W2:
- Removed damage bonus on big flame pyros, made them Easy skill
- Lowered amount of crit soldiers from 16 -> 14 to reduce the chance of a few straggling
W3:
- Increased engie WaitBetweenSpawns from 6 -> 7. Made them Support Limited. Increased WaitBeforeStarting from 0 -> 15.
W4:
- Lowered amount of ghuntsmen from 8 -> 6, fire rate bonus changed from 0.3 -> 0.6, reload speed bonus removed
- Gave colonels and gbrasses Tag noflank and Tag forcefollowbombpath
- Increased gbrass WaitBeforeStarting from 16 -> 16.5 to stop them stacking with the colonels
W5:
- Reduced engie WaitBetweenSpawns from 8 -> 7. Made them Support Limited. Increased WaitBeforeStarting from 5 -> 15
- Reduced Rocket and Grenade Walls MaxActive from 2 -> 1
- Lowered gdeflector WaitBetweenSpawns from 13 -> 12
W6:
- Changed possible paths to only middle, left path does not play well
- Changed music to only use 1 wavespawn, and use # to be controllable by music volume
- Replaced tomislav heavies with stock minigun heavies
- Replaced gdf pyros with gbison bursts to put more pressure on medic shields
If an expert mission is defined at the standards that were used for Anniversary Annihilation, then this mission missed the mark very badly. It is a pure two-cities spamfest that is primarily a test of how much [crit] damage the team can shell out above all else. The only redeeming feature of this mission is the engineer getting behind the front lines and dropping a teleporter near the hatch, which at times (depending on the location of the bomb) caused a multi-sided assault (left, right, and behind), which is a worthy feature for expert difficulty. Aside from that, most of the difficulty derives from throwing tons of giant robots (especially a massive overuse of giant scouts, with more than half the waves using giant scouts) and slapping crits onto every other robot. The last wave alone featured 40 giant robots and 4 tanks. The wave with 2 tanks and 6 dragon fury pyros (wave 3?) should not have 1200 HP bowmen on infinite support, which is essentially pseudo-infinite giant support.
This mission would be better suited as a high-cash, spammy advanced mission after dialing the difficulty down in some places but it is not appropriate for expert and should not be admitted to an event in its current state. We have not tested this with a 2 cities meta but we predict that most of the rubbish that is thrown by this mission can be quickly neutralized with a heavy-medic combo, which is likely what the public would use in a live event.
(This post was last modified: 03-04-2023, 10:17 PM by Pineapple Medals Bot.
Edit Reason: fix comma
)
Wave 1:
-The crits absolutely do not belong on this wave.
-The wave felt like sheer shitspam that could be either easily countered with medic or would steamroll you. No in between.
Wave 2:
-Even more crits!
-The all-crit gimmick is only good when there aren't crits on other waves AND when the bots can be dodged. Neither of these apply this wave.
-Probably one of the least objectionable waves, surprisingly.
Wave 3:
-One subwave wave. Structure the wave better so it's not just everything at once.
-The engineers on this wave (and every wave in general) were spammed to a pretty absurd degree--you'd kill them and they'd come back like mosquitoes.
Wave 4:
-By this point there was so much money that we could buyback spam. The waves never got "easier" so to speak, but the wave length was awfully short and therefore anyone with enough brain to spam canteens/buybacks would snooze through this wave and every subsequent wave.
-I suppose giant spam is only one level above common spam in enjoyability...
Wave 5:
-This wave was awfully forgettable and felt like a repeat of wave 4. See above as well.
Wave 6:
-This would have been an easy wave had it not been for the "no crit canteen" restriction on judges. See feedback for waves 4 and 5.
Overall:
-This mission really doesn't have too much going for it. It wasn't enjoyable almost at all, and definitely needs an overhaul.
(03-04-2023, 10:16 PM)Pineapple Medals Bot Wrote: This mission is very deserving of a strike and it's surprising that it got this far without any strikes.
If an expert mission is defined at the standards that were used for Anniversary Annihilation, then this mission missed the mark very badly. It is a pure two-cities spamfest that is primarily a test of how much [crit] damage the team can shell out above all else. The only redeeming feature of this mission is the engineer getting behind the front lines and dropping a teleporter near the hatch, which at times (depending on the location of the bomb) caused a multi-sided assault (left, right, and behind), which is a worthy feature for expert difficulty. Aside from that, most of the difficulty derives from throwing tons of giant robots (especially a massive overuse of giant scouts, with more than half the waves using giant scouts) and slapping crits onto every other robot. The last wave alone featured 40 giant robots and 4 tanks. The wave with 2 tanks and 6 dragon fury pyros (wave 3?) should not have 1200 HP bowmen on infinite support, which is essentially pseudo-infinite giant support.
This mission would be better suited as a high-cash, spammy advanced mission after dialing the difficulty down in some places but it is not appropriate for expert and should not be admitted to an event in its current state. We have not tested this with a 2 cities meta but we predict that most of the rubbish that is thrown by this mission can be quickly neutralized with a heavy-medic combo, which is likely what the public would use in a live event.
While I have made some major changes to the mission, there are still some statements in this post I disagree with.
Quote:It is a pure two-cities spamfest
Higher cash warrants more bots. The mission gives plenty of cash to kill plenty of bots. The cash given is adequate to deal with everything.
Quote:that is primarily a test of how much [crit] damage the team can shell out above all else
This is just MvM in general.
Quote:most of the difficulty derives from throwing tons of giant robots ... The last wave alone featured 40 giant robots and 4 tanks
While some waves have been reworked to rely on stronger common robots, I don't see much of an issue with throwing a constant stream of giants at the players. The same way how throwing tons of commons at players can work, throwing tons of giants at players isn't always a bad thing. Valve missions like Desperation and Broken Parts already pull off similar feats.
Quote:especially a massive overuse of giant scouts, with more than half the waves using giant scouts
While the giant scouts usage has been lowered, I don't see much of an issue with liberal use of giant scouts, especially in expert. They act as a sort of skill check, forcing players to pay close attention to them, well suited to being commonly used in expert missions.
Quote:This mission would be better suited as a high-cash, spammy advanced mission after dialing the difficulty down in some places
I don't see why a high-cash, spammy expert mission wouldn't work. Compared to an advanced, the mission applies much more pressure each wave, provides less room for error, and overall, just requires more player skill to progress. This makes it an expert in my eyes.
Quote:we predict that most of the rubbish that is thrown by this mission can be quickly neutralized with a heavy-medic combo
Anything gets destroyed by a heavy-medic combo, balancing around medic in general is not a good idea.
W2:
- Possible paths are now right and left
- Replaced gsoldiers with gburst demos
- Added 3 quickubers
- Replaced gscouts with fat scouts
- Phlogs now spawn on spawnbot_topflank
- Big flame pyros are now Normal Skill
- Replaced crit soldiers with charged soldiers
W3:
- Uses regular wave_start_relay instead of wave_start_relay_aggressiveengis
- Engies removed
- Gdf pyros removed
- Pyro support added
- Heavy MaxActive reduced from 6 -> 4, SpawnCount reduced from 4 -> 2, TotalCount reduced from 45 -> 30, Skill increased from Easy to randomchoiced Hard and Normal
- Demo MaxActive increased from 4 -> 5
- Bowmen WaitBefore starting increased from 6 -> 35, TotalCount reduced from 8 -> 6, increased WaitBetweenSpawns from 8 -> 9, Spawncount increased from 1 -> 2, removed crits
- First 2 tanks hp increased from 19k and 16k -> 26k + 23k
- 22k tank added
W4:
- Replaced batts grapids with batts gbursts, reduced buff duration bonus from 9 -> 2.5
- Replaced kritz meds with bigheals, pyros spawn in streams now
- Replaced ghuntsmen with scouts
W5:
- Engie + bigheal TotalCount reduced from 30 -> 20
- Lowered amount of gbonks from 5 -> 4
- Lowered amount of gblasts from 4 -> 3, new template used that fires slower rockets
- Removed Rocket and Grenade Walls, added conches and shortstops to 2nd sub instead
- Reduced Persians TotalCount from 36 -> 12, reduced MaxActive from 6 -> 3, removed from Support
- Reduced Gdeflector WaitBetweenSpawns from 12 -> 11
W6:
- Now has all 3 paths activated simultaneously
- spawnbot_topflank super scouts now spawn from spawnbot
- Reduced direct hit TotalCount from 25 -> 20
- Reduced heavy support TotalCount from 40 -> 30
- Reduced bison burst TotalCount from 6 -> 4, WaitBetweenSpawns increased from 13 -> 13.5
- Reduced bigrock burst TotalCount from 5 -> 4, WaitBetweenSpawns increased from 13 -> 13.5
- Reduced gburst shotgun TotalCount from 8 -> 7, WaitBetweenSpawns increased from 13 -> 13.5
- Reduced final tank WaitBeforeStarting from 120 -> 114
(This post was last modified: 04-06-2023, 04:26 AM by Quantum Apple.)
W1:
Crit bat scouts made into Hard scattergun scouts
W2:
Shotgun heavies Skill increased from Normal -> Hard
Mitten TotalCount reduced from 30 -> 20, MaxActive reduced from 12 -> 6, SpawnCount lowered from 3 -> 1, WaitBetweenSpawns reduced from 1.5 -> 0.5
Pistol Scouts added
Charged soldiers reverted to Crit soldiers
W3:
- Heavy MaxActive increased from 4 -> 6
W4:
1/3 Bigheals replaced with quickubers
W5:
Gave conches crits, TotalCount lowered from 16 -> 15
Replaced Persians with soldiers + umeds
Increased gdeflector MaxActive from 10 -> 15, lowered WaitBetweenSpawns from 11 -> 10
