Defending ships dead, Time to cap.... Squid is back already.

[Captain Phil]

Been playing a lot of CP maps lately such as Labyrinth and Angleans. And it has come to my attention that the points are too easy to defend with the long countdown timer. As soon as the enemy ships killed me and my ally I was already back blocking the point before they could un-capture it. Another incident that keeps coming up is when one fleet finally defeated the other, they cannot un-capture the point quick enough to save the game, as soon as that timer is 50 seconds away, you loose. The best way to handle this in my opinion is to reduce the time it takes to un-capture a point while keeping the time to capture an uncontested point the same. This will allow teams to make last minute saves when the clock is running low but give the other team time to try to save the point again. This will also allow for new tactics in crazy king maps where a squid can come in for those last 100 seconds of a point and quickly uncap it and move on to the next point.

This is a change that will make CP maps even more fun and easier for ships on the attacking side of the match. it will also nerf squids a bit on the KotH maps.

What do you all thing of CP maps currently? Are they fine as they are or do they need a change? Will this idea work or will something else need to be tweaked.

[Zenark]

Sometimes it's best to let yourself be killed when defending a point so you can get back to it with a full hull without losing it. I agree that it takes too long to uncap a point in Labyrinth, but not quite so on Scrap since the map is bigger. Something that might help (maybe) is if a point could be uncapped if there are two attackers but only one defender. It would be slower to uncap because of the defender, but by the time the other defender got back to the point, it'd be halfway gone. Attackers get a better chance to cap if they both stay alive, and defenders would have to really coordinate instead of "RUSH THE POINT OMG"

[Thaago]

In my experience the countdown timer is so long that a third of the game is just getting to the point first. Example: I recently played a game in Labyrinth where me and a teammate decided to meet up before rushing the point so we could be concentrated. The other team got the capture before we arrived. We then absolutely murdered the other team - I'm not sure if either of us died a single time and we certainly got a dozen kills. Even with that the other team got 186 points - they just kept rushing back in over and over, always getting back before we could finish the uncapture.

I would be very happy if the countdown timer was reduced to 3 seconds or less for both capturing and uncapturing. Maybe this is a bit of an extreme position, but I can't think of anything less fun than 'whelp, I better sit here stationary for the next minute and if they come back then that whole last fight was wasted'. Not to mention all the times where in a close match you and your ally finally manage to kill the other team only to realize that with 30 seconds left you won't even be able to uncapture fast enough to win.

[Captain Smollett]

Yeah this has been a problem for a while.  Especially on maps where the whole team is fighting over one point like Scrap, Labyrinth and the crazy KOTH maps.

[shadowsteel]

My suggestion is to increase the spawn timer for downed ships.

[Squidslinger Gilder]

And this after everyone complained "they cap too fast."

Heh...Guys gotta make up your minds. I had no problem with the cap rate before but a bunch fussed and now here we are complaining about it being too long.

[Duzzyy]

All my experiences with these map types are that the first team to capture it ends up winning

[Thaago]

And this after everyone complained "they cap too fast."

Heh...Guys gotta make up your minds. I had no problem with the cap rate before but a bunch fussed and now here we are complaining about it being too long.

Well I for one wasn't around then. I'm surprised it was ever made longer, at least from my experiences.

Perhaps a 'tag' mode would be fun where the capture time is 0 - whoever touched the barrel last has control. Not sure how that would work on crazy king though.

[Captain Smollett]

People way back when complained about cap points because of Anglean raiders.

Back then Anglean had no combat.  Ships would just race around capping and uncapping points.

Though to be honest I never complained about that.  I do have a bit of a problem with the difficulty in taking back points.  I like comeback victories and that's something this game thankfully provides in great bounty in Deathmatch, however it's a bit lacking in CP games.

[Cloudrunner]

I've consistently played matches with even odds where cps went back and forth many times. A coordinated team can take the point very quickly and hold folks off just fine in my experiences. Guess I just haven't had the same problem.

[Thaago]

Ah, I can see that. I have much more experience on the single capture point where everyone would have to be fighting for that location. I can see how very low capture time would be bad with multiple capture points. Hrrmph. The two gametypes could just have different capture lengths - long for multiple shots and very short for single spots.

[Captain Phil]

And this after everyone complained "they cap too fast."

Heh...Guys gotta make up your minds. I had no problem with the cap rate before but a bunch fussed and now here we are complaining about it being too long.

Not complaining about the cap time being to slow, just complaining about the Uncap time taking to long. And for reference, I preferred the quicker cap time back then.

[Captain Smollett]

It's not difficult for a coordinated team to take over a point; but usually if a team is good enough to take back a point, they're likely not going to give it back.  Only in rare instances when skill level is extremely close will the point go back and forth more than once.

If uncapping were made easier, then the team trying to uncap would simply need to kill both enemy ships to get it to stop accruing points, which seems fair enough. 

Point limits for the maps would have to be lowered though to account for the extra time spent battling over points.

[Cloudrunner]

It's not difficult for a coordinated team to take over a point; but usually if a team is good enough to take back a point, they're likely not going to give it back.  Only in rare instances when skill level is extremely close will the point go back and forth more than once.

If uncapping were made easier, then the team trying to uncap would simply need to kill both enemy ships to get it to stop accruing points, which seems fair enough. 

Point limits for the maps would have to be lowered though to account for the extra time spent battling over points.

Hmm. That seems fair.

[Richard LeMoon]

Let crews vote on capture times in the match lobby after voting on the map. Everyone ends up happy (or not happy and leaves, just like voting on maps).