The fix list

[Gawain]

no good ps player will take a tazer that isn't at least as strong as the pandora one, just do simple mathematics: the ct sniper rifle needs 2 non-zoomed shoots in the head, and 5 non-zoomed ones in the torso to kill a spy with full health. so you need less than 1 second to kill a spy if you got proper aiming (the aiming in ps won't be the crappy laggy raster crap we got atm). the mercs will get even more overpowered. i'd love to see the pandora rifle and a slightely changed tazer back, but also the pandora chaff nades etc.

[Gawain]

i've observed gasmask use and smokes/cams quite exactly during the last weeks and i found a problem: if you encounter people that spam cams well (especially cams hided behind corners, really fast quickcams etc), your gas mask will run out way too soon (especially on running-in-circles maps like museum) if you want to prevent falling asleep effectively. on the other hand, if the mask gets more capacity, smoke nades will no longer slow down the merc. atm this problem is "solved" partly via eax superhearing, but what about project stealth? seriously, the capacity should be 1.2 - 1.5 times as it is now.

[Succubus Dryad Of The Undying Comet]

i'd love to see the pandora rifle and a slightely changed tazer back, but also the pandora chaff nades etc.

Yeah, i'd love to see the phosphor nades, they own3d....

[InvisibleMan999]

i've observed gasmask use and smokes/cams quite exactly during the last weeks and i found a problem: if you encounter people that spam cams well (especially cams hided behind corners, really fast quickcams etc), your gas mask will run out way too soon (especially on running-in-circles maps like museum) if you want to prevent falling asleep effectively. on the other hand, if the mask gets more capacity, smoke nades will no longer slow down the merc. atm this problem is "solved" partly via eax superhearing, but what about project stealth? seriously, the capacity should be 1.2 - 1.5 times as it is now.

You can fix this problem by one of two things.

Either client side gas mask or a short delay added to the time it takes a quick cam to fire its gas after attaching to the wall.

One of the main things that depletes gas mask is the fact that you've actually got to activate it in advance of the spy firing his cam. If you're not the host, you can't hear the cam then quickly throw on gas mask. The mask just doesn't activate fast enough.

Speaking of which, in the context of this mod, do we even get to decide what's server and what's client side?

[goodkebab]

i've observed gasmask use and smokes/cams quite exactly during the last weeks and i found a problem: if you encounter people that spam cams well (especially cams hided behind corners, really fast quickcams etc), your gas mask will run out way too soon (especially on running-in-circles maps like museum) if you want to prevent falling asleep effectively. on the other hand, if the mask gets more capacity, smoke nades will no longer slow down the merc. atm this problem is "solved" partly via eax superhearing, but what about project stealth? seriously, the capacity should be 1.2 - 1.5 times as it is now.

for stopping circle tactics in cafe,  you need to make clever use of your mines

-and instead of camping the outside of cafe,  camp inside of cafe

-if all else fails,  shotty kicks ass in Cafe....even getting 1 shot kills in the cielings...

This of course gives easy acess for the spies to the bombs....but then, thats what this game is all about...changing to the appropriate tactic.

[Gawain]

no1 understands me XD

cafe is np (i usually use spytraps and mines there), and so are most quick cams (if not host cams -.-)atm with the eax superhearing. the real problem are (and will be even more with fixed audio) cams placed in advance behind corners. imo if you don't waste your mask by using it to get through smoke nades, and you know that there likely is a cam behind one of the next 5 corners, one should have enough mask to not fall asleep. but i think 1.2*capacity should be enough though, because in most games 1 merc has to be knocked towards the end.

[goodkebab]

har har....sounds like a clever spy that knows how to use cams

[Gawain]

95% of the good players rely on cams. this is no good gadget balance tbh

[Succubus Dryad Of The Undying Comet]

I dunno, yeah i do know many players that lpay like cams only, but i know also many ppl that own without cams - by stealth. Me, for example :D

[InvisibleMan999]

If someone placed the cam in advance and then lured you into an ambush with it, then I think they deserve to get you. I mean that's part of the tactics of using cams effectively, and you had ample time to turn on your gasmask. You just got taken in by a spy ruse.

I'm more worried about quick-cams because they're a lag issue more than anything else.

As far as everyone taking sticky cams, I'm not sure we can do too much about that. The thing is that cams are the only gadget that will really incapacitate a merc at range, and sometimes, based on the map, you have to do that. I do think quickcams can be a bit overpowered, though that can be fixed by something like client side gasmask. Sometimes when it's a fairly laggy game, you just don't have enough time to get your mask on after a guy fires a cam. You see him fire it, you hear the sound, you activate the mask, but due to lag it just doesn't stop the camera and you're too late. So you get KOed even though your gas mask was "on" at least as far as you're concerned.

[goodkebab]

the majority of problems we experience in this game are lag induced

[Gawain]

If someone placed the cam in advance and then lured you into an ambush with it, then I think they deserve to get you. I mean that's part of the tactics of using cams effectively, and you had ample time to turn on your gasmask. You just got taken in by a spy ruse.

omg i'm no noob. there is no way of knowing where the cam is placed and isn't it hilarious that most "pros" rely on cams completely? smoke nades are too weak with the ct mask and capacity, and cams are too powerful.

[InvisibleMan999]

omg i'm no noob. there is no way of knowing where the cam is placed and isn't it hilarious that most "pros" rely on cams completely? smoke nades are too weak with the ct mask and capacity, and cams are too powerful.

Well part of this game is the mental aspect of expecting an ambush. If you're playing a good player and they suddenly reveal themselvs and start running, especialyl if they don't cover their tail with smoke, you should expect something.

Setting up a cam in advance can be difficult. It means that first you've got to have sneaked into the area where you want to lay the cam without the merc detecting you. Next, you have to lure the merc into your trap. The merc has several options here. his first and most obvious is not to give chase. These sort of traps only work if you know which way the merc is going to come. So if you're playing museum don't run around following the spy's trail exactly, do something unexpected, try going through the center of the cafe instead of around it and so on.

You can also turn your gasmask on as you're approaching a corner, since you can only get surprise stickied as you round a corner or enter a choke point. You can charge through doorways to make it more difficult to sticky you there. Also the good old dead stop short of a doorway or corner also works.

I don't think ambush cams are all that unbalanced, you just have to do anything except run straight into the ambush. Once you know a particular spy or team is capable of this, you've got to be wary of it.

Really I don't think smoke grenades are too weak, and while quick cams may be a bit too powerful, I think that's another lag issue and is easily solved by a client side gas mask.

What I dont like about gasmask is that your gas mask time is deducted as soon as you right click, but you're only actually protected after the lag. So in a laggy game, you use up your mask faster for less protection. If the gas mask was client side you'd be much better able to handle ambush cams and quick cams, because you can switch it on and off more rapidly.

[Gawain]

invisible, sometimes you have to follow a spy and you have only one obvious way, for example from exhibition to monolith through storage. if quick cams are made harder and the eax stuff gets fixed, ambush cams will get pretty overused. it's sad that knocking out the merc is more effective than everything else, and on most maps (factory is an exception) you have to knock out one merc for the last objective. the bs is, if the spies spam cams and smoke during the whole game, camming the merc gets easier towards the end as he is running out of mask. all im asking for is ~1.3*mask capacity and a larger radius/duration for the smoke nades. the combination of sticky cams and smoke is just too good compared to other combinations (there are 70 different gadget combinations). probably people will stop taking always cams (+smoke for serious games) when the flash nade works reliably (+no more mt whoring) and people are more likely to use mask. spamming smoke in order to empty the mask can still be an option if it's done really well.

[InvisibleMan999]

invisible, sometimes you have to follow a spy and you have only one obvious way, for example from exhibition to monolith through storage. if quick cams are made harder and the eax stuff gets fixed, ambush cams will get pretty overused.

They still take a while to set up and require that the merc isn't there. If you've got a merc patrolling the corridor for instance on museum, then you should hear the cam get set up, EAX or no EAX.

I mean, all I know is that I don't really have much trouble with ambush cams, and I have never used EAX.

it's sad that knocking out the merc is more effective than everything else, and on most maps (factory is an exception) you have to knock out one merc for the last objective.

This is the very reason cams are so popular.

If we allowed people to win by full stealth, then we'd find fewer people would take cams.

As it is, you must disable a merc, and cams are about the only gadget out there that does that, aside from shock + triple nade. When you must disable a merc, it's unsurprising that people tend to favor gadgets that help them disable mercs.