An idea to help encourage newcomers

[HoboHob]

Alright after not playing the game at all for like a year I opened up the new OpenSpades and started playing, at first I was like "OMG GRAFIX :D" and then I was like "OMG HOW R THESE HAXOR NUBS TRICKSHOTTING ME FROM ACROSS THE MAP?"

You see one of the big issues with this game is that the inherent skill level is really high, the only people left playing are the ones who've played for a long time which means newcomers who may not have much experience with FPS games at all are just gonna get destroyed, not have any fun at all and leave.

How do I propose to fix this? Matchmaking. Yes that horrible M word. This is how MOBA's solve the problem, you see MOBA's require a great deal of time to learn to any form of mastery and if you kept getting stuck with people who have been playing the game since beta and you only just started, you'll get destroyed, have no fun and quit. Ace of Spades is nowhere near as complex as a MOBA like Dota 2 or League of Legends but it still has a fairly high learning curve as your mechanical skill determines everything and it handles quite differently from most other FPS games I've played.

Now how the system would actually work is whenever you played a game, you would gain points based on whether you win or lose. The longer you are on a winning streak, the more points you gain. The longer you are on a losing streak, the more points you lose. The closer you are to a 50% winrate the more matched up your point gains and losses are. This would place greater value on actually playing games through to the end instead of quitting halfway through because you are raging. Servers would place a value between 100 of how many points they want players to have before playing on the server (like 1000-1100) and you would have to have a point value greater than 1000 and less than 1100. The points would be connected to your build and shoot account, so whenever you went to the play page it would automatically filter out the servers you can play on and the servers you can't.

One proposed change I have though is that EVERY server that wants to be part of this system has to have a hard limit of 16 players (maximum of 8v8). The reason is it will increase each individual players impact on the team so that it's harder for a player to get "carried" to a high point level without actually deserving it.

Also this could also lead to the creation of a ranking system and a leaderboard.

Also this system would lead to a decrease of hackers, why? Because it would be easier to catch them. They would rapidly increase to high point levels which would obviously have them play against people who have been around the community for a while and know how to get hackers banned.

This would be very hard to implement I imagine and get servers to come around to the idea but all in all, I feel it would very much benefit the game and would help draw in new players.

[learn_more]

matchmaking wont help for shit if there are simply no players of your skill.

it's not going to open a magical can of new players...

[Jdrew]

hankey and coco would be all alone

[danhezee]

http://www.buildandshoot.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=10351

Welcome back hobohob and we have been talking about it. Check it out we might merge the thread.

[Redsovietz]

Matchmaking ruined the new Ace of Spades classic servers, so no.

[topo]

compulsory matchmaking is awful.
a similar system which simply recommends servers to you... that'd be cool.

[Blockbuster]

Instead of trying to re-attract new players.
We need to try and attract the countless amounts of players who have left.


However if finding new meat is your want,then the only answer is to make bns known.

Instead of being on the street, bns is in a dark alley. She'd some light on the site and people will know about it.

For the bored player base that left, do what Ben would have done.
( ok, not selling the rights to the game)
Update.
That's right people, players get sick of the same maps and features

[topo]

tell that to dm6 and dust2

[Lincent]

I suggest we modify Openspades to have lower graphic options and start advertising it on youtube along with its download.

[Jdrew]

That won't be able to happen, read the FAQ on the openspades website

[Jasper]

Don't think that would quite work, or are you suggesting something like iCCup for AoS?

[HoboHob]

compulsory matchmaking is awful.
a similar system which simply recommends servers to you... that'd be cool.

Why is compulsory matchmaking awful?

I see nothing wrong with it.

But that isn't what I'm really suggesting, it's more of an opt in type deal. Where you can play on servers that are around your skill level, OR you can play on pubs.

Instead of trying to re-attract new players.
We need to try and attract the countless amounts of players who have left.


However if finding new meat is your want,then the only answer is to make bns known.

Instead of being on the street, bns is in a dark alley. She'd some light on the site and people will know about it.

For the bored player base that left, do what Ben would have done.
( ok, not selling the rights to the game)
Update.
That's right people, players get sick of the same maps and features

This isn't an idea to attract new players, rather an idea to help new players stay with the game and take time to learn it and be part of the community.

It isn't fun to join a server and get completely owned.

Matchmaking ruined the new Ace of Spades classic servers, so no.

Honestly when matchmaking is done right (See: Dota 2, League of Legends or CS:GO) it's very good for the game.

1. It stomps matches from being one sided stomps that aren't fun
2. It gives players an incentive to "climb the ladder" and thus continuously play the game to get better
3. It helps build a community because of the aforementioned point

Honestly I feel this would be a really good thing over all for the game.

[topo]

compulsory matchmaking is awful.
a similar system which simply recommends servers to you... that'd be cool.

Why is compulsory matchmaking awful?

I see nothing wrong with it.

being forced into a particular group of servers sucks, especially when you have friends at a lower level. consider skill tiers in Quake Live: (in aus/nz ca/ctf/tdm at least) the tier 3 community is great. everyone gets along really well, nobody expects a superb standard of play so nobody complains when you fuck up. as soon as you get moved up to tier 4, you're bombarded with "what the fuck are you doing", "you're useless", etc. assuming you manage to get past that and keep improving, you then have to stay in that tier and listen to people bitch and moan about everyone else. it gets old really fast and at least for me, makes playing in said tier for too long unbearable... and then you get down-tiering which still isn't good for the game.

But that isn't what I'm really suggesting, it's more of an opt in type deal. Where you can play on servers that are around your skill level, OR you can play on pubs.

that would be much, much better than a system which forces you into something yes