Incentives to Move

[N-Sunderland]

One thing that I think is really hurting a lot of brawling teams and helping snipers right now is the flare gun. On maps like Canyon, there's loads of cloud cover from which you could launch an ambush. However, a few well-placed flares guarantee that the snipers will see their enemies coming from a long way away. In our match on Friday against P&S, for example, we spent a long time trying to find a way to sneak past their gun line and rush in. But every time we passed through a cloud, we were flared, spotted, and sniped.

[RearAdmiralZill]

Lol flare Op yo.

All seriousness though, that's not a bad point. Back in the day flares weren't popular at all, and now 8-10 boats carry one. You guys did real well with that final ambush to make it 6-5.

Misdirection is a lovely thing, though.

[Queso]

I was really looking forward to the now reversed merc changes that reduced it's armor damage. That would have made sniping strategies much more difficult to pull off. If it only disabled you'd have to move in after a few shots to finish them off on ships like the pyra.

[RearAdmiralZill]

Since it's still one of two guns that can strip armor well, I don't see it losing that role till something else wanders in.

[N-Sunderland]

There are other guns that can strip armour well. The heavy carronade, the light carronade, the lumberjack, the mine launcher...

But that's not too relevant to this topic.

[RearAdmiralZill]

Well yea flechette does it with average results (minus the LJ) but two of those are heavy guns, one is quite outdone in range, and mines can be avoided.

But yea, about that topic.

[GeneralAmericanQuack]

I guess it all depends on how the new tweaks pan out. The mine launcher and Mobula are definitely going to change the scene as well. Still...

I've been toying with ideas of how a game mode featuring a timed match, with no kill cap would play out. The team with the most kills when time is up would be the winner. Something like that is something I think would encourage teams to search one another out. Especially as the time winds down.

[Mattilald Anguisad]

mercs are amazing for sniping thats true, has anyone tried getting their engies AND gunners to focus on engine repairs while you close the distance and then focus on firing? you'll be surprised how easy it is since the merc turn is quite lumbersome

I see a problem there. Either you are in brawling range if you can dissable, and you've allready dealt with the problem, or you are sniping yourself. The general  Idea is to keep them busy with something that is not shooting at you while you approach, but accomplishing that on open maps is another story.

[Saull]

Well when I think of an incentive to move I feel like a lot of older first person shooters had this down with power ups and weapon drops actively rewarding a player who knows how best to get around the map. For guns of Icarus I can't really imagine how best to do something like this. A straight forward way would to maybe have floating supply crates that insta buff certain or perhaps all the components of a ship temporarily. Thing is the buff would have to be good enough to incetivise moment but not so good that it'd diminish the use of the buff tool. Alternatively maybe instead of providing buffs maybe a small return on perma health.

If we want to avoid power ups altogether punishing the player for not moving rather than rewarding them for moving would be an option. Maybe environmental hazards that hang around the edges of map like storms and dust clouds or maybe just a strong wind that's force more stationary ships toward the center.

Idk what do you think

[Surette]

Well when I think of an incentive to move I feel like a lot of older first person shooters had this down with power ups and weapon drops actively rewarding a player who knows how best to get around the map.

I think it's obvious you're talking about Quake here (at least, that's what comes to mind for me), and I agree with you. Quake and similar games have so much strategy that go into them and require you to know maps inside and out, as well as know where your opponent is at all times. Inversely, games like Call of Duty have nowhere near that level of strategy, which is why you see a lot of spawn camping (not so far off from some Guns of Icarus matches).  Not saying GoI has no strategy because it certainly has a lot, but we do see some level of spawn camping.

[Spud Nick]

What if there was a bomb on each ship that would blow up if the ship slowed down?

[snor-laxatives]

I still haven't watched the last feed, but Im assuming it was at Fjords?  Which is a beautiful but large map.  And now that I think about it, most of our maps are larger maps (with exception to Duel at Dawn... maybe). 

Smaller maps means that after a ship dies it will spawn closer to the fray, possible catching sniping ships with their pants down.  If we make smaller maps (or at least cut up larger maps into smaller segments) we could see a whole new brand of brawling in competitive matches.

Only other thing i can think of is jacking up merc reload times...

[Zenark]

What if there was a bomb on each ship that would blow up if the ship slowed down?

Speed 12: Blimps now? Seriously?

[QKO]

The reason why I think the "time limit" set by the server itself is plenty is really one thing: tactics.

You start putting short time limits in there, and you get a bunch of "strategies" that revolve around it instead of, well what you saw Friday. You could have a team ahead in kills, and they simply avoid the other team till time runs out. You cut way into the chance for comebacks. And I can only imagine the rage of a tied game, and you both lose? Most of our games were close, and 2 of them were 7-6.

I can agree that I wished some CP maps were in the rotation. You don't have to separate them to have a good tournament either. Both can exist.

Having more time doesn't make a game more tactical. Quite frankly, strategies evolve from quick thinking and improve with experience. Fightinggames usually have a 99 second time limit on their rounds and that is a HUGE amount of time in those games as the game itself is designed to finish a round in under 40 seconds. The same way Virtua Fighter has a 45 second time limit while the game mechanics are build around finishing the round in 15 seconds. So for this game you have to consider what the game is designed for and how much time you intend to give it. From my small personal experience, rounds tend to take 15 minutes, so having a timelimit of 2 hours is just too long.

Secondly, the incentive to move comes from the playing style you wish to execute. Back to fightinggames because I got more experienced there, some characters have less incentive to move than others. Most notably characters that have longer range tools are less likely to try to rush at the opponent to fight him in close combat. With the airships it's the same deal. If your ship is loaded with 4 mercury field guns, you're not putting yourself in an advantage by charging at your enemy, instead, you prefer distance and you intend to stay at that distance. Once this game evolves, some players will develop more close combat oriented styles and have loadouts to accompany them; those players will have an incentive to move and will happily do so.

[Echoez]

Brawlers already have an incecitive to move, they need to get in close range, I think the OP was mostly referring to snipers having to move instead of camping the same place while the enemy brawlers are forced to mane an engagement each time, sniping is effective right now because aside from the game boasting some of the scariest sniping weapons I have seen, you don't need to move your arse much.

In KotH where you need to get on the point, sniping is less effective due to forcing both teams to meet at a single point, Crazy king forces way too much movement for the sluggish Galleons to be effective as well so sniping loses effectiveness, you simply don't have the time to stand still and point broadsides at an enemy unless you are the current owner of the point and I promise, the brawlers will have the advantage of boasting faster ships than the snipers here.

So yeah, DM is pretty much the only mode plauged by snipers 24/7 and that's only in competative. It's not as bad as people think though