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

[FriendlyFire]

Clear direction, game play, user input, is what I want. Too much user input and not enough direction, and we get BFRs.

[megamold]

how i recall it we never had any choice on the whole BFR thing, that was just the dev team thinking up something and shoving it in our faces

i think the devs gave some insight on their long term goals for the game ( mostly in the older interviews )
the things being discussed on this forum right now are mostly the basics of how the game works

so far i'm seeing direction and input , the gameplay will be when beta comes

[Raymac]

Originally Posted by Malorn

No. There's a lengthy post at the beginning of this thread that details the root of the topic.

Yeah, Malorn. I already read it, and enjoyed it like I do all your posts. One of the premises of your stance is that playing with a focus on the K: D ratio (i.e. killwhoring) should be discouraged in Planetside. Believe it or not, I do have rudimentary reading comprehension skills.

I do find it a bit hypocritial that you are advocating supporting many other different types of gameplay, but singling out players that enjoy having a high K: D ratio as being "bad" for the game. I personally don't like that playstyle either, however, I like to see Planetside as the video game world's version of the Statue of Liberty. Bring us all different kinds of players and we will all have fun in our own ways in this massive open world.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by Raymac

One of the premises of your stance is that playing with a focus on the K: D ratio (i.e. killwhoring) should be discouraged in Planetside..

Yes, K:D should be discouraged; no, the reason is not because I have anything against killwhoring.

I have issue with death tracking and K:D tracking discouraging people from taking risks. In a nutshell it encourages cowardice.

Has nothing to do with killwhores. I founded a killwhore outfit. I have nothing against killwhores. I'm far more concerned about the general population who looks at their character screen, sees deaths & K:D prominently displayed and either actively or passively get the message that those stats are important to success in Planetside, which they are not. That leads them to do activities which essentially minimize deaths. Minimizing deaths in games is easy - you don't take risks. You camp. You don't press forward. You don't move for objectives. You don't help others or do anything that makes you a target. Effectively you become a giant pussy, but hey, your K:D looks great so clearly you're successful at the game. I don't like things that encourage people to be pussies. I'd much prefer they reward someone for accomplishing an objective no matter how many times they die doing it, which encourages them to take objectives instead of encouraging them to not take risks.

It's a war game, there should be action. Stats that are promoted by the game should be stats that encourage people to take risks, capture territory and keep the game interesting and fresh.

If you're getting a message that this is some campaign against killwhores you're reading it wrong. What I just wrote in this post is the correct way to read my message.

[FriendlyFire]

Originally Posted by Malorn

snip

I think the point is, PlanetSide has always rewarded players for fighting over objectives. If you don't like someones play style or how they may view their stats, it isn't going to change PlanetSide. Players have to kill other players to get a K: D, they aren't killing wandering nomads in the middle of a desert.

Fighting over objectives will always reward the most points.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by FriendlyFire

I think the point is, PlanetSide has always rewarded players for fighting over objectives. If you don't like someones play style or how they may view their stats, it isn't going to change PlanetSide. Players have to kill other players to get a K: D, they aren't killing wandering nomads in the middle of a desert.

Fighting over objectives will always reward the most points.

This is not true. Not every kill contributes to an objective, and not every objective results in the most points. The Tower of Power game and Interfarms are good examples of that. In many cases the most points in PS1 was obtained by finding a good stalemate and milking the steady stream of infantry and vehicles for hours. No objectives achieved, but tons of points earned.

I'm not saying that wasn't fun - it often could be, but it was not a reward for going after objectives.

[Raymac]

Originally Posted by Malorn

If you're getting a message that this is some campaign against killwhores you're reading it wrong. What I just wrote in this post is the correct way to read my message.

Then either I am getting stuck on semantics, or perhaps my reading comprehension is even more pathetic than I thought. I see "killwhoring" as trying to maximize your K: D. So in order to do that, one would try to decrease their deaths as much as possible and only focus on the score THEY care about i.e. K/D. Or as you put it, play like a pussy.

So, the way I saw your post was "I don't have anything against killwhoring but playing like a killwhore is a pussy move". Judging from what you've said, I'm sure it wasn't your intent to rail on killwhoring, but in a way you kinda did.

As usual, I do agree with you that this style of gameplay is not the ideal way Planetside should be played, and there are ways to encourage the "correct' way to play Planetside like the ones you've stated. At the same time, you are really calling for a major paradigm shift in something many gamers already pay attention to. People will pay attention to their K/D, it's just some people will give it more weight than others and that is their perogative.

At the same time, I don't think there is anything wrong with the game being designed around giving more weight (like extra XP) to things like capturing territory instead of kills. We all know Planetside is so much more than a Team Deathmatch, so it's fine for the "score" to reflect that. I don't think you need to do away with tracking deaths to achieve that, though.

[Malorn]

Killwhoring - to whore kills...says nothing about deaths.

Who is the better killwhore - the killwhore who goes 18-0 in an hour, or the one who goes 80-25 over that same hour? What about the guy that went 25-30 in fifteen minutes? The death stat is meaningless. What matters is kills and accomplishments - things can change the battle.

100-120 guy -> 1.66 kills per minute, .83 KD
80-25 guy -> 1.33 kills per minute. 3.2 KD
18-0 guy -> 0.3 kills per minute. undefined KD

Who's really the best killwhore here? Who impacted the game more? Who helped their faction achieve victory more? The best way to really know that is what other things each player did, namely score contribution. Since support and objectives also net points that helps reflect not only who got the most kills, but also who made the largest contributions.

If these are the things that people are encouraged to improve -> Kills-per-minute and Score-per-minute, then they will go looking for conflict and strive to achieve those objectives.

Deaths and K:D...not significant at all. Counter-productive. Only encourages cowardice.

[FriendlyFire]

Originally Posted by Malorn

This is not true. Not every kill contributes to an objective, and not every objective results in the most points. The Tower of Power game and Interfarms are good examples of that. In many cases the most points in PS1 was obtained by finding a good stalemate and milking the steady stream of infantry and vehicles for hours. No objectives achieved, but tons of points earned.

I'm not saying that wasn't fun - it often could be, but it was not a reward for going after objectives.

I guess we can nit pick "objectives" for 10-12 pages now?

People play differently than you, but if they are in PlanetSide, they are fighting the enemy, and the enemy is normally in an area for a reason.

These stats have no impact on your play style and will not/won't ruin the game.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by FriendlyFire

I guess we can nit pick "objectives" for 10-12 pages now?

People play differently than you, but if they are in PlanetSide, they are fighting the enemy, and the enemy is normally in an area for a reason.

I don't see how your astute observation relates to the topic of this discussion.

[FriendlyFire]

Originally Posted by Malorn

I don't see how your astute observation relates to the topic of this discussion.

I guess we are done here?

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by FriendlyFire

I guess we are done here?

Well you could elaborate more on your point, but if you want to drop out of the discussion that's up to you.

[EVILPIG]

Originally Posted by FriendlyFire

I guess we are done here?

Nothing lasts forever.

[FriendlyFire]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Well you could elaborate more on your point, but if you want to drop out of the discussion that's up to you.

I am saying:

People will play in ways you will not like. (those players love K&D ratios)
Those people will be playing with you.
When those people are playing with you, they will kill players.
The way those players play the game, is in no way breaking the game.


and to expand further on the part you quoted:
When a player kills another player, it is normally for a reason (i.e. objective.) This doesn't mean the area/time has a giant stamp labeled "OBJECTIVE."

[Raymac]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Killwhoring - to whore kills...says nothing about deaths.
-snip-
Deaths and K...not significant at all. Counter-productive. Only encourages cowardice.

OK, so it was just a matter of semantics then. So for the sake of clarity, we'll call it the K/D whores. In any case, just replace what I said about "killwhores" and substitute "K/D whores".

Essentially, let people play the way they want to play. Through stats and XP you can encourage the more "correct" way to play i.e. giving more XP for mission completions and objective captures and give less XP for kills.

The bottom line really is, scoring kills AND deaths will not destroy the moral fiber of the game. I'm all for giving much more value to other "scores" but let the K/D whores have their fun too. Let's not exclude a certain type of player because we feel they are unworthy.