Re: Breach & Destroy, Sabotage Pro, Team Elimination, Hostages

donotreply@activision.com — Sun, 03 Apr 2011 00:03:21 GMT

yeah, it's the style of play that most tactical clans would love! anyone who has ever played the socm games knows whats up

Re: Swiming with Sharks. Chaos/Fun vs Competition/Balance

donotreply@activision.com — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 23:12:06 GMT

Nemesis-Kanden wrote:

I am so glad this topic came up, I've been reading these forums since the game was announced but I registered because of this opportunity.

I'm am currently on my way to become one of those ultra competitive gamers who play on Gamebattles/travel to MLG events. I've done gamebattles (gb's) on resistance 1, call of duty 4 MW1, MW2, and will be doing it for Black ops as soon as I'm satisfied with my ability at this game. This problem of skilled players among less skilled players has bothered me for a long, long time.I'm going to talk from a competitive players perspective so I will probably be blind obvious problems with my reasoning, as I hope someone will point out afterwards

I for one really dislike having "sharks in the kiddie pool" but not for what I think is the obvious reason. A lot of times lately when I go into a room such as search and destroy I do relatively well. I get a high K/D, assist teammates, call out enemies...all that good stuff. The thing I hate is that most of the time, unless I run into a clan or the random godlike player, I don't get challenge/improve my skills much. This isn't just a problem that's present in this game but the same type of thing has happened to me in all of the previous games I've played. Once you play enough and put enough time into the game, you get to a certain point where ranked matches don't provide the challenge necessary to improve the skills/keep the interest of the better players. Sure you run into the good party or group of players occasionally, but for the most part skilled players will be going up against teams mostly comprised of people below their skill level.

The point I'm getting at is that the only game I feel that gave me the solution to this problem was resistance 1 because of its private match feature. Now I know all of the call of duty games I listed have this feature too, but there is one part of resistance 1's private matches feature that call of duty, to my dismay, never had.

I'm gonna type this in bold because its one of, if not the, most important tool I used to get better in resistance...

You could filter out and choose which private games you wanted to play in. An invite was NOT needed to join private games always, I could go to "unranked games" and look through the list to find a match that is sufficient for my skill level!

After I got to the highest rank I could get to in resistance, all I ever played was unranked games. Here the real killers would set up games, invite their friends, and then leave the games open so two things could happen. If the lobby was full then the newly joined players could spectate and wait their turn to play. If the lobby wasn't full, then they could jump in and play with the makers of the custom game. This way spectators could get a glimpse of higher level play/tactics and have the opportunity to play if room was available (unlike private/ranked games in CoD...if the other team drops out, its done). I feel like resistance was the only game I was truly decent in because I got to play against so many good players back to back to back, every day. It was great until resistance added the option lock the custom games with a password to get in...

I cannot stress enough how much better I got at the game because I was able to go into the "unranked" category in the main menu and play against people with rulesets that they set up before hand. In call of duty, unless you know top players or their friends and they actually like you (not likely?) your not getting an invite to a private game...therefore the skilled player will have to compensate by...

A) Getting wrecked by aimbot veteran cpu in combat training A.K.A target practice on crack.

B) Going on gamebattles.com and making lots of new friends just so I can play in games with good players. (a game full of good players = a completely different game altogether)

or my usual option

C) Play a combination of ranked matches and hope I run into people who will show me new tactics/ideas/give me a challenge.(while dodging claymores, motion sensors, care package dogs, and other fun but crazy stuff)

I probably rambled on a lot in this post so I'm just gonna sum it up here. I really like resistance's answer of allowing people to join custom games by searching through the lists of games created/available and picking which one they want to pick. Allowing me to pick which room I want to join allowed me to practice under different rulesets that corresponded to what I needed practice on. If i need sniper practice, snipers only room. Assault rifle practice, rifle only room...the idea right? I could join a room titled "GB" and know that there would be no rocket launcher or bullseye tag used in the room and I could just practice the basics in a controlled environment of my choosing. The call of duty equivalent to this would be (in some situations) certain maps with no claymores, launchers, shotguns and to a lesser degree killstreaks enabled. If I could search right now and join any private game that had space, you bet your *** I'd run to rooms like these when I need serious practice. Teams already play with these rules in private games anyway, the only thing is random people like me who want to play these teams don't have easy access to them...

The weird thing is that even though resistance had the option to choose what unranked game I wanted to play in, I still partied up with people who wanted to play the main ranked modes and play against random people for fun...the only real difference is that back then I could do both wherever I wanted while now I can't.

I really hope this post isn't too convoluted. TL;DR search for private/custom games + easy join = skilled player in skilled rooms, bad players in bad rooms. Fun rooms for all who wants it, GB/MLG rules for all who wants it, everyone has an option.

First off, Vahn, thanks for being so open to improving your game & community. I don't play MLG but I'm a die hard S&D player. My clan, GSI, originates from SOCOM US Navy Seals on the PS2. It was the #1 online Playstation game before there was a PSN. Socom & Halo were the 2 big dogs in online console games. Socom is exactly like S&D, except no killstreaks, radar, perks, nothing. Everyone had every gun& every attachment to choose from. There were no classes. You just picked a gun, put some attachments on it, & off you went!

What seperated SOCOM from ALL other console games was LOBBIES. The closest thing to this today is Warhawk & generally any PC game.

Like Nemesis-Kanden is quoted above, we need a way to browse private games. It increases the community aspect of the game. It allows people to find like minded players & compete. It also allows clans to find other clans.

In socom, we would make a room in the "clan practice" servers & title it "8v8 no gb". That meant we were looking for a 8v8 clan war but not GameBattles. (do some research, gb was actually SocomBattles. They as socom lost support it shifted to all games, then MLG purchased GB)

Anyways, Vahn, your already doing a great job. Much better than Sony/Zipper is at maintaining Socom (they are burying it).

If you are looking to increase the competiton on CoD, plese give us more 1 life to live modes. S&D is awesome, but we want more! I know your aware of this because S&D is easily one of (if not THE) most popular game mode on CoD, been that way for a few years. If your looking for ideas, load up SOCOM 1, 2 & 3/Combine Assault on the PS2. You will find game modes with AI hostages & VIPS, where the games are more like special ops mission simulators.

My co-leader resinlung has posted a great thread about 1 life to live modes. Link: http://community.callofduty.com/thread/100459133

And if more game modes aren't something you can do on black ops, then give us clan support.
Someone already did the homework on how it would work on Black ops. Credit: Rdy4War360
Link: http://community.callofduty.com/thread/100297912

Clan support would increase the competitiveness 5x!!! The biggest issue with CoD is that sharks have to do too much work to find other sharks. I shouldn't have to join a website to find another clan to play against. I should just be able to search in game for other clans (or partied of 6) that are ready to play.

In a perfect world, I should be able to search for a party of 9 who wants to play S&D against my 9. Make it unranked, i don't care. I just want the competition. Stat tracking of wins & losses would benice.

The clan support thread explains in detail how this is easily done on black ops. Check it out,

thanks for listening to the community Vahn! You set the bar high for other dev's to follow, keep up the great work!

Re: Breach & Destroy, Sabotage Pro, Team Elimination, Hostages

donotreply@activision.com — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 23:01:12 GMT

Shadow_016 wrote:

Great idea. But sounds to much like Socom gameplay.

That's the point. S&D is easily one of the most popular game modes on CoD. guess what? S&D IS SOCOM!! So yeah, it should play a lot like socom. 1 life to live, that's socom bro.

Re: What do you run with?

donotreply@activision.com — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 22:58:39 GMT

S&D
Commando w/Suppressor
Crossbow
Frag/Smoke/Claymore
Flak Jacket
SoH
Ninja

S&D Shotty
Spas-12 wSsuppressor
Crossbow
Frag/Smoke/Claymore
Flack Jacket
Steady Aim
Ninja

If the other team appears to have a Killstreak, I have duplicates of these classes that has Ghost replacing FlackJacket. When I use ghost, I often use Hacker so I can see the claymores (since I can;t just walk through them anymore).

And of course, the "shoot em down" class

Strela-3
Ghost
SoH

All respawn modes are just practice for S&D (im my opinion). Tac Mack Pro would be nice for S&D rushing & quick plants. Firing range comes to mind.

Re: More Non-Respawn Games

donotreply@activision.com — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 02:58:44 GMT

good stuff resin, need more 1 life to live games!

Re: Breach & Destroy, Sabotage Pro, Team Elimination, Hostages

donotreply@activision.com — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 03:48:47 GMT

YES, 3ARC bring us these modes, many socomers have no place to play. We need more round based modes. S&D is awesome, but we want more! We ar enot alone, S&D is easily the 3rd most popular game mode in all of CoD. Playlist numbers speak for taht, 3arc has gotta kow this.

Re: FEATURE: CLAN SUPPORT & CLAN AUTOMATCHING (sign it)

donotreply@activision.com — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 09:27:32 GMT

I sign this, and so does my entire clan [GSI].

I want to know what is Vahn's view on CoD clan support (or the lack of there of)

Community: Message List

Re: Breach & Destroy, Sabotage Pro, Team Elimination, Hostages

Re: Swiming with Sharks. Chaos/Fun vs Competition/Balance

Re: Breach & Destroy, Sabotage Pro, Team Elimination, Hostages

Re: What do you run with?

Re: More Non-Respawn Games

Re: Breach & Destroy, Sabotage Pro, Team Elimination, Hostages

Re: FEATURE: CLAN SUPPORT & CLAN AUTOMATCHING (sign it)