Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: DamnedBuzzard on March 25, 2002, 09:06:20 AM
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There's been a good deal of discussion lately among the Damned about killshooter and other options possible. I figured I'd bring it here and get some other opinions.
I don't care for killshooter, not because it affects me much (I've only shot myself down once in nearly a year playin AH) but because i hate the concept of smart bullets in general.
Alternatives we've discussed include no damage to anyone from friendly fire and the old DOS Air Warrior solution, PNG. I don't care for the vanishing bullet solution either because when a bullet hits something it should hit and have affect, not pass harmlessly through because the target was unintended.
Here's the way PNG (Persona Non Grata) worked in AW for those unfamiliar. When bullets hit a plane they damaged or kilt it. That's real. No smart bullet that kills the shooter if he hits a friendly, no vanishing bullet that passes harmlessly through a friendly. If you kilt 2 friendlies in a 24 hour period you were denied ammo for the next 24 hours. (obviously both those numbers are adjustable) AW did allow you to switch sides once if you went PNG and allow you to have ammo in your new country.
I would like to see AH adopt something similar to PNG and dump the killshooter. I would propose a 24 hour period without ammo for killing two friendlies in a 24 hour period. I would make that universal, no country switching to get ammo. I would also like to see HT set it so that if you were kilt by friendly fire that death registered as a landed hop rather than a death on your score.
I think a PNG situation would have some serious and positive affects on MA play. Mainly I think the 10 on 1's that everyone hates so much would whither and die. I think there would be a great deal fewer of those guys that come blastin in behind you with all guns blazing while you're saddled up 300 yds off an enemies 6 tryin to steal yer kill.
I see a lot of talk on these boards about the want of and need for "realism" in the game. Killshooter is the most unreal feature here. Bullets should kill what they hit. Folks should pay a price for shootin friendlies.
Flame away my friends.
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So if a bunch of countrymates decide they don't like me, they can each kill be once every 24 hrs? I don't like that idea. I can see it being totally abused.
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There's a reason AW did away with PNG and implemented a variation of killshooter. What you're suggesting would be tantamount to regressing to a system that was considered ineffective and was hence eliminated, Buzzard. Killshooter was and is the solution to PNG, not vice-versa.
-- Todd/Leviathn
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"Mainly I think the 10 on 1's that everyone hates so much would whither and die."
Yeah, never saw that in DOS AW.
5190
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Originally posted by Dead Man Flying
There's a reason AW did away with PNG and implemented a variation of killshooter. What you're suggesting would be tantamount to regressing to a system that was considered ineffective and was hence eliminated, Buzzard. Killshooter was and is the solution to PNG, not vice-versa.
-- Todd/Leviathn
That's a whole other discussion Todd but I'll be glad to join in.
PNG was discontinued in AW shortly after AW went free on AOL. The primary contributory factors were "free AW", 5 screen names per account, and all the kids on AOL. Those were the reasons PNG was, in your words, "ineffective". I have always argued that it was more a case of Kesmai takin th easy way out rather than workin harder to police the miscreants. As a point in Kesmai's defense, AOL may have made it impossible for them to correct the fraggin problem with enforcement. Neither you nor I know that for sure. But AH doesn't have any of the factors that made PNG a problem to deal with as it was on AOL.
PNG worked well in AW DOS for years. "Most" players there were more mature that the free AOL horde. Few had more than one account. I think those attributes are similar to the AH crowd.
Don't get me wrong Todd, killshooter or PNG doesn't/ didn't affect me directly very often in the form of penalty incurred. I am even able to avoid most of the 10 on 1's that I hear so much squeakin about. I don't mean I don't get gangbanged now and then but SA goes a long way to minimizing that.
Perhaps PNG is a regression. That's not necessarily bad. I think it's a better solution than killshooter. Just MNSHO.
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Originally posted by popeye
"Mainly I think the 10 on 1's that everyone hates so much would whither and die."
Yeah, never saw that in DOS AW.
5190
Popeye I don't know if that was meant to be sarcastic or not so I'll respond as if it were.
Fact is while a 2 or 3 on 1 was pretty common in DOS so was the much vaunted 1v1. More a factor of small crowds than anything else. That doesn't mean PNG was not a factor at all.
I flew DOS from late 1992 when the SVGA box came out till DOS was killed in 1996 and I can tell ya that other than th furballs around N11 or at 15/ 16 in the PAC arena I sure don't recall any 10v1's. Doesn't mean it never happened of course but it was infrequent enough that it wasn't memorable, for me anyway. Of course it could be that my memory is failing in my old age too.
Perhaps I'm just phrasing my argument wrong. Let's just say that I hate the whole idea of "magic bullets" that turn around and kill th guy that fired them and I think punishing the guy who kills a friendly is a better alternative.
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Killshooter prevents idiots from being amazinhunks and I submit this is a very important feature in any online game.
Killshooter is also the straightest way to keep things moving uninterrupted. Anytime you start putting a system in place that arbitrarily prevents people from participating in the game you are going to kill subscriptions.
HTC quite simply isnt gonna change the way killshooter operates.
Its either on or off and in the MA turning it off would be a huge mistake.
For SEs, where more serious attitudes are the norm, killshooter off is certainly feasible. Same with friendly collisions. But in the MA having either of these options turned off is asking for big trouble.
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Originally posted by Thrawn
So if a bunch of countrymates decide they don't like me, they can each kill be once every 24 hrs? I don't like that idea. I can see it being totally abused.
Perhaps rightfully so...
I'm all for a PNG implementation as opposed to
kill-shooter.
I do so miss those days of yore when a good justified
dweeb hunt was possible!
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Funny I rember png differently. About once every month some how when kite and I were winging together I would nail him by accitdent.
Used to real make me mad when I could no longer fly on a sunday night with him.
Other huge bug exploits in PNG. Rember being able to up, drop bombs as a squad was taking off? Kill the hole squad , but you were killed first so you didn't go PNG?
Rember being able to ping some one, then crash before he did so you wouldn't go png?
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Heh, I remember seeing Subbie get accidentally pinged by a newbie, then taunting the guy before she deliberately augered to make him PNG.
Ahhhh....the Good Old Days. :)
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I don't mind so much taking the damage, but the guy that cuts in front of me should take the same damage.
There needs to be a balance of incentives. He needs to be given a reason NOT to just cut in front of me without thinking as much as I need to be given a reason to check my line of fire. IMHO.
Wab
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Originally posted by hitech
Funny I rember png differently. About once every month some how when kite and I were winging together I would nail him by accitdent.
Used to real make me mad when I could no longer fly on a sunday night with him.
Other huge bug exploits in PNG. Rember being able to up, drop bombs as a squad was taking off? Kill the hole squad , but you were killed first so you didn't go PNG?
Rember being able to ping some one, then crash before he did so you wouldn't go png?
If I remember correctly ( my advanced years bringing that concept into question) I only went PNG 2 or 3 times. Yea it made me mad...but mostly at myself for killin friendlies.
On the bomb thing I truly don't remember it. Course I've never been much for bombs and you always were more diabolical than me :) I never sat in a tank and kilt guys takin off the carriers ;)
I do remember augerin a time or two so as not to get credit for pingin up a friendly in case he got kilt. I remember a lot of folks, me included, askin others to be carful not to get kilt cause they/ I had put a few rounds in them by accident and didn't want to get PNG'd.
As popeye mentions downthread I do remember augerin when some dweeb pinged me so as to help him down the road to PNG.
Havin said all that though killshooter can be gamed too. The NME that locks on the tail of a friendly in a furball and doesn't shoot him in the hopes that his friends comin to his aid will hit the good guy and get killshootered is one example I've seen (and heard folks admit it) in AH.
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The other evening I was manning an ack, firing like mad at an enemy, when a friendly zommed across my line of fire very close. I don't think I hit him, but it's entirely possible. Later, I took a ship's gun and started bombarding a town; it's entirely possible I might have damaged a friendly from explosion damage or a GV might be hit directly - but at such great range you can't tell. Any new method has got to cope with this.
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This topic is discussed at least once a week on this board. So, I will let my signature state my thoughts on it.
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Originally posted by Mathman
This topic is discussed at least once a week on this board. So, I will let my signature state my thoughts on it.
Does that mean your opinion on the subject is as much in error as your signature file or that you don't understand either ?
One would think a teacher who wanted to use big words to paraphrase a colloquialism could at least use the right big words.
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Sweet, so instead of getting "check 6" everytime I close on my kill because the guy 1.2K behind me and closing at 600MPH wants the kill.. he can just shoot me down instead?
No thanks, if I'm going to be killed because of a friendly, I'd much rather the burden of it being on myself. Atleast I can stop pulling the trigger.
-SW
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Agreed wulfe.
AFAIC, the current killshooter setup handles the problem about as well as anyone has managed in any MMP. Honestly, I dont have a problem with killshooter. Its a non issue for me as it is.
Further, if hitech were to impliment a punishment value because I gunned down a greedy sob contryman who tried to swoop in for the kill steal I would just bag the game. No, if it worked in AW just let me say I didnt want AW then, I dont want it now.
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Originally posted by DamnedBuzzard
Does that mean your opinion on the subject is as much in error as your signature file or that you don't understand either ?
One would think a teacher who wanted to use big words to paraphrase a colloquialism could at least use the right big words.
You are right, I should have used hippophilic instead of equestrian. My bad. Thanks for pointing that out.
I will change it immediately.
One would think someone that was trying to provide a well thought out idea would have researched the bbs to find that the topic of concern (PNG vs. killshooter vs. other alternatives) had been discussed repeatedly, with the same result mind you, over the last several months.
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Originally posted by Yeager
Agreed wulfe.
AFAIC, the current killshooter setup handles the problem about as well as anyone has managed in any MMP. Honestly, I dont have a problem with killshooter. Its a non issue for me as it is.
Further, if hitech were to impliment a punishment value because I gunned down a greedy sob contryman who tried to swoop in for the kill steal I would just bag the game. No, if it worked in AW just let me say I didnt want AW then, I dont want it now.
as it is, KS is all 1 sided, and put NO, 0, NOTA burden on the
2nd party of the KS, when the pilot being shot, is as much
or more to blame for cutting infront of the friendly.
KS really stops nuthing, people still cut infront, fly through u, shoot over your shoulder. why? cause 9 out 10 times they dont
get KS, u do.
in the 8 years i flew AW, i rarely saw a problem with
PNG, when it did happen, most would auger to give the
pilot purposely doing it the kill.
whels
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I miss being able to shoot down the whiney guys....I'de change countries in a New York minute to have a crack at a few who fly here.
Sorry, that was the evil Rude....I'm really a nice person:)
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PNG is a terrible idea.
I cant think of a single instance when flying with my squad that I didnt ping at least one of them on purpose just for toejams and giggles.
Its really cool to fire tracers over their head just as you hit the 'check6' button.
With PNG instated, I would not be able to do this anymore without being subjected to no ammo.
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Well im sure we can agree (most) that we hate hearing the PING sound when we get shot? Well, how about NO damage goes to the friendly that gets in front of you and NO damage goes to you either but what you hear is HORRABLE :) you hear 2 times amount of pings as you put into him LOL here comes the bad part.
Spit I and Hurri I u ping a buddy ur going to be deaf becuase those .303 cal are going to nail him good for a while :p But NO damage is done to any player and life goes on....... Even tho i havent seen/heard about killshooter in a VERY long time I know it is still a problem.
This is just a idea REMEMBER
Peace
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PNG is as absurd as our actual system or even more. You seem to think that the shooter is doing that on purpose, while the fact is totally different. Only those that have very little time in sims, that are just starting to learn who is "friend" and who is "enemy" are going to shoot at friendlies on purpose, in fact they will fire at anything that moves in their first days. I'm sure 99% of friendly fire occurences are pure accidents due the normal limitations of a flight sim (net lag, no way to scan the surrounding sky in a second, etc).
It is funny to see how we are punishing now friendly fire against someone crossing in your path, but, at the same time, we have friendly collissions turned off ... IMO, both are just the same thing.
Our actual system leads to sistuations as hilarious as the next one (few days ago):
I was chasing a SpitV at 400 yards, just about to open fire and another rook dived at my left, aproaching the spit from a different angle. I said, well, he will try a snapshot from the left without problems cause the spit was just target fixated and not evading. I opened fire at 200 yards but the other rook was too fast and was about to overshoot by the left, what did he? just to climb away? just a left barrel roll? nop, he did a hard right turn and put ALL his plane in front of my nose. As soon as I saw his plane entering into my front view area, I stop shooting, but I pinged he once. His plane literally eate my D9 while I lost the tail section. Well, the spitV got the credit for my death even being unaware of our presence.
In normal circunstances, that rook not only forced friendly fire, but also a friendly crash. The final result? a D9 killed by a SpitV ...
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I dunno whether this has been brought up already or not: KS and PNG do have their respective drawbacks. Ok. Now. What if we had *both* solutions combined? This means: My bullets hit the friendly, he gets the damage as if an enemy plane had hit him and my plane gets the same ammount of damage (not necessarily the same damaged parts - i might fly a plane which is able to absorb more bullets). If nothing is damaged ( i.e. only a few accidental 'pings' on him) and he crashes i don't get courtmartialed because my fire was not the cause of his death.
If i kill his plane however, i'm in trouble.
This could lead to a 'realistic' behavior because neither the shooter nor the "receiver" (lol) can get any benefit from this. A nice addition would be if the killed person is able to forgive the teamkill hence the shooter does not become a PNG. This way a poor guy who evaporates a whole squad on takeoff would still be able to fly if the squad forgives him. The only way of abusing this system that crosses my mind is when a person willfully flies into the bulletstream of friendlies. However, the probabillity of flying into the fire of the same guy twice in 24 hours and killshooting him should be rather low - especially since the shooter is keeping a sharp eye on friendlies and thinks twice before pressing the trigger after his first teamkill.
How does this sound? :)
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To compare Killshooter with PNG in the first place is like comparing apples and oranges! Killshooter kills the shooter when fragging friendlies. The nearest equivalent in AW was actually "anti-fragging", which applied any damage to the person shooting. However even this wasn't used (or didn't work, not sure which) during recent times, as attempting to frag a friendly had no impact whatsoever on either the shooter or the target. Someone attempting to frag a friendly was just wasting ammo and getting nothing to show for it - I used to find these players (usually newbies who didn't know any better) quite amusing more than anything else, but would always try to help them by telling them they would get better results by killing the bad guys, and indicating what colour to look for! :)
During special events, however, fragging was usually enabled and this was just like having Killshooter OFF here, ie someone fragging a friendly would actually succeed in killing them, just as if they were an enemy, meaning extra care should always be taken during special events! :p
PNG was something totally different, in that it was more of a punishment resulting from killing two or more friendlies. Killing one friendly would give the shooter a message, "You have killed an Ally" which was a warning to go careful for the next 24 hours. Killing another ally during the next 24 hours would result in being PNG for 24 hours. Usually, providing care was taken during the initial 24 hours, the impending PNG status would then be wiped clean... however, if the person went on to kill another ally during that time, PNG would follow. This meant no ammo - either bullets or bombs - for 24 hours at least, depending how many allies had been killed. However, because fragging didn't cause any harm in recent years, the only way to go PNG was to drop bombs either on a friendly, or too close to the target with gunners on board. This used to happen most often when someone was doing a torpedo run with more than one gunner on board - they would drop the torpedo, then fly over the target as it hit, killing themselves and their gunners - instant PNG! :D I saw this debated several times during my Air Warrior days, and the answer was always that the Pilot was responsible for the safety of his crew! :)
PNG could get quite complex if someone made a habit of fragging friendlies, and Mage once wrote an explanation of how it all worked, which I still have here if it is of any interest.
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The whines seen as an affect of killshooter would pale in comparison to the whines generated by someone that was just shot down by a friendly who had one PNG kill to blow before having to worry about it.
It would also pale in comparison to the person that now could not play for 24 hours because someone did the same thing as they did with killshooter enabled.
I fail to see how it promotes anything even remotely playable behavior wise. Now, if someone gets between you and a target you've been fighting, you ping him or shoot him down. Then you explain how that was all his fault and if he doesn't want that to happen, he shouldn't get in between you... despite the fact that you deliberately did it.
Or now you can actually clear someone off of an enemy if you are coming in for the kill. No need to worry about sending a few into his wing anymore. And you can completely forget about that check-6 function... you don't need the bogus calls anymore.
PNG just offers more opportunity for people to act like asses. Considerably more.
AKDejaVu