I'm at Valve HQ in Bellevue, Washington as I write, and just about to jump back on the two new Team Fortress 2 maps - Badlands, and the first map for an entirely new game mode - more on that in a bit. But the biggest news is this 'large-scale modification' Valve teased us about a few weeks back. It's even larger scale than I'd thought.
Starting with just two new items for the Medic, Valve are going to be gradually rolling out new, unlockable weapons for every class. These will be alternative versions of their current loadouts that, once unlocked by earning a certain number of achievements, you can pick and choose from on a new 'Loadout' menu.
The unlockables aren't just beefed up versions of the weapons, they balance major advantages and disadvantages to fundamentally alter the role of that class. The first Medic unlock, for example, is called the Overhealer. Instead of temporarily buffing people's health to 50% above their normal maximum, it permanently boosts them to double their standard health. The downside is that it'll be dramatically worse at building Ubercharge - in fact, Valve are toying with not letting it Uber at all.
No details on what the second unlock they'll be rolling out in this update will be, beyond the basics: it'll be another Medic healing ray, and it'll change the way the class plays all over again. The first is earned by acquiring half of the thirty-five new Medic achievements, the second for acquiring them all.
The new game mode is showcased in Goldrush - the map that will ship alongside cp_badlands in a little over a month from now. One team must escort a small mining cart through a series of Dustbowl-like map segments. The cart moves faster the more Blue players are near it, but stops entirely if even one Red player is in range. Blue have to escort the cart all the way to Red's headquarters within a certain timelimit.
Don't fret over the details too much just yet - we don't have time or space to do it justice here and now. We'll have an in-depth preview of the new changes and mode in our next issue, but until then here's what you actually need to know. The new mode, current unnamed, is awesome fun. It concentrates the action around one point, keeping it intense and frenetic, but that point is constantly moving. That means the tactical landscape is constantly changing, Engineers have to rethink their Sentry positions as the cart grinds forth, and everyone has to adapt constantly as they play. And crouching alongside the cart, using it as a piece of mobile cover from enemy snipers as it crawls along agonisingly slowly, is hilarious.
The possibilities for the unlockable loadouts are uncountable and ridiculously exciting - in fact, we'd love to hear your suggestions in the comments. Valve probably would too - they're rolling this feature out in a very limited form precisely because they want to experiment with it, see what people think, and let it evolve as they progress.
Huh, no decaying health buff of double? That's seriously not balanced at all.
A soldier or heavy is hard enough to kill as it is, let alone being healed AND with double health, even a headshot won't kill one. On top of that even after you kill the medic they still have double health. Only a backstab will sort them out fast.
I'm not against the unlockable idea at all, but that sounds like it it needs a more serious drawback than a slow building uber. Even if it has no uber a they can still buff the whole team to double health. That's a soldier with 400. That's just stupid.
Headshots are the same as backstabs though, aren't they (i.e. one hit kill regardless of target health)? Whatever the case it sounds like a balance nightmare, particularly if they go ahead and make two new 'load-outs' for each class.
I am intrigued by the concept though and, hopefully, if it doesn't work out they'll revert back.
This is bound to upset a few people, but I trust Valve are doing this for the best. Let's face it- It's TF TWO, not a remake so they can do what they think will improve it. I'm all for the changes as long as the balance remains.
I think kinsman makes a good point there about it being really hard to kill heavies and soldiers with this new idea. However, I'm prepared to wait until we see it in action.
I would have thought it would take less than ten seconds to lower the soldier or heavies health back down to its original health, so the short term benefit would be less than the uber.
Remember this is Valve we are talking about, they are obsessed with testing these ideas, so I am sure that if it is unbalanced they will spot it.
I would have thought it would take less than ten seconds to lower the soldier or heavies health back down to its original health, so the short term benefit would be less than the uber.
With a Medic healing me it takes around 10 or so seconds for around three people to kill me if you add another 10 seconds onto that your going to have some serious trouble trying to kill the heavy, not to mention that all one on one confrontations will be like the Matrix when they spot an Agent...."you run your ass off"
The only disadvantage I can see is clearing out rooms full of turrets, you really do need an uber to do that so having all medics choose this new way of healing isn't going to work.
@Everyone who's worried about the medic being overpowered
Keep in mind, this is the first of the rollout...the medic buff may be slightly overpowered right now and make guys really hard to kill, but they'll almost surely be balanced by the equivalent weapons rolled out for the other classes.
For example, if they roll out a soldier with a super powerful rocket launcher with a longer reload time, it'll have the capability of taking out the stronger buffed guys.
I am just so psyched that they are adding more customization for playing styles and a goal to achieve. Right now I play a ton and I feel like I don't get much of anything out of doing really well. I've gotten all of the current achievements and that was the only goal type thing I had to shoot for. It'll be really nice to have the incentive and know that if I play and get a certain number of kills as a heavy that I'll get a better gun or something cool like that.
Plus, it'll make the game less repetitive as those of us who have been playing for months are probably starting to get tired of the classes...it'll be nice to spice them up with new abilities and see how people make use of them. With the current class system, there are pairings and counters that have become obvious (e.g. Pyros to counter a scout rush and spies) but weren't in the first days of the release. Adding the new capabilities to classes like this will jazz up the already great game and make things interesting as the gamers find good couplings and strategies for each classes new abilities.
Oh and also, to follow up KingButtMonkey's great list of weapons, here are a few I came up with:
Soldier: 1. Super powerful rocket launcher with only one rocket before reload and a long reload time. This will help take out those heavies with 600 HP
2. A one-time use medkit that takes a few seconds to apply so they can go out into battle and last longer...provided they take a short break to heal themselves.
Scout: 1. Caltrops! This is one thing I really missed from TFC that I think was a great scout weapon. (For those unaware, these are little spikes that the scout throws down and makes everyone that steps on them run slower)
Demoman: 1. Dynamite. This was shown in the TF2 Demo vids, but hasn't seen daylight yet.
2. Proximity Mines
Heavy: 1. Something like predator vision. It'd be neat if you could earn and strap on a pair of goggles and make the enemies glow a certain color and everything else fade to black. It'd be much easier to see them for heavy machine gunning.
2. A grenade launcher attachment for the heavy gun. This wouldn't make the demoman obsolete as it would have a low reload rate, but it'd be nice to have something better equipped to taking out sentries than sitting blasting them with an uber for 10 seconds.
Engineers: 1. Walls...it'd be cool if you could build a wall that wasn't indestructible, but took a decent amount of damage to knock down and would give your teammates some cover
2. Some kind of device to detect cloaked spies and make them visible. This would create an interesting dynamic of engineers trying to build these devices on pinch points
Sniper: 1. Some sort of chameleon effect, similar to the spy cloak that makes you blend in more with the background. It'd make them harder to spot and make sniper wars more interesting.
2. Call in an air raid. Give the snipers the ability to call in an air raid once every few minutes and bombard an outdoor location within line of sight which they would mark.
Pyro: 1. Similar to the Scout request, bring back pyro grenades from TFC. It was way cool to be able to throw a grenade and lay down a wall of fire.
2. Another throwback request from TFC is to bring back the pyro's fire rockets.
Spy: 1. Following KingButtMonkey's idea of engy's building remote cameras, have the engineers and spies work together by having the spies build spy cameras within the enemy base and the engineers build monitors inside their base to view those cameras. This would allow you to get a camera in a useful place and also help facilitate someone to become the coordinator for your team by looking in the camera, seeing what the enemy is doing, and mounting an attack.
Anyway, there are a billion possibilities, but these are a few I thought would be neat.
Unlockables is a terrible idea for an FPS. Makes the game very unfriendly for newbies the only exception would be if these levels started equal on each map and level up via map play not starting a game with uber level gear vs someone without it.
It's the old problem with most MMO's PvP the player who has the most gear, who plays the most hours wins most of the time. Twitch is slightly better than this because it is a least skills based.
If this is persistant then I think it's bad if it's match based then it is potential very good.
It would have to be persistent if it's based on achievements.
I can't see that it's going to be a huge problem for new players as long as the alternative weapons are fairly balanced. Especially as they'll probably have team-mates who have unlocked some of them already - this is supposed to be a team game, don't forget.
My main concern with this specific heal-buff idea is whether players will still be able to cap while buffed, or will this be impossible as with ubercharge? It will be a hell of a lot harder to defend cps if they can.
I don't see why some of you are making such a big deal out of this, it's only adding variety. It won't unbalance the game as there are two teams, whatever one has, the other can have. If Red are running about with double health, then Blue either need to get a medic with the right load out to counter it, or come up with something else.
And it's hard to say that's it'll be unfair against newbies since we don't know anything apart from the medic ability. I suspect Valve will ensure that if you take one weapon instead of another, it'll be perfectly fair. A soldier could replace the standard rockets with ones 4 times as powerful, however they only have 1 shot before reload, which takes 4 times as long to do. Obviously I haven't thought about that a lot, but I for one, trust them.
I'm really looking forward to this, especially since I've become rubbish at playing medic recently - here's some motivation to get good again.
Dave
PS: Kinsman - a heavy or soldier is not harder to kill than any other class, they all have their own weaknesses.
PPS: Presumably the medic buff goes when the medic changes class? If not, I'll be abusing that!
Well I didn't mean to patronise you at all, but I guess it may have come across like that.
I just think questioning the balance of something that has the same affect on every class is a little pointless. Although admittedly the impact is probably greater for those classes with a s**t load of health already... maybe they could make the Heavy 50% slower if he's fully buffed, it'd be so fkin slow no-one could be bothered with it.
Personally, I feel that achievements should be irrelevant, and the unlocks should just be available immediately, letting people choose how they want to play from the start.
Personally, I feel that achievements should be irrelevant, and the unlocks should just be available immediately, letting people choose how they want to play from the start.
The achievements are irrelevant, but with this update, they will have a purpose. And BF2's weapons weren't open from the start, and we all remember how fun that was Goldrush also sounds ace, can't wait for it.
I can't help but laugh at everyone saying that its 'unbalanced' without ever having played with it. We don't know nearly enough about it to be able to make those kind of judgments at this point, so wait and see.
With this concept, I would just like to say, why stop at two? There are plenty of ways you could alter the play mechanics of each class, while keeping them working within that role.
Giving Medics a 'drain life' healing ray, that encourages them to play more offensively would be cool. A balance would require adjusting the rate of healing and maybe drain the uber meeter when draining enemy health. The current medic offensive abilities are more than lacking, and force them to play as purely a support role, leading to fewer people playing as them. Giving them some strong offensive abilities could really improve their playability.
I can't wait to see what they add to the engineer. A flame turret, encouraging placement of turrets in different places that normal? A longer range turret maybe? How about 'trap' dispensers that kill spy's who try and put a sapper on them? There is just so many ways you could alter each class's tactics.
I love the idea of having to unlock these, encouraging players to stick with a class with the promise of a unique way to play the class the longer you play with them. I am not sure if achievements being the only way to unlock them is the best way to accomplish this, but I would have to play with it before I can make up my mind on it.
Keep it up valve, you guys are amazing game designers.
Caltrops that look like jacks for the scout Virus gun for the medic Smoke bomb for the pyro or sniper A sniper rifle that can shoot through thin walls.
I'd personally expect the overheal gun to drain at the uber bar to balance out and limit the duration of the overheal.
I'm incredibly excited to see what they do with these additions. The only reason I ever play anything besides medic now is to get some added variety (chargin' mah uber gets old after 2-3 times in a row). Throw in a couple different options for me and I'd never play anything else.
I'll be looking forward to what happens with the other classes as well. Very exciting times for TF2 ahead.
To people already concerned about balance before even knowing all the details of the additions, it's certainly your right to express your opinion. I'll want to see things in action before getting pessimistic about it myself though. Right now I'm still overwhelmed with the awesomeness of what the possibilities might be!
Medics: Imagine Lazytown...two medics acting as a gas station...filling up heavies to 600hp and then sending them up to the top. I'm gonna need a lot of rockets. One of my coworkers, Sumason2, was wondering what if one medic filled me (soldier) to 400hp and another medic ran out and kept me alive until his uber showed up.
Critical rockets and other critical ammos are going to be welcomed to help offset all the health everyone is going to be running around with, but with everyone living longer, you'll start seeing more crits.
About the GoldRush map. Sounds great for soldiers and snipers. Soldiers love caves, pipes, confined spaces, areas where they can use splash damage to great effect. Snipers like long hallways with enemies moving directly toward or away from them.
At first thought, "dustbowl like caves" I imagined a confined space that moves relatively in a contiguous path. The path will surely snake around and will open up into areas that snipers can use. These are all important. What would be a mistake is if there are not alternate entrances and exits. It maybe cool if there was a control lever that was placed at a split in the track where anyone could push it with a weapon shot or manually that could decide which track the cart takes. What you don't want is one contiguous track down one contiguous tunnel. A better team could push the advancing team to their spawn and deny them the chance of moving the cart.
As for the advancing team, I see trouble ahead. If the map favors the engineer/demo too much, kdr will be very low. The advancing team will really need to coordinate together to push all at once with every man involved to get the cart along. Imagine an area 2 minutes into the "track" where all the engies are setup and lots of stickies along the track. Advancing team may need sacrificial lambs to fall on the stickies to keep the cart moving...or depend on their snipers to take out the demos.
Its not all bad. I like the idea. FPS's have been plagued with the same types of maps...deathmatch, ctf, and control point. I like this new idea. I think that the custom map builders will go wild with this. For a real challenge, I'd like to see each team with their own cart, esp on 32 player maps, forcing the teams to split the defense/offense work and making it more like a race to see who gets their cart to the finish line first.
I'm trying to think which role looses the most and I figure scouts loose out the most on these types of maps. In order to really help, they need to have 2x influence over moving the cart like they do in capping a control point. It might open up times when a scout rush actually helps...get the cart to the enemy fast b4 sentries get set up. Then antagonize engies...die and spawn into something more offensive. Break through the engies setup and move the cart along again.
It doesn't need new weapons, class load outs or anything else like that to invigorate the game (although it hardly needs a boost of adrenaline rightnow). What it needs, are a few more really well thought out and balanced maps.
I don't want to be one shouting "beware of change", but I really do think these ideas of Valves about the load outs and special buffs are needlessly complicating the game, to its detriment.
I like the simplicity of the game. If I'm in the mood to cackle whilst rushing into burn someone, then run off screaming when a soldier turns up, then I know what I want. These plans seem to be trying to add too much variety. Just give us some new, well structured maps, particularly a new brother or two to Hydro's play mode, and I'll be happy.
Oh, and buffing a Soldier upto 400 is just retarded. They're already too overpowered, with too short a reload time.
Okay So I like the sound of the new game mode and unlocks but its stupid with the new medi gun, 600hp heavy rolling into your base would just own every single person there, and then they could easily spawn camp till they run outa ammo, Know I havent read any of the comments so dont have a go at me if I repeat w/e you said.
Here's what I'm thinking for Pyros: Napalm. Primary fire would be a sprayer for jellied gasoline, secondary fire an igniter with a delay of a few seconds. The Pyro gameplay wouldn't be altered too radically, because you would still have to be in close with the action starting fires. It wouldn't have the insta-kill possibility of sticky bombs, but the flames would still give a DOT effect as well as some visual cover. You could use it to set traps or discourage enemies from closing in on cap points or chasing the flag holder, but the flames would only last a short while and the Pyro would be vulnerable while lighting the napalm. So if you cover a cap point with it and a scout rushes in, you have to time it so that he's on the point while the napalm is burning and protect yourself so he doesn't kill you while you are lighting it.
For Heavies: A more accurate, slower-firing machine gun, looking kinda like an M60 or a Browning Automatic Rifle. One could be a long-range threat, but be less able to blow people away at medium and short ranges.
I'm looking forward to the additions. I don't seem them as being unbalancing just offering slightly different playing styles for each class. I do wonder if it will lead to some load outs being shunned by players, but that could lead to some nice discussions.
As for the goldrush map I have a wonderful image of a lone heavy chasing a mine cart that keeps speeding up when he gets closer and slowing down a bit further away till he catches up again. I'm also curious as to whether you will be allowed to build a sentry on the mine cart or not. for proper gaming I'd hope not. For comedy value I'd like to be able to stick a sentry on. That or let a sniper crouch on top of it while it trundles along, would help keep the sniper constantly in range of the action around the cart and make him a juicy target.
I saw some of the other ideas for class weapons, here is another type of medigun I would love to see:
An area of effect heal, which works similar to the Dispenser (but a lot faster) in an area around the medic. It would not over-heal, but could possibly build an uber to use on one person (while active no one else would be healed). This would be great on maps where you must move an object or take a point with many standing on it. Makes them more of a threat and they could get a portion of a point for anyone killed while being healed, on a smaller basis than now (use a math equation to balance it out, the more people you are healing their HPs go up slightly slower, the less=the faster; however, the less you are healing the more points you get for kill assists, the more people you are healing=lower points for kill assists.
I think an area of effect medigun would be stellar.
I also like the idea of a fire bomb/fire grenade for the pyro. I feel the pyro is the most underutilized class (along with scout) in TF2. It has a lot to do with most the maps having limited places where pyros do little more than 'spy' check and rarely even get the final kill on most people. Pyros need a serious over haul to be effective. I love their 'Kenny' like voice and would love to play one more often.
Headshots are the same as backstabs though, aren't they (i.e. one hit kill regardless of target health)?
Nope.
Oh. That's odd, I'm sure I've had fully buffed Heavys taken out from under me by lone Snipers (I should clarify that I was referring to fully-charged headshots, rather than un-charged shots).
I don't see why some of you are making such a big deal out of this, it's only adding variety. It won't unbalance the game as there are two teams, whatever one has, the other can have. If Red are running about with double health, then Blue either need to get a medic with the right load out to counter it, or come up with something else.
Um, that falls down completely if no-one on the opposing team has anyone who has un-locked the alternate 'load-outs'. All possible configurations need to be tested with each other, which is what balancing is all about.
Anyway, unlock some of the classic weapons. That would be rad. Here are some of my suggestions
medic -> melee distance Infection weapon. I mean, nothing is more terrifying than an enemy medic with his healthpack out, 10 metres away, running at you. Even with a heavy on your ass, you are going to focus all your attention on killing that medic before he reaches you. It's enough to have you retreat, giving the opposing team the chance to move up.
scout -> concs or caltrops I just love flying one end of the map to the other or just launching enemies that would otherwise block your escape route. Probably some of the most laugh inducing moments from TFC came from using the concussion grenade. Obviously the amount a scout has at his disposal will have to be adjusted least we have a massive scout rush that deals out 3 or 4 grenades each on the opposing team. Cries of mercy and agitation abound on the microphones. Althooouggghh.... Hmmm. Might want to work on that, it could work.
Demoman -> Detpack I really miss the ability of opening shortcuts and extra routes by setting a detpack in a specific location. Even then, you may want to counter a detpack by having an engineer deal with it much like he would with a sapper. Or even better, a friendly spy sapping an armed detpack. Then the spy can have defensive qualities as well as offensive ones. If there are no routes to open up, then a demoman can set a detpack near a cluster of enemy sentries or some other stronghold like a capture point, sending the opposing team into a scramble to get rid of it.
Sniper -> ability to charge weapon when not scoped May this won't create too much difference in game tactics but this probably could make a sniper more versatile in eliminating non-sniper classes. Hold the left-mouse button to do this (or default firing button on the 360/pstripple). He'd be just chilling on his side of 2fort, watching to see if there are any scouts with the flag/case leaving his base to get an early jump on them. On top of that, the sniper's focus would not be set in one area (that he'd have while peering through the scope), giving other snipers the chance to get the jump on him. Having to zoom in again and find that threat will cause the sniper with the ability precious milli-seconds that he'd otherwise need to survive with.
Heavy -> Nevermind cluster grenades. Those were annoying. Try something like a faster spinning barrel (with a limit before it locks up or overheats) or an ability to one-time-only sprint a brief distance (very slow speed to medium speed).
Pyro -> liquid trails of gas A defensive trap, lay a trail or puddle of gasoline on the floor. Wait until enemy comes near, set it alight. Sets the enemies in place on fire or holds them back long enough for your team to come back you up. It'd probably be 5-10 seconds before the flames blow out. This could seriously upset an enemy point capture. But of course, this will penalize you plenty. Probably by costing you 50% or 75% of your ammo supply.
Engineer -> Ehh, I don't know. The buildings are enough, there doesn't need to be more to that. Probably what he needs is a better way to fend for himself. Perhaps bring back the railgun or give him an improved shotgun (maybe a sawed off double barrel to enforce his TEXAN PRIDE)
Soldier -> More powerful rockets, even longer reload time. Sure, he'll be able to frag more people, but that won't help much when he's back tracking to reload his weapon in safety with 3 guys on his tail.
Spy -> Tranquilizer pistol Give him a 1-shot reload tranquilizer pistol that inebriates the victim for 10-15 or so seconds. So if someone notices something's amiss with his character, the spy could whip it out and shoot him with this - giving him the chance to run off and put on a new disguise with less damage taken. All without a sober goon tracking him down with a vengeance.
I have an interesting idea, now here me out, I want you to criticize the idea and expand on it please.
Say if you are a Pyro in game. You have killed 3 or more spy's in a single round OR game (depending on round or game the # of spys need killing will go up or down)You can achieve something called the "SpyHunter" A device you can use even after death, but you can only achieve it once per game and use it only once. How it works is once equipped all spy's in the vicinity will turn green or brown or something of that sort. So you see a scout running around put on the "SpyHunter" and he turns green so now you see a green scout marking him as an enemy spy. With this you can see more than one spy if there is more than one, but you can only choose one to target. Now this could be an uncloaking device so the spy comes out of his disguise OR a one shot kill of some sort. As soon as you use it you can no loner see other spy's but you can inform your team what they look like via headset/microphone.
Once again please expand on this idea I would love to hear comments. As for the Pyro someone suggested Molotov c**ktails which i think is an excellent idea along with the gasoline on the ground and igniting idea.
I just think questioning the balance of something that has the same affect on every class is a little pointless. Although admittedly the impact is probably greater for those classes with a s**t load of health already...
Which was my point (sorry for the curt response). It will have a much greater effect giving a heavy 600 health (especially as the heavies tend to have medics pinned to them at all times) than a demo man 350, for example.. a 400 HP soldier would be horrific.
Everyone has a weakpoint, but some are certainly harder to kill than others.
I'll obviously have to wait and see how it pans out, as will we all, but this specific idea doesn't sound particularly fun - I'm ofno opinion on the others as I have heard nothing as to what they may be.
OMG, team fortress 2 is turning into world of warcraft (and that's bad, not good.. well I guess Valve wouldn't mind 9 million paying customers, but that's another story)
What made TF2 great was it's simplicity. Drawing the caracters in a bright cartoonish style was a stroke of genius. No need to sit hiding in a bush until you figure out if the person in front of you is friend or foe. No need to guess what weapon he'll attack you with. Being able to quickly analyze the threat you're up against allows you to think out a strategy of how to deal with it, instead of just mindlessly blasting away. Each class having several different equipment sets might be lots of fun for someone who logs on to a random server and just runs around killing whoever they bump into. For someone who enjoys playing a little more tactically this can instead be game breaking. If I run into a demoman I know that he'll have a difficult time hitting me with a grenade if I jump around alot. I also know that if he runs around a corner, there will probably be a bunch of stickybombs waiting for me. Simple and obvious information like this allows me to make an intelligent decision of what to do next. But if the demoman has unlocked a shotgun (now, I really don't think Valve would do THAT, but it's just an example) and some other weapon it comes down to guessing and pure luck.
A few more well designed maps would definitely be welcome, since about 90% of all homebrewn maps suck in ATLEAST one way. But there's no immediate need to invent new game modes.
I really hope Valve's developers know better than to listen to the community. The vast majority of players who comment on articles like this one and come up with "good" ideas don't have a clue about game design. Game design (which ofcourse include level layout, class balance and MUCH more) is an advanced subject just like programming and not something anyone can pull out of his ass. The worst thing is that those with the worst ideas are the ones with the biggest mouths (metaphorically speaking).
The only issues I'd like to see adressed are: * Medic class is quite boring to play (hopefully this will be fixed without making them overpowered) * Snipers almost never contribute to the team's efforts to actually win a map. Some people might enjoy sitting in a dark corner and killing a random enemy every 30 seconds, but there's no teamplay in that. * Some maps are too easy to turtle up with tons of turrets, demomen and a couple of pyros which leads to boring stalemates.
I really hope servers will be allowed to disable unlockables, because there are people who like the game as it is. I'm not that pessimistic as I think I sound though. Valve made a good game from the start, and this doesn't have to ruin it. I'm just concerned that so many think it's the best idea since When I bought the game I assumed I would be allowed to play TF2 until I got bored of it, not just until they changed it to something else with mandatory patches.
I am just so psyched that they are adding more customization for playing styles and a goal to achieve. Right now I play a ton and I feel like I don't get much of anything out of doing really well. I've gotten all of the current achievements and that was the only goal type thing I had to shoot for. It'll be really nice to have the incentive and know that if I play and get a certain number of kills as a heavy that I'll get a better gun or something cool like that.
How about playing the game because you enjoy it? It's what I do, and have done since the beta.
It doesn't need new weapons, class load outs or anything else like that to invigorate the game (although it hardly needs a boost of adrenaline rightnow). What it needs, are a few more really well thought out and balanced maps.
I don't want to be one shouting "beware of change", but I really do think these ideas of Valves about the load outs and special buffs are needlessly complicating the game, to its detriment.
I like the simplicity of the game. If I'm in the mood to cackle whilst rushing into burn someone, then run off screaming when a soldier turns up, then I know what I want. These plans seem to be trying to add too much variety. Just give us some new, well structured maps, particularly a new brother or two to Hydro's play mode, and I'll be happy.
Oh, and buffing a Soldier upto 400 is just retarded. They're already too overpowered, with too short a reload time.
I think the Scout needs to be made a little bit more effective, particularly his double jump. It's constantly the case that the jump is not high enough to avoid either splash-damage (a la Rockets/Grenades) or to jump over Stickies, both more often than not resulting in insta-gib.
More frustrating is the fact that upon taking aforementioned damage, the resultant explosion fling leaves you helpless as the enemies can easily judge where you land.
I'd quite like to see either a triple-jump, which would be great strategically as it would grant the Scout even more maneoverability, or a hyped up double jump (higher, longer) to be able to avoid annoying rocket spam and accessibility to less-used regions of the map.
My $0.02
P.S. I have over 56 hrs played on Scout, so I hope they do something cool with him!
Adding unlockables and loadouts is going to ruin the game. The simplicity of it is what makes it so fun. You are required to work as a team to win. The "one man show" events rarely happen. Adding new weapons is going to make them happen all the time and will also add too much variation to it. Knowing what you are going up against is what makes it work so well. This is just going to make things way too chaotic. It's basically like adding twice as many classes to the game. Stupid stupid stupid.
Valve - Keep your dicks in your pants and try not to p**s all over the game. Go make more maps and gamemodes.
First of all, I think some people here aren't quite getting the point of "load-outs". These are not unlockable uber weapons and they are not "upgrades" to existing weapons (like someone recommending the sniper rifle charge while un-zoomed.) These are different variations and possibly new items that have their own benefits and disadvantages. No triple jump for scouts, no mobile sentry guns, etc.
Secondly, I think one thing Valve could do that might help satisfy all the people who enjoy the original game as it was is really quite simple: Make the load-outs a server option that you can disable. Then all you have to do is either find an original game server or make one yourself.
With that said, here are a couple ideas Gir and I came up with in the lab. Several are similar to what others have already voiced in this thread:
Engineer -
Proximity alarms to replace dispenser: An engineer can set up a small sonar device that emits a visible pulse every few seconds. When a cloaked spy passes through the radius of the device, it "pings" to alarm those nearby. Spies can still avoid it because they'll be able to see the pulse as it radiates from the device. Possibly allow the engineer to have upwards of 2-3 devices. Would be great to use on sniper towers and battlements to alarm snipers to incoming cloaked spies. Shouldn't detect costumed spies (I think that'd be too overpowering).
L3 sentry load-out - Flamethrower: Instead of the L3 sentry having missles for long range, have a flamethrower for close quarter sentry guns. Would be great for placing around corners to avoid enemy pyros from burning them down from 90 degrees. Also great for hallways.
Pyro -
Napalm instead of flamethrower: Would make the Pyro a little more range-oriented similar to the Demoman. Has a large bag that contains small bombs that the Pyro tosses (4 bombs to a bag, new bag for reload, 32 bombs total) They create a small patch of fire wherever they land that lasts a few seconds, setting anyone who pass on top of it catch on fire. Make it really interesting and have them explode on walls and ceilings too.
Spy -
Tranq-gun instead of revolver: Gun puts enemy to sleep for 3-5 sec. One shot reload. Duh.
Scout -
Caltrops?: I like the idea of caltrops from the original TF making a return, but I'm not sure how this could be balanced out. No double-jump? No handgun? Shotty?
Heavy -
Chainsaw instead of fists: Revs up just like the primary weapon to do constant melee-range damage similar to contact damage made by a pyro, but considerably less.
Redesigned ammo spray for primary weapon: Instead of having the machine gun spray randomly in a circular pattern, have it spray in a flat arc. Would be fantastic for clearing bridges and hallways at medium range.
Sniper -
Sniper rifle "pings" enemy targets: Instead of the power-up ability of the sniper rifle, have it ping enemy targets (ones that you don't kill outright) so they are marked to all enemy players. For instance you shoot an enemy sniper on the arm, he runs to get health. To all enemies, he now has a small marker attached to him that is similar to the speech bubble that pops up when you call for a medic. This ping could be removed by friendly medics.
Demoman -
Layered grenades to replace sticky bombs: Like those seen in the original trailers. They throw a grenade that explodes and then releases several extra grenades that explode after a few seconds.
Pyro - Molitov c**ktail (to burn those at a distance)
Solder - Grenades (An average Frag Grenade to umm Frag people)
Heavy - Berserker Rage - (@ 25% health he goes into a rage for 15 seconds that tightens his bullet spray, turns his vision red, and increases his rate of firing. IF shotgun is active he can use the butt of the gun @ short range IF he's using his fists he runs slightly faster and his punches f'in hurt!)
Demo - satchel charge - (AKA the tossable that is in the teaser trailer)
Spy - Smoke Screen -or- smoke blow - (Screen you'd see him mash like 5 cigarettes into his mouth and puff away...lol and the blow will reveal laser trip wires...see below)
Engineer - Laser trip-wire claymores (Typical area denal weapon, only friendly's will see the laser -or- a spy's smoke blow)
Sniper - Proximity alarms (To alert the sniper if someone is around him when he's buried in his scope to vent someones cranium)
Medic - Infection Steam - (turns his gun into a green stream that "infects" n00bs with a virus that slows them and makes them dizzy & blurred vision effect lasts 15 sec)
Snipers ; each shot will "paint" a target and right mouse would fire. So there for you could lay 3 shots into a heavy and guarentee a kill, or "paint" 5 headshots on the opposing team for a team wipe. that would be awsome.
Pyro ; gas release. You can get behind an opponent and just shoot ivnvisible fuel over them, after a few seconds it would just take a spark to basically blow them up.
Heavy ; errr i dunno. flashbangs?
Demonoob ; limpet mines that attach to an enemy but dont explode until he gets withing a few feet of a team mate. Or just get rid of them, i wouldnt be sad
Scout : Rollerblades. makes them faster but can only use baseball bat when activated.
Spy : Clone. Project a hologram of a teammate that draws your enemies attention long enough for a low blow (like a backstab, but a kick to the gonads with steel toecaps on, resulting in 75% health loss and 75% movement reduction in the enemy)
Engineer : Building spawn points
Soldier : SA80 a basic assault rifle that jams frequently.
Medic : Drop medi pacs ( generic I know, but I hate medic classes)
I'm sorry, but some of the suggestions I've read in this comments thread really are absolutely bloody retarded. Valve aren't going to implement anything that sounds like an insta-death bomb for any class. No one class is going to get any sort of weapon that allows a scout, or a demoman or whatever to annihilate 3, 4 or 5 enemy team members at once. That would totally unbalance the game.
Suggest something feasible, please, people.
Again, I'd like to re-iterate my feeling that this whole venture by Valve is needless overcomplication.
Grenades might be a viable route, if you could somehow prevent 'nade spamming. Other than that, I don't see how, or even why, Valve should try to alter TF2 for the better. It's already a sublime game.
I think that you should give a spy the ability to run a little bit faster than a scout, jump like a scout, but it is for a limited amount of time equal to the time you can cloak for and it replaces your cloaking ability. This would be balanced and very difficult to master how to move at that speed and get backstabs.
Adding unlockables and loadouts is going to ruin the game. The simplicity of it is what makes it so fun. You are required to work as a team to win. The "one man show" events rarely happen. Adding new weapons is going to make them happen all the time and will also add too much variation to it. Knowing what you are going up against is what makes it work so well. This is just going to make things way too chaotic. It's basically like adding twice as many classes to the game. Stupid stupid stupid.
Valve - Keep your dicks in your pants and try not to p**s all over the game. Go make more maps and gamemodes.
How about you work on not being quite as much of a dumbass? By your logic, I can say that I know you're a moron without ever meeting you just like you can say that this will ruin the game without ever playing it, right?
First of all, it was already said once that these aren't "uber" weapons or anything. They are simply more choices. There's nothing that says they will be stronger than what is already out there. It's impossible to say that one man shows will happen all the time. Impossible to say and idiotic to say.
As for it being similar to adding whole new classes, from what I've seen so far, it's just variations of weapons that the classes have already. In no way are the differences that major. And you'll still only be able to use your two weapons (three with melee) at a time so it really won't complicate anything. It may add a new depth to the game though.
You seem to just be talking about things you obviously don't understand, as do a lot of people here.
And anyway, it was stated that Valve is just releasing it slowly as a test run and will be looking for feedback, so stop acting like assholes and thinking that this is an irreversible change. Just stfu with all the "I know how this will turn out already" and give Valve proper feedback after you test it out.
Here are my ideas, ill try and amke all of them have disadvantages: Scout:Uzi to replace shotgun, equal power but each is good for different ranges. Or sprint, he can activate a sprint to go uber ffast and jump 2 times the height but he has to wait for this to recharge, this also replaces his gun.
Soldier:Homing rockets, but have less damage. Or Mortar launcher, more powerfull but slower, it loses height which means you have to compensate for long range this also means it can fire over things.
Pyro:Napalm Thrower to replace flame thrower. Fires a stream of firey liquid, it travels in the air so is not as good as flame thrower but it can set parts of the level on fire for a bit. Or BOOM suicide bombing, to weaken off enemys that will probably survive your DoT flames but wont if you lower their health with this. The downside is that being shot in the gas tanks a few times causes you to explode NOTE: does not insta-gib enemys (only you)does the damage of a sticky but with wider splash.
Demoman:Ricochet nade launcher, less power but more will rebound off corners better. Or that Dynamite nade from the early trailers to replace stickys.
Heavy:Infinate ammo but slower movement. Or Mini Mini gun, a smaller mini gun that he can fire while running but a has less power (instead of a mini-mini-gin it could be something like an M60).
Engy:hmm dunno really perhaps different SG's like rocket SG, flame SG. Or he can build two level 1 SG's but cant upgrade them, this means he could constantly move them becausce he wouldnt have to waste time upgrading. Or A laser pen that marks targets for the SG's past their normal range, but replaces his guns so he has to stay at SG at all times.
Medic:Well ones already listed so a different medi-gun, has the same healing power and charge up time but the uber lasts twice aslong, the disavantage is that this gun only stops you from dying, you can still take damage, so if i shot an ubered heavy 5 times with rockets after the uber wears off he will spontanously explode.
Sniperont really know but id say a sniper rifle that cant charge(so bodyshots wont kill a guy on full hp) but headshots instantly kill anyone. Or, an auto sniper, it has less power.
Spyermant invisibility but the faster you move the easier you are to spot, this replaces disguise kit but sentrys cant spot you unless you run. This makes you better against player but worse against SG's. Or smoke bombs, you throw them at your feet and crate an instant cloud of smoke to escape in, replaces revolver(this could also work with falshbangs).
Feel free to critisece these ideas, it lets the mbe adjusted.
Secondly, I think one thing Valve could do that might help satisfy all the people who enjoy the original game as it was is really quite simple: Make the load-outs a server option that you can disable. Then all you have to do is either find an original game server or make one yourself.
Best idea in this thread so far! Would kick ass in combination with an option to filter based on content in the server list.
These weapons would be cool if you can unlock them.
Scout: 1. A speacial powerup that speeds him up even faster for a limited amount of time. 2.gernades. To throw gernades and run fast? I hope there are alot of gernades.
Soilder: 1.A stronger rocket launcher but less ammo and you have to reaload at every shot. Also the rocket does not damage you so it can rocket jump higher without hurting yourself. 2.a sniper added on your rocket or a whole new rocket launcher with a scope on it with extra accurcy and faster shooting but, weaker then the other rockets.
Pyro: 1.Fire bombs. You throw it and every person in the range turns on fire except teammates. 2.armor so you cant get hurt as much as before and you cant turn on fire at all but, your slower because it is heavy.
Demoman: 1.Those dynomite from the trailers. That would be so cool. 2.Reguler but really strong gernades.
Heavy: 1. A powerup that makes you go faster. That would be so useful. 2.a gernade launcher attached with the chaingun or shotgun that is very low ammo.
Engineer: 1.A backpack that holds 200 more peices of metal so you will have 400 peices of metal. 2.A upgrade to the dispence so that it has a watergun and a a machinegun or shotguns attached to it to protect it self.
Sniper: 1. A sniper that has less ammo but stronger and can scope in more. 2.throwing knives to deal with people that is only a little far away.
Medic: 1.I think the overhealer is a good idea. 2.A gun that infects the enemy and hurts them for 30 seconds. It goes good with the pyro's flamethorwer.
Spy: 1.a stronger pistol or a shotgun. 2.a thing that will cloke everyone that is in the range for limeted time the downside of that is that is will cloak enemys too.
That is what i would do if I were the creater of the new update tomorrow.
Personally, I feel that achievements should be irrelevant, and the unlocks should just be available immediately, letting people choose how they want to play from the start.
The achievements are irrelevant, but with this update, they will have a purpose. And BF2's weapons weren't open from the start, and we all remember how fun that was Goldrush also sounds ace, can't wait for it.
Be quiet Hulio
Although, yep you're right about BF2. I think everyone is looking a gift horse in the mouth here, how many FPS games get updates like this.
I think either scout or spy could climb walls and the heavy should turn into a womble... I'm sure there will be an option for 'No Unlocks' on servers.
i like the idea of the unlockables, i doubt it will be unbalanced because it will overpower everyone, making everyone equally super. and like someone said, there will probably be on option for no unlockables
also i think one of the classes should get a machine gun, sorta halfway between the heavies and the snipers. the shotgun is a little overused
I would like to see some new abilities as well like the spy could have a “Fake-Death” ability.As for weapons I would love to try the “Pill” from the first games,and a type of distraction would also be cool, like a manikin that would appear real or something…
The laser detonator/trip wire would be real cool, I would also like to see Engineers building spawn points, to a limt so not directly in the others base.
Also the demoman does need a short range weapon in my opinion.
i like the idea of the unlockables, i doubt it will be unbalanced because it will overpower everyone, making everyone equally super.
for me its not the affect of the unclockables on each class, and whether certain ones would get weaker stuff. valve are good at balancing, so they would do a good job of it.
its just this whole idea of ''the more achievements you have, the more unlockables you've got access to''
edit: dang. just read the article through again and i suppose its not quite as bad, as there are achievement lists coming out for every class. so at least your unlockables for that class will be somewhat based on how dedicated to that class you are. some skill involved.
anyway, we'll see how well it turns out.
P:S: do u think a massive rocket launcher that only the heavy is physically capable of carrying, containing 1 or 2 shots but being mega powerful, is out of the question?
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