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Game Theory :: CAH Rate Topic: -----

#1 User is offline   NulL Icon

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Posted 18 November 2007 - 11:48 PM

This week I'm going to have a stab at tackling CAH, as I think most people are aware CAH is pretty much dead; which is a shame as it is quite popular in other games. The only time I've seen a populated CAH server in the last few years is when FSK runs ut_temple, which isnt a perticularly great example of a CAH map. It suffers from whats become known as 'capture and run'; where players run round the map touching as many flags as they can before the time runs out. players should never be in a game where they see more capture points (CPs) than opponents. Today I'm going to quickly cover the two workable map layouts and a couple of problems I see with urbanterror's current CAH game logic.


CAH is a game where teams spawn in the standard base vs base structure. Between the spawns is a number of capture points, map should always have an odd number of capture points to avoid stalemate situations. Capture points, as far as I can see, should be layed out in one of two fashions. Either an even layout, where each Capture point is an equal distance from each teams spawn. Most urban terror maps fit this layout:
Posted Image

Or maps can use a linear layout where capture points area arranged on an imaginary line that passes through both spawns:
Posted Image


When I started thinking about CAH I thought that linear maps wouldn't play well because only one CP, the center, would be contested and CPs closer to a team's base would always be held by that team. I have however changed my mind and realized that once the center CP is controlled by a team, they could make the choice to either stay holding the center for a 2-1 advantage or they can push further towards the enemy's base for a 3-0 advantage. This, I think would create a more interesting game experience than an even layout - letting teams push further into the enemy's territory, where the enemy has the upper hand, for extra credit. (Upper hand coming from proximity of spawns.) Also in linear maps the whole team can concentrate on attacking/defending a particular CP together, as opposed to even maps where the teams split up and take part in smaller isolated battles as seperate CPs.


Problem #1 with linear layout maps coupled with the ut game logic is that players would have to keep going back across the map and re-capture CPs when the timer runs out - this would be tedious for players. I understand that releasing CPs at the end of the capture time is to deter 'capture and run' play style, but was it introduced because of poor map design where too many CPs were used in a map with even layout? I can see 5 or 7 CPs being used in very linear maps if CPs were kept by a team at the end of the capture time. These maps would have to be specially built as I don't think any of the current maps could support 5 or 7 linear CPs. Even layout maps should be limited to 1 or 3 CPs, urbanterror map sizes and player loads don't warrant more, it will become a 'capture and run' game if more are used.


Problem #2 is the length of the capture time, 1 minute by default. With such a long capture time the following situation can occur: one team can hold the CP for the first 50 seconds, the other team for the last 10 seconds and get the point. One team here has clearly been stronger but the team that held the CP when the timer ran out was given credit. Firstly this seems unfair to the team that held it for so long and secondly I see it promoting 'capture and run' tactics; where players try to dash in to areas as the timer is running out and touch the flag to be rewarded with a point. This certainly isn't capture and HOLD.


So my recommendations for CAH would be to stop setting capture points to neutral at the end of the capture time. Secondly reducing the default g_cahtime, or lock it, to 1 or 2 seconds, so holding a CP is actually rewarded. This would require removing the 'red scores x, blue scores Y' print message and the 'urrrush' sound at the end of the capture time to stop them from spamming.


(Re-)Introducing players to this game mode so late wouldnt be an easy or perhaps even do able task, and finding mappers willing to spend time creating maps specifically for linear CAH will also be hard. But I hope its possible as I don't think this game mode is fundamentally flawed just perhaps imperfectly executed.


  - NulL

#2 User is offline   Oswald (old) Icon

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Posted 19 November 2007 - 12:06 AM

I like the levels for TF2 from The Orange Box for whatever they called that Capture mode....all the levels work very well

#3 User is offline   slackin Icon

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Posted 19 November 2007 - 12:09 AM

humm, interesting, i did do capnhold in invasion, i like my cap points, kind of a combination of both examples you gave, but the are hieght differences in the cap points, and also kind of random spawn locations, should maybe throw a wrench in the cap n run theory becuase someone could spawn closer to one cap point than the other, then spawn somewhere else.(note: not total random, blue is on one side and red on the other, just not all together)

#4 User is offline   nemesis Icon

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Posted 19 November 2007 - 02:57 AM

Quote

I like the levels for TF2 from The Orange Box for whatever they called that Capture mode....all the levels work very well


I concur except the one CTF map they produced still plays like ass aka 2fort.  I concur with $null as well.

#5 User is offline   Csan (old) Icon

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Posted 20 November 2007 - 12:40 PM

Quote

So my recommendations for CAH would be to stop setting capture points to neutral at the end of the capture time. Secondly reducing the default g_cahtime, or lock it, to 1 or 2 seconds, so holding a CP is actually rewarded. This would require removing the 'red scores x, blue scores Y' print message and the 'urrrush' sound at the end of the capture time to stop them from spamming.


Sounds very interesting...

Quote

(Re-)Introducing players to this game mode so late wouldnt be an easy or perhaps even do able task, and finding mappers willing to spend time creating maps specifically for linear CAH will also be hard. But I hope its possible as I don't think this game mode is fundamentally flawed just perhaps imperfectly executed.


I would be willing to dedicate my second server port to CAH to support bringing back CAH gametype to life. :)

An official mapcycle-cah.txt with recommended CAH maps would be awesome.

CAH is so much fun it should be played more.

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#6 User is offline   Oswald (old) Icon

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Posted 20 November 2007 - 05:35 PM

thought this was about C&H, not CTF....but anyway. I do like some of the ideas they implemented and used, their levels are highly successful in my eyes. I just think in developing our C&H there was really no true idea, so level designers had no real direction in how to create a good and playable C&H level

#7 User is offline   Kendle Icon

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Posted 20 November 2007 - 07:19 PM

DOD (Day of Defeat), the game I played for 18 months before UrT got it's evil claws into me, uses Capture & Hold, but where it differs from UrT (from what I gather from the above) is :-

1. CP's are arranged in a linear fashion as per the 2nd diagram.
2. There are usally 5 CP's, with each team starting with 2 already in their possession, and the centre being neutral.
3. Once a CP is taken by one team it remains theirs until the other team (if they can) take it back.
4. The central, neutral, CP usually requires more than 1 player to capture.
5. Once a team takes all 5 CP's the round ends.
6. In Clan matches the round is scored on the number of times a team takes all 5 (called "full caps").

I think this is a fantastic game mode, better even than CTF, although what killed DOD for me was the horribly inaccurate weapons and slow movement speed. I could see UrT's faster pace presenting a challenge to this game mode, which in DOD certainly kinda relies on the slower pace to prevent CP merri-go-round.

It does however promote a different kind of team work, because it's all about controlling an area, as opposed to simply having half the team sitting behind a single "thing" (flag) while the other half try and take a single other thing.

#8 User is offline   Csan (old) Icon

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Posted 21 November 2007 - 12:37 PM

hey I kinda like the current "CP merry-go-round" ;)

#9 User is offline   žalost (old) Icon

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Posted 22 November 2007 - 01:19 AM

i think that there should be a few second wait where you have to stand within 256 units from the flag's origin until that flag turns to your team's color, so that an enemy player doesnt just sprint and jump through the flag 1/2 a second b4 the cap.

maybe there can be like a status bar at the bottom of the screen showing the estimated time left until the flag changes, like in bomb, and it would be cooler if there was an "enemy color-to-white-to-your team's color" gradient fill to the flag.

just a thought

#10 User is offline   paelleon (old) Icon

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Posted 04 December 2007 - 08:57 AM

Sorry, slightly off topic and quite a bump, but do you have any recommendations for capture and hold? i mean maps to play it on. I've been trying to get people to play it here, but I'm always outvoted. And before you say it, /disconnect and go to another server is out of the question - cause we're on a lan, not the net.

EDIT: this reminded me of the game type in Unreal Tournament called "Onslaught". That was a cool idea.

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