Weapon Level Idea

Pebr · 07-23-2009, 04:05 AM

Here is my proposal for weapon levels should they gain a purpose in TF2.

Here is an example App for the system: http://tf2app.com/levelsystem/

As you can see from the example, every time you refresh the page you will be given a random weapon level and some random weapon specs to go with it. In my example case, i have presented a generic shotgun.

With my level system, two weapons with the same levels will not have the same weapon specs. In this system, the weapon level only decides to what degree the weapon specs can randomly change. See the details at the bottom of the App to see what is happening to the specs.

The algorithm first gives each weapon spec a random buff or a nerf to a degree based on the weapon level. After the process is finished, you are given two specs that are buffed and two that are nerfed. However, each weapon spec was changed by a random amount so ultimately you end up with a weapon that is either OP or UP.

To counter this, the algorithm then goes back and determines to what percentage the weapon is OP or UP. It will then evenly deduct the percentage difference from the imbalanced side so that there is an equal distribution of change.

Lastly, in most cases some specs will be less important than others. In this case, rate of fire is probably less of an issue than firepower. For example, when rate of fire is affected, an additional 1% change is added to make the difference more balanced.

On a side note, i am rounding to 2 decimal points - This may sometimes cause a very very slight imbalance of specs.

-------------------------------------------------------

This is the most dramatic one i found after a lot of refreshes:

Regular Shotgun:

Firepower: 75
Rate of Fire (shots per sec): 0.75
Reload Speed (reloads per sec): 0.65
Spread: 25

Level 99 Shotgun:

Firepower: 70.46
Rate of Fire (shots per sec): 0.78
Reload Speed (reloads per sec): 0.6
Spread: 22.68

Details

Overall Buff: 13.1%
Overall Nerf: 13.1%

-------------------------------------------------------

TL;DR
Just go to the link at the top.

-------------------
See all my other ideas:
http://forums.steampowered.com/forum...d.php?t=833120

Rem · 07-23-2009, 04:09 AM

They should never serve any purpose. In gameplay or aesthetics. It would absolutely ruin the game.

Kews · 07-23-2009, 04:10 AM

Item levels in PvP RPGs never work unless they have player looting too. I can't see why it would do any different here.

Rem · 07-23-2009, 04:22 AM

Yes. But TF2 is competitive FPS (we can debate this point in one of the other thousand threads about "lol competitive TF2", thanks.) where each team has a reasonably equal chance of winning in the long-term if the skill levels are the same. Unlocks already throw this off because players on one team might have more options than the other players. Multiplying the number of unlockables by nearly one hundred obviously mucks all of this up even more. Even if the differences are subtle and hardly noticeable, not every player will get access to the weapon at the level of their choosing. It could literally take thousands of hours to get a weapon at a specific level. This is not a MMORPG.

In short: No, never, absolutely not, terribad idea, would ruin TF2, would ruin the planet, would bring about a real zombie apocalypse, nein, would screw up competitive play even more, it should never happen ever, thumbs down, one-star idea, would cause kittens to die, et cetera.

sole21000 · 07-23-2009, 05:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rem

Yes. But TF2 is competitive FPS (we can debate this point in one of the other thousand threads about "lol competitive TF2", thanks.) where each team has a reasonably equal chance of winning in the long-term if the skill levels are the same. Unlocks already throw this off because players on one team might have more options than the other players. Multiplying the number of unlockables by nearly one hundred obviously mucks all of this up even more. Even if the differences are subtle and hardly noticeable, not every player will get access to the weapon at the level of their choosing. It could literally take thousands of hours to get a weapon at a specific level. This is not a MMORPG.

In short: No, never, absolutely not, terribad idea, would ruin TF2, would ruin the planet, would bring about a real zombie apocalypse, nein, would screw up competitive play even more, it should never happen ever, thumbs down, one-star idea, would cause kittens to die, et cetera.

So....force players to use the stock versions of weapons in tournament mode? Unless you're saying such minute differences would even matter in most pubs, and to most pubbers. I don't think people would rage that much over a shotgun that does less damage but shoots a little faster. But I do know that people like customization.

I for one have been hoping for this for a long time. Hence there have been a couple threads on this topic already....if you catch my drift.

The Kilo · 07-23-2009, 05:20 AM

Your idea is plausible.

I'm personally very interested in what Valve is going to do.

oldmeme · 07-23-2009, 05:27 AM

Sorry, but I'd have to go with Rem. If I see a Soldier with a shotgun, I want to know precisely what range of damage he could potentially do to me, learning this from experiencing it through playing matches. Unknown variables (as in, I don't know the level of the weapon my opponent is using) will strike an unneccicary and unfair blow to the game built around having everything in balance.

No thanks.

Pebr · 07-23-2009, 05:43 AM

Ok, first, if the weapon levels are going to do nothing, they need to go. There's nothing more pointless than the system we have now with meaningless level numbers.

Yes, this isn't an MMPORG - And it wouldn't be any more of one whether this weapon level idea was implemented or not.

About "knowing" precisely what each weapon is going to do - To begin with, once you get killed by someone, you do know exactly what they can do to you when you see what you weapon they were holding. Second, these weapon variations are very very small. It's hardly going to make any significant impact on you as a player. You can expect that shotgun to behave almost exactly the same way as a regular shotgun. As i noted in my OP, any particular spec that could make the weapon OP or too diverse will have restrictions applied to it.

I'm not sure why people are so afraid of some changes that are this minimal that often won't even be noticed. this idea simply gives weapon levels a tiny purpose rather than being meaningless and confusing. So a rocket launcher has an extra 1% damage and 1% slower reloading - How is this harmful to anything? The only thing that will happen is that you may die once every 100 battles instead of being left with 1HP...

Tankjuh · 07-23-2009, 05:50 AM

Unfortunately the stock weapons are always at level 1 so they will be excluded from this whole level stuff... And personally I prefer the stock weapons.

Ty4on · 07-23-2009, 06:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rem

Yes. But TF2 is competitive FPS

No it isn't.

Some people play it that way, but Valve never designed the game to be that way.

Nyarlathotep666 · 07-23-2009, 06:31 AM

It'd be extremely hard to balance everything out for each weapon. If you increased rate of fire, the damage would have to go down some exact amount to compensate. How would one calculate this for each weapon? I like the idea of "unique" weapons, but this isn't the way to do it.

Reaper70k · 07-23-2009, 06:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ty4on

No it isn't.

Some people play it that way, but Valve never designed the game to be that way.

They designed it to be both competitive AND casual.

SNES · 07-23-2009, 06:36 AM

Too complicated. I have a level 73 Sandvich. Does it heal 73% more health but take 73% longer to eat?

Pebr · 07-23-2009, 06:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SNES

Too complicated. I have a level 73 Sandvich. Does it heal 73% more health but take 73% longer to eat?

No.
Divide your level by 10 - It would be 7.3%.
Let's say the specs are just regenerated health and eating time.
The amount of change is randomly picked anywhere between 0.0% and 7.3%.
The function picks health regen to increase by 3.4%.
Now eating time must increase by 3.4%.

So this...

Regeneration - 120HP
Eating Time - 5 seconds

... changes to this:

Regeneration - 124HP
Eating Time - 5.17 seconds

It's really not too complicated at all for players. All we need to know is that a high level number will have a more drastic effect on weapon specs.

EDIT: Thanks Kabuto, oops.

Kabuto · 07-23-2009, 06:44 AM

Personally, I don't see why most people would hate a system like this, other than because they have some aversion to change. If Valve added it to default weapons too, and had a server variable to set them all to default, I think it could work.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pebr

Let's say the specs are just regenerated health and eating time.
The amount of change is randomly picked anywhere between 0.0% and 7.3%.
The function picks health regen to increase by 3.4%.
Now eating time must decrease by 3.4%.

Wouldn't that be OP? Eating time would increase to be balanced.

07-23-2009, 04:05 AM	#1
Pebr Join Date: Feb 2009 Reputation: 1375 Posts: 2,611	Weapon Level Idea Here is my proposal for weapon levels should they gain a purpose in TF2. Here is an example App for the system: http://tf2app.com/levelsystem/ As you can see from the example, every time you refresh the page you will be given a random weapon level and some random weapon specs to go with it. In my example case, i have presented a generic shotgun. With my level system, two weapons with the same levels will not have the same weapon specs. In this system, the weapon level only decides to what degree the weapon specs can randomly change. See the details at the bottom of the App to see what is happening to the specs. The algorithm first gives each weapon spec a random buff or a nerf to a degree based on the weapon level. After the process is finished, you are given two specs that are buffed and two that are nerfed. However, each weapon spec was changed by a random amount so ultimately you end up with a weapon that is either OP or UP. To counter this, the algorithm then goes back and determines to what percentage the weapon is OP or UP. It will then evenly deduct the percentage difference from the imbalanced side so that there is an equal distribution of change. Lastly, in most cases some specs will be less important than others. In this case, rate of fire is probably less of an issue than firepower. For example, when rate of fire is affected, an additional 1% change is added to make the difference more balanced. On a side note, i am rounding to 2 decimal points - This may sometimes cause a very very slight imbalance of specs. ------------------------------------------------------- This is the most dramatic one i found after a lot of refreshes: Regular Shotgun: Firepower: 75 Rate of Fire (shots per sec): 0.75 Reload Speed (reloads per sec): 0.65 Spread: 25 Level 99 Shotgun: Firepower: 70.46 Rate of Fire (shots per sec): 0.78 Reload Speed (reloads per sec): 0.6 Spread: 22.68 Details Overall Buff: 13.1% Overall Nerf: 13.1% ------------------------------------------------------- TL;DR Just go to the link at the top. ------------------- See all my other ideas: http://forums.steampowered.com/forum...d.php?t=833120 Last edited by Pebr: 09-25-2009 at 03:06 AM.

07-23-2009, 05:43 AM	#8
Pebr Join Date: Feb 2009 Reputation: 1375 Posts: 2,611	Ok, first, if the weapon levels are going to do nothing, they need to go. There's nothing more pointless than the system we have now with meaningless level numbers. Yes, this isn't an MMPORG - And it wouldn't be any more of one whether this weapon level idea was implemented or not. About "knowing" precisely what each weapon is going to do - To begin with, once you get killed by someone, you do know exactly what they can do to you when you see what you weapon they were holding. Second, these weapon variations are very very small. It's hardly going to make any significant impact on you as a player. You can expect that shotgun to behave almost exactly the same way as a regular shotgun. As i noted in my OP, any particular spec that could make the weapon OP or too diverse will have restrictions applied to it. I'm not sure why people are so afraid of some changes that are this minimal that often won't even be noticed. this idea simply gives weapon levels a tiny purpose rather than being meaningless and confusing. So a rocket launcher has an extra 1% damage and 1% slower reloading - How is this harmful to anything? The only thing that will happen is that you may die once every 100 battles instead of being left with 1HP... Last edited by Pebr: 07-23-2009 at 05:46 AM.

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07-23-2009, 04:09 AM	#2
Rem Join Date: Dec 2008 Reputation: 1 Posts: 43	They should never serve any purpose. In gameplay or aesthetics. It would absolutely ruin the game.

07-23-2009, 04:10 AM	#3
Kews Join Date: Dec 2008 Reputation: 9 Posts: 232	Item levels in PvP RPGs never work unless they have player looting too. I can't see why it would do any different here.

07-23-2009, 04:22 AM	#4
Rem Join Date: Dec 2008 Reputation: 1 Posts: 43	Yes. But TF2 is competitive FPS (we can debate this point in one of the other thousand threads about "lol competitive TF2", thanks.) where each team has a reasonably equal chance of winning in the long-term if the skill levels are the same. Unlocks already throw this off because players on one team might have more options than the other players. Multiplying the number of unlockables by nearly one hundred obviously mucks all of this up even more. Even if the differences are subtle and hardly noticeable, not every player will get access to the weapon at the level of their choosing. It could literally take thousands of hours to get a weapon at a specific level. This is not a MMORPG. In short: No, never, absolutely not, terribad idea, would ruin TF2, would ruin the planet, would bring about a real zombie apocalypse, nein, would screw up competitive play even more, it should never happen ever, thumbs down, one-star idea, would cause kittens to die, et cetera.

07-23-2009, 05:20 AM	#6
The Kilo Join Date: Jan 2008 Reputation: 181 Posts: 2,418	Your idea is plausible. I'm personally very interested in what Valve is going to do.

07-23-2009, 05:27 AM	#7
oldmeme Join Date: Feb 2008 Reputation: 9 Posts: 347	Sorry, but I'd have to go with Rem. If I see a Soldier with a shotgun, I want to know precisely what range of damage he could potentially do to me, learning this from experiencing it through playing matches. Unknown variables (as in, I don't know the level of the weapon my opponent is using) will strike an unneccicary and unfair blow to the game built around having everything in balance. No thanks.

07-23-2009, 05:50 AM	#9
Tankjuh Join Date: May 2009 Reputation: 0 Posts: 21	Unfortunately the stock weapons are always at level 1 so they will be excluded from this whole level stuff... And personally I prefer the stock weapons.

07-23-2009, 06:31 AM	#11
Nyarlathotep666 Join Date: Jul 2009 Reputation: 1 Posts: 122	It'd be extremely hard to balance everything out for each weapon. If you increased rate of fire, the damage would have to go down some exact amount to compensate. How would one calculate this for each weapon? I like the idea of "unique" weapons, but this isn't the way to do it.

07-23-2009, 06:36 AM	#13
SNES Join Date: Dec 2008 Reputation: 127 Posts: 2,082	Too complicated. I have a level 73 Sandvich. Does it heal 73% more health but take 73% longer to eat?