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TonicBH

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Dear Valve: How to make Left 4 Dead's Versus mode suck less.

Alright, I like the concept of Versus. It's UT's Assault meets the co-op campaign of L4D. The problem is right now... it's broken. I have seen one too many games where matches end 6,472 to 310. Those aren't fun. In fact I end up seeing loads of ragequits when matches go that way thanks to good players on one team and average-to-bad players on the other. So I have a few suggestions to improve Versus.

CONCEPT 1: Points for killing special infected

Every time they kill a special infected, that's points added to their team's score. Even if they fuck up and die towards the end, they get more than just 100 points for getting that far. Here's a rough outline:

HUNTER
15 points if the Hunter is killed without successfully pouncing a survivor
10 points if the Hunter pounces a survivor but doesn't make any more hits (aka pounces but does no additional dmg)
5 points otherwise

SMOKER
20 points if the Smoker is killed without grappling/strangling a survivor
15 points if the Smoker grapples and drags a survivor but doesn't strangle them
10 points otherwise

BOOMER
10 points if the Boomer is killed without getting bile on any survivors (spewed or exploded)
7 points if the Boomer causes explosive bile to hit a survivor when killed
5 points otherwise

TANK
100 points if the Tank doesn't kill/incapacitate a survivor
remove 20 points for each survivor downed (2 survivors down while tank is killed = 60 points total)

WITCH
50 points if the Witch doesn't attack anyone (those who one-shot-kill her)
30 points if the Witch is startled but does not incapacitate the person who startled her
20 points if the Witch incapacitates the person who startled her, but is killed after

Of course, these are not solid numbers, but these could easily help a team behind in need of some additional points for nailing loads of special infected.

CONCEPT 2: Adjustment of distance in last map

Right now the distance is "100%" if the survivors get to the radio spot. This should be changed to:

50% if they get to the radio spot but don't contact the rescue vehicle
60-65% if they die before/during the first wave (contacted rescue vehicle by this point)
70% if they die during first tank
75% if they die during the second wave
80-85% if they die during the second tank
90% if the rescue vehicle arrives but nobody makes it
100% if they escape successfully

Again, not finalized values. I'm welcome to a few suggestions

CONCEPT 3: Algorithm to prematurely end the match

To avoid these situations where the losing team quits en masse due to a clear loss, I suggest an algorithm be put in that determines the point distance between teams. If it is to a point where one team cannot mathematically catch up, then the game ends early with an automatic victory to the winning team.

Example: Team A is kicking ass and taking names. They've had all four survivors on their team usually hit 75-100% of health, no incaps, and Team B has barely put a scratch on them. They're leading on Map 3 with 3,500 points. Meanwhile, Team B has been hobbling along after the first two maps at 230 points. Let's say that Team B doesn't make up enough points to catch up to Team A. Therefore, the game will make a note that "The other team cannot make enough points to catch up," and that Team A automatically wins after Map 3.

Yes, this might cause matches to end before the full campaign is played out, but it prevents situations where the losing team KNOWS they're gonna lose and there was nothing they could do to get back into it. Now, this differential would only take place after the third map in a campaign, and would increase accordingly once Maps 4 and 5 are played. But if this and Concept 1 are put into play, there's possibilities that even if they muck up in the first two maps, they could still rebound and get points by killing special infected along the way of those maps to shrink that deficit.

So, in the immortal words of Joel Hodgson, "Whaddya think, sirs?"

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