Well, it didn't take long for NASL to fail their Tribes debut. Not that I expected any different, but god damn it, I want this game to succeed. A sub-par cast and badly observed game with no introduction or explanation of game features for new viewers is not a good start.
"Welcome to our first ever Tribes cast! Okay, introductions over -- let's get right into the game. We won't explain anything about the game at all, and in fact we won't even show it from the start, but rather we'll start streaming a full thirty seconds in, long after teams have set up, and then do nothing to explain the subsequent chaos you see. Forget talking about classes, roles, or game features at all, or even comment on any of these while the game is going. Keep talking about action that's happening off screen. Then, let's take a really good idea - that of a second screen overlay which gives viewers a better overview of the action - and find a way to ruin it by placing it on top of an information box.
Oh, look, a team won. Let's show a generic victory splash screen and cut to commercial with zero post-game talk or analysis. Then, once the series is over, we'll run an interview and post-game session that's longer than the game itself, and during this time we will never tell anyone that there's another game coming up after this. In fact, let's make every effort to make it seem like the stream is coming to a close, by saying goodbye, doing shoutouts, signing off, and cutting to a splash screen, losing us some 800+ viewers. Gotta get this nonsense over with so we can get back to putting in zero effort into everything we do."
and thats the sort of criticism they want to hear so they can do better on the next cast. nasl listens and will make it better next time. posting this randomly in a thread wont make any difference =\
Couple of questions for ya'll. Did anyone here play Tribes 1 competitively and like this version? I absolutely refused to play Tribes 2 because of the max velocity limits they put in and other bs. Totally ruined the game for me.
I played Global Agenda and HiRez did not impress me there at all. Is anyone here that played GA that can tell me that this is higher quality?
And did I see a couple of pages ago someone hint that HiRez runs all the servers? Is it going to stay like that after beta ends?
On February 28 2012 20:10 orangesunglasses wrote: the spinefuser aim for the ground style is really lame... wish you had a detonate button for more midair combat
Good players can hit players in mid-air as well. There's even an achievement for it ;o
you cant consistently hit people mid air thats stupid
No, you're just bad.
It's not fucking hard to midair people. I dont know where this misconception comes from. Everyone I know can midair people, everyone who plays with the Spinfuser for any amount of time can midair people. It's really not hard at all. It's not about us being stupid, or elitist, or whatever -- it really isn't. It's just a matter of practicing and not sucking.
He's right, and you're wrong. MA's are not consistent enough to be used in smart, competitive play.
(Note: I play in top T:A comp + was involved in high level comp when it existed for Tribes 2 in most of it phases for reference)
MA hit rates inherently can't get much beyond a certain percentage (probably around 30% for close range shots on average, if that.) Because hitting MA's relies a lot on the person you're shooting maintaining a trajectory that's going to let your shot actually hit. And the massive opportunity cost for going for an MA essentially ensures that you lose whatever fight you're in if you miss (since the other person will presumably be hitting you with accurate smg fire as you miss your MA, if they're also a top player).
There's no scenario in where someone (at top levels) who's going for MA's will consistently beat a player who's properly using SMGs in response. A top player will consistently put out a shitload of damage on any player in the air with an SMG every time, as opposed to MA's which hit merely some of the time.
Best example I can draw to SC, is if you somehow developed a blind all-in build that had a strong chance of working, but only worked if you guessed the opponents location correctly. You might guess your opponents location correctly 30% of the time (and have a solid shot of winning), but the fact that you have a 70% chance of losing outright should be more than enough to deter you from making it something you rely upon.
Listen to ZProton, flying car driver (jk zprotoss). Hes right, MAs will never be competitively viable outside of the flag stand, and its only viable there because of the lack of time to put DPS on with a chaingun.
BUT IF FLASH PLAYED TA, MIDAIRS WOULD BE 100% ACCURATE AND VIABLE
I pretty much agree for the most part.
Anyone with half a brain will realize that flying in a predictable trajectory is almost as bad as just running around on the ground. If the guy goes in the air, might as well pull out the SMG or whatever other gun. If you dont have one, I would only go for an MA if you know he will be in the air at least as long as youre cooling down. Otherwise, you just lost an easy opportunity to hit him as he lands. If he only takes short flights while fighting you, you might as well wait for him to land before shooting the disc.
I remember when I played Tribes1 and 2 back in the day. I refused to use the chaingun and got extremely good at MAs with spinfusor (and shocklance in T2). While I beat most of the people I fought with in duels, the people who whipped out the chaingun while I was in hte air and spinfusor when i landed could beat me more than I could beat them. I raged at the fact that it took less mechanical skill to do and told them how bad they were at the game, but nothing changed the fact that their tactics were just more effective than mine even though i was an MA machine.
On February 28 2012 07:04 Scalepad wrote: Go like them on Facebook if you haven't, http://www.facebook.com/tribesascend , they are giving away free gold (250). Just redeemed my code. It's not much, but it's better than nothing!
The facebook page says you may only do it once. Does that mean I can only get one code per facebook account (which is kinda obvious) or that I may only use one facebook code ingame? Because - you know - i might know one or two people who use facebook and don't need that code..
On February 28 2012 07:04 Scalepad wrote: Go like them on Facebook if you haven't, http://www.facebook.com/tribesascend , they are giving away free gold (250). Just redeemed my code. It's not much, but it's better than nothing!
The facebook page says you may only do it once. Does that mean I can only get one code per facebook account (which is kinda obvious) or that I may only use one facebook code ingame? Because - you know - i might know one or two people who use facebook and don't need that code..
Once you use the code on an account it's "flagged" so you can't use another Free 250 gold code. They aren't dumb.
So I watched a few competitive plays, 7v7 specifically, what is the typical team composition? It seems that you generally have 1 Sentinel, 1 Doombringer, 1-2 Soldiers and 3-4 Pathfinders.
On March 01 2012 18:52 VoO wrote: So I watched a few competitive plays, 7v7 specifically, what is the typical team composition? It seems that you generally have 1 Sentinel, 1 Doombringer, 1-2 Soldiers and 3-4 Pathfinders.
In NA comp we generally play 7v7s, which breaks down into 2 main schools of thought: O-Stack & D-Stack.
For an O-Stack you'll run something like 1 Sentinel (sniper), 1 Soldier (stay at home), and 1 Pathfinder (chaser) on defense and 1 Pathfinder (capper), 0-1 Infiltrator (LO), 1-2 Raiders (LO), and 1-2 Juggernauts (HO) on offense. You can also go light on clear with 2 cappers and 2 Raiders clearing.
For a D-Stack you'll run something like 1 Sentinel (sniper), 1 Doombringer (heavy on flag), 1 Technician (stay at home), and 1 Pathfinder (Chaser) on defense and run a similar offense (typically 1 Pathfinder & 2 Raiders).
Typically you'll pull a defensive player (sniper or hof) to Shrike.
What are the advantages of a soldier defending? I'm not entirely sure but I think bolt launcher does about comparable damage to spinfusor/thumperdx, and a soldier can definitely not get speed as fast as a pathfinder for chasing. I never pick soldier myself anymore because I think he's just a slower pathfinder with 200 more hp, but if he's used in comp play I'm obviously wrong. Could you explain?
On March 01 2012 21:22 Ethenielle wrote: What are the advantages of a soldier defending? I'm not entirely sure but I think bolt launcher does about comparable damage to spinfusor/thumperdx, and a soldier can definitely not get speed as fast as a pathfinder for chasing. I never pick soldier myself anymore because I think he's just a slower pathfinder with 200 more hp, but if he's used in comp play I'm obviously wrong. Could you explain?
Note I explicitly point out that one person plays chaser, killing people who get away with the flag & returning it. The Soldier plays stay at home, clearing the base of their offense and trying to keep the chaser (who plays pathfinder) & sniper alive so that they can kill the incoming cappers. Playing pathfinder would mean that you gained speed (which you don't need, because you're staying at home) while sacrificing health and reliability on your chaingun. With offense playing very hard-hitting classes like Raider, you can't afford the health loss, even if that means sacrificing the high damage of the bolt launcher.
We don't play 2 chasers because that means the only person in the base preventing them from completely owning your stand is the sniper, who should be killing cappers, not clearing out a base in a sub-optimal dueling class. You need to keep your stand at least partially clear to prevent instant (and sometimes devastating) llama grabs from being able to get off the stand uncontested. If you ran 2 chasers you would have to have 1 respawn and clear the base a bit before you could return semi-safely, but you can't afford that time when your flag is in the field under pressure from multiple escort.
Something I've noticed now that I can actually land snipeshots decently is that I find myself drifting away from our main base, instead perching myself somewhere in the middle of the map, generally on an intercept course for one of the capping routes. This makes me unable to place Claymores anywhere useful, unless I die. Should I force myself to stick around the base more?
On March 01 2012 22:12 Southlight wrote: Something I've noticed now that I can actually land snipeshots decently is that I find myself drifting away from our main base, instead perching myself somewhere in the middle of the map, generally on an intercept course for one of the capping routes. This makes me unable to place Claymores anywhere useful, unless I die. Should I force myself to stick around the base more?
It is generally map & situation dependent. If you are on, say, Katabatic BE, positioning yourself on the front left hill (near the turret) is not a bad move at all, you can call incoming cappers from that entire half of the map sooner and you have a decent/better shot at most of the outgoing routes (except the most blatant front left which you can't hit for a good 10 seconds after grab but should stop). Another notable spot is the back left hill on Arx which covers a good deal of the incoming routes and puts any LO trying to clear you way out of position to clear the stand.
For examples of where you shouldn't leave the stand... a map where you don't really want to go far off the stand is Crossfire, where mines are very useful and the base is the highest point anywhere near the flag. If the team you're going up against is running two cappers moving out of position is a bigger risk since you can't call as many incoming routes, so you'd have to adjust on the fly with your defense.
Don't worry about not helping your team in pubs though, it's sort of a lost cause, just improve on your own play.
I missed the NASL broadcast since im european But i heard from a stream of one of the guys who actually played in it, that it was kinda bad, and I actually can't find anything about rebroadcasts apart from speculations on Tribes community websites and IRC channel. So bad marketing for that.
If people actually want to know how competitive play works, http://tribescast.com/ is the place to be, specially the "Team ZFZ vs Area 51 (26 Feb.)" is a recommendation, good games and different approaches from both teams, and they explain whats going on for the new people a lot! and good camera work as well by Craig.
The broadcast was pretty bad in the sense that the observing was subpar and the casters did not explain much about the basic elements of the game to new people who may have been watching. The viewer count was around 1.5k iirc. The drydock game was fun though, IMO.
If you guys are looking for some insight into competitive T:A this FPVOD from Blinks' POV of Egocentric in their match vs Tao of Tribe. You can see their team loadout and hear all of the communication going on between the stuff and believe me when I say this is some pretty high-level stuff (the team leader DavidBowie keeping everyone on point really impressed me as it's something you'd think happens all the time but really doesn't in a lot of team games). I won't spoil anything but suffice it to say the match is fucking epic.
On March 02 2012 04:03 prodiG wrote: If you guys are looking for some insight into competitive T:A this FPVOD from Blinks' POV of Egocentric in their match vs Tao of Tribe. You can see their team loadout and hear all of the communication going on between the stuff and believe me when I say this is some pretty high-level stuff (the team leader DavidBowie keeping everyone on point really impressed me as it's something you'd think happens all the time but really doesn't in a lot of team games). I won't spoil anything but suffice it to say the match is fucking epic.
Been playing for about a week or so, loving it. So far only playing in pubs tho, mostly as sentinel or doombring hof. I'm not very good but I'm interested in hooking up with some people to play more coordinated games anyway, pubs get kind of stupid at times what with everyone switching teams whenever there are too many "below silver/gold scrubs" on one team... I've no idea of where to go, anyone have any idea? I play on euro.
On March 02 2012 07:13 Nudelfisk wrote: Been playing for about a week or so, loving it. So far only playing in pubs tho, mostly as sentinel or doombring hof. I'm not very good but I'm interested in hooking up with some people to play more coordinated games anyway, pubs get kind of stupid at times what with everyone switching teams whenever there are too many "below silver/gold scrubs" on one team... I've no idea of where to go, anyone have any idea? I play on euro.
Check out the irc-channels #tribesascend and #tamixed on Quakenet. That should get you started. In order to play team matches or pick up matches you have to be whitelisted first which might be a bit tricky at the moment. (The developers have to manually add you to a list). But private servers will soon be out and then it will be a lot easier.
On March 02 2012 07:13 Nudelfisk wrote: Been playing for about a week or so, loving it. So far only playing in pubs tho, mostly as sentinel or doombring hof. I'm not very good but I'm interested in hooking up with some people to play more coordinated games anyway, pubs get kind of stupid at times what with everyone switching teams whenever there are too many "below silver/gold scrubs" on one team... I've no idea of where to go, anyone have any idea? I play on euro.
Check out the irc-channels #tribesascend and #tamixed on Quakenet. That should get you started. In order to play team matches or pick up matches you have to be whitelisted first which might be a bit tricky at the moment. (The developers have to manually add you to a list). But private servers will soon be out and then it will be a lot easier.
Thanks for the reply =) man, i keep forgetting it's still just a beta. I think I'll just wait 'til the game is out for realz.
EPT
But i heard from a stream of one of the guys who actually played in it, that it was kinda bad, and I actually can't find anything about rebroadcasts apart from speculations on Tribes community websites and IRC channel. So bad marketing for that.
Was a good match as well, recommend this game also as a Spectator point of view. 
