Why K:D, Deaths, streaks and other stats are bad, and how PS2 can evolve the genre

[Saintlycow]

Originally Posted by SKYeXile

That never works, its a PvP game, you need to encourage fighting eachother, kills need to be the primary method of advancement, if not people will simply avoid combat and rotate bases or something else equally lame...see WAR and Aion...in WAR people avoid fighting and rotate BOs between eahcother to get renown, in Aion everybody plays the one faction and fights the NPC mobs at the forts for GLORIOUS "PVP" GEAR.

I can totally see your point. If the points are unbalanced, then people would simply trade bases. Or play kill whore. Or destroy vehicles all day

Realistically, they need to distribute points so that they all give APPROXIMATELY the same amount based on effort. Capping a base should give out the points that killing X guys in that time would give.

EDIT: Thanks for the reply, SKYeXile and Aurmanite

[Fortress]

Killing will always be encouraged because it's pretty hard to take a base when your enemy is still shooting at you. Dying will always be discouraged because it's hard to take a base when you're dead. I really don't see how you can make kills not matter, or render killwhores irrelevant in a shooter game.

Now for on topic: Don't count deaths from out-of-combat TK's to reduce griefing. Tyvm.

[PrISM]

They aren't going to change the stat system, kill-streaks and whatever else the terrible modern day FPSs have. The MWs and BFs are what make the money and that's what SOE is trying to go after. Whatever those games have to attract players is what this game will have.

[DaddyTickles]

Originally Posted by PrISM

They aren't going to change the stat system, kill-streaks and whatever else the terrible modern day FPSs have. The MWs and BFs are what make the money and that's what SOE is trying to go after. Whatever those games have to attract players is what this game will have.

Exactly, a f2p mmo of any type relies on large participator figures. In order to get there, Higby is going to give new players familiar hooks to pull them in.

Better get used to it.

[Drakkonan]

The solution is simple. Allow the player to make these stats public or private.

In modern first-person-shooters, it's become commonplace to calculate and record an array of statistics, and stats such as these do occasionally prove useful, if for nothing more than benchmarking yourself. However, when they're made public, they're often made more important than they really should be by the community.

It's important to remember that making these stats public, and thus meaningful (it's inevitable), will discourage 'team-play' and promote the stat-whore mentality that's so prominent throughout the genre. I'd like to be a support-only player, but if I play that role, I'm likely going to have a very poor KDR. That doesn't mean I'll be a less effective player (in fact the opposite is true), but that's the impression the community will get. While that's our fault, as players, the developers can assist us in overcoming our tendencies to place too much importance in trivial stats for the sake of simplicity.

DICE was on the right track. While not allowing stats to be made private, they kept SPM as the main stat, and relegated KDR down to the bottom of battlelog stat profiles. That doesn't mean players no longer looked for it, but at least they made an attempt.

To be honest, I'm more worried about how they're going to balance support points. Will the only means to maintain a high SPM be to get a high number of kills, or will healing/resupplying award enough points to keep the support players competitive with the MAXes in terms of points? In early BF3 beta, heals/resupplies only awarded 10 points, and after spamming every thread I could find making light of the imbalance, the amount was eventually raised to 20/30(team).

I suppose another alternative would be to have the option of disabling stat tracking at character creation. Obviously, stats would have to be calculated and stored internally to award experience, but one of the joys of PS was not having to worry about maintaining stats at all.

[Cosmical]

Wow you guys have gone nuts over this. Lets not forget, all of this information will be recorded for balancing and development purposes anyway, so why should we not have access to it?

Think of it like BF3, kill to deaths are a means to an end. But you can still be the best player by just being there doing your job. A medic can outclass most kill heavy players just by healing.

Might be worth adding something like a broadcast when bases are captured, saying who the top players are for different reasons. healing, repairs, ammo, objectives. Then people will focus more on the fame of helping, than kill streaks.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by DaddyTickles

Exactly, a f2p mmo of any type relies on large participator figures. In order to get there, Higby is going to give new players familiar hooks to pull them in.

Better get used to it.

Death stat tracking is not a hook. It will neither attract nor deter anyone, and it will negatively impact the game.

Just because it was done in a successful game doesn't mean it's appropriate for another game. I would hope the PS2 devs are intelligent enough to think about things and not blindly add them to the game simply because some other game had the feature. From what we've seen of PS2 so far clearly they do think about things.

I'm hoping they give this one some real thought because the stats they make salient to players are the stats people will work to improve either consciously or subconsciously. It's the power of suggestion. Merely having something there is implying that it is important. Therefore they should emphasize things that truly are important for this game.

[StumpyTheOzzie]

I gave up at page 16. I've previously said my piece that I think every single iota of information should be tracked, right down to how many metres you've travelled in enemy SOIs and outside enemy SOIs.

I do agree that in a game where deaths and kills are not relevant to the outcome of the game they are basically meaningless but I like to know "stuff".

If somebody spawns from your gal and goes on to hack a door, you should get a "door hack assist"

Maybe we can keep the K/D thing in, but make it less relevant than team based objectives? 5 "score" points for an assist, 10 "score" points for a kill and a billion "score" points for a CC hack.

subject to balance.

[megamold]

Originally Posted by StumpyTheOzzie

Maybe we can keep the K/D thing in, but make it less relevant than team based objectives? 5 "score" points for an assist, 10 "score" points for a kill and a billion "score" points for a CC hack.

subject to balance.

this.

just because they have a tracker for kills and deaths, that doesnt mean that all scoring will be based upon this stat like it is in CoD.

i dont think its a helpfull stat to track but neither do i believe it will "ruin" the game, thats just adding drama for no reason.

and who ever said you cant have a positive K/D ratio and still be a great team player?

at the end of the day the people who will play this game like CoD will die quickly and not get many kills ( since they just do random shit ) while the team players will allways be in the face of the enemy taking bases wich will result in more kills and if you are any good a higher K/D ratio
its not the K/D ratio that changes the importance gameplay, its the gameplay that changes the importance of the K/D ratio

[Gandhi]

How XP is earned will be far more important than what stats are tracked. If people see they can earn much more XP helping their team than by protecting their kill streak they'll naturally gravitate toward teamwork and objectives.

Not all of them mind you, some will killwhore no matter what. But I don't care about them, I care about the ones who join the game without a clue what to expect and try to figure out the most important aspects based on what's emphasized to them as they play. If they join and see they can make the most XP by racking up kills, kill streaks and dominations then they'll assume that's the point of the game, and that's when the game goes down the shitter.

[FriendlyFire]

I think everyone forgot one important factor, this is Planetside 2.

No matter how much you hate Kill Whores, they will be on your side and the two other factions as well. The impact of their play style is going to be almost nil.

Think about it, they will be getting kills, in the areas you are trying to capture. You are not required to coach, teach or even provide tips to them, they will get kills. A great thing about getting kills in an FPS is, getting kills. If there is any impact on your style of play, it may be that there will be less targets for you to shoot, while you are in the same area as the Kill Whore.

This topic is full of people raging over CoD Kiddies, when this game will not resemble CoD in any way.

[Physed]

I previously mentioned that I'm against the prominently tracked killstreaks and K/D ratios, but I'd like to add one more thought:

The difference between PS and the flavor of the month FPS games is that PS is an MMO. Being an MMO, it has to focus on the community. WoW was built on communities, more specifically guilds, that kept players logging in for years. Therefore, the focus on PS's stat tracking should look like this:

1) The player's contribution to the empire, tracked as score/xp. (Just as it was in PS1)
2) This is further translated to outfit points. (Just as it was in PS1)
3) Each player's outfit points contribute to the overall score of the outfit (Just as it was in PS1)
4) Outfit score should be meaningful and used to purchase or unlock things for outfits that contribute to the empire. (Something that was unfortunately skipped in PS1)

Focus on the community, and the community will continue to play your game. Cater to the flavor of the month FPS teenagers, and you'll lose your whole playerbase when the next CoD comes out.

[icon]

Originally Posted by Physed

Focus on the community, and the community will continue to play your game. Cater to the flavor of the month FPS teenagers, and you'll lose your whole playerbase when the next CoD comes out.

Bingo. Those kids will always want the hottest and latest game, and PS2 easily has the potential to still be the hottest game around even after the next CoD/BF release.

As I personally feel, PS1 is an MMO that focuses an RTS appeal and was implemented as an FPS. It was brilliant for its time and PS2 can continue that legacy, as long as, imo, they maintain that philosophy. Each time I re-watch the GDC videos I feel its just a run of the mill FPS in a large MMO environment map with not much in terms of RTS aspect. Hopefully, playing the beta will change my outlook on this, when we get to experience the day/night shifting, and can focus more on the global strategy of the game.

[FriendlyFire]

I would rather the Devs take a clear direction, than try to "cater" to anyone. The Devs clearly had problems addressing issues the player base brought up in PS1.

The game is going to be accessible to millions, not hundreds of thousands. Offer something that millions of people are going to want to play.

[megamold]

Originally Posted by FriendlyFire

I would rather the Devs take a clear direction, than try to "cater" to anyone. The Devs clearly had problems addressing issues the player base brought up in PS1.

The game is going to be accessible to millions, not hundreds of thousands. Offer something that millions of people are going to want to play.

thats a bit contradictory isnt it?
to offer a game that millions of people want to play you need to try to cater to everyone, thats just the current climate in the gaming industry : user input, user customization, personalisation,....

i'm not saying thats a good thing per se but whatcha gunna do