Hey there ForgeHub! At long last the Extermination Contest has come to a close and we were able to crown five winners out of nearly one hundred submissions! The contest had an amazing turn out and we were completely stoked to see how eager and willing you all were to get involved in what was essentially a virgin game mode cooked up by your very own customs monkeys. We at the ATN value an array of things, but among all of those things feedback is one of the most valuable. Extermination was built and developed from intensive testing and feedback from not just the ATN team but from a multitude of players from all walks. Now that the contest has come to a close, we once again want to hear YOUR thoughts and see YOUR feelings. ---------------------------------------------------------- We are looking to tackle a few major questions and we would love your input. The topics include: How do the contest winners compare to the launch maps for the mode? Do you feel that one group performs better than the other? What puts certain maps above others in your book? Does Extermination function well with players you cannot communicate with? After a brief stint in matchmaking, many of you got to experience Exterm solo-queue or partial-queue. Do you feel that the mode performs well either way is is full communication an absolute must? Does Extermination have replay value? Why or why not? We are looking to implement a new wave of Experimental Extermination Variants. These new modes would be live firing ranges for a variety of concepts for new Exterm types to enjoy. What changes would you like to see implemented into Extermination? What objectives do you think would compliment the fast-paced, elimination based mode? When building a map for Extermination, what is your biggest hurdle? What is your biggest like and dislike of the mode? ---------------------------------------------------------- Now, you're probably thinking, Ascend, that's a hellavu lotta questions! You expect me to answer all of those?! Haha, no you silly goose. Feel free to answer whatever speaks to you. These are topics we are looking to gather info on in general and are of importance to us. That being said, we don't wanna limit you. If you have pertinent feedback that exists outside the boundaries of these topics feel free to share. Phew, that's a lot of text. Well if you made it this far, here's one last note. We at ATN appreciate the time you take to provide this feedback. It is critical to the process. Remember to be respectful to others as they're thoughts are just as valuable as your own but don't be afraid to dispute and discuss thoughts. In the end, this is feedback focused.
The only issue I noticed with map making for the gametype was the slim window for approved maps. It seems like the game type creators had an ideal experience in mind and anything outside of that is dismissed. It kind of limits what can be done with the maps besides a simple low-mid-high 3 lane. With more testing on asyms it could be different but the majority of maps made so far are symm. You seem to have a better chance at making a successful extermination map by taking an approved template layout and decorating it with a theme
I would still like to experiment with objectives for this mode. I think 'headhunter' would be a perfect game type to combine with this mode. King of the Hill is also something that could easily be implemented. Overall, I'd like to see more experimentation with the mode I know its not possible to script at this point but I always thought that providing the last man standing with a waypoint marker would speed things up in the right places. Similar to the way we can spot players holding a flag in CTF to notify our teammates of their location.
I would like to say i helped with the first version of the Extermination scripting. Of course most/all of it might have been replaced/overhauled by the end, by the gravemind @Max Extra is. However, right before launch i fixed the pesky spawn switching issue. My thoughts on the mode, are that its fun, when it's fair. (I hate losing. lol.)
I think that would eliminate one of the most exciting and tension inducing elements of the game - the 10 seconds where you must use your cunning and map knowledge to stay alive until your team mates spawn back in.
A classic setting mode and set of maps would be a nice variation (albeit the easiest choice) It's not really a dynamic that could be easily implemented as a standard, but bits of a map could be scripted to change with each round (Shrek style with dem onions)
my only issue with the game mode is that on PC, a lot haven't heard of it (noobs and people out of touch with the news about halo in general) so you get a few ppl to join, but you don't have a solid 4v4 group going. Then it sucks. It's hard to get the ppl who are there to understand how fun it would be if there were a full room. That is completely out of anyone's control, however.
I think thats just going to be the issue with PC halo players for a while until either cross platform is a thing or computer gaming becomes more wide spread. the people who love to play halo are already on xbox and its going to take some time for PC users to pick up on it. Do you mean like an H3 setting sort of deal? Im fairly certain this identify the leader can be accomplished. my issue with this is that one its slightly complicated to pull off, and there is a ton of room for this to break which makes it improbable. Since the focus of the game type is on teamwork adding the waypoint doesnt seem inline with our goals. Similar to what @NOKYARD said.
I had an idea for last man standing wayoints, but after thinking it through more, realized it wsa half-brained and definitely is not as easy as it sounds initially... I may be back if I figure it out though. I will offer to help with this, but I am only on PC so if you want to coordinate please do so here.
Why bother? It would be like adding a "Push button to win", or "HEY EVERYONE TOSS YOUR GRENADES HERE" sign over the player's head. It's fine for Infection due to the hiding places found on most maps, but a last man standing waypoint in Extermination would ruin a perfectly fine game. Why mess with perfection?
I kind of agree. It's already somewhat easy for a team to find and kill that last player. I was just thinking of it as a problem-solving thought experiment. Anyway, if someone wants to try this, I think it would be as simple as. ( doing a variation of this to implement a feature on a map) Script brain: Script 1: on timer (pick an interval you like) number change global var set to Count of Team(x) - exclude dead Script 2: same, opposite team, new var Scripts 3-4: (1 each team) on number check global var = 1 Nav Point Change Add "Kill" or something to Team(x) Similar scripts to check when numbers are not 1, and remove nav points.
"How do the contest winners compare to the launch maps for the mode? Do you feel that one group performs better than the other? What puts certain maps above others in your book?" Atlas and Alpha-Niner are essentially the same as Harbinger, Timeframe, Watch, and Remains. In that they all have a high side with a power-up, and a low side with a power weapon. If you boil it down, they're all basically a modified version of isolation. Yeah, Isolation. Abyss is a combination of Citadel and Longest. Augury is Sanctuary. Firewall is actually the only map with an original layout, even though I'd argue that the sides aren't completely balanced for opening pushes. So if the purpose of the contest was to reward maps with original designs, then it was a failure. I'd have to say that Alpha-Niner plays the best in my opinion out of the contest winners. Except, it was built and tested well before the contest was announced so according to some judges it shouldn't have even been allowed in the contest anyway.
I could make a pretty lengthy post about how I think extermination could be improved if that's what this thread is looking for
Okay fine I'll give my feedback. I'll start with the positive. I think Extermination is the best custom gametype to come out of Halo since Conquest, and it's much more competitively viable than Conquest too which is a bonus. The entire concept of it is good; be aggressive and win. Anything that fights the trend Halo has been following since 2004 of perpetually slowing the game down is a good thing, and Extermination does this. That being said I find a lot of core settings that makeup the gametype current problematic. The current implementation is sloppy. Games are sloppy, uncoordinated, and unpredictable. You could argue otherwise anecdotally but the fact is that it is way too difficult to actually force team wipes on anything but minuscule maps (Which is what Extermination is, I understand that). In essence, the quicker you respawn in Extermination the smaller maps must be to compensate with that. Which leaves us where we are now; you can't have any meaningful depth or creativity in a map the size of a fish bowl. It's just not easily feasible and it never will be with 15 second respawns and dynamic respawns. I've recommended bumping it to 20 second respawns before and the general responses I got were "It makes the game too slow, people just want to jump into the action. Also it shortens the average round time and we want the average extermination match to not be really short." Okay 1: The perceivable difference of a player on death with a 15 second respawn to 20 second respawn is effectively negligible. What it does do is allow your maps to be what, 33% more dense, more intricate, larger? That's significant. And anything that will allow you guys to make maps that aren't minuscule 3 lanes is a plus and should be considered. The gametype already emphasizes raw aggression and technical skill, that's good. Now appeal to the other end of the spectrum and introduce mental skill. The difference here is akin to playing Search and Destroy on Nuketown as opposed to playing Search and Destroy on De_Dust. Same gametype, same principles. One is an ocean of depth and the other is trying to swim in the piss I just took in the trash can. 2: If the goal is to lengthen the average extermination matches, that's fine. But don't do so by compromising the competitive integrity of the game, there are other more structured and controllable ways of doing it. Otherwise you're valuing extending the length of matches for no reason and sacrificing other elements to do it. The most apparent example is through the non sided spawns. Which by the way, I consider the absolute biggest problem for Extermination. Why are people spawning in every ****ing corner of an abysmally small map? It's already difficult to secure kills in Halo 5 due to shitty kill times and a whole slew of defensive mobility options. But now players aren't even going to spawn on their respective end of the map? The Halo 5 spawn system is already hilariously broken and has extremely unpredictable spawn influence. The short respawns and non-sided spawns together make Extermination as sloppy as it currently is. I'll stop bitching. My suggestions; make sure teams have sided spawns, and bump the respawns. This does serveral things. Primarily you can afford to make maps much, much, MUCH more complex than they currently are without sacrificing any of the speed you currently have. The easiest example I can give would be to imagine playing on an actual to-scale Narrows. Initial engagements would happen, and then you push, kill, push, kill, push, kill, until eventually they were pressed into their end of the map and not respawning ****ing who knows where and you could force team wipes. The only parameter at this point would be that the back ends of whatever maps feed all paths together so you could push, trap, and end the round (which is already the case with current Extermination maps). However you don't need to worry about people quite literally randomly spawning elsewhere by no reward of their own, and your maps could have actual depth. Size. Verticality. Density. Anything really, there's no bars. In fact I'd bet a to-scale Narrows under these settings would more frequently end rounds through team wipes then the current bite-size Narrows that's in matchmaking, on account of the fact that in current Extermination if you push too much they spawn behind you. Which is stupid, and counter principled to the whole idea of the gametype which is too push. You don't want to push too much now because you'll flip the spawns, that's ridiculous. You spend so much time just frantically looking around hoping to find the last mine wherever he might be. That's not competitive; that's random. And anything random doesn't belong in a competitive experience. TLDR; Sided spawns will allow you to introduce actual depth and properly sized maps while retaining all the aggression that you value while ALSO keeping the round times respectable by allowing multiple engagements as teams battle down the map to the enemy spawn. Respawn bump will help fight against the ridiculous survivability there is in H5 while contributing to the potential for actual map depth, and probably lose just about no pacing in the process. Side note; I've asked several times why there is radar in Extermination and I've been told is makes the game play faster. I honestly refuse to believe this; we have 16 years of competitive Halo telling us that radar does nothing but slow the game down and somehow magically the opposite is true for Extermination? Sorry, not buying it. That's never been the case. And even if that were the case; I'm going to go on a limb and say that the minor increase in speed you get from radar is probably not worth the moment to moment gameplay benefits you would receive without it. And if any of my above recommendations were implemented than radar effectively becomes completely negligible. Also, I don't know if it's been tested but maybe actually give 1 point per kill and if the round goes to time then the team with more kills wins instead of just drawing? It seems fair, and would only help promote aggression for the team that might be down players because no matter how far behind they can still win by wipe. And the winning team can solidify the lead by continuing to get kills. But yeah, I like Extermination. And I like the concept and principles of extermination. I just think the current implementation compromises too much for the wrong reasons. Give this some thought.
Also worth noting. 1 life modes will never be Halo's strength. 99% of Halo's depth comes from the way the game progresses, how you react off of respawn. How the map is shifted and controlled throughout the game. How different weapon spawns and player cyclings change the map. Most arena shooters work through this basis. And most games that succesfully do 1 life modes do so through extraordinarily quick kill times and/or significant gun skill. CoD and Counter Strike have extremely quick kill times that allow single players to challenge full teams and provided they have the gunskill, they can come out on top. Counterstrike is famous for its fixed spray patterns which allow crazy kill times and precision if the players can muster it. Halo doesn't have either of these. We don't have quick kill times which makes even a 1v2 extremely unlikely, and as a console shooter with absolutely balls to the wall aim assist, we don't have much of a mechanical gun skill either. Which means Halo has little potential for comeback, way less potential for outgunning compared to other great 1 life games, and you sacrifice just about everything else that makes Halo great in the meanwhile. Obviously Extermination isn't a 1 life mode in the strictest terms but my point is play to Halo's strengths. Build larger maps, give sided spawns, let players die and react in a structured way and in a team environment to progress. Not randomly around fishbowl sized arenas hoping to get picks.
@MultiLockOn We plan to increase spawns times at some point. The last thing I heard when you mentioned it the first time is its something we will look in to but wont change for the duration of the contest. I have been working on a way to allow us to move exterm away from the small maps so that it works on core maps or something in between core and where we are now. Static spawns was my solution or a hybrid spawn layout with fixed spawns in the back and neutral spawns in the middle. Both of these would allow us to play a larger map since you don't have to worry about them spawning on your side. The difficulty is that for the game type like breakout or mini-game sides do not swap on their own and we have had to create a scripting solution to force it. So it becomes a bit piece intensive for placing double spawns for asym maps when they swap. We could totally do this for sym maps though that don't use spawn swapping. A I have been working on a few layouts to allow for this. Making the maps larger will also open up for objective game types where the objective will end the game or an extermination. Currently small maps like we have do not support this very well. As for the score increase per kill. we have considered something like that. Last I checked the ability to tie out a round and give your team a break to try to recover was why we decided not to go with it. Another option we considered was an over time where we disabled respawns to help push for eliminations. again this works with symmetric maps but fails with asym ones where we need to swap the spawn order to get side swaps to occur. As for radar, one of the reasons we have it in is that it helps the casual player. We want this to be something that all players can pick up and enjoy. We were not strictly making this for competitive play. One thing we are looking to try here is a functionally reduced radar like the SA radar or something similar. Whether it sticks around or not, I don't know, but we wanted this to be as close to core halo as we could get it jut at a faster pace. and core halo came with radar so its there. The idea for this thread is get Ideas for how to improve and I am sure if we aren't already we can look into some or all of your suggestions. It wouldn't be right not to at least give them a chance since we would like to make extermination the best it can be. Thanks for the suggestions!
So if you add a point to capture that would cause a win that could help so you can make bigger maps. And, if you have that point only spawn for the last 30 seconds then that would help to eliminate draws. As long as it is fast for a player to capture it so it's worth it to push the objective. I feel that a point like this at the end of a match will succeed in helping bigger maps to be in extermination and it would add a bit of strategy to extermination.