New idea - XP vs Snowballing

[Nogen]

The big conflict between those ET purists and those who want more competitive gameplay is the XP system. The main argument against from a competitive perspective is the snowball effect. XP gains favour the defensive team and thus they go up levels faster making it even harder for the offensive teams thus increasing full holds etc etc.

The solution thus far has been to nerf the XP system much to the dislike of many people who feel its one of the things that sets ET apart from other games. The secondary solution (usually combined with the first) is to tweak the maps giving the offensive team a big enough advantage such that unless completely outclassed they will certainly set a time.

What I was wondering was if it was possible to achieve both goals simultaneously...rewarding for XP and good play while avoiding snowballing.

So heres my idea... apologies if it is unoriginal/infeasible/unpopular or just plain stupid. (yes i was bored when i thought of it)...

What if you made the defensive teams XP reduce slowly (or quickly) over time. This would give the effect of "running hot". A player getting a succession of light weapons kills would go up in light weapons skill but unless they keep killing their XP would start to run down and they would lose their skill increase. Similarly a medic who just made a whole series of revives might get up to level 3 medic for a brief period of time giving full revives to their team.

The XP reduction rate could be tuned to whatever was appropriate, just like the XP levels. It could be made anywhere from easy to close to impossible to get a "hot streak" thus affecting gameplay as much or as little as you liked.

This idea would allow the features of the XP system and the strategy variation brought on by the class upgrades to remain in the game while reducing the snowball effect of giving skill upgrades permanently. Would this be possible? Would it be easy to do? Do people even like the idea?

Let the flames begin...

[sgone:red.]

Not really a yes or no answer but:

For instance, what if assigned to guard the North gun on Oasis and 90% of a game you see little action in terms of enemy kills, thus making you very vulnerable in comparison to the peeps in the action. But on the flipside, I suppose this would certainly increase tactical play for the defensive team regarding changing team formations to optimize defence etc..

The actual rate of XP degradation would have to be carefully implemented if it was to work but would certainly be worth a go.

[Ragnar_40k]

For Light weapon skill:
Let the XP awarded vary in a range between 50% and 200% of the default XP. You get more XP when you shoot someone with more XP than you and you get less XP when you shot someone you who has less XP.

For all other skills you can simply adjust the skill levels from 20-50-90-140 to something higher.

[Decade]

I like very much the idea of the first post.
Also in the same way you could make the attacking team automatically increase their xp as time passes.

[Nogen]

I was thinking you could keep both teams XP reducing with time and could tweak the balance by having a different reduction rate for both sides. So the offensive team would find it easier to keep skill upgrades than the defensive teams.

[Imbroglio]

skill reduction? who decides what skills get reduced? what happens if you lose lvl1 battle sense, do you lose that extra clip you just spawned with? i could go on and on, but imo skill reduction isn't the answer

[Nogen]

what happens if you lose lvl1 battle sense, do you lose that extra clip you just spawned with?

Lvl1 battlesense doesn't give you an extra clip...but in any case I would assume that you would spawn with all the properties that were relevant to your skill level as you spawned. So if you got akimbos but then lost the XP before you respawned then you wouldn't get them. But if you did spawn with them then you would keep them until you died. The same would apply for all skills that are only applied at spawn time, and of course all those which can be applied instantly would be.

skill reduction? who decides what skills get reduced?

You would apply it to all the skills that people feel need to be nerfed. The common ones being light weapons skills, heavy weapons (in particular panzer charge) and medic and fops levels. I would expect that things like covert levels wouldn't need to be touched.
So basically all the levels which are currently set to -1 in competition configs could be made achievable for a limited time. This isn't just some random idea...its a good compromise between keeping skills and XP in the game and keeping snowballing out.

[CrosshairBill]

He's warming up!

He's on fire!

[Imbroglio]

very few comp players would want to play with a lvl3 fldop or a lvl3 med let alone a lvl4 fldop/med. same thing with lvl3 heavy weapons. nothing like adding spam to the cluster fuck as well eh. there's a reason no med should ever have 156 hit points.

i mean don't get me wrong, i love getting shot at by a panzer, then trying to avoid a double arty, then having to worry about the panzer again, because he had absolutely no need to recharge after the first shot. if this doesn't screem spawn slaughter in matches i dunno what does.

i agree that def lvl'ing up slower than offense would make sense, but the idea of removing lvls is absurd. ppl had a hard time grasping the concept of new hitboxes, and now these comp players that have played without xp at all for the past seasons now all the sudden have to stick to certain classes, or they lose their particular class rewards, just doesn't seem right. seems more like an idea for a campaign ladder, than a sw season.

[Nogen]

How are temporary level gains anything but a compromise between NO LEVELS and SOME LEVELS???

Removing levels is what most comps that I know of are drifting towards with many of them already there. In my local ladder the next season will remove light weapons levels and medic levels to name a few.

very few comp players would want to play with a lvl3 fldop or a lvl3 med let alone a lvl4 fldop/med. same thing with lvl3 heavy weapons. nothing like adding spam to the cluster fuck as well eh. there's a reason no med should ever have 156 hit points.

Whats your point? Under my proposed system you could still permanently remove any levels that would upset the balance. ie lvl 3 fops. Or if it was decided that there was an instant where someone could be rewarded with lvl 3 fops for a brief period then you could do that too. I am not prescribing how it all should be set up. That'd be for the league admins to decide. You could set XP reduction rate to 0 and the levels to default or with some levels disabled.

and now these comp players that have played without xp at all for the past seasons now all the sudden have to stick to certain classes, or they lose their particular class rewards

What are you on about? Are you saying that the change BACK to some sort of system with XP would be too much of a system shock?

but the idea of removing lvls is absurd

Do you mean in my idea how you only get level ups temporarily? If so then how is that any worse than in most comps where most of the levels are removed permanently?

[bani]

how about rewards which dont directly affect combat ability. instead of increased agility/firepower/health, think of other rewards for xp.

[Ragnar_40k]

how about rewards which dont directly affect combat ability. instead of increased agility/firepower/health, think of other rewards for xp.

How about ranks like Lieutenant, Major or General?

[Nogen]

By definition a reward is a positive thing. Any reward you get is going to influence combat ability. Any reward which doesn't do this is not really a reward at all - as Ragnar pointed out so facetiously.

From your reply, bani, am I to assume that you don't believe in any sort of reward system? Or is their something in that key word "directly"? Cause I'm stumped. Anything that fiddles your personal numbers will increase your combat ability. Anything which benefits your team or makes teamwork easier will increase your combat ability. Where do you draw the line as to whats a direct influence and an indirect one?

What are the problems with giving rewards which increase combat ability if you make them more easily achievable for the offensive team?

[bani]

A direct reward is the arnold schwarzenegger powerups you get now.

Think of more subtle rewards, not stuff that turns you into Terminator-2000.

[Nail]

team that's hot can trigger different constructibles, deconstructibles, or toggle things like FD mapscript to blow back door or different spawn points, or cold team could't rebuild barriers etc