Does Precision Weapons Hurt Teamwork?

Games Other Halo
1

This is something I have always been interested about. This is a huge complaint of mine throughout many games including Reach gameplay (which I loved) and I keep seeing this now with Halo 4. I do not know for sure if it the precision weapons causing this, if its more casual players getting into games or just how online gaming is going but I believe the precision weapons don’t help.

I’ve been noticing more and more, with precision weapon spawning, players tend to immediate split away from teams and run off into a hiding spot to start killing the enemy from afar. If it only happened in Slayer that would be fine, but it doesn’t. Objective playlists constantly have stat padders and players running off by themselves just to get easy kills as people attempt to play the objective.

A huge example of this is Ragnarok Capture The Flag. I have not once played this map & game type and have had even a slight amount of fun. Every time it has either turned into my own team killing each other for vehicles and half getting booted or when I play with my group of friends, it’s the enemy team never going for our flag and hiding in rocks sniping and DMR killing us as we try for the flag. And forget vehicles because it’s easy enough to take down the driver and/or gunner.

I can’t help but think, if players spawned with Assault Rifles (or close quarters rifles i.e. Storm/Suppressor) and precision weapons would spawn on the map so let’s say, each team might have 1 or 2 players with a precision weapon team work would increase. You couldn’t have a team racking up kills in objectives because you can’t take out enemies constantly from a distance, it’s just not feasible. It would also help groups defend and run a flag carry back to base (or even oddball etc) since the player wouldn’t be killed before even making it half way. Teams would have to engage in combat, use vehicles for mobility (please make the mongoose have a purpose!)and coordinate better.

That’s my take on it, I’m tired of the lone wolf attitude and no one even working towards the objective and I think that’s why.

2

The problem is that the DMR is too powerful. It would be fine with BR/carbine/LR starts.

And people don’t go for the objective because without a ranking system there is literally no point in trying to win games.

3

While I can see/understand your thinking, I dont really think it has that much bearing on the lack of teamwork in todays gaming. No matter what game you play, teamwork does not seem to be involved nearly as it used to be.

I personally think it is a multitude of contributing factors. Greed, Selfishness, inflated egos mainly.

I personally do not use a mic the majority of the time I play solo. I do however plug it in if I hear other people on the team (more than 1) making calls. I do however always help my team mates. If I am pug CTF I play opposite of what everyone else does. They all rush, I sit back. They sit back, I attack.

4

That is mainly their mentality. No matter how hard they try, game developers cannot patch human stupidity.

IMO, your suggestion only just delays the situation from happening, where everyone rushes to the precision weapons and then when the dust clears, they go about their merry way. Not only that, it reminds me of Valhalla, with AR starts…hate it.

It’s just something they’ll have to learn to stop doing, or something you’ll have to learn to bring friends with.

5

> The problem is that the DMR is too powerful. It would be fine with BR/carbine/LR starts.

Aside from another dont nerf/nerf dmr argument. It really does not have much bearing on the lack of team work in todays gaming. This is not just isolated to Halo.

6

In slayer (the game I play most), people split up regardless of weapons they are using.

On adrift, inevitably one or two guys goes for the sword, someone runs for the Scattershot and the last goes for the Sticky Detonator. I am as guilty sometimes, as anyone else.

I think the problem is just groups of randoms with no communication, moreso than any specific weapon types.

7

I see your point, but I don’t think there will be more teamshooting with AR starts :slight_smile: lol

8

> > The problem is that the DMR is too powerful. It would be fine with BR/carbine/LR starts.
>
> Aside from another dont nerf/nerf dmr argument. It really does not have much bearing on the lack of team work in todays gaming. This is not just isolated to Halo.

Im more talking about his issue of people just hiding in rocks and shooting him across the map.

The DMR kill map movement, and movement as a team.

9

> In slayer (the game I play most), people split up regardless of weapons they are using.
>
> On adrift, inevitably one or two guys goes for the sword, someone runs for the Scattershot and the last goes for the Sticky Detonator. I am as guilty sometimes, as anyone else.
>
> I think the problem is just groups of randoms with no communication, moreso than any specific weapon types.

Slayer it’s definitely inevitable, everyone just scatters regardless. I have a way worse time with objective playlists though with that. Basically, I don’t even play halo 4 unless friends are on because it’s almost impossible to do anything with randoms.

Unfortunately, if the map is large, we are always faced with the enemy team hiding and DMR killing and if it is smaller (haven, abandon) we absolutely destroy the enemy team because they don’t organize and we can seek cover easily from their precision fire giving us an advantage.

But my problem with that is I want to have fun. I don’t like playing objectives were we win oddball 300 - less than 50 (which we did for 7 games in a row) and flag 5-0 but I also don’t want a 1 point lead etc and get faced with constant players ignoring the objective. I want a challenge and I’d love to see players actually playing the game.

10

How do you suggest a team that is pinned down by players who have established positions and picked up precision weapons fight their way out of their spawn with assault rifles?

11

Why use team BR’s to take someone down from far away when I can just peg them off with my DMR alone?

12

> > In slayer (the game I play most), people split up regardless of weapons they are using.
> >
> > On adrift, inevitably one or two guys goes for the sword, someone runs for the Scattershot and the last goes for the Sticky Detonator. I am as guilty sometimes, as anyone else.
> >
> > I think the problem is just groups of randoms with no communication, moreso than any specific weapon types.
>
> Slayer it’s definitely inevitable, everyone just scatters regardless. I have a way worse time with objective playlists though with that. Basically, I don’t even play halo 4 unless friends are on because it’s almost impossible to do anything with randoms.
>
> Unfortunately, if the map is large, we are always faced with the enemy team hiding and DMR killing and if it is smaller (haven, abandon) we absolutely destroy the enemy team because they don’t organize and we can seek cover easily from their precision fire giving us an advantage.
>
> But my problem with that is I want to have fun. I don’t like playing objectives were we win oddball 300 - less than 50 (which we did for 7 games in a row) and flag 5-0 but I also don’t want a 1 point lead etc and get faced with constant players ignoring the objective. I want a challenge and I’d love to see players actually playing the game.

They will need to give more players an incentive to actually getting the flag captured. So far, only the carrier gets 100 points for capturing the flag. If the team was to be rewarded that much, they’d probably be more likely to do stuff to actually make this happen, and give them a continued drive to make the game continue to 3, as intended.

So far, killing seems to be the most rewarding for everyone else but the flag carrier. If everyone were to get it, it could help.

13

There are a lot of different factors involved. I do agree that the classic spawn with AR and move for the set weapon placements causes players to play the game far more strategically and rewards teamwork far more than the current system. The issue is that when you are playing with a bunch of random people it is very difficult to try and communicate and cooperate with each other effectively. Along side the issue of starting with which weapons and Ordnance vs. set weapon placement is the issue of map design. The Halo 4 maps all have a sort of bottleneck feel of “force people to the middle”. This causes chaos, and while this can be fun, it is not so great when it is the only map layout available. perhaps it isn’t fair to say that it is the “only” one. Ragnarok doesn’t do this, but Ragnarok is also not original. Halo 3 had the best map design I have ever seen, maps were set up with teamwork in mind, multiple vantage points, long sight lines, plenty of cover and a strategic purpose to almost every area of the map (with exceptions of course). The same cannot be said of H4’s maps, full map awareness is very difficult, as flow of constant movement seems to be the objective, most maps having very limited useful pathways, The donut and the figure 8 being the main styles. Nothing like Last Resort, where you have an open and diverse battlefield, great for long distance as well as close range encounters and setup perfectly to defend spots as well ambush others.

14

I think objective gametypes should have a large bonus for actually winning the match. Say…like 1000 xp??

15

What’s killing teamwork is there is no motivation to play for the win.

  1. do you get more xp for winning? No.

  2. are we ranked based on wins? Partly, but win percentage is not displayed in service record in game… Just kills and deaths

3)kill times are pretty fast meaning teammates need to be react insanely fast to affect eachother ( either no teamwork or extreme teamwork, set ups, communication etc)

Halo 4 maps are larger to handle instant respawn, precision weapons are going to be needed. Coupled with a jetpack, I find myself often going high into the air, just because I saw my teammate was shooting at something. Jet packing up normally gives me vantage enough to put 1 or 2 DMR shots in the enemy he is facing. The more shots I get in there, the more likely he survives. My teammate gets a kill, he is closer to his next OrdDrop and I get an assist, I to get closer to my next OrdDrop. However this tactic requires time, teammate is often dead by the time I can help… Meaning I get the kil and my teammate gets a death and assist.

16

> This is something I have always been interested about. This is a huge complaint of mine throughout many games including Reach gameplay (which I loved) and I keep seeing this now with Halo 4. I do not know for sure if it the precision weapons causing this, if its more casual players getting into games or just how online gaming is going but I believe the precision weapons don’t help.
>
> I’ve been noticing more and more, with precision weapon spawning, players tend to immediate split away from teams and run off into a hiding spot to start killing the enemy from afar. If it only happened in Slayer that would be fine, but it doesn’t. Objective playlists constantly have stat padders and players running off by themselves just to get easy kills as people attempt to play the objective.
>
> A huge example of this is Ragnarok Capture The Flag. I have not once played this map & game type and have had even a slight amount of fun. Every time it has either turned into my own team killing each other for vehicles and half getting booted or when I play with my group of friends, it’s the enemy team never going for our flag and hiding in rocks sniping and DMR killing us as we try for the flag. And forget vehicles because it’s easy enough to take down the driver and/or gunner.
>
> I can’t help but think, if players spawned with Assault Rifles (or close quarters rifles i.e. Storm/Suppressor) and precision weapons would spawn on the map so let’s say, each team might have 1 or 2 players with a precision weapon team work would increase. You couldn’t have a team racking up kills in objectives because you can’t take out enemies constantly from a distance, it’s just not feasible. It would also help groups defend and run a flag carry back to base (or even oddball etc) since the player wouldn’t be killed before even making it half way. Teams would have to engage in combat, use vehicles for mobility (please make the mongoose have a purpose!)and coordinate better.
>
> That’s my take on it, I’m tired of the lone wolf attitude and no one even working towards the objective and I think that’s why.

I would have to say no communication is what really hurts teamwork, not a specific weapon.

17

Two thoughts:

Communication helps hugely but randoms rarely seem to be mic’ed.

I find nothing so frustrating as getting someone down to 1-shot, and there’s no one anywhere to clean them up. Regicide comes to mind.

18

If only I had teammates who went for the objective :frowning:

19

> If only I had teammates who went for the objective :frowning:

I stopped playing objective in every game out there because nobody does go for it. My K/D went down in Reach .2 because I went for the objective so much without so much as an extra man for help. I was the only going for the ball/bomb/flag/hill 90% of the time. So I gave up on objectives, for all shooters I play. Same happened to me in CoD and Battlefield.

What should happen is that 343 should make their CSR not only in-game but also make it so it keeps track of how often you score and win objectives and objective games.

20

I’m not sure why so many posts keep saying they’ll just use Battle Rifles etc. I’m saying no precision weapons at all at spawn, I used DMR in my ragnarok example because that is what everyone uses.

Now, obviously a big issue is communication. There is no doubt about that but without being able to really implement features to fix that (if somebody won’t use a mic, that’s basically end of discussion) not much can be done. However, as someone pointed out, the drive to win is not great. Unless you count commendations but 1) who cares? and 2) there requirement are so far fetched for most who is going to bother.

Personally, I think the KD stat is a horrible idea. The best games I’ve played for team work do not include the KD stat and it really helps eliminate stat padders. Also, ranking would be a much better system if ranking up required wins! I think kills and any other medals etc should grant you the experience but rely on you successfully winning the game. So if you have that one player on the enemy team just going for kills, it wouldn’t do any good if he can’t help his team for the win. I’ve seen this in games too and it is a much better system, for me anyway. And please add a forced respawn timer on Oddball

If lets say, you forget the very obvious communication problem & lacking win bonuses issue and focus more on precision weapons. Here it why I think it really affects gameplay overall.

A mongoose holds 2 players, ideally a great vehicle for flag runs, getting to a point quickly etc. But when is the last time you’ve ever wanted to even jump on one? With this vehicle especially, I never touch because I know, I’m a sitting target for DMR/BR fire. Now if the weapons swapped and I would be riding through assault rifle fire…much less intimidated. It might do damage, but it won’t kill you.

Same with warthogs (despite the very easy plasma pistol/grenade kills) getting shot out of the turret is the same difficulty as hitting a player running cross map.

I’ll use complex capture the flag as more of an idea. How often do you get this gametype/map and constantly get stuck with players on the main base roof with a perfect view to your spawn (if you spawn on gravlift side). I never see them move, go for the flag, nothing. Just pick off spawns and hide when shot at. If spawned with say an AR, what are the odds there will be a person on the roof firing madly at you with the gun. It just won’t happen.

Taking objectives out of the consideration, I feel it would make players more aware. At this rate, you barely have to watch your radar or positioning. For the most part, you can kill enemies before they will even touch the outskirts of your radar’s range. If a open top vehicle comes at you, its easy enough to fire out the driver and if your higher up than an opponent, you’ll probably beat them just because your head is harder to hit (this is ridiculous if someone has jetpack, near impossible to finish them off if they fly directly up). So naturally, precision fighters will find high ground, not even use the maps cover and pay no attention to the flow of the map. Honestly, why would anyone? I can get more kills on the roof in Complex than anywhere else with minimal risk since I have the height and first shot advantage.

And forget King of the Hill. If you try for that it’s almost a guarantee slaughter from DMR/BR fire from enemies just up high with clear view of the hill. That variant is extremely frustrating with precision spawns. Never have I raged so much on a game type than Hill. Always turns into slayer with anyone entering the hill acting as a marked sitting duck.