Time for some pub changes

[Dierienow]

Might be worth it to look at some of the Milestone rewards and see if there is a way to make them worth more. There are a lot of different rewards (time played, # of ships in ship # killed, etc) that offer low value prizes.. maybe make an organized collection of Good milestones you want to have, then come up with some higher quality rewards. Also if you lowered the session time allowed (5 hours of being away but on the game counts as a session - kind of odd IMO) to something more reasonable, the milestones would be more difficult to reach and thus justified in having a more significant reward. Also would be cool if there was an option or command (if there isn't already!) to see your progress this session towards applicable milestones. Thanks

Just an idea.. milestone for winning duels in a session and other duel-related milestones maybe to go with the new Duel Builder (like Domino's Pizza builder) that's been teased.

[Dierienow]

BaseTerr imo is a very useless buyable and needs a 'creative overhaul' you could say. At present it's a ham-fisted approach to solving the terr issue. You spend money (aka Skillpoints) and in turn have a gateway into the base. It's a bit silly. Yet skilled teams without terrs should have an opportunity because the amount of good terrs online at any given time is not guaranteed.

Just brainstorming ideas here but what if buying a baseterr put the stationary terr in either the upper most tunnels near the corner or in the pockets further down. It's a solid defensive terr position, solves the issue of enemies warping into base like fucking Babylon 5 (dunno this show tbh lol just a prank), and would allow skilled players a (still disadvantaged) opportunity of taking the FR. You could even have doors that only open for friendlies (but enemies can get inside if you're not cautious) and bursts that go off when an enemy approaches. Not only that but it would make it a far less useless item. It's rare that a team is controlling FR yet unable to handle enemies coming out of the ear. It's just way too indefensible, there needs to be a balance. Doesn't the bot know not to go in the ears? What a noob.

[G.KNOXX]

I have to say rab is right that red box is the base where you should be and I like having the arena message for the base Terr but not the flexible deaths for it and don't make it more money to buy PLEASE just make the !buy time on it longer after use.

[Rab]

I think of base as this area. Perhaps you could re-use areas already defined for buy restrictions.
The idea is just to exclude areas where people clearly aren't helping their team win the round.


--

The in-base counter gets reset when:
- they die (freq 0 and 1 only)
- they shipchange (freq 0 and 1 only)
- They freq change (to freq 0 and 1 only)

The in-base counter stops counting when:
- they go in the red box

When it reaches a time of our choosing, e.g. 2 mins.
- It says "go to base"

When it reaches an extended time of our choosing, e.g. 3 mins.
- It moves them to another freq (to free up their slot for someone who will go to base)

--

I'm not a big fan of shuffling. When I want to shuffle, the bot tells me I can't. When I don't want a shuffle, there'll be a shuffle, and it'll produce an outcome I don't like.

That said, there might be a scenario where we move people off freqs 0 and/or 1 such that the teams become imbalanced. E.g. if there are 3 people not in base and they all get moved.
Do we:
- do nothing and wait for the spots to be filled
- arena message asking people to balance (with reward for doing so)
- auto-shuffle at the end of the round
- something else?

--

Levis. Well, they're part of the problem. It's quite rare a levi actually manages to get into base. They're mostly just flying around getting killed, and so I'd classify them as -1 players (who aren't contributing to their team). If the timer is generous enough (e.g. 2 mins) they can still make it into base in that time. If they're flying away from base, e.g. to a safe, then they aren't going to make it in time. So do we support that gameplay, perhaps giving them more time (but don't give them infinite time because they are actually useless if they're never going to base!), or do we give them different messaging "your team might appreciate if you chose a different ship". So there are options and I'm not sure which is best. I'd be happy to give them a longer timer for now, just to get this working for everyone else, e.g. 10 mins.

[Rab]

Could you tell us what the current logic is for killing a buyable terr? Perhaps it just doesnt scale based on number of players playing, and more importantly number of players actually attaching. I've often felt we didn't have enough ppl to possibly kill it.

Also wonder if it times out. Imo it should only last about 30s and should be removed at round end.

I think people are sufficiently rich that increasing price doesn't do any good.

--

Edit: I bought it to test how it works.

The buy menu is
!buy baseterr -- Get a Terr in base for 5 minutes (or 30 hits) ($20,000)
So a cost of $20k is low. It should be between superpower ($85k) and thor ($140k).

The bot joined my team and did a yellow message.
TW-Bot1> ATTACH! TW-Bot1 BASETERR stationed in FLAGROOM but I can only take 30 more hits!
So my team knows it takes 30 hits. But the other team got no information at all.
I think there should be an arena message which says there's a baseterr and you need to hit it x times to kill it, so the enemy knows what they're supposed to be doing!
I had 1 player on the enemy team, he was a wb. So good luck to him killing my baseterr lol.

The bot did time out, I didn't time it but I'd guess around 2 mins.

--

Edit 2

Perhaps the baseterr's death count could be:

1 + (PlayersOnFreq * 1.5)

1 player = 3
5 players = 9
10 players = 16
15 players = 24
20 players = 31

Rounding up or down doesn't rly matter. The point is that it can scale.

[qan]

Responding to this thread from the past couple months:

• All ships warping in at round start are now shipreset, and also have their bounty restored (thanks to K A N E)
• Fixed the bug that allowed players to switch to the winning team. Let me know if it still comes up
• Regarding Weasel taking the flag, Weasel flag grabs now take longer (thanks to SpookedOne). Meanwhile cloak+stealth is heavy drain. If you know a Weasel is around, you should probably watch the flag closely, and maybe consider switching to a ship with X-Radar. It's been part of the game a long time. Sharks had buyable X at one point; could try that again?
• Haven't heard anyone else say the buyable terr is OP. Anyone else agree? Is it too difficult to kill? Could make it easier to kill, or alternately, more expensive.
• Shrap was removed from Jav duels after several complaints. AFAIK having it in duels was unintentional. There's a ticket in to revamp the duel system with a kind of "duel builder" (idea courtesy of BIET) which could include selecting shrap.
• Die, if you have reports of abuse or cheating, please let me know. twcomplaints[at}gmail.com for complaints about staff.
• Bounty was recently expanded so that the limit is not shared among players, but is instead individual (thanks to K A N E)
• Bounty also had a low limit that may not reflect the current economy. There may have been issues of bug abuse in the past that kept bounty low. Not sure. I've raised it to 500K to reflect the current times. We might be able to do unlimited at some point, if it's demonstrated it can't be exploited.
• G.KNOXX, appreciate the backup, but we really do need more feedback (rather than less) and it's not a bother to hear what people think. Also, there are other devs these days who can help take care of things so it's not overwhelming by any means.
• The "go to base" idea is interesting, and people certainly do end up weighing down their freq sometimes by being on a public freq. Though it might encroach too much on the freedom of pub, which is not solely about the basing game, despite that being its center. Also, there are a few difficult questions. For example, what's considered "in base"? Does the in-base counter get reset any time they make it to mid? And what about Levis? Rather than forcing players to switch to a private freq, we might be able to make it such that whether or not you can switch to a freq is based on who's on it, and also base initial freq placement on it. So maybe the game is 8 active basers vs 7 active basers and 3 randoms in spawn. The bot could potentially put a new player on the team with 7 active basers. Shuffling already takes into account certain factors, splitting up terrs, sharks, and fighters evenly. Could look at weighting these a bit in terms using it to determine team balance and so forth... there are options, at any rate. I'm not sure how many would be in favor of forcibly telling people to go to base and then setting them on a private freq if they don't, though. Seems a bit extreme. But, could be wrong... any ideas, guys?

[G.KNOXX]

Rab won't stop complaining about pub!

Look rab I am sick of your FUCKING COMPLAINING ABOUT EVERYTHING YOU THINK IS WRONG WITH PUB! just STOP! You have used 2 FUCKING PAGES OF THIS TREAD TO DO NOTHING BUT COMPLAIN! if you have a problem take it to the complaint email that qan has and stop using this tread for you stupid problems SO JUST SHUT UP! THANK YOU AND HAVE A NICE DAY!!! 😀

[Rab]

When someone's on freq 0 or 1 but not going to base, their team effectively has -1 player.
This could (and should) be solved with a "go to base" check like we have in javs.
If you're on freq 0 or 1 and don't go to base for x seconds (e.g. 2 mins) then you're prompted "go to base".
If you're on freq 0 or 1 and don't go to base for x+y seconds (e.g. 3 mins) then you're moved to a priv freq.
This should make basing more balanced and active in base, whilst also allowing people who don't want to base to continue to do that.
Also as it's freq 0 and 1 only, it won't interfere with duels, or ppl already on priv freq to LT or LT hunt (freq 99).

[Rab]

Look Rab! qan has a lot of work he dose every day already and we all need to stop bothering him about petty problems with the pub! if a bots not down and the severs not down then it's not a real problem! SO LEAVE HIM ALONE!

who asked you, piss off.

[Wirah]

TW-PubSystem> [BOUNTY] Unable to add that amount. Minimum $500, Maximum $50000

I vote that !addbty should have........... NO LIMIT

[G.KNOXX]

This is unacceptable.

DEDICATED! Leland received a loyalty MEGA-BONUS of $75000!
Wataaah!> you call that a mega bonus
Leland> good
Leland> u
Leland> weak mega bonus again
Rab> !addbty leland:75000
TW-PubSystem> [BOUNTY] Unable to add that amount. Minimum $500, Maximum $50000

Look Rab! qan has a lot of work he dose every day already and we all need to stop bothering him about petty problems with the pub! if a bots not down and the severs not down then it's not a real problem! SO LEAVE HIM ALONE!

[Rab]

This is unacceptable.

DEDICATED! Leland received a loyalty MEGA-BONUS of $75000!
Wataaah!> you call that a mega bonus
Leland> good
Leland> u
Leland> weak mega bonus again
Rab> !addbty leland:75000
TW-PubSystem> [BOUNTY] Unable to add that amount. Minimum $500, Maximum $50000

[Dierienow]

Funny how everyone has ideas for changing pub, making it more competitive etc. But when actual issues involving competitive integrity come up such as cheating, teaming/cliqueing, staff/captain abuse, etc there are few if any people calling for that side of competitive integrity to be maintained. But useless and boring changes to pub are put in without second opinion.

[Dierienow]

A) was shrap removed from jav duels in pub or was the shrap bot dead earlier

B) can you make shrap duels an option for those of us who go, "NOW THAT'S What I Call ez Get Good (GG) Noob Shrap Isn't Luck" ? Maybe make that shrap evenly distributed between duelists idk just an idea guy

[Rab]

Shut up rab

don't talk to me newbie.