SCOREPADDING

[Bubbachuk-PG-]

For those of you not familiar with this term, a player is padding his score when he either positions himself within sight of an upcoming objective and out in front of the rest of the players for the purpose of getting as many kills as he can before the other players get there or he is firing on an upcoming objective before the current objective is completed.

In most cases its a duck shoot for them because on most of our maps the bad guys for an upcoming objective are not even activated until the current objective is completed . . . in short, they don't fire back making them easy targets. I can't tell you the number of times I've gone to an objective only to find all the bad guys have already been killed.

I and others have noticed this trend and I'm giving advance notice that anyone caught doing this will have their score ZEROED. Everyone wants good stats but doing it this way is kind of like cheating.

[viiper]

Which is why in part I would like to see a game where meeting objectives was scored higher than killing bad guys. A player gets punished by helping to complete an objective, as opposed to wiping out a area of bad guys.

Mission-based scoring would be ideal, with less points given to killing bad guys.

[NightRunner]

now im not trying to find a grey area here but there are some maps were the BGs from another objective will fire on you while trying to complete a separate objective. me personally i follow rules of engagement if they shoot at me ill send them to an early grave.

and i do not know the name of the maps right off the top of my head 2 for sure where i know that happens.

[Bubbachuk-PG-]

There are a couple of maps in the rotation like that and I do the same thing . . . shoot at me and I'll shoot back.

What I'm talking about is a situation where BGs at an objective other than the current objective are visible and easily picked off by someone with a sniper rifle.

Another situation arises when there are 2 objectives at one location like "kill the BGs" then "destroy weapon crates", or whatever . . . When the BGs are all dead, a player familiar with the map will take off for the next objective while the other players are taking care of the crates. He won't fire on the BGs at the next objective until the crates are destroyed but because he got a head start he's in position to get several kills before the other players can get there. This is SCOREPADDING!

[NightRunner]

roger that bubba. just wanted to clear that up with those not familiar with PG CO-OP.

[NightRunner]

by the way may i post this in the GENERAL DISCUSSION forum?

[Country Joe-PG-]

Many of our older maps were made for DFX. We converted them to DFX2 when it came out and like wise with the Black Ops MODs. To be sure, we experienced players shooting ahead back in DFX and our map makers modified they're maps to prevent this using fog, spreading out the objective areas, or changing day maps to night time maps.

With the introduction of the Black Ops MODs, it's easier to see enemy further away in some maps because of the weapon's scope magnification. Mortars make it even easier to just hang back and shoot ahead too.

Bubba built this team on the philosophy of fair gaming and challenging maps. If you've played in other Co-Op servers I'm sure you've noticed they're mostly respawning Enemy with less than accurate shooting abilities. It's very easy to attain high Kill/Death ratio stats and was most likely the inspiration for Bubba's motto, "We Build Gaming Maps . . . Not Shooting Galleries". Unfortunately, shooting ahead reduces the level of challenge.

With over one hundred maps now in the rotation it will take some time to modify maps to prevent shooting ahead but we've adapted in the past to make this a non-issue and I know we'll do the same now.

[Bubbachuk-PG-]

Very well stated, Joe.

When I switched to DFX from DF2, I found out that there wasn't much interest by players in deathmatches or team deathmatches. Most of the DFX players were former DF2 players, like myself, that just didn't like the feel of DFX. Compared to DF2, it's a very slow and cumbersome game. I started going into COOP servers to see how they played. Some were OK and some really sucked. Almost all of the maps I played were easy . . . sickeningly easy.

I had made several hundred DM, TDM, and CTF maps for DF2 but had never even thought about making a COOP Map. I knew I could do better and went about learning how to make COOP maps that were at least challenging. Windstalker, the only remaining PG member from the original DF2 Squad other than myself, came along and also took an interest in making COOP maps and we started cranking them out. This was back around the middle of 2007. There was a lot of trial and error but we eventually got the hang of it. The players liked them and the rest is history.

Country Joe, POG, TAR1, Apparition, and most recently Hotstick are the rest of the squad's mapmaking team and they have all produced the best COOP maps you'll find in any COOP Server. Country Joe has made the most maps by far and continues to crank them out.