[COMMUNITY] Open letter from ~{MS}~ on MTC, instagib and the future (Page 2 of 4)

I have some input on how to make this mod more competitive. Ill try to be short and up to the point. The key concept of my ideas is that a single shot would not kill you. I know this would not be real instagib, but then call it something else. If you still read this here are my ideas

1 u spawn with a laser with 2/3 ammo ( normal spawn, no delay )
2 if u want moar ammo go pick it up ( in places of normal weapons ( or once u pick a weapon u have infinite ammo ) )
3 if u want to live longer pick those shiny gray credit cards ( i mean armor )
4 the rifle does 5 damage which means u can kill a newly spawned player in 2 shots and a fat-ass-armored one in 4 shots ( however there would be only armor pickups, and the rifle would do 2 hearth damage and rest armor/health. This means theres no way to live more than 5 shots even if u pick full armor after each hit )
5 consider putting back the laser jumps

The numbers are only speculations if you would choose to implement something like that u may need to balance test it. This is how i see my ( theoretical )modifications:
1 and 3 solve the too easy flag defense
2 and 5 make u move to places u was never in in instagib, which makes the gameplay less linear, more unexpected situations, whatever.
4 solves the monotonous gameplay ( go, respawn, go, ...)

Btw I mostly agree with the non-instagib players who expressed their opinions there even if I havent seen MTC or played insta for long time. I played several times, seen some good players, and from my point of view playing instagib is like listening to a cool song on your mp3 player ... over and over again 24/7

Edit: omg it works

Actually, I don't like torch's idea, sorry This makes it non-instagib, and I certainly wouldn't play it. But our clan is currently brainstorming some ideas on what Somerunce can do with instagib. So far we have this:

0. You start with 10 hp.
1. Hook-kill: when you catch a player with a hook, after some time you kill them. Let's say after the time the hook lets go of a player.
2. Laserjumps as an optional feature: It's not a server setting anymore. You spawn with a default laser, but you can pick up a grenade launcher. And after picking it up, an explosion adds to your shots. Also, the radius of the explosion is bigger, so you can kill with explosions, with a given force. A direct shot kills instantly, an explosion deals damage dependent on how close you are to it. When this option is on, the laser bounce is off.
3. A "lightning gun" from Q3, or a "link gun" from UT2kX. After picking up a second laser, your laser becomes a link gun, firing with a single, stable beam. It deals 10 damage every half a second of direct exposure to the beam. If it's not codeable, there's always an option of cutting the shot interval so that it looked like a single beam. Another option is: when picking up the second laser the akimbo option can be turned on (see point 6), and when picking the third laser, you have a lightning/link gun.
4. Hitting a player with a hook (not holding them) pushes them away from you. It can help in giving speed to your teammates.
5. You can grab a flag with a hook.
6. Akimbo lasers: Under a given condition, or by using a bind command (e.g. /akimbo), your hook turns into the other laser, as if you had two. You can't use the hook while using akimbo lasers.

The purpose here is to put more ephasis on the hook usage which is very important in instagib. It also adds some new options for a laser to require more skill. It's funnier to watch and funnier to play, because you finally have some veriety. Of course, the default one-shot-one-kill laser has to stay!

Another idea concerns the respawn time.

It's about spawn rounds like in Enemy Territory, team respawns are every 10 seconds. This way selfkill could be reinserted. This way if you have good attackers and they get killed, the defenders are obliged to go for the flag. It gives some more action in the center of the map and also provides necessary suspense. Makes defending the flag a bit more difficult. And yeah, the counting of the respawns goes on and on, waiting for more dead players, and then they respawn all together. It still needs some work, because instagib can't lose this fast-paced, dynamic spirit.

Vanilla
If two good players are combat both full with armor and hearts you have much more options to end the fight Like switching into closed combat, stay in range or try to trap your opponent with shooting rockets at a point where he probably go when he hunts you.

In the end Instagib is missing combat variety that is what it makes boring after playing long for me.

but as we see o10 makes some good suggestion like adding new weapon types of instagib by taking up lasers. This would add very interessting gameplay ways.

I like the most the link gun since i would like such a weapon in normal Teeworlds too.
But such things have to be tweaked till a final release.

Only problem is that maps would have to be reworked or code something

@Magnet,
I just wanted to express my opinion about that subject. And for sure I'm not off topic.

ziltoide, allow me to say that you're my hero for today.

Well I will take the position of the "wrong" guy and say that I like instagib the way it is now. If vanilla guys don't, I don't care. It was delibarate decision to play instagib not vanilla. I don't miss any special feature that vanilla provides and insta doesn't. This is why there is no point for vanilla players to participate in this discussion. Sorry guys but you can't understand it just like we can't understand you (it couldn't be simplier). We play only this mod for like a year and that for sure means something. That means that we aren't looking for any change in gameplay but just in the way instagib is seen by the whole scene. There are some guys that play teeworlds not only for fun but for something more e.g. events. If such guy starts playing teeworlds he has no option but to play vanilla. This should be changed. The very first thing should be making instagib more than one of the mods (as someone said before). We do play for fun but we also need those seriously playing guys to keep the community alive. There are some projects on their ways so we have nothing more to do now but wait and see how will the future look.

The second thing I want to talk about are the ideas you've already made up. From my point of view making some major changes which you are all talking about can only divide the community more than it is now. I'm pretty certain that you all we unanimously say that this is exactly what we don't want to achieve. Instagib's originality is its simplicity and let's keep it as it is now. What I can offer you instead of the changes you all mentioned is considering which factors decide that a particular map is competetive or not and making new special instagib maps which are what we want them to be. I didn't have much time to think yet so I'm not sure how such map should look like so I give you an opportunity to show me your ideas.

I think that we can't expect the whole teeworlds community to support instagib without any changes that would make it more interesting for them. If we were just a bunch of guys playing on one server, or a bunch of guys that stayed in 0.4.3, it wouldn't matter. But AFAIK we were planning to create an instagib ladder, to make instagib present in every tournament, and generally to make it more known. And because vanilla is the majority and we're the minority, we have to take their opinions into account. It's them who keep the forum going, who code the game, create TeeTV and organize tournaments. And we're the ones who want to step on their territory. I'm not surprised they are putting some conditions.

So if we want to make something big, we can just think about the changes that would make instagib better, without ruining the general spirit. I also think that instagib is awesome the way it is, and I wouldn't change anything. But we wanna make something big, and to do it, we must come up with good ideas. I'm not a big fan of respawn changes, but hey. Wouldn't you guys like to run around the map with a lightning gun? Or kill with a hook? We need vanilla's support, and I know they're open to us now. So let's do something and come up with ideas that will make instagib more interesting for the public, but also keep our own identity and the main spirit.

Dont know if it has been said before, but maybe a good idea is a shield, that reflects the laser back or something. This would mean defending and attacking at the same time.

I'd be OK for a sheild, imo

Wow this would be totally awesome.

and to just write down the things that have been said:
-It would be an individual weapon, so when you select it you cant select a weapon
-Should bounce the laser back
-You can get shot by all directions except the one your shield is facing
-X seconds before you may use it again

New suggestions:
-May have a timer on it. So when you select the shield you have X seconds before teeworlds automatically switches back to the laser

at the moment we are trying to make instagib better.
We are leaving vanilla alone because I believe the whole community is pretty satisfied about it.
There were some complaints about instagib, so what do we try to do? we improve it.

I dont want to be mean or anything or say that the shield ISN'T a good weapon to implement to vanilla, but that is what I will leave to the devs.
Meanwhile Instagib is a project that isn't supported by Teeworlds so if we look Somerunce (Instagib Maker) nice in the eyes he MAY implement it.
But to continue mrlantastic, you didnt quite catch what this thread is about. This thread was made to discuss about and improve Instagib.
So sorry if I say so but if we go talk about vanilla here the thread is getting a little bit raped and offtopic.