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Okay first off, since this game is still in early Alpha development there's plenty of time left to discuss possible features that could breath new life into the Arena genre. The trick here is that the game shouldn't be polluted with too many features, resulting in randomness. On the other hand it needs some refreshing features to differ from it's spiritual predecessor (CPM) and QL. Hypothetically speaking, what would you like to see introduced in Reflex?
I have a couple of ideas of my own (or inspiration from things i've seen):
- A temporary protective spawn bubble that lasts for 1-3 seconds. This prevents spawnraping like it occurs on for example Aerowalk. Keep in mind the spawn bubble would dissapear if you start moving/shooting! For Aerowalk in particular, another solution would be too add more spawnpoints.
- A shield gun (reflect enemy projectiles, so it also functions as a weapon in that manner) that wears off after a few collisions (depending on enemy weapon). It should be small, so it doesn't cover the whole hitbox. It's more efficient when you duck, because that makes you more compact. The downside of that is you can get pinned down easily.
- As mentioned before by some people here, damage through floors (only a specific type of floor, that's placed around armors and strong positions). Only possible with rocket launcher. Negates camping.
- When a player's health is reduced to 25 hp or lower, handicap his movement speed by 25% (or something similar).
- I noticed something interesting while watching some Reflex streams, you can just leave a gap in the floor and you simply fall out of the map and crater. You can create these kind of deathtraps around the mega or red armor, to punish you even harder if you fail to execute the jump correctly.
- Maybe some kind of gun that, like the grenade launcher, shoots projectiles that bounce off the walls, but the projectiles aren't affected by gravity like grenades are. I remember a similar weapon being used in Unreal. Not sure how far the projectile should be able to travel though, it could be abused to spam corners.
- Shoot through teleporters (already confirmed in a way).
- Map interaction, and by that i don't mean pulling some levers to trigger some Indiana Jones kind of boobytrap (that could be another concept, though!), i was thinking about slowly moving concrete artifacts that you can jump upon (for example to get past a boiling pool of lava). The moving platform would add another challenge, namely to execute the jump flawlessly (or else you turn into a burning pile of ash).
- In team games (after the round has ended) be able to bring down some kind of chart that shows how many times you killed (or got killed by) certain players, e.g. Bob killed John 5 times, John killed Bob 3 times (preferably with the weapons used).
- Footstep sounds (really nearby, like 2-3m away). I know this could favor the camping player but it also locks down for example a camping player with low hp, so he can't really make a move.
- Variable increased weapon switch time. For example it takes a little bit longer to equip the railgun than it does to equip the machinegun. This would nerf the overpowered weapons like the railgun. The railgun wouldn't have to be nerfed the way it was before (by removing hitscan). Also i would welcome a little more delay between the railshots, to rule out spamming.
- Increased speed with gauntlet. I noticed this in the leaked QL changes, call me crazy and yes this isn't COD or CS but let me sketch a scenario. If you choose to pick the gauntlet, you have more chance of surprising the enemy, but consider this: it reveals your position (switch sound) and you can get severely punished if you don't switch to the right weapon in time. It could be useful to reach a position more quickly and catching the enemy off guard.
- Introduced by QL's latest update, make your damage output visible (in digits).
- Certain map geometry that's vulnerable to damage and breaks at some point (only when shot at by a lot of rockets or nades). Example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtovm4AdMcY
- Instead of watching the clock to time items accurately, imagine you could see the item 'build up'. Try to visualize a transparant bucket, slowly filling up with water so you can see when it's full (and about to spawn). This would make (simple) maths during gameplay redundant, since you can visualize the item timings.
- Choose your own spawn point (like pre-start of HooneyMode albeit in real-time, on a small 2d screen). Advantage being you can spawn at a place where you are not likely to get spawnkilled. Disadvantage can be you're losing valuable time. Another way would be to spawn above the map (a la midair mode) and 'parachute' your way into the map to the position that you desire. Advantage is you can choose where to land, disadvantage is the enemy can see this and predict your landing. Landing speed would have to be balanced, not too fast, not too slow (sitting duck), and the maps would need an open roof.
- UT styled double-tap dodge, good to make an unexpected move or to emerge quickly behind the corner to hit a rail. With cooldown time, so it can't be abused and it makes you vulnerable to counterattacks. Can't be followed up with bunnyhopping.
- Crouchsliding (already confirmed will NOT be implemented)
- Cell shaded graphics (confirmed probably not going to happen)
- The possibility to record demos from your opponent's POV as well as your own (like mvd, but you wouldn't need an extra guy in spec to record you both. This way you could learn from mistakes you made during the match).
- In the serverbrowser, show how much time is left in the game you are about to join. In Q3 you have to join the game first, only to find out it's another 9 minutes of waiting.
- During Vo0's stream i noticed triple-jumps in cpm3, this opened up a lot of new possibilities in my eyes (imagine u can just hop to yellow from lower area without having to go through teleporter, cutting off some distance). Please consider keeping this feature!
Community driven feedback (from esreality):
- REMOVE GRENADE LAUNCHER, keep grenade ammo. Make launch grenade an alt fire of the spawn weapon (launch grenade bind would equip spawn weapon and shoot it, if already equipped it would just shoot). REMOVE MELEE WEAPON, keep melee attack. Make melee its own bind (gun bash, quick axe, etc.) I realize this might conflict with your cosmetic plans slightly. REMOVE SHOTGUN, keep shotgun ammo. Make shotgun ammo an upgrade to the spawn weapons main fire. Remove BFG, no new weapons, and buff PG to be more on par with LG. (c) Sed
- In the planned training mode, be able to seperately practice the needed set of skills, e.g. movement, aiming (something like the bot practice map ojtar1a), positioning etc. (c) Anonymous
- The ability to shoot your own, or your opponents' projectiles (rockets, grenades). Good to pre-detonate a rocket that would have else penetrated the wall. Perhaps the machinegun would be a good weapon to shoot the projectiles, thus countering the attack? (c) Generic Nickname
- Add a minor (cumulative) movement penalty in proportion to your armor stack (for example a heavy stacked player is restricted to a slower movement speed, like the Tank class in NTF mode). You could also penalize the different armor tiers (red moves slower than yellow etc.) (c) Anonymous
- Some kind of Defrag mode, it's a fun and useful mode to practice movement. Could be combined with Surf in an all-movement orientated gametype. Basically like QL race but better! (c) qr
- A Coaching mode like it exists in TF2, requires voice-comm support. Newb friendly and it brings players closer together (no homo) (c) Anonymous
- Tank mode (many players take up arms together to beat 1 overpowered player with battlesuit) (c) JS3
- Add back wall-clipping, being able to cut corners by clipping the curves when strafing fluidly at high velocity (c) Shin-Obi
- Some kind of spawncounter that makes sure you don't spawn in the same spot twice or more, effectively reducing the enemy's consecutive spawnfrags. (c) Terifire
- Save the server's current state (done by referees/admins) when for example during an official tournament match one player drops out due to connection issues. Saves all the positions, items, weapons etc in a temporary file. Avoids having to recreate the whole match statistics (remember Strenx vs Cooller @ IEM Kiev?) (c) foctis
- With RL equipped, keep fire pressed and be able to change the trajectory of the rocket with the mouse while it's travelling towards its target. (c) Bluder, Terifire
- Some sort of Google Translate option to decypher what foreign players (for example Russians) are saying. Nice to know! (c) faerie
- Less air control, fixed somewhere between VQ3 and CPM (c) obi
- Infinite range on the LG, but with significant damage fall off (depending on the distance to the enemy) (c) obi
- Have the railgun start charging after being equipped. It can be fired at any time but for less damage. Full charge time would be equal to current delay between shots. (c) obi
- Contrary to the above, you could also have the railgun slowly de-charge after you equip it, to still be able to perform a combo with the LG. It also makes it harder for players to camp with the railgun out, waiting for an easy shot. (c) neeple
- Add VQ3/QL ruleset (in regards to switch delay and movement) (c) multiple users
- Make the melee weapon (axe) throwable, as an alternate fire. Pro: can hit enemy from greater distance, con: you lose the weapon, but you will be able to pick it up again. (c) Smilecythe
- Armor decay (armor slowly wears off, for instance 1 point per second, only when highly stacked) (c) White_Insane
- A cripple effect on the plasmabolts, slowing down the opponent (c) White_Insane
- Overheating machinegun (when it overheats, it yields more bullet spread but starts shooting faster like a HMG) (c) White_Insane
- Residual burning effect on the floor where a rocket struck. This way you could make it harder for the opponent to chase you down (c) White_Insane
- Environmental damage, for example firing the LG on a player who's wandering through water exponentially deals more damage (c) White_Insane
- Fully customizable HUD (c) Gobotz
- A blend between the movement styles of UT (double tap dodge), VQ3 (strafes) and Warsow (Walljump/dash), resembling the movement style of upcoming title UT2K14: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_VzQtlvyoI
Wouldn't work very well with CPM bunnyhopping as it tends to reach excessive speeds (as seen in Warsow). (c) Gobotz
- Xonotic-like 'warpzones', see below for reference material and description (c) Smilecythe
- Persistent leaderboards for FFA (c) ImpulseBE
- Midair mode (c) JS3
- Realtime config panel, like a transparent text box (c) Ursa
- Visible timer that also displays milliseconds during the last minute (c) multiple users
- Analog clock (c) multiple users
- Location based teleports (exit the other side depending on where you entered) (c) Pineapple Pizza
- Plasma climbing and plasma ground boost, similar to that in Defrag (c) several df community members
- Turn the crosshair into an analog clock (c) Shin-Obi
- Item timings: greens/yellows 20s, red 30s, mega 40s (c) T1E
- Higher knockback values for the PG, allowing to boost yourself up against a nearby wall to avoid for example splash damage from an incoming rocket (c) Amalik
- Allow disabling of ingame chat + chatsounds to prevent spam (mute other players) (c) gory
- Be able to spec players the way they see the game (take a few important visual cvars like r_picmip and cg_fov and store these serverside somewhere, so it can be retrieved) (c) moto1
Very serious ideas below:
- Drain gun (steal hp from enemy players!)
- Portal gun (make your own teleports!)
- Jetpack (gain the higher ground ez!)
- Scorpion spear/rope (get over here!)
- Proximity mines, pre-timed mines
- LED light for dark areas
- Gravity gun (c) Serious
- Fleshlight (c) Jamerio
- Vehicles (c) Comrade
- Hugs in team modes (c) Gobotz
- Micro-transactions (c) Ger1e
- A pan (c) DamianLillard
- ZTN (c) Megaman
- Medals (c) me
- Cooller statues all over the place (c) Pill
- Cooller bot using Cooller quotes (c) Shin-Obi
- Invasion mode, fight hordes of aliens (c) Jamalz
I might think of some more later... then i'll add them here... you post yours, let's continue making suggestions! Remember that the collective mind always > the individual mind, there's always someone with innovative ideas.
edit: once we have received enough suggestions i will create a poll to see which features are considered most popular.
edit2: THIS THREAD NEEDS AN OVERHAUL. SO MANY SUGGESTIONS. WILL DO WHEN I FIND THE TIME.
I have a couple of ideas of my own (or inspiration from things i've seen):
- A temporary protective spawn bubble that lasts for 1-3 seconds. This prevents spawnraping like it occurs on for example Aerowalk. Keep in mind the spawn bubble would dissapear if you start moving/shooting! For Aerowalk in particular, another solution would be too add more spawnpoints.
- A shield gun (reflect enemy projectiles, so it also functions as a weapon in that manner) that wears off after a few collisions (depending on enemy weapon). It should be small, so it doesn't cover the whole hitbox. It's more efficient when you duck, because that makes you more compact. The downside of that is you can get pinned down easily.
- As mentioned before by some people here, damage through floors (only a specific type of floor, that's placed around armors and strong positions). Only possible with rocket launcher. Negates camping.
- When a player's health is reduced to 25 hp or lower, handicap his movement speed by 25% (or something similar).
- I noticed something interesting while watching some Reflex streams, you can just leave a gap in the floor and you simply fall out of the map and crater. You can create these kind of deathtraps around the mega or red armor, to punish you even harder if you fail to execute the jump correctly.
- Maybe some kind of gun that, like the grenade launcher, shoots projectiles that bounce off the walls, but the projectiles aren't affected by gravity like grenades are. I remember a similar weapon being used in Unreal. Not sure how far the projectile should be able to travel though, it could be abused to spam corners.
- Shoot through teleporters (already confirmed in a way).
- Map interaction, and by that i don't mean pulling some levers to trigger some Indiana Jones kind of boobytrap (that could be another concept, though!), i was thinking about slowly moving concrete artifacts that you can jump upon (for example to get past a boiling pool of lava). The moving platform would add another challenge, namely to execute the jump flawlessly (or else you turn into a burning pile of ash).
- In team games (after the round has ended) be able to bring down some kind of chart that shows how many times you killed (or got killed by) certain players, e.g. Bob killed John 5 times, John killed Bob 3 times (preferably with the weapons used).
- Footstep sounds (really nearby, like 2-3m away). I know this could favor the camping player but it also locks down for example a camping player with low hp, so he can't really make a move.
- Variable increased weapon switch time. For example it takes a little bit longer to equip the railgun than it does to equip the machinegun. This would nerf the overpowered weapons like the railgun. The railgun wouldn't have to be nerfed the way it was before (by removing hitscan). Also i would welcome a little more delay between the railshots, to rule out spamming.
- Increased speed with gauntlet. I noticed this in the leaked QL changes, call me crazy and yes this isn't COD or CS but let me sketch a scenario. If you choose to pick the gauntlet, you have more chance of surprising the enemy, but consider this: it reveals your position (switch sound) and you can get severely punished if you don't switch to the right weapon in time. It could be useful to reach a position more quickly and catching the enemy off guard.
- Introduced by QL's latest update, make your damage output visible (in digits).
- Certain map geometry that's vulnerable to damage and breaks at some point (only when shot at by a lot of rockets or nades). Example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtovm4AdMcY
- Instead of watching the clock to time items accurately, imagine you could see the item 'build up'. Try to visualize a transparant bucket, slowly filling up with water so you can see when it's full (and about to spawn). This would make (simple) maths during gameplay redundant, since you can visualize the item timings.
- Choose your own spawn point (like pre-start of HooneyMode albeit in real-time, on a small 2d screen). Advantage being you can spawn at a place where you are not likely to get spawnkilled. Disadvantage can be you're losing valuable time. Another way would be to spawn above the map (a la midair mode) and 'parachute' your way into the map to the position that you desire. Advantage is you can choose where to land, disadvantage is the enemy can see this and predict your landing. Landing speed would have to be balanced, not too fast, not too slow (sitting duck), and the maps would need an open roof.
- UT styled double-tap dodge, good to make an unexpected move or to emerge quickly behind the corner to hit a rail. With cooldown time, so it can't be abused and it makes you vulnerable to counterattacks. Can't be followed up with bunnyhopping.
- Crouchsliding (already confirmed will NOT be implemented)
- Cell shaded graphics (confirmed probably not going to happen)
- The possibility to record demos from your opponent's POV as well as your own (like mvd, but you wouldn't need an extra guy in spec to record you both. This way you could learn from mistakes you made during the match).
- In the serverbrowser, show how much time is left in the game you are about to join. In Q3 you have to join the game first, only to find out it's another 9 minutes of waiting.
- During Vo0's stream i noticed triple-jumps in cpm3, this opened up a lot of new possibilities in my eyes (imagine u can just hop to yellow from lower area without having to go through teleporter, cutting off some distance). Please consider keeping this feature!
Community driven feedback (from esreality):
- REMOVE GRENADE LAUNCHER, keep grenade ammo. Make launch grenade an alt fire of the spawn weapon (launch grenade bind would equip spawn weapon and shoot it, if already equipped it would just shoot). REMOVE MELEE WEAPON, keep melee attack. Make melee its own bind (gun bash, quick axe, etc.) I realize this might conflict with your cosmetic plans slightly. REMOVE SHOTGUN, keep shotgun ammo. Make shotgun ammo an upgrade to the spawn weapons main fire. Remove BFG, no new weapons, and buff PG to be more on par with LG. (c) Sed
- In the planned training mode, be able to seperately practice the needed set of skills, e.g. movement, aiming (something like the bot practice map ojtar1a), positioning etc. (c) Anonymous
- The ability to shoot your own, or your opponents' projectiles (rockets, grenades). Good to pre-detonate a rocket that would have else penetrated the wall. Perhaps the machinegun would be a good weapon to shoot the projectiles, thus countering the attack? (c) Generic Nickname
- Add a minor (cumulative) movement penalty in proportion to your armor stack (for example a heavy stacked player is restricted to a slower movement speed, like the Tank class in NTF mode). You could also penalize the different armor tiers (red moves slower than yellow etc.) (c) Anonymous
- Some kind of Defrag mode, it's a fun and useful mode to practice movement. Could be combined with Surf in an all-movement orientated gametype. Basically like QL race but better! (c) qr
- A Coaching mode like it exists in TF2, requires voice-comm support. Newb friendly and it brings players closer together (no homo) (c) Anonymous
- Tank mode (many players take up arms together to beat 1 overpowered player with battlesuit) (c) JS3
- Add back wall-clipping, being able to cut corners by clipping the curves when strafing fluidly at high velocity (c) Shin-Obi
- Some kind of spawncounter that makes sure you don't spawn in the same spot twice or more, effectively reducing the enemy's consecutive spawnfrags. (c) Terifire
- Save the server's current state (done by referees/admins) when for example during an official tournament match one player drops out due to connection issues. Saves all the positions, items, weapons etc in a temporary file. Avoids having to recreate the whole match statistics (remember Strenx vs Cooller @ IEM Kiev?) (c) foctis
- With RL equipped, keep fire pressed and be able to change the trajectory of the rocket with the mouse while it's travelling towards its target. (c) Bluder, Terifire
- Some sort of Google Translate option to decypher what foreign players (for example Russians) are saying. Nice to know! (c) faerie
- Less air control, fixed somewhere between VQ3 and CPM (c) obi
- Infinite range on the LG, but with significant damage fall off (depending on the distance to the enemy) (c) obi
- Have the railgun start charging after being equipped. It can be fired at any time but for less damage. Full charge time would be equal to current delay between shots. (c) obi
- Contrary to the above, you could also have the railgun slowly de-charge after you equip it, to still be able to perform a combo with the LG. It also makes it harder for players to camp with the railgun out, waiting for an easy shot. (c) neeple
- Add VQ3/QL ruleset (in regards to switch delay and movement) (c) multiple users
- Make the melee weapon (axe) throwable, as an alternate fire. Pro: can hit enemy from greater distance, con: you lose the weapon, but you will be able to pick it up again. (c) Smilecythe
- Armor decay (armor slowly wears off, for instance 1 point per second, only when highly stacked) (c) White_Insane
- A cripple effect on the plasmabolts, slowing down the opponent (c) White_Insane
- Overheating machinegun (when it overheats, it yields more bullet spread but starts shooting faster like a HMG) (c) White_Insane
- Residual burning effect on the floor where a rocket struck. This way you could make it harder for the opponent to chase you down (c) White_Insane
- Environmental damage, for example firing the LG on a player who's wandering through water exponentially deals more damage (c) White_Insane
- Fully customizable HUD (c) Gobotz
- A blend between the movement styles of UT (double tap dodge), VQ3 (strafes) and Warsow (Walljump/dash), resembling the movement style of upcoming title UT2K14: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_VzQtlvyoI
Wouldn't work very well with CPM bunnyhopping as it tends to reach excessive speeds (as seen in Warsow). (c) Gobotz
- Xonotic-like 'warpzones', see below for reference material and description (c) Smilecythe
- Persistent leaderboards for FFA (c) ImpulseBE
- Midair mode (c) JS3
- Realtime config panel, like a transparent text box (c) Ursa
- Visible timer that also displays milliseconds during the last minute (c) multiple users
- Analog clock (c) multiple users
- Location based teleports (exit the other side depending on where you entered) (c) Pineapple Pizza
- Plasma climbing and plasma ground boost, similar to that in Defrag (c) several df community members
- Turn the crosshair into an analog clock (c) Shin-Obi
- Item timings: greens/yellows 20s, red 30s, mega 40s (c) T1E
- Higher knockback values for the PG, allowing to boost yourself up against a nearby wall to avoid for example splash damage from an incoming rocket (c) Amalik
- Allow disabling of ingame chat + chatsounds to prevent spam (mute other players) (c) gory
- Be able to spec players the way they see the game (take a few important visual cvars like r_picmip and cg_fov and store these serverside somewhere, so it can be retrieved) (c) moto1
Very serious ideas below:
- Drain gun (steal hp from enemy players!)
- Portal gun (make your own teleports!)
- Jetpack (gain the higher ground ez!)
- Scorpion spear/rope (get over here!)
- Proximity mines, pre-timed mines
- LED light for dark areas
- Gravity gun (c) Serious
- Fleshlight (c) Jamerio
- Vehicles (c) Comrade
- Hugs in team modes (c) Gobotz
- Micro-transactions (c) Ger1e
- A pan (c) DamianLillard
- ZTN (c) Megaman
- Medals (c) me
- Cooller statues all over the place (c) Pill
- Cooller bot using Cooller quotes (c) Shin-Obi
- Invasion mode, fight hordes of aliens (c) Jamalz
I might think of some more later... then i'll add them here... you post yours, let's continue making suggestions! Remember that the collective mind always > the individual mind, there's always someone with innovative ideas.
edit: once we have received enough suggestions i will create a poll to see which features are considered most popular.
edit2: THIS THREAD NEEDS AN OVERHAUL. SO MANY SUGGESTIONS. WILL DO WHEN I FIND THE TIME.
Edited by Padawan at 14:56 CDT, 1 October 2014 - 97297 Hits