an advancing spawn point (regroup point)... or forcing the paratroops to haul it back to their spawn objective (2 people needed?) in order for the team to recieve the extras.