New Vet System

[twentyseven]

Hey,
I'm pretty curious to know why the veterancy system was changed so drastically? I know there was some issues with "simple" units being counted as "big, powerful" units (I've heard the t3 spy plane = battleship argument). But wouldn't just adding a rule or adding another couple of levels to the amount of points given based on tech-level or the strength of the unit be a better balance choice?

This new system makes it incredibly hard to know how much I need to kill before (for example) my ACU has enough meat on its bone to attack. It becomes more of a guessing game. Because I don't think it should be necessary to have to memorize the algorithms of veterancy, know the mass-count of every unit of every faction, apply those numbers in a couple of equation and then decide if one can attack and escape with a reasonable HP and regen...

Don't get me wrong, I like the IDEA of the more mass you kill, the better. but I really don't believe it to be a user-friendly approach - it really hurts mid-ranked players like myself. I know I'm not fast enough to make these complex estimations, especially not while there's really intense fighting going on around my commander. Before i could just look down and see "Ok, 4 kills. I need 4 kills to get away from this. Let's find a good overcharge"... Now it's more like "Ok, 500. I need to kill 500 mass. Let's see; 150 there + 155 here, +200 there, no wait that's only 100. woops. ded."

Lastly, hasn't anyone seen that ACU blast seems to give vet to the guy who killed the other? Before, the risk of killing someone else is 1. You lose alot of units in blast zone. 2. If you don't have a good buffer of HP, you're really exposed to an airsnipe (giving the other team a last chance to balance things out again).
Now its more like "I might get down to 200HP but the 6k HP boost from him blowing up his own units will let me survive."

[keyser]

I part of agree with what you say. One of the main issue is that it's harder to evaluate how many kills of which unit you need to do, to get a vet.
Though counting the remaining kills you have to do to get a vet was rare, therefore the advantages of having an overall fairer systeme but less predictable out weight the drawback.

[twentyseven]

Though counting the remaining kills you have to do to get a vet was rare, therefore the advantages of having an overall fairer systeme but less predictable out weight the drawback.

How do you decide that it's rare? I'm fairly sure there's no statistics to prove this nor have I heard of any sort of poll/questionnaire to even ask if people do this or not. In my mind it has always been a quick glance of how far away from vet am I and a quick count of units attacking me. Now it's far more difficult to estimate the number of mass attacking me because its not enough with rough number of units + tech level, I also need to know type of units, faction, and their mass worth.

Second point that it's "fairer". I don't really understand how. If both players have the same type of vet system, it's fair. But I'll assume you mean that if I kill a t3 scout and you kill a Battleship we get the same points, sure. But my original post included a fix that would make that type of "injustice" go away, whilst keeping the integrity of a vet system that is far easier to comprehend and use. That argument does not outweigh the drawback of forcing people to learn the mass worth of every unit of every faction. It just makes it less predictable and harder (more frustrating) to use.

[Morax]

It was completely unnecessary to change the veteran system aside from how easy it is for experimental units to prolong their effect.

It's common practice to "ctrl-k engies to prevent vet" which was kind of lame. The UEF comm vet was perhaps a bit much but I never felt it was such an imbalance it warranted this decision.

I'm quite disappointed this received attention over other matters in the game.

[keyser]

ok so i reformulate :
Though the balance team has evaluated that counting the remaining kills you have to do to get a vet was rare, and therefore the advantages of having an overall more intuitive system but less predictable out weight the drawback.

usually you are going to look at vet on your ACU and exp; so this mean it's pretty rare. Are you checking all your unit vet, all the time ?

that doesn't mean i haven't been raising concern, on different aspect of this vet change during balance discution.

i've been using "fair" to show the more intuitive effect of mass based vet; for the example of T3 scout vs BS, but also for engie farming by exp. Your first post won't fix that 2nd one for example.

So this is a balance between intuitive and predictive, feel free to keep commenting and try to convince balance team it was a mistake of appreciation. Just so you get that we are hearing you.

[biass]

more intuitive system

I would like to hear why you think this way.

[keyser]

Seems more intuitive to get a better reward when you kill something that has more value.

[Lieutenant Lich]

just philosophically, a t3 scout can be as dangerous as a t3 battleship... aside from it falling on your acu when it has 10hp and killing it, the scout provides vital intelligence which is as useful as having a huge amount of firepower

[keyser]

yes and T1 scout does provide radar, while BS doesn't. I think the reward for killing them should be the same. (T1 scout does provide vital intelligence, whereas BS doesn't !!! )

[biass]

Uh sorry, i guess we communicated wrong, the whole spy plane and battleship relation is something that makes more "logical sense" not something "intuitive".
Being intuitive means easy to use or access without much prior knowledge or experience, like COD, and unlike an IRC channel.

If this is cleared up, can you answer again? with less snark too if that's okay.