NEW Pub LEVI and Small X in Testing

[Shadowmere]

I've read this entire thread and I'm liking how Qan attempts to take all input on board and compromise to get the best results, effectively working with the community. Don't think people consider the fact that we could easily have this fool that does what he wants without any regard for the rest of us.

What I'm actually wanting to post about is something that doesn't seem to have been considered yet. People say a whole range of things about the cloaker, but as a pretty decent lev/terr/jav myself I would like to point out that a decent cloaker on the enemy team can have 1 more consequence, which is to do with the base terrier.

A decent base terrier that preserves their energy, can and will frequently survive when they see their whole team blow up by a big lev bomb blast, due to its high energy level and recharge rates being what they are. This survivability is from experience only available to the terrier when they do NOT use x radar. What has not been said is that while the terrier is FORCED to keep x radar enabled at all times due to this decent pesky cloaker that just won't leave flagroom alone, it leaves the terrier much more vulnerable for a longer period of time due to the reduced energy recharge rate from x radar. As a result, surviving a direct impact from level 1 or 2 bullets, and javelin bomb blasts becomes much more difficult, to the point I've actually been commenting about terriers being 'squishy' while having x radar enabled. Cloakers that are visible on the map does not actually render cloakers as weak, since high activity in flagroom will cover its blue map dot up with the blue dots from other ships flying around and so you still need x radar to effectively stop them.

As for the cloaker bullet spread.. it may have been a little big for its size in the past but as for how people used it, I don't think criticism for its high spread is warranted. It was easy enough to dodge as the cloaker just sat shooting through a gap repeatedly. You run into it, that's not the bullet spread's fault, but your own. As it is right now you can barely make out that it's actually shooting 3 bullets. The spread is very narrow. In my opinion a spread between what it is now, and what it was with the previous small x would be preferable. But in saying that.. the old high spread would allow people to dodge it by flying in between the bullets which would then not be possible.

My personal view and experience:

A lancaster bullet 1-hit kills a cloaker due to their low max energy. Javelin bombs also don't need to hit close to an x to get them out. That's two big weaknesses, plus both of those ships have a huge multifire coverage that will weaken x to the point of insta death or very low energy rendering them useless until they recharge.
So an x has no business in a busy flagroom. I've already experienced that painful fact myself.

As for the old small x and outside of ear campers shooting multifire to flagroom; the spread was so big there was no dodging those bullets. If you weren't going around the small bar at the very top of the flagroom, but instead from in front of the flag, those bullets hit you, as they covered the whole space from the bar to the cram bar. It was too big.
I do admit the multifire is very tiny now, but it was too big before.

[LadyHawk]

I've read this entire thread and I'm liking how Qan attempts to take all input on board and compromise to get the best results, effectively working with the community. Don't think people consider the fact that we could easily have this fool that does what he wants without any regard for the rest of us.

What I'm actually wanting to post about is something that doesn't seem to have been considered yet. People say a whole range of things about the cloaker, but as a pretty decent lev/terr/jav myself I would like to point out that a decent cloaker on the enemy team can have 1 more consequence, which is to do with the base terrier.

A decent base terrier that preserves their energy, can and will frequently survive when they see their whole team blow up by a big lev bomb blast, due to its high energy level and recharge rates being what they are. This survivability is from experience only available to the terrier when they do NOT use x radar. What has not been said is that while the terrier is FORCED to keep x radar enabled at all times due to this decent pesky cloaker that just won't leave flagroom alone, it leaves the terrier much more vulnerable for a longer period of time due to the reduced energy recharge rate from x radar. As a result, surviving a direct impact from level 1 or 2 bullets, and javelin bomb blasts becomes much more difficult, to the point I've actually been commenting about terriers being 'squishy' while having x radar enabled. Cloakers that are visible on the map does not actually render cloakers as weak, since high activity in flagroom will cover its blue map dot up with the blue dots from other ships flying around and so you still need x radar to effectively stop them.

As for the cloaker bullet spread.. it may have been a little big for its size in the past but as for how people used it, I don't think criticism for its high spread is warranted. It was easy enough to dodge as the cloaker just sat shooting through a gap repeatedly. You run into it, that's not the bullet spread's fault, but your own. As it is right now you can barely make out that it's actually shooting 3 bullets. The spread is very narrow. In my opinion a spread between what it is now, and what it was with the previous small x would be preferable. But in saying that.. the old high spread would allow people to dodge it by flying in between the bullets which would then not be possible.

[Azov]

Now we just need to fix that rocket on the weasel

[qan]

Had to edit that one for clarity. Sorry about that. Bounty.

Many items are also receiving a cost cut, as their application has shown to be somewhat limited with the new !buy zones. Of particular interest is the cost of Antiwarp, which has been significantly reduced to help deal with the LT menace. Give spider + anti a shot the next time you look to go hunting.

[bounty]

NEW !deploy LT hunting option

LT hunters now have a new weapon in the arsenal against those pesky pro LTs. The new weapon is called !deploy - ships 1,2,3,7 can pm the tw-pub with !deploy to be warped to roof instantly any time during a round, to a random spot up top near rock ring. The first use is free then 500, 1000, 2000, 4000, 8000, etc. pubbux for each use thereafter. Deploy count resets after each round.

The LT hunting freq 99 can deploy from anywhere in the arena, whereas anyone else must be inside base.

This will make for intense hunting and element of surprise, and possibly a new dimension to the basing game. :rifle:

[Shadowmere]

can we fire qan and get someone else to fix the ships plz

Perhaps you could browse the thread and contribute yourself:

Re: SMALL WEASEL, I'm going to be trying some settings myself. Unfortunately I can't find an arena with the last used small weasel settings. (Trying to keep this from happening again by creating backups of all major settings we change, especially pub.) So many combinations and tweaks are possible.

I'm going to do something a little unorthodox, but something that as the new dev sysop guy I feel more comfortable doing than I would have in the past... Here are the settings for the current large Weasel. TW settings used to be some sort of protected holy esoteric knowledge, but especially Weasel? Not so much. So here is what we have. If you guys want to come up with your own weasel, try making your own server or the like, or just try modifying these numbers and I can put them up in an arena for you so we can test them. Note that for small Weasel, energy has traditionally been a little over 1000, less than 1040, so a L2 bullet kills it in 1 hit, Radius=7 so it can get through holes, and it's not had access to stealth. But it still COULD have access to stealth, larger energy, even smaller radius, etc etc etc. Don't let preconceived ideas limit you too much. The goal is to make a ship that works in pub, not ape the past.

[Weasel]
SuperTime=1
ShieldsTime=1
Gravity=1500
GravityTopSpeed=100
BulletFireEnergy=208
MultiFireEnergy=242
BombFireEnergy=32000
BombFireEnergyUpgrade=0
LandmineFireEnergy=32000
LandmineFireEnergyUpgrade=0
BulletSpeed=1000
BombSpeed=1
BulletFireDelay=40
MultiFireDelay=40
BombFireDelay=30
LandmineFireDelay=20
MultiFireAngle=888
CloakEnergy=800
StealthEnergy=500
AntiWarpEnergy=32000
XRadarEnergy=32000
MaximumRotation=130
MaximumThrust=24
MaximumSpeed=6000
MaximumRecharge=1250
MaximumEnergy=1020
InitialRotation=130
InitialThrust=12
InitialSpeed=1200
InitialRecharge=1250
InitialEnergy=1020
UpgradeRotation=0
UpgradeThrust=0
UpgradeSpeed=0
UpgradeRecharge=0
UpgradeEnergy=0
AfterburnerEnergy=4000
BombThrust=0
BurstSpeed=1
BurstShrapnel=1
TurretThrustPenalty=0
TurretSpeedPenalty=0
TurretLimit=0
RocketTime=150
InitialBounty=3
MaxMines=0
RepelMax=1
BurstMax=0
DecoyMax=1
ThorMax=0
BrickMax=0
RocketMax=1
PortalMax=0
InitialRepel=1
InitialBurst=0
InitialBrick=0
InitialRocket=1
InitialThor=0
InitialDecoy=0
InitialPortal=0
BombBounceCount=0
CloakStatus=2
StealthStatus=2
XRadarStatus=0
AntiWarpStatus=0
DamageFactor=3000
PrizeShareLimit=0
AttachBounty=3
ShrapnelMax=0
ShrapnelRate=0
MaxGuns=3
MaxBombs=0
InitialGuns=3
InitialBombs=0
EmpBomb=0
SeeMines=0
DoubleBarrel=0
SoccerBallFriction=12
SoccerBallProximity=64
SoccerThrowTime=1200
SoccerBallSpeed=2500
SeeBombLevel=2
DisableFastShooting=0
Radius=0

[bandcampgirl]

can we fire qan and get someone else to fix the ships plz

[Azov]

LEVI fans rejoice, guns are now 500 energy to fire. 2 sets of bullets can now be fired to kill an enemy with 1500 energy, and with current recharge rate a 3rd shot is far behind. This makes the guns very effective again!:ship4:-:sneaky:

Great news!

[bounty]

LEVI fans rejoice, guns are now 500 energy to fire. 2 sets of bullets can now be fired to kill an enemy with 1500 energy, and with current recharge rate a 3rd shot is NOT far behind! This makes the guns very effective again!:ship4:-:sneaky:

[qan]

If your going to give one ship a huge advantage over every other ship in the game. See that it is openly being abused already as if LT wasn't abused before this change to L3 what do you expect the end game to be? What balance are you looking for when one ship can destroy every ship in base. No other ship has ANYWHERE near that ability.

It can be very disruptive, to be sure. But even though when I pub I'm almost exclusively a baser, and most of the work I've done on pub over the years has been geared toward increasing basing activity (because, in the end, it's what keeps pubs going, and arguably where the most complex and interesting play is to be found), I don't think that pub is "only basing."

The way I see it (not saying this is how it is, but this is my personal perspective): Some of TW pub is about playing in a way other people don't always like, messing around a bit. You are free to do as you please, though basing is generally rewarded more than other kinds of play. So you can duel in a WB around the safes, you can just spawnkill, you can mine the tube as a private freq shark, you can Weasel levis in spawn to your heart's content, and you can also LT. Traditionally, Levis have had L3 bombs. They were changed to L2 in the last couple of years, but we put a graphic over them so they didn't appear yellow and LTs would not get so angry. (Not a big fan of this cover-up, though I can sort of understand the reasoning.)

Levis are incredibly disruptive, especially on a good terr. They can get that 10-1 K/D you talk about (so long as they aren't getting spawnkilled relentlessly). But this chaos has always been part of TW. It's ridiculously fun being that Levi or LT, doing the killing. It's incredibly aggravating being killed by it, but also very satisfying running it down like a dog.

My end goal is to allow that range of emotions, but offer a way to vent your frustration when people piss you off, in a way that still requires some skill. (Thus Roofturret is quite expensive, as it's a very low-skill response to Levis.) That's pretty difficult, but I think it's a worthwhile attempt. If we finally come up with some working balance for Levis with L3, we'll have achieved a long-held dream. I'm not saying it can be done. But I'd like to see if we can.

The thing you seem to have forgotten or maybe i member it wrong but what kept the small X in balance was that when it was cloaked there was a large drain on power. So yes you can sneak in and grab flag but there is a good chance with terr in base you will die.
Also old X made user make a choice between shot or stealth. X's were faster than jav with their boost. It was too hard for most that's why it was changed or so I was told. The grabbing flag came in because squads only would terr for their squad and xradar changed and was only available to 2 ships. Is the problem with the ship? Or how players use the ship? That is what we used to ask.

The current small X's cloak has a higher drain on power than the original version's did, iirc. With cloak on, the ship does not recharge at all. (Recharge = cloak energy.) It's been a long time, though, and I don't have access to the oldest small X settings. Currently cloak+stealth together drain energy very rapidly, and stealth is only available via !buy. You can usually spot an X just by watching radar. I don't understand what you mean when you talk about it being too hard for some (which?). Also am confused when you say old X -- whether you mean the last large X, or the previous small X. The main issue with the old small X didn't have much to do with cloak, but rather its abilities without even using cloak. It was fast ship, with a relatively inexpensive afterburner and a high maximum speed. This meant you could easily rush into the flag room, grab the flag, and go out again, or sit outside base where it was very difficult to attack you and simply spam spread bullets into FR (one reason spread was reduced). It was a decent ship even with cloak entirely removed, due to its small size, high speed, long rocket, and ability to thrust-shoot L3 multifire with a decent spread.

It's an excellent question you ask: "Is the problem with the ship? Or how players use the ship? That is what we used to ask." You can prevent players from using a ship a certain way through restrictions or addition of rules, without modifying its settings. But in some cases, the settings themselves enforce hidden restrictions or rules. It's a very difficult problem, and we can't pretend it isn't. We can only experiment, discuss, revise, reiterate...

[olde]

Goodjob qan! And the rest of you fellaz working on improving pub. You guys are the real heros of TW!

Mybe you can pass this "better for the community" ethnic off to some leaguer staff of TW :' )

[Funky Hobo]

I complety agree with qan!

Also, I've spoken to a couple of players who have said they've been playing tw non-stop since the big lev has been bought back, even a player from another zone said that! So that's a positive thing!

[senorkevin]

+10 rothe. Maybe a vote would be good but only for the "noobs" who don't know the difference.

[rothe]

And your right 2pac it is just pub.
But pub is the face new gamer's see not ?go base.
Still maybe pub is the best place to test stuff because it has the most ppl.
Will think it over.

[rothe]

Did read all of that but for some reason I still do have interest in all of the above.

What exactly is this supposed to mean?
The goal is to make pretty much nobody happy. Compromise is the process where every side can live with the results but no-one is overjoyed over them
What I am asking is.
What ships are you planning on as you put it. Putting ships through the process. What is the process? And Which ships? Whats the end goal?

In context of the whole game Levis are not the most popular ship because as you said it is not a good solo option.
Quick to point out that levis get killed in spawn.
Do not point out how lame is it that levis are allowed to go to safe level up and hop in a terr run around the map and get 10/1 k/d or just troll base for hours on end.

Your ignoring that when one team takes the flag most of the time the other team will dissolve and go LT or just generally go to another arena.
This does not happen because of Levis.
You can spend all the time in the world on Compromise and making no one happy but forced to accept the new changes.

Its very good to see someone actively putting time and thought into helping things don't take this any of this in a negative way please.
If your going to give one ship a huge advantage over every other ship in the game. See that it is openly being abused already as if LT wasn't abused before this change to L3 what do you expect the end game to be? What balance are you looking for when one ship can destroy every ship in base. No other ship has ANYWHERE near that ability.

Lastly the change you made in the X.
Don't mind it at all. The thing you seem to have forgotten or maybe i member it wrong but what kept the small X in balance was that when it was cloaked there was a large drain on power. So yes you can sneak in and grab flag but there is a good chance with terr in base you will die.
Also old X made user make a choice between shot or stealth. X's were faster than jav with their boost. It was too hard for most that's why it was changed or so I was told.
The grabbing flag came in because squads only would terr for their squad and xradar changed and was only available to 2 ships.

There is a huge history behind how we ended up with the settings we did. Is the problem with the ship? Or how players use the ship? That is what we used to ask.