Lockdown Needs More attention.
Di, 04/09/2013 - 21:01
This thread is going to mainly be dedicated to discussing lockdown. I’m not likely going to be saying anything that hasn’t been said before, but I’m going to put a couple things out there that I think would make the game better (which is why it’s located in the “suggetions” thread). For the most part though, I’m going to primarily want to just talk about the role of Lockdown as it pertains to this game as a whole. I’ll also express my concerns for the recent trend in updates and go through the reasons why I think that this so-called “mini game” deserves far more attention than it’s getting. I also want some feedback (obviously) on whether you guys feel the same way I do or not and why.
First off, if you don’t already know this, I am a MAJOR lockdown junky. Lockdown alone is the only reason me and many other veteran players are still around. This leads me to make a very bold statement: a game is only as good as its pvp system. Admit it, you can only play against an AI for so long before it begins to get seriously dull, but a human opponent learns as you do and gets progressively harder as time goes on. One of the most famous and best-selling games (in the U.S. at least) is the Super Smash bros. line of games, particularly the first two. Why is this? Neither of them had any plot. They were just the multiplayer half of a game that had no story mode. Now, I’m not saying story mode is bad, but despite all the efforts that get put into making the story mode of a game, it seems to me that typically, it’s the PvP that causes a game to live well beyond its release date (to this day, there are still national tournaments that feature Smash Bros. and Smash Bros. Melee).
Now, I’m not going to say that Lockdown is the ONLY reason people stay with SK, but once you beat Vanaduke 5 times, there’s really only two things left to do: make costumes or play PvP. I can say for sure that lockdown is what hooked many new-comers and anchored many veterans who would’ve otherwise left. It gives players the chance to fight the ultimate boss – each other.
All that being said, I just cannot understand why lockdown hasn’t gotten more attention from its creators. Many have suggested wonderful and truly necessary additions and options that are available in other PvP’s of rival games, but haven’t really come to pass here. Things like 1v1, 4v4, deathmatches, and custom lobbies would REALLY bring Lockdown to perfection and finalize what is likely the best PvP game I’ve ever played.
Now, you may be thinking “Dude, this is a little over board don’t you think? It’s just a mini-game for crying out loud! It’s not even what SK is all about!” I have to respectfully, but strongly disagree. Lockdown is NOT a mini-game. It is a highly competitive (and highly fun) PvP and as I’ve already established, PvP’s are the life-blood of what would otherwise be a short-life’d campaign game. If Lockdown was perfected and sold as a separate game by OOO, I would drop my SK account and buy that game tomorrow. It deserves that much recognition and that much attention. Without Lockdown, players would have no reason to continue to beat their heads against that vanaduke-wall so-to-speak. It’s the only reason so many players STILL, after all this time, continue to do runs and expand their arsenals.
What serves as a major turn-off to LD though, is how hard it is to be successful these days. The inability to play guild matches with smaller teams or shut off features like UV’s are major obstacles to overcome and only serve to hinder this game’s ability to grow into what it was meant to be.
Ok, that’s my two-cents worth. Let’s hear from you guys. Am I hitting the nail on the head, or am I just full of horse defecation? :P
State your opinions below.
See Also: Thrillhaus' custom lobbies thread
Mi, 04/10/2013 - 20:30
#2
Extra Credits is now my go-to for game design links
Watch this. Asymmetrical Balance/Perfect Imbalance. SK has great potential for this because of its large weapon/gear selection, plus LD classes, they just need to tweak everything (significantly) to make them all viable.
Mi, 04/10/2013 - 22:18
#3
I have things to say but it's late. b"r"b.
Do, 04/11/2013 - 10:54
#4
Some things to dis/agree on
Mutliplayer games are all about playing with other people. Fighting with them or against them is an aspect that multiplayer encompasses. I have to agree with Kilpik (Hey it's me Kysup), Lockdown is very tied to PvE. However, it's not impossible for this game to create a balance between the two.
-I will reference another arcade fighter from Nexon, Dungeon and Fighter (DnF). And yes, I know the North American servers are closing, but that's due to issues in customer service and non-gameplay related issues. In DnF, the game creates two instances between skills and stats for PvE and PvP, PvP skills generally being weaker, status effects chance being lower, and player HP being higher to create a better arcade experience (Arcade being the style SK was designed as). In Korea, this is one of the most profitable arcade style games in their country. It has TV shows for it's PvP, that's how much they like it.
I won't act like this is something easy to do, and a lot of time and work will have to be made to create something like this. But I think a balancing between the two game modes would benefit the LD experience greatly. I want Lockdown to become more than some Arena minigame. I'm not saying that making attacks weaker and HP higher is the direct solution as only mentioned previously as an example. There will be a lot of thought put into LD before something major happens to it, and it will take a long time. There are a lot of things going on in SK, and a lot of these forum posts are addressing them. The game is focusing more on gaining new players rather than keep the old player paying and playing, but that's enough of that on a PvP post.
If I had any direct suggestions for PvP, it would be this:
-Make a mode that didn't cost any money and didn't give any Krogmo Coins or bribes.
-Make it so multi-hitting weapons can get all their hits, which wouldn't kill someone if the damage is balanced like mentioned above.
-Make it so Invincibility Frames don't affect team players and create a separate counter so it doesn't become an infinite chain.
-I won't say anything about rage quitters, because that is a human aspect that we cannot compensate, but perhaps punish
-Create two instances of each weapon, UV, armor, and maybe trinket for PvP and PvE.
(Things such as decreasing attack power of faster weapons like the Flourish, reducing the shock rate of the Polaris, lowering the blast area of Haze Bombs to perhaps the size of T1, things to that manner)
These are suggestions, I am a person who cares for the PvP in this game. Disagree with me; share your opinion. I want these threads to keep coming until the day Lockdown gets a change like this.
Do, 04/11/2013 - 13:39
#5
"-Make it so multi-hitting weapons can get all their hits, which wouldn't kill someone if the damage is balanced like mentioned above.
-Make it so Invincibility Frames don't affect team players and create a separate counter so it doesn't become an infinite chain."
I can't figure out if these mean the exact same thing, or are mutually exclusive. I think I'm leaning towards exclusive - how does a multi-hit weapon like blitz or cutter get all its hits in, but teammates can't pepper someone with DVSs into a corner until they die of boredom?
Do, 04/11/2013 - 22:28
#6
Mutually exclusive
It addresses a situation without creating an instance where a coordinated team could theoretically chain a knight into death. If you don't quite understand what I spoke of Kilpik I'm sorry for not writing more transparantly. The flinching state is currently identical to PvE, a state in which you cannot be harmed for another second. We can take a game such as Megaman X, where Zero's beam saber combo hit the boss for all it's entirety. The first and second slash were programmed to not activate the boss' invincibility state. A combo could be programmed to this effect.
The danger of this would be that a team could cutter a knight in check while another used a more powerful weapon. Creating multiple instances of invincibility per player would keep this from becoming an issue. A duo of knights would not be able to chain attacks together, instead they would have to wait those normal seconds of invincibility respective to when they struck and attack once it's over.
So, 04/14/2013 - 13:42
#7
<_<
>_>
*bump*
So, 04/14/2013 - 19:41
#8
I found another thing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EitZRLt2G3w
Balancing skill versus power. LD struggles with this, as the techniques for being truly "good" (shield canceling, weapon switching, etc) require a lot of skill and are not sufficiently better than WRH/Polaris spamming, so lazy/inexperienced players stick to their spammy guns and continue to be more effective than they really should be.
Mo, 04/15/2013 - 08:53
#9
Also create lockdown teams so
Also create lockdown teams so the AVERAGE wins/losses ratio of either team is about the same (instead of completely random as it is now).
Mo, 04/15/2013 - 11:48
#10
Regardless , pvp section
Regardless , pvp section should be worked on, more game modes? As it surely is a large aspect of the game, for example the most famous guild is the jempire, it is know to be the best guild, a LD guild, if it was so minor it wouldnt be that way
Mo, 04/15/2013 - 20:56
#11
@Klipik:
Whether or not Smash Bros was "intended" to be a party game. It rapidly evolved into a much more competitive tournament machine. When they removed the "glitches" that made the first two games so much fun and competitive, it died (at least for me). If I'm going to play a game, I want to have to earn some skill. Lockdown builds skill. Your opponent is ever changing, learning, adapting. It's player vs. player - the two strongest entities in the game. People don't stay for the clockworks (although it DOES play a part in why people join in the first place), they stay to build costumes or play PvP. I dare anyone here to claim that they've played this game for more than a year for any other reason.
Mo, 04/15/2013 - 22:19
#12
Well, that wasn't the only reason...
I mean, I've played for two years with a short break towards the beginning and I'm just getting my first 5* set now, so you could say I keep playing because I haven't finished the game yet. Actually though, you could probably attribute that to my addiction to T2 LD.
Di, 04/16/2013 - 06:42
#13
@Noklip
And that's my point. What other reason is there to stay? Surely not to get better at grinding the clockworks; nor do people simply like grinding for the heck of it. There's an underlying goal for getting better gear and grinding the clockworks over and over and over and over again.
Di, 04/16/2013 - 17:14
#14
well
Keep in mind, there was a time before PvP.
Di, 04/16/2013 - 17:38
#15
And it's been infinitly better since lockdown was implemented into spiral knights.
Sa, 04/20/2013 - 19:23
#16
*raises hand*
I've been around for well more than a year, and I can just about count on one hand the number of LD matches I've played. I find it to be a fundamentally-broken game mode, and even if OOO put in the substantial effort to fix it, I'm still not sure that I'd find fighting against other players using SK's isometric top-down mechanics to be particularly fun; TF2 neatly handles all of my beating-up-your-friends needs. I don't play the game just for the sake of "grinding"...I play it because I find the PvE fundamentally enjoyable, so I still keep doing my usual runs.
Do, 04/25/2013 - 10:20
#17
@Pdtopgun: So you mean to
@Pdtopgun: So you mean to tell me that you've been grinding the clockworks for this long for no reason?
I dont know whether I should pity or envy you.......
Do, 04/25/2013 - 10:52
#18
@Bulby
He said it's not grinding, beacuse he enjoys the combat. Really, if you're playing PvE only for the money to do better at LD, you may be in the majority but you're not experiencing the game as the devs intended. Gameplay is supposed to be experienced for the fun of it, not for some extrinsic reward. I'm not sure where it is, but go watch that extra credits about intrinsic/extrinsic rewards.
Do, 05/16/2013 - 21:34
#19
With all that dashing and bashing and Lockdowning going on in the test server, I felt like this deserved a bit of a bump.
Fr, 05/17/2013 - 02:55
#20
dashing AND bashing?
I thought shield bash wasn't in LD. in the notes of the test server it's not mentioned, and during the "preview" the bash was not avaiable in LD.
Fr, 05/17/2013 - 21:21
#21
oops, my bad. yes, only dashing. :P
Sa, 05/18/2013 - 03:41
#22
bombs... yea bombs
One place I think LD needs some serious attention is the bombs. Now the status mist bombs are quite effective and over all work pretty well for what they are supposed to do. However all of the basic damage dealing bombs seem really lack luster in LD. A lot of times they feel completely useless to me. Granted I'm not an expert on bombs, but I just can't seem to get anything but the status bombs to work well consistently for me.
I think asi should be able to reduce the fuse time on bombs. Now I know it doesn't sound like a lot at first, but it could have a drastic impact on bomb usage in LD. I don't think it would hurt PvE much either... Some bombs like the crystal lines really feel like the fuse time is almost twice as long as I want it to be, and being able to self time how long you want your bombs to take in order to fit your play style just sounds like a lot of fun. (if not a little complicated)
Some of the bomber armors are already completely outclassed by the chaos armor now anyway. Adding asi to some existing bomber armor could help even that out just a bit and add some diversity. On a side note, I really do think chaos was more balanced back at dmg low, ctr low, per piece of armor...
Sa, 05/18/2013 - 04:40
#23
BN needs more attention. >_>
BN needs more attention. >_>
Sa, 05/18/2013 - 09:01
#24
^ This.
Sa, 05/18/2013 - 10:06
#25
eyes trying to see the end to another end
@fabiandor/Aplauses:
BN need attention?
so, add what?
pickup upgrades like:
ability to kick the bombs?
throw all the bombs in the line at same time?
allow blow the bomb as your command?
more health to survive one blast?
allow pass through the bombs?
carry and throw away the bomb from your hand?
...
BN will look, even more, like Bomberman, unless you give something unique
Sa, 05/18/2013 - 17:42
#26
@Zeyez
Just add a new map. Lockdown got Frostbite and Avenue during Winterfest but BN got nothing.
"a game is only as good as its pvp system"
Wrong. A game is only as worth coming back to as its replayability factor. Games can definitely be good without PvP, without multiplayer, even without replayability. It's the replayability - whether it be co-op against randomly generated scenarios, open-world gameplay like in Prototype or Minecraft, or PvP like SK or Halo - that keeps people coming back. I made a thread about this.
Lockdown is an amazingly fun gamemode, and it definitely has that competitive spirit. However, it can never be truly "competitive" - in the sense that you know you can beat someone if you are better than them 90% of the time - because of elements of the core SK game, which is PvE. This includes both balance and mechanical issues.
I'll use invincibility frames as an example. In PvP, they are nothing but a nuisance, ruining teamfights and rendering quick-attack weapons like Cutter, Winmillion, Blitz, Troika and Catalyzer charges, useless. In PvE, however, we can use them to our advantage (somewhat controversially) to take less damage and survive being mobbed.
We could also go with the similar examples of Auto Target, trinket/weapon slots, and UVs. Because the PvE aspect of SK is noncompetitive, it doesn't matter how unfair your tactics or gear sets are. Weapon slots give extra versatility, UVs just give a straight stat buff, AT helps with hitting targets - you get the point. But in PvP, all these things are carried over and you get an asymetrical, unbalanced system. Players are divided into "haves" and "have-nots" - you could argue that it was pay-to-win, but right now that's not even relevant. The main point about all these systems is, they give certain players permanent advantages over others.
Look at all the games that are played on a professional level - Halo, CoD, counter-strike, Street Fighter, SCII, LoL. What's the common link between all of them? They all have completely skill-based multiplayer (except halo and cod, which are on console so they get a bit of aim assist). No dice-rolls, no AT+flourish combo spammers chancing a hit they shouldn't have gotten. They also all have a level playing field to start - symmetrical or asymmetrical. If it's asymmetrical like in LoL or SCII where you start with different teams, they all have their own strengths and weaknesses that make them balanced. SK does not have this. Instead, we have AA combo spammers, polaris spammers, hammer spammers, trinket users with twice the HP of non-trinket users, and generally people getting too far because of balance exploits and luck. If we got rid of all that, LD would be truly competitive. Unfortunately, LD is too tied-in to PvE to warrant those changes without disrupting the core and main draw of the game.
And about Super Smash bros - that game is a party game, and it was never meant to be competitive beyond the casual level. When real money started getting involved, characters, maps, and abilities had to keep getting removed from competitive play, until it got to the point where the creators basically said "look guys, it's a party game. It's not meant to be played at tournaments for prize money." It's good for fun, certainly, but not actually competitive in the sense that you can be "better" than someone else. It's like being competitive at slot machines - if you win, it's not because of you.
1v1 and deathmatch
These wouldn't be Lockdown, since the main purpose of Lockdown is to "lock down" the points. I feel like people forget that all to often. Maybe you should retitle this thread "PvP needs more attention"?
Overall, LD is a PvP gamemode - not minigame, gamemode - of SK that has a lot of potential, but do to what needs to be done in order to make it into what it needs to be to be really amazing would take it too far from SK for them to be in the same game. And OOO definitely doesn't have time to work on this kind of thing right now.
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