What you see as an advantage in map control when under a respawn timer others might see as an unfair disadvantage in certain situations. In games like territories where map control is key I can see the importance in being up a man for a small period of time but in team slayer that time could be used to set up in spawn camping positions turning the game into a not fun, non-competitive, match. Really the only true benifit I see in removing the spawn timer is for objective games where map control is more important then kills.
Then the map is designed poorly in that it provides spawn camping positions like that, and ones that can be gained in a single slayer respawn are worse. If map control equates to exploiting the map in ways like that then the map is badly designed for purpose, taking huge chunks out of the entire basis of map control isn't the solution IMO.
If those situations are truly unfair then they need to be dealt with in other ways - usually by fixing whatever is wrong with the map. I don't have a strong opinion either way on instant respawn, and probably won't until I experience it, but your argument here doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Map control is key to all team games of Halo using standard competitive gametypes (slayer, CTF, assault, territories, etc.). For team slayer specifically - since that's what we're talking about here with instant respawn - map control has always been important, and spawn trapping is actually part of a good competitive team's gameplan on any map with static spawns. The key is to design the map properly so that spawn trapping is difficult to achieve and maintain. It should take exceptional coordination and knowledge of the spawn areas on each side of the map, not just be a simple case of "stand here and wait for people to spawn in front of you."
But you two just shifted responsibility away from the players who do it (and it happens on every map, some are just harder to predict then others) to the map design. I could easily just say that if the map was designed perfectly then I could remove so many imbalances including spawn timing. Why does that argument of, "well its the map's fault then" only come into cases where players like a certain imbalance. Good teams might make good use of spawn trapping but only because they've gaged an already imbalanced system in their favor. If you remove the imbalance and that is what being down a person for a length of time is, then you make spawn trapping more harder because getting into appropriate positions is harder. I don't need to know the exact location within the opponents spawn zone to still be in a favorable position for when they spawn. To me anyway it just sounds like you guys are supporting a particular imbalance that suits how you like to play. If you remove the timer in team slayer then no team is ever down a man. That doesn't affect weapon spawn timing or any other map control issue other then the situation of spawn trapping. Spawns are usually not placed near power weapons so some person you killed won't be spawning any closer to it then where you killed them. If you're in enemy spawn zones then there should be proper disincentive to staying there for long. Perhaps I'm looking for a clearer definition of "map control" as it applies to team slayer and how you think the respawn timer is a significant factor in that because I'm not seeing it. All I'm seeing is a thinly veiled attempt to uphold spawn trapping as a noncheap tactic with the weak defense of "if that happens it is the map's fault".
ummmm,what? Anyway, are you saying every map has spawn trapping issues with the way it is? It's funny, someone mentioned getting killed by a guy who just respawned while your shields are still down as a problem with instant respawn. But, wasn't the excuse to that the same?
It's not inherently imbalanced and that's where your argument fails. MLG teams like spawning with a certain amount of predictability - it's sort of like in basketball how you have to inbound the ball from certain places, and good defensive teams will guard the inbound pass and even full-court press as you try to bring it upcourt. The "casual" basketball game would let you inbound it from anywhere because it's just not "fair" to put that much pressure on the ball until it gets into the halfcourt. But that's just one way of looking at things, and it's not how pro players (arguably the most competitive of the competitive types) look at it. To me (and removing other people's opinions from the equation), spawn trapping becomes a problem when teams are incredibly imbalanced, or when the map's available spawn areas or the game's spawn system make it too easy to pull off. But those are flaws with matchmaking logic, the map, and the spawn determination mechanics respectively. I don't believe it's a general problem that should be addressed by pushing other elements to a point that no matter how much map control you concede, the game will always find a safe place to spawn you, with avenues that let you move freely to the most powerful locations on the map. And I disagree that thinking this way is "uncompetitive." In a properly set-up map with even teams, it is actually highly skillful (on both individual and team-coordination levels) to create a spawn trap and keep it going for more than a few seconds. EDIT: As much as I hate linking to what is IMO one of the worst forums of all time, this guy nailed it. http://www.bungie.net/Forums/posts.aspx?postID=59369283&postRepeater1-p=1
I'm saying that normally all these discussions revolve around the player, what they do in game, their skill etc. These one should be the same way but was being deflected with the pretense of if it happens it isn't the player's fault who is doing the spawn trapping but the map's fault for allowing them to do it. If I wanted to I could make that case for any other player involved argument. If the map was designed perfectly there wouldn't be such and such problems. That second part you said has more to do with objective games then slayer ones, as far as it being a significant issue anyway. As I said I understand the purpose of the timer in gametypes where controlling positions is more important than killing players, I.e, taking a flag, planting a bomb, territories etc. But in team slayer if you are in an enemy spawn zone then there should be proper disincentive to staying there for very long. I mean I'm sure spawn weighting would still be in place so extremely unlikely an enemy would respawn right next to you after you killed them. That coupled with how fast shields recharge and the issue you raise would probably be a rare occurence. Nutduster: Not "inherently imbalanced"? I'm pretty sure being down a man for any length of time is "inherently imbalanced". To borrow a more apt sports analogy (the basketball one sucked) a power play in hocky is purposedly imbalanced. It punishes the other team for committing a penalty by giving the other team a man advantage which increases their likelihood to score. That is an inherent imbalance. It is a purposeful one that's adds a justified penalty to misconduct in a hockey match but that is not the case in a team slayer game. My team shouldn't be punished any more then the opposing team getting a point when I die. Saying it only affects games where the teams are highly unmatched skillgap wise is only paying attention to the cases of highest disparity. It happens in all team slayer games at some point. How significant those cases of spawn trapping are in the final numbers isn't the point. As I said it is being defended because it is an imbalance competitive players actually like but let's not lie to ourselves that it isnt an imbalance or that the fault is completely the map's.
You're conflating spawn trapping with spawn camping - they're not the same thing. Map control is nearly as important in slayer as in objective games. You can create spawn traps, control power weapons, and control the map's main thoroughfares - all of which leads to more kills, leading to victory. Or you can set up as a team in a specific location (top hall on Reflection is the obvious example, but most maps have at least one or two areas where something like that is possible - I've seen a team do it very effectively under center on Boardwalk), and constantly trade one death for two-plus kills as the other team attempts to break your stranglehold on that area. The disincentive you're looking for should be self-evident: you're in enemy territory, where they spawn. Unless you have bottomless rockets, you should be at a built-in disadvantage. Asylum is one of the best maps in Reach for spawn trapping, but what happens when you push into the enemy objective, assuming you're not MUCH better than the entire other team...? They spawn all around you and after you get a few kills, you die and reset to your side of the map. Unless your whole team is there with you, you're at a numerical disadvantage - and when your teammates die, they have to run across the map to get back to help you; when the other team dies, they have to move ten feet to rejoin the fight. The disincentive is where you're standing. An instant respawn would just be gravy.
honestly, the situation described where you really need that extra two seconds for map control would really only occur in games where there are two two skilled teams who play with their teammates often, which probably would not be the case in normal mm slayer. and i would assume you'll be able to change spawn times in custom games settings, so you'll be able to have spawn times in competitive games and mlg.
I don't think that's true. Normal tactics for most players on most maps is to rush back to the action that just killed them. If a guy dies around top health pack on Countdown, when he spawns he is typically quite eager to get back there and see if he can come out on top this time. Respawning the moment he dies makes that task a lot easier for him, regardless of whether he's coordinating with his team at all or not, and regardless of his skill level. It's harder to maintain map control against coordinated, skilled teams - but one dipshit with an itchy 'nade trigger can still clear out an area if the people in it are waiting on their shields to recharge.
OK, for one, if we're talking about a designer who bases their approach to a competitive experience (not MLG in terms of how specific it is, but basic competitive, which I think is a fair pre-requisite for this discussion) around effectively relying upon 'honour rules' of sorts, i.e including exploitables but trusting players to just not take advantage of them, then I'll go one further than shifting the blame on to the map and put it squarely on the designer. They're doing their job wrong. Also you're equating two things which aren't being equated at all. Map control is an aspect of an effective competitive team effort (and even an FFA experience, though much less developed). The ability to, but difficulty of controlling a map is the manifestation of the entire point of design with respect to area/position balance, LoS balance, spawns, weapon placement etc. Without the design of a map playing out as the process of attempting to control it, you might as well be playing octagon and just have it come down to raw aim. Now what you're saying is, first off, based off a circumstantial premise, ie. some cases/designs. This is part of why we approach the map as the problem rather than the player or the entire principle of "controlling a map" being a sound competitive merit. Furthermore: A perfect example of what's flawed about your point. You yourself say that the criteria here is an imbalanced system (inherent in the design of the situation, ie. a specific map). So why not, ya know, balance the system rather than just saying "how map control plays out in this case is sometimes harmful, so let's try and negate the basis of map control itself rather than addressing the specific issue." OK now you're just saying that an earned advantage and imbalance are the same thing. That's a senseless position, as you have to logically extend that to other things. High ground? It's an imbalance, get rid of it. Position based cover? It's an imbalance, get rid of it. So if someone spawns with a better chance of getting first shot on you than you on them, you don't see a problem with a respawn being more of an advantage than a penalty? To me it sounds like you don't understand the appreciated usage of the term "imbalance" in this context. Again, take that to its logical conclusion. Losing player position, as well as the player themselves in pure number terms, is just an "imbalance" and should be negated. Why not just get a point when you've done a kill's worth of damage, but not have the player actually die at all, and just get rid of respawns altogether? Because that would be utterly retarded. You've got to see this back and forth for what it is. Dying should be a penalty in practical terms, that's absolutely fundamental to the idea of an FPS. How that penalty manifests is a dynamic principle, I'll happily admit, and in basic terms it can be reduced to 2 methods: time and position. Position only penalties (ie. instant respawn) are totally valid when placed within a design framework built to support that mechanic, a key (but not the only) aspect of which is sheer scale or restrictions on spawns. Think of Battlefield or TF2 for examples of how the penalty is focused more around position. A strong enough position penalty twinned with an appropriate scale carries its own inherent time penalty in the sheer time taken to get back to where you need to be. And you can also think of resurrection mechanics like Shadowrun to approach a time focused penalty, though not fully realise it. Halo can be approximated as finding a balance between the two, but already swayed a little more toward position than time penalty (ie. the place in which you respawn is more fundamental to your respawn experience than how long it took, though not by a huge gulf, and both are still important). You're effectively proposing removing the time penalty aspect entirely, but not just that, only in Slayer. The problem comes when you expect a given design framework (largely defined by the map pool) to support both. 343 aren't negating the time penalty in the game mechanic's design altogether, but expecting two mechanics which are at odds with one another to coexist within the same space. Think about Invasion and how it differed as a Halo experience, and even that didn't go so far as to negate time penalty altogether. For one thing, how well did the maps play for non-Invasion gametypes? Right. And two, do you really want that kind of disparity between Slayer and objective experiences? Ok, take this as an example. Two teams playing on Sanctuary/Asylum. One is being pushed by the other, held in their base whilst their opponents' setup is based heavily around a strong control of Ring, Sniper and Carbine. The team being pinned in their base get four down on the other, and let's say have two left alive (to fulfil the requirement of an earned advantage). Under existing Halo principles, that's the time for those two to push up and try to secure some semblance of map control or dominance. Map control/dominance isn't inherently an absolute thing, but a balance of power. It takes time for this balance to shift in sheer physical, position based terms, this time is allowed for by "getting numbers" on the other team being a second to second aim. Without respawn timers in the above example, the moment the previously dominant team are killed at their position of Ring, they spawn in a safe and relevant area (their side of the map) and immediately push back to try and grab the key position. The players on the other team who immediately push up after the enemies died aren't met with a position they fought for, they're met with another fight. Even aside from the fact that instant respawn can help spawn campers as much as it can hurt them (ie. making it so they can regain the position from which they spawn camped much easier even if the spawn campees manage to take them down), it epitomises the "hold forward" approach to second-to-second competitive strategy. Then perhaps you need to look with less jaded eyes. You're not even beginning to account for how fundamental the respawn penalty mechanic is to the gameplay experience, how other mechanics must co-exist with it and maps be designed around it (and even that doesn't really convey it, as the basic choice of how to do respawn penalty heavily impacts upon the basic map design ethos, not just the specific designs themselves). You're talking about justifying a fundamental change by saying it addresses a specific and circumstantial issue. One, I'd disagree that it truly does address this, and Two, you're ignoring the other effects of such a change.
Read it. Couldn't help myself. I agree with everything you say here. Death should be a penalty. According to CoD and now Halo 4, it is going to make the casual gamer lose interest. Power weapons, high ground, and good positioned cover should be an incentive to get players to move. This is how they draw people in, get people to fight. These are advantages, but they are earned advantages. Without it, they are encouraging camping. They are then creating a stupid armor ability to head it off. That is what happens when you mix up a recipe. There is more chance for disaster. Personally I think they should keep the old weapon spawning, but implement something to help the struggling team take away that advantage. Instant respawn though, that is just ridiculous. You are rewarding people for dying. People won't mind dying, if they don't care about K/D ratio.
You guys should learn, Pegasi is never wrong. He is literally a computer program/robot with a british accent. (Basically we're of the same opinion)
You can't apply one standard to one specific situation which is what I'm doing without making an equal case for applying that standard to multiple situations which is what you're glossing over. It's like the "is abusing a glitch cheating" discussion. Just because the designer made a mistake and left a glitch is it ok for players to abuse it for their advantage? In a practical sense, yes. The glitch is there and until an official source says not to do it there is no reason not to. In an ethical moral sense, no. If you are doing something against the spirit of what was intended, it is not morally acceptable. I'm only saying this in regards of "shifting the blame from the player to the map" which only ever occurs in situations where players like to things against intended ideal. That intended ideal I will go more into in a bit. And in that very description of what "controlling a map" entails, you think the handful of seconds offered by a respawn timer is deeply innerworked into those facets? In an idealized environment perfect balance would be a flat plane where the only deciding factor is skill. As this environment would get pretty boring after awhile of course variations have to be introduced. The problem is as soon as those variations are applied the "perfect balance" is no longer true. Things such as height variance, cover, even objects that could cause lag induce balance changes. Now these are static. They do not change therefore the gameplay rebalances itself because everyone has access to these elements over the course of a game. It is still not a perfect balance thus "inherent imbalance" in the system. Those who can utilize those small imbalances are better off because of it. An imbalance is an imbalance regardless of how useful or crucial to gameplay you might think it is. It's a circumstantial premise because this whole conversation is circumstantial. Halo 4 has not come out yet and we have not had instant respawns in MM games. So you thinking it would not be good is just as circumstantial as me saying it won't matter. So from me saying that if there are instant respawns in team slayer it would not have a significant impact over gameplay but have a direct effect on people's ability to spawn camp or trap (they really are the same thing people, whether you're one person waiting for some guy to spawn in 1 spot or covering zones with a team forcing your enemy to spawn in predictable areas) you take it as scrap all those ideals, "lines of sight, weapon placement/spawn times, etc" of what constitutes "map control". Tell me where my point was flawed again? I'm not the one tying disparate things together and saying the system will be flawed because of it. Your "earned advantage" comes from the point you gave your team. It comes from the fact that now that player has to get back to the position they were killed and potentially lose out on whatever position or weapon was being fought over. The respawn timer has little control over that process. Also that is still a platitude that adds spin to what something is. "An advantage" regardless of being earned is an imbalance....so they are the same thing. So it is "senseless" to act like they are not. Again, I'm not saying every imbalance is bad and should be done away with. You are putting those words in my mouth. I am saying that for team slayer at least the respawn timer is not a good imbalance. In cases that it would be good, which is what bows pointed out, is when your shields are down and that respawn timer gives you the time your shields need to recharge or for you to run away to a safer position. That is the only situation where your enemy spawning instantly after you kill them would be bad and only in the case of your enemy spawning within close proximity to you, which is not something that should happen often if spawn weighting is done right. I'm not sure what this means. Are you suggesting the case that I addressed with bows and again right above this quote? The penalty comes from your team being down a player or more if more than 1 is dead. By extension the team that is now up that many people is rewarded doubly. Once for getting the points for the kills in the first place, and now having the extra time to stake up better positions for added kills due to the team who just lost people's man disadvantage. On a small scale it is a continually downward trending system that game developers try to avoid. Because this situation corrects itself through the course of a match many times it is seen as not a big deal or worth a fuss but that doesn't mean the problem doesn't exist. Defending a continually punishing system brought on by one specific thing, the respawn timer makes no sense to me. If you do away with it you make it much harder for that system to take place. The consequences of removing it have still not been made clear to me by any of you other then you guys saying it would ruin the gameplay. Give me a realistic scenario depicting the negative effects of an instant respawn (the only one I heard thus far is the case bows brought up, which I addressed) and I might be better inclined to agree. I'm not the one saying when one side has more players then the other then it is balanced. "Earned advantage" is a subjective opinion based on how much leeway you think you should be given after killing someone. In a perfect system your only earned anything would be just the score you're given for accomplishing the task. Anything else is an entitlement brought on by the situation. And boy do we like our entitlements. How is that the logical conclusion of anything I said. In fact...all of that was too stupid for a rebuttal, shame on you pegasi. You essentially made my point for me. Dying is the penalty. Your team now has less points then the other team. What your saying is that if a player dies, their entire team deserves the weakened state that puts them in and the higher likelihood of more deaths because of it. In a slayer match that directly affects the outcome of the match on a "second-to-second" basis. The position penalty resulting from having to respawn induces a time penalty as you said. Why do you think making that process longer (through the respawn timer) is what drives the gameplay? The player that killed the enemy player will still be where they are, whether that was near a power weapon or near a strategic position. The only thing those 4 seconds offered them was a chance for the rest of the team to have a greater % to kill the remaining enemies due to overwhelming numbers. I pick team slayer as the situation because this whole discussion is based on the premise of instant respawning only being in slayer gametypes. I didn't impose that disparity, the details of the basis of this discussion did. I limit my discussion to team slayer because that is my decision to do so. I could make cases for free for all and other kinds of slayer but I'm choosing a situation where the potential prospect of instant respawning might help gameplay better. I don't predispose my argument on what I'm used to, I think about both the positives and negatives inherent in the change and to me there are more positives then negatives or at least the negatives do not outweigh the positives. You have not given me any specifics of why instant respawning would be bad within slayer other then assume it would entail the doom for competitive gameplay as we know it. And again, I go back to do you think the respawn timer was the deciding factor in any of that? If you think it was then I think you over giving attributes to gameplay settings that didn't exist to begin with. So, assuming the team doing the attacking has all 2 of their teammates alive out of 6 players total and the defending team has all 6 players. Now the defending team has 4 more points. Now the defending team presses forward because the attacking team is at a disadvantage for that position. The time it takes for the attacking team to get back to position even if they instantly respawn gives the now pushing up defending team the time to take better positions. You're saying that giving them a few more seconds to give them even better positions is the reward for killing those players. I'm saying that is the subjective part, that is the part that makes it imbalanced, and that is the part that if it was removed the gameplay would not be significantly altered. Players would still need to get back to where the fight happened to reclaim better positions. Instant respawns would just ensure the rest of the team doesn't get put at a disadvantage leading to a downward spiral (even if it is a small one). What? What other fight? What fight do you think goes on in the absence of those few respawn seconds? The player that killed would hold their position or advance on the better position if they killed the player that was in it. How would exactly does that process change in your mind and why do you think that change impacts anything on any significant scale? On a nonsignificant scale, yes the player that won a battle might not get quite as far as they might have if they were going toward a particular position and the opponent instantly spawned in a location equidistant from it or possibly closer. The "reward" of increased odds of getting that position because of your increased survival odds due to more manpower is what you're arguing about, not because of some perceived change to gameplay. ...what? How does the spawn timer affect that process at all? Whether I spawn instantly or in a minute I would try to get back to a location I had a successful time getting kills from. "Much easier" is true only if they instantly spawned near where they spawn camped and if that is true then the player that killed them would probably still be in that location. You're acting like the dynamics of what goes on in match somehow would deeply change because of no longer having the "power play" (to use the hockey analogy again) advantage. The players in favorable positions won't change because of or lack of a respawn timer and the players who were advancing on positions or weapons will still be advancing toward them regardless of a timer. How close they get to those positions might be affected but again you feel players deserve that extra incentive for getting a kill on top of increased score. My contention is that extra incentive is not gameplay breaking and you have ever right to defend that incentive but labeling it as gameplay essential is crap and you've poorly defended it as such. Then enlighten me. Telling me that it "does" does not tell me how it does. You said it earlier in your own argument. The penalty would be position due to having to respawn away from where you were fighting and the derivative of that is time because you have to spend the time to get back to that location or to a new one. "Extra" time is the incentive. Jaded would be tailoring my own playstyle and gameplay preferences into a discussion regarding the core mechanics and how what specific change effects this specific outcome. I engage in all the same practices that everyone else does but I can still look at things objectively to determine how they would be impacted if specific things change. I don't wool over my eyes something just because I'm used to it. If you break down a team slayer game enough the basic fundamental is it is two sides trying to get to a score cap. Everything else is derivative off of that. Whether it is bloom, movement speed, height variance, jump height, cover, line of sight, weapon balance, vehicle balance, whatever, all those things effect the percentage each team has to accomplish the fundamental task of kill the other team to get to this score. Again, are you telling me the respawn timer is such an integral facet of that formula that to remove it would be detrimental to the game? If so I don't believe it and would need comparative proof of a match with no respawn timer and a match with the normal respawn timer. I would need to hear each player's opinion on which match seemed better and how they thought the timer affected the final score. As I said at the start of all of this, the entire conversation is circumstantial. The instant respawn timer is only being discussed given a specific gametype grouping and in a game that has not come out yet. I would argue hardly a fundamental change and you've done little to dissuade me from that other then to just say it is. What you have given me is an argument as to why you think players should be given that extra reward for killing players on top of just score but not why the spawn timer is integral to the gameplay process.
i also remain unconvinced that press to spawn will have a significant negative effect on normal MM team slayer. you'll still have plenty of time to "gain map control" in almost every situation. it's not like they'll instantly spawn in the exact spot you just killed them, they'll spawn halfway across the map in most cases.
My thoughts exactly. No but seriously, Halo 2 and 3 had ARGs that were pretty interesting, so why not Halo 4. At first I though Project: Icefly was the ARG, but I'm not so sure now.
For tonight this will have to do: You've misunderstood three key terms here. One is, again, balance. You equate advantage to imbalance, very few in game design or analysis terms will agree with this vast oversimplification. Imbalance is advantage without appropriate demand required to gain it. Advantage is an observable instance or fact. Imbalance or balance is a value judgement placed upon this instance or fact. Second is circumstantial. When I say circumstantial, I don't mean conjecture based on something we haven't played. I mean it's specific to given circumstances. You initially posited the idea that not only is instant respawn appropriate for Slayer but not objective, but then even within that accounted for the fact that it's circumstantial within Slayer, that the problem you're asserting that it counters is only a problem itself in some circumstances. Or in other terms, surprise surprise, certain maps. Third is advantage. A point is not an advantage. A point is a point, you get more than the other team to a win a game. An advantage is an in-game dynamic, a situation that is worked for (well, in principle, *glares at AAs off spawn*) to gain added potential for gaining further kills. So, to recap: Advantage =! Imbalance Circumstantial =! Conjecture A Point =! Advantage I could pull up plenty of further examples, such as how you clearly just didn't understand the word "jaded" there, but those are the important ones. I hate to sound condescending (though obviously not enough to actively head off that possibility...), but I'm actually finding your grasp of certain language here to be a bit of a barrier to discussion. EDIT: Also, aside from all of the above, since your support of instant respawn has progressed to a detailed progression of, for want of a better word, reasoning, do you still support your assertion that respawn penalty is still appropriate for objective gametypes? If so then I'm yet more surprised.
Idealized to who..? That describes a game that only satisfies people who only want to test their twitch shooting ability. That is a very limited and reductive take on what even the most self-declared "competitive" players want from a game. But yes, respawn timers do have meaning, which is why they existed for all prior Halo games and why there were respawn penalties for things like suicide and betrayal, plus the ability to change the respawn timer based on kill streak, etc. This wasn't just random player punishment. Sigh. How on earth are those the same thing to you, even if you're rabidly opposed to both of them in any context? The time it takes a person exiting a firefight to regenerate their shields, pick up weapons, and get behind cover is something that is directly affected by the respawn timer, particularly on smaller maps. Imagine I die at top health pack on Countdown, then insta-respawn in one of the standard locations - say, my team's big door or adjacent to the lift room. I could 'nade the person who just killed me from that spot before he has a chance to do any of the things I just mentioned. That's not significant? You can argue it's actually a positive for gameplay somehow, but you can't possibly argue that it wouldn't happen - unless they change the spawn system in such a way that you never spawn physically near, or with a direct LOS to, the area you just died. And since no Halo spawn system has ever worked that way 100% of the time... Which, in Halo, happens almost constantly. A "perfect system"... hoo boy. I don't know what game you want to play, but it's not one that looks like any previous Halo game... or any FPS ever made, actually. Team-oriented FPS games are full of earned advantages, and all players like to have them. They need to be kept within limits so that winning one battle doesn't award you the entire game, but doing away with them entirely would satisfy no one. You seem to want to play a far less complex and rich game than the rest of us do. I'd go on but... walls of text, blah blah blah. If this conversation is going to continue I think we all need to find a way to reduce word count, lest we bore ourselves and everyone else into a coma.