Inso «Ð*§*§» "My 2 Cents"

Squad leaders Please pass this along to all of your member pilots. You may also feel free to post this in any forum, Web site, BBS, or where ever you see fit. (careful) :-)

Hello fellow Squad leaders, pilots, co-pilots, wingmen/women, friends and adversaries.

Inso «Ð*§*§» here. Ok now this is going to end up being a little lengthy so I apologize up front for taking up alot of your time, but this is of great importance too me as well as most I believe. I have a few issues that I need to discuss with all of you, but before I begin I need to address a concern you may have after reading this. I am not god, nor am I trying to play god, I don’t feel that I am the all-knowing ruler of C4 nor do I want to be. I want to play a game on a ethically level field, have fun and enjoy the company of people who share the same interest. My desire in this is only to improve the quality of the game for ALL of the people playing it, nothing more nothing less. That having been said I hope that what follows does not get misinterpreted or misunderstood.
The first issue that I would like to address with you is the efam bug. You may have already heard some rumors and begun to wonder, so I will clear that up right now. I have been working on a new version of Autoexplode trying to expand its abilities to weed out the remaining bugs we have left in the game. I have in fact killed, or better said, voided the use of the efam bug. This is a bit tricky to follow but I think you’ll get the idea. When AE is active players in the game will still be able to farp using the bug and receive all 28 of their stingers without the use of the efams. But only the first 12 rockets are actually hot, effective munitions, the remaining 16 rockets lmao, are duds. Ok, HOW THE? you may be asking yourself, here is how. The server knows that the player is not using efams (that’s how it knows what radar data to send to opponents) and AE tells the server that if a player is not using efams then he or she can ONLY be carrying 12 rockets. Thus when a player using the bug fires rocket number 13 the server does not even know it exists. The player using the bug is the ONLY ONE that will see those remaining rockets (13-28) being fired, no other player will be able to see them at all, because the server doesn’t know they exist therefore they cant be fired, hence no data to transfer to opponents visual or other. The end result, the cheats will get cheated out of their last 16 rockets, thinking that they have the upper hand, when in fact they have squat!!!! They might as well be spitting at you, cause all thats going to happen is it will splatter on there own screen. Man isn’t irony beautiful. The numbers used in this example were stinger quantities, but yes rest assured that it has the same effect for hydras and hellfire’s, although the numbers are different (Hydras is first 24 hot last 32 duds (total 56), Hellfire’s are first 6 hot last 8 duds (total 14).
The second thing I wanted to discuss with all of you is this "no count" information going around. I have read and heard many tid bits of information on this topic. I am not hear to slander or point fingers so don’t look for it!!!!!!! What I am hear for is too give you all the facts that I have acquired based on reading the articles, observing battles, and doing some of my own testing. The facts stated about the "no count" being a result of flare splash damage is in part the truth, "In Part!" Ok, follow this for a second Im going to bounce between real world and game world for a minute. If someone throws a concussion grenade at you, and it lands 15 feet away then goes off does it hurt? Hell YES! Does it kill you? Maybe, maybe not it probably will just wound you. But if someone throws 20 concussion grenades at you and they all land in a 15ft circle surrounding you, ummm, all those wounds equals-------your dead! Now, lets say that four guys threw those 20 grenades at you, who got the kill? No way of knowing for sure. Back to the game world, yes splash damage exists, how is the game to determine that it was the concussion of an explosion that caused the damage and not a tree, or a hanger roof? It can’t and because it really isn’t a "named hit" the tree gets credit as far as the game is concerned. Ok why is this happening so much? This is the only thing I have not read posted anywhere. So I’m going to give you my 2 cents. It is very simple, look at the grenade example above, this Helo your flying was designed to fire off stinger rockets at a rate of about 1 every 4+ seconds, Real world, addition (pilot reacts, pushes button, signal travels through the wire, computer gets the data and processes it, sends a signal to the release mechanism holding the rocket, and a signal to the rocket to begin burning its fuel cell, fuel cell lights starts to burn, arm releases stinger, stinger flies, reaches its target, target responds with counter measures (flares) flares impact stinger, stinger explodes, concussion throws the target off course and causes some damage. NOW there is a 5-10 second delay before this can all occur again, cycle rate on the stingers. Almost every pilot in the game (my self included) has modified his or her trigger to repeat+rapid fire. So look back at the grenade example again is 20 going to kill ya? Ok the following is FACT; find it at the army’s web site. Your 20mm cannon has a cycle rate of 1800 rounds per minute. Do the math and that equals 1800/60(seconds)=30 rounds a second. Now there are 1000 milli seconds in a second so continue the math, 1000/30 that works out to 1 bullet every 33.3 milli seconds. Now LOOK at the delay rate on your trigger, you want to fire stingers at a 30 milli (that’s .03 sec) second cycle rate? Or worse most have set lower than that. Ok one more hard thought for ya, you want the pc 2000 miles away across the web to receive the signal that you fired those stingers every 30ms LMAO your ping is twice and three times that at least!!!!!!!!! By the way the ping time is what’s called latency (time it takes to travel from point a to b). The signal used to transmit the rocket you just shot travels 3 times slower than you can fire them, and we haven’t accounted for the time it takes your pc to process the data and the receiving pc to process the data, AND YOU WONDER WHY IT DOSNT COUNT AS A HIT!!!! Please!!!!!! All right so what is he saying? <----- Is this you right now. Here’s what I’m saying I love my trigger tweak, do I think its a cheat, no I think its adaptation to the tools we have, used to our own advantage (the nature of the beast). BUT I am also saying that I know due to my trigger tweak giving me that super rapid fire that NOT all of my KILLS will count, and that is a cost I am willing to pay without complaining and nagging every other player out there about how when I shoot "them" it doesn’t count. If you don’t like the "no count" slow down the trigger rate!!!!!! Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that the game doesn’t have some lag, and that some "no counts" aren’t caused by other factors, I’m saying that this trigger mod causes about 85% of them. Also add into the fact that you have 16 pilots in one game firing 1 missile every 30ms and you wonder why the game lags? That’s my 2 cents on the "no count" PLEASE do not take my word for it!! Do your own test and research, get 10 or 12 trust worthy pilots into one server with the trigger mods off and watch the TOTAL difference in the game! We are altering the way this game was designed to be played by CHOICE, therefore we MUST be willing to voluntarily and gladly accept the responsibility of our own actions, or do not do it! I’m done talking about "no counts" negatively anyway, if you would like some help to determine the best setting for your conditions Ill gladly help you.
My last issue (thank god I hate typing, and your tired of reading I’m sure) is the scoring system that plagues us all. The rumor that you heard about someone altering the scoring was true. It was me! I have found a way to fix it, but I fear that it will only fuel the already hot fire. Why? You say, here is why
Currently
Score = Kills
p1 17k 22d score=17
p2 16k 02d score=16
This is BS as we all know.

So what I tried was subtracting 1 kill for each death that a pilot has
p1 17k-22d score=-5
p2 16k-02d score=14
Player 2 wins That looks better!!!!

But, here in lies the issue. Change it to this
p1 17k-16d score=1
p2 16k-14d score=2

Three minutes before the game ends another pilot enters and gets 3 kills bam, bam, bam but no deaths. The scorecard now looks like this----
p1 17k-16d score=1
p2 16k-14d score=2
p3 3k-0d score=3
Player 3 WINS~! Does player three deserve the win as a better pilot because he has lucky timing?

I really didn’t like that much better. So I changed it again, 1 kill is subtracted for every 2 deaths so the last game would look like this
P1 17k-(16/2) score=9
p2 16K-(14/2) score=9
p3 3k-0 score=3
Hmmmm, ok this looks better p1 and p2 are very close in their ability and p3 just joined so this is a little more of a true refection of ability.

Ok, so that may look good. But it got me to thinking, why did I make Autoexplode?, Why did I give it out to all for free? The answer, quite simply to improve the quality and equality of the game for EVERYONE that plays it. So I wondered, "Who the hell do you think you are that you can decide how everyone else is scored? You want to make fair scoring, but are making the decision without asking anyone! I began to realize that if I did that it would defeat my initial goal of equality for everyone. So I thought maybe one that allows the host to decide! OH my I think that would get messy in a hurry, no conformity and can see it splitting the c4 community into a million pieces.
So I am asking you, each and every one of you. How do YOU want it? I will post the idea's that are given to me and people can vote, respond, or ignore it. Maybe this is something that we can set up as a squad match rule but not public play. If we can reach a choice that everyone agrees on without the backlash later on "I don’t like this BS why did you change it", I will gladly fix the scoring. But if this is going to turn into a problem that was bigger than the dumb scoring we already have then why bother? I am asking for your input, feedback, ideas, opinions etc. I would like to hear everything!!! Whether it's FU or GJ!!!!!!! Ok I am done!!! Yaaaaaa

Kill ya Later! :-)

Inso «Ð*§*§»

If you would like to see how the scoring works please feel free to join a server
«Ð*§*§» Hydra Server is running
Score=K-D (1 to 1)
or
Stinger game at "Blood Sport" is running
Score=K-D/2 (1 to 2)


[Edited on 9-19-2002 by Inso «Ð*§*§»]

[Edited on 9-20-2002 by Inso «Ð*§*§»]

while i agree with you to the most! i dont not agree with takeing one point off every 2 deaths, i think that 1 death = -1 taken off, but i would have to see it in play, i understand that when someone joins and gets 3 kills, bam, bam, bam, and no deaths, i hate that, but if someone is killing 15 and dieing 15 then they are not doing that good and should not be scored good! thats all there is to it, 15-15 your barely killing one person then dieing. so, i dont like the "every 2 deaths -1 point" it should be every 1 death -1 point, or just dont use a custom scoreing system"

V.rAp†oR «L·R·S» :ar15:

i like the 1 kill -1 death but i also like the 2 deaths -1 kill we all need to agree on somthing so we can git back to the fun part of the game that is why we all bought it was for fun right not to argue abot 3 or 8 h or no kill counts or who is the reall winner in a game we all bought the game to have fun and that is my 2 cents:ar15:

[Edited on 9-20-2002 by Drake«Ð*§*§»]:flames::thumb:

[Edited on 9-20-2002 by Drake«Ð*§*§»]

why not do a poll?

INSO..Hats off to you for putting in the time and effort for making a fix for the current bugs. It has made C4 playable again. Playing in the DSS server last night and using the new scoring system was fun....but....I never had an issue with the scoring. It is all a matter of tactics. If you want to snipe, then you are going to have less deaths. If you want to go in balls out, then you will have more deaths. Its all about the kills, so the guy/gal with the most should win.

As far as the bug issue....thumbs up!!!! It has made the game fun again and has turned a bunch of pilots back into the game. Great job.....late

This is just one dog's opinion and I am a DuMas.

Yes lets do a poll! how and where? Get it started and post the link.

[Edited on 9-20-2002 by Inso «Ð*§*§»]

just hit "new poll" and start a new thread.

there is a poll box where you just list each item to be voted on.

each item on 1 line

i'll link up the threads 4 ya

Cg of course refers to comanche gold. in comanche gold a % or ratio is compaired to all players and the one with the BEST ratio is put on top . . . if you could award the BEST player ration a score of TOTAL NUMBER of players and then the next best would be TOTAL # - 1 etc etc . . .

the scoring would not take in acount kills or deaths BUT overall numbers and would award positions . . .

i myself have played with your system and i like it BUT i dont like the negative nuumbers . . .

and i know this is going a little far BUT what about adding playing times?

_______________________________
ok issue on the no kills . . .

for a while now it has been recognized by some who i will not disclose that the no kills were in part due to the way we dodge the stingers.

when we dodge many times the flairs will contact the stingers and at times this will cause the splash damage.

thus killing us . . . SO that said if you fire all your stingers as someone and they all hit the flairs and not the person you will most likely not get a kill at all . . .

i have found too as well if you slow the rate of fire to match the lag in a game you will score more (that is to say some times YES i am pressing the single fire key 5 or 6 times with .5sec between just to kill someone on a laged server) on oponets that dont dodge as well BUT on the same respect if that oponet did dodge good i would still get a no count . . .



so that is my friends the truth . . . and there is no denying the truth . . . just live with it . . . and try to find ways that you hit your oponet with out them taking splash damage.
well i hope this has been helpful.

_]

[Edited on 9-20-2002 by _ghost_]

inso id like to thank you for all the constant effort youve put into making this game fair for everyone.i am with whatever you think is best to handle all bugs etc & know if it didnt work you would then find something that does .it is obious that your working toward a level playing field & thats all that matters to me .keep up the great & much appreciated work your doing & all please remember this is a game we play for enjoyment & funn:bouncing:

I think that the idea of getting -1 point off every death even though that will make my score alot lower lol but I think it would make it more fair because I hate it when people win with like a 15 kill 20 death ratio or something like that because they didn't do that great so I don't think they deserve it but sometimes I do that but I still think it should be 1 death= -1 point or the 2 death= -1point they both sound like a good idea.


Killer

Hi Inso,

This is Mosquito SAI. I would just like to say "well done". I think you have hit all the big major points that everyone out there is talking about but has no confirmation on.. I am glad to see someone come forward and talk about these issues, outside the individual squads..THANK YOU... I also think that this is the cause for most of the problems, but like you talked about in your letter, your still playing over the internet (an unknown quantity).. In answer to your question at the bottom, the scoring, I like the idea very much. I also think you really cant use it in public games as of now. I think this would work well in matches or private servers. I still think we need to get the word out to all the other pilots, not on squads in order to use it. I know this is a very large task, but I think it could be a lot easier if all squad members that are out there can inform newbie's and veterans alike, that are not on squads, of what will be taking place.. Honestly, I don't think this will happen in real life. The newbie's wont understand. The veterans like playing the way they have been. I think the scoring concept that you have come up with must stay on private servers and matches.. Excellent letter... Kill you later..LOL

The bug

Two Modes:

Competition Mode:

Score - Kills = True Score

Public Mode:

Score as normal.

Make it an option. :)

I will give the new scoring system a try but i am afraid it might not work. I had a long post written out but i didnt realize that i had to register first before i could post so i lost all of the post data when i pressed post reply. Therefore, this one will be short and to the point..... i'll give it a try.

Would everybody please go to the new C4 Squad Central site as it represents the future of C4 and it will be a vital part of making this game truely fun. http://c4.jalopes.net/modules.php?name=Squad_Central . please explore the site and bocome familiar with it.

-Sickle SAI

Sickles idea is a good one.

Using AE and that, and you have a good foundation for the game's community.

A sort of C4 Ladder.

That's the way the best competitive games remain organized, fair, and have mediation for issues.

It would be good have a forum dedicated to such a ladder too, where Squads can make suggestions and communicate in general.

Perhaps a new forum can be hosted here?

Just a thought.

I want to start off by saying thank you for your hard work and dedication to a game that gets no support from its creators. You ARE the man!

I hate to do this but I am going to have to agree with :ar15: WetDog's comment :stupid: . Although the current scoring system is weak at best, I don't think changing it to 1d=-1 will be any better for regular game play. Don't like the idea of possibly having a negative score:shocked2:lol . I wouldn't mind the 2d = -1 in match and private server play.

We should have a few servers with the different options running, for a week or so, and then come back and do a poll. I think people will get a better feel and have a little time to get used to a different scoring option.

:mad: we will program a competition between squads and not participants of squads
hydras category, I think it would be good pilot for each show his ability and to be known as better of the world at the moment..
:ar15:

:baddevil:

Star_Fox:.

[Edited on 9-29-2002 by Star_Fox]

First off, good work on solving some of the major problems about C4 gameplay. If there were any justice in the world you'd probably be developing Novalogic's games (that, if they weren't f***ing a**holes who don't care about the bugs in the game...)

About the scoring (hot issue nowadays) I think 1k -1d is probaly the best. People who complain about the negative scoring should be more worried about increasing deaths (sorry if I'm hurting anybody's ego here, but that's the way I see it). I'm not a great player, I'll probably end up in the negatives often, but hey, it's just a question of scale! If you're getting -1, -2, etc, just make sure the others are getting -10, -20, and so on!!!

About the no score, I have to confess I haven't thought about it very much but the 'flare concussion' theory sounds reasonable enough.

As for the EFAMS, there's something that troubles me. I don't know much about the bugs in the system. I mean, I know that they exist, I know that some people use them, but frankly, I don't know how to put them to work. And the reason I don't know these things, it's because I never though of a use for them! I'd like to leave it perfectly clear that as far as I know I've always played 3H and never used the EFAMS bug.

Now for the 8H bug I know you have to play a game in coop or something and then you leave the game, or it's stilll running and you do something in the console... I really wouldn't be able to help anyone who want's to go 8H. But my understanding is that it's activatable, not a bug per se, it isn't random. For the EFAMS bug i don't know. And this doubt comes from one time being accused of using the EFAMS bug just because I was server! I don't believe I was, but to this day I don't know! (and everyone who played with me long enough knows I like a fair game)
This is all just to say that, this being a game that keeps attracting new people everyday, and if this bug happens without need of activation, the AE (no doubt an excellent tool) could be penalizing players unnaware of the problem.
I think you've gone WAY out of your way in helping the C4 community, and I honestly appreciate it, but would like to ask you just for one more thing:
this is just in the case that the EFAMS bug is random and IF people could be having it without knowing (because, if not I really enjoy the idea of cheaters firing duds, hehe!), couldn't the AE, instead of creating duds eliminate the missiles altogether?

Thanks for your time (man!! this got almost as lenghty as Inso's letter!!! Geez!! Sorry ppl, I promise not to write anymore... not! ok, i'll write less next time...)

Cya all later
Storm II <SAI>

Two quick notes,
1) To the best of knowledge there is no possiable way to accidently use the efam bug! If someone knows different please chime in. It requires a deliberate combination of movments/keyboard. As the pilots that have been helping me will all tell you, it requires practice to master the use of it.
2) The 8h issue (really beating a dead horse at this point) on the other hand is a little different. Yes it could be an inadvertant mistake on the part of a pilot. In the begining I think that for the most part it was. A few pilots picked up on its effects and it was exploited from there. (this is gonna hurt some of you Im sure) My standing on the 3h 8h issue is still the same as it was the first day I found out about. I stand firm in my opinion that I really don't care if it's 3h or 8h, so long as it is all the same. Accident or intent, if you can only fly it one way there's nothing left to discuss!

Please take a look at how Comanche Gold calculated the scoring. Thanks Viper :-)http://comanchegold.50megs.com/gamesplayed.html


[Edited on 9-21-2002 by Inso «Ð*§*§»]

Just a thought... Comanche Gold will post the true kills vs deaths. It is the order in which the way they are posted that determines the winner, 2nd, 3rd etc. Not sure if it can be done, but if the calculations can be done in the back ground.. ie 2x kills - deaths = where you are the list. Dont post the actual 2x kills minus death score.

THE viPer®

Hello again,
A few points to ponder. I have reached the conclusion, that I personally like the cg scoring mentioned by Viper. I find it to be the most accurate and fair. Update on the "NC" theories. Following our match on Sunday, and the intense amount of lag and nc's throughout the match the desire to find a solution grew stronger. Myself and 3 other pilots agreed to fly stinger rounds using only the auto deploy for flares. Within the same map, switching back and forth between using the auto flares and using our JS config to manually deploy them, there was a drastic reduction in the amount of lag seen by all of us, when the auto only was used. This lag immediatly returned (as did the nc's) when we switched back to manual deploy. What does this mean? I dont know that we can do anything about this due to it's nature but thought I would pass along our findings. Try it for yourself!

The new version of AutoExplode is availabe on our site www.deepstrikesquadron.com 09/23/02

[Edited on 9-24-2002 by Inso «Ð*§*§»]

[Edited on 9-24-2002 by Inso «Ð*§*§»]

From the time of C4's inception into the multiplayer world, I contacted Novalogic on this issue. In the begininng the scoring was done as follows: Score = Kills. So the pilot that had the most kills, was listed first and so on. Deaths played no importance. So you would have a senerio like this:
Pilot A: 25 Kills and 35 Deaths
Pilot B: 24 Kills and 2 Deaths
Winner: Pilot A
This is not right! And I had noticed that if you crashed.. a death was not counted either. I let NL know about this and they did change it. Now you notice that the Score is Kills minus Crashes. But still they did not take into consideration the pilots skill of not getting killed. Now we have a pilot among us that has the programming skills to eliminate some of the problems that the NL team refused and still refuses to address. Inso«Ð*§*§» has created the Auto Explode program to get rid of the 3h-8h problem, the EFAMS problem, and now the scoring problem. And I hear that some pilots out there are upset with him for"sticking his nose into problems where it doesn't belong." All I have to say about that is "Honor". Where is your honor? I guess if you like the idea of being unfair, then you are really doing it to yourself. If you want to pat yourself on the back for being Pilot A and say that you won.. knowing in your heart that Pilot B deserved the honor. then you are cheating yourself.
The scoring system that Inso«Ð*§*§» has come up with is close to the same scoring system and NovaLogic developed for Comanche Gold. And that system is as follows: Kills times two minus deaths. Now the only scoring difference between Comanche Gold and Comanche 4 is that Comanche Gold does not show the score (it is figured in the background but not displayed), just kills and deaths and it ranks you at the end of thegame. But if Gold did show the score, you would see negative scoring. 2 Kills 25 Deaths would be -21. So what needs to happen here.. is to realize that the Score is nothing more that the mathamatical computation to rank the pilots 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc. I am sure that if Inso«Ð*§*§» could figure a way for the score not to be displayed.. he would do it. So guys.. give him a break, embrace these changes.. NovaLogic should have been the ones to do it.. but they dropped the ball there!

Inso
Until I read this article, I did not even know who was responsible for all of this fine work. It is very discouraging to train for months in order to gain skill, just to have everybody accuse you of cheating. Elimination of the cheats will be the only thing that keeps me in this game. Thanks for making it fun again. Please keep up the good work.

Also, as far as scoring is concerned here is my two cents. If it is an official team death match, then I think that the scoring should be 1/1 (if you die, you lose a kill). Just make sure that they understand that latecomers will not be allowed to join. If you are not there for the start of the match, then you don't get in. I think that this is really the only way to demonstrate the true abilities and tactics of any given team. Thanks again for all of your work!

One last item. I usually end a game with about a two to one kill/death ratio. I am pretty good at surviving jousts and a lot of that has to do with how you move to avoid the stingers. I started out manually deploying flares during attacks, but stopped about two months ago. I found that it just didn't make any difference, and if anything the flares work better when deployed automatically. However, I still see times when I get killed but the other pilot gets no credit. Can't really say if you are on the right track or not, but any elimination of lag can only improve the accuracy of the game.

[Edited on 9-29-2002 by Col. Sparrow Chaos]

If I worried myself over the scoring, no better than I am, I'm afraid my old ticker would give out. Maybe those obsessed with 'keeping score' should decide the scoring system in their server. Kinda have to be in quiet's corner for that one, make it an option.

However, it would be an error to say that the playing field should not be as level as possible, and would like to offer Inso a thank you for helping to make this possible and a salute to his efforts at improving the chance of an honorable contest.