Skillgap=/=Harder: The Real Reason AAs Suck.

Games Other Halo
#1

This post is kinda from another thread, so sorry if its worded weird or repeats some.

In essence, all AAs have atleast 1 thing wrong with them: (if pickup and limited, only #2 is required)

1: They shouldnt alienate other skill bases too much, even if they add more skill in their department (example: long kill times, make shooting a little harder but completely removes importance of map positioning, being sneaky and flanking)(example: jetpack gets to avoid gernades)

2: They should not have bigger bonuses for defensive use than offensive use(jetpack has equal if not more offensive, which is why MLG uses it, buts its OP so its also a pickup)

3: They should never accomplish a job which previously took more skill using a different method. (example: being sneaky without camo and being sneaky with camo)

The main problems with AAs and Sprint is that they reward a player more defensively than offensively. This creates less skillgap. Picture a 1v1, a player who was better would get to use an AA less, due to their defensive nature. Because the better player would need to use it less. This would result in more of a bonus from the AA to go to the lesser player, lowering the skill gap.

They need to be more offensively capable than defensively capable to increase the skillgap, and to not alienate other areas of skillgaps.

A good example is radar (i know, not an actual AA, but still an example) Sure it takes a little bit of skill to use the radar, and encourages head-on-head fighting. This would increase the importance of shooting well. Sounds good, right? But there are entire skills taken away, flanking and knowing the thought patterns of others are almost completely taken away. The AA/radar now does this job for you.

Another example, invis off spawn. Are you good at being sneaky, setting up flanks, or hiding? Well now this AA does 90% of all these jobs for you, at the press of a button.

Sure, its harder to kill the dude if he has invis, but that doesnt mean it adds skillgap.

A good example with nothing to do with AAs. Picture a 1v1 with no radar, and theres a room with 3 exits. A good player would know the estimated time to each door, reasons for going to each door, thought patterns of enemy, and the likely hood for each door. Lets say hes really good, and this results in a 90% success rate of guessing which door is used.

Now same example, but with 20 exits. Its now waaayyyyyy harder, but the player is only successful 10% of the time.

Now lets say the 2 above examples, but with his lesser skilled opponent. His 2 success rates are 40% and 5%.

Sure it was harder for the skilled player, but it alienated the skills he had learned and developed, resulting in an easier game for the lesser opponent.

Discuss.

Edit: oh and as to why aggressive is better:

Someone who does hang back isnt necessarily worse. Lets look at halo 3 for an example, if someone hung back, it was easy to run. But they were still receiving the same benefits as the aggressor.

And typically the aggressor will need less defensive capabilities, if they are better. So a while balanced but slightly tipping the scale in favour of the aggressor will produce a more skilled and fast paced game.

Of course you shouldnt tip it too far in the direction of the aggressor, other wise the skills of defensive strategies would be alienated, but that doesnt mean make an AA which makes defensive strats easier. (i.e. sprint, camo)

> Defensive =/= passive
>
> Offensive =/= aggressive
>
> These words do not mean the same thing. You can be offensive with passiveness, and defensive with aggressiveness.
>
> Some examples:
>
> Aggressive/defensive
> Say your playing doubles oddball, and your buddy has the oddball and is trying to get away but is weak. You jump out very aggressively but with only the intent of staving your opponents off the oddball carrier.
>
> Or as you said, a trap or lure would be a good example of a passive/offensive strategy.
>
>
> And yes, offensive doesnt technically require more skill than defensive, but without offensive being favored, game functions would only serve as a crutch and defensive would be the go-to style for the lesser player, lowering skillgap and slowing down the game.

#2

> This post is kinda from another thread, so sorry if its worded weird or repeats some.
>
> In essence, 3 things wrong with all AAs.
>
> 1: They shouldnt alienate other skill bases too much, even if they add more skill in their department (example: long kill times, make shooting a little harder but completely removes importance of map positioning and flanking)(example: jetpack gets to avoid gernades)

Which is a good reason why button combos are a bad idea for Halo. I know you didn’t mention them, I am.

> 2: bigger bonus for defensive use than offensive use(jetpack has equal if not more offensive, which is why mlg uses it, buts its OP so its also a pickup)

How many “competitive” players hate the offensive use of Sprint?.. the Derpa-Derp I believe it is called. (And by extension, Evade)
How many “competitive” players hate the invisi-sniper who doesn’t sneak around maps but instead maintains an offensive posture from a distance?
Even with offensive capabilities, I don’t see much acceptance of the concepts themselves.

> 3: they should never accomplish a job which previously took more skill using a different method. (example: being sneaky without camo and being sneaky with camo)

Well that’s just not evolving or expanding on what we’ve learned, that’s just simply processing the status quo.
Not just that, but that example really only helps in non-radar lists as the scrambling motion tracker is a dead give away someone is “sneaking” near by.
As with many things, having both skills instead of one is the best “strategy.”
AND, if you can sneak effectively without Active, generally you’ll pick another AA to compliment your skill rather than use the one AA that leaves you vulnerable in other areas that Active doesn’t cover.

#3

> > This post is kinda from another thread, so sorry if its worded weird or repeats some.
> >
> > In essence, 3 things wrong with all AAs.
> >
> > 1: They shouldnt alienate other skill bases too much, even if they add more skill in their department (example: long kill times, make shooting a little harder but completely removes importance of map positioning and flanking)(example: jetpack gets to avoid gernades)
>
> Which is a good reason why button combos are a bad idea for Halo. I know you didn’t mention them, I am.
>
>
>
> > 2: bigger bonus for defensive use than offensive use(jetpack has equal if not more offensive, which is why mlg uses it, buts its OP so its also a pickup)
>
> How many “competitive” players hate the offensive use of Sprint?.. the Derpa-Derp I believe it is called. (And by extension, Evade)
> How many “competitive” players hate the invisi-sniper who doesn’t sneak around maps but instead maintains an offensive posture from a distance?
> Even with offensive capabilities, I don’t see much acceptance of the concepts themselves.
>
>
>
>
> > 3: they should never accomplish a job which previously took more skill using a different method. (example: being sneaky without camo and being sneaky with camo)
>
> Well that’s just not evolving or expanding on what we’ve learned, that’s just simply processing the status quo.
> Not just that, but that example really only helps in non-radar lists as the scrambling motion tracker is a dead give away someone is “sneaking” near by.
> As with many things, having both skills instead of one is the best “strategy.”
> AND, if you can sneak effectively without Active, generally you’ll pick another AA to compliment your skill rather than use the one AA that leaves you vulnerable in other areas that Active doesn’t cover.

1: what skillbase would those alienate?

2: sure those examples are more offensive, but they also dont follow 1st and 3rd rule, they need to follow all 3 to be succesful. Also i would argue overall they are still tipping in favour of the defensive.

3: well i didnt really think of the motion scrambler, but the AA is still effective enough that low level players see its obvious benefits, otherwise they wouldnt choose it, no?

and its not about learnign both strategies, mainly because you can always spawn with camo for one, and just because something that lowers the skillgap will only be in the game a little bit doesnt mean it should be in the game.

#4

Edited by Moderator - Please do not flame/attack others.

*Original post, click at your own discretion.

I don’t normally do this…

But I stopped reading at “Picture a 1v1”

HALO IS A TEAM BASED SHOOTER, YOU DUMB -Yoinks!-!

FIGURE IT OUT ALREADY!

#5

Edited by Moderator - Please do not flame/attack others.

*Original post, click at your own discretion.

Contrary to what you might think… AA’s actually add to the gap.

But you’re idiots. And I don’t know why I’m going to bother explaing to you why.
Because it will go in one ear and out the other.

Invisibile Snipers…hmm might not take much skill to be one.
But look at it from the other side of the barrel. How do you deal with it? THAT IS THE SKILL GAP!

THE GOOD PLAYERS DEAL WITH IT! THE BAD PLAYERS DON’T!

DUHR!!

My god, that took a whole -Yoinking!- brain cell to figure out.

Jetpack…easy to engage, easy to ruin map control… But look at it from the opposite perspective. The good players still maintain map control. The bad players don’t.

You know how many brain cells it took to figure that one out?

How about that Armor Lock? How do you deal with a guy who’s been given a few extra seconds to live, in the hopes a teammate comes to bail him out. Do you forget about all your flanks and all stare at him waiting to come out…and thus get raped in the -Yoink- by his teammate… do you dedicate 1 person on the team to wait for him to come out so the rest can watch for the rest of the enemy? What do you do?

Good players maintain map control, and don’t all suddenly stand there like a deer caught in the headlights. Good players learn to realize when a person has chosen AL and avoids melee confrontations with said players at all times. Good players don’t waste grenades on a person who still has plenty of charge left.

Good players, actually have a BIGGER advantage than bad players when using Armor Lock… Good players actually have a teamm that will come save their -Yoink- before AL runs out. Bad players…only delay the inevitable.

So … THERE IS STILL A SKILL GAP. In fact, that skill gap has increased BIG TIME! But you’re idiots, and I honestly can’t understand where you people get your logic from.

No really, evaluate the outcome of a really good team all using armor lock.
Now compare that to a team of -Yoinks!- using armorlock.

Who gets the bigger advantage? The one who has teammates who will actually save his -Yoink- before it runs out.

Who complains the most about Armor Lock? The one who has teammates who will actually save his -Yoink- before it runs out.

Am I the ONLY one that see how -Yoinking!- stupid these people are?

#6

Smaller skill gap is good.

People play videogames for one of two reasons: to win, or to have fun. Most of the time, people have fun by winning. But you get a problem when winning is too easy–it’s not fun any more. Likewise, when it’s too hard to win and you’re just hopelessly staring at your TV, the game isn’t fun.

Both those examples come from higher skill gap. Think about it; if the skill gap is as big as you say it should be, the “pros” would win every single game and the “casuals” would never win anything. Sounds pretty boring. With a small skill gap, the game becomes intense and competetive again, automatically generating more “fun.”

Look at it this way. Just for an example, let’s say there are four categories of players: noob, casual (decent), casual (good), and pro/competetive. A noob, by definition, is new to the game. Until he gets the hang of the game (which might take a little while in campaign), ever other player group will beat him. However, as he gets better, he’ll start beating decent casuals until he becomes one of them. Now, he normally beats noobs, often beats decent casuals, and sometimes beats good casuals. Ideally, his skill will keep increasing until he almost always beats noobs, normally beats decent casuals, often beats good casuals, and sometimes beats pros. And so on and so forth until he reaches the top.

This is good–everybody has somebody to play without being overwhelmed by their skill. If you increase the skill gap, however, a player might get stuck in, say, decent casual and never get any better at the game because he’s being beaten so badly by everyone else that it’s impossible to pick up new skills. Over time, players will migrate towards one extreme or the other (picture a reverse bell curve) until there’s a huge no man’s land between the two skills. This will be almost impossible to pass–the people you play with and beat don’t offer any new skills to pick up, and the people that beat you beat you too badly for you to pick up skills.

Throw in AAs. These lesson the skill gap–a good thing! Think about it, noobs have something right off the bat to combat decent casuals, but the more experienced players will still generally win–it will just be more competetive. Quickly, the noobs learn from the casual players how to more effectively use their AAs. Good casuals, on the other hand, don’t necessarily need AAs to do well. But, because of the addition of AAs, they always have decent competetion from lower skill sets. Pros don’t need AAs at all, but this doesn’t mean they can’t use them–they’ll just use them for different things than the noobs, who rely on them. And again, good casuals can effectively combat pros through their own use of AAs.

What does this accomplish? Look at the skill match-up again: noobs often beat casuals and sometimes beat decent casuals. Decent casuals often beat noobs and good casuals and rarely beat pros. Good casuals normally beat noobs, often beat decent casuals, and sometimes beat pros. Pros still are at the top, but only most of the time beat good casuals, instead of always.

What does this mean for actaully playing the game? Because so many more players can compete against you, you face a much more varied play style. This gives you great competetion, insuring that the game doesn’t become a boring win, and also shows different ways of using something that you might not have thought of before. This will happen without AAs (with a large skill gap), but it will take a very long, frustrating time. This allows you to more quickly move between skill levels–up and down–and creates a much more rounded player overall.

So everyone should be happy–noobs have a chance, decent casuals can compete with the vast majority of players, good casuals can beat pros with regularity, and pros have a much wider variety of play styles to combat–in short, the game is a little harder for those who are good and a little easier for those who are bad.

Isn’t this good? Don’t we want competetion? What’s worse than popping into a game to find yourself on a team of pros against a team of pros? You don’t do anything–the most helpful thing you can do for your team is hide and don’t die. Likewise, isn’t it annoying to fight against nothing but far inferior players time and time again, winning with little to no effort? Okay, so that can be fun…sometimes. What if you just crave competition, like so many of the community claim to do? Smaller skill gap means more competition and faster improvement.

#7

> Smaller skill gap is good.
>
> People play videogames for one of two reasons: to win, or to have fun. Most of the time, people have fun by winning. But you get a problem when winning is too easy–it’s not fun any more. Likewise, when it’s too hard to win and you’re just hopelessly staring at your TV, the game isn’t fun.
>
> Both those examples come from higher skill gap. Think about it; if the skill gap is as big as you say it should be, the “pros” would win every single game and the “casuals” would never win anything. Sounds pretty boring. With a small skill gap, the game becomes intense and competetive again, automatically generating more “fun.”
>
> Look at it this way. Just for an example, let’s say there are four categories of players: noob, casual (decent), casual (good), and pro/competetive. A noob, by definition, is new to the game. Until he gets the hang of the game (which might take a little while in campaign), ever other player group will beat him. However, as he gets better, he’ll start beating decent casuals until he becomes one of them. Now, he normally beats noobs, often beats decent casuals, and sometimes beats good casuals. Ideally, his skill will keep increasing until he almost always beats noobs, normally beats decent casuals, often beats good casuals, and sometimes beats pros. And so on and so forth until he reaches the top.
>
> This is good–everybody has somebody to play without being overwhelmed by their skill. If you increase the skill gap, however, a player might get stuck in, say, decent casual and never get any better at the game because he’s being beaten so badly by everyone else that it’s impossible to pick up new skills. Over time, players will migrate towards one extreme or the other (picture a reverse bell curve) until there’s a huge no man’s land between the two skills. This will be almost impossible to pass–the people you play with and beat don’t offer any new skills to pick up, and the people that beat you beat you too badly for you to pick up skills.
>
> Throw in AAs. These lesson the skill gap–a good thing! Think about it, noobs have something right off the bat to combat decent casuals, but the more experienced players will still generally win–it will just be more competetive. Quickly, the noobs learn from the casual players how to more effectively use their AAs. Good casuals, on the other hand, don’t necessarily need AAs to do well. But, because of the addition of AAs, they always have decent competetion from lower skill sets. Pros don’t need AAs at all, but this doesn’t mean they can’t use them–they’ll just use them for different things than the noobs, who rely on them. And again, good casuals can effectively combat pros through their own use of AAs.
>
> What does this accomplish? Look at the skill match-up again: noobs often beat casuals and sometimes beat decent casuals. Decent casuals often beat noobs and good casuals and rarely beat pros. Good casuals normally beat noobs, often beat decent casuals, and sometimes beat pros. Pros still are at the top, but only most of the time beat good casuals, instead of always.
>
> What does this mean for actaully playing the game? Because so many more players can compete against you, you face a much more varied play style. This gives you great competetion, insuring that the game doesn’t become a boring win, and also shows different ways of using something that you might not have thought of before. This will happen without AAs (with a large skill gap), but it will take a very long, frustrating time. This allows you to more quickly move between skill levels–up and down–and creates a much more rounded player overall.
>
> So everyone should be happy–noobs have a chance, decent casuals can compete with the vast majority of players, good casuals can beat pros with regularity, and pros have a much wider variety of play styles to combat–in short, the game is a little harder for those who are good and a little easier for those who are bad.
>
> Isn’t this good? Don’t we want competetion? What’s worse than popping into a game to find yourself on a team of pros against a team of pros? You don’t do anything–the most helpful thing you can do for your team is hide and don’t die. Likewise, isn’t it annoying to fight against nothing but far inferior players time and time again, winning with little to no effort? Okay, so that can be fun…sometimes. What if you just crave competition, like so many of the community claim to do? Smaller skill gap means more competition and faster improvement.

When adding a strict skill-based ranking system all of your reasons for why a lower skill gap is a good, is gone. Then it suddenly became nothing but to help bad players get better at the game.

#8

It’s hard to imagine a 1v1 scenario because we do not have a 1v1 playlist. Usually you are accompanied with at least 7 other people. Sometimes, all of them have their guns against you, and each other. Other times, you got 4 pointing at you, and 3 guns with you.

How do you take care of an invisible sniper? You announce there is one, get the team to attack him and he dies. Obviously, he’s in a position that can be reached by foot, and with Pro-Vision, you can find out where he is hiding when you get close enough for a scan. On top of this, Armor Lock is gone, so the only human shields this guy can have is the ones that do go down.

Armor Abilities can be used like weapons. Treat them as such.

#9

Armor abilities add to the skill gap the same way the rockets do. When everyone employs the same tactic the same way with the same great success it doesn’t add to the skill gap, it lessens it. The tactic needs to require SKILL in order for the gap to exist. I make the rocket analogy because they’re easy to use and most players use them with the same high success. There’s no higher class of sprint swords players, they’re all the same and they’re all extremely successful. There’s no skill involved in running away. Rocket jetpack takes slightly more skill than using the rockets themselves. Sniper camo is dependent on the skill of the sniper, but in the hands of bad player can still deter a good non camoed sniper.

#10

MR EOS speaks the truth. So called “good players” need to evolve their strategies instead of complaining about change.

#11

> Smaller skill gap is good.
>
> People play videogames for one of two reasons: to win, or to have fun. Most of the time, people have fun by winning. But you get a problem when winning is too easy–it’s not fun any more. Likewise, when it’s too hard to win and you’re just hopelessly staring at your TV, the game isn’t fun.
>
> Both those examples come from higher skill gap. Think about it; if the skill gap is as big as you say it should be, the “pros” would win every single game and the “casuals” would never win anything. Sounds pretty boring. With a small skill gap, the game becomes intense and competetive again, automatically generating more “fun.”

A skill gap isn’t there so pros can play directly against casuals and crush them, it’s to create an extremely deep and very difficult to master competitive environment. It’s to create a huge spectrum in levels of play that gives the game depth and produces a learning curve. The easier it is to reach the highest level, the less value it has. I wouldn’t find mlg entertaining if anyone could do it and there was no skill gap.

It’s true in a game by game basis, you want a small skill gap. Player get matched up with similarly skilled players, but that’s what the matchmaking system is for.

#12

> Posted by the OP
> The main problems with AAs and Sprint is that they reward a player more defensively than offensively. This creates less skillgap

Well I’m really not one to get into the contrived -Yoink- of competitive play. Sufficed to say there can’t possibly be a discussion about skillgap until you’ve both created a quantitative definition for skill AND quantified the difference between one skill and another. As it stands I haven’t seen anyone come up with a convincing qualitative definition of skill, (as the phrase “what skill in particular” should demonstrate well enough) but that’s a thesis paper of a post and I don’t want to get into it any more than I have.

But to AA’s, I actually agree with the “defense only=bad” argument. Not because there’s less of a nebulous difference in value between nebulous behaviors. I agree because in only approaching combat from the side of short-circuiting a kill past armor abilities have added a considerable amount of frustration to the game, mainly on the part of the player who may have been able to ping that sniper out of his hole if the best possible tent wasn’t pitched up there for him. However in some respects the player whose now enjoying a new lease on his armor locked/evaded/sprinted life is also frustrated because his life has only been prolonged by an ability which stepped outside the confines of what we all would probably consider “normal” halo gameplay removing the need for that player to compensate/adapt/play for/to/around the situation and so develop as a player in the grand venue of Halo’s entire gameplay structure for the lessons learned. (Now I don’t want this to make me sound like an miser against anything that’s new to Halo. I’m a miser against additions to gameplay that don’t generally concern themselves with it’s extant structure such that they’ve been “tacked on” to provide a “gimmick.”)

Quite simply I view most AA’s as Staples brand easy buttons which get you through combat by doing something completely out of the ordinary for Halo. How you play becomes largely a search for the best possible means to initiate an extra-dimensional jump from which you can better approach your opponent to roundly -Yoink- him over. Now if Halo actually had a single extra-dimensional jump ability I might be happier with Halo 4 because it could be better integrated into the game but with so many of these little buggers (ie. more than two) the sandbox, level design, and the game as a whole can’t possibly be built to deliver the best experience across the full, multi-dimensional span of AA driven gameplay.

Therefore, they suck. What I’d like to see instead is a diversification of AA’s into the “equipment” catagory to encompass more than just “Ha ha, I’m not dead!” (Forerunner vision is probably a step in the right direction) and a reduction in the amount of tacked on -Yoink- Bungie blighted us with in Halo Reach in their “Smash the hotel room” exit strategy from the franchise. Namely, Active Camo and the Jet Pack which I must admit I’m a fan of in other games but I just don’t think it can work well for an arena shooter like Halo.

This isn’t to bring Halo to the ideal state. It’s just to bring it closer.

#13

Annnnd this thread will accomplish nothing.

people need to stop acting like they know how the game will play and trying to convince 343 to make AA’s some other way lmao its just a colossal waste of time for these threads xD

#14

> Annnnd this thread will accomplish nothing.

No thread has ever accomplished anything. That’s the point of the internet.

#15

>

I absolutely agree, the armor abilities in the right hands have a the potential to amplify the skill gap. But it goes both ways. Because the armor abilities themselves don’t require skill to use, both teams use them the same way. If a good team with AL is playing against a bad team with AL the game will turn out the same as if they all had sprint. The good team will win. AL does not require a lot of skill to use and so it doesn’t add to the skill gap. Rockets don’t add to the skill gap. A bad player with rockets can be just as successful as a good player. The sniper DOES, because difficulty of use creates the skill gap.

#16

>

Its an example, good god.

#17

>

It’s easier to see the skill gap from the top looking down. Being at the bottom looking up, you really can’t see what happens at the top. You’re just rambling guesses looking silly.

#18

>

Did you not read at all? First off just because somethings harder to do doesnt make the skill gap higher.

Secondly, its not always an extremely uneven game. Sometimes you would be barely better than a team, but lose because they use a jetpack.

Calm down.

And with your example of armor lock, that does nothing but create a rich-get-richer situation, demanding LESS skill of the BETTER to do good, since every life they get a jail-free card.

#19

> It’s hard to imagine a 1v1 scenario because we do not have a 1v1 playlist. Usually you are accompanied with at least 7 other people. Sometimes, all of them have their guns against you, and each other. Other times, you got 4 pointing at you, and 3 guns with you.
>
> How do you take care of an invisible sniper? You announce there is one, get the team to attack him and he dies. Obviously, he’s in a position that can be reached by foot, and with Pro-Vision, you can find out where he is hiding when you get close enough for a scan. On top of this, Armor Lock is gone, so the only human shields this guy can have is the ones that do go down.
>
> Armor Abilities can be used like weapons. Treat them as such.

Ok, imagine that same situation, but the other teammates are across the map. Happy?

Secondly, offering your “strategies” is illogical. You cannot dedicate your entire team to one person, otherwise you have 3 other people getting free shots in the back.

Thats like saying if you have to face a person with infinite rockers “just dodge the rockets”

#20

> Armor abilities add to the skill gap the same way the rockets do. When everyone employs the same tactic the same way with the same great success it doesn’t add to the skill gap, it lessens it. The tactic needs to require SKILL in order for the gap to exist. I make the rocket analogy because they’re easy to use and most players use them with the same high success. There’s no higher class of sprint swords players, they’re all the same and they’re all extremely successful. There’s no skill involved in running away. Rocket jetpack takes slightly more skill than using the rockets themselves. Sniper camo is dependent on the skill of the sniper, but in the hands of bad player can still deter a good non camoed sniper.

Thats because 1: the AAs themselves take little skill to use, while taking away from other skills such as sneakiness(camo) and map positioning(jetpack)

2: You dont spawn with rockets. The skill in rockets is GETTING the rockets, and rockets are youre reward for using better teamwork, skill, etc.

3: It depends, if jetpack was pickedup or spawned with. Picked up its an earned advantage that takes more skill. It also lessens the importance of map control and map positioning, so it should be offset by being a pickup, since more skill is added in GETTING the jetpack.