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[Gart]

Yeah smoker needs some kind of buff. Sometimes I just kill myself at the start of a round so I can spawn as a hunter and actually do some damage before the survivors get out of the safe room.

Having the ability to release smoke clouds at will that lessen the damage of bullets for infected that are inside(like in Natural Selection) and the cloud do a little damage might be a good idea. That could counter the super survivor clump and help out the tank in open areas and long hallways where he gets raped in 5 seconds.

 

[ezekial45]

This game tells its story in a similar way to portal.

Kinda. They both used the environment to tell a story, but Portal had the antagonist character GLaDOS. Who gave the player context and information. Left 4 Dead doesn't really have one like that. Most of the story comes from the characters (who almost rarely give out story details during the campaign) and the environment.

 

[Nabs]

the smoker may need to be improved (i like the drag damage idea) but it's still a very useful character. you don't get all the points, but it's a great way to split up a team and make them hate each other. i'd rather be a smoker than hunter.

 

[ratcliffja]

The stories in this game are the events and scenes that happen when you play online with other people that you just have to tell others about. If you had read this thread, you would have noticed that.

I read part of the thread and figured that I'd enjoy it since it's Valve and I've never regretting buying a Valve game. If I had money to blow, I wouldn't feel so bad, but this was going to be the last game I bought for a while. Oh well. I may eventually play online with people, but I can't stand playing online with strangers, and I rarely have friends that play.

 

[Amir0x]

fuuuuck Valve needs to get on that patch for the 360 version already. Or Microsoft needs to certify the patch if it's already done. Forklift/Generator/BreakDownDoor/etc glitches have destroyed the game, literally every other match has some asshat doing it

 

[Teknoman]

I read part of the thread and figured that I'd enjoy it since it's Valve and I've never regretting buying a Valve game. If I had money to blow, I wouldn't feel so bad, but this was going to be the last game I bought for a while. Oh well. I may eventually play online with people, but I can't stand playing online with strangers, and I rarely have friends that play.

GAF games are always fun. Strangers or not, just dive in.

 

[The Blue Jihad]

More on L4D's art direction.

Valve has quickly become my favorite developer. Fucking geniuses, man.

 

[Facism]

Having the ability to release smoke clouds at will that lessen the damage of bullets for infected that are inside(like in Natural Selection) and the cloud do a little damage might be a good idea. That could counter the super survivor clump and help out the tank in open areas and long hallways where he gets raped in 5 seconds.

Smoker with Lerk abilities sounds fun :O

 

[Suburban Cowboy]

i think smoker needs a slight damage boost (and points too). Don't really believe a hunter should do more damage over the same period of time when often times its hard to even get the first hit in as smoker

 

[Sibylus]

Maybe it would be a good idea to give a Smoker points if survivors get hit by zombies in his cloud, allow him to deploy it at will, and also make the cloud bigger and more dense.

I don't like the idea of adding drag/smoke damage, mainly because the Smoker can "get at" the survivors the easiest of all the zombie classes.

 

[ratcliffja]

GAF games are always fun. Strangers or not, just dive in.

How would I join a GAF game, anyway?

 

[Sciz]

Maybe it would be a good idea to give a Smoker points if survivors get hit by zombies in his cloud, allow him to deploy it at will, and also make the cloud bigger and more dense.

I don't like the idea of adding drag/smoke damage, mainly because the Smoker can "get at" the survivors the easiest of all the zombie classes.

The smoker doesn't need points, he needs to be able to get something done. He doesn't need to be doing huge amounts of damage either, but right now pulling survivors is largely an exercise in futility except for the rare case where you can drag them off of a high ledge.

How would I join a GAF game, anyway?

Post your Steam ID and ask people to friend you. The GAF TF2/L4D crew is a friendly bunch, and we're generally willing to invite any other members who need people to play with.

 

[ratcliffja]

My ID is jrat12345. I suck though.

 

[Sibylus]

The smoker doesn't need points, he needs to be able to get something done. He doesn't need to be doing huge amounts of damage either, but right now pulling survivors is largely an exercise in futility except for the rare case where you can drag them off of a high ledge.

Voluntary smoke clouds and more annoying smoke clouds could fit the bill, they could serve as cover or to get attention in addition to what they do right now.

 

[Pop On Arrival]

You know somethings wrong with the smoker when you absolutely don't NEED him to win a round. Got a crappy boomer? Fucked. Got crappy hunters? Fucked. Crappy smoker? No one cares.

 

[TheHeretic]

the smoker may need to be improved (i like the drag damage idea) but it's still a very useful character. you don't get all the points, but it's a great way to split up a team and make them hate each other. i'd rather be a smoker than hunter.

Smoker in No Mercy 4 is completely useless. I really don't care if you have some amazing story that defied all odds, smoker is a dead weight in that level.

 

[Volcynika]

Smoker in No Mercy 4 is completely useless. I really don't care if you have some amazing story that defied all odds, smoker is a dead weight in that level.

He's at least considerably more useful on the upper area rather than inside the hospital halls.

 

[Pop On Arrival]

Smoker in No Mercy 4 is completely useless. I really don't care if you have some amazing story that defied all odds, smoker is a dead weight in that level.

He's also completely useless during the Blood Harvest finale if they survivors decide to camp next to the ammo. Then again, Blood Harvest finale is just broken in general. I don't remember the last time the we managed to get wiped out as survivors during it.

 

[ahoyhoy]

The smoker doesn't need points, he needs to be able to get something done. He doesn't need to be doing huge amounts of damage either, but right now pulling survivors is largely an exercise in futility except for the rare case where you can drag them off of a high ledge.

Or into a fire. Getting a survivor stuck in a molotov pit can pretty much doom him.

 

[Keylime]

Smoker in No Mercy 4 is completely useless. I really don't care if you have some amazing story that defied all odds, smoker is a dead weight in that level.

Inside the hospital: No.
Outside the hospital: Definitely no.

L2Smoker.

Spawn immediately and run up the steps and climb up the pole. Knock out the hand rails at the top. Immediately jump down and hide. Survivors go through, you yank someone down. Do this with friends and you've got a great ambush that will likely require the entire team to have to back pedal a good amount.

During the event, not much use unless you can find a spot.

At the top there are 2 spots where you can yank people directly off the building and make them hang. One is shortly after the survivors make their second right turn and the other spot is right where the tank usually spawns. In both of these spots you can quickly yank someone off the edge and cause all sorts of trouble.

He doesn't have nearly as many options in that level, but he's far from useless.

Edit: And I question how people are playing the smoker if you think he sucks. The smoker's drag is the hardest primary move to detect, as sometimes the players will yell something as they are dragged, other times you don't know until you hear the musical cue and see them in yellow (mics and binds solve this I'm sure). Smoker pulling while people are vomited on is a surefire way to cause problems. Smoker pulling people as far backwards as you can is a great move to delay the teams progress.

The trick is to wait until the team is in the middle of something and grab whomever's in the back. More often than not the team is too busy or can't see and you'll mess them up a bit.

The smoker's cup of tea isn't damage, it's disruption.

 

[unagisensei]

Any L4D noobie GAFers out there? Just got the game for PC and want to figure it out, but have no idea what I'm doing...if anyone wants to show me the ropes add me on steam.

Steam ID is: russbiscuit

 

[Nabs]

Smoker in No Mercy 4 is completely useless. I really don't care if you have some amazing story that defied all odds, smoker is a dead weight in that level.

completely? nah... you can pull em off the hallway w/ no railing (setting up a hunter attack), pull em out the elevator as it closes, or pull em off the building. early on you can set up a level higher, and get em in the stairway... and getting em when the entire team is slimed is great as usual. it's tougher to play as a smoker on that level but it's not useless at all.

 

[TheHeretic]

Edit: And I question how people are playing the smoker if you think he sucks. The smoker's drag is the hardest primary move to detect, as sometimes the players will yell something as they are dragged, other times you don't know until you hear the musical cue and see them in yellow (mics and binds solve this I'm sure). Smoker pulling while people are vomited on is a surefire way to cause problems. Smoker pulling people as far backwards as you can is a great move to delay the teams progress.

Against a good team who sticks together, its very difficult to do anything as the smoker, consolidated even more when you are in a small space. A melee attack from a team mate breaks the smokers snare, and the player being snared can also fire back to break the tongue. Finally, the tongue can break if the path is blocked in such a way. In a level like no mercy 4, the best you can do within the halls is remove someone from the group and wail on them for crappy damage.

 

[DaFish]

Ok so...

Vert and I were messing around in a public versus match and this guy on our team (don't recall his name) as a hunter he would go to console, type spectate, so his hunter would be controled by the AI then he would rejoin the infected team and another hunter would appear in his control (he had at least 6 hunters on screen at one time along with the rest of us as our infected just raping).

Needs fix ASAP!!

 

[Pop On Arrival]

Ok so...

Vert and I were messing around in a public versus match and this guy on our team (don't recall his name) as a hunter would go to console, type spectate, so his hunter would be controled by the AI then he would rejoin the infected team and another hunter would appear in his control (he had at least 6 hunters on screen at one time along with the rest of us as our infected just raping).

Needs fix ASAP!!

Nabs mentioned that a few pages back. I've never actually seen it in action, though.

 

[DaFish]

Nabs mentioned that a few pages back. I've never actually seen it in action, though.

It was madness I tell ya!

 

[NameGenerated]

Ok so...

Vert and I were messing around in a public versus match and this guy on our team (don't recall his name) as a hunter would go to console, type spectate, so his hunter would be controled by the AI then he would rejoin the infected team and another hunter would appear in his control (he had at least 6 hunters on screen at one time along with the rest of us as our infected just raping).

Needs fix ASAP!!

Happened to me once too. They had all of us pinned down. PC version too.

 

[JRPereira]

One of the clips from matches I played today:
http://www.jrpereira.com/left4dead/gaf_l4d_tankrocks.mp4 (currently uploading, should be done 7-10 minutes after this post).

Spoiler

Going to sleep, going to test whether filezilla properly does an automatic shutdown after the upload finishes

 

[Visualante]

Nabs mentioned that a few pages back. I've never actually seen it in action, though.

You tend to notice when 4 hunters hit you all at once.

 

[timetokill]

Sort of kind of. Except for the distinct lack of a character that is not a player.

What, do helicopter pilot guy, army apc rescue guy, "fill 'er up so we can get outta here" pilot guy, and boating dude not count?

How about churchie "i'm gonna ring this bell and you're all gonna die" mcgee?

 

[Goreomedy]

Ok so...

Vert and I were messing around in a public versus match and this guy on our team (don't recall his name) as a hunter would go to console, type spectate, so his hunter would be controled by the AI then he would rejoin the infected team and another hunter would appear in his control (he had at least 6 hunters on screen at one time along with the rest of us as our infected just raping).

Needs fix ASAP!!

Because it announces whenever someone spectates and rejoins, you know instantly if someone is cheating like this. Funny thing is, they typically do it at the very start of the first round. So... it's not a big deal to bail on them and find a fair match.

But yeah, add this to the very long list of needed fixes.

 

[syllogism]

Inside the hospital: No.
Outside the hospital: Definitely no.

L2Smoker.

Spawn immediately and run up the steps and climb up the pole. Knock out the hand rails at the top. Immediately jump down and hide. Survivors go through, you yank someone down. Do this with friends and you've got a great ambush that will likely require the entire team to have to back pedal a good amount.

During the event, not much use unless you can find a spot.

At the top there are 2 spots where you can yank people directly off the building and make them hang. One is shortly after the survivors make their second right turn and the other spot is right where the tank usually spawns. In both of these spots you can quickly yank someone off the edge and cause all sorts of trouble.

He doesn't have nearly as many options in that level, but he's far from useless.

These are the spots I always use, but they are utterly worthless against even a semi-competent team. Most maps have a spot or two where the smoker can be somewhat useful, but generally he is rather useless. Even if the whole team is boomed, it's trivial to hear the smoking sound (actually you don't even have to hear it) and save your teammate with melee. They might waste a few seconds doing that, but that's hardly adequate.

Nabs mentioned that a few pages back. I've never actually seen it in action, though.

There's a way to do the exploit so that there's no spawn timer, which allows you to pretty much instantly spawn more infected.

 

[123rl]

I'm slowly going through the campaigns online with my mate in America. This is probably the most fun I've ever had with a co-op game. It is just brilliant in every way. We did the boathouse survival bit last night and it was just incredible fun. L4D is easily one of the best games of this generation

 

[Pop On Arrival]

You tend to notice when 4 hunters hit you all at once.

Eh, not doubting that there really is a bug like this. I'm just saying I've never seen it.

 

[timetokill]

There's a way to do the exploit so that there's no spawn timer, which allows you to pretty much instantly spawn more infected.

Yeah, I just found this out. Not too hard to find online.

Patch needs to come as quickly as possible, damn it.

 

[me Jojo]

On the subject of the Smoker, don't you just hate it when you get to the roof of the final chapter in No Mercy and a smoker pulls you all the way down only for you to insta-die.:lol

 

[timetokill]

On the subject of the Smoker, don't you just hate it when you get to the roof of the final chapter in No Mercy and a smoker pulls you all the way down only for you to insta-die.:lol

I can still not find out how to get the "insta-death" smoker pull. I can only incap them. What's the secret?

 

[me Jojo]

I can still not find out how to get the "insta-death" smoker pull. I can only incap them. What's the secret?

When you climb out of the elevator shaft, the edge on the right of you is too high from the ground below for you to survive the fall, so you'll end up hanging there, waiting for another survivor to save you. If a smoker manages to pull you from that edge all the way down you'll simply die.

 

[timetokill]

When you climb out of the elevator shaft, the edge on the right of you is too high from the ground below for you to survive the fall, so you'll end up hanging there, waiting for another survivor to save you. If a smoker manages to pull you from that edge all the way down you'll simply die.

Where does the smoker stand, then? I always stand near the satellite dish and I always drag them off, only to have them hit red when they hit the ground, not die. I suppose the smoker should stand elsewhere?

 

[Walshicus]

fuuuuck Valve needs to get on that patch for the 360 version already. Or Microsoft needs to certify the patch if it's already done. Forklift/Generator/BreakDownDoor/etc glitches have destroyed the game, literally every other match has some asshat doing it

I guess me and my friends are pretty lucky - we only play co-op or 3 vs 3 on Left 4 Dead these days. Can slap those who abuse glitches!

 

[Grecco]

fuuuuck Valve needs to get on that patch for the 360 version already. Or Microsoft needs to certify the patch if it's already done. Forklift/Generator/BreakDownDoor/etc glitches have destroyed the game, literally every other match has some asshat doing it

I only play Blood Harvest on VS for now. No Mercy in Campaign

 

[syllogism]

I'm going to have to see video proof of the smoker nm5 instakill pull done on PC as I've tried dozens of different spots (to clarify, all of them on the satellite dish building) in single player and the survivor never gets pulled to the bottom level. If it's possible on PC, it would seem to require almost pixel perfect positioning.

e: in fact, the instakill pull appears to be relatively common on 360, and yet after all this time I've never seen it happen on PC
e2: someone with both versions says it does not happen on PC

 

[SimpleDesign]

Valve has quickly become my favorite developer. Fucking geniuses, man.

This, Left 4 Dead is the best game of the year bar none.

Only thing I want is more content!

 

[Shake Appeal]

fuuuuck Valve needs to get on that patch for the 360 version already. Or Microsoft needs to certify the patch if it's already done. Forklift/Generator/BreakDownDoor/etc glitches have destroyed the game, literally every other match has some asshat doing it

...and I have been kicked from an infected team maybe six or seven times now for unblocking the survivors' route. :lol

 

[NotWii]

Smoker in No Mercy 4 is completely useless. I really don't care if you have some amazing story that defied all odds, smoker is a dead weight in that level.

Learn how to play.

The smoker can be used as bait, luring a survivor into a small room where you can pull them in and lick to your heart's content, it usually takes survivors a fair while to rescue that person

The smoker can pull survivors off the upper area of the 2nd floor, forcing them to run all the way around again

The smoker can pull survivors out of the elevator as the doors are closing

The smoker can pull survivors over chasms in the top most area and incap them instantly

 

[me Jojo]

So apparently the trick is for the smoker to stand on the building with the sattelite on, next to the building that holds the elevator shaft. So far I've noticed every pull leads into an instant death. It's kinda sad how it's being abused though, I guess the fact it doesn't insta-kill on the PC is because they patched it already? You can't consider it a glitch, but it is extremely unfair.

 

[Penguin]

Well, I don't know if a glitch or just cheap or maybe a way around it.

But we were playing I think the No Mercy campaign on versus, and the Infected team blocked the elevator exit with some vehicle of sorts. Is there any way to get past that or would we have to wait for them to spawn as a tank or something?

 

[Amir0x]

I remember when I first started being so frustrated to get a Hunter, because it's not the most immediately useful character if you're new to the game. It can be hard to get meaningful impacts away from a good team. But man, Hunter is so rad after a few rounds... and once you utilize hunter swipes for massive damage, you'll become a beast. Sometimes I don't bother pouncing, I'll just go in after a boomer vomits and start swiping the shit out of one of the other team members and they'll think it's a regular zombie for a moment... until they're down to ten health :lol

PubexQub is great at hunter swipe damage, he's always knocking down fools!

But we were playing I think the No Mercy campaign on versus, and the Infected team blocked the elevator exit with some vehicle of sorts. Is there any way to get past that or would we have to wait for them to spawn as a tank or something?

It's a glitch/bug.

There is two ways through it. One, hope one of the infected boomers and explodes by it, knocking it back sometimes... or get smocked from the opposite end, pulling you toward the generator and edging the generator a bit.

But the most consistently successful way is to scout rooms before you enter to elevator for a pipe bomb or a gas tank, and bring it with you on the elevator and place it by the generator. It'll blow the thing out the way.

 

[syllogism]

Learn how to play.

The smoker can be used as bait, luring a survivor into a small room where you can pull them in and lick to your heart's content, it usually takes survivors a fair while to rescue that person

The smoker can pull survivors off the upper area of the 2nd floor, forcing them to run all the way around again

The smoker can pull survivors out of the elevator as the doors are closing

The smoker can pull survivors over chasms in the top most area and incap them instantly

No i think it's either you or your opponents that should learn how to play as none of those tricks are any good against a decent team, even with other infected assisting

e: on nm4

 

[morningbus]

I wonder how well a projectile attack-based Infected would work? For example: a zombie that spits a gob of green goo that will deal some damage and slow the survivor down for a set period of time.

I'm not sure how it'd affect the balance, but all I know is that I want some more special infected.

Edit: Oh, and I can confirm that Spectate/Join Infected exploit. I joined a random match and was waiting for the survivors at the top of NM4, when all of a sudden I notice that there are four hunters and a smoker up there. Over the course of the next few minutes there were at least a dozen hunters up there.

I think someone on the other team was in on it too, as no one complained. They ended up doing the same thing next round.