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Halo 5: Guardians |OT4| You picked a helluva week to join up

Madness

Member
Every two years? A successor to the Xbox One came out last year?

Isn't that the plan going forward? Iterative designs as opposed to long stretches without changes? Obviously the Neo and Scorpio sales will be used to judge what happens further, but if it is something that takes hold, and for MS especially, if all flagship games will be PC as well, I would build a pretty good gaming rig.
 

jem0208

Member
If a Halo game were to release on PC I think that any crossplay which isn't custom games should be limited to controllers only. I actually made a big post on the Beyond forums about H5 on PC:

It's very obvious that H5 has been designed with controllers in mind and as such I think H5 would play quite differently on PC to Xbox, especially at a high level.

Weapon balance is one thing which would be affected most. Consider how different levels of aim assist and bullet magnetism are used to balance the precision weapons. On PC with the accuracy of a mouse aim assist would (hopefully) be removed. This means one of the biggest differentiators between precision weapons is gone; every precision weapon would be just as easy or difficult to use as another. This could be a good thing if you think about the pistol vs DMR/BR because the pistol is suddenly more powerful than both of them due to lower TTK as opposed to now where the BR and DMR are easier to use.

However consider the sniper, currently it's balanced against the other weapons by being far more difficult to use in close quarters due to massively reduced aim assist (inb4 H5 sniper is too easy to use). However on PC the sniper suddenly becomes just as easy to get headshots with as the pistol. With Halo's fairly slow movement speed and large hitboxes the sniper would make any player insanely overpowered, you'd be almost guaranteed a kill with every shot if you had a reasonable aim. Other PC shooters balance the sniper by removing your reticule in hip fire/making it very inaccurate unless zoomed in or by having a high movement speed.

Another thing to consider is long distance battles. On Xbox the red reticule range limits a weapons effectiveness by limiting the range where bullet magnetism takes effect. However, the precision weapons are almost perfectly accurate (or near enough that it makes no difference on maps this size) so on PC shooting at long distance suddenly becomes far easier.

The low strafe speed, perfectly accurate hitscan weapons and large hitboxes also means that someone with good aim is going to very rarely miss shots at mid range, I imagine the number of reversals you'd see would drop dramatically compared to on Xbox.

I'm not saying H5 on PC would be worse (or better) but hypothetically, if H5 did release on PC I think competitive play would be quite different to what we're used to watching on Xbox. If they do release it I'd hope they keep the HCS on Xbox, or at least force players to use controllers.
 

Trup1aya

Member
If a Halo game were to release on PC I think that any crossplay which isn't custom games should be limited to controllers only. I actually made a big post on the Beyond forums about H5 on PC:

Still doesn't explain away the fact that PC players who could take full advantage of these advantages would amass CSRs way higher than everyone else... Meaning they'd be playing amongst themselves.

If a kb/m player gets ranked diamond six, it's because he's not good enough to be a champion, but better than a diamond 5, despite his accuracy.

With a combined playerbase, you'd simply see most of the PC players at the top of the rankings, and controller players peaking much sooner. But with a decent MM system and a decent population, you wouldn't see PC coming into contact with controller users often, let alone dominating them. If kb/m players are going up against controller players, it's because beyond accuracy, the PC guy didn't have much going for himself.
 

Defect

Member
Phil Spencer knows what's up. Give us the options, but don't force controller vs kb/m. Which reminds me, custom games browser and matchmaking toggles when?

I agree that there needs to be options. If someone wants to match players exclusively on the same platform, so be it. But having the choice to play against any platform in a playlist needs to happen. Limiting it to just customs and forge is terrible.
 

Madness

Member
Still doesn't explain away the fact that PC players who could take full advantage of these advantages would amass CSRs way higher than everyone else... Meaning they'd be playing amongst themselves.

If a kb/m player gets ranked diamond six, it's because he's not good enough to be a champion, but better than a diamond 5, despite his accuracy.

With a combined playerbase, you'd simply see most of the PC players at the top of the rankings, and controller players peaking much sooner. But with a decent MM system and a decent population, you wouldn't see PC coming into contact with controller users often, let alone dominating them. If kb/m players are going up against controller players, it's because beyond accuracy, the PC guy didn't have much going for himself.

Your argument doesn't hold water at all. During a crossplay game, all things being equal, one is playing with a better and more precise control scheme. So a diamond 6 keyboard/mouse player may be worse than an Onyx keyboard/mouse player, but he will have an inherent and observable advantage on a diamond 6 player with a controller. He may be worse than an Onyx or Champion controller player but that is because the controller player would have to be much better.

This is something you think will work in theory but like Phil said, the PC'ers took an absolute shit on controller users with Shadowrun. You would see the same in Halo as well. Especially for playlists with loose matchmaking. Some playlists are so low you can see platinums match Onyx or Diamond regularly. Now throw matching others who have keyboard/mouse.

If you want to play that, fine. But like Phil said, they should not and would not force it on the rest of us.
 

op_ivy

Fallen Xbot (cannot continue gaining levels in this class)
Trup1ya has me convinced. Matchmaking should be able to take care of input differences. After extended use, kbm players should be ranked higher than they otherwise would be. Matchmaking skill algorithms should work better with a larger pool making like skill matches more common even factoring in input device advantages and disadvantages.

But this only holds if your controller usage type is consistent. I could see people milking the system though by playing on a pad and earning a low csr then farming kills with a kbm csr catches up, only to switch back to a pad and repeat. The new down ranking.
 

Welfare

Member
Just force a PC player to use a pad if they want to play with Xbox players. Only pad vs pad, and kb+m vs kb+m. Using the ranked argument, pad players at higher ranks would still be disadvantaged facing kb+m players.
 
I feel like releasing Halo on PC will effectively kill any reason to own a Xbox, no clue why they would do that.

Nah, take 20million X1s sold divided by say 4million H5 copies sold and only 20% of Xbox gamers are buying Halo, let alone actually playing. The console itself will continue to do fine.

You also have to factor in many don't want to play on their PC or configure it or simply don't upgrade their PCs and want the convenience of a console for gaming. Take XMAS and sales time, the consoles sell bigger and mums and dads and grandparents/friends aren't buying PC components as gifts. Many will also continue to have XBL and their home theatre/TV setup existing as is; so it's almost a no brainer for the current userbase to stay with what they know and how their house is setup.

I don't recall the Steam box exactly taking off or wiping out consoles.

Just force a PC player to use a pad if they want to play with Xbox players. Only pad vs pad, and kb+m vs kb+m. Using the ranked argument, pad players at higher ranks would still be disadvantaged facing kb+m players.

Please don't split the playerbase, I think we've all learnt our lessons on that. Just force the whole thing to be controller only. Allow campaign, coop, customs and FF to be KB+M or mixed. Done.
 

Trup1aya

Member
Your argument doesn't hold water at all. During a crossplay game, all things being equal, one is playing with a better and more precise control scheme. So a diamond 6 keyboard/mouse player may be worse than an Onyx keyboard/mouse player, but he will have an inherent and observable advantage on a diamond 6 player with a controller. He may be worse than an Onyx or Champion controller player but that is because the controller player would have to be much better.

This is something you think will work in theory but like Phil said, the PC'ers took an absolute shit on controller users with Shadowrun. You would see the same in Halo as well. Especially for playlists with loose matchmaking. Some playlists are so low you can see platinums match Onyx or Diamond regularly. Now throw matching others who have keyboard/mouse.

If you want to play that, fine. But like Phil said, they should not and would not force it on the rest of us.

That doesn't make sense: if a diamond six kb/m player is consistently beating all the diamond 6 controller players, he wouldn't be diamond 6 anymore, he would rank up.

If he isn't consistently beating diamond 6s it's because, despite his aim advantage, he isn't winning more than half his matches... Which means he's ranked in a way to provide competitive matches.

When you beat your opponents you rank up until you hit your ceiling. The distribution would have kb/m players focused in the higher ranks, since due to the accuracy advantage, they would have higher ceilings.
 

Haruko

Member
I swear when ms announced cross play.. They also said something about xbox players and pc players that pleased everyone.

Did i dream it up?

For Gigantic, they said crossplay will be "opt-in" (that's what they told me at their PAX East 2015 booth at least). If that's any example.
 

Welfare

Member
I feel like releasing Halo on PC will effectively kill any reason to own a Xbox, no clue why they would do that.

People buy consoles for the yearly sports and CoD titles. Halo can go on PC and the only thing that changes is more people playing the game.
 
There are a lot of assumptions about a flawless ranking system, which more than likely won't ever exist. What we see on a daily basis from people in this thread is how Platinums or lower frequently get matched against Diamond players or higher, and many times while matching with low level ranks on their team lol. Parties vs randoms exacerbates this as well. I remember a few days ago ExWife posted about winning a majority of his placement matches, several of which were against Onyx/Champion players, yet he was still placed in Platinum.

Now throw kb/m players into that mix and you'll see way more complaints than we have now. No one in any ranking currently touches close to 100% accuracy, but with the pinpoint accuracy of a kb/m with the ability to whip your reticle around exactly where you want it, something many controller players struggle with especially on low sensitivities (which is the most common), and the ranking system not being flawless, there are bound to be issues with crossplay. The important thing here is that as long as 343 enables us to opt in or out of crossplay, all should be fine.
 

Madness

Member
That doesn't make sense: if a diamond six kb/m player is consistently beating all the diamond 6 controller players, he wouldn't be diamond 6 anymore, he would rank up.

When you beat your opponents you rank up until you hit your ceiling. The distribution would have kb/m players focused in the higher ranks, since due to the accuracy advantage, they would have higher ceilings.

He isn't the only kb/m player and playing in a vaccuum though. He would lose to the kb/m players.

I am saying all things being equal, equal skill, you are giving one person a more precise and faster control scheme and one player has a handicap and you're saying it won't matter when consistently, everytime we have ever seen PC vs controller players especially in FPS, the keyboard/mouse players always destroy controller players.

So it isn't about a diamond 6 kb/m player being the same skill and rank as a diamond 6 controller player, one is always going to have an advantage, whether it is utilized as effectively depends on the player.
 

Trup1aya

Member
He isn't the only kb/m player and playing in a vaccuum though. He would lose to the kb/m players.

I am saying all things being equal, equal skill, you are giving one person a more precise and faster control scheme and one player has a handicap and you're saying it won't matter when consistently, everytime we have ever seen PC vs controller players especially in FPS, the keyboard/mouse players always destroy controller players.

So it isn't about a diamond 6 kb/m player being the same skill and rank as a diamond 6 controller player, one is always going to have an advantage, whether it is utilized as effectively depends on the player.

Simply put, the rank you land at is based around the principle that people you share a rank with have a similar likelihood to win as you. This fact doesn't change with additional input methods.

Yes a diamond kb/m players has an inherent aim advantage over controller users of the same rank. BUT the fact that they share a rank, means that they have an equal chance of winning... So either the kb/m player has a deficiency elsewhere, or the controller player is so good in other areas, that he can compensate for his aim disadvantage . Either way, it would be a close match between worthy opponents, which is the goal of a MM system.

The games that have tried to mix PC and console in the past did nothing to attempt to match opponents based on who they've demonstrated an ability to realistically compete against

@funk

With the above in mind, playing people above your rank would be no more or less problematic than it is now (except the fact that a higher population would make it less likely to happen). If I'm a plat 6 and I'm playing against a d4, Regardless of his input method, his likelihood of winning is the same as everyone else at d4.. If his chances of winning were higher, he'd have a higher rank.


At the end of the day, most kb/m players would rank well above contention with most controller players.
 

jem0208

Member
That doesn't make sense: if a diamond six kb/m player is consistently beating all the diamond 6 controller players, he wouldn't be diamond 6 anymore, he would rank up.

If he isn't consistently beating diamond 6s it's because, despite his aim advantage, he isn't winning more than half his matches... Which means he's ranked in a way to provide competitive matches.

When you beat your opponents you rank up until you hit your ceiling. The distribution would have kb/m players focused in the higher ranks, since due to the accuracy advantage, they would have higher ceilings.

They might not win every game but they sure as hell would win 90% of 1v1s vs console players.

Also as Madness says there's not going to be only one mouse player in each game. A standard diamond mouse player may not win more games than the standard console diamond player but imagine if 4 mouse players were matched against 4 console players.


Also this system would essentially guarantee that all the high ranks would be populated by mouse players, effectively capping the max rank which a console player could obtain. There would be 0 controller champions and very few controller Onyx players because as soon as you started hitting the higher ranks you'd start getting matched against players who be have a massive aiming advantage.

That sound like utter shite, playing on consoles would effectively limit you to the lower ranks.
 
I understand what you're saying Trup, but it's not accurate. This is along the lines of a tier list in fighting games: A player who is good with both a controller a kb/m will have an inherent advantage with the kb/m. If that player was to 1v1 their clone, the controller player would lose against the kb/m player.

Ready for a Smash 64 reference? Best character in that game is Pikachu. However, just because a player is using Pikachu does not mean they will always beat a player using Ness who is much lower on the tier list. Sure, individual skill is a factor in these things, but if you take that Pikachu player to play against their clone using Ness, the Pikachu will win a vast majority of the time.
They might not win every game but they sure as hell would win 90% of 1v1s vs console players.
This. You shoot a kb/m player and they instantly turn to you and start shooting. A majority of console players use a low sensitivity because it's much easier to control, so what chance do you think a player on 3 sensitivity will have going against players using kb/m? Now couple that with parties vs randoms and you're looking at a series of hate mail lol. Then there's the issue of not finding a controller setting that feels comfortable, something we see people a lot of people struggle with.
 

Trup1aya

Member
They might not win every game but they sure as hell would win 90% of 1v1s vs console players.

Also as Madness says there's not going to be only one mouse player in each game. A standard diamond mouse player may not win more games than the standard console diamond player but imagine if 4 mouse players were matched against 4 console players.

Solved by the fact that you rank up when you start winning a majority of your games.

It's a self correcting system that would see players with more skill and/or advantages ranking out of contention with those who don't have them.

If a party of 4 kb/m users find themselves at d6 after playing 100 games against opponents who were using a variety of input methods. And a party of 4 controller users find themselves at the same rank after the same amount of matches, it would be a close game.

Yes the kb/m team would have an aim advantage, but the fact that they are stuck at d6 means that despite their aim advantage, they have plateaued against other d6s. Perhaps they have weakness in other areas. Yes the controller team is at an aim disadvantage, but the fact that they've reached d6, means that they've compensated by excelling in other areas of the game.
 

jem0208

Member
Solved by the fact that you rank up when you start winning a majority of your games.

It's a self correcting system that would see players with more skill and/or advantages ranking out of contention with those who don't have them.

There's still going to be a ton of overlap due to the imperfect nature of the matching system and limited population. Any time a console player is matched against mouse player's they're going to be shat upon.

And like I said in my edit, the system you're proposing would cap a console players rank way below max. No matter how good a Halo player you are, you're not going to be able to compete against even a standard Halo player with a mouse.


Also that completely destroys the concept of even starts if playing on one system vs another gives you a massive advantage.
 

Trup1aya

Member
There's still going to be a ton of overlap due to the imperfect nature of the matching system and limited population. Any time a console player is matched against mouse player's they're going to be shat upon.

And like I said in my edit, the system you're proposing would cap a console players rank way below max. No matter how good a Halo player you are, you're not going to be able to compete against even a standard Halo player with a mouse.


Also that completely destroys the concept of even starts if playing on one system vs another gives you a massive advantage.

Overtime the system would correct itself. You never find yourself getting 'shit on' by people who share your rank... Because people capable of shitting on you would have ranked up. This will be true regardless of whether they are shitting on you because of their input method, it because they are better than you with a controller.

Yes it would cap controller players below max rank... But MM is intended to create close matches, not be an e-penis.

For pride purposes they could just hide CSR and award ranks at different CSRs depending on input method. If 2000 is diamond for controller, then 4000 could be diamond for kb/m. The mm would make the match based in the CSR.
 
There are a lot of assumptions about a flawless ranking system, which more than likely won't ever exist. What we see on a daily basis from people in this thread is how Platinums or lower frequently get matched against Diamond players or higher, and many times while matching with low level ranks on their team lol. Parties vs randoms exacerbates this as well. I remember a few days ago ExWife posted about winning a majority of his placement matches, several of which were against Onyx/Champion players, yet he was still placed in Platinum.

Almost correct. I played nothing but onyx and champs for my FFA placements, lowest place was 4th and won a few games, but got placed in Diamond.

Recently, myself and FATs did our placements in SWAT together. He only played 2 matches without me and got placed Plat while I was put Onyx 1700.
 
Isn't that the plan going forward? Iterative designs as opposed to long stretches without changes? Obviously the Neo and Scorpio sales will be used to judge what happens further, but if it is something that takes hold, and for MS especially, if all flagship games will be PC as well, I would build a pretty good gaming rig.

Think of iterative design more in the idea of the "platform". The Xbox 360 and the Xbox One are both their own platform. They do not share the same OS, interface, game marketplace, app marketplace, feature set, controllers do not work with both (despite having the same buttons), etc. That aspect of all hardware and software tied together in a little bubble that gets nuked for a new "generation" will certainly go away.

With that assumption in place, they are able to release new hardware easier as there is demand. The cadence of when that takes place almost certainly isn't set in stone, and saying "every two years" seems pretty extreme. We're looking at 4 years after a console (XBO) was released that was significantly lower in power compared to the market than the 360 was at release. If the target that Polygon is reporting is true for Scorpio, it's going to launch higher in the market than the XBO and PS4 did, so another release two years after doesn't seem necessary.

------------

As for KB + M vs controller, you guys are kidding yourselves if you think that in a shooter like Halo that by default they'd just shit on anyone wanting to sit on their couch and play Halo with a controller. Devs will do what makes sense for their game.
 

Trup1aya

Member
Trup1ya has me convinced. Matchmaking should be able to take care of input differences. After extended use, kbm players should be ranked higher than they otherwise would be. Matchmaking skill algorithms should work better with a larger pool making like skill matches more common even factoring in input device advantages and disadvantages.

But this only holds if your controller usage type is consistent. I could see people milking the system though by playing on a pad and earning a low csr then farming kills with a kbm csr catches up, only to switch back to a pad and repeat. The new down ranking.

Yeah this is true... They'd have to give you a separate rank per input type.
 
Almost correct. I played nothing but onyx and champs for my FFA placements, lowest place was 4th and won a few games, but got placed in Diamond.

Recently, myself and FATs did our placements in SWAT together. He only played 2 matches without me and got placed Plat while I was put Onyx 1700.
There's nothing to be ashamed of brev, embrace the Platinum:
My MMR is crazy high, but the dumbass game keeps putting me in diamond (or lower) after placements where I play and do well (a couple wins even) against only onyx and champs. Been like this every month since they did the rank reshuffling bullshit.
I am never incorrect.
Sometimes.
 

TCKaos

Member
Looking up some old screenshots. We've shit on some people before. Is this even our largest gap? I think we've done single digits, right?

Screenshot-Original.png
 

EYEL1NER

Member
I checked back through today's page of posts and didn't see any mention of it but did anyone else receive a Halo promotional email with a code for a free gold REQ pack? It looks pretty legit on this end. It says "EYEL1NER, accept your free Gold REQ Pack from Spartan Command. Claim your free Gold REQ Pack immediately, Spartan! Sign up for Halo News. EYEL1NER, you are ordered to immediately claim and open the Gold REQ Pack that has been issued by Spartan branch. Get into the fight, get Halo News." It also has an XBL code. However the code says it has already been used. WTH?

EDIT: The email in question:
 

mo60

Member
I died over 40 times in a warzone match.The enemy was farming the team I was on for like 15 minutes in that match.
 
I checked back through today's page of posts and didn't see any mention of it but did anyone else receive a Halo promotional email with a code for a free gold REQ pack? It looks pretty legit on this end. It says "EYEL1NER, accept your free Gold REQ Pack from Spartan Command. Claim your free Gold REQ Pack immediately, Spartan! Sign up for Halo News. EYEL1NER, you are ordered to immediately claim and open the Gold REQ Pack that has been issued by Spartan branch. Get into the fight, get Halo News." It also has an XBL code. However the code says it has already been used. WTH?

???
 

EYEL1NER

Member
Sorry, I just edited in an image of the email. Selecting any of the links takes me to the official MS page and selecting the code itself takes me to the "Redeem Code" page (after a log-in page that 100% looks like the actual official MS URL, it is the HTTPS login page).
I just googled it, googled the Halo newsfeed, and checked the Halo Twitter, as well as checked the Waypoint forums. I see no mention of the email or free code or a warning of an email scam. Seems really weird.
 
I checked back through today's page of posts and didn't see any mention of it but did anyone else receive a Halo promotional email with a code for a free gold REQ pack? It looks pretty legit on this end. It says "EYEL1NER, accept your free Gold REQ Pack from Spartan Command. Claim your free Gold REQ Pack immediately, Spartan! Sign up for Halo News. EYEL1NER, you are ordered to immediately claim and open the Gold REQ Pack that has been issued by Spartan branch. Get into the fight, get Halo News." It also has an XBL code. However the code says it has already been used. WTH?

EDIT: The email in question:
I got this today. It just took me to waypoint.
 
Sorry, I just edited in an image of the email. Selecting any of the links takes me to the official MS page and selecting the code itself takes me to the "Redeem Code" page (after a log-in page that 100% looks like the actual official MS URL, it is the HTTPS login page).
I just googled it, googled the Halo newsfeed, and checked the Halo Twitter, as well as checked the Waypoint forums. I see no mention of the email or free code or a warning of an email scam. Seems really weird.

I got one aswell.
 

EYEL1NER

Member
Hmmm. Well I doubt MS will hook me up but I may try getting a hold of a CS Rep tomorrow and see if I can get another code, since this one was dead on arrival. It will probably end up being a lot of work on my part but a free gold REQ pack gets me closer to have all the REQs than I am now. The email is addressed to me and they can see on their end that the code wasn't used by me, so it might end up being an easy fix.
I got one aswell.
Did your code work or was it already used? Or was it a code-less email like FATS received?
 

IHaveIce

Banned
Matchreport screens the thread :D

Guys I'm also an Onyx on one account and am currently terrible because H5 really requires you to play on a regular basis.
 

Blueblur1

Member
Here is Phil Spencer's stance on cross-play:

Polygon article:



GamesBeat: Bringing in mouse and keyboard, how do you account for that in something like Halo or Gears or Call of Duty on Xbox?

Thank god for that. Mouse & keyboard presents have an inherent advantage and will ruin the existing console Halo MP experience.
 

Fuchsdh

Member
Spartan Strike is on sale for $0.99 on the iOS store. Maybe they'll announce a console version soon.

I bought it on iOS when it came out, played a few levels and never went back. I have realized I'm just not into most game genres on handhelds. It's definitely a step up from Spartan Assault which I beat on 360 and X1, so I'd love to have it on X1 as well.
 
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