Skill=/=Difficulty
Edit: took this part out since it caused people to stray from topic.
I don’t need to play halo 4 to know these characteristics are bad, ive played with these in reach and I know they are bad. All im saying is halo 4 will be worse than the trilogy <mark>if</mark> it doesn’t have these traits…
<mark>MULTITASKING</mark>
Its simple as this, the more a player must take into account, the more smarts it takes, so the skillgap is made larger(although its not the only characteristic). So these things such as A As and perks will be good right? Not necessarily, and here’s why.
Functions and objects that SEEM to increase the options/opportunities of gameplay may be the exact opposite. I don’t think anyone wants to dispute that more vhoices takes a smarter, quick minded person to keep track of.
Lets look at jetpack as an example. Lets say there was a building with 3 bridges or ramps to the top, all having a certain advantage and a certain disadvantage if you take them. There’s 3 options here, with difficulty in choosing correctly. What happens when you throw jetpack into the mix? The pathways become useless, the viable choices are eliminated, due to how easily the jetpack has access to the top. There is now a one-way-rules-all function, and we add one element at the almost complete cost of 3.
It doesn’t have to be in the way of maps or jetpack either. Lets look at the new flag no-dropping function. People say “its harder to capture the flag, that makes the game more competitive”. Well that’s simply not true. Hardness is a component, not a definition of competitiveness. This severely limit’s the options a player has to them, removing the decision making skill. The fewer tools a player has to use, <mark>the fewer ways a player can differentiate themselves (and thus become more skillful) from a worse player.</mark>
Lets look at this in the way of say, shotguns in mlg. They would hardly be the rule all weapon with the right settings. They would increase the options for gameplay. Since the sniper and dmr are harder to use, the shotgun should have a very small niche of course, but still be viable. The skill would be in positioning with it and the simple more factors = better gameplay rule. (funfact- a large portion of mlg community wants shotguns in maps)
<mark>BABYSITTING</mark>
A game function should never do the job of a player. Vengeance, the new waypoint on flag, ProV, etc, all do the job of a player, which is locating the enemy. This was perfectly doable in the past, with skill and knowledge of maps. This is an insult to people who have invested their skills in being sneaky or other diversion techniques. (radar does this too)
Look at something like aim assist, it ,literally, aims for the player. People can acknowledge this right away, the more the game does FOR you, the less competitive it is.
<mark>IMPROVEMENT</mark>
Difficulty IS good for gameplay. Its just like I said, it’s a component and not the definition. Although extremely important, and necessary, it should take backseat to the other 2 options.
Lets look at strafing as the example here. Personally, I cant think of one reason we cant have the best strafe in halo 4 out of any game, ever. It would undoubtedly make the game harder, and I think people would enjoy the freedom of motion.
<mark>PUNISH FOR MISTAKES</mark>
There is a right way to do everything. The further one deviates from this, the worse they should do. What do I mean? Largely I mean the kill times in halo. They’ve simply became too long, and are even lengthening more WITH the inclusion of sprint. This frankly surprised me. There is a right way to move around the map, to run the flag, or to flee from an enemy. The further one deviates from this correct way of doing things, the more they should be punished. The longer kill times are, the less it matters. In reach, with bloom, slow kill times, and sprint, it almost didn’t matter at all. You could make the biggest mistake of your life in terms of map positioning, or someone could sneak up behind you, and you still had like a 70% chance of fleeing if they just had a DMR or AR. This simply isn’t right.
There are a lot of good players out there in halo, who simply may not be the best aimers but are very sneaky. We should not rob them of a skill set just to make the game easier for new players.
I personally wish there was stopping power like in CE , it would function great with sprint in my opinion. Get to the fight super quick, but if you mess up, your stuck. Personally I love it in counterstrike. I quickly learned to not over-push myself and realize my mistakes.
Im not advocating for instant kill times. Im thinking of somewhere between halo 1(0.6s) and halo 2(1.5). I think a 1.2 ks would be best. That way you could be punished for messing up, but still have a lot of gunplay involved.
<mark>NO SCOTT-FREES</mark>
There should never be a skill that takes 5 minutes to leanr that makes up for a deficiency in other skills that take months if not years.
Oddball throwing may or may not fall victim to this in Halo 4, it depends if the maps oddball is played on. If theres an off-boundrry map where you can simply throw the ball to make it reset every time your team dies to the better team, it will be skilless. The team wont be punished for losing the ball, and while theyre respawning it will just be sitting exposed in the middle of the map, almost as if they never lost it. I could see it working well on a map like ratsnest, but not maps like guardian.
<mark>REWARD THE BETTER PLAYER</mark>
Functions should NEVER give a bigger defense bonus than offense. The main culprits of this are armor lock, HLS, sprint (reach’s), and things like a bubble shield. The reason is simple: a better player will need to use these less. Lets use armor lock as an example. A good player in a game will need to use AL less to save his life than a bad player. Consequently it helps a bad player more than a good player, as these can only be used to null an attack rather than launch one of your own. Therefore the bad player is put closer to the good player, simply because of the gameplay function.
Im not saying that just because you sit back and don’t rush you’re a defensive player, its quite the opposite in some cases. A nade trap is an example of a passive/offensive play. Cover fire is an example of aggressive/defensive play.
I was really psyched about the possibility of the thruster for mlg for strafing, but now you cant shoot while its done and it largely becomes a defense-only capability…