New shock combo more difficult to pull?

[briach]

what kind of noob are you?
you think a straight shock combo in the face gets me? its the combons from other noobs that shoot at will when you got another bout to worry about.

one on one the chances are very slim it will hit me but when i am against two and the combo comes from a noob that is not even part of the battle then i get pissed off. i also get pissed off when playing with team damage and they do it like there is no tomorrow. they made it easy to achive and they have to stop it. end of story.

If you can't handle demo servers you should go play some retail 1v1 servers, and see where you rank in skill.

You play in servers where easy frags are norm, and you benefit from the easy frags just as much as others. btw don't call others noob when you only play on demo CTF servers and can't avoid noob's shock combos because your DM style and movement sucks

 

[f.sardis]

on occasion i just go in and play on any server. who said i play on demo servers? i pay them a visit every now and then but thats not where i spend my time usually.
besides, i dont play ut2k4 much and i play it even less online. i do my own lans for ut99 and 2004 usually because thats the only way to have fun.
i cant be bothered dealing with lamers of all sorts on public servers.

 

[Wail of Suicide]

It's very amusing to see this Briach person waving around the epeen and spouting off on things he clearly doesn't know anything about. Faster shock projectile in UT99? Sorry, that is clearly incorrect. Go try doing shock combos in a 512 cube.

Results:

UT99: Shock Combo minimum distance = ~724 UU
UT2004: Shock Combo minimum distance = ~886.6 UU

Looking at the code the only other potentially relevant change I see is that the UT2k4 SR Primary is .7 which is much faster than the UT99 SR Primary at 1.1xx, although the secondary fire on both is .6. To my knowledge the primary fire rate does not impact the timing of the combo, but if it does we can assume then that the UT2004 core is then faster than the UT99 core.

Just for reference --

UT99 Core radius = 80
UT2004 Core radius = 150

To my knowledge, however, the core speed is unaltered between UT99 and UT2004. The difference in the minimum combo radius is due to the UT2004 impacting the far wall obstruction before its UT99 counterpart (thereby effectively increasing the amount of space needed to successfully activate the combo).

UT99 Combo radius = 275
UT2004 Combo radius = 275

In conclusion, stop trolling.

As for UT2007, I have no problem with either decision Epic may make -- UT2004 brings easier combos, which many people enjoy, but UT99 style shock cores have nearly half the size of UT2004 ones, making them easier to position for truly killer combos (typically I find that in UT2004 really excellent combos are too hard to pull off because the larger radius makes people bump into the core more readily).

 

[Renegade Retard]

I may be wrong, but I think, Wail, your numbers are skewed.

UT99: Shock Combo minimum distance = ~724 UU
UT2004: Shock Combo minimum distance = ~886.6 UU

You're using the minimum distance to pull a shock combo as the basis for your argument that the core (secondary fire) travels faster/slower. However, there are several variables that effect the minimum distance for a combo:

- Speed at which the core (secondary fire) travels - I'm pretty sure that it was faster in UT based on my failing memory of playing and multiple discussions, but I could be wrong

- Rate of fire of primary - I don't know if the primary fire in UT or UT2k4 is faster

- Delay between secondary fire and primary fire - I know that the time from switching from secondary fire to primary fire is much slower in UT2k4 than it was in UT

All these items figure in to the minimum distance for a combo, so you can't just base your argument of the speed of shock cores on this one fact.

Also, the scale of UT and UT2k4 are different. Aren't the UU's different as well?

Like I said, I may be wrong as well.

 

[Wail of Suicide]

I may be wrong, but I think, Wail, your numbers are skewed.
You're using the minimum distance to pull a shock combo as the basis for your argument that the core (secondary fire) travels faster/slower. However, there are several variables that effect the minimum distance for a combo:

- Speed at which the core (secondary fire) travels - I'm pretty sure that it was faster in UT based on my failing memory of playing and multiple discussions, but I could be wrong

- Rate of fire of primary - I don't know if the primary fire in UT or UT2k4 is faster

- Delay between secondary fire and primary fire - I know that the time from switching from secondary fire to primary fire is much slower in UT2k4 than it was in UT

All these items figure in to the minimum distance for a combo, so you can't just base your argument of the speed of shock cores on this one fact.

Also, the scale of UT and UT2k4 are different. Aren't the UU's different as well?

Like I said, I may be wrong as well.

No, the UT2004 engine is just a much improved version of the UT99 engine. The UUs are the same and you can easily port BSP from UT99 to UT2004. The scale is, in absolute terms, the same, but perceived scale is definitely different. I suspect that it is largely due to the massive mobility granted by the double jump (when converting UUs to feet a double jump ends up being around 45 feet IIRC). There may also be differences in the camera placement (such as by having the camera lower to the ground) that impact perception of scale.

- Delay between secondary and primary fire : There is no property that I can see looking through the class files that defines a "Delay between primary and secondary fire." I noted the only given delays in my post above. Perhaps there is a "Delay between primary and secondary fire" hidden in a superclass somewhere, which may differ between UT99 and UT2004, but it seems highly unlikely. There is no reason from looking at the code of the weapons to believe that the delay between secondary and primary fire differs in any way except to (possibly) favor the UT2004 SR.

If you wanted to be more precise you could simply time the core from firing to impact against the wall -- Or you could look at the code and see that they have the same speed in UU (1150). Like I indicated in my previous post, the difference in the distance to combo is due to the UT2004's core size.

 

[Israphel]

I don't know anything about the mechanics of gameplay, but I find myself agreeing with some of what briach says.

It's simply wrong (and a form of elitism) to say that combos are "too" easy to do in 2k4 and that noobs are running around with mini deemers killing better players without having to use any skill.

Reading what T2A said above and I can kind of feel myself agreeing with that. I only came to the game with UT2k4 so I can't make any comparisons with other UTs, but I have been playing this game exclusively for 2 years now, so I think I no longer qualify as a noob.
Like T2A, shock combo kills are extremely rare for me (unless it is against a genuine new player who doesn't know how to dodge) because anyone with a degree of experience at UT2k4 is usually better at getting out of the way than I am at killing them with a combo.

Perhaps for people who've been playing this game for 6 years or whatever, and who learned combos on the (more difficult?) UT, then they are really easy to do and kill people with....But that is certainly not true for the casual gamer.

Lets not forget that it is the casual gamer that UT2k7 has to appeal to. Epic have claimed that they thought UT2k4 was a failure in terms of numbers of people playing. 2k7 HAS to get more players in, and I personally would love to see more players, more NEW players on the servers.
That's not going to happen if the shock rifle is made even harder. The shock rifle is already a little unbalanced because of it's high rof and the pushback effect...It is pretty much the strongest weapon in the game and one that more experienced players can already dominate new players with. To make the combo even harder to pull will for sure keep the hardcore players happy....but pretty soon the new players will turn away in droves. As briach pointed out, there is simply so much competition now, if a game is simply too hard for a new player to get a foot on the ladder, then they won't stick with it.

I'm not saying that things should be nerfed. I've played 2k4 for so long because I love it's sophistication, I love the fact that I still need to develop and hone new skills. I work full time and have a busy social life and don't have much time to dedicate to getting good at a game, but 2k4 kept me coming back because I liked it enough to want to learn (that and the fact that I own a Mac and there aren't many other games worth playing on Mac )....

...but for gawdsake don't make it harder. It will kill the game.

 

[f.sardis]

making the shock combo harder to achive makes the game easier for new players since an intermediate player wont be able to dominate over them. for the highly skilled players the new shock combo should take about a month to learn and thats it so it wont really bother the experienced.
besides experienced people usually have attitude and they got a fav weapon and go around killing with that. i dont know many experienced players that will only hunt for a shock rifle and only play with shock combos. those type of people have been playing the game for about a year or so and they think its cool cause it gets them the frags. that has to stop. the combo is clrearly and overpowered blast and it should be made harder to achieve.
wail of suicide went a bit further to prove how the shock combo changed from 99 to 2k4. all i can say from my experience is that a shock combo that killed 3 people in 99 was something that called for celebration. in 2k4 its the norm.

 

[Israphel]

Well my experience seems to be totally different from yours, we must be playing on totally different servers.

In fact, I think we might not even be playing the same game.

 

[T2A`]

Seriously. I can't remember ever killing three people at once with a combo. With UT2004's huge player/map scale, there's not really a good chance for three people to be that freakin' close. I think you're getting your games mixed up.

 

[MonsOlympus]

ut2k4 - shock beam firemode

TraceRange=17000
Momentum=+60000.0
FireRate=0.7
DamageMin=45
DamageMax=45
bModeExclusive=true

ut2k4 - shock ball firemode

FireRate=0.6
bModeExclusive=true

UT99 - Shockrifle

hitdamage=40
FiringSpeed=2.0
AltRefireRate=0.700000

ut2k4 - shock ball projectile

Speed=1150
MaxSpeed=1150
Damage=45
DamageRadius=150
MomentumTransfer=70000
ComboAmmoCost=3
ComboDamage=200
ComboRadius=275
ComboMomentumTransfer=150000
LifeSpan=10.0
ForceType=FT_Constant
ForceScale=5.0
ForceRadius=40.0
CollisionRadius=10
CollisionHeight=10

ut99 - shock ball projectile

speed=1000.000000
Damage=55.000000
MomentumTransfer=70000
CollisionRadius=12.000000
CollisionHeight=12.000000
LifeSpan=10.000000

function SuperExplosion(){
HurtRadius(Damage*3, 250, MyDamageType, MomentumTransfer*2, Location );...,

Ok well just to clear up any miscalculations, this is direct from the ut2k4 source 3369 and ut99 436. There are a few things missing here and there but it seems pretty much the same for things I havent listed. Maybe it is different but I tried to get as much as the useful info from the classes I could without spending alot of time on it.

I must say also I did a good move just before I saw this thread while playing 2k4 tonight, I double jumped over a combo and got thrown towards the other player, had my flakk handy too

Another thing is that a shock can counter a shock pretty well in 2k4 cause you can explode other peoples cores or use your own cores to cancel it out so ummm, people tend to use the shock alot... Dunno if this is the same in ut99 id have to boot it up.

Anyways I dont want to rant and rave too much I'll let the numbers do the talking lol

Edit: yeah that 250 in the hurt radius might even be the ut99 core size, tracerange for the ut99 beam migth be about 10000.

 

[Renegade Retard]

Speed=1150
MaxSpeed=1150

So the shock balls could potentially have variable speeds?

Sorry, I just found that to be funny.

 

[Deadmeat]

Hey Monsolympus quick question (and sorry this is way off topic) -
How do you get those stats? I remember a few years ago when I was mapping for UT I was trying to find all the weapon information but the closest I could get was the actor properties info.

 

[MonsOlympus]

There are a few ways deadmeat.
You can dl the source online from various places or you can export the classes from unrealed. I dont think unrealed actually shows the defaultproperties block when using source view.

 

[Israphel]

@Wail

I agree with what a lot of what you said...(and for the record, it wasn't me who called the shock a "mini-deemer", I was quoting someone else...I find the comparison ludicrous).

As I said, I can't compare with UT, and I agree that it is VERY rare to see combos killing multiple players in 2k4. As I said, I rarely kill with combos because any remotely experienced player can dodge before I've had the time to hit the core.

Most of my post was aimed at the poster who called the shock a "noob" weapon in 2k4.
That personally is not my experience. The shock is incredibly powerful in the hands of a skilled player, and to be honest, not that useful to a newer player who will struggle to hit a dodging target with it.
However, as you've pointed out, 2k4 favours hitscan because of the wide open maps (which are basically there because of the enhanced movement...infact the whole scaling issues from the map sizes to the player sizes are to do with this). So this means that in 2k4 hitscan weapons like the lg and the shock are far more effective than projectile weapons.
I think the experience of most newer players in 2k4 is that they will be owned from mid to long range by a good player who uses hitscan weapons and throws his shield gun up at the merest hint of close range combat.

For me 2k7 has got to get back to making close range combat worthwhile, and to an extent, unavoidable.

EDIT: Am I going made here? I wrote this post in reply to a post by Wail of Suicide that quoted mine...and when I posted it, it had gone.
Please, someone tell me...it was there wasn't it. I'm not seeing things. :-(

 

[nuttella]

UUs may be 1:1 between UEd2 and UEd3, but they are effectively smaller units in UT2004, because the players are larger and map features are larger to accommodate them. And that's before taking movement into account. Also I believe the minimum distance for a combo is limited by the rate of fire of the projectile as well as its speed.

PS- No, in the UT2k7 demo vid, the projectile does not look faster or smaller than in UT2k4.

 

[Renegade Retard]

EDIT: Am I going made here? I wrote this post in reply to a post by Wail of Suicide that quoted mine...and when I posted it, it had gone.
Please, someone tell me...it was there wasn't it. I'm not seeing things. :-(

You're losing it, dude!


No, he deleted his post, which is a shame because it was quite a long post. A lot of wasted hard work.

 

[nuttella]

UT99 - Shockrifle

hitdamage=40
FiringSpeed=2.0
AltRefireRate=0.700000

ut99 - shock ball projectile

speed=1000.000000
Damage=55.000000
MomentumTransfer=70000
CollisionRadius=12.000000
CollisionHeight=12.000000
LifeSpan=10.000000

function SuperExplosion(){
HurtRadius(Damage*3, 250, MyDamageType, MomentumTransfer*2, Location );...,

Just to be clear, however, in default Hardcore game mode, all damage values are multiplied by 1.5. The shock beam did 60 damage, projectiles 82.5 damage, combos 247.5 damage (82.5*3). I believe it does say elsewhere in the code that the radius is actually 275.

 

[MonsOlympus]

found this as well, seems that the ut2k4 core size is reset after launch...

SetCollisionSize(20, 20);

and this is from ut99 for the normal core, hurtradius is interesting...

function Explode(vector HitLocation,vector HitNormal){
   PlaySound(ImpactSound, SLOT_Misc, 0.5,,, 0.5+FRand());
   HurtRadius(Damage, 70, MyDamageType, MomentumTransfer, Location );...,

There is soo much more to take into account than just the weapon so it makes it hard to stay on topic I think. 2k7 is a whole game and epic do know there stuff, Id expect to see tweaks/improvements/features across the board not just this single weapon. They might make the stinger harder to use but the shock easier, probably change switch times between sniper and shock to longer. You know its a big topic we really got to wait and see what the epic has in store for all the players...

edit: and yes this is all default properties for gamespeed 1.0

 

[Deadmeat]

Id expect to see tweaks/improvements/features across the board not just this single weapon.

Yup if anyone here remembers Epic made changes to every...single....weapon from UT'99 to UT2003/4. Which was necessary as they made changes to just about everything else as well. People can argue over which version they think got it better but it's very difficult to realistically compare the two because so many factors are different.

 

[Wail of Suicide]

ut2k4 - shock beam firemode

TraceRange=17000
Momentum=+60000.0
FireRate=0.7
DamageMin=45
DamageMax=45
bModeExclusive=true

ut2k4 - shock ball firemode

FireRate=0.6
bModeExclusive=true

UT99 - Shockrifle

hitdamage=40
FiringSpeed=2.0
AltRefireRate=0.700000

ut2k4 - shock ball projectile

Speed=1150
MaxSpeed=1150
Damage=45
DamageRadius=150
MomentumTransfer=70000
ComboAmmoCost=3
ComboDamage=200
ComboRadius=275
ComboMomentumTransfer=150000
LifeSpan=10.0
ForceType=FT_Constant
ForceScale=5.0
ForceRadius=40.0
CollisionRadius=10
CollisionHeight=10

ut99 - shock ball projectile

speed=1000.000000
Damage=55.000000
MomentumTransfer=70000
CollisionRadius=12.000000
CollisionHeight=12.000000
LifeSpan=10.000000

function SuperExplosion(){
HurtRadius(Damage*3, 250, MyDamageType, MomentumTransfer*2, Location );...,

Ok well just to clear up any miscalculations, this is direct from the ut2k4 source 3369 and ut99 436. There are a few things missing here and there but it seems pretty much the same for things I havent listed. Maybe it is different but I tried to get as much as the useful info from the classes I could without spending alot of time on it.

I must say also I did a good move just before I saw this thread while playing 2k4 tonight, I double jumped over a combo and got thrown towards the other player, had my flakk handy too

Another thing is that a shock can counter a shock pretty well in 2k4 cause you can explode other peoples cores or use your own cores to cancel it out so ummm, people tend to use the shock alot... Dunno if this is the same in ut99 id have to boot it up.

Anyways I dont want to rant and rave too much I'll let the numbers do the talking lol

Edit: yeah that 250 in the hurt radius might even be the ut99 core size, tracerange for the ut99 beam migth be about 10000.

MonsOlympus -- Cool, thanks for digging up the actual stats for UT99 (had been running off of the UTClassic UT2004 .us since I do all of my mapping and modding in 04 nowadays).

Some more ramblings --

I don't know anything about the mechanics of gameplay, but I find myself agreeing with some of what briach says.

It's simply wrong (and a form of elitism) to say that combos are "too" easy to do in 2k4 and that noobs are running around with mini deemers killing better players without having to use any skill.

Reading what T2A said above and I can kind of feel myself agreeing with that. I only came to the game with UT2k4 so I can't make any comparisons with other UTs, but I have been playing this game exclusively for 2 years now, so I think I no longer qualify as a noob.
Like T2A, shock combo kills are extremely rare for me (unless it is against a genuine new player who doesn't know how to dodge) because anyone with a degree of experience at UT2k4 is usually better at getting out of the way than I am at killing them with a combo.

Perhaps for people who've been playing this game for 6 years or whatever, and who learned combos on the (more difficult?) UT, then they are really easy to do and kill people with....But that is certainly not true for the casual gamer.

Lets not forget that it is the casual gamer that UT2k7 has to appeal to. Epic have claimed that they thought UT2k4 was a failure in terms of numbers of people playing. 2k7 HAS to get more players in, and I personally would love to see more players, more NEW players on the servers.
That's not going to happen if the shock rifle is made even harder. The shock rifle is already a little unbalanced because of it's high rof and the pushback effect...It is pretty much the strongest weapon in the game and one that more experienced players can already dominate new players with. To make the combo even harder to pull will for sure keep the hardcore players happy....but pretty soon the new players will turn away in droves. As briach pointed out, there is simply so much competition now, if a game is simply too hard for a new player to get a foot on the ladder, then they won't stick with it.

I'm not saying that things should be nerfed. I've played 2k4 for so long because I love it's sophistication, I love the fact that I still need to develop and hone new skills. I work full time and have a busy social life and don't have much time to dedicate to getting good at a game, but 2k4 kept me coming back because I liked it enough to want to learn (that and the fact that I own a Mac and there aren't many other games worth playing on Mac )....

...but for gawdsake don't make it harder. It will kill the game.

The problem with the Shock Rifle, in my opinion, is that they decreased the primary hit damage by 10% UT99->2004 (50->45) but they increased the rate of fire by over 100%. The Shock Rifle didn't really need that improvement, as it was "overpowered" even in UT99. It is particularly problematic because UT2004 favors (in general movement and map design) long range hitscan weaponry and the Sniper Rifle's (either LG or CSR) rate of fire was increased by something like 200%, essentially necessitating that it only be used as a secondary potshot weapon.

In order for the Shock Rifle to be brought back into balance long range combat needs to be reduced and the rate of fire needs to be returned to UT99 levels, possibly returning to the UT99 level of damage. The ease of hitting shock combos is not, in my opinion, going to be a decisive factor.

Like I mentioned before, some people enjoy the easier combos, others do not. Easy combos goes hand-in-hand with having your shock core collide with some random static mesh. Hard combos goes hand-in-hand with having your shock cores fly half-through your opponent, yet doing no damage (one solution would be to add an area-of-effect "static lightning" to small shock cores so they would do damage on near-hit flybys). With a UT99 sized core, combos are more difficult but I also found that combos in UT99 were more rewarding. With UT99's close range combat you could frequently kill many people with a single combo, and would almost always find another opponent within combo range at all times.

In UT2004 I find that the much greater player speed (via dodgejumping) makes the combo more difficult to effectively use to kill multiple people. In typical situations you may kill one or two people with a combo. The combo is much more difficult to use effectively in general because the shock core is relatively much slower than player dodgejumping speeds.

It may have been more difficult to hit a combo while moving in UT99, but the obvious solution was to not move, or only move directly forwards or backwards in the path of the shock core. It was also similarly much more difficult to avoid a shock core heading in your direction. Performing combos while still engaging in normal movement was a sign of a very good player but the new player could still perform combos and gain kills easily (it's just that they would probably die frequently from moving predictably before performing a combo).