First person spectate and "Ghosting"

[RanklessFish]

I see alot of people worked up over people telling others where everyone is in ventrilo, "Ghosting" as it's called and have suggested to fade-to-black all forms of spectate, even if the developers implement first person camera. Leading to boredom, frustration, etc. I believe that first-person camera leading to ghosting is very farfetched in a team vs team scenario rather than just a pug. Let's look at some points here

1. If the developers solve the issue with players being clipped through walls, you have to consider should fade-to-black be used in a team vs team format or for something fun and organized like a pug. If free cam and third person are removed from competitive play, what's the point of hindering you watching your teammates play in first person.

2. It's very unlikely that in a team vs team format that a teammate from either group is going to be telling the other team where everyone is, In the event it happens it would be hard to shift+tab to one of the other team's players, tell them where everyone is and communicate with your team all at once.

3. SourceTV has a delay of 90s when relaying games, so it would serve no purpose sitting in STV hoping to ghost for the other team.

4. If there's someone specating in the actual server like an admin from a tournament/league/draft, it comes down to the person ghosting underhandedly, which is highly unlikely.

Now for the time being black-screen is a temporary solution, however when the game does have first-person camera, it would be illogical to indiscriminately black-out for a whole round rather than switching to a first-person perspective.

[aeVersatyle]

Using a 3rd party program such as Ventrilo, Teamspeak, or Mumble as a way to communicate is almost necessary for a team nowadays, no matter which game you play. Unfortunately, ghosting occurs because of these. Theres no real way to enforce a ghosting rule when theres a 3rd party program involved. You can only deter it with methods (some of which you mentioned) that reduce the efficiency, or don't allow people to spectate at all.

Now, It's been discussed hundreds of times. I'm still not sure what the official stance is of the devs, but I KNOW that there are severe limitations with the version of the source engine that NT is using and 1st person spectating and leaning. Go check the "Ideas and Suggestions" forum and look for something there. I'm sure theres an official answer in there (somewhere).

I do agree with you though. Seeing exactly what the other person is seeing and yelling in his ear SHOOT THERE! SHOOT THERE! is not gonna help him much.

Spectating and clipping through walls is a server side option. You are allowed to enable/disable it.

FTB is pretty annoying, especially on matches, where tension is high and you want to see how your team is doing.

My only suggestion would be a plugin for matches that forces you to watch STV with the 90 second delay

That is all.

[bearcat]

out of the people still posting on this forum i have probably been in the most competetive nt games and i can honestly say, white outs are fine. i never got bored, i don't think anyone else did either. it was pretty suspenseful not being able to see the action, but wanting your teammates to pull through, and providing moral or tactical support over vent ( "take the tie, it's just you left." or "make a push, you only have 20 seconds left!" )

the games are very short anyways, 6 players with a 3-4 minute time limit, so seriously, white outs are fine. you have to sit for AT THE MOST 4 minutes, no big deal.

it's a competition game, it shouldn't be about constant entertainment, it should be about a fair competetive platform - and besides, i really did find it very suspenseful watching the console/white out screen while hoping the rest of your team pulls through.



i say white outs are fine, first person spec would be nice for pubs but is redundant for scrims.

every scrim we played both in the two neotokyo tournaments and the games we scheduled on our own, we used the white out system and ghosting was obviously a non factor.

[aSH]

FTB is awfull. during 9 sisters tournament we made a 4hours match. Half the time my screen was useless.

In my team at least 3 players decided to stop 'competitive nt' after that match (we finished the tournament, but they wont engage in another one), because they felt like it was 'boring'.

Because this is boring, because 'competitive players' that take part in high level tournaments on cs or tf2 can not accept the FTB, because NT has the pretention to be one of the best and competitive tactical FPS... This looks like a detail, but such details are gamebreaker.

Think of spectators too, that can not decide what they are looking at. Some guys supporting us spent hours watching our matchs, and they did not enjoy the experience.

[bearcat]

which is why the time limit was shortened and the score limit dropped to 8 for the finals

i can see where you're getting at, but every comp nt game i was in was very quick. i did hear about those long games you guys had, and that sucks, but that is a rarity.

basically there's no alternative, because they can't get first person spectating to work.

[aSH]

basically there's no alternative, because they can't get first person spectating to work.

I can understand that.
Still, IMHO, such details missing in NT is the reason why this mod did not get the success it deserves

[RanklessFish]

If it were CS I'd understand, in that game when fadetoblack is off the death cam is enabled, meaning you can see which direction your killer is moving in for the next few seconds. This obviously makes ghosting after your death much easier, as you can call where the opponents are going.

The death cam in this game obscures everything

From the time you die, to the time you switch views, nothing is visible.

The problem with F2B, is that the 2 second fixed deathcam is already in the game, making it a useless cvar that would only disable first person spectate.

"IF" first person spectate were to be implemented, there should be no need to use FTB command other than in the event that it's a pug or pub (Who the fuck on your team would ghost for the other in a match?).

[Terr]

There isn't a good solution to this, since even first-person-spectate potentially allows a dead ghoster to inform his team of threats or help coordinate two different squads by flipping between them. (Not that big of an issue in NT, but an extra set of eyes can still be handy in some cases.)

The only way to prevent all ghosting is to give people something unrelated to the match to look at. That'll be boring. Blackness just happens to be extra-boring.

[RanklessFish]

You see what you're teammates see, when they die you get the same obscuring deathcam. How in anyway other than hanging in ventrilo with a friend and telling people "Here's where my teammates are" can you Ghost at all.

[aeVersatyle]

What if when you died you could watch a recording of the last round played? It gives you feedback on your performance, shows you how to counter enemy strats, where your team is lacking, etc. while not giving vital current round information away.