AGN: Consolidated Community Clash Feedback Thread

[NewSith]

Okay I finally got some time to watch the show and here's my feedback (DA vs BWC):

I'll start by saying that I was amazed with the quality of the show, considering it was pretty mach a fan-made show, started by players without much esport broadcasting experience.

Now more detailed feedback and suggestions:

• Find a solution to latency, because commentary is several seconds ahead.
• It's preferable to have 2 commentators max, since when there're 3 commentators, pandemonium sets loose during a heated battle.
• Before the show, ask the players who can stream (harmlessly for their performance) to put streams up. First person view is always interesting, besides it makes checking out loadouts possible.
• I strongly advise keeping an eye on the score tab ("Tab" button), and point out individual player achievements, since 12v12 is not a very big format and allows for this.
• Similar to the previous point, try and look out for players' achievement druing fights (like killstreaks, AMS destructions etc), and name these players.
• Multiple cameras are great, but I suggest that there's always only 1 on-screen camera with one person responsible for choosing which is active. I can safely bet that Mrs. Hamma can do that. Or else invite a friend to your enterprise.
• The squad roster class callouts are great, but I'd advise some more speculating on how the comp can be used in battles, its strengths and weaknesses. Commentators did that, but they didn't go in-depth.
• Some acting skills would also benefit the show, as some significant pushes should make the commentator sound excited, even if he isn't. A bit more drama always makes watching interesting.
• Less talk about the general stuff, like the environment, unless it's somehow tied to the team, like "the point has alot of cover but Outfit Name did not use it to it's full potential, and, I think, that is why they lost the first wave", etc. Basically you should comment for an informed player rather than a newbie who can't see what's happening.
• Before releasing the recording, I'd suggest making a short Clash Highlights video with some poetic newscaster-like commentary. Something like that* (see the asterisk), shedding some ligh onto the even't main highlights. Avoid the mentions of unrelated things like randoms popping out on the point etc, unless these were gamechanging.
• When showing team comps via squad window, zoom in on the list, so it is actually visible and put an outfit's logo onto screen so people can see whose squad is on the screen even if they don't hear sound.
• It's the first event and it certainly needed polishing, but changing the rules during the event is not exactly a good idea.
• Less webcams even when there's nothing to see on the map. Talking faces are more still than player characters running around in circles, even if it may seem quite the opposite.
• If at all possible - have 2 extra dummy players on two teams with continental map opened at the place of combat to fully see the movements of players. This is not necessarily a screen to show the viewers, but a mere tool to help cameraman (cameramen).

*"After grouping up for their first combat, both teams were using what some may call "unorthodox" comps, Black Widow Company chose to gather MAXes, sacrificing Heavy Assault slots, while DasAnfall decided to use as many Heavy Assaults as possible. DA quickrushed BWC with harrasers and infantry, quickly taking over the point not letting BWC take it back, resulting in BWC losing their first defense rather quickly, despite their hard effort to ensure the proper entrenching with mines and Anti-Vehicular setups. The start of the second half was extremely spectacular as DA had a very interesting tactic in mind: while BWC tried to use the quickrush methods similar to DA's, DA countered their own tactic with droppods raining down from the sky and taking high ground. Successful ambush denied the first strike to their enemy with one successful smoke grenade and..."

[DviddLeff]

After watching my outfits clash against Validius Gamers on MLG this was a nice change of style, instead of spending the time insulting the outfits and missing the action with shots of the warp gate you had multiple angles covered and had some interesting conversation.

I also really like the way you interview the outfits members and get their opinion on the matches.

To improve I would suggest as NewSith has to have streams of the competitors somehow available, perhaps as small windows on the side. Is it possible to have viewers choose which camera to watch?

[Pella]

What time are these Clashes?

I'm sure i can get my guys to stay up late one night to participate. FNO Was 2am and we managed that.

We would love to get some outfit action versus you yanks :P

We can have a USAvEU Situation. Which will be great viewing.

Are there any outfits up for this?

[OblivionTR]

The community clash was a great addition - will be reporting more on social media sites about this. The time worked out great for us, as we already have an op 6 PST Wed!

[Greenthy]

NON EU event is something something ...
racist!

well at the least it's not truely representative.

[Hamma]

Find a solution to latency, because commentary is several seconds ahead.

This is our biggest issue but unfortunately there's no way around this - we are using remote cameras and the lowest I've been able to get delay is about 3-4 seconds. I'll do some thinking and see if I can come up with some solutions during live broadcast.

Also first person is DEFINITELY something we have coming, we just ran into issues doing it this last show.

[NewSith]

Originally Posted by Hamma

This is our biggest issue but unfortunately there's no way around this - we are using remote cameras and the lowest I've been able to get delay is about 3-4 seconds. I'll do some thinking and see if I can come up with some solutions during live broadcast.

Can you please share the origin of the problem with the community, maybe we can figure something out too...




From what I understand:

You have 3 cameras.
At least 2 of them are connected via delayed streams.

If that's the case, why not put all commentators into a separate voice program, so thier streamed voices are translated (broadcasted) through 1 streamer, with delay, as opposed to having them all transmitted live through the studio. From my understanding, the program used for streaming is built-in twitch (without 3d party voice), but if you use a separate twitch program on one of the commentators, he can be the host of the party. Based on that, the Engineering Central (aka Hamma studio) will still be able to move cameras around, although without the ability to participate in discussions during game streams.


If there's a problem of the sort that if you put non-host on screen, the sounds get mixed up (like there's a max shooting on the video, but instead there is a sound of roaring sunderer), you can make streaming based on the separate twitch program for everyone. The issue then is whether you can withstand 3 echos constantly going through your audio.

There's also a possible way to solve the issue above by having 4 streams, but I just don't know if it's at all possible to be streaming 2 things simultaneously, not to even mention - one of them being skype*. But I'm quite sure that at the final destination (Hamma's studio) you can show two mixed streams both with audio, so if it's possible at the starting point, the solution is very preferrable.

This way when it's time to show "the mugs" you'll have 5-10 seconds to prep the google+ conference. And above that, you'll be able to set ANY delay on streams, so that you can do tech stuff and rehersing, while the delayed stream catches up with its live end.

EDIT: And, if you decide to put 5 minute delay on the stream, during the delay takeoff point (where you basically need 5 minutes to fill up the stream gap, you can invite a "guest star" of the previous event (team-leader or any participant), taking an interview and/or asking for predicitons for the following match if the player is familiar with one of the participants; or you can fill it up the "Clash Highlights" video I suggested... The only issue you'll encounter then is what to fill the time in-between the rounds with.

EDIT2: *Okay it's doable:
http://help.twitch.tv/customer/porta.../733542-xsplit
https://v1.xsplit.com/forum/viewtopi...=20165&p=81870

[inigma]

I was the tactical leader for GotR in the GotR vs TRG match last week. My suggestions have already been echoed and responded to by others. Thanks for working hard on making CC a blast of an event.

I recommend:

1. Bases agreed to at least 24 hours in advance.

2. Make event host responsible for hard spawns. (my best sundy driver was held up doing the hard spawn sundy)

3. Have four rounds (yes call them rounds), with halftime after Round 2. Round 5 SDO if a tie. But call them rounds. Call the whole set of rounds a Match.

4. Have Rounds 1 and 2 attack and defend, like it is now. Then halftime. Then have Round 3 be vehicle SDO, and Round 4 infantry SDO. If a tie, then Round 5 SDO would be a pick by the winning toss caller of any of the above: point capture, vehicle SDO, or infantry SDO; and prohibitions/weapons decided by losing toss caller.

5. Rounds 1 and 2 points should be decided by capture of points by timer end + number of kills.

6. Status of teams posted on an overhead HUD, so viewers can see at a glance who is alive or dead. Perhaps # of kills also shown.

7. Timers on display in the stream, both countdown timer, and round timer.

8. Eliminate 3 screen split. Use picture-in-picture instead with one view displayed as the main, with the other two cameras as PIPs at the bottom of the screen. Then rotating to other camera angles as needed.

9. Would be cool if you rotated to a map view with highlights as you comment on the play being watched (while still keeping PIPs for all three cameras to the right side of the screen).


Good fight TRG. It was a blast.

[robocpf1]

About camera angles and positioning:

I felt, and I'm sure TRG felt at some points, that some of the "greatest" moments in the match weren't shown simply due to our outfits moving fast and in various ways without the cameras knowing. I remember at one point GOTR made a really clutch drop to seize [A] during Round 1, and it was an epic moment for us that ended up not being shown, referenced simply as "Oh, GOTR has now taken Point [A]".

During our FNO, Maggie and I shared the same frustration. She would see something happening a few seconds too late and rush over only to catch the very end of the action, so we developed a system where anytime we thought something meaningful or intense might occur, I'd send a /tell to her and she could position beforehand. Regardless of what happened after that, the footage would show sort of what "we wanted it to show", win or lose. If we won the engagement, it would be something GOTR clearly wanted shown, and if we lost, inversely, I'm sure TRG would like to see that specific clip. So even if a glorious MAX rush that we had set up to be an epic victory ended up with us getting wiped, the show still gets fantastic footage.

So my suggestion is to allow the ops leads to send a quick /tell or a voice notification to their assigned cameraperson to let them know "Hey, we're about to drop on [A]" or "Hey, come follow us out of the Spawn Room, we're MAX crashing" so that when there is something one outfit or another wants to show, it will be shown.

[Hamma]

NewSith,

We use a private streaming server for the feeds so I'm not utilizing Twitch to get the commentator feeds (or future FPS feeds). I have 2x observer cams remote (Noxx and Deringer) and 2x live observer cams via capture card. I cannot delay their audio without causing issues on the live feeds. So unfortunately dealing with a 3 second or so delay is our only option without having everyone in the same room.

No matter how we handle it we are going to be stuck with some delay somewhere unfortunately.

[Calista]

To be quite honest with you Hamma I hope SOE commisions Jace Hall's crew to replace FNO. From what I have seen they have an impressive build out that you cannot match. Only MLG comes close.

[Hamma]

They do have a pretty impressive setup but it's 90% live cams not game cams like I need to bring in.

[Calista]

You know it's attention whores.

[Calista]

Hey T-Ray?

[Calista]

Weak