Why K:D, Deaths, streaks and other stats are bad, and how PS2 can evolve the genre - Page 29

Plunkies · 2012-07-23, 04:00 AM

Originally Posted by Mythoclast

No it isn't, that is an opinion. Some of us have a different opinion. Don't be arrogant. Recognize the facts and opinions. You HAVE supported your opinion with SOME facts and so have we. But they are still opinions.

No. It's fact. It's literally fact. Working under the assumption that teamplay > KD whoring, it's a fact. Under no circumstance that I can think of will tracking deaths HELP teamplay in any conceivable way. I can come up with dozens of ways it will discourage it. How could it? How could it encourage anything but dying less? How could that lead to anything but players taking less risk?

At this point you are either trolling (/bow) or you are so entrenched in yourself you can't even recognize another viewpoint. You may backpedal on the severity of your statement now (or not) but either way this statement is high evidence that you don't give a shit about a reasonable argument and therefore I bid you good day.

Yes, because the mark of someone wanting a reasonable argument is accusing people who disagree with them of being trolls....

pengalor · 2012-07-23, 04:04 AM

They should just have options to hide them. I want to see my stats. Kills, death, SPM, number of revives, ammo given, accuracy, everything. It helps me to improve as a player by allowing me to critique my own performance. If you are worried about what the community is going to judge others on, there will always be something. You don't lower the bar to meet the lowest common denominator, you raise it and expect people to rise to that level. The highest level is choice, the choice to show whatever stats you want and allow you to base your performance on whatever you like. We don't need to be babied by the devs and told "you're not grown-up enough to see this stat and use it in a 'responsible' way".

Originally Posted by Plunkies

No. It's fact. It's literally fact. Working under the assumption that teamplay > KD whoring, it's a fact. Under no circumstance that I can think of will tracking deaths HELP teamplay in any conceivable way. I can come up with dozens of ways it will discourage it. How could it? How could it encourage anything but dying less? How could that lead to anything but players taking less risk?

Yes, because the mark of someone wanting a reasonable argument is accusing people who disagree with them of being trolls....

Except he's right. It's not fact, it's your opinion. It's based entirely on what YOU think will happen and circumstances YOU can think of. There's been no research, there's been no study, just random and biased observation. That's opinion.

Mythoclast · 2012-07-23, 04:09 AM

Originally Posted by Plunkies

No. It's fact. It's literally fact. Working under the assumption that teamplay > KD whoring, it's a fact. Under no circumstance that I can think of will tracking deaths HELP teamplay in any conceivable way. I can come up with dozens of ways it will discourage it. How could it? How could it encourage anything but dying less? How could that lead to anything but players taking less risk?

Yes, because the mark of someone wanting a reasonable argument is accusing people who disagree with them of being trolls....

The statement "Showing deaths hurts gameplay" is an opinion. Don't be an ass. It is a REASONABLE opinion but it ain't a fact.

Your whole argument centers around the idea that no matter the class or player there should be no incentive to avoiding death or playing less risky is narrow minded and against the spirit of playing PS2 your way. If someone wants to play in a high risk high reward, pulse pumping adrenaline fueled, objective rushing, squad, hell yeah, go for it. If someone wants to play in a calm, collected, surgically precise and slow paced, squad, you gonna knock em' for it?

I think tracking things like healing per death, vehicles exploded per death, hacks per death, all of those separated per class, per weapon, hell, maybe even per minute of play, would all add to my game experience. I wanna see weapon accuracy stats, miles traveled in each vehicle, miles ran, team kills, multi-kills, times ran over people, drop pod kills, everything. That stuff entertains me. I don't think the asshole KDR whores are gonna care a lick if you remove deaths from some out of the way stat screen and will continue to be asshole KDR whores.

Also, I can't BELIEVE you used the phrase "literally a fact" when referring to this. You need to go take a debate class or something because that just makes you look like a stubborn mule. I don't think you are an idiot, or an ass, or a stubborn mule, but God damn bro do you come off that way. I like your arguments and it would be interesting to test the effect of removing deaths. I wouldn't be completely surprised if you were right (but I would expect you weren't) but don't try and set your opinion as the fact we must all believe.

EisenKreutzer · 2012-07-23, 04:28 AM

I fear that a prominently displayed K : D ratio or an easy way of accessing peoples K : D could potentially hurt the game, or atleast some aspects of it.

To support my claim, I present to you: GearScore from World of Warcraft.
Lots of people say GearScore ruined WoW. While I would hesitate to go that far, it did change lots of social dynamics in the game, and not for the better. Basically, for those of you who have never touched WoW, Every item you equip has a level. gearScore was a user-created addon that tracked those item levels, and displayed them as an overall score easily available to users of the addon.
What this meant was that people had an easy way of quickly looking at a character and "rate" their overall performance.
Thats where the shit started.
People with lower GearScores were excluded from everything. Guilds, Raids, even dungeon groups. You could literally be kicked from a PUG if your GearScore was too low in somebodys eyes.

Simply put, GearScore split the community.

Now, you might say that this was a good thing, as it separated the good players from the bad, but I don't agree with that.

I am also not saying that K : D in Planetside 2 will automatically turn into this, but the potential is there.
So just keep that in mind.

Mythoclast · 2012-07-23, 04:29 AM

Originally Posted by EisenKreutzer

I fear that a prominently displayed K : D ratio or an easy way of accessing peoples K : D could potentially hurt the game, or atleast some aspects of it.

To support my claim, I present to you: GearScore from World of Warcraft.
Lots of people say GearScore ruined WoW. While I would hesitate to go that far, it did change lots of social dynamics in the game, and not for the better. Basically, for those of you who have never touched WoW, Every item you equip has a level. gearScore was a user-created addon that tracked those item levels, and displayed them as an overall score easily available to users of the addon.
What this meant was that people had an easy way of quickly looking at a character and "rate" their overall performance.
Thats where the shit started.
People with lower GearScores were excluded from everything. Guilds, Raids, even dungeon groups. You could literally be kicked from a PUG if your GearScore was too low in somebodys eyes.

Simply put, GearScore split the community.

Now, you might say that this was a good thing, as it separated the good players from the bad, but I don't agree with that.

I am also not saying that K : D in Planetside 2 will automatically turn into this, but the potential is there.
So just keep that in mind.

This I agree with. Make KDR only accessible in some out of game stat screen and this effect would be negligible.

Flaropri · 2012-07-23, 04:33 AM

Originally Posted by Zulthus

Just so this post is considered a contribution to the thread, K/D should not be tracked as it is not an accurate measure of player skill and contribution. That guy sitting over there with a 50/1 K/D is most likely just camping that doorway with a sniper rifle. SPM is a much better way to track how useful you are.

Neither is batting average. Doesn't mean you shouldn't track it.

Zulthus · 2012-07-23, 04:49 AM

Originally Posted by Flaropri

Neither is batting average. Doesn't mean you shouldn't track it.

Yes, it does. Nice try comparing real life statistics to a video game, though. A high K/D ratio means absolutely nothing, whereas a high batting average is concrete proof that you are a better player. You'd be better off comparing it to SPM, which is also how to tell if someone is a good player or not.

Aurmanite · 2012-07-23, 04:51 AM

Track everything. Don't take away an essential part of my experience.

Flaropri · 2012-07-23, 05:03 AM

Originally Posted by Zulthus

Yes, it does. Nice try comparing real life statistics to a video game, though. A high K/D ratio means absolutely nothing, whereas a high batting average is concrete proof that you are a better player. You'd be better off comparing it to SPM, which is also how to tell if someone is a good player or not.

A high batting average doesn't mean you're a better player, it means you're a better batter. You could instead be better at running, stealing bases, out-fielding, low number of errors in the infield, pitching, etc. to justify your position on a team.

A high KDR doesn't mean you're a better player, it means you're better at killing people in a video game. You could be better at healing, at driving transports, at laying defensive mines/turrets, or at infiltrating to take out generators or other key structures. Perhaps you focus on supporting with suppressive fire to pin an enemy in a location.

Batting is a key element in Baseball, to be sure, but it isn't the only part of the game that matters, just as being able to kill and survive in an FPS is a key part of the game but not the only part that matters. Even so, it's worth looking at.

I suppose if you think that batting average is equivalent to telling you how good a player is... you just wouldn't get the comparison (or have looked at a baseball card).

Accuser · 2012-07-23, 05:05 AM

Here's an idea:
Give every player the ability to not track K/D at all on their account. Killwhores are going to killwhore even if you didn't track deaths. But completely disabling K/D on your account will force others to look at other stats if they want to evaluate your character.

Zulthus · 2012-07-23, 05:21 AM

Originally Posted by Flaropri

A high batting average doesn't mean you're a better player, it means you're a better batter. You could instead be better at running, stealing bases, out-fielding, low number of errors in the infield, pitching, etc. to justify your position on a team.

You know what I meant, don't be a nazi.

Originally Posted by Flaropri

A high KDR doesn't mean you're a better player, it means you're better at killing people in a video game. You could be better at healing, at driving transports, at laying defensive mines/turrets, or at infiltrating to take out generators or other key structures. Perhaps you focus on supporting with suppressive fire to pin an enemy in a location.

Or KDR could mean you're good at camping the spawn doorway with a sniper rifle. It varies by person. And as for the second part, that's exactly why SPM should replace K/D. It covers everything you do and shows how good you are and how much you contribute in general.

Originally Posted by Flaropri

Batting is a key element in Baseball, to be sure, but it isn't the only part of the game that matters, just as being able to kill and survive in an FPS is a key part of the game but not the only part that matters. Even so, it's worth looking at.

The score you get from kills is a part of your total SPM. Everything else you do, repairing, healing, deploying CE, transport driver, etc is also calculated into it. What is the need for K/D? I didn't say killing doesn't matter, I said your K/D ratio does not matter.

Originally Posted by Flaropri

I suppose if you think that batting average is equivalent to telling you how good a player is... you just wouldn't get the comparison (or have looked at a baseball card).

Again. I'm sure you know what I meant. Nazi.

Emperor Newt · 2012-07-23, 05:42 AM

Maybe track deaths, but only show it somewhere hidden in the web-profile or whatever.
KDR ingame doesn't tell you anyhing, especially not how good a teamplayer someone is. I very vividly remember the 6 sniper teams in BC2 which had tons of kills but where simply unable to do the objective.
If there is a ingame display then just show kills and some kind of "team score", just like Tribes Ascend does (just leave out the stupid stuff like in TA returning the flag. so infuriating...). It might not be perfect, but it's better then judging people by their KDR.

Trennen · 2012-07-23, 06:06 AM

KDR is a useless stat that only shit head fps **** need to stroke there e-peen to.

The only stat that matters in PS2 is the score stat and if they have any stat tracked it should be a score per death average. This would be the only way to really tell your worth in the empire.

FireWater · 2012-07-23, 06:15 AM

Granted I'm new here and hardly a PS1 vet, but let me give you my perspective as a competitive gamer in general.

Stats are awesome! I like the idea of a total score stat, where valuable behavior in the game (i.e. point capture, drop ship blowing up etc....) gives a single unit of score. But here is the challenge with that.

The one number doesn't tell me what a player did to reach that high score, AND if a player found an exploit to jack up the score artificially and no other stats are tracked, it maybe more difficult for the developers to figure out why player X has a HUGE score over everyone else, but his faction/outfit doesn't appear to be doing well. A single score can cause disparity on how that score was reached, without other statistics to kind of provide back up.

I believe that all statistics should be shown to give an outfit/player the "logic" of why a score is either so high, low or in the middle. Score is like just giving the answer in high school Algebra Class, its great that we see an answer, but the teacher is most likely more interested in the logic of how said answer was calculated. Score without any reference point to it can detract from its meaning.

So there is an opinion of a non-PS1 vet, but a big gaming vet in general. What do you all think?

Sighpolice · 2012-07-23, 06:46 AM

I agree with OP.

K/D is a stat for solo players, this game is revolved around teamwork so it shouldn't be the main stat, Score is a much better alternative to encourage teamwork.

To everyone who says "oh I care about K/D though" you shouldn't be so worried, all it shows is how well you can farm a situation (i.e waiting for the tank to be on 1hp and stealing the kill), if you were given the same "score" for hitting the tank as you was getting the kill, it would discourage kill stealing etc. Example - prowler dies in 7 hits, you get 6 shots and then some guy gets the 7th hit, and it is then that guy who gets all the glory.. just promotes bad teamwork