Thoughts on DA/DT for vs. mode?

Morganan · 04-24-2009, 02:49 PM

Interestingly enough valve released a statement http://forums.steampowered.com/forum...&postcount=188

Quote:

We'll be releasing a quick patch for the most critical issues, such as the invulnerable freezer door in the Versus version of Dead Air 2.

After that's out we'll be looking at what sorts of further changes we'd like to do. The Death Toll and Dead Air VS campaigns are not in a final, unchangeable state at this point. We'll gather up the things we want to address and do a pass on them.

As for the Infected clips ("invisible walls"), there are a few reasons why they are more noticeable in these campaigns than in No Mercy and Blood Harvest, performance constraints being the most important of these. However, we'll be taking a look at which areas can be opened up more for the Infected without making the maps unshippable.

The ideal is to allow the Infected as many options as possible in the open areas, and we certainly aren't looking to balance the Survivor vs. Infected matchup by preventing Hunters from getting to tempting spots. In places where we don't achieve this ideal but can do something about it without killing performance, expect to see changes in the future.

I believe they are referring to DT4 which has a lot of houses you should be able to get on, but cant and things like the water-tower at the start of DT3 (it's not a solid prop anymore because pouncing up at all had you hit the skybox on the map, same for the DA1 and DA2 water towers) DA1 and DA2 have the same basic problems as DT4, places you think you should be able to reach as infected, you cant because you either pass through them or simply are blocked access.

Overall I think they've done an excellent job converting these maps to decent vs. maps. There could be a few less things for the tank to knock around on some of these maps (DT4/DA3/DA5 anyone?), but with no meds on these maps are really close to the perfect balance between the teams. DT2 is my personal favorite as the changes in the sewers/pumpstation make that a dangerous area for the survivors to dally in.

Thoughts?

FL1Pmode · 04-24-2009, 08:14 PM

Already played the "unofficial" versions. They are very fun. More fun than BL/No Mercy.

**Kebab-Kastike** · 04-25-2009, 01:01 AM

They are interesting and provide lots of ways to complete them. No mercy and Blood Harvest were mostly CQB with few open areas.

**Lyramion** · 04-25-2009, 11:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by FL1Pmode

Already played the "unofficial" versions. They are very fun. More fun than BL/No Mercy.

This.

Also if you played the unofficial versions you now will see how much work they actually put in to make VS more work on those 2 maps. Lots of little details that got changed.

Mech__Warrior · 04-25-2009, 12:43 PM

No! Don't get rid of the invincible freezer door!

Morganan · 04-25-2009, 12:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mech__Warrior

No! Don't get rid of the invincible freezer door!

It's already gone, the patch of the 23rd did some quick tweaks to the maps.

Mech__Warrior · 04-26-2009, 12:28 PM

Aw, it was one of the few things that gave my group a slight chance on the Expert Dead Air campaign, although it didn't do much.

Morganan · 04-26-2009, 03:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mech__Warrior

Aw, it was one of the few things that gave my group a slight chance on the Expert Dead Air campaign, although it didn't do much.

It's still there on the co-op versions of the maps, but it's gone in the vs. versions.

**Kebab-Kastike** · 04-28-2009, 11:51 AM

I would see them as death trap. I only recall the 3rd level one in Death air, it's just outside the saferoom (why would you want to go in there?) and one at the beginning of Death toll 3rd level in the train yard.

Well if you get a tank you could exploit the fact that the door doesn't break and now that Tank can't punch trough walls, sure it would be bit unfair to go in there to fight the tank. Cheap tactic against tank and with horde, nothing that autoshotty can't handle. Only gives the infected more time to set up ambush outside the door.

Morganan · 04-28-2009, 02:06 PM

I've found/submitted a few more locations for valve to hopefully address.

DA has 3 smoker pull locations where if the smoker waits for just the right spot, he can pull a survivor off the ledge and said survivor will never grab ahold of the ledge, it's an insta-kill. There is also a spot where a smoker can get an insta-incap just due to the fall distance. (that spot forces a tough choice on the survivors, retreat to almost the beginning of the level from near the end to save him/her, or leave the survivor) The DA finale also has some buggy spots/spawns. I've seen the normal tank spawn for DA spawn the tank in the middle of the crater, right in the fire, so of course basically the tank spawns on fire.

DT has 2 "insta-incap" pull spots as well but only one should be addressed by Valve imo. (if you have 2 paths, one where you cant be insta-incapped by a smoker, and one you can, it's not valves fault you chose the path you could get insta-incapped on) I still think the street on DT3 needs a little more work, a few more obstructions to allow the infected to spawn closer to the road, in it's current state the boomer is almost useless against a smart team. I'd also like to see the ranch house have a breakable exterior wall or two, but I cant consider that a bug as much as just wishfull thinking. There are some buggy climb locations as a tank as well, The event on DA3, the tank can spawn on the far side of the block. A smart survivor team will of course instantly trigger the event, and for some reason you cant climb over the block when it's on fire as the tank. If you dont climb over it however you will be forced to pass control over to the next player. You cant climb any building and bypass the fire either, it kind of sucks to be honest. If the tank spawns on DA4 on the far side of the fence before the survivors trigger the van, climbing over that fence can be a bug-ridden nightmare as well. (If you dont time your crouch just right, you simply wont fit through and fall back down to the ground)

Both DA and DT need to have more cars as static props and not as physics props, overall I think both DA and DT have a few to many "punchable" props period. There are more "punchables" for the tank in DT1 then the entire NM/BH campaigns combined. That leads to the question, are there to many punchables in DT/DA, or to few in NM/BH? I think they have a great start for DA and DT for vs. mode and they are far from unplayable, but they are also far from perfect imo.