[Ikslorin]

During the last live stream covering two matches of the first round of the Swiss Format there was quite an uproar due to my decision to set the cvar cg_showbullethits to 0. It is quite clear, that a lot of viewers do want it, so I’m open to change it, but as I will argue below I’m not fully convinced that it is a good idea for the viewing experience. As it mainly comes down to a ratio of pros and cons, the question is if there are pros that I’m either not taking into account or not giving enough weight compared to the cons that I’ll mainly be putting forth in the following.

For the first few arguments, I want to disregard any information added or removed by having cg_showbullethits on or off. Let us only study the visual clearity and appeal with and without. For this I’d like you to compare the two images below, where the first has cg_showbullethits to 0 and the other below has it to 2 (no arguments are changed comparing 0 to 1 instead of 2).



Where the kill information is easily readable “X [weapon] Y” the hit information is a long sentence. Having these two different styles are not very appealing, as the interface does not use a coherent style. Now this could be solved by going back to the classic full sentences for kills, but there’s no way I’m going to do that, as that is certainly not making for a better viewing experience. A better solution, which would require changes to the game would be a shortened version for hits, like “-> X [shortest limb-descriptor] damage%”.

More importantly than the earlier stuff when disregarding information given or taken away, when you have cg_showbullethits on, you end up with the same area of the screen with two relatively disjunct responsibilities: Showing current players hits on/from other players + Showing global kills. That does not lend itself to very easily understandable interface.

On that note of disjunct responsibilities, you might also ask yourself, if the cg_showbullethits isn’t more just treating the symptom rather than a deeper problem in the viewer’s interface? The information of damage and more should in my opinion be showed elsewhere, such as total health of all players in the lower right.

While we begin to take into account the information given by cg_showbullethits we get to one of my main reasons not to turn it on. The most important thing to realize, is that there’s only so much space on the screen on which you can put information, and after some amount of time, some information is going to compete for space with another piece of information. This is specifically with cg_showbullethits already the case, since it directly competes for the four lines at the upper left with the kill-log.
A very rough test in CTF gave me 28 kills in 2 minutes, meaning that a kill happened roughly every fourth second, except for the fact that kills in wave-based CTF very much come in waves of two or three to hit the timer. Should you turn on cg_showbullethits you will end up missing kills, which might possibly be more important to map control than the specificities of the current players hits. In CTF it will very much result in an unreadable mess in the upper left, which is so cluttered that it looses all value.
In TS on the other hand, we only have 10 players, not respawning and a generally much slower engagement speed. So, while the argument does not apply as strongly, you do still have to keep in mind, that engagements are usually coordinated in a way, such that more people are being under fire at once. Simultaneously TS very much has a lot of nothing and then a hectic engagement, meaning that all kills are happening very much in a very short time frame.

Another problem I see, is that you as a viewer of the live stream are switching views all the time and have to keep track of the movement of possibly ten people at once, but only being able to do so through their POV. That is not something to disregard lightly. So getting information of the hits of the current player (which as argued later explains players choices and more) are not going to be of huge value, when you switch quickly over to another player on the other side of the map.

With so many arguments against put forth already does not mean, that the information given does not have value. Let us disregard the fact, that it is competing for space with the kills and with itself, and only focus on the information that we’re given. On a most basic level, it is a confirmation of the current player watched actually getting a hit, and this information also being a bit more specific than just the hitsound, which I also have turned on for the stream. On a higher level, the players choices, such as hunting down a player or staying back, are primarily done based on the hit information, where they get a good idea of the total amount of health and their ability to move.

But, there’s one more argument against it, which also in some ways nullifies the one pro I just wrote. This information, especially when used to argue for the choices of players, are only used by a higher level of viewers. But, there’s one thing you have to realize as to what one of my goals are with the stream. My stream is not only for the expert and the master-analyzer, hell if it was, why would I attempt to call GG as late as possible in the game and always try and keep the hype up? The expert does already see it being won after the first few minutes most likely, but I’m also trying to make it appealing to casual viewers and even non-UrT players. The game will at this size primarily get exposure through new releases and mouth-to-mouth, but there’s absolutely no reason also not to attempt making the content created as friendly to casual viewers and people who never played the game. And having a coherent, easily readable and also most importantly not overwhelming interface is one way of obtaining exactly this.


With that we’ve reached the end of my arguments, where I personally find the cons outweighing the pros. The following are invalid arguments put forth from people in chat, though I have changed them here to remove profanity and unecessary immaturity. I am just outright already addressing them, as I just don’t care to read these again here.

• SevenofNine has hit info
  This is a argumentum ad verecundiam. Just because SevenofNine does it, does not mean that that is the best viewing experience. If you want a concrete counter-example very close to the current topic, SevenofNine still uses the old, long and unreadable kill messages. Now, there’s absolutely no argument that having “X got a lead enema from Y’s retro m4” is more readable and appealing than “Y [m4] X”.
  
  
• You don’t play with hit information? (You noob)
  This is a reductio ad absurdum, and I don’t see any reason why I need to further address this, as we’re talking about the viewing experience and not the playing experience.
  
  
• You just don’t understand
  This is a argumentum ad hominem, and the wording here is very different from the use in chat, but it all comes down to trying to discredit me as a person rather than actually addressing my arguments. If you cannot bring forth anything that is not an insult or a “gotcha” I don’t even care to listen.

These are all my arguments for why the cg_showbullethits does more harm than good from a viewing perspective. I’d love to hear what you have to say.
______________________

But, before I end this post, I do want to give a comment on how certain viewers handled the disagreement during the livestream.

Very quickly after I did not immediately adhere to their view but instead was arguing against them, few polish players began in chat to switch over to polish to insult me behind my back, but effectively (and clearly on purpose) still right in front of my nose. Among the many messages for more than an hour, which all are extremely rude, we have the various gems of “ignorancki fiucie” and “co to za jebany idiota”, both of which you don’t really even need a translation to understand what was said.

Simultaneously with the massive amounts of comments in chat, which is appropriate (at least if it was kept at a proper maturity) I also was messaged on both Discord and IRC. This even escalated to someone getting a player of the current match to spam me in-game to turn on the hit information. Since everyone starting the message-flood through the other channels were there during the first discussion on stream and through chat, there’s no way you can argue that they thought I just hadn’t noticed their desire. It is very clear, that the whole point was to spam me so hard, that I in the end would crumble under the pressure and turn on the hit information, just to get it stop. There’s no way around calling this anything but just peer pressure.

There is absolutely no way, that this behaviour is anything that I want to encourage or even want to have anywhere in my chat or around me, as it is absolutely disrespectful, childish and outright disgusting. To be honest, due to that behaviour, I more feel inclined to leave showbullethits off at this point just to spite them and to not to promote such behaviour. So, I hope there can be some damn mature and convincing argumentation done in the following, or I’ll just leave it as is.

This post has been edited by Ikslorin: 01 February 2017 - 03:53 PM

[Vortex2]

I watched the Netherlands Canada match today.

A few thoughts I can share:

Re: Your Stream:
Your intro is awesome! I love it :)
Technical difficulties are kind of off-putting, but I got over them rather quickly. This being said, as I'm sure you have imagined, the overall experience may suffer as the result of lack of preparation which is bad for the image of the game and the broadcast. I think most people were more interested in simply viewing the match, so I'm thinking it's fine, but good work done well is always nice to see whether it's appreciated properly or not.

Re: GG Before GG:
I see that you have knowledge about the game, but I would avoid being anything but impartial... I've noticed SevenOfNine is a skilled linguist, but he gets a little attached to one side's performance at the expense of the other. This may be an honest thing, but for I'm thinking that especially for younger viewers, it's not really something we want to see. Furthermore, I whole-heartedly disagree that you can absolutely determine whether a match is over 2 minutes in, as this is certainly not ever the case. Also, please take into account that some players who have chosen to represent their country in Nations Cup are not accustomed to the big delay due to 200+ ping.

Re: Broadcasting:
I'd like to see more streamers/broadcasters in the future which may result in the same kind of feeling for me (and others) as when I watch the Toronto Raptors (only Canadian team in the NBA) broadcasted on TSN (Canadian network). If you can tune in sometime, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised to see all the stunning graphics and the presentation, but more importantly you'll get to meet the dynamic duo of Jack Armstrong and Matt Devlin (along with Rod Black, Sam Mitchell and Leo Rautins).

It's true that we focus more on players and stats and positions and who is doing what, but when you stop mid-game and think to yourself, man, are those broadcasters doing a great job or what? It just makes you appreciate they have been making the experience that much more enjoyable for everyone involved all along. And it's not because the broadcaster is elite or super-knowledgeable or anything like that. It's just really inspiring to watch someone who is passionate about what they are doing becoming their job, which in the case of broadcasting is simply finding a way to share what it is that you're seeing... So, while having knowledge of playing the game is great, I think it's even more important that you bring a certain upbeat energy and sincere passion about playing the game with you to every broadcast. Don't be afraid to be open and share what you're really thinking but make sure that what you're sharing is the result of carefully calibrated intentions in the best interest of the game and its' players.

I'm not a broadcaster, but I have some education in the field that I received along the way to a film production degree and I've met some people who are involved in what we refer to as 'presentation' (on-camera work. I can appreciate it's more difficult than anyone can imagine and it's also a thankless role which can be easily overlooked.

Also, when the pressure of something unexpected happens it presents especially difficult challenges which can become very overwhelming very quickly. All I can say is um, it's good to be prepared and I understand that it takes a lot of dedication and hard work to set up a stream, so thank you, Ikslorin.

Re: Rude Players:
People who have decided that it is socially acceptable to be openly ignorant will likely not succeed in UrT Resurgence until they learn to behave more appropriately. In my experience, all of the examples I've had the honour of sharing a server with who I consider to have effectively represented high-performance play share a similar quality in common. I've come to learn that anyone who has honestly and sincerely dedicated their whole being to this game must have taken the time to break things down and to appreciate each aspect as carefully as possible.

Eventually, I think we all come to the realization that, in fact, anyone who we ever considered to be 'pro' is actually a person before a player and each person has their own mentality with which they play. People who have taught me the game who I will love forever have shown me that they have learned better than to claim to be 'good' and instead accept their status as it is and for what it is: a learned privilege which brings along with it a great sense of joy and possibility along the way to a well-earned satisfaction and fulfilment as the result of sharing their performance with others who are also learning and trying to do their best.

If you watch any successful streamer who plays CS:GO, you will probably immediately recognize this distinct quality about them which only comes as the result of hard work, dedication, respect for the game and of course respect for other players.

If you have listened to a player such as Steel or whoever, in an ESEA Rank-S PUG, you will likely recognize immediately that all of the other players who use voice-comm have a similar calm demeanour and the intention not necessarily to dominate or even to win, but to PLAY and to play respectfully. Younger players need to learn to let the butterfly land on their shoulder rather than spending all their time chasing after it, and then perhaps learn how to treat it wisely so that it may stay.

Anyway, I'm not sure why anyone thought that it was okay to be disrespectful to you, but on behalf of the Urban Terror community and the future version of those players who were, I would like to apologize. I'm sure I've said some things myself in the past that I now regret (I could think of examples) and if someone brought them up I would probably apologize immediately (now), but part of being an example in this community is going to have to be exercising our ability to forgive growing people/players and to understand things like that may happen from time to time. I think the worst thing we can do is retaliate, but perhaps even worse is to ignore them. Rather, I think the only thing we can do really is accept that the person either had different intentions than we thought initially or else is still learning how to grow.

Re: This Thread
I'm very glad that you have taken the time to share all of your thoughts in an orderly manner. I think it's a healthy practice and I wish more people would practice doing so.

Thanks again, and keep up the good work! I'll stay tuned.

This post has been edited by Vortex2: 01 February 2017 - 08:47 PM

[Mod Iye]

Wheee text!
TL;DR: Hit info does not really add to the viewers experience.

Agreed. I really dont see any point to make for leaving it turned on. As you argued, it only adds to the perspective and decision making of the spectated player, while possibly overshadowing way more important information.

As you already bring it up: please FS gods give us better readable hit information and possibly even player HP in the spec overlay.
I got used to reading hit info rather quickly, as i suppose every "high" level player has. And i would have to relearn that if it changed, but i really think it could help. It would be just like switching from the old text (victim - killer style) to the new compressed (killer - victim)

[Ikslorin]

Iye, on 01 February 2017 - 12:01 AM, said:

As you already bring it up: please FS gods give us better readable hit information and possibly even player HP in the spec overlay.I got used to reading hit info rather quickly, as i suppose every "high" level player has. And i would have to relearn that if it changed, but i really think it could help. It would be just like switching from the old text (victim - killer style) to the new compressed (killer - victim)

It’s amazing how much we as humans are able to adapt, like the pattern-recognizing of the hit information. But, I totally agree, even just when playing a more readable hit information would be lovely!

Vortex2, on 31 January 2017 - 11:46 PM, said:

Re: Your Stream:

With technical difficulties you are referring to the mess at the start, due to OBS crashing?

I cannot do anything but just wholeheartedly agree, that preparation for the match is where most of the time has to be put to be able to deliver a good stream. As stated by the legend Paul Chaloner, preperation is the most vital thing, to be able to fill downtime, but sadly I’m mostly not able to put in all the hours needed to be able to do so. This is not an excuse in anyway, since the only thing of concern is the end product, which is dramatically decreasing due to it.

Vortex2, on 31 January 2017 - 11:46 PM, said:

Re: GG Before GG:

Yes, you are right that in most cases the wording of “The expert does already see it being won after the first few minutes most likely” is probably a bit extra dramatic.

In a perfect world, it would not need to be necessary to say GG before the map actually ends, but this is also something, that I’ve complained about numerous times before. The format of one map being 20 minutes of game time, results in the loosing team at some point physically not being able to get enough points, due to how long each round is. Commentating is very much storytelling, and with a team behind, I usually always am going to try and set up the comeback story, but at some point it is not outright not possible anymore to do so without just lying. I suppose, I have to switch focus to something else, instead of moving into analysis of how the one team won? Do you have any suggestions?

I completely second your point about impartiality. I hope I don’t favour one team over the other, both in terms of attention and when it comes to respect to the players. If I do that, I’d love to get the feedback.

Vortex2, on 31 January 2017 - 11:46 PM, said:

Re: Broadcasting:

I don’t much watch sports, but the outtakes I found of Jack Armtsrong and Matt Devlin are hilarious. It very much reminded me of the amazing eSports commentating duo in StarCraft of Tasteless and Artosis. They not only are extremely sharp when it comes to analyzing the state of the game being watched, but their commentary oozes of fun and enthusiasm. Maybe I should begin focusing more on having better energy in my commentary compared to try and force in the analysis?

Actually one of the main reasons I started my YouTube channel, which resulted in the livestreaming a bit later, was actually because I wanted to better my English and exactly also wanted to learn this skill of presentation and entertainment.

Vortex2, on 31 January 2017 - 11:46 PM, said:

Re: Rude Players:

Yes, you are probably right that I might have been reading too much into the intent, especially on the messaging over more channels. Even though you have absolutely nothing to apologize for, thank you for your calming words, and I totally agree on mastery is a learned privilege stemming from hard work.

This post has been edited by Ikslorin: 01 February 2017 - 07:00 PM