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Haswell

Plague Special Operation: Feedback Collection

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Reposting here for visibility, discussion and free-form answers.

https://aw.my.games/en/news/general/plague-special-operation-feedback-collection

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In Update 0.34, we’ve introduced the Plague Special Operation and today, we’d like to ask you about your opinion.

 

Please let us know what you think about the map using the form below (if you do not play Special Operations, please refrain from submitting feedback):

https://forms.gle/pM6n8cSDXyv5QuYU7

Please note that the form is available in English only. Three randomly chosen players who submit their feedback (and provide us with their nicknames) will receive the access to the upcoming Echoes of War Battle Path!

 


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Thoughts on tier 4-8 difficulty:

Enemy vehicles fall under three main categories: unarmored, fragile tier 7-8 bot variants, and unadjusted tier 6 bots. Due to the 0.33 vehicle rebalance, any player using a tier 7 or 8 vehicle can easily stomp on any enemy they face.

 

Thoughts on tier 9-10 difficulty:

All enemy vehicles can be reliably damage frontally. Due to the map design being essentially one big corridor with very straightforward lines of fire, gameplay is boiled down to simply driving forward and removing enemies that appear in front of you. There is very little time pressure, very little risk of exposing your flanks, and plenty of frontal cover to utilize. In short, very easy and boring.

 

Other stuff:

The beginning blurb is a nice touch (and very cliche), but far too long and also partly unreadable because black text on black background.

69Z29aJ.png

 

The list of objectives is far too long and covers up the kill feed. My screen resolution is 1920*1080 and it still manages to touch my minimap.

uWWD8nW.jpg

 

Ammo collection caps at the beginning are wholly unnecessary and contributes nothing to gameplay. In fact, the beginning sequence is literally about how fast you can get to the bottom and start shooting at things. Not particularly fun or engaging, narrative plot devices shouldn't get in the way of gameplay.

The map has over 50 enemies in total and very little time pressure. This makes it an excellent and reliable choice to complete missions that require farming damage or kills, especially since you can play it at any time without having to play through other chapters. Also has infantry to shoot at for that bloody contract mission.

 

I won't call it Spec Ops, I'd rather call it a long PvE mission (which is the whole point). The overall difficulty is on par with PvE in general and slightly higher at times, but far lower than what I've been used to in other Spec Ops maps. Even so, corridor MBT meta bad.


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Some fragment of passing through city ruins reminds me some scenes of video from Syrian war tedios combat in cities. The mission doesn't look like "hurr durr lets destroy bad guys". But corridor passages obviously annoying. 

Initial capping could be removed, not really contributing to the story and it looks like some players didn't came to steal ammo at all. They will be waiting at gate until you cap all caps.

Tier 4-8 is as dull as usual, especially if you have bunch of autocannons. In general such map is place to fullfil Terminator purpose.

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qLAR5YV.png

 

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There are some things in the first mission that  need to be fixed.

  • Comments about the ease of the mission due to the tiers have already been noted
  • There is a lack of clarity about what the caps in the beginning of the match are about.  I didn't know what it was until Haswell's post.
  • The flow of the entire mission is hectic and the flow of it from start to finish shows
    • You have a medium size area that everyone stumbles over each other trying to get through to funnel into a small corridor that looks like its 2 wide but reality only fits 1 wide to advance forward due to the amount of "debris" present.  Much like having to go through a turn stile

 

This was an okay-ish mission, but not one that I would want to deal with having to stumble my way through for the however many times to get all the missions related to it completed.


 

"If you were not birthed with claws or fangs, store bought will do just fine."

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I was not expecting a masterpiece but this is underwhelming to say the least. I don't know what the designers whanted to achieve with this one. If the aim was to induce as much rage as possible to the player they probably succeeded.

Maybe it's just me but the english voiceover is probably the worst I've heard in AW. The content of the conversation is already bad enough. Guess it fits then.

I don't really care about the voiceover as long as the mission is good. When I played my first plague match on T10 however, the initial impression was like they took all bad things from previous Specops to combine them into one to rule them all. The Map looks fine and all that but oh boi is it a pain to play.

So you start at the castle. And the first thing you need to do is cap some literally useless caps just to waste time. How could anyone think of this as fun or engaging activity? As if the game wasn't easy enough on its own. Now all you need to do is use three fingers to press WASD instad of two hands simultaneously to operate the mouse. This is a bit exaggerated but there is zero skill involved in this activity. It's just wrong to make players waste time with such stuff. 

As you bumped into your teammates multiple times already you hope to leave this damned castle behind and get to some less narrow areas. Not gonna happen. So you slide down the tank-slide (which is fun as long as no idiots block it, which happened 50% of the battles I played) just to find out that you're basically forced through a corridor for the whole mission. You proceed to bump into your teammates or they keep on bumping into you. This is the first PVE mission that made me nearly rage because of this. This "feature" helps a ton to hate your randoo teammates even more and makes you want to throw your PC out of the window at times.

Why just why would this ever be fun. I mean imagine playing this with a squishie (I didn't feel masochist enough to even try it). There's some corridor missions like AN4 which work fairly well and are fun at times. This one clearly isn't. Way too cramped in the key areas.

The trip through the city is fairly easy besides trying to avoid your teammates which seems to be the main goal and difficulty of this mission. Inf and firepoints are annoying but can be dealt with.

If you manage to get to the pickup point you end up getting cramped again. Hordes of enemies flood the place while you're pressed against the few viable positions which are available to reliably fight the bots. Usually this is where the randoos and I included get crushed fast, so you end up at the respawn location pressed against the end of the map.

It's not fun. At least good to farm a ton of damage if you need to with carry-15 and co.

So overall the idea and look of the map is fine. Gameplay is not.

 

I won't comment too much on tier 8 and below. basically the same issues there. Additionally it's just way too easy and dull. There's just no real challenge fighting a bunch of tier 4 vehicles and a majority of paper-tanks with a tier 8 tank even worse after 0.33.

 

If I got this correct this is just the first mission of the series, so there's still hope left for the rest to be more enjoyable than this one.

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Well, here's the result of the survey. In the previous one, players mentioned they wanted more PvE missions. This is basically a normal PvE mission. Apart from some specific issues (falling into holes or getting stuck), this is what most players wanted and they got it. The survey results are very good. The developers are, no doubt, satisfied.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by Silentstalker (see edit history)
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I've done my 15 missions in SPG (PLZ-89) and LT (Griffin 120), and am working through AFV (K21)now.  I'm doing these 3 vehicle classes at Tier 8 (7 for the Arty), and squishies have no trouble at all.  I'm getting ridiculous kill totals with fairly normal "good" PvE damage numbers... something like 15-25k damage and 15-25 kills.  I was getting 15-ish kills in my Arty missions.  Despite the mission corridors being much too tight, if you just sit back and give your teammates time to clear out of your way, you can still put up crazy good stats.

Tier 10 is a completely different story.  I have yet to complete it successfully (but have only tried twice) because the swarm at the final cap is just insane.  There are a couple of points where you have to push or you'll get capped out, but they're not too bad... except for that final cap.  I used my K2 in my 2 attempts and it seems like a reasonable choice, but we just had no chance against that final swarm and I'm not sure that all T-15s would have made any difference.  There must be some trick or position that I haven't figured out yet.

From a design standpoint, the airship should be removed or at least kept at high altitude until the mission is over.  Having it land while combat is still ongoing makes no sense from a story point of view (especially given the dialog during that phase of the mission) and completely ruins the one opportunity that Artillery has to contribute in a significant way by blocking all fire from across the river.  Derp gun Arty isn't fun... it's just a bad TD when forced to play that way, most players aren't very good at it, and that means everyone else has to carry the Arty (more than usual).  Furthermore, players have to play Arty in order to complete the achievements and they're being forced to play it in its least fun, least effective manner.  Get the airship out of the way and let Arty shine for one brief moment during the final cap.

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Overall, a decent start for a new mission chain. I can see how it appeals to casual players. I see the mission reward has been reduced to a plat crate instead of a SpecOps crate, so it's commensurate with the effort/difficulty. I only got stuck once on a pile of rubble, but was able to get un-stuck by shooting some HEAT rounds at the rubble.

The map rewards mobility. It's actually kind of fun driving around with the ZTQ-15 with the nifty suspension. The tank slide is fun, have never had to use my brakes before on other maps, but it does help control descent if someone spins out in front of you.

Mech infantry here and there help knock out the homicide contract mission. There are enough for everyone on the team to kill at least one, even if you are tied up in the back of the platoon.

Agree with wishing corridors were wider, but this isn't really that different from the early SH chapter corridors. The problem is that the corridor bends a lot, which slows down travel, especially after respawns. I can understand how a couple hairpin turns can be fun and help make the map feel bigger (like the locomotive section of Onyx) but the tortuosity here is a bit annoying.

For whatever reason, I am not hearing the English voiceover, but doing OK just following the mission map. I kind of miss hearing Hana Buric's voice right now (<<Oh, Magnus!>>)

QR

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50 minutes ago, Quantum_Ranger said:

new mission chain.

Please don't be a mission chain. The appeal of PvE (and Plague, which is basically PvE) is that you can play any mission you want without having to suffer through multiple "chapters" to unlock the mission you want. Forcing people to do work, enjoyable or not, just to get back to one specific map is the primary reason I stay the hell away from spec ops in general.

53 minutes ago, Quantum_Ranger said:

The map rewards mobility. It's actually kind of fun driving around with the ZTQ-15 with the nifty suspension. The tank slide is fun, have never had to use my brakes before on other maps, but it does help control descent if someone spins out in front of you.

I wouldn't say mobility matters much. The corridor map design basically funnels you into static bot spawns, there is zero need for fancy maneuvers or positioning and there isn't enough room anyway even if you want to do so.

The uncontrollable slide drop, ugh... It looks cool at the beginning, but you will very quickly hate it when you get repeatedly rammed into a corner and have to wait for others to move away.

 

On 11/27/2020 at 6:57 AM, Silentstalker said:

Well, here's the result of the survey. In the previous one, players mentioned they wanted more PvE missions. This is basically a normal PvE mission. Apart from some specific issues (falling into holes or getting stuck), this is what most players wanted and they got it. The survey results are very good. The developers are, no doubt, satisfied.

This will sound weird coming from me: Plague makes for a dull and boring Spec Ops mission, but works fairly well for normal PvE.

The mission pace is nice, not too long to be a chore but also long enough to have a sense of challenge. My only critiques for the pacing are the beginning ammo collection caps and the ending, which involves a lot of sitting around waiting for the invisible timer. Everything in between is fine, player skill determines the pace as you can slowly clear everything out or speedrun if you want to.

The claustrophobic corridor meta on the other hand heavily punish players for using vehicles without some degree of armor. This is where Plague falls short compared to other PvE missions, the map design does not allow squishy vehicles to even come close to the carrying potential of armored MBTs. Normal PvE missions such as Dire Wolf or Rolling Thunder (both which use portions of the same base map) in contrast, have more open areas and distance for squishy vehicles to utilize vision control and careful positioning, while still favoring MBTs for the easy way out.

Good map design is hard, I know. At the same time good map design is a massive determining factor for how enjoyable the game can be. Plague has almost everything done acceptably except for map design, I'd rate its replayability potential to be very good if not for the corridor meta. You can only drive down the same alleyway so many times before you get bored, and wonder why every other path is blocked by rocks.


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If the majority of players like it I'm fine with it too. But I do hope they won't cramp every single new map this much.

Have a hard time noticing how this map rewards mobility though.

Additionally from what I've heard if you're DCed at the spawn and the castle collapses you're fucked. Might want to change this too to reduce frustration of the whole team.


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Re: mission chain - I'd like to see each mission released individually when first released, which would give us the chance to play it over and over to get the mission-specific achievements, but then when the entire SpecOp has been released go back and link it together into a traditional SpecOp.

Re: corridors - my only real complaint about the design is that they're too tight.  PvE missions by their very nature are channeled by the "story" of the mission, but this one in particular is extremely tight.  There are a couple of places where, realistically, only 2 people can participate if those first 2 people are stupid and stop blocking the corridor.  (Technically in all cases there are alternate routes, but they're less optimal so no one wants to take the alternate route.)  I also agree that the channeled nature of this particular mission is especially egregious with regard to lightly armored vehicles - by the time you can see most of the enemies anyone can spot them, so it isn't possible to "be a spotter" for your team in this mission.

On 11/28/2020 at 1:28 AM, TeyKey1 said:

Additionally from what I've heard if you're DCed at the spawn and the castle collapses you're fucked. Might want to change this too to reduce frustration of the whole team.

I like the fact that people can't just connect and go AFK to get credit for completing missions, which I've seen regularly in past SpecOps on release.  If your internet is so bad that you can't connect within 2 minutes, which is roughly the amount of time you have at the start in Plague, then you really shouldn't be trying to play.

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3 hours ago, knutliott said:

but then when the entire SpecOp has been released go back and link it together into a traditional SpecOp.

I hope not. The biggest appeal of Plague to me so far is that there's only one mission, and I don't have to complete any prerequisites before getting there. If I can't pick and choose what I want to play when I want to, I'd rather not play entirely.

3 hours ago, knutliott said:

  If your internet is so bad that you can't connect within 2 minutes, which is roughly the amount of time you have at the start in Plague, then you really shouldn't be trying to play.

The beginning sequence of capping the ammo can be completed within 1 minute and less. Using myself for example, I regularly load in 30 seconds AFTER the mission clock starts running. The argument of late loaders shouldn't be playing sounds incredibly selfish to me.

There are in fact other instances in the game where late loaders are heavily punished. Your initial spawn point on Tsunami gets swarmed by bots; a lieutenant and 2 other bots on Leviathan pushes directly into your spawn if they get triggered; you lose on Dire Wolf if you don't load in fast enough to defend the first cap point. These are things I want to see improved in order for the game to be more friendly to players, not doubled down on.


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10 hours ago, knutliott said:

I like the fact that people can't just connect and go AFK to get credit for completing missions, which I've seen regularly in past SpecOps on release.  If your internet is so bad that you can't connect within 2 minutes, which is roughly the amount of time you have at the start in Plague, then you really shouldn't be trying to play.

On the other hand I've seen plenty of people who (probably) crashed and didn't load in but were in a platoon. So hard to believe they deliberately went AFK to fuck over their platoonmates. In such a case it's just frustrating and dumb to make people die in the spawn just because their game crashed or internet died.

It's just tiring if the only thing saving you from losses en masse is the Carry-15 because in near every game I had one AFK (mostly bec they got fucked by the castle) and the usual randoo retard with a T15 barely managing 10k. So I'm forced to do 60-85k dmg myself combined with the triple jesus kit to reliably win it. It's beyond sad and maybe it will get better once people get used to the mission because it isn't even hard basically.


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15 hours ago, Haswell said:

The beginning sequence of capping the ammo can be completed within 1 minute and less. Using myself for example, I regularly load in 30 seconds AFTER the mission clock starts running. The argument of late loaders shouldn't be playing sounds incredibly selfish to me.

Plus the initial 30 second countdown, plus the fact that you are allowed 60 seconds to exit after the final lower-level cap has been secured.  So I was being generous when I said 2 minutes, because in reality you have a minimum of 2.5 minutes.

If you're a late loader, you're also being impacted elsewhere in the game and that affects everyone in your mission.  Playing anyway when your internet impacts your performance and affects everyone else in the match is what sounds incredibly selfish to me.

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Everything not in the tunnel already explodes as soon as someone reaches the bottom to complete the "get out of here" objective, regardless of how much time is left on the timer. The sliding down part takes less than 10 seconds, so you really don't have a full minute.

If playing with poor internet (and loading in late) can be considered selfish, does having low frame rates or high ping also fall under the selfish category? For whatever it's worth, I play with bare minimum settings and I only get 30-40fps if the map permits. I also play with 250-300ms ping with constant packet loss because I'm physically too far away from the server. Should I be disqualified from playing the game altogether because my reaction time is mechanically limited, and I will never perform as well as someone with equal skill and better hardware? It's a slippery slope to say late loaders shouldn't be playing while also accepting (or tolerating) others with similar mechanical handicaps.

Instead of punishing players who load in late, measures should be taken so that they can still play the match and contribute after loading in. Delay the countdown timer until all players have loaded in for example, or not having death and failure mechanics that cannot be countered individually. There's a reason why the player spawn points on most missions are safely tucked away in corners that bots won't ever reach.


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15 hours ago, Haswell said:

Everything not in the tunnel already explodes as soon as someone reaches the bottom to complete the "get out of here" objective, regardless of how much time is left on the timer. The sliding down part takes less than 10 seconds, so you really don't have a full minute.

I've never seen this happen, and I've perfected the exit slide about as well as it can be perfected.  I find it hard to believe that I've never "trapped" someone and caused them to explode by exiting too fast, which would have to be the case if what you say here is true.  I've only ever see exploded vehicles on the upper level having never spawned in... anyone on the lower level always manages to exit.

15 hours ago, Haswell said:

If playing with poor internet (and loading in late) can be considered selfish, does having low frame rates or high ping also fall under the selfish category?

I know this isn't going to be popular, but here you go.

If you're gameplay is being affected by mechanical/system limitations that significantly affect your performance, then continuing to play is selfish.  You're allowing your own system's deficiencies to affect everyone on your team.  You're unable to give your best effort, which by definition means you're relying on your teammates to carry you in every match.

Note that I'm only talking about effects that have an impact.  If you're playing with high ping, but you're used to it and know how to lead your shots to compensate, then it isn't affecting your game significantly.  But if it takes you 2 minutes to load into a game... set aside Plague and consider some of the shorter PvE missions.  2 minutes is 1/4 to 1/3 of the match that you've missed!  That sounds pretty significant to me.

15 hours ago, Haswell said:

Instead of punishing players who load in late, measures should be taken so that they can still play the match and contribute after loading in. Delay the countdown timer until all players have loaded in for example, or not having death and failure mechanics that cannot be countered individually. There's a reason why the player spawn points on most missions are safely tucked away in corners that bots won't ever reach.

I hear what you're saying, but ultimately... why?  That just encourages people to play with systems that really aren't viable, which in turn drags down the experience for everyone else.

Standard PvE?  Sure.  In Standard PvE you're not affecting people much by playing with a bad system.  But that starts to change with PvE Hardcore, especially at Tier 9-10.  And it's at a completely different level in Spec Ops.  Spec Ops, particularly at Tier 9-10, is for people who want the most challenge that the (PvE) game can provide.  I grant that it's still not that challenging, but that's not the point.  You shouldn't be playing those modes with a bad system, so no I don't think there's anything wrong with punishing people for failing to keep up in those modes.

FWIW I'm playing on a 6-year old computer with 6 GB of RAM and a GTX 770 video card.  My ping from the West coast of the US is around 170-180.  So I'm far from an ideal setup, but I'm still doing the carrying in most matches.  I'm not coming at this from an elitist POV.  I don't mind carrying bad players... at least they're in the game and trying.  I can help them learn and get better.  But if your system is so bad that it takes you 2 min to load then there's nothing I can do to help you, and it's never going to get better.

I can think of plenty of measures that could be taken in this case, but they'd just be adjusting the line.  You could delay the collapse until the first tank has reached the cap circle at the top of the hill after the slide.  You could make it so that only the top level of the spawn collapses and that anyone on the lower level would be safe.  You could even simply teleport everyone still in the castle to the bottom of the slide.  Lots of options.  I just don't think they're necessary.

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