New Spawn system rollout for TWDD

[BIET]

With the introduction of the new spawn system in last year's TSLD, a new and improved version has made it to TWDD. An introduction to the TSL version can be found here.

The main thing that's changed is the way the system can be customized. The TSL version often left players in limbo, separated from their team and/or close to the border. Center spawns were rare. The new version gives the option to solve both of these issues, and with the initial settings I tried to do just that.

If you've played a TWDD match since yesterday you might've noticed spawning near team mates, and near the action more often while not warping right in the middle of it. This is because the system prioritizes warping near team players that aren't in close combat with the opponent. If no such spot is available the bot defaults to a spawn area in the center of the map, and making the area bigger until a suitable spawn point is found.

From what I've seen this resulted in a better flowing game with players being more engaged and spending less time flying around getting back to their team. The warping near team priority also lead to a funny situation where a whole team warped right after go and ended up pretty much in the same spot.

With the settings being so heavily focused on trying to spawn near your team you might have some questions on how it will impact certain play styles and actions. Let's take chasing a low energy opponent for example. With the game's spawn system there was a chance that while you were chasing, another opponent could spawn in your path and either cut off your chase, or worse, kill you while you had no energy to return fire. With the new system, as long as you are close enough to the opponent, you ensure that no opposing spawns can happen near the fight. Of course this goes both ways, as no team players will be able to spawn close as well. This should result in more (opportunity for) tactical play since the chance of getting a random spawn right in the middle of a fight is zero.

It's important to remember that the settings are by no means locked, and could totally be improved upon, the new way of spawning however is IMO not going away. So if you have any gripes with the way these settings impact gameplay, please try to describe the scenario in which it happens, what's going wrong, and how you'd like to see it work. As always, leave a message here, in-game, or on discord (BIET#2111) for feedback and questions.

[ag$]

Nice!
Good work biet
Thank you

[RageRitual]

Nice!
Good work biet
Thank you

+1 to what laggi said.

[RaCka]

Thanks for all the work you do BIET , it looks great so far

[qan]

This has been a feature waiting to be implemented for literally years now (and it could have been done haphazardly as well). This seems like an intelligent and thoughtful solution that helps modernize gameplay. Good work! Remember to give BIET feedback to continue to improve the algo as needed.

[saiyan]

2 problems I've noticed:

1. Increased likelihood of being spawned by stray bullets. You're often spawning behind people who are being fired at. Anything that misses them is coming towards you.

2. Numbers advantages are being artificially created against you. If you're iso'd, 1v2 for example, as you try to regroup you will often notice numbers mounting against you. A 1v2 becomes a 1v5 very quickly thanks to the bot automatically regrouping enemy players who died lol..

It's honestly seeming like the random system used previously was superior. Not only has a new problem been introduced (see #2 above), spawning has not been eliminated, it has been increased if anything. You just get stray-spawned instead of R1-spawned, and the skill of regrouping has been greatly diminished.

Thank you for your work, but I think there has to be another way. A mid-season revert might be a good idea lol.

edit (02/05): adding onto this... It almost feels like you're being punished (harder) for being the last player on your team alive after a lost skirmish... All of the enemy players who died will respawn nearby while your own team respawns somewhere distant. It feels really unnatural. This happens when there is 1 big fight on the map.

With the settings being so heavily focused on trying to spawn near your team you might have some questions on how it will impact certain play styles and actions. Let's take chasing a low energy opponent for example. With the game's spawn system there was a chance that while you were chasing, another opponent could spawn in your path and either cut off your chase, or worse, kill you while you had no energy to return fire. With the new system, as long as you are close enough to the opponent, you ensure that no opposing spawns can happen near the fight.

What I'm instead noticing is when chasing, you're getting lured towards enemy players thanks to the bot consistently spawning players behind the guy you're chasing. It feels real uncanny and unnatural. This happens when there is more than 1 fight happening on the map.

From what I've seen this resulted in a better flowing game with players being more engaged and spending less time flying around getting back to their team. The warping near team priority also lead to a funny situation where a whole team warped right after go and ended up pretty much in the same spot.

I could go on about why having to fly back to your team is good but I think you get the idea

Dunno if anyone has noticed any of these things but it wouldn't surprised me if not.. A lot of people play with their brain off

[ag$]

Yeah Saiyan's right after he said it I realized it during the last few DDs I played..

If your team loses a skirmish and you're the sole survivor you will quickly be 1v5...

And the initial issue of not getting spawned hasn't really been resolved - still getting spawn strayed (like Saiyan describes) at least 2-3 times a game the only difference is you don't spawn directly by the enemy

The bigger issue at hand is the eats and how horrible the server lag has been lately though...

I've recorded a game where between me and tripin in a single round there was 20 eats..

:/

[Rab]

I think the new system is an improvement because you used to be able to push the enemy team to the edge of the map and cut off reinforcements from the center. How about 2 second shields when you spawn? Now that people are spawning away from other players there's less reason to worry about it being abused than before.

[Zeebu]

I think the new system is an improvement because you used to be able to push the enemy team to the edge of the map and cut off reinforcements from the center. How about 2 second shields when you spawn? Now that people are spawning away from other players there's less reason to worry about it being abused than before.

whats the point now that you typically spawn away from others.

oh well, i guess if youd insist on doing this just make certain the shielded person either cannot fire or significantly hurts their team by trying to kill while shielded. maybe spawn with no energy or have bot give a +1 death if you shoot while shielded.

[daresound]

I think the new system is an improvement because you used to be able to push the enemy team to the edge of the map and cut off reinforcements from the center. How about 2 second shields when you spawn? Now that people are spawning away from other players there's less reason to worry about it being abused than before.

Yes, I second this. Apply ~2 second shields on spawn to resolve this. The new/current system has not fixed/removed spawning, only intentional spawning.

whats the point now that you typically spawn away from others.

Now that I spawn away from others, I am no longer a hazard of spawning someone. There are no enemies on my radar. Because I'm often spawning behind my team, however, I'm in the line of fire, and frequently spawning on bullets.

The player with shields is not a threat if there is nobody around

[BIET]

It's been over a year and I've been pretty much out of the loop when it comes to monitoring games. I'm interested to know a couple of things.

1. Are games still being a bit weird and unbalanced towards the outnumbered group in skirmishes? And,
2. do you still spawn more often on bullets?

Below are some suggestions and thoughts I have about the matter. My goal is to make the changes within the new spawn system to avoid any rework.

Let me start at point 2. I like Rab's suggestion to prize a 1-2s shield to make sure you can either tank or dodge any stray bullet coming your way after spawning. I could tie it to any warp or just the initial spawn after death. This one can be implemented whether or not it's still an issue, but it sort of depends on how people feel for point 1.

As for the first point, the weird part, if it still feels like you are being lured into enemies while chasing and it still feels unnatural I'm not really sure there are any (smart) ways to go about it other than randomize spawns as they were before. I do wonder though if this was part of the "getting used to" period and that it settled into something more tolerable later on. But, let's say we do change the spawns back to being random, with a rectangular area this time, we don't add the shields on spawn.

Last the outnumbered situation. From what I gather it's actually playing out as intended. Teaming is encouraged and rewarded, while playing solo or getting outnumbered is punished. It's up to the rest of the team to either get you out of the situation or set up/regroup. This wasn't possible when spawns happened randomly, they would just interrupt any play far too often. It did make it harder to stay ahead in numbers while chasing so this also could be "fixed" by changing back to random spawns.

Admittedly it's been too long since I've played any DD game to know if this is either viable or a fun way to play the game, so feedback is much appreciated.

[Jz-]

As someone who plays quite a bit of WB, the spawning system is working as intended. I know people will still complain that they might spawn on a bullet once in every 10 games, but that's once per 100 deaths. It's still extremely rare and does not happen often. In fact, you will notice the huge difference if you were to play in a populated elim or wbduel. DD feels so much better with the spawning system and a far cry from what the old spawning system was like.

I am not a fan of prizing a shield as that might cause some other problems or might be taken advantage of. Thanks for the work on this BIET!

[BIET]

Thanks for the reply. Good to hear you have had a positive experience. Regarding the chance of spawning on a bullet, while 1:100 isn’t high it's a very annoying and frustrating way to die. Especially if there’s an easy way to prevent it from happening.

Looking at specifics, if shields have a max duration of 1 second and are only prized when spawning after a death I can’t see how it could be abused. Players spawn far enough away from enemies that getting a deliberate shot on the spawned player within that timeframe is very unlikely if not impossible. I could calculate the exact minimal duration needed to hit a freshly spawned player to confirm.

Are there drawbacks or opportunities to abuse I’m missing?

[ag$]

tbh I see myself always getting surrounded lets say if I'm last alive on my team when it was 3v3 and I take 1 out and my 2 teammates die..

all of a sudden I'm surrounded by 4, 2 that popped up from spawns recently..

going to be even harder to survive those since I'm usually getting flanked (by the 2 recent spawns) in those scenarios plus the initial enemies I was already fighting.. and if they have shields gonna be really fukd if I waste a bullet and get rushed

the random bullet spawn sucks but I think it might be better than tryna shield because of how often you're flanked if you're the last alive on ur team..

But I dunno maybe its worth a try I guess..

But definitely penalized for staying alive currently (1v2 turns into 1v4/5 really quickly)

[BIET]

Positioning on the map is key. If you get outnumbered on the edge of the map it's likely the opponents will have an easier way to regroup and outnumber you even more. However, it also means there's a chance to flank them. Also, since you could be fairly sure where enemies could spawn relative to your position there are ways to lower the chance of getting trapped.

and if they have shields gonna be really fukd if I waste a bullet and get rushed

The idea is to grant shields up to the point any planned bullet could possibly hit you. So there will never be a situation where you rush up to, or get rushed by someone you can't kill because they have active shields.