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Post by Pegasus Actual on Apr 5, 2018 12:38:25 GMT -5
I'm confused as well. That's clearly an inequality, not an equation... and why are you dividing by raiding? Aren't the raids some of the fun stuff? If anything I'd say you have to multiply!
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Apr 5, 2018 1:49:16 GMT -5
My computer ate the original version of this post (this time I can't blame proboards), 0 for my last 2! im honestly surprised it took so long for someone to make a game like this. DayZ was huge despite being a massive chore to set up and play. pubg basically just took all the best parts of that mod and made an arcade mode. i think the most impressive part of it is that they basically grew it all by word of mouth. I didn't play DayZ, and I'm not even really sure what if any relation H1Z1 has to it. They were things I was vaguely aware of but I wasn't so into the zombie thing and just never got around to trying it. So I'm still a bit confused about the trajectory to PUBG. great post, Pegasus. I like that map landing strategy. I haven't played the game but I find this genre so cool. How does the plane drop work? You get to pick when you jump off the plane or is it random? So you land as quick as possible, grab a car and then drive to that tower and the idea is that you are so far away from the action, that you have time to loot the tower and prison before people start finding you or the circle causes you to move? What does Rambo mean on that map? Hot/kill zones? IW5k covered it, I'll just say the the 'Rambo' zones, or let's just go with hot drops, as that's what most people call them and I don't think Rambo is gonna become a thing based off my crude example map so let's drown that newborn in the tub.... Anyway, I would expect around 50 percent of the players with that plane path to drop into those three spots. Maybe a bit less on Xbox, as PC plays a bit differently. Hot drops are extra bad on Xbox as you get single-digit frame rates at times in hectic early situations not to mention that especially on regular Xbox One there is a tendency for assets to not load in on time causing all sorts of problems and frustration. Unable to get loot, getting stuck in geometry, etc... Keep in mind the first circle only appears some odd seconds after the plane finishes its path and forces everyone off anyway. You can't just stay on and wait for max intel. Grabbing a vehicle early on opens up so many options since you can abort the east tower loot plan if you get a rare west coast circle. The first circle gives you 5 before it starts closing which is a real long time. Any driving and fighting you do in that time is something to keep to a minimum. Interestingly enough patch 1 on the new experimental test server, that is the new 4x4 map (as opposed to the regular 8x8, so 1/4 the size) they changed it to give you the circle while you're in the plane. I wonder if the meta will shift but early on watching people jump they tend to value landing in the circle ridiculously highly. Especially considering the other circle changes in play with the new map. That is, there is less time in between circles, and the circles take much longer to shrink. That allows you to run with the circle and even have time to pop off shots pretty much in any scenario. As it stands right now it's very easy to evade and get good loot by dropping outside the circle to something with good loot and then grabbing smaller compounds on the way in. The concecpt of intel in this game is huge. For instance, and the xbox version doesn't explicitly say anything about this so you may not already know IW5k, but if you hold RB you can free look. This is especially useful while parachuting to get a view of how many people are landing in your vicinity. If you can for instance find one isolated guy that dropped uncontested on some nice loot, and you predict where he is probably going next, you can relatively safely set up an ambush and get lots of good stuff. You can also use free look to find cars that are near your drop zone, which can buy you precious extra looting time as you know you have a quick way into the circle. While I agree that kills a bit later in the game can net you lots of loot and thus are valuable, I wouldn't make it a strict rule. An early kill or two that completely clears your area and lets you loot in peace can be even more valuable. And in terms of loot, late game kills might have zero value if you are geared out. Or even if you're not, a lot of times with circle pressure, and pressure from other players you can't get your just spoils anyway! so because it's better to land fast, don't most people jump out of the plane as soon as it is over land? With very people jumping out of the plane during the end of its run? Is there any strategy to jumping late or is it a lot more risk since you're the last to get l00t? this game is cool as hell People jump out earlier in general. Especially the hot drop type players. The 30 second advantage or whatever you get by dropping right away is washed away and then some by human nature. Dropping later will tend to get you less competition for your loot. Also, going back to the circle intel thing Dumien was talking about... If you drop late, and you drop long, even on the normal maps you will see the circle while you are in the air. Which means you can find a vehicle if necessary, or safely ignore vehicles if you're already going into the circle. On your 2nd-to-last point, surviving the circle. You say there are two schools of thought. Playkng the centre or the edge. It seems like the center is better IF you have a place that can limit your exposure since you'll be at risk from all sides. So if that's not possible, playing the edge must be good, i'm guessing, because enemies will always be in front of you? So you just move towards the center from the edge, never having to worry about behind you? That's basically it. The biggest problem on standard maps is that the circle moves kind of fast. The esports settings have them move slower, more like the new map. But as it is right now, moving with the blue can be a major issue as an irrational opponent can and will easily cause you both to die. One of you to the prolonged and unnecessary gunfight, the other to the blue. For that reason you have to be really careful about playing from the edge of the play zone like that. Taking a power position in the middle of the circle can be extremly good. Especially in squads where 360 degrees of cover plus DBNO revive mechanics give your squad a huge advantage over squads moving in the open. It's a little harder to successfully hold good power positions on Xbox as the frame rate makes it a lot harder to hit moving targets. In general I would say center circle is preferable early, as being able to stay still versus moving kilometers is relatively safe. Also, if you're center circle, then the max distance to the next possible circle will be small. As most new circles will contain the old center. Whereas if you're on the side, you may have to run clear across in a short amount of time. At a certain point the edge is pretty much the only thing you can play though. With a high player count the middle becomes suicide near the end. Also, the blue gets stronger later, so you can be much more certain that you won't get flanked from outside the play zone in later circles as they will kill in under 10 seconds, whereas earlier circles can be healed through for minutes easily. Killing people /is/ super fun in this game which is why so many people prefer the rambo life. The only negative is that the frames drop HARD on xbox when you get into CQC with a bunch of buildings/players around. Sure this is a console only problem but still... I feel like they could do better. My gripes with the game boil down to console only issues and serious lack of gun variety. Sure fortnite has stupid stupid stuff, but they do have the gun variety. It also plays smooth on console at 60 FPS. Getting a high kill game is super fun especially in squads where after a great game you can count up your kills with your friend and realize that you collectively killed 1/4 of the rest of the players. Killing being an end to itself is definitely a thing in this game. They have three leaderboards per mode, overall rating, win rating, and kill rating. With overall of course being a mix of the other two. But ultimately you get to define your own criteria for success in this game. One thing with the hot droppers, you could say they're not playing to win, and I mean, they kind of aren't... but they also are. If you win a big loot spot, you've got all the stuff you'll need to win the game. And if you lose early, well you get to go right back into a new game and try again. Compared to the guy who only loots garbage compounds, makes it to the top 10 almost all the time but doesn't have competitive gear and rarely pulls out the chicken dinner. I do personally value not dying early, a 90th place will bug me, and a 5th place will be some solace. But what's better is up to you. Hot drop guy finishes 93rd, 75th, and 1st. Risk averse guy places 10th, 3rd, and let's even give him a chicken dinner on the third game. He got the same single dinner, but he invested a lot more time into his losses. Also, and I'm not clear on this point, but there is some skill based matchmaking involved. Not sure on platforms or modes, but it is a thing to at least some extent. Getting lots of close but no dinner type games might push you into lobbies where you're even less likely to get one, whereas a bad run of hot drops might put you in a lobby you stand a chance of winning. So it's not completely clear-cut. Conversely, a certain horse might start losing his mind and yell at everyone about everything they do wrong... I do love the squad experience though, even if I'm an awful teammate/person on very very very incredibly supremely rare occasions certainly not every game. I mean, I guess I agree on the techinical shortcomings of the Xbox version, but as a game design I don't buy it. I'm expecting a lot of BR games that I just don't like as much. I'm trying to think of a single thing I like about Fortnite more as a design compared to PUBG and it's tough. I guess their circle speeds are better dialed in (if you ignore things like jump pads and the ability to just bypass all terrain by building which completely neuters the concept of circle pressure anyway). That's about it. And on a technical level it runs a lot better especially on Xbox. I think games will come putting their own 'spin' on BR without really getting it, and fail spectacularly. Of course, I think Fortnite clearly doesn't get it either and it's a smash runaway success so ya know I guess we'll see. I saw something about an interesting BR-ish game called "Mavericks: Proving Grounds" Supposed to be 400 player matches, and allow for up to 1000. It promises mechanics such as persistent footprints and disturbed foliage for tracking people, stuff like that. I dig the ambition and the focus on the hunter/prey aspect, but we'll see. I don't think PUBG is going away just because higher quality devs are going to get in on the genre. I've had enough shit shoveled on my face by AAA studios to buy into that line of thinking.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Apr 3, 2018 17:08:35 GMT -5
If Pegasus' post at the top of this page doesn't perfectly represent why i come to this site, I don't know what does. SUPER helpful and I don't even play this gosh darn golly gee whiz game. Thanks! Come for the helpful content, but stay for the shitposts I always say! For whatever reason I am not quite sure of....I find the whole PUBG game to have almost no annoyance or aggravations. Seriously, like 20 min of solo CoD I am ready to go kill animals, blood pressure goes up, get hate emails from other players, campers, people who don't play to win, etc...The list is so long I can't even get to everything. PUBG? None of those things. Maybe because everyone is playing the game as it's intended to be played. There's only one way to play...to win. That's refreshing. I'm not used to this. CoD isn't like that. Most players aren't playing to win, they are playing for KD. Or levels. Or gun challenges, etc... Same with Destiny for the most par (except for Trials) So I had a pretty much novel length response to your post, but the forums ate it so I will try the cliffs notes version... Anyway I mostly agree with this. Modern shooters have a lot of busywork and bullshit that ultimately harm the basic game by negatively influencing player behavior. And if someone is going to Foxtrot around in PUBG, no big deal, they'll die early on and not negatively affect your experience. This stumbles a bit on the point that playing to win involves getting uncontested high quality loot. Novo is a good place as it is high loot and military base is a RAMBO magnet. If the base is closer than the town to the loot path, while you can expect other players to still be there, it's good loot for the amount of competition you'll have. But, the best strategy for winning is to get to good loot that is far off the plane path, preferably farther than you can plausibly drop. Secure a vehicle and drive 3+km off the plane path and you are very safe. Winning comes down to your efficiency. Avoiding a fight is as good or better than winning a fight. Here's an example plane path and strategy (possibly my favorite drop on the map): Drop on the road next to military base. Tons of vehicles spawn there, and you can make a quick getaway in one while everyone is trying to have their action movie moment. Go to the marked building, which is actually pretty great, especially for a solo player. If the circle is nice to you after and/or you're efficient you might get all of Mylta Power or Prison to yourself as well. Then use your vehicle to enter 2nd or 3rd circle as far off the plane path and you just converted a 1v99 to a 1v20 with good loot on your side. The final circles are almost an entirely different game. I'd say generally being prone on a hill is a bad move. You are visible to observant players and you are a sitting duck if someone takes the shot. Getting out of prone and escaping is highly unlikely. Better to play cover and keep your head moving so you don't get one shotted. Playing the snek (prone) game might be advisable if you have a little dip that provides visual cover, or near tree/bush shade especially in situations where there are a lot of people for the size of the circle. You can let the aggressive visible players thin themselves out potentially. An important skill is being able to quickly locate shots, especially ones AT you so you can take cover. It's a bit more in depth than your standard COD sounds. This video covers it for the most part: The thing to remember is that if you're getting shot at, you will hear a loud crack noise that's 90 degrees from your attacker. You have to try to ignore that and focus on the second sound, the pop of the gunfire. That will be the sound that locates the shooter. It takes focus and a bit of practice to get decent at. So you have two main weapon inventory slots. Any attachments on any of your weapons don't count against inventory space either (same goes for the ammo in the gun, so loading a gun from zero to full will give you space to pick up more stuff potentially). Attachments in your backpack eat up space super quickly though. You also have a dedicated pistol and melee slot. Both of those suck. Skip pistols unless you absolutely need a weapon. For melee just pick up a pan. It will block bullets shot at your butt. Seriously. Up on d-pad will cycle between melee and pistol. Grenades... so... right on d-pad will equip your grenade. Pressing it again will cycle through your inventory of grenades. Left trigger toggles between the normal long throw overhand, and a short underhand throw. Holding right trigger will show you a grenade arc, releasing will throw. Tap LB to cook your grenade before releasing RT. Frags are like 5-6 seconds. Other grenades are more like 2. You cannot cancel a cook. Cooking a frag for 3-4 seconds before tossing it can be a good strategy, but keep in mind the noise is audible so a really good player may rush you during this time. The arc the grenade shows will have a impact spot if you are close enough. Use this to line up tosses into windows (it will break through glass). If the little impact indicator is not there, then the grenade will go shorter than you think. And it may bounce back at you. Get close enough to get the impact indicator if you are trying to get through a window. A potential use of cooking would be to cook a smoke grenade and just let it explode in your hand. This can provide good visual cover to loot a corpse or a supply drop. I'll just leave it there, my post was like twice as long before proboards ate it... but I think I touched on the most important things I wanted to get across.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Apr 2, 2018 18:45:59 GMT -5
The game doesn't even seem to have that many glitches. That's usually not the first thought to pop into a PUBG player's mind. Especially on Xbox these days! I think some of the glitches are less apparent in solo. The game can really struggle with say a squads match where three squads come together in a giant death cloud. I'm kind of surprised the game got as huge as it did. It is relatively slow paced and has a lot of mil-sim-y aspects that you usually find in very niche products. Anyway, the game is very unforgiving as it has zero aim assist. Between this and Siege... it's almost a trend on console! If you were in a final 2 and you felt the need to switch to your pistol, then you were definitely under-geared. I think it's helpful to play for gunfight experience before you start focusing too much on getting wins. That means dropping on School, Pochinki, and Military Base. Getting good at getting to the ground first, or vaguely tied for first. Figuring where to land to get some loot quickly. The thing about stealthing around and playing to get to the end game is you just won't generate enough fights to get a feel for the combat. I'm not sure if you are playing first person or third person. First person is probably a bit sweatier but I think it's a better game that way. I recommend you try them both out a bit and decide which way you want to go, because third person peeking fundamentally affects the way the game plays. Best YouTuber for tips and guides: www.youtube.com/channel/UCfK7qpS954pk14YvDCsWCuw/videos -- but it's a PC player, so not everything applies, console has reduced vertical recoil for instance, and is way behind on maps. But the weapon guides, ranging guides, building push, circle management and mythbusters stuff should all be reasonably relevant. And the videos are nice and short, zero fat. Anyway, if you have any questions I've put in ~500 hours on the Xbox version (yikes). The short version is, try to get a 5.56 AR. M416, SCAR, M16 in general order of preference. Try to get at least level 2 helmet/armor/backpack. It makes a huge difference. Don't carry that many bandages. First aid kits are good to have (though keeping more than 4 is starting to push it depending on what kind of backpack and vest you have). Boosters (energy drinks and painkillers) are probably way more important than you might think just starting out. They're usually the first thing I will grab when looting a corpse. In solos Kar98k is good as it will one shot someone in the head unless they have the level 3 helmet. Don't try to Kar people who are running around, but if you find someone sitting behind a tree, or prone in a field, take out your Kar and pop the head off. Oh yeah, 4x and 8x scopes are gold as well. Don't pass them up.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Apr 2, 2018 17:51:05 GMT -5
PS4 babbies just jelly that they don't have a choice! CONSOOOOLE WAAARRRRSSSSS YEAHHHHH LEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSGOOOOOOO!
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 26, 2018 15:36:01 GMT -5
PUBG is teh Hunger Games. Ya get dumped in a big area. The players get forced together by a shrinking circle that damages you. Last one standing wins/survives everyone else dies. You find stuff to kill people with along the way. Fortnite is like that but faster paced with minecrafty stuff thrown in. You can build walls and ramps and the like with materials you collect. You don't respawn, you just move on to the next game. Fortnite rounds are like 20 minutes, PUBG is a little over 30. But why build things, if the area just keeps on getting smaller and smaller and smaller? Why not just kill stuff? Why build? For one the ramp is useful for scaling mountains (or enemy forts), crossing the lake with floor pieces, or whatever. Walls are instant protection. If you are caught out in the open you can kind of back off and make a wall in that direction indefinitely to retreat so long as you have the materials. Or more likely a quick wall for protection followed by a ramp against it to make for a quick headglitch and/or perch for you to do some jump shotgunning. So you use it while moving to the new circle. You use it while fighting. And if you're solidly in the circle you can build a more proper fort/tower to protect yourself, give you good shooting angles and all that. The circles are random so towards the end you might have two forts on opposing hills or something, and one player/team will be forced to push the other and be at a disadvantage. That sort of thing.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 26, 2018 14:45:21 GMT -5
No one still has been able to tell me about what Fortnite is... you shoot people and build stuff. There has to be moer than that, right? PUBG is teh Hunger Games. Ya get dumped in a big area. The players get forced together by a shrinking circle that damages you. Last one standing wins/survives everyone else dies. You find stuff to kill people with along the way. Fortnite is like that but faster paced with minecrafty stuff thrown in. You can build walls and ramps and the like with materials you collect. You don't respawn, you just move on to the next game. Fortnite rounds are like 20 minutes, PUBG is a little over 30.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 26, 2018 14:12:50 GMT -5
It looks fine on higher settings. It has some modern graphical effects that weren't around in 2009. So I guess I can deny it? It's not like Fortnite is that good looking on a technical level either so I don't really get it. It's a petty thing to harp about, in a few years just about every new release will look much better than either game so who cares? Games from 2009 are still good.
And of course liking or not liking the art style is subjective? So what?
Yep total bullshit. Especially in a squads game you're telling me you guys aren't finding weapons? Then you just suck at the game. Landing at Pochinki is great for learning the game but you're going to take your lumps. If you are good at parachuting and mindful of your surroundings you will get a gun before you are pushed by an opponent 99/100. I honestly don't remember the last time I was killed in PUBG without getting a weapon including drops in places like Pochinki or the military base. But I've also been beaten to weapons and killed in Fortnite. And I've killed plenty of unarmed players in both. Maybe you're just not good at finding things without big bright shiny GUN HERE graphics or singing treasure chests. I don't know.
I didn't see a killcam in Fornite, just the follow around the guy that killed you thing. Which is fun in its own way but.... I don't know, why are you getting mad at killcams? The whole replay system in PUBG is great. It really helps you figure out what you did wrong, what you missed, how players collectively move. If you want a pixel perfect view of what the guy who killed you saw so you can go SEE I SHOULD HAVE KILLED HIM HE DIDN'T SHOOT AS FAST AND AS GOOD AS ME I really don't know what the to tell you. The killcam answers the questions of "how did he spot me?" and "what kind of shots did he make?". You're not getting perfect killcams out of 6v6 COD, and you sure as hell aren't going to get them out of a 100 man BR game.
Do you think the same people who work on the core technology of the game are making cool hats and jackets for lootboxes or something? PUBG for sure has development issues top-down starting with modder-in-chief PLAYERUNKNOWN himself but the notion that they're not prioritizing things like anti-cheat and improved network performance is absurd.
I'm just trying to follow along. So is RNG ok for long range battles but not short range battles? Does hitscan make for good long range battles?
Clunky is not RNG. Bad network performance isn't RNG. If you want to talk about the game design then there's nothing more RNG about PUBG than Fortnite when it comes to combat mechanics. If your complaint here is that PUBG lags, fair enough. Fortnite lagged a ton when I was playing it a lot too. If that's all fixed, great. Who cares if Dr Disrespect gets mad about a death? Are you telling me I won't be able to find a Fortnite streamer who calls bullshit on some of his deaths?
PUBG is all about positioning, reading terrain and pathing. The better players are moving a lot and getting information on where other players are by clearing big chunks of the final circles. You need to make tons of reads and decisions in PUBG.
Sure building and fighting in Fortnite have lots of skill elements, but I don't buy for a second that it approaches PUBG in terms of meaningful decision-making. I explained my bone with Fortnite already. I didn't exactly hide it. PUBG is still a game with up to 3 million concurrent players and 10x that sold. Yeah Fortnite has gotten huge in its own right but it is F2P, they wouldn't have their numbers at $30, and they surely are nowhere near the ballpark of PUBG in overall revenue. Fortnite still has to prove its longevity.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 23, 2018 20:39:42 GMT -5
Still hate Fortnite as a game, but it is impressive they launched a 60fps mode across all consoles. Makes PUBG's drops to 10fps on Xbox One X even more pathetic by comparison.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 19, 2018 16:06:40 GMT -5
Oh, you're one of those people who instantly dislike the game because of its visuals. As opposed to what? PUBG looking like a game straight out of 2009, whilst running like crap (less crap since 1.0 but still crap relative to its graphics) to boot? The fort building takes a little getting used to, but that's what separates Fortnite from PUBG and adds a new & interesting dynamic to the Battle Royale genre. I also like how everything is destructible, meaning you can't just turtle up in a secure corner of a building indefinitely like in PUBG. The close quarters battles in Fortnite are a lot more skill based and smooth, as opposed to the freaking dice rolls in PUBG. The killcams in PUBG are probably the most frustrating BS I've ever seen in recent history, they're worse than CoD killcams! The amount of Chinese hackers is also extreme, I thought it was overblown at first but it's very noticeable (at least 1 in 3 games). Fortnite is much faster paced and less unfair with loot, i.e. you're guaranteed to find a weapon almost everywhere. Not necessarily a good one, but something that gives you a flying f**k of a chance. In PUBG, numerous times I've landed in a fairly large area where the building I'm in has NO guns, just ammo, attachments, and fingerless gloves, then some dingus and his boyfriend will storm into my building with their M416 and SCAR-Ls. PUBG is more RNG than Fortnite, it's not even funny. Fortnite is more to the point as you're not spending the majority of the game finding decent weapons and attachments that make said weapons marginally better (but they still matter, because of the aforementioned RNG loot & the 100% probability that some squad that got lucky with their landing area will have fully specced M416/SCAR-Ls). PUBG just can't decide if it's a milsim like ArmA or an arcade shooter like CoD, it's a weird ginger bastard child that combines the worst aspects of the two. I'm glad Fortnite brought some much needed competition to the genre, perhaps Brendan Greene & co. will finally give the game a meaningful update instead of gouging Chinamen and children with loot crates. I dislike the game's art style. To me that's a more valid criticism than 'it looks like it is from 2009'. Neither game is really state of the art anyway graphically. Some of your complaints are total bullshit. If you're not getting a gun that's totally on you. Watch any good player and see how often they don't get a gun. The only time it's really a concern is if you're going for a really popular drop but that's basically a risk you can manage yourself. And that also happens in Fortnite. Except it's a harder situation to read and deal with because you can't track people's drops as well. Since you can just turn on a dime and switch what building you are landing on in Fortnite. If you are dying consistently in either game with no gun you just have no Foxtroting idea what you're doing. PUBG also makes it just a little easier to disengage when you're beaten to a weapon as they have to grab the weapon, the ammo, and also do the reload animation. Killcams and spectating are pretty out of sync, but it's not exactly hard to divine where people are actually shooting or what happened so I'm not sure of the complaint. Does Fortnite have a killcam now? As far as meaningful updates, I mean with 1.0 there was plenty. A second map with new weapons and vehicles. The aforementioned killcam. A full replay system (which is an excellent tool to break down your own gameplay and improve). Vaulting. A fix to the uhhh previously limited ADS and soft ADS control options. Sure they still have plenty of stuff to do, and sometimes they come off as comically inept (especially regarding the Xbox version) but this isn't Epic Games, this is a Korean shovelware outfit that stumbled into a worldwide sensation. I haven't been killed by any hackers that I've noticed either, though I play FPP and apparently it's far less frequent there. But that's one of the things they've been focusing on since 1.0. Anti-cheat. And they've banned millions of accounts. The loot crate stuff does kind of tie into this and I'd rather it didn't exist but it is what it is. Seems silly to obsess over in game cosmetics that you're going to drop for a helmet or cover up with a huge tactical vest. That whole system could use an overhaul... but while it incentivizes cheating for monetary gain the loot crates really don't seem all that predatory to kids. But then again maybe I've just read too many articles about shit that EA is trying to pull to worry that you might have to spend 3 dollars on the Steam Marketplace if you want an ugly shirt. Back to RNG fights for a second... the Fortnite design relies inherently on RNG. They want to be hitscan, but they also realize that pure hitscan doesn't really work in this sort of game because it's too easy. So to keep you from getting instantly killed at a distance there's inherent spread to all the guns. That's fundamentally different from PUBG, where distance engagements are balanced around ballistic trajectories. Instead of RNG you really have your own evasion and aiming skill put into play. Leading your targets. Lining up a headshot from distance if they haven't noticed you. CQB in PUBG can be a little clunky but it's not really RNG. Aside from the pretty standard hip fire mechanics... but you have the option of tightening your spread and sacrificing a lot of speed or going full ADS and sacrificing almost all of your speed to make your shots. I don't see how that is any worse than jumping around and shotgunning in Fortnite. Some more destructibility would do PUBG some good, especially like Siege's bullet penetration model. But the indestructible cover is mostly an issue in TPP where you can just hide with a shot lined up on some poor bastard who is forced to push you because of the circle and pop out and no-chance him. That style of ambush also works with Fortnite third person peeking but yeah if you know someone is there you can just shoot the cover. I don't really like that damage model though. They're still not going to take damage until the cover is gone. And they can just plop down 3-4 quick walls, hide behind whichever ones you decide not to shoot first and heal up or retreat. That kind of battle is incredibly tedious to me. In PUBG reading the map, pathing through cover into new circles and figuring out what the best positions to take are a critical skill. In Fortnite that is lessened when you can just put up new cover anywhere and erect a fort in seconds. If having a Lego competition in the final circles is your thing, great. But I think as a design it clashes with the BR concept. I also welcome competitors to the genre. All the big boys will be putting out BR stuff over the next couple of years I'm sure. I haven't tried Islands of Nyne. The gunplay looks a little too COD. It seems like a number of games are adding PVE elements back into the formula, which I suppose incidentally Fortnite is very poised to copy if they turn out to be popular.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 17, 2018 2:46:22 GMT -5
Yeah, Xbox version is ass for many many reasons. Though at least on X it mostly loads in assets. Mostly. It helps if you have a fast external drive. Somehow it has gotten worse and worse with the more recent patches.
PC version is pretty great in 1.0. Performance is solid. First person mode is definitely my go-to these days. The PC meta is far more agreeable as well. Not as much vehicles as weapons bullshit. Though that has died down on Xbox a bit as they gradually have made the vehicles into bigger and bigger deathtraps. Also nobody really fights early on and that leads to way too many players for the circle sizes. Some would argue that the PC has the opposite problem, with too many dying at School and the like leading to a slow mid-game but it's just about right for me. I like doing long drops with relatively low risk and then positioning myself into lower population parts of the circle, though I will aggressively defend/clear those areas so I'm not quite a scumbag corner camper. The replay feature on PC is also great for figuring out what was going on around you, what you missed that you shouldn't have, and ultimately why you died.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 9, 2018 18:34:11 GMT -5
It's better, but like I said some of that might just be the EQ. I need to go back and check some PUBG replays and runthem through with my X7 vs motherboard audio (with Atmos software). There were a couple of times where I felt like it was better and it did me good, but could easily be placebo. I plug in the X7, excited to try out new tech, so obviously I'm focusing more on sound than I normally would be. Xbox PUBG has no replays, and isn't as convenient to switch between setups.
When plugging in my Xbox I do get some sort of ground loop whining noise with both USB to PC and chat audio coming from the controller to the line-in. Maybe rewiring some of my power setup could fix that. That's one area PS4 probably works better with this thing if you connect bluetooth for chat audio.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 8, 2018 12:58:52 GMT -5
The poors are the worst. If I had known they were allowed on this site I would have never signed up!
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 7, 2018 14:12:00 GMT -5
What you need to understand is when you play with scrubs like Dumien a lot of times their cheap peasant mics will start barfing static in your ear at random and you want to be able to deal with it as quickly as possible before it gets you killed. It's probably way easier if you don't play with scrubs. Speaking of Dumien I can't believe he just left my nay-saying as the last post in the Fortnite thread, I really expected him to jump to the game's defense at some point.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 7, 2018 3:50:28 GMT -5
So far I like the Soundblaster X7, though it's only hooked up to my PC. Plenty of power, no hissing, sounds good. SBX surround spacing sounds pretty good, and just having access to an EQ setting is a big upgrade over my old mixamp. Hooking it up to the Xbox seems annoying. SPDIF is simple enough, but seems like the mic has to go straight into the controller, and I guess I'll get analog audio by splitting that headset input and running it to the RCA L/R inputs on the back. So the mic is just going to be a thing that is getting constantly swapped. But at least the headphones can stay plugged in full time. I also like the little headphone hanger they give you, though I don't know if I'll have any good place to use it and still be able to access the controls on the front easily.
The volume knob is kind of a wasted opportunity. It does volume.. and then you can push in for mute. Meh. Would much rather have it cycle through other things like the mixer controls. Adjusting my chat volume in the software is a bit clunky but it will be doable. But it's the sort of thing where I'll always have to pull it up before starting if I want quick access. Like, c'mon a secondary knob or push-to-cycle on the big knob could do wonders here.
I like that I can switch between headset and my speakers (on motherboard sound) simply by powering off the X7. But in contrast I'm not sure how much I'm going to like my PC volume coming through while I play Xbox. It might get annoying with audio balance issues. But on the bright side that's a quick and easy way to play music while playing Xbox and the like. Not that I have any game I play on Xbox at the moment where I don't need the top soundwhoring settings anyway... but still not too bad. Can also pair it with my Amazon Echo through Bluetooth and have that play music with voice commands while playing games on PC and then mixing it all on my headset, seems pretty good.
And PC chat is still in a screwy place, where there's that whole Communication Device interface, but games don't really seem to use it, but it probably works for Discord. Still, I'm not getting even half decent mixing options for that unless I pair the X7 through Bluetooth as a different device so that I can kind of control everything in the X7 software.
For that matter, the new Xim Apex appears to be losing some PC features as far as doing your game configs. So I might need to convert to using my phone to do that stuff. And the X7 has a phone app as well. And my now very old Galaxy S5 can use an upgrade. So, time to get new phone and then tether the poor S5 as a permanent XIM and X7 controller under my Xbox monitor? Seems like it solves a number of problems.
Overall I feel good about the purchase and look forward to messing with the setup just as soon as I clean up my desk and rewire some stuff.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 1, 2018 23:50:38 GMT -5
The HD595 is on its way out for more reasons than just sound quality. They sounded pretty good on a PCI-E soundcard that I had a while back, I forgot what it was, compatibility started becoming a nightmare, but it specifically advertised a headphone amp and allowed you to select the impedance of your headphones.
I think my number one concern, aside from being in the super high-end for normies aka like medium-end for rabbits who have gone down holes, is the comfort factor. The HD595s are actually pretty light, the options you are listing are generally heavier by a solid +20%. So that leads me to Senny HD600 or HD650s, which seem like the super obvious one to two steps up from the HD595s, and are actually even slightly lighter according to the specs. I'm trying to cut down on the marathon gaming sessions, but even so, every ounce counts.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 1, 2018 17:27:16 GMT -5
Screw it, ordered an X7 off Amazon, it dropped back under $300 and seems to tick enough boxes. Going to have to think about what other upgrades to my setup are appropriate but I'll evaluate that once it gets here. If anyone has suggestions for open-back headphones a tier or two above HD595s though I'm all ears (no pun intended).
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 1, 2018 14:22:45 GMT -5
Destiny 2 is a game that has all the potential in the world. What a stupid post. You know what else had potential? Adolf Hitler!
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Feb 1, 2018 14:20:18 GMT -5
It's a MixAmp 5.8. So PC on USB and Xbox via optical doesn't quite work. Or rather it might, but PC needs to be on optical as well via a switch. This thing was designed in the 360 and PS3 era. As such it has a USB chat cable for PS3 and a normal analog cable that works for Xbox 360, and also works fine on my One X with the chat adapter and a 2.5mm to 3.5mm adapter or whatever it is.
I believe I've tried using the USB chat cable on my PC at some point, and even though it was detected as a device I wasn't getting any sound through it nor was it recording my mic. I think I might know part of the problem, I forget how it works, but I think one short circuits the other. If the analog connector is plugged in then the USB doesn't work at all. Or something like that. That's a bit of a problem as a switch doesn't really help in this case. It's all a little weird as the USB connection runs from the wireless base station (so as to plug into a PS3 console) and the analog cable runs from the wireless receiver (so as to plug into a 360 controller).
I guess another option would be a cheap USB dongle-style sound card dedicated to voice input/output. Then having a switch for the analog and the optical. I'd leave the USB sound as permanent communications channel, but I'd still have to manually change between sound devices in Windows when switching between headphones and speakers. Still that would let me use a nice desktop or boom mic on both systems very easily. For something like Rocket League my preferred setup would be speakers + a mic anyway.
I still don't see a perfect solution. I might buy some cables and a sound card to do some tests to see how viable what I described might be.
I still feel like I want to move on to nicer hardware though:
Something better than my current MixAmp. Even if it is just a newer MixAmp. My understanding is still that the Soundblaster X7 can kind of do what a MixAmp does, but it doesn't have a dedicated volume balance knob so I'm not exactly sure how it works. It might be through a phone app that you can mix sources like that? In which case... no thanks. It seems like the current line of MixAmp Pros is a couple of years old. They used to put out a new one like every year. I kind of want a refresh. They are explicitly made in Xbox/PC or PS4/PC varieties which seems kind of weird. I used to prioritize having the setup work on PS4 as well but I don't think I care at all about that now. PS4 can probably live a life of exclusives played on speakers at this point for me.
Something better than my Sennheiser HD595s. The replacement earpads I installed are kind of crap, even though they do seem to be official replacements. The cable is too fucking long and not removable. That and the add-on modmic pro with its own cable is just way too annoying. Especially when I'm constantly switching it between the mixamp and my PC's front panel.
And of course something to replace the ModMic and maybe live on my desk rather than attached to my face.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Jan 26, 2018 17:53:42 GMT -5
You can definitely turn off your Dolby on MixAmp and then feed it Dolby Atmos from the Xbox... I didn't try that with any Atmos games but for regular surround games my MixAmp processing sounded better. The Atmos thing sounded way better on my PC than it did on my Xbox for some reason. Maybe I'll try it again, I have upgraded to 1X since then though I don't know if that had any sound related upgrades. And, no I don't watch movies with headphones. Though it might be an upgrade for me with the right setup. Close quarters apartment living means I watch stuff at a modest volume and often turn on subtitles just in case. Sad to be sure but I'm only like 60 yards from really good tacos so I take the good with the bad. What is your exact gripe with the mixamp sound quality? The amplification or the Dolby algorithm? I mean, dolby headphones will never "sound good" afaik. I use it to get an advantage, I will never use it for music/movies personally. That said, if you are looking for an amp ugrade, daisy chaining a Fiio could resolve your problems. Another great option is actually buying an AV receiver.... I had one and it worked better than the mixamp. They can be found quite cheap if you don't mind 2nd hand. All you need is 2 inputs and dolby headphones. For me the problem is space (living room), but maybe you are not limited in space if you sit behind a desk. I think the Dolby actually sounds pretty decent for games. I'm running HD595s and my MixAmp puts out just about enough volume (though it does hiss a little when you get close to max). If I upgrade to something with higher impedance I know it won't be enough. My end game setup would be something where I could quickly and easily mix chat volume with game volume for both PC and Xbox on the same device. And a toggle between the two. Right now the MixAmp does pretty good with Xbox, but I do think it could be a little more powerful. Maybe just upgrading from my wireless MixAmp to one of the newer wired models would help. I basically use my wireless as a wired at this point anyway. The PC side is where the real problems are. Right now if I plug in my headphones and mic, those devices take over. And Dolby Atmos automatically turns on, which is great. But getting good balance for chat versus games is trash. I haven't even come up with a decent software solution let alone the awesomeness that is a simple balance knob. I do really want that unified setup though. Something where nice headphones and maybe like a Blue Yeti mic are just plugged in full time, maybe a switch for Xbox vs PC side, and maybe a one click situation on my system tray to go between speakers and headphones... The way it is now as of the first Creator's Update for Win 10 is much better than before. Where I had to manually turn on headphones after plugging them into my PC and then manually enable or disable surround processing, which would often report the incorrect on/off state and was just a general nightmare to deal with. Also, wouldn't feeding MixAmp output into a better Amp kind of defeat the purpose? As in, the audio has already been sullied by the filthy peasant MixAmp? That may just be my misguided impression on how this shit works rather than the reality.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Jan 23, 2018 16:13:49 GMT -5
Oh boy I could load up D2 and do a Flashpoint on Titan or Inverted Spire for a Nightfall? My god the depth and variety of this game know no bounds!
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Jan 23, 2018 15:32:00 GMT -5
Oh shit Aphoristic is clearly having a stroke! Anyone got his RL identity? Call an ambulance for Foxtrot's sake it's been 3 hours! Building is the main skill in this game. Git gut at it or you will never be the best you can be. It is genius how deep it goes though, it might be one of the biggest skill gap games I have played in my life because of it. Building big forts is for noobs btw, building is meant to be a dynamic mechanic if you get good at it. I don't know if I'd say it's the main skill, but yes it is important. And I have zero interest in it. I'm not even that against the ramps for getting up mountains and buildings but... walls and forts. Nah. There are lots of things that are skillful and don't interest me. The original jump pad was trash but the newer one that sends you parachuting is kind of cool. I can dig stuff like that but... Oh my teammate got downed let me just plop down 3 walls and heal him no problem. No need to punish anyone for running around far from cover when you can just pull it out of your ass. 3rd person tactical loitering plays are infuriating. At least in PUBG you can go first person mode. There's no solution in Fortnite. Slots stacking with no penalty is just a bad way to do a game about scrounging together resources. I mean I guess it's cool that you can carry 5 weapons if you want but meh. Also the console version is really bad for rearranging your inventory. Is there that much RNG shooting in PUBG though? I think weapons might have some base inaccuracy but it's more modeled on the accuracy of real guns than anything. And you're certainly not missing shots at 20 meters because of pure RNG. The bullets do all have muzzle velocities and the travel time and bullet drops that go along with it. It's a very high skill system. Ranging your targets, leading them, waiting for the perfect shot. The looting phase can get a little boring at times but you can definitely go aggro and hunt people down if you want constant action. Find a vehicle and it's never hard to go pick a fight. They are definitely competitors. Hell everyone I played Fortnite with on Xbox were only playing it because they wanted to play PUBG and couldn't! And not to mention they pivoted their whole game to copy PUBG's design when it became a craze. Like hey, good on them for being nimble enough to pull it off... but it is kind of scummy. But look at a studio like Bungie, that Destiny 2 oil tanker was speeding so hard at the fucking iceberg that they couldn't even incorporate the course corrections from DESTINY ONE. Like... wtf?!? And sorry, but Fortnite does not compete with PUBG as far as pulse pounding endings go. I've been involved with some good Fortnite endings but the games take half as long. I didn't get nearly as invested as I did going for the chicken dinner in PUBG. Final circles in PUBG are one of the very few times in gaming where I can literally catch myself nearing panic and have to calm myself down and draw out deep breaths. You don't have to play PUBG any more campy than Fortnite. I mean sitting in a bush while others kill themselves is frankly just about as effective in either game. Don't expect PUBG on PS4 anytime soon. Microsoft is very invested in keeping it off. But it will come, unless Microsoft outright buys PUBG at some point. But PUBG on PS4 is going to be worth a hundred million plus dollars to Bluehole.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Jan 23, 2018 6:52:42 GMT -5
It's gay as hell. PUBG all the way. (assuming you're referring to the BR mode and not the nobody plays it mode)
edit:
I hate the game's art style, so it's off to a bad start there. I think a faster paced PUBG has potential but the inventory stuff is a little too simplified. And I absolutely hate the fort building aspect, especially what it does to the end circles. For most of the game I can get by playing it as a shooter but at some point you're screwed if you don't start playing the build your own use mind bulletses game. I hate this game in a way you can only hate a game when your friends keep pushing you to play it. The other thing is the pure TPS aspect to it (I prefer FPS mode in PUBG). Weapons with a ton of spread leading to too much RNG in the battles. Last time I was playing I was on a really good run, 8 kills, getting towards the late circles, good weapons and healing, and I end up in a long range fight with the scoped AR vs a non-scoped AR. The spread just wouldn't give me more than 2 hits, and 10 seconds into the battle the game just gives him like 3-4 shots right in a row to my head to down me from 150% health to nothing in 100ms flat.
Compared to PUBG I just don't feel any of the tension. I understand why someone on Xbox might prefer Fortnite as it definitely runs more consistently and has a lot fewer glitches at this point. But as a fundamental game design I think PUBG wins across the board.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Jan 20, 2018 19:37:15 GMT -5
illram How much does the A16 cost? I couldn't find it... though based on the price of the uhh A8... rabbit hole indeed! It does sound like pretty cool tech. I've been on my Mixamp 5.8 (though the wirless doesn't really do anything for me at this point as I've abandoned the couch life for gaming). I've considered getting the X7. But for that price I kind of want it to easily handle at least Xbox and PC at the same time. And I'm not sure it's really good for mixing chat audio in. It seems like it has enough inputs that with a few wires I could maybe make it work. But that's the thing, even though the Astro Mixamp isn't amazing quality, it does what it needs to do, and it has a dial for chat audio vs game audio. I'd love to upgrade my overall audio quality but not at the expense of that utility. Maybe there are more options these days. I too am a believer in virtualized surround sound. The Mixamp does a solid job there. I've been using Dolby Atmos on the PC side and it's worked well there, and could potentially work well on Xbox for me as well so I could consider going for a headphone amp that doesn't do the surround sound. Ideally I'd have something where I could hook up a desktop mic, have it switch between PC and Xbox at the touch of a button, and maybe also be able to mix and match other audio streams. Say an Amazon Echo. With buttons. On the front. Not a fucking Android App. Speaking of high end audio stuff. So Dolby Atmos and various competitors added ceiling speakers... which is great. What about sound from below? Maybe that's something that isn't useful for movies but it seems like it would be nice for games. Seems like surround sound is in an OK place on consoles right now but the PC side is still a bit wack. The obvious example I can think of is PUBG, behind you sounds like in front of you (though it sounds good on the Xbox version). I've noticed it with other games at times as well. I don't think it's the Atmos for Headphones thing letting me down, I think it's the game not providing a 5.1 or 7.1 or whatever to begin with. Yeah, sound is definitely a frustrating topic. I'm willing to throw money at the problem if only I could figure where!
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Jan 5, 2018 4:55:16 GMT -5
For 2017 releases it seems like an easy call. PUBG. I haven't played much of Zelda or Horizon. Hollow Knight was fun but I might be a little burnt out on Metriodvania games, I stopped 3 or 4 hours in and haven't gotten back.
Oh, I forgot about Cuphead. That actually kind of makes it tough. I'll go with it just because even at 1.0 PUBG needs some tweaks and even though it's Early Access, the way it runs on original Xbox One hardware can be considered a crime against humanity.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Dec 9, 2017 3:01:28 GMT -5
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Dec 6, 2017 23:24:45 GMT -5
As per the reddit thread I went ahead and got a refund for my Xbox version. I thought maybe at some point I would hop back on it just to clean up some achievements and as it's no longer possible, fuck it. They've seriously got to get their shit together. Buy the DLC or else we're taking stuff away from you. What the fuck kind of an idea is that? I'm still on the PC version as I pre-ordered the derp-a-derp edition with season pass. So you know, hopefully at some point they actually turn the game around.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Dec 6, 2017 9:21:56 GMT -5
I don't know, calling D2 a great 'teamwork' game and lumping it in with Overwatch seems like a pretty massive stretch. Destiny's higher-than-COD TTK and resultant teamshooting is kind of the lowest form of teamwork. And I don't really buy that communication is any more key to winning a game of Destiny than it is COD.
And what game aren't you at a big advantage being in a full party vs a squad of randoms? Even in COD just communicating enough to make sure every lane is covered, making sure to not flip a spawn, or coordinating a push on an objective puts you at a huge advantage over a disorganized rabble.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Dec 4, 2017 17:59:46 GMT -5
I'm pretty happy with the state of PVP compared to D1. I mean bird lady gave me a Better Devils for not playing. And I always wanted a Better Devils. It could be better if the wikis weren't telling me you have to play Crucible to get the Rat King thing.
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Post by Pegasus Actual on Nov 29, 2017 0:53:00 GMT -5
Lots of good points made by Slayerage... skip to 12:50 if you want the tl;dw I was extremely skeptical of the new weapon loadout system before launch... and yeah. It's a disaster. Suckass Weapons is a great term for it. There was a serious zen to swapping between your three D1 weapons as you unleashed a symphony of violence. In D2 I'm on Suckass 1 and Suckass 2 really only comes out against second rate shielded enemies. Did they playtest the concept at all? I can't imagine booting it up for the first time and thinking "Oh man I got 2 hand cannons now and no sniper rifle this is the bomb fuckin' dotcom!"
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