Bought Tank Limit

[Inglish]

Hello,

 

Mentioned this in the server, thought I would post it on the forum.

 

Btw, just bought a membership, so it'll be cool to play with you all.

 

Seems like in a lot of rounds, things devolve and people are buying 3, 4, 5 or more tanks. Obviously, no team can survive that (unless they're really, really good). Seems the massive tank buying at end of rounds only makes unbalanced teams worse, and makes the human side hopeless/pointless, to the point maybe people ragequit and that affects the server pop in a negative way.

 

I'd suggest a limit of either 2 or 3 tanks... not counting whatever tank actually pops up naturally in the round.

 

My other question... as a member, is there a way for me to choose the side I want to choose, or no? I've bought a couple memberships to TF2 servers, and they allow you to swap teams (!swapteam) anytime, and regardless of how many people are on each side. Like if it was 10 on 10, and a member wants to swapteams, they'd go to the other side and a non-member would be forced to take their place on the old team. I think servers with this in place do a time limit so people can't abuse the swapteam and always play infected or whatever-- say once every 45 minutes or something. Just an idea, if it's not in place.

 

Thanks guys.

[samurai nightling]

You can type !infected or !survivors to swap sides, however it won't force a non-member to switch with you. If teams are full, you won't be able to switch sides.

 

As for tank buying, i agree that a limit of 2-3 at any given time should be set. I don't know if you mean a total of 2-3 for the entire round, but that i would not like. Limiting it to 2-3 at any given time, but when one dies someone can buy another one is more what i was thinking.

 

There are plenty of times i have seen a team survive 3 tanks at once. It's a matter of A) making sure they get lit on fire and B ) Teamwork in getting rid of them one at a time while dodging the swings. It can be done, but your right in once there are 4-5 tanks that gets near impossible.

 

Maybe some other members have thoughts on this as well?

Edited May 20, 2011 by samurai nightling

[Cake]

Hrmm, even if there is a tank limit, 3 tanks are pretty hard and even after one tank dies, another will come so there could be continuous tanks anyway even with the 3 tanks at a time limit. It's hard though, when no one is shooting tank. When the bots go against tank, they died in less than a minute! That's teamwork

 

I actually like it when someone else is tank so I can attack with spitters to buy more tanks. Hehehe... With that said, the more tanks there are, the less other special infected there attacking. But i do see your point Cat, since there is a possibility for not having good teammates, it's hard.

Edited May 21, 2011 by Cake

[crasx]

Maybe 3 tanks per x minutes?

I could definitely code this no problem...

[samurai nightling]

Well then hop on it crasx!

[crunchyorphan]

I can see Inglish's points, but I think that a large appeal of this server is the mod it runs. I personally find great joy in working with my teammates to gain enough points to buy multiple tanks and to release them at a strategic time. That said, I think it is a little ridiculous when 5 or 6 tanks are released at once. I think Samurai's idea of limiting the number of tanks at any given time is the best idea here. People are constantly screaming about unbalanced teams, when 90% of the time I see it as really an imbalance of communication and teamwork. Really. Skill is a minimal requirement if everyone works together.

 

As for 3 tanks at once...maybe 2? It's a very hard call but I would agree on a limit of some sort. I would not, however, propose X tanks per minute, but rather X tanks at a time. Would be a shame to spend a whole round working up my points only to not be able to use them on a tank.

 

I think another solution would be to increase the number of points it takes to buy a tank and at the same time increasing their health?

[Inglish]

Thanks for the thoughts, guys. There are a lot of things to try. I certainly don't want to make it less fun for the regulars, I just feel there are always improvements that can be made, especially in a mod environment.

 

I think there should never be a point when it's totally pointless/hopeless for the humans. Say the human team is hit hard right out of the safe room, spitter points are racked up and what not... now the infected team is well on their way to 4 tanks eventually. So it's already like, shoot, let's just lie down and die. In that case, the tank mechanic exacerbates the skill disparity between the two teams.

 

I'll continue to overthink and say that I'd bet the infected win the majority of the time on the server, and by a significant margin, simply because of the tank mechanic. And frankly, I think it's best when each side has an equal chance of winning, all other things being equal (which they probably never are). Now, maybe everybody likes the status quo, because tanks are fun to play. And the sentiment I've heard of, "If you don't like it, gtfo," well, that's partially warranted I suppose lol.

 

So, I've said my peace and won't whine about it any more.

[JackieChan]

100% agree with you Inglish. Look for the plugin updates in the stickied thread.

Edited May 23, 2011 by JackieChan

[samurai nightling]

Hey we are always welcome to suggestions and I'm glad and I think so are others here that you had input rather that just being an onlooker from the sidelines. We're definitely gonna look into the best ways to balance teams constantly, and everyone here has good input from different viewpoints/ideas. Please keep suggesting possible changes or balances that can be made. As for all of this, I'll talk to Jackie and the others and see what might be the best to do.

[Cake]

In any case, it usually only takes one to destroy a whole team

[Inglish]

Cool, we'll see how the Tank Alive limit goes. Thanks mucho.