I think everyone is on edge since the leak and spoilers have happened, waiting and watching pirates play the game while more than many of us are going to be paying customers to play. It hurts. Also at the sametime the pirates are our best source of information lol.
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Halo |OT10| The Calm Before The Storm
- Thread starter GhaleonEB
- Start date
I think everyone is on edge since the leak and spoilers have happened, waiting and watching pirates play the game while more than many of us are going to be paying customers to play. It hurts. Also at the sametime the pirates are our best source of information lol.
HiredN00bs
Member
Please god tell me it's another Believe diorama!Another non-tease tease.
My absolute favorite ad to ever come from Bungie and was set to the best music of any ad as well.
Here's to hoping Pawel Czernek is back!
Tha Robbertster
Member
Lots of people played, enjoyed, and even paid attention to ranks, but that's different than having a serious investment in them or caring passionately about them out of context of the rest of the experience. A giant majority of people who care about rank care about its effect, not the number itself, and subsets of those care about other aspects and got much of that comparative satisfaction from Reach's experience based system. There is an overlap in XP and skill in Reach, and where there isn't, the scoreboard deals with doubt.
And "1%" is a colloquial and throwaway term, not a statistic unless you see it in a table. We have lots of really boring data to look at, and as I noted, skill data is being tracked very closely by the game.
ElzarTheBam
Member
Are we talking about Bobs'?
Thats fucken cute.
On a serious note I'm sitting here debating the samething.
I need a MP stream now!
Bobs earned his legit 99.
Haha yeah.
Just curious though. Anyone know what happens to the people that get caught streaming the game?
Haha yeah.
Just curious though. Anyone know what happens to the people that get caught streaming the game?
Im sorry that will be the last time I do that rofl.
Im assuming their accounts may get banned or suspended, but their xboxs shouldnt be getting permabanned.
I don't know, I always liked to think that no one was actually that stupid to pay a large amount of money for level 50 accounts. I mean, what could you do with it besides brag to your "friends."
Pop
Member
So skilled based visible ranks are forever gone now.
I just don't get the need of removing 1-50 that a lot of people enjoyed. When all you have is social friendly playlist in Reach, ya your numbers will show that people don't care about skill based ranks. Hell Reach was catered no handed to the social community. Why should they care or acknowledge ranks when all they care about is unlocking the next armor piece.
I just don't get the need of removing 1-50 that a lot of people enjoyed. When all you have is social friendly playlist in Reach, ya your numbers will show that people don't care about skill based ranks. Hell Reach was catered no handed to the social community. Why should they care or acknowledge ranks when all they care about is unlocking the next armor piece.
Shake Appeal
Member
I appreciate both this and the realities of development in general, but ranking (or the lack thereof) at least appears to be "in flux and in dev" a hell of a lot later than literally any other feature. Meanwhile, other features, some of which were at least initially unpalatable to the "1%" were revealed far earlier, with far more confidence, and far less concern about "flux". In that context, it's hard not to feel -- if you are a member of that diehard constituency who play Halo games come rain or shine for year upon year until the next one is released -- that your fanboy purchase is being taken for granted, and other constituents actively courted ahead of you.
Also, while I will not dispute that it is a small minority of players who are vociferous about having visible ranks, I think the people who you say don't care may not consciously care, may not report caring, but still actually do benefit from ranking, and are moved by ranking, in ways they don't really consider.
Also, the Pareto principle is at work here. The sizeable majority may not "care" about ranks, but the minority that does -- and cares about 'competitiveness' in general -- also tend to be some of your most devoted customers, the kinds who go and make threads on other forums, drive conversations and communities, buy map packs, hype your games, and play them day after day after day, long after the majority has got distracted by newer, shinier things. Attending to that minority -- or at least being more obvious in respecting what they cherish -- has implied value for the franchise far down the line.
The problem isn't that they get to see the sausage being made; it's that the butcher is serving them last, if at all.
Edit: I also appreciate that they are the hardest audience to please, and will happily call you 'cunts' when you fail to, so I can understand why you might throw your hands up and dismiss them. But to do so is probably bad for Halo in the long-term.
In the sense that a skill based ranking system leads to better consistency of higher quality games right? Ultimately I think that's what everybody wants, a system where teams are compiled fairly and where skill gaps are narrow as possible to ensure the best experience for everyone across all playlists.
Reach never really felt like it achieved this, wheras Halo 3 did. Halo 3 matches composed of 8 level 50's/high level players used to be the best thing in the world, and fundamentally I just want to keep on experiencing that. (Balanced weapons, maps and gametypes non withstanding).
Pop
Member
Completely agree.
While the Grifball community is rejoicing. -_-
Edit-^^Agreed but Welcome guests and JIP -_-
bobs...onGaf
Member
Tha Robbertster
Member
So if I understand you correctly, you're saying that a lot of people did play ranked playlists in Halo 3 but didn't care care so much about them that they'd think Halo 4 is a lesser package due to there being no visual ranking system?
If this is your (meaning 343's) reasoning here, then why did you decide to make the changes to infection? Sure, a lot of people played it in Reach but do you think they would have thought lesser about Halo 4 without the flood skins and sounds added to the gametype? a significant portion of people play infection to boost their K/D so that's a percentage of people you wouldn't have to care about when considering the changes you made. Are those people who really care about infection a bigger group than the people who really care about ranks? And what about Griffball? Do those people have a bigger community that really cares about the gametype?
I get that adding a ranking system and changing gametypes are 2 different things, but is the difference in demand for a ranking so lower different than the demand for an infection gametype with flood skins that you guys felt that a skill based ranking system wasn't necessary to add but the new infection changes were?
I've seen over 100 people with a bought 50. When you play in a ranked playlist with a rank around 45, you'll see them popping up every 2-3 games.
Pop
Member
Agreed
It really didn't matter if they bought or boosted to 50. If they were bad they dropped in rank. I've played countless 50's who were god awful, good for me I get an easy win.
That really wouldn't be a good judgment since you HAD to play ranked if you wanted to play a certain game mode. In Halo 3, I had to play with ranks if I wanted to play SWAT, even though I didn't want to, and ultimately had to stop playing SWAT even though I fucking loved the gametype because I kept getting hostbooted and standby'd in games.
Technically they can do this. The Reach system could have it's formula changed at any time and be told to display any number. I'd imagine they retained that backend, so it wouldn't be as hard to change as Halo 3's system would have been. We only got to see a couple different versions of the formula.
A gamed ranking system is still gamed, and you're assuming all cheaters were up at 50. We had to get pooped on by cheaters on their way to 50, you didn't have to be 50 to experience boosters.
Monocle
Member
Hey guys, isn't every individual member of 343 just the worst person ever? Halo 4 has ruined the lives of my unborn grandbabies.
Anyway, here's a repost of my impressions of The Thursday War from the spoiler thread. For kicks. (BTW, the only spoilers you'll find below are for the book.)
OK, resume panic mode.
Anyway, here's a repost of my impressions of The Thursday War from the spoiler thread. For kicks. (BTW, the only spoilers you'll find below are for the book.)
As in Glasslands, TTW's best feature is its cast. I really enjoyed getting to know Kilo-Five on a more personal basis. Phillips is likable and easy to root for. He's also an ideal window into the world of the Sangheili. Black Box is still the most interesting and entertaining member of the group by far. I hope the expanded fiction and maybe even future Halo games will give a lot more attention to smart AIs. Their perspective, their life cycle, their relationship with humans; it's all fascinating stuff. Every chapter from BB's point of view was a treat. I also enjoyed spending more time in Parangosky's head. This peppy old bulldog is a first rate antihero. You can't help but love her even though she's the grand poobah behind ONI's most sinister operations. It was thrilling to see her in Judge Dredd mode near the end of the book.
I was less impressed with Naomi getting all sulky over her terrorist father. (This subplot wasn't overly intrusive, I admit, but I have a problem with its underlying premise for reasons I'll go into.) I sympathize with her situation. It's not hard to see the tragedy in her story: a soldier finding out that her father went rogue after he realized she was kidnapped and replaced as a child. On top of that, she's faced with the possibility that her team might have to neutralize him. But to me the whole thing felt a bit contrived. I'm fully aware that my personal bias is in play here. I take issue with the author Karen Traviss's stance on the ethics of the SPARTAN-II program. I also know that elaborating on the repercussions of forcibly recruiting kids into a military program is a valid way to inject some human drama in a story that focuses an awful lot on the more glamorous aspects of war, the exciting spectacle of military might in action. Clearly this is in line with 343's avowed intention to make the Spartans more than faceless soldiers. I suppose I'm just turned off by Traviss's sentimental treatment of the issue. It feels like moral blackmail to me, like she's trying to make readers and players feel bad if they see Spartans purely as the armored badasses Bungie initially presented to us.
One more grievance and then I promise I'll get back to the lighter stuff. It's pretty obvious throughout TTW that Karen Traviss is still committed to vilifying Dr. Halsey. As we know, Halsey has sociopathic tendencies. It turns out she's also a bitch. One fascinating little oddment: apparently it's entirely consistent with antisocial personality disorder to cry yourself to sleep night after night over the death of your daughter. That Halsey, what a creep. Saving mankind with her genius and seeking redemption for her unethical actions and treating her Spartans like family and mourning her daughter and stuff. It must be exhausting to suck so hard. Let's hope Halo 4 shows the character more respect—or at least portrays her more consistently with established canon—than Traviss has. Dr. Halsey is one of my favorite characters (thanks mostly to Eric Nylund's books), OK? I don't want to see her retconned into a one-note mustache twirler.
One subject I'm always happy to read about in Halo books is the Forerunners. TTW certainly didn't disappoint on that count. Between Phillips monkeying around in the temple on Sanghelios, Jul ‘Mdama exploring the Forerunner sites on Onyx/Trevelyan, and all of the delightful conversations with various Engineers (the precious little things. I want one), there were all sorts of tantalizing bits and morsels to add to the puzzle of the Forerunners' motivations and sudden disappearance 100,000 years past. There was also a good deal of fairly blatant foreshadowing for Halo 4. The two most prominent items are the Forerunner portal system and the Didact, and it's likely there's a lot more to unpack. I'll add as a side note that TTW's obligatory pimping of the Infinity (or as I like to call it, Admiral Hood's Magical Space Dong) had its due effect. I am now more hyped than ever to see what humanity does with all that new Forerunner tech. I hope it has greater implications than more sparkly guns, fancier ships, and forced parallels between a newly upjumped humanity and the less savory aspects of the Forerunners.
All in all, TTW is a satisfying followup to Glasslands, a provocative teaser for a certain highly anticipated game, and a firm foundation for a new phase in Halo's fiction. A lot is going to change with Halo 4. I hope the new developments are daring—not out of joint Bungie's vision, but unsafe. I want the story to go to unexpected places and not settle for the reiteration of traditional sci-fi tropes (mad alien who hates humanity, technologically superior society with a vaguely defined grudge against the good guys...you know how it goes). 343 has the freedom to really stretch their creative muscles here, and with a storyteller like Greg Bear in the fold, they also have the imaginative capacity to build a truly grand mythos. As a longtime Halo fan, I care about this franchise. I'm anxious about an untested (but on paper, brilliant) developer continuing where Bungie left off, yet I'm equally excited to see what comes next.
I was less impressed with Naomi getting all sulky over her terrorist father. (This subplot wasn't overly intrusive, I admit, but I have a problem with its underlying premise for reasons I'll go into.) I sympathize with her situation. It's not hard to see the tragedy in her story: a soldier finding out that her father went rogue after he realized she was kidnapped and replaced as a child. On top of that, she's faced with the possibility that her team might have to neutralize him. But to me the whole thing felt a bit contrived. I'm fully aware that my personal bias is in play here. I take issue with the author Karen Traviss's stance on the ethics of the SPARTAN-II program. I also know that elaborating on the repercussions of forcibly recruiting kids into a military program is a valid way to inject some human drama in a story that focuses an awful lot on the more glamorous aspects of war, the exciting spectacle of military might in action. Clearly this is in line with 343's avowed intention to make the Spartans more than faceless soldiers. I suppose I'm just turned off by Traviss's sentimental treatment of the issue. It feels like moral blackmail to me, like she's trying to make readers and players feel bad if they see Spartans purely as the armored badasses Bungie initially presented to us.
One more grievance and then I promise I'll get back to the lighter stuff. It's pretty obvious throughout TTW that Karen Traviss is still committed to vilifying Dr. Halsey. As we know, Halsey has sociopathic tendencies. It turns out she's also a bitch. One fascinating little oddment: apparently it's entirely consistent with antisocial personality disorder to cry yourself to sleep night after night over the death of your daughter. That Halsey, what a creep. Saving mankind with her genius and seeking redemption for her unethical actions and treating her Spartans like family and mourning her daughter and stuff. It must be exhausting to suck so hard. Let's hope Halo 4 shows the character more respect—or at least portrays her more consistently with established canon—than Traviss has. Dr. Halsey is one of my favorite characters (thanks mostly to Eric Nylund's books), OK? I don't want to see her retconned into a one-note mustache twirler.
One subject I'm always happy to read about in Halo books is the Forerunners. TTW certainly didn't disappoint on that count. Between Phillips monkeying around in the temple on Sanghelios, Jul ‘Mdama exploring the Forerunner sites on Onyx/Trevelyan, and all of the delightful conversations with various Engineers (the precious little things. I want one), there were all sorts of tantalizing bits and morsels to add to the puzzle of the Forerunners' motivations and sudden disappearance 100,000 years past. There was also a good deal of fairly blatant foreshadowing for Halo 4. The two most prominent items are the Forerunner portal system and the Didact, and it's likely there's a lot more to unpack. I'll add as a side note that TTW's obligatory pimping of the Infinity (or as I like to call it, Admiral Hood's Magical Space Dong) had its due effect. I am now more hyped than ever to see what humanity does with all that new Forerunner tech. I hope it has greater implications than more sparkly guns, fancier ships, and forced parallels between a newly upjumped humanity and the less savory aspects of the Forerunners.
All in all, TTW is a satisfying followup to Glasslands, a provocative teaser for a certain highly anticipated game, and a firm foundation for a new phase in Halo's fiction. A lot is going to change with Halo 4. I hope the new developments are daring—not out of joint Bungie's vision, but unsafe. I want the story to go to unexpected places and not settle for the reiteration of traditional sci-fi tropes (mad alien who hates humanity, technologically superior society with a vaguely defined grudge against the good guys...you know how it goes). 343 has the freedom to really stretch their creative muscles here, and with a storyteller like Greg Bear in the fold, they also have the imaginative capacity to build a truly grand mythos. As a longtime Halo fan, I care about this franchise. I'm anxious about an untested (but on paper, brilliant) developer continuing where Bungie left off, yet I'm equally excited to see what comes next.
OK, resume panic mode.
Shake Appeal
Member
I wasn't talking about the possibilities of it so much as the skewy perception it gives competitive fans to see competitive stuff being worked on last, after the game is gold.
Pop
Member
No I never said that. I said if they weren't legit 50s you would find out quite quick. Bought 50s the majority of the time would never play high skill 50 cause of how horrible they were.
I get that you would call boosters cheaters but it's not like that would give them almighty skill. You still had to play to 50 kills. All lag switching/ host booting aside the better team wins regardless of being a booster or not.
Shake Appeal
Member
Boosting and buying accounts were behaviours encouraged by Halo 3's weird ossification thing where your rank grew stagnant over time. That ossification thing was the main reason 1-50 sucked. Ranking systems that periodically 'reset' after set 'seasons' may have their own rake of problems (see: Reach's Arena), but on balance they're better and part of the reason is they make boosting and account-buying kinda pointless.
Okay, but at the point that ranks fail to be usefully indicative of skill (because people have gamed the system somehow), then I start to agree with people who say "what's the point in having them if the effects are the same?" The system has to be protected, where possible, against visible ranks failing in their primary purpose, which is to give strong indications of favourability and a reasonable sense of the stakes.
People only know this though, because people stole the game and got a look at an early primordial Halo 4 matchmaking setup. I'll have to disagree here and will just say that I think people are getting too wrapped up in the 'order' of things. Infection and Grif would show first because they have to be implemented and baked into the engine and ready to go sooner. Any ranking stuff can come later since it can be modified on the fly, is determined server-side, and therefore can have it's focus be shifted later in the schedule. This isn't 343 catering to one playerbase over the other, it's just development scheduling.
They told us it'd be talked about later, so I'm assuming they didn't want to go one way then change it later and suffer from the usual 'but you guys changed it from what you originally said!!11' reactions from the internet.
Zeouterlimits
Member
On balance/average? Sure, but Arena failed so extremely it's to be expected that the do called 1% would strive for a system they have experience with and to a much greater extent enjoyed, heavily flawed as it was.
The competitive community never asked or liked arena.
That wouldn't be a statistic towards anything ranks.
I'm not a big fan of ranks resetting after a season because it devalues the rank and it discourages playing rank near the end of a season. I'd rather have a system in place that if you don't play in a playlist for a set amount of time you lose a rank. This way people who buy 50's are forced to keep playing to keep their rank but if they're not good enough they'll most likely lose the matches so they won't keep their rank for too long. This would discourage people from buying 50's because if you're not actually any good you won't stay a 50 for a long time. Also, on your service record it should show your current highest rank, not the highest you get at one point.
ElzarTheBam
Member
This would be my preferred system as well.
whipped this up while eating a mcgriddle.
Seasons
Benefits:
I always feel like the sentiment of no ranks is that people cheat or get their feelings hurt with a low ranking, which sucks that the minority that don't like it hurt a big part of a community in halo.
Seasons
- 3 Months Long
- Every new season you get your rank reset
- A+ to D grading, A+ = Best, D = worse. Skip F so no one feels like a complete failure.
Benefits:
- If you buy a account it's worthless in 90 days
- Keeps people coming back to play
- Not required to play, so no one is forced
- No F rating so no one gets their feelings hurt/discourages player
I always feel like the sentiment of no ranks is that people cheat or get their feelings hurt with a low ranking, which sucks that the minority that don't like it hurt a big part of a community in halo.
Zeouterlimits
Member
That sounds like you're agreeing with me.
Although the asking for bit.. I'm not sure that's relevant to Arena. Everyone and their mother saw that 1 - 50 was too flawed to return as is, so at least here on GAF, the reception to the concept was positive.
The implementation, however, we all know how that went.
Why does 'E' get skipped? Anyway, how does having a lower rank hurt peoples feelings? If it does hurt their feelings, than it gives them something to work for, they don't want to be the worst so they try and get better. Imo having an 'F' rank would be beneficial.
But yeah, other than that, I like it.
If you get a F that's going to translate into "wow I'm never playing this again". A D can translate into "I should practice more so I can get a better rating".
That's my thinking at least.
Shake Appeal
Member
I would argue the main problems of the Arena, in descending order were:
1. Gametypes, rules, and voting. All of these failed to meet people's expectations of it as a 'competitive' playlist, and the constant chopping and changing Bungie/343 attempted just made things confusing in addition to disappointing.
2. Intimidation. I think someone covered this in a longer and better post yesterday, but sectioning off the 'hardcore' in one place while using aggressive, competitive rhetoric turned off a lot of the non-hardcore who might have enjoyed it. While I love ranks, I think they should be fairly subtle/soft in their presentation; if people want to be serious about them, they can choose to be, but don't talk up one solitary, scary, dark corner of the playlist browser as the Domain of the Fucking Serious, Bro. Just let the ranks rest on top of any hopper that uses TrueSkill (or equivalent), and then people can opt either to obsess over the numbers or just enjoy the good match-ups.
3. Lack of transparency. Dividing people into bronze, silver, onyx, etc.? Good idea. Making the requirements of these and their relative positions within them more or less impenetrable? Bad idea. Tell me I'm 15th out of the 100 players in my division, that I just dropped seven places, and that I need 17 points to reclaim 8th. Let me know where my friends finished, exactly, relative to me. Put all that info in a well-lit, available space outside of the game, and let the people who care about it go find it if they want it. Make the consequences of defeat or quitting very, very obvious, and make every aspect of ranking and the 'rules' clear as day to players, so they're not fumbling around wondering why they're silver instead of gold. And then make sure to give them the names of the people they have to 'beat' to get back there. Give them the tools to tell stories, basically.
4. Using individual 'performance' as a metric instead of simple team wins or losses. This has been covered enough over the years.
Generally, I think longer seasons (like, two-three months long) with rules and ranking systems that are transparent to a fault, and gameplay that is honed down to a very few idealized competitive set with less randomness and variability, and all of this sitting benignly on top of a few ordinary playlists (1v1, 2v2, 4v4 Slayer only, and maybe CTF now that it's just W/L and not 'slaying') instead of being portrayed as a hardcore-only cage match... would work pretty damn well. There are a lot of other details and nuances that can be borrowed from other games (I'd love to be able to issue challenges, or ask for a replay against fun opponents, for instance), and there would still be innumerable problems, but it would be a whole bunch of steps in a fun direction.
1. Gametypes, rules, and voting. All of these failed to meet people's expectations of it as a 'competitive' playlist, and the constant chopping and changing Bungie/343 attempted just made things confusing in addition to disappointing.
2. Intimidation. I think someone covered this in a longer and better post yesterday, but sectioning off the 'hardcore' in one place while using aggressive, competitive rhetoric turned off a lot of the non-hardcore who might have enjoyed it. While I love ranks, I think they should be fairly subtle/soft in their presentation; if people want to be serious about them, they can choose to be, but don't talk up one solitary, scary, dark corner of the playlist browser as the Domain of the Fucking Serious, Bro. Just let the ranks rest on top of any hopper that uses TrueSkill (or equivalent), and then people can opt either to obsess over the numbers or just enjoy the good match-ups.
3. Lack of transparency. Dividing people into bronze, silver, onyx, etc.? Good idea. Making the requirements of these and their relative positions within them more or less impenetrable? Bad idea. Tell me I'm 15th out of the 100 players in my division, that I just dropped seven places, and that I need 17 points to reclaim 8th. Let me know where my friends finished, exactly, relative to me. Put all that info in a well-lit, available space outside of the game, and let the people who care about it go find it if they want it. Make the consequences of defeat or quitting very, very obvious, and make every aspect of ranking and the 'rules' clear as day to players, so they're not fumbling around wondering why they're silver instead of gold. And then make sure to give them the names of the people they have to 'beat' to get back there. Give them the tools to tell stories, basically.
4. Using individual 'performance' as a metric instead of simple team wins or losses. This has been covered enough over the years.
Generally, I think longer seasons (like, two-three months long) with rules and ranking systems that are transparent to a fault, and gameplay that is honed down to a very few idealized competitive set with less randomness and variability, and all of this sitting benignly on top of a few ordinary playlists (1v1, 2v2, 4v4 Slayer only, and maybe CTF now that it's just W/L and not 'slaying') instead of being portrayed as a hardcore-only cage match... would work pretty damn well. There are a lot of other details and nuances that can be borrowed from other games (I'd love to be able to issue challenges, or ask for a replay against fun opponents, for instance), and there would still be innumerable problems, but it would be a whole bunch of steps in a fun direction.
ViewtifulJC
Banned
I think everyone assumed "talk about it later" would mean it would be one of the last things to be revealed before launch, "yeah, we don't have a ranking system yet, but maybe down the line...!"
Demoncarnotaur
Member
So, any word on groups?
Ah, the story of the plastic Jackal, of course..
Thats a good question.. I don't think they're in, but thats just I guess and I would love to be wrong.
Ouch.
Another non-tease tease.
Ah, the story of the plastic Jackal, of course..
Thats a good question.. I don't think they're in, but thats just I guess and I would love to be wrong.
Ouch.
Hydranockz
Member
But are those skill ranks at all then? If all I have to do is take a hiatus from a playlist for a while so my skill drops and I can dong on low levels again, where is the value in that? Halo 3's 1-50 tried to find the skill you were at, you;re actual skill. It wasn't a time based thing and it never reset because, as I'm sure you'd agree, your skill can't just reset.
1-50, for the most part found out how good people were using TruSkill and eventually, consistently found people of similar skills. The playlist specific ranks meant that just because I was good at Team Slayer didn't mean I was just as good at Swat. What this also means, is that the purpose of this system is not to see how fast you can climb to 50, it's supposed to just find out how good you are and keep you there to play people as good as you are.
The 1% of people who really were invsted in the system, I suspect, were people who were driven to get to 50 as opposed to the people who were happy to play at whatever level they got because it meant close, fair matches. The quest for 50 is a noble one sure, but it isn't a guarantee.
I think this is essentially what Halo 3's system was meant to achieve. Maybe the data reflects this? Or perhaps the data is showing a skewed curve where there is a strangely higher number of people in later ranks. I think the boosters, sold accounts and other such things really threw things off. I don't think it was designed behaviour and I don't think it's a positive for players.
Cheaters will cheat.
Most people will not.
If people buy accounts then whatever. That showed how important ranks were to some people. Chances are they'd never play in matchmaking anyways because they ain't level 50 players.
Considering how much content is bound to your live accounts these days, and the exclusion of the monthly trials, the chances of people starting an account for the purposes of getting to level 50 and reselling should be lower
Throw in the anti-griefing systems in reach and people will have difficulty deranking
The problem in halo 2 was glitching, modding and standby
If halo 4 has problems, hopefully it's only standby as its the one thing that's only somewhat under control of 343
But I just don't want some assholes who gamed everybody to take what I found extreme joy in out of the game. It's bending over and letting those asshats succeed in their grief.
Most people will not.
If people buy accounts then whatever. That showed how important ranks were to some people. Chances are they'd never play in matchmaking anyways because they ain't level 50 players.
Considering how much content is bound to your live accounts these days, and the exclusion of the monthly trials, the chances of people starting an account for the purposes of getting to level 50 and reselling should be lower
Throw in the anti-griefing systems in reach and people will have difficulty deranking
The problem in halo 2 was glitching, modding and standby
If halo 4 has problems, hopefully it's only standby as its the one thing that's only somewhat under control of 343
But I just don't want some assholes who gamed everybody to take what I found extreme joy in out of the game. It's bending over and letting those asshats succeed in their grief.
Yeah, I think a skill system should encompass the entirety of the userbase, as opposed to a fraction of it.
Shake Appeal
Member
I think there are ways to address the latter, and again, if things are much, much more transparent, people are much more conscious of what they have to do to attain or secure a given rank when there are days remaining in a given season.
And I don't think resetting has to devalue rank provided the game tracks and records those past ranks in detail, with lots of flashy medals and cold, hard numbers, and so on. Like I said before, the most obvious feature in the world to me in Halo 4's current game browser is to be able to hit a button to flip someone's 'baseball card' over and see their past stats/previous seasons. That would be so, so cool to me. "Oh, they were Onyx in CTF last season, but their K/D in 2v2 Slayer was only 1.09..." (And if they don't want that information to be visible for whatever reason, which I completely understand, then simply give them the option to hide it either from non-friends, or completely.)
Edit: one of the other reasons to fucking drown people in stats and detail is so they can dig out something to love from that. If I finished silver in the Arena, chances are I'll be silver again next month. And the month after. And the month after. But if I can see that I finished 70th in a silver division two seasons ago, and 7th this time, I get some sense of a narrative that isn't just "You're silver, all right, stop playing." And even if my ranking hovers around the same place season after season, if I can see a bazillion fucking stats and compare them to my friends, I'm going to find some measure of progress or prowess in there somewhere, even if it's just that I tend to get more headshots with the pistol than my buddy.
Hypothetically, If i did care about that rank, i'd say it doesn't matter what the last rank is; If got that, i'd react as if it i were F, even if there were only A and B. Now, that's just me, but i reckon there are quite many people who think the same way.
I don't really think that way though.
Arguably the more ranks there are, the more accurate the system is, very few people would end up with absolutely lowest ranks if there were, say, 100 ranks (and people wouldn't start at 1 but rather they were placed after 10 games).
Tha Robbertster
Member
This is a ranking system I'd like too. Kinda like a leader board were you have to keep playing regularly to actually keep your high rank.
I'm talking like 1 level down every month. If you want to wait nearly a year to play against 40's be my guest.