This is clearly pandering to crybaby whingebags who who ragequit when they can't locate an infiltrator. The most enjoyable aspect of this game for me is hunting infiltrators (as an infiltrator). The duels are great fun. Having the way pointed out to me would massively reduce the level of fun.
The cone seems a bit better than the straight line. You already have directional hit markers anyway. The cone still makes it easier, but so long as the deceased are still unsure of the range it still allows people to remain more hidden. If more players quit the game because they don't know where a sniper shot them from, maybe this isn't the game for them and would feel more at home with the small match console games. This is a big game with large maps and a lot more players. Yeah, I get frustrated sometimes when I get sniped but what can you do? It's the nature of such a large scale game. IMO, maybe SOE should have thought about that frustration before launching the game. But on the other hand, how many of those players who quit even spent money on the game? Had this game been a straight sub game, would those players have stuck it out longer and tried to adapt had they had money invested? How many of those are just the type who ragequit as soon as they realize they can't roflstomp everything in sight, one death and they say F it? We don't know.
Also, I want to be clear that I am all for making a game more appealing and accesible to new players. Take WoW for example. There is a game whose PvP aspect was dominated by the avid players, which made it extremely frustrating for anybody just jumping into it. Yes, the vets had more time invested and thus more skill. The problem there was that even if you had skill, you were still dominated by gear. You had to have your butt handed to you over and over to slowly grind out your gear. When the devs decided to try to close that gap in order for fresh max levels to jump into pvp faster, the hardcores complained. They spent all that time to get the better gear so they should be better. But that isn't skill, that is steam rolling all the newbies because, no matter how much they play to hone their skills, they are still outmatched by numbers. I defended the normalization of the gear against alot of people I know. I felt like, if you are going to get stomped, it should be because you don't know what you are doing yet and strive to get better. You can't increase your skill if you get stomped over and over simply because they out gear you. Jump to Planetside 2. Yeah, you are still going to be "out geared" by higher BRs (and the new starter loadouts are a great start to help fix that. And if you haven't already, check out STLYoungblood and DrankTheKoolaid's latest Duality with Wrel discussing player progression) but this game favors more on the skilled side of things. Rather than pandering to the skill side for the new guys, we should be looking at other avenues to intice new players and make them feel welcome. Things that will put the newbies on an even more level playing field with the vets, gear wise, so that they can more easily increase their skill.
Stalker Cloaking, and any stealth related mechanics, become worthless if this goes to live. As it stands, the Stalker Cloaking device works best as an ambush oriented cloaking device that rewards flanking the enemy and taking up position near hotspots. If you get behind the enemy and their Sunderer as they're assaulting your forces over a ridge...you can systematically whittle down the forces from behind them in a very stealthy manner. If this goes through, every situation akin to this becomes worthless...and you have to remain mobile with a cloaking device that punishes mobility with exposure. I never understood the purpose of this mechanic...it's completely unrealistic and unneeded. Are new age gamers really that spoiled? I mean...I haven't played a first person shooter since Counterstrike and stopped playing them when every game took up that sort of theme because I preferred games like Delta Force: Land Warrior with huge open maps... The ability to know the exact location of your killer is ridiculous, and that's not just a statement for our class...that's a statement for every class. Your Light Assaults take up stealth positions from time to time...everyone does once in a while, finding a nook or exploitable position to work with. At the most, the only thing the killed player should see is a small arrow attached to their skull and crossbones pointing to the general direction of where they were killed from: North, North East, East, South East, South, South West, West, North West. An extremely small generalized indication of where the assault came from...and even that's completely unneeded.
nonsnipers don't care since nonsnipers tend to move between kills and only snipers can be invisible outside of when they actually deliver the killing shot
My main advantage over my targets is, that I can stay hidden in my sniper spots. There are several tactics that makes this possible. The whole advantage would become obsolete by the new death screen. Snipers would be forced to change their position after a few shots, instead of using smart tactics to cover their current position. If this death screen goes through on life, I cancel my subscription and stop playing PS2 - I really don't see any sense that the game engine gives the victim an advantage over the killer. The killer has now NO INFO from his victim after his death, while the victim gets all info about the killer, including the position Thats BS!! As a victim, you can now exactly set up a waypoint on the map and try all you can to destroy the sniper spot. So after killing the 1st target you get like 30 seconds left to leave the spot and get a new one. A BIG NO to the death screen in this form, where the killer is now in a disadvantage to the victim
Yeah, I think a lot of people here are thinking too much about sniping and less about the ones that play much closer to the enemy forces. Stalker cloak is the one I've mentioned previously. Even with a cone, you are going to be in a much tighter area of that cone with stalker. I understand the points of repositioning and overall playing your infiltrator smart. In fact, I agree whole heartedly in learning those tactics. What I don't agree with is making those tactics even more difficult to learn and pull off for the sake of people in the mindset of ragequitting because somebody killed them. It just feels like a half ***** band aid solution to one of their "biggest complaints" from people who probably were never going to spend a dime on the game anyway (and yes, I have very strong opinions about free to play models and I am not going to into it here). And yeah, what about that LA who wants to pick off people with a suppressed carbine from a tree on an enemies flank? This isn't just a camp sniper issue.
This is not even necessary, because if and when you are attentive enough you get hit pointer in your HUD, that shows the direction of the hit on the body and this even while you die - so we already have this hint in the game and as I already said in the death screen related thread: It is not necessary to support blind and dumb people even more and take them by the hand and show them exactly where the one is who caused their death!
You're right, it's not. It's a system for the nine year old kids on the Playstation 4. They're treating us like we road the short bus to school...and it's absolutely ridiculous. There's a reason why the majority of us don't play Wizards 101, they shouldn't be trying to push this game into the direction of catering to children on the PS4...and if they aren't, there is ABSOLUTELY no reason for this at all. Oi...infuriating. I'm still ticked off about the implant reiteration, and now this.
Oh no I use superior tactics to give myself an advantage. Quick nerf everything and just give everybody a pistol with 1 shot. Then they have to stand 20m apart with their backs turned to each other and when a bell rings they get to turn around and shoot each other. That'll make everything fair. You got it *** backwards btw: All the people for this tool are saying: I want to keep on being a no brainer without being afraid so have my reward for dying (like there should be such a thing) be the death screen telling me exactly where the enemy is so I can kill him.
So... Maybe we are looking at this all wrong. If we know that our targets know where we are, can't we also use that to our advantage? Kind of like our recon darts and the new motion spotter. You can almost guarantee that if you drop one or the other in the middle of a battle, eventually someone will come by to investigate, either thinking you fired the dart right on your super secret spot or looking to destroy the motion spotter. This is currently a great ambush method. In my experience, when I've killed someone from a neat hidey spot, and they actually see me before they die, they very frequently return to seek revenge, especially those of high BR. I can usually tell when they've seen me, and change my position to intercept them on their run back from the respawn. This works well, and I can see adopting a similar tactic with the new death screen. I'm guessing that, as an infiltrator, we will be seeing a lot more people trying for the vengeance kill/bonus once they are provided with our location, however rough (or not) it may end up being.. Maybe this will actually provide more opportunity, rather than hindrance! Now on the other hand, if our targets know that we know that they know... it could get complicated...
Every guy in this thread that is against this has an infiltrator for avatar... You are totally right about it. Every body gets the same chances, giving information to your victim, when you know what you give them, is good. Once again, bla bla bla positionning bla bla bla ruining the game for snipers bla bla bla is nonsense, before this being sniper elite berlin 1945, this is a FPS, you are expected to move. If this killcam helps newbies to start it's all good for me, for older players, it won't change anything. All the people thinking they are so great when they flank a platoon (lol) should think again: As a threat to this platoon, when being spotted, they will help spreading the effort of the said platoon on multiple fronts, rather than one. So after one or 2 kills, the sniper gets chased. If there's like one people after him, no big deal. If there's more, he takes the advantage, as he is already locking more than one guy, and thus being useful for the team. Now, if all your idea of being useful for the team is landing headshots without dying, that's a poor idea of teamplay. Seing the location of snipers will bait people into thinking about an easy kill, if you can't have the brain then to use this to your advantage, I agree, you should be against the killcam. It all comes down to people wanting to get away with their kills easily. I am not a very good sniper, but I have done more than once every situation that is described by previous posters several times, and the killcam would never have changed my experience. All I do as a sniper is basically the same as the other classes, pushing, flanking, taking objectives. I never use anything else than vandal or parallax, m77 or longshot. Please reconsider your points of view when you deny all of the player base a really great tool just for the sake of being able to camp. I hope that if it comes live, all the people that are so afraid of this will adapt or leave, that will make the game better.
Thank you for posting that. I'm going to try and choose my words carefully because my intention is not to offend anyone. However there is a huge difference between playing against skilled opponents in scrims versus how you play on LIVE. One shot you have to consider their entire team knows exactly where you are. Relocation, or setting traps and ambushes for expected retaliation is key. I don't think we are going to see LIVE play drastically improve to the same extent as you would see on TEST scrims and PAL Scrims. However its going to make the transition to those types of engagements easier, and more natural on all of us. We will become accustomed to having to compensate for increased enemy awareness and making a choice to stay or adjust. As for stalker cloak, this is going to affect me very little. I don't hide snipe / ambush a location with it. I am moving, always adjusting never in the same (exact) location for long periods. I can even comfortably flank CQC with it using an Xbow. Push yourselves to move more and adapt to the changes. To expect enemies to come looking for you, and capitalize on the fact they truly believe they have your location down. I understand that using cloak or a BASR in a certain way is going to become less rewarding. I used to love hide sniping with my ghost. I still do from time to time. Example: Tenebrae , your using the Xbow it to devastate enemies from sneaky location your only going to be able to stay there for your first kill + time it takes for enemy to return (or communicate) safely before a risk develops of being countered. This is going to hamper your effectiveness because eventually you will be found using the cone to narrow down your location. I don't want to pretend this doesn't suck for hide sniping in general. I guess what I am trying to say, is that, you cannot get away with doing tactics like these during SCRIMS. The hit indicators tell enough info already for skilled and aware players to call out a general direction on TeamSpeak and then you have an entire squad looking for you and listening for you. Taking advantage of unaware players is going to be more difficult to do with the new changes. Not impossible, but the risk will go up and we are all going to have to adapt and anticipate retaliation attempts. The benefit of this, in many cases you can manipulate enemies.
I just see it as a way for the developers to sell mods in the future (remember some of the implants) that block this ability. Create an ability for all players to easily figure out where their killer is, months later implement a way to block this and charge people at the same time.
Just want to add this to my sort-of "look on the positive side" post I made above. I really, really hate the idea of this thing in general. Forget whether I'm a sniper, CQB, LA, or whatever. My role doesn't matter. This is going to allow experienced players, and especially those on a team, to just totally wreck those with less experience. I would welcome it with open arms if it went away at BR 15 or 20. Heck, I'd even make it more powerful for them. But giving this to high BR people is an absolute mistake as it benefits them on both sides of the equation. As the aggressor, in my ambush idea above, it will help them get multiple kills. As the victim, it will turn something that was sometimes challenging (locating your killer) into something trivial. So for a high rank BR it's a win-win against a low BR/less experienced player. It will only help low BR players to learn how the game works, not how to play the game. That only comes with experience (and teamwork), and with high BR players using this, I feel it will simply empower them to dominate low level BR's even more. I also think Cutebeaver made a good point about working with an organized team. They will usually be able to locate you anyway. This gives everyone nearly that ability, for good or ill. I just worry about it being abused by those who don't really need the crutch in the first place.
Great post, I have to agree, but mostly these final points. The changes have just too many pluses for new players versus minor annoyances (that really are so very minor) for older players. Feeding off unaware newbies isn't anything to be proud of, but it will still happen. Yet, for a player like myself (and the majority of the kind of people who like shooters) the line indicator is a great learning tool, especially in the incredibly hectic, fast-paced, explosion-filled environment that are towers (esp, the crown), sub-terrainian or any other enclosed space where dying without blinking is about the worst thing for a new player. I play Infiltrator mostly, but honestly my first hard lesson as the class applies to each and every single other class. Keep moving, this is not a game for camping in one spot for very long ( unless defending, and even then...a fluid defense works best ) Perhaps in a game where dying isn't a 10-second timer, or where rocket-death can't easily be called down upon anywhere. I will also, be using proximity mines as an infiltrator more often.
Pure BS. Giving the victim more information about his killer, except "you just died by" is absolutely nonsense. And whats the reason behind the position info in the death screen? Forcing people to keep on moving, because the victims are too stupid to get a clue on their own where the well positioned snipers are? Why not mark the position of the killer automatically with a waypoint on the map? Why not make them glow for 2 minutes, so the victim can spot them more easily? This is an FPS, but FPS only mean First Person Shooter and does NOT mean that you have to continuously change your position, because our enlightened devs think it's fine to reveal every sniper on the first kill they make. While most professions ain't affected by this, long range snipers are those who have to pay the bill now - and I absolutely does not like it, when I get revealed, my spot compromised by someone or something else, except by my own mistakes. If I make an error, when I do something wrong and my sniping spot gets compromised, then it is my own fault. But I'm absolutely against a system that gives my positiuon away by very very cheap methods as a gift for the victim! It is very well possible as a smart sniper to stay undetected as long as a battles continues (1.5 hours and 100+ kills was my personal best) - but on the other hand it is also possible to detect me on the first shot, because every shot I make leaves a bullet trail directly to my position. If people in a battle are too inattentive to notice this, then they will get rewarded in future by a pointer directly to the position of the killer.
