@ChaosHawk, since I feel as though you misunderstood my point: I, at no point, said that turf is not worth a shot, and I also did not say that it's completely luck based. Skill is a significant factor. But as I said in a previous post (from a few weeks ago), I feel as though the results of a Turf War game do not adequately reflect the actual skill differences between teams, and it's largely because of the set round times. Therefore, I feel as though it should not be included in competitive gametypes.
As for
@Cobbs, I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you just didn't notice that I rebutted your arguments. If this is the case, I'd suggest going back to the last page and reading it.
There's that word again. "Emergent." Disregarding that "emergent" is both a buzz-word and not even really relevant to this context in the first place, you must not be terribly familiar with FPS games to think that they disallow you from being creative in-game. Are you expecting Zones to be ttek/ttek/96 deco/3k scope all day every day? Are you expecting nothing but set play every game? Have you forgotten that there are at least three specials in the game (zooka, wail, bomb rush) that force people to mix up their play?
I'm not sure you quite understand the point about the last few seconds. The final push in a Dota game rides entirely on how the rest of the game has gone, and the final push in Dota does not happen at exactly 30 minutes into the game, every game. The final move in chess is the one that all the other moves prior to it led up to, and you deciding to sacrifice your queen early on is going to heavily influence how the rest of your match goes. The position you are in with 30 seconds to spare is almost entirely unconnected with the position your team was in 30 seconds into the match. Sure, there may be some causality in there somewhere, but the difference is that it's not a major factor. It doesn't matter if you're 0-5 or if you're 15-0, your inkzooka will be just as effective. Absolutely, your positioning will matter, and you'd rather be in an offensive position than a defensive one, but the fact that a game can be lost
immediately following a bad fight is the problem here. It's this emphasis on a single engagement that makes fluke plays a determining factor in too large a percentage of games.
As for your defense of the final 30 seconds: "denying the other team a great last 30 seconds", from my perspective as a player, means trying to get picks before the other team can build special. But knowing this, what would I do if I were on the defensive? I'd build special and turtle with throwables, Splash Walls, behind a 3K Scope, or whatever. I would get as much territory as I could safely hold and only push out when my set play is ready. If it works, we win. If it fails, we lose. Sure, we could maybe get a pickoff at 0:45 or 0:50 that gives us an extra special. But that would only happen against a team that isn't turtling themselves, because the other team will want to conserve bodies and specials for the final fight as well.
This is not just "armchair" (again, not really what that word means) theorycrafting. This is how our 4v4 Turf scrims developed over the course of the month and a half that we played them. Even now, when we aren't playing super seriously and are going for flashy plays instead of wins, the team that wins is the team that gets that last multikill. Teams would go from getting spawn camped in Mackerel to breaking out with a zooka and a bomb rush, then proceeding to win 44-42. Advancing the metagame is what the Imperious Lounge is for. I'm not sure what sort of game you're envisioning as a commentator, but as a
player, as someone who is actually
trying to develop the meta, I do not see turf having a competitive future. Even if it does, your argument that it's the pinnacle of competition in this game, to me, would imply that this game is completely ****ed.
I would appreciate it if you didn't try to speak for me. What if I were to say that you're only saying this because you would rather commentate Turf than Zones?
I am not trying to make Splatoon "like other shooters", and I'm not sure why you think I (and others who share my concerns) am. What I am doing is arguing from experience that generally, games that involve pointing guns at people and shooting
are shooters, and so it has fundamental similarities to other shooters that cannot be overlooked.
As though you deciding that turf is the ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~golden egg~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ of this game is any more scientific than a group of ~30 people playing Turf for a month and a half? Groupthink is easily accounted for and avoided. I personally tried as much as possible to make our Turf matches more strategically diverse, because I'm of the opinion that more viable game modes is always a good thing. I'm still saying that Turf is worth a try, even though I'm (evidently) not optimistic.
It does, so long as it isn't smothered at birth by people with opinions.
If you were to, say, give an example of how you might sidestep the timed rounds problem, or how you might create a rule that adds a win condition to the game that is practical, fair, and competitive, then perhaps your opinion might have some weight to it.
Addressing your second paragraph first: All shooters have an aim aspect, Splatoon included. But no shooter is about aim, any more than an RTS is about being able to click fast. Every single competitive FPS, from arena shooters to CoD to CS:GO to TF2, rewards positioning, movement, and both strategic and tactical decision-making significantly more than aim. You don't need to be able to land headshots to go into a game of CS:GO and top frag, and being able to land railgun shots 100% of the time doesn't mean you're going to stand a chance against even an average Quake player. Aim is, obviously, useful, and can be a determining factor in a game; in a heads-up play, the better aimer might win. But who cares if you'd lose heads-up if you never let the other guy fight you evenly? Perhaps you should educate yourself on FPS fundamentals before you try to make claims about what other shooters are about. You may also wish to familiarise yourself with chargers and (to a lesser degree) inkzookas, both of which require very good aim and reward the kind of dexterity and twitch reactions that you say this game doesn't have.
You seem to be forgetting the fact that Turf has timed rounds with no end condition. 3 minutes per round. What kind of creative play are you expecting here? These sorts of game modes promote set play and safety, not creativity. What does it matter if you pull off a quad kill with 1:30 to go if that still gives the other team 45 seconds to build special? Are you expecting people to pull off crazy flanks or incredible Charger plays in a game mode that cannot end simply because they do so? Are you expecting people to not run the same, safe pushing routes given that creative play is not rewarded with a game win?
Your argument might make sense if Turf had an end condition. If you could run some rushdown strat that secured 70% of the map for 20 seconds and have that actually mean something to the final result, then people would do it. Then someone would counter it. Then someone would counter the counter. That's how a metagame develops. You are missing the precondition for innovation, which is that innovation actually matters. No doubt there is some metagame development to be had, but you can be damn sure it's going to evolve into rock-paper-scissors very quickly.
But let's say we figure that out. Let's say there's some way to make an end condition work without Nintendo adding one (since, let's face it, they're not going to). What then? Well... you've just said that Turf is
everything. Disregarding for now whether or not this is true, what does that mean? You seem to think it means diversity, but in reality, it means safety. Since my team needs to be able to push cross-map
and defend arbitrary areas
and control the map
and ink turf
and win skirmishes
and be highly mobile, I need to pick weapons that allow our team to do that. Which basically means Ttek, 3K Scope, 96 Deco, and like 3 other weapons. I can't have a pocket Jr, because that Jr is a liability if I find myself in a defensive position. I can't run a Splat Roller, because it has no way in when I'm pushing forward as four and it doesn't have zooka, bubbler, or echo to always be useful in a skirmish. The opportunity cost of a pocket strat is far too high; why run a Jr when I could just run another 96 Deco or Ttek and be able to accomplish more with it? Compare this to Zones. The only real necessities are a way in (usually zooka) and a way to defend (usually a 3K Scope or some sort of wall kit). That leaves room for my pocket strats. I can run a Jr, because I don't need to be able to defend any position on the map, only the positions that the rest of my squad can. I can run Wail kits on Kelp Tower because I know that at some point I will need to either defend or push a narrow pathway.
But is it actually about "everything"? Let's see...
Some of what you say here is true, in the sense that, yes, the modes are designed to be playable solo. But how do these modes prepare you for Turf if the way solo ranked plays out does not even emphasise these aspects of the game? Tower rewards protracted pushes and sieging, but playing without communication makes these things impossible, so the game instead devolves into people throwing themselves at a tower for five minutes. Solo Zones rewards pointing a gun at a choke point while your zone ticks down, or alternatively, getting in on a flank with an Inkzooka and popping the enemy team. Team Zones, meanwhile, will reward positioning and co-ordinated pincer pushes.
The key point here is that the modes are
always about these aspects of the game. It doesn't matter what map you play on, you need to be good at them. Sure, Arowana is a hell of a lot harder to push than Blackbelly, but those skills are still necessary. But what about Turf? Turf, far from being the ~~~~~~~~~~~golden egg~~~~~~~~~~ of diversity, is so dependent on the map that it becomes one-dimensional. Are you trying to tell me that Turf will not devolve into one team winning mid and then holding some advantageous position for the rest of the game? How is that any different from Zones, except for the fact that Zones requires that you hold this position for an extended period of time, as opposed to Turf, where you need only be the team holding it at the end of three minutes? Where's the motivation to push in Turf? Why would the defending team risk their specials early when their highest percentage play is waiting out the timer and pushing at the last moment?
As a spectator, nothing gets stale faster than the same two fights on the same ten maps with the same three specials and the same four guns. And I can guarantee that, so long as Turf is timed to 3 minutes, that's precisely what you're going to get.
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