How to encourage teamplay?

[Bob_Bobber0]

Hey guys, been tracking this mod on ModDB for sometime now. I really like the direction it is headed. I am wondering what ways you guys have come up with to promote teamwork and tactical play.

The main problem Ive seen so far in other tactical "teamwork" games such as Red Orchestra and Project Reality is how to encourage players to play as a team. Project Reality (A BF2 Mod) does it by squads. Every person joins a squad and they can communicate with that squad. The squad leader in turn can communicate with other squad leaders and the commander.

This encourages players to stick together as the squad leader can put down a "rally point" or spawn point, with him and 2 other squad members present.

I think for realism games like this to truly work, something like this has to be implemented. Not only this but I think that there should be over bonuses for sticking near squad leaders and teammates.

Maybe something like:

-Longer sprint times
-Better accuracy (assuming weapon sway is implemented)
-Being able to plant a spawn point.

These things all help players feel like that are actually part of a team working towards an objective. Also I'm not sure if any of you have played Red Orchestra or Project Reality, but these games feature a kind of "suppression syndrome" where you screen blurs when rounds and artillery fall around you. I think something like this is a necessity and should be implemented.

I don't know how the mod team is going to make matches, either attack and defend style, obj based, or something else, But I think that teams should have 1-2 minutes before each round to plan out an attack or organize a defense. The defense team should be allowed to enter the field immediately and begin setting up and the attacking team should be allowed to form squads and look at a map of objectives and talk about how to plan. Also another idea I have been thinking about is to allow the commander (or whoever drops arty and controls things like that) to be able to view the battlefield from the air for several seconds, several times during the match, either by capturing a certain strategic sector, or a elevated point on the map, this would allow him to accurately and efficiently, direct ground troops and tanks.

The squads should be as diverse as possible, so that each man compliments the others, several rifleman, sub-machine gunner, sniper, anti-tank, w.e. just enough so that each squad could possibly survive on its own. Maybe even a medic?

Also perhaps in addition to rewarding players who stick together, there should be something that hinders players who dont? Something like,

-Line of site decrease
-Fear of being alone, which makes you slower, more cautious and less effective.

I think that this is the only way to fully take advantage of this great game and mod.
Also some kind of wiki page explaining how the game works that is easily accessible will encourage new players to join and learn how to play fast. Running to get back in the action and then just getting blasted isnt always because of poor tactics, its because of bad leadership, and bad teammate communication. I think the map and objectives featured need to be designed so that battles can be focused and the squads and teammates can easily see where they need to go to help out.

Umm other than that, I'm wondering if support weapons will have a setup feature needed in order to be fired. (setting up mg, before firing). I saw mortars are being used, thats awesome, I've been waiting for games to use mortars.

Anyway thats my take on it sorry about the long post. I'd love to help in w/e way I can.

Thoughts?

 

[General Naga]

We currently plan to use a system of groups (called sections) which work in a similar way to squads BF2, except with more flexible commands available.

Rally points are a great way to improve teamwork (and are more realistic over squad leader spawns) however how to work them into a WWII environment without spoiling the atmosphere is slightly harder.

As for bonuses when working in a section correctly. Personally I think it would be better to give disadvantages to players who are a long way away from the rest of their section (as you say). This might be removing their minimap (if we give players one there is some debate about that currently) so players would have to open the map view in order to navigate or by giving them blurred vision as they "panic" (which they would be in reality).

We have a brand new gamemode planned and we'll be starting work on it as soon as the Crysis Wars SDK is released. So if you have any ideas for things you'd like to see in a gamemode sing out theres still time - As for allowing defenders to spawn early, I could see that being quite annoying if you gave the defending team enough time to put together a decent defence. However it might work if we allowed both teams to spawn but stopped both teams from leaving their area until after a fixed time. So the attacker would have to wait in their starting base and the defender would be able to move inside the base/town/whatever they're defending.

I'm all in favour of having diverse sections. As you say, in reality sections would have a range of weapons carried by different people. We plan to have some weapons limited to force the correct weapon distribution across the team. This wouldn't apply to basic kits like a rifleman though.

When we get near release there will be a wiki/manual of some kind and probably some tutorial videos as in the run up - we like to keep things quite vague at this stage though

Deployable weapons are on the cards, however finding a good way to implement them is something else.

Keep the ideas/comments coming

 

[Bob_Bobber0]

"So the attacker would have to wait in their starting base and the defender would be able to move inside the base/town/whatever they're defending."

Exactly what I'm talking about. In real life, the defending army would no rush out of a spawn point to get to defensive windows and get their mg's in place. They would be ready. I'm not saying let the Defending Team, rush all the way up to Attacking spawn, but simply be able to set up some kind of reasonable defense.

Even 30 seconds would be enough time for people to get organized.

The mini map has always caused debate amongst realism players. Here is how I see it. It all comes down to gameplay > realism. In real life, every soldier would know his map by heart, therefore a map of the objectives and landscape should be given. In real life, every soldier, at least those in the squad, would know where his squadmates are as well as his squad leader, therefore they should be included in the mini map. Even if they could not see them directly, a simple whisper would confirm their location so to not include at least their squadmates and leader would not make sense and just add a burden on the game.

Now as for other squads, its entirely up to the designers. I wouldn't because their needs to be at least some kind of "shit- is that friendly?" thought before you fire. And having almost every friendly on the mini map would negate this type of "check your fire" mentality. Friendly fire is a BIG reality in every war and cannot be taken out.

I agree that probably the best way to encourage teamwork is to make playing Rambo style, extremely difficult and burdensome. However, what if a squad needs to flank an MG and has to split up, ex. several members draw its fire, several others move up and grenade from the flank. How many squad members it takes to negate any negatives involved is extremely important. I think two-three at max, probably two.

Of course limiting weapon classes is a must and very important for game balance. IMO tanks should be extremely powerful, but very limited. Light vehicles such as halftracks and bren carriers should be used cautiously as well, and only certain classes should be able to operate them. Perhaps being able to spawn from a halftrack or bren carrier would be a way to keep the atmosphere while maintaining constant action.

One of the worst things I've seen in Project Reality and Red Orchestra, is sprinting for ages to get back in the battle, only to get killed and repeat the process. So smart spawns that do not over power the game, and still provide an advantage to the team who is doing the killing.

As for deployable weapons, Red Orchestra does this by allowing weapons of any kind to be rested on objects such was walls, cars, the ground, and rocks. This steadies your aim and improves accuracy. MG's and other heavy weapons work the same way, but once you set them up you can only aim in a certain arc or range, and you have to re-setup to get better angles ect.

I'm not sure if something like this can be implemented in Traction Wars, but it is very effective.

So thats about all I can think of at the moment, I'm sure more stuff will come to mind as this thread progresses. I guess I'll go check out a gametype thread or create one myself.

Ahh, dynamic battlefields. Something I forgot. In order to create a unique gaming experience every time, (as we all know once everyone knows everything about a map it gets rather boring) there should be classes of engineers who can setup, mines, tank traps, roadblocks, maybe bunkers, anywhere within their defensive perimeter, eg. town, field, causeway. Of course they would have to be limited to that they cannot wall off entire sections of the maps. Attacking teams would have combat engineers as well who can remove these obstacles and detect mines. It would keep every battle unique and provide for a better gaming experience.

Also not sure on how this works with Crysis Wars Engine, but destructible buildings is a must if it can be done. This is the ultimate way to keep the battlefields ever changing. Tanks can blow holes in buildings, artillery should create craters in the ground, all these things will immerse the player in a destructible, every changing environment.

Thanks.

 

[General Naga]

A Dynamic battlefield is possible to some degree. Craters are possible but there are some major graphics problems associated with them. One of these is that decals (small detail textures like puddles and blood splatters) don't bend with the terrain. So you have textures of puddles or blood floating where the terrain once was. Destructible buildings is built into Crysis Wars DX10 but not DX9 due to performance issues.

So it's that's very possible but very time consuming for the team if we're with DX9 having a compromising gameplay experience. We're are however conserving performance wherever we can so we might find in testing that we can bring fully destructible buildings and trees to DX9.

A limited minimap showing only a map (rather than a satellite view) and section members is probably the best compromise between realism and gameplay. As for the problem with flanking manoeuvres, well we're working on a system which should make splitting up a squad like that a dream

Vehicle kits can be quite annoying and slow down the game quite a lot if they aren't implemented seamlessly (the original bugs in PR for getting the kits was incredibly annoying if there was a lot of demand!).

I've never played Red Orchestra but I have heard of it's system of weapon stabilising and it sound great. A similar system is not impossible and it's something that we will be looking into at some stage.

Player spawning is a real problem, how do you get a semi-realistic system for spawning which doesn't result in hours walking? It's not easy certainly but it's something which I feel is the greatest weakness in PR - which has FAR too much walking for my taste (I still mourn the passing of PR 0.5 ) It's one of those things which I hate and so I really want to do better in TWs

 

[Bob_Bobber0]

Yes, I still cannot think of a sure fire way to fix the days of walking and walking and walking.

Personally I think that you should go with DX10. Although it might limit some people at first due to hardware capabilities, eventually everyone will have to upgrade, and the things you can do in DX10 are amazing next to DX9.

Could you explain a bit what you mean here: "A limited minimap showing only a map (rather than a satellite view) and section members is probably the best compromise between realism and gameplay. As for the problem with flanking manoeuvres, well we're working on a system which should make splitting up a squad like that a dream"

Perhaps for at least several maps, you could have some kind of paratrooper invasion, so drops could be focused around objectives, and spawning would just be landing near your squad mates. It will be a temporary fix. Again I'm just making stuff up as I go along.

 

[General Naga]

The best compromise I can see for the minimap would be to have the minimap displaying, rather than a really detailed satellite view of the battlefield with everyone on your team marked on it, a military map with only your section members marked. - Does that make more sense? Reading that last one again it doesn't make a whole lot of sense I know

As for the flanking manoeuvres I can't really give much more detail until we've finished deciding that aspect but we're working on a much slicker system of orders which should make jobs where splitting up the section is necessary much easier to achieve and members won't be penalised for moving away from each other.

Not sure how the paradrop system would work. Could you explain more?

 

[Bob_Bobber0]

Ah ok, makes sense.

As for paradropping, instead of spawning on the ground and sprinting to get back in the action, perhaps just paradropping closer to the front lines would be better. Although unless it is a night map, people may be easy targets. Parashooting in near a spawn point, with some type of drift penalty or something.

 

[General Naga]

Hmm... random drifting for parachutes - that's an idea

Your quite right though, WWII parachutes your a sitting duck until your on the ground. Although that depends how accurate the rifles are and how good a shot the enemy is

 

[Bob_Bobber0]

Another idea, and of course this is all theoretical and wayyy past any kind of first release. Is to have an ongoing war, much like Europe in Ruins and Operation Market Garden Mods for CoH. Every battle that is played is a part of the bigger "war." Your character can gain XP by achieving objectives and earning points, unlocking new abilities as the war goes on. You could have realistic map battlefields and have the war progress towards berlin or back to the beaches. Stats could be tracked online and leaderboards and everything could be created. Also you could have a "war room" or "war map" which would show the progress of the war on some kind of interactive map.

 

[General Naga]

That sounds very much like my outline plans for a tournament. However as you say that's long after first release and would really depend on what sort of mod community builds up and how many people are in it.

 

[Bob_Bobber0]

Would be very original and a great edition to the FPS genre.

 

[General Naga]

I agree

 

[Nadanova]

Sounds good to me.

 

[thefallen]

For the map you should take the idea from metro 2033 and make it so you need to press a button and your person will bring up the map and it will show the terrain and objectives in color. which will make it more realistic and you can make it so infantry gets not the best maps with sucky detail, squad leaders would get ok maps wich will have ok detail, commanders would get good maps that would have realy good detail and so on or you could have it like fog of war were your map only shows what your team has seen

 

[Alberich]

Definately more points for players in a squad - and to enforce it - staying close to the squadleader. No points for lone wolfs - or even less health for lone wolfs as penalty, simulating lower morale.

 

[slowdownloader]

it doesn't matter if your talking about a squad platoon or a company they each have soldiers assigned to security also assigned to support and assault the security sets up a perimeter defence around the support unit and the support unit supports the assault unit while the assault unit makes the assault so what im trying to say here is you don't separate them because that how they work as a team its also the same for battalion brigade and regiment but at that level its not tactical but operational and when it gets to the campaign level your talking division corps and army

 

[Pvt_Larry]

it doesn't matter if your talking about a squad platoon or a company they each have soldiers assigned to security also assigned to support and assault the security sets up a perimeter defence around the support unit and the support unit supports the assault unit while the assault unit makes the assault so what im trying to say here is you don't separate them because that how they work as a team its also the same for battalion brigade and regiment but at that level its not tactical but operational and when it gets to the campaign level your talking division corps and army

Read this as a single run-on sentence, was out of breath by the end.

 

[slowdownloader]

To keep cohesion of team play coordinated in massing fires in an attack or defence . a communication net of field telephones radio back packs or runners could give our microphones the upper hand or draw back

 

[FlyingR]

For the spawning, the squad leader could set an HQ. For example, if the team is in a city, the team could get into any building and "proclaim" it as an HQ, then soldiers could spawn there. In the forest or open ground, the squad leader could order the construction of tents and foxholes and that could be the HQ. You can use the PR system of crates or ammo boxes.

 

[Aniallator]

Like an FOB in PR?