Patch - april 28th, bots, training, helper dialogs, balance tweaks

[lamster]

================================================== ===============
April 28th, 2009

Bot AI greatly improved

"Tutorial" replaced by "Training" -- includes 5 new training missions and a 'skirmish against bots' option

Added helper dialogs for router/firewall issues and to show when Altitude's master server is down

Bomber
Grenades - increased cooldown by 5%, reduced splash radius and damage, increased direct hit damage (non-direct hits do 50% less damage, direct hits do 5% more damage overall)
Flak Tailgun - reduced splash radius and damage (direct hits do same damage overall)

Biplane
Heavy Cannon - reduced range by 7%, reduced max-pierced-targets from 4 to 3

Explodet
Mines - decreased lifetime by 10%
Thermobarics - testing different effects - unrecoverable stall replaced with angular momentum twist
Remote Mine - blast radius increased by 3%, damage increased by 6%

Miranda
reduced time to max charge by 2%
cleaned up collision boundary on bouncy-shot projectile (overall slightly smaller, but rounder and produces more consistent bounces)
increased 0-energy weapon charge-up rate by 25% for energy consistency
Laser - reduced range by 33%, reduced duration by 15%, increased total damage by 15%
Afterburn-Teleport - reduced energy usage by 5%

lots of bug fixes

[Ferret]

and the bug introduction of keyboards freezing after firing or turning, helpcomputer

to clarify, about 5 other people said something to the effect of "woah my keyboard locked up" and then I experienced it twice. It was like the effect of Y that will keep you auto turning while chatting but I couldn't break the loop, fire or open chat. ESC to the menu was all I could ge to respond.

[TheCapedAvenger]

"reduced time to max charge by 2%"

Out of curiosity, why do you bother with 2% changes?

[lamster]

keyboard bug fixed! thanks

[NomNom]

Originally Posted by TheCapedAvenger

"reduced time to max charge by 2%"

Out of curiosity, why do you bother with 2% changes?

It's the little things that matter.

[AtomikPi]

Originally Posted by lamster

================================================== ===============

Bomber
Grenades - increased cooldown by 5%, reduced splash radius and damage, increased direct hit damage (non-direct hits do 50% less damage, direct hits do 5% more damage overall)
Flak Tailgun - reduced splash radius and damage (direct hits do same damage overall)

This fix was sorely needed to discourage offscreen shooting and various other skill-free behaviors. Thanks.

[nesnl]

Just as an initial comment to the two TBD training missions, first I think that there needs to be some indicator of the difference between a neutral bomb and a team only bomb. Throwing a new player into the_core and saying "kill the enemy base" will probably elicit the response of "where is the bomb?" Maybe an indicator that shows where the bomb spawns on each of the two missions might help. Also, the bots tend to grab the bombs pretty fast which might confuse the new player as to why the computer is doing the bombing, etc.

Anyway, it was fun playing through the missions. The bots are a lot smarter now and very good bomb droppers. I found it more effective to shield a bot and let him drop because they never miss.

[Triped]

I really like the new missions. Nice AI! Now I think those bots more personality than Bot 1-5. For example, you could name them after some of the top aces in WW1:

The Red Baron (Germany)
Eddie Rickenbacker (USA)
Robert Little (Australia)
Billy Bishop (Canada)
Rene Fonck (France)

Also, they should chat a bit when they do very well or very poorly. I'm sure we can all think of things for them to say.

[skywalker]

the bots are so much better now!!!

[argonide]

Agreed, great job with the bots! The first and only game I played was an ffa to 20 with expert bots and I lost with 19, very impressive!

[NfoMonkey]

bots are truly awesome now.
and testing the new Thermo-s i must say they are pretty freaking fun, i just had a nice escape thanks to one of those, i was about to get pwned but got shot by one of them and with some turning i did a 180 right on the spot... with an explodet.

also are the Debris effects new? when stuff hits the landscape? or i just havent noticed em before?

the bomber doesnt seem like that much of a threat as it was before, yesterday when i saw a bomber i was like "oh ****", now i can actually go face to face and not get instapwned. but when in well trained hands its still lethal.

on miranda, i already heard heavy whining, but i like it as it doesnt have the reach of Gods hand anymore and requires a bit more aiming.

overall good job.
and now for the traditional negative commentary: you nerfed BPlanes HEavy Cannon? dude thats so Blizzard... Ghay!

[DiogenesDog]

hahaha you're trying to salvage remote mine.

[nobodyhome]

about the miranda changes, in particular the damage to +15% and duration to -15%: i see where you're going with this, but isn't part of the fun and uniqueness of the laser miranda is the skill necessary to keep the laser painted on the target? by shorting the duration you're making it closer to it being just like any other projectile: one that is aimed prior to firing and doesn't need too much attention paid afterwards. if that is the intention, then that's ok, but i feel like it takes away from the laser's uniqueness.

[lamsbro]

Remote mines are much more interesting and useful than people realize. They have a longer ejection distance than normal mines and the remote control allows you to determine how the mine blast affects the enemy. If you're dropping a remote mine and then waiting 20 seconds for someone to come by you're doing it wrong.

[Triped]

I was playing an expert bot FFA and flew past a remote mine. The bot detonated it and blasted me into a wall.

[DiogenesDog]

Feedback on the training missions with some other stuff thrown in that I hadn't posted yet:

- Can't decide how I feel about the new bomb bomber. It's kind of neat, but there might be a little too much overlap between the front facing grenades and the bombs.

- Getting kicked from a server bans you from ALL servers? wtf

- "Stats" is a weird place to put challenges. Maybe rename this option if you're going to group stuff here? "Hangar" or "HQ" or something?

- Can't enter spectator mode in FFA. Not that it matters since being dead is the same thing, but whatevs.

- Idea for reverse thrust to make it viable: Rename it as "anti-grav" or something, and remove stall completely. So the player can move normally, reverse thrust, OR hover in place.

- "help" as a console command should do the same thing as "listcommands". Or maybe have a separate help that just gives some of the basics and also tells you about listcommands.

- Two pieces of feedback that would be nice for time warp: 1) Make the line change color slightly when it's at full length so you know it's ready; 2) Add a small arrow at the rear end showing the direction you were facing at that point.

- New training missions are cool, but don't provide enough info to new players. (For instance, they no longer tell you how to use powerups. And there was nothing whatsoever about how TBD works... like that the bomb is the only way to hurt bases.)

- The training missions should let you look at the screen for a sec after you get the last kill / destroy the base / whatever

- The dropdown boxes in Skirmish are ghetto looking.

- I really like that you have a Play Online button from training, nice to have a second way to get there from here.

- lolz you use player-made maps for the training missions. In all seriousness though, I'd make sure that none of the art belongs to someone else. Also, I don't think Asteroids looks nearly as good as the other maps, so I dunno if I'd use it. The Core and Mayhem are probably the only maps that meet the visual quality bar imo, but Mayhem is kind of a no-go since it'd completely rape anyone that was new to the game. Might be a good one to include in skirmish, though! (Also, I assume you got the mapmakers' permission to use these?)

- The training missions kept telling me how to use my primary and secondary weapons. Bah!

- Skirmish should let you select both the level of the bots on your team AND their team. Also the number of players!

- It seems like you could get a passable single player campaign going with the new bots without a ton of work. I guess you'd need a tiny bit more art (briefing screen at least), but not much!

[Spirtz]

one thing i noticed is taht bots can't fly though the screen to the other side. you know like in aqua, they have to stay on one side can't transfer in between.

[Triped]

Originally Posted by DiogenesDog

- lolz you use player-made maps for the training missions. In all seriousness though, I'd make sure that none of the art belongs to someone else.

Isn't Maimer the Nimby artist?

[Ajplagge]

I was actually very suprised to see remote mines get buffed. I always use it with my explote and to, I dont mind saying, great success.

[Vi*]

Originally Posted by DiogenesDog

- Idea for reverse thrust to make it viable: Rename it as "anti-grav" or something, and remove stall completely. So the player can move normally, reverse thrust, OR hover in place.

Next you'll be posting enthusiastically in the helicopter thread. What might work better is to have the boost get you moving forward out of a backwards stall more easily.

Note: I haven't seen the new patch yet.

[Blank]

roar. Haven't played for awhile so these random thoughts of mine aren't all patch related but meh... whatever.

New tutorial is awesome. Still needs better TBD explanation but meh, otherwise awesome.

New bots are great. I'm thinking we should use them in 'normal' low player count games now. Maybe if the game has less than 6 players, bots will take up those slots so it's always at least a 3v3 (or just make it server option... which it probably is already, but for official servers or something).

Kind of old, but flak cannon is a clear upgrade over regular turret. There's no redeeming factor for regular turret. I'm hesitant to suggest a buff for the bomber since it's already very good so instead, if anyone ever comes up with a workable primary weapon change (instead of grenades) that's probably the config that should go.

New explodet missile sucks. You've basically created an aimable woodstock which is BEYOND annoying. The only status effect I can think of that I'd want to see tied to an explodet missile would be a vamp effect (health steal, X% damage dealt = health gained). Thermos just function far too close to normal missiles otherwise.

There is also a secret cult forming in Altitude that is under the delusion that remote mine is useful in some way. This cult must be purged before it takes over the community and spreads their pro-remote mine propoganda onto these forums. The only way to stop them is to remove the remote mine as soon as possible. I had an idea for a tow cable with a mine attached... basically one button press fires out a mine at the current distance except there's a wire connecting it to your plane so it gets dragged behind you. Pressing the button again releases the mine along your current trajectory/speed. I have no idea if this would be useful or not, but it sounds cooler than remote mine IN MY HEAD.



Also, all projectiles either need a serious nerf in range, or a damage reduction when it leaves the players screen (I have no idea what distance that is, would also depend on speed of plane... but whatever). Back when there were arrows, you could at least make the argument that you could use knowledge of the map + arrows to 'skillfully' aim at the other players. Now, the game is just loaded with retarded spam. God knows I abuse this mechanic, but it's freaking silly. It's 10x worse on maps with chokes, but even on more 'open' maps like grotto/woods, you'll see a crap load of random firing. So yeah, range needs to go down, or screen needs to zoom out (so people are actually aiming ****), or something like a 50%+ damage reduction after projectile(s) have travelled a certain distance (miranda bouncy shot would prolly need a more complicated formula :|).

King still sucks at this game and requires serious buffing.