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Delete huttball


Taerrik

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I love huttball, its my favorite map, but there is nothing more frustrating than watching 15 other ppl not play to win. At least with maps like voidstar or odessan the mentality of go fight ppl for high stats can somewhat help objectives.

 

The only other way I can see to save pure objective based maps like huttball is

In regs, remove **ALL** rewards for loss. If you lose you get nothing.

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I think the larger problem is that the "death-match" style of pvp (where you typically have a pack of 5 or 6+ players huddled up, destroying the lesser-numbered mobs they come across) with players overtly ignoring objectives (wiping an area and not even claiming it; throwing the huttball on the ground as soon as they receive it) has become contagious.

 

We're starting to see everyone do it bc... I guess its like -- "if you cant beat em, join em". I wouldn't know - I still futilely try to play objectives. But even beyond huttball, its plaguing several other match types.

 

And to put my pop psych cap on for a second:

 

I have a feeling that people do this because there is some idea that... "I can't lose objectives if I don't play them." So we see people obnoxiously/overtly avoiding objectives so they can't be confused as caring about them. So what happens, is we get these 5/6 man mobs with a healer, and they murder every little objective-playing mob of 2 or 3 they happen across. So it boosts their ego, and validates their entire reason for playing that way. I mean, I would figure certainly they realize that 5/6 > 2/3, but regardless of the perception, or their perception of themselves, they still do it...

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If I had to offer a solution, instead of just complaining about it...

 

What if players could opt to receive UC's/credits/weekly mission progress in proportion with either: DPS/HPS/PPS OR Objectives. So if one person, say myself, opts to receive their loot in proportion with Objectives, and another, say a random death-matcher, opts to receive it based on DPS/HPS/PPS, then the MM system could do its best to keep each type grouped together. Obviously with the population, there can't be a hard n fast segregation, but a soft one may do the heavy lifting during peak hours.

 

I duno.. just a random idea. They may have to tinker a bit with the objective points, but something that naturally segregates the populations would be nice. (You'd think that DMers would just play ranked and leave the 8v8 queue alone... But I think they like the #s advantage I mentioned above.)

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i've dedicated a

twitch matches on utube. Its awesome and while I do notice players not playing the game, rarely however does a match end up with the kills farmers having the best. U just need 1-2 interested players in the match and the game picks up quickly.

 

Huttball is just about my favorite thing in swtor when it comes to community. PLS DONT DELETE IT!! :D

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i've dedicated a
twitch matches on utube. Its awesome and while I do notice players not playing the game, rarely however does a match end up with the kills farmers having the best. U just need 1-2 interested players in the match and the game picks up quickly.

 

Huttball is just about my favorite thing in swtor when it comes to community. PLS DONT DELETE IT!! :D

 

The problem is you usually only have 1-2 people on your team playing to win and 4+ on the other team doing it. So you are out numbered 2-1 or worse,

Most of my matches (due to matchmaking), seem to put me on the team with one other person that try’s, while the rest of my team chase 2 guys all over the map and we are out numbered 3-1.

Then add the desync and bugs and it’s infuriating. I see a player with the ball and I go to stop them (and would have) and they desync and I can’t target or anything (ie stun in the traps).

I can tell within the first 30secs how my team will play and how many on the other team will try. If my team won’t even pick up the ball with no enemy there or chase the ball carrier, then it’s an instant leave for me.

HB has always been one of my favourite maps. But idiots on my team ruin the whole experience. I would rather leave and requeue with people who want to try.

Edited by TrixxieTriss
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  • 3 months later...

I'm pretty sure huttball has been like this since the beginning. A few people playing the objective in a focused manner, while most fiddle around and engage with it in a haphazard manner.

 

It's easy to assume people are just interested in fighting and don't care about objectives, but my guess would be that it's more a matter of people not understanding how to play it and getting confused. On paper, it's very simple. Grab the ball and take it to the goal. In practice, it gets complicated fast. For example, passing is advantageous, but only if you have other people around who understand that passing is advantageous and are playing to be passed to. If you don't, passing might be disastrous or impossible. But hanging onto the ball is probably a bad idea, unless your team is just outright trouncing the other one in all combat, or unless you have a huge amount of mobility and a clear strategy for reaching the goal.

 

Then there's the fact that some classes are more readily mobile than others, so they have an easier time playing to score goals, while others kind of have to figure out how to play support, which can be its own set of complexity. Do you follow the scorer to try to be passed to? Do you try to slow people following them?

 

I think it's a map that's made in heaven for coordinated play and a team with clear roles and people who understand what their job is. It's kind of a mess in the pug scheme of things. Undeniably fun when strategic play is successful though.

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It's easy to assume people are just interested in fighting and don't care about objectives, but my guess would be that it's more a matter of people not understanding how to play it and getting confused.

 

no. I'm certain that's not the issue. there have always been ppl who don't know what the objectives are and just derp around. what's going on now is that the good players (most of them) completely ignore the objectives purposely b/c they don't care anymore. presumably because WZs are irrelevant to the ranked arenas that they play.

 

IMO, it makes quesh unplayable the majority of the time.

 

It makes every WZs unfun when you catch a good premade either on your team or against you.

 

Huttball has traditionally been the most confusing map and the one that leads more often to ppl derping around. that was before the advent of OPG. now that one is the worst (alongside quesh but not out of ignorance for quesh).

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I'm pretty sure huttball has been like this since the beginning. A few people playing the objective in a focused manner, while most fiddle around and engage with it in a haphazard manner.

 

Then there's the fact that some classes are more readily mobile than others, so they have an easier time playing to score goals, while others kind of have to figure out how to play support, which can be its own set of complexity. Do you follow the scorer to try to be passed to? Do you try to slow people following them?

 

 

Actually that’s not the case. For the first few years before we had Arena, people used to mostly play it properly. We were even asking for a proper Hutt Ball league. Which Bioware said they might be interested in at the time.

 

As for class mobility, that’s not really a factor in Hutt Ball because every class and spec is viable if they play their classes role.

Not every class needs to run the ball and obviously some are nearly made for it. But others are also made to be awesome support classes.

 

If you know your class and its strengths, then it’s not hard to work out what you should be doing to help your Ball carrier get to the line or slow and stop their ball carrier from scoring.

And that’s the problem. People don’t know their own class or it’s strengths if they are playing Hutt Ball, I blame the arena mentality for this because all people know how to do it kill and farm numbers. They really don’t understand how their class and spec fit into a team that requires co-ordination and team work.

 

Take snipers for example. If you’re an engineering sniper with lots of crowd control, you don’t want to be camping in a static area trying to kill people. You want to be moving so that you can slow the enemy down. Then depending on the map (ie, Quesh), you may even want to run or stay in range of your ball carrier so that you can slow and run interference for them. (I’ve even run the ball on mine when needed).

As a Sorc, you can be a runner, an off healer/healer, run interference or ideally, get ahead to pull your ball carrier. They are one of the classes that can fit into just about any support or main role in Hutt Ball.

We all know how good operatives and even PTs can be in Hutt Ball. But they aren’t gods and people seem to give up trying to stop the carrier when they see an Operative with the ball.

 

Those are just a few of the classes and specs. But if you know the tactics, strategy and most importantly, your own classes specific strengths in Hutt Ball, then you can be effective on any class,

 

Besides the death matching and fools who don’t try and the desync that keeps getting worse with the bugs, the main thing that has been ruining Hutt Ball is Bioware. All the class changes that give most classes gap closes or speed or massive immunity has made all classes a bit too generic in Hutt Ball,

As an example, in the past, Operatives would have to run the ball and use roll and DCDs. Now they also have a gap closer that allows them to leap up to other lvls. You also have Dps sins doing this too. Before those changes, leaping up was the specialty of Warrior only classes or dps PTs.

You also have Mara’s with 30 sec auto predation spam and other classes with speed abilities now, which use to only belong to Inquisitors and a semi speed boost to PTs.

There are others as well, but I think those show how every class is starting to end up with other classes specific abilities and actually making too many classes feel generic and not as unique as they use to be.

 

Bioware seem to have a hard-on for making Hutt Ball maps. But then make them with bugs, desync and poorly design, while also making class changes that change the dynamics of the maps. I’m pretty sure they don’t even consider how changing classes will affect specific maps. They should not have made Vandin and they should never, ever make another HB map.

 

I use to love Hutt Ball. I know I’m not the best over all pvper, but even to this day I’m a much better Hutt ball player than 98% of the player base because it’s my jive, it’s my thing, it’s what I excel at. Anyone who knows me in the game and have played HB with me can attest to my passion in Hutt Ball.

But I basically hate Hutt Ball now because nobody tries and because of all the other issues I’ve listed. The map type also pops way too much compared to other maps, which just reinforces all the bad feelings I now have when playing it.

I now leave 50% of HB maps before they start and leave the other 50% when I stay in the first minute as soon as I realise my team won’t try. It’s not my job to carry them to a win if they won’t help.

 

Besides Vandin (which has one design fault I dispise), original HB and Quesh are still good maps. Bioware just needs to fix the bugs and desync in them.

Plus, Bioware need to fix the way HB works in the queue rotation. The maps needs to be put into a group of 3 and counted as 1 map, then when they pop, it rolls again to choose the map.

But until all the other things are fixed, I would not be sad if they completely removed HB from the queue.

Edited by TrixxieTriss
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Actually that’s not the case. For the first few years before we had Arena, people used to mostly play it properly. We were even asking for a proper Hutt Ball league. Which Bioware said they might be interested in at the time.

 

As for class mobility, that’s not really a factor in Hutt Ball because every class and spec is viable if they play their classes role.

Not every class needs to run the ball and obviously some are nearly made for it. But others are also made to be awesome support classes.

 

If you know your class and its strengths, then it’s not hard to work out what you should be doing to help your Ball carrier get to the line or slow and stop their ball carrier from scoring.

And that’s the problem. People don’t know their own class or it’s strengths if they are playing Hutt Ball, I blame the arena mentality for this because all people know how to do it kill and farm numbers. They really don’t understand how their class and spec fit into a team that requires co-ordination and team work.

 

Take snipers for example. If you’re an engineering sniper with lots of crowd control, you don’t want to be camping in a static area trying to kill people. You want to be moving so that you can slow the enemy down. Then depending on the map (ie, Quesh), you may even want to run or stay in range of your ball carrier so that you can slow and run interference for them. (I’ve even run the ball on mine when needed).

As a Sorc, you can be a runner, an off healer/healer, run interference or ideally, get ahead to pull your ball carrier. They are one of the classes that can fit into just about any support or main role in Hutt Ball.

We all know how good operatives and even PTs can be in Hutt Ball. But they aren’t gods and people seem to give up trying to stop the carrier when they see an Operative with the ball.

 

Those are just a few of the classes and specs. But if you know the tactics, strategy and most importantly, your own classes specific strengths in Hutt Ball, then you can be effective on any class,

 

Besides the death matching and fools who don’t try and the desync that keeps getting worse with the bugs, the main thing that has been ruining Hutt Ball is Bioware. All the class changes that give most classes gap closes or speed or massive immunity has made all classes a bit too generic in Hutt Ball,

As an example, in the past, Operatives would have to run the ball and use roll and DCDs. Now they also have a gap closer that allows them to leap up to other lvls. You also have Dps sins doing this too. Before those changes, leaping up was the specialty of Warrior only classes or dps PTs.

You also have Mara’s with 30 sec auto predation spam and other classes with speed abilities now, which use to only belong to Inquisitors and a semi speed boost to PTs.

There are others as well, but I think those show how every class is starting to end up with other classes specific abilities and actually making too many classes feel generic and not as unique as they use to be.

 

Bioware seem to have a hard-on for making Hutt Ball maps. But then make them with bugs, desync and poorly design, while also making class changes that change the dynamics of the maps. I’m pretty sure they don’t even consider how changing classes will affect specific maps. They should not have made Vandin and they should never, ever make another HB map.

 

I use to love Hutt Ball. I know I’m not the best over all pvper, but even to this day I’m a much better Hutt ball player than 98% of the player base because it’s my jive, it’s my thing, it’s what I excel at. Anyone who knows me in the game and have played HB with me can attest to my passion in Hutt Ball.

But I basically hate Hutt Ball now because nobody tries and because of all the other issues I’ve listed. The map type also pops way too much compared to other maps, which just reinforces all the bad feelings I now have when playing it.

I now leave 50% of HB maps before they start and leave the other 50% when I stay in the first minute as soon as I realise my team won’t try. It’s not my job to carry them to a win if they won’t help.

 

Besides Vandin (which has one design fault I dispise), original HB and Quesh are still good maps. Bioware just needs to fix the bugs and desync in them.

Plus, Bioware need to fix the way HB works in the queue rotation. The maps needs to be put into a group of 3 and counted as 1 map, then when they pop, it rolls again to choose the map.

But until all the other things are fixed, I would not be sad if they completely removed HB from the queue.

 

Yeah yeah... htball sucks. It's trash... and idiotic. For me it's either quit, or farm dps and kills.

 

They made a lot of bugball maps and they removed arenas from the rotation and now every 2nd, 3rd pop is a some kind of hball map and people hate it already and that's why they don't care anymore.

 

Back in 4.0 when the had ONLY 2 hball maps people enjoyed it including myself and have played obj and was focused to win.

 

The only way to fix it is to make new maps that aren't bugball or add the old arenas back to the rotation again and sot that the chances of getting some kind of trash hball map are lower.

 

Also, why would I care about this game mode when my team or enemy just places a stealther on goal line and an operative can roll freely to him and score 6 times ? That's not real PVP...

Edited by DavidAtkinson
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As for class mobility, that’s not really a factor in Hutt Ball because every class and spec is viable if they play their classes role.

class mobility is a HUGE problem in huttball. it literally broke the pit. the fact that any class can carry the ball makes the game a joke.

 

the fact that the timer is so short that just two stuns and a snare can prevent a carrier from bring the ball from spawn to end zone before the ball explodes in quesh is a joke (especially because half the players aren't going to help move the ball). (also cannot leap to the end zone)

 

vandin requires even MORE cooperation to move the all, and that makes the explosion timer even worse.

 

so movement breaks 1 map, and not enough movement breaks the other 2.

 

movement also breaks CW, Yavin.

 

it does make VStar more tactical, except the first door on VStar has always been broken. it's too easy to defend.

 

AHG can be tactical, but it's so ridiculously slanted toward stealth classes that it's not even worth playing objectively.

 

NC is the only 8v8 map in the game that isn't broken by the abilities of 3.x-5.x abilities. It requires tactical CC to cap. you don't need any one particular class to play it. and victory conditions can realistically be achieved at any point in the match (you can be at 2%-100% and come all the way back).

 

ok. so I went off on a riff on all the maps, but dayum, if the only good HB map didn't get borked by all the movement and class dcd buffs.

 

Also, why would I care about this game mode when my team or enemy just places a stealther on goal line and an operative can roll freely to him and score 6 times ? That's not real PVP...

agree with the idiocy of a holotraverse or the sin version with ball to a stealthed teammate in the ez. that's just stupid that 3 classes have that abil (2 + intercede).

 

but HB is pvp. it was a wonderfully unique pvp hybrid that has gone to sh*t. but it really was a fantastic map and game. it's as much pvp as warsong gulch. /shrug

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