ISSUES OF BALANCE
This is mainly my own fault I feel. On looking back, I shouldn't have given people the choice. It caused a lot of arguments and left a very tense feeling for everybody. I also think the arguments that went down were on rough enough ground as it is. One side was arguing for, what I and others felt, was an unbalanced weapon, while the opposite side was giving pretty shoddy excuses like "the leagues don't use em so there". We should have taken certain things from the leagues alright but not used them as an example without knowing properly why. These were our games and we should have incorporated at least a few of our own rules from scratch, not basing them on others.
I should have laid down the rules and given a proper reason to each one. I probably shouldn't but for future reference, I'm going to try to delve into this a little more. Not so much as to really get into the reason, but enough that I feel should be reason enough to calm down the more excitable participants.
The reason The Sandman was originally banned was because the Scout's main attribute is not the Double Jump. It's his speed (which would make a more fair tradeoff imo). A decent scout could still get on fine without the Double Jump, especially if he has the trade off of a Stunning weapon. The problem then with the Stunning weapon is that it can be very easy to successfully kill someone upon hitting them. They then have little to no chance to defend themselves should they be hit. Somewhere, in an interview, I remember reading Robin saying the Sandman was to work so if you were to hit someone, it would wear off by the time you got to the enemy. This however was overshadowed in the Steam forums and never really kicked off anything. The other problem with this statement is that it really doesn't hold up. Again, a decent Scout knows the Sandman can give you plenty of time to kill someone in a one vs. one situation, provided you hit the opponent. This completely shatters the idea of any class being able to take on any class, provided you practice with it enough.
Now there's this new tradeoff of health loss. Fair enough I say, to an extent, a health loss is better than a double jump trade (speaking in terms of fairness), but then it's again, destroyed by the new buff of dealing 75% damage whilst stunned instead of 50%.
In such a small environment, where 1v1 situations are very likely to occur, with a high respawn time for everyone, where people are not going to be teaming up too well like in leagues, the Sandman is just unfair and unbalanced. It might work where there are organised players, where being stunned while in a crowd won't affect you, but for our raggedy bunch of players, giving the Scout the ability to become an extremely effective Sniping class*, and the ability to escape effectively, is just barmy. I really hate to make harsh statements and use forceful tones in these situations as I think it comes across as a "dur dur i cum 4m teh internets, I no beter than u" rage, rather than a well meaning and fair saying, but I'm willing to make an exception for this:
Anyone who thinks The Sandman is a fair and balanced weapon to use within the Fester's Place community organised matches, 6v6 or otherwise, is wrong.
*I mean Sniping class as in a player who is very effective in 1v1 combat, not the TF2 Sniper Class
As for the Dead Ringer, I also feel it's unbalanced. Unlike the Sandman, the concept behind the Dead Ringer is solid. In fact, it's great. The problem is however that it's just too easily spammed and easy to abuse in the right hands. This is not too bad now in Pub matches or on Fester's, where death lurks every corner, balancing it out, but in a 6v6 (or 9v9 to an extent) game, being able to make a clean get away is far too easy. I can honestly say I'm disappointed with this because I'm a fan of the Dead Ringer, but it's just too easy to get away with killing off the whole team and getting away scott free with our raggedy bunch. The sound it makes is indeed very loud, but only within a certain limit. Seemingly outside of a select range, all noise the Dead Ringer makes just has a sudden drop into silence. As long as a Spy can get out of this range, he is ok. Not a fair tradeoff for the organised matches we played. Again however, it balances out in Pubs and on Fester's which are packed with players and full of people who can hear you.
Until Valve lessens the time of the cloak, or decreases the damage reduction, or adds a timer that can't be affected by picking up metal (so as to stop it being spammed so well), I feel the Dead Ringer is unbalanced in Fester's community organised games.
Just about everything else is fine however. The FaN is still a little too effective in some situations, but I think it actually does have a fair tradeoff. Same with the Huntsman. Perhaps too effective in close range, but you loose the perfect long range abilities. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with the Cloak and Dagger. I don't like it personally as I think it makes you into a campy Spy instead of one that's always on the move, but in terms of balance, it's perfectly A-OK.
Whiners
I really don't want to name any names, as I don't like embarrassing others, but there were a couple here which went over the top, myself and people for pro-banning particular items included, not just the obvious....
Again, we should have drawn the line somewhere. I should have drawn the line somewhere and said "Hey, you know what? We're not going to do this, case closed, no argument."
Some people really made a fool of themselves, again, myself more than others at some points. The key however to these arguments is not persitence in quips and jabs, but detailed and non-biased reviews and personal comments on the subject, not too far off what I'm doing right now, albeit less bias than I, the former Overlord and Master of these games, who needs to give a little higher up view of things anyway.
Look at where the others are coming from before judging, and really think twice before pressing that Submit button. I always do, no matter how small (although that might just be me).
And if it's really not too big a deal, just don't go any further. Just bite the bullet and go with the flow, even if you don't like it too much. Loosing a friendship over something like this is just sad.
Other than that:
I like to think beyond the arguments and the disorganization and my computer shitting itself, the ME-ME-OW games were a rousing success. For any out there who might have the time, it's well worth making an effort for these games. The planning and organizing can be hell for the first week or two, but once you have a working system, things can easily be copy/pasted and repeated in the future.
General tips for any would be future organizers:
- Foresight and planning are essential parts to getting things just right, something which needs a lot more planning than it really should, but must.
- You'll need a lot of time to get things right the first time. My own summer holidays where I had very little to distract me, which was perfect for me to do so.
- There is no such thing as planning or organizing something too early.
- Having a swimming pool filled with patience can really help
Gameservers had a very finicky ruleset and pricing about them though and I only really found out about the FDL servers after I had everything in a happy enough medium, to which I didn't want to go messing with too much more.
