Multiplayer Overview: Call of Duty: Black Ops

[pwnsore]

Just curious, am I the only PC player who had the mad lag patched out only to be replaced with a game that CRASHES EVERYTIME I TRY TO JOIN A MULTIPLAYER GAME! I got the game on release day and am yet to be able to play it.

Sorry for caps, somewhat rage-filled about this.

 

[gphjr14]

The maps are too big and they ruined the sniper rifles, other then that it's an enjoyable game.

I think they just made them more realistic don't know of any sniping techniques where you slam the scope against your face and shoot. Its funny running into snipers and they try and quick scope and I just mow them down.

 

[Freddyqaqualung]

I agree that the maps are too big. Also, it seems to me that since the game just came out people are camping it up because they want a nice big K/D.
Also, the Ak74u makes me angry. What a gun.

 

[Nokterne]

The maps are too big and they ruined the sniper rifles, other then that it's an enjoyable game.

I think they just made them more realistic don't know of any sniping techniques where you slam the scope against your face and shoot. Its funny running into snipers and they try and quick scope and I just mow them down.

A multiplayer video game needs to be both fun and balanced. The snipers are neither right now.

Carrying a "camera spike" or "motion sensor" around with you on the battlefield isn't realistic. Assault rifles with barely any recoil isn't realistic. A perk that removes fall damage isn't realistic. Regenerating health in a few seconds after getting shot isn't realistic.

I'm tired of people saying that CoD is realistic and using that as a justification for making the snipers useless. Your game is arcadey as fuck, and now has only two useful weapon classes (assault rifles and smgs).

 

[gphjr14]

The maps are too big and they ruined the sniper rifles, other then that it's an enjoyable game.

I think they just made them more realistic don't know of any sniping techniques where you slam the scope against your face and shoot. Its funny running into snipers and they try and quick scope and I just mow them down.

A multiplayer video game needs to be both fun and balanced. The snipers are neither right now.

Carrying a "camera spike" or "motion sensor" around with you on the battlefield isn't realistic. Assault rifles with barely any recoil isn't realistic. A perk that removes fall damage isn't realistic. Regenerating health in a few seconds after getting shot isn't realistic.

I'm tired of people saying that CoD is realistic and using that as a justification for making the snipers useless. Your game is arcadey as fuck, and now has only two useful weapon classes (assault rifles and smgs).

You can either adapt, die, or play something else.

 

[Kitteh]

too bad im too shitty at this game to do anything good!

 

[Nokterne]

You can either adapt, die, or play something else.

It's funny how often this line comes up whenever I post in threads about FPS games.

Adapt, die, or play something else? Fine, but telling me to go do that doesn't change the fact that Treyarch's changes to the sniping are terrible in terms of both fun and balance.

 

[stdragon]

Sniping is a bullshit because of the map design and cause submachine guner can give you a headshot from one side of the map to another.

Please tell me how you're doing that. I've found the opposite. In MW2, you could headshot anybody from any range with a low-accuracy gun. It's just how it worked. Now in blops I can't even hit somebody at medium or beyond range with many of the guns. They have seriously increased the effect of range and accuracy.

Of course another part of that may be lag related. Blops is way way more laggy than MW2. When I see people sprinting at a distance they are generally phasing from one spot to another. It's kind of ridiculous.

Right now I vastly prefer MW2 to blops. However, I have noticed that gameplay is evolving pretty rapidly. I don't know if there are secret patches being pushed out or if it's entirely the players evolving. Things that I suspect have been addressed by patches are that on day 1 I could not hear my own footsteps, could not hear helicopter machine guns, could not hear enemy gunfire from around the corner, rpg's and missiles had a huge fly-by kill radius, spawns were random to the point that I spawned right behind or next to enemies many times.

Gameplay has evolved too though. People are learning the maps so there isn't this mad running around by yourself shooting constantly and throwing grenades, which probably has helped with the overwhelming spawn kills that had been going on. As others get better the multiplayer is getting more strategic and more fun.

 

[demoman_chaos]

I don't see teh appeal in CoD multiplayer. My experience was as follows:
Started a match as a lvl 1 against people who were at leasst lvl 40, run for a few seconds in search of a target, get randomly murdered. Respawn, get instakilled. Respawn search for 4 minutes only to get blindsided again.
On another match I was murering quite a lot, and then I realized what is going on. Ther eis no skill involved, it is all a matter of getting the jump on the enemy. He who fires first, generally always wins thanks to the 3-shot rule (a 3 round burst from the M16 (starter weapon) will kill you even if you were undamaged before). The M14 and FAL are 2 shot kills and fire quite rapidly if you have a fast enough trigger finger, which means snipers are pointless when you can get an ACOG scope and sleight of hand pro (quick scoping does exist afterall with the psuedo-snipers). The G11 (last assault rifle you unlock) is stupidly OP as well.

In short, there is no skill in CoD multiplayer. The 3-shot rule means that it comes down to whoever gets lucky enough to find the enemy first gets the kill. I didn't bother playing enough to unlock CTF and all the other modes (Very dumb idea to have core game modes locked), but as for TDM and FFA, no skill required.

Flame me if you want but remember that your insults won't change the fact that I could face the best CoD player of all time and do well against his custom class with the pre-built starter class as long as I could find him first.

 

[Dorian Cornelius Jasper]

Flame me if you want but remember that your insults won't change the fact that I could face the best CoD player of all time and do well against his custom class with the pre-built starter class as long as I could find him first.

While true, you're overlooking something simple but quite relevant. There's a reason the better players consistently wind up getting the drop on other players and that has a lot to do with map familiarity, muscle memory, and just being a craftier bastard than the other guy. Think of it like Poker. Sure, on paper it's about getting the right hand, but the real heart of poker is in outwitting your opponents in a more social sense. Luck plays a large enough factor in the proceedings that newbies can feel confident that they can win a few times and might come out with a profit if they know when to quit. But beyond the element of luck there's a layer of skill that, in the long run, will more consistently win due to making fewer mistakes and knowing when to make their move.

Kills and deaths come and go quickly enough that simply getting killed once or twice isn't a terrible setback. As play continues, the law of averages would accurately predict that randomness gives way to more constant factors--including skill.

So yes, it's true that you could face the best CoD player of all time and take him down if you found him first. It's also true that, in all likelihood, he'd find you first 7 times out of 10. And if you watch the death replays sometimes you even learn a thing or two.

Simply put, there's more skill involved than you realize. The design of the game is simply such that deaths and kills happen fast enough, and quick enough, to afford less-skilled players a chance to get lucky and--ideally--get better over time while minimizing downtime or personal stress.

But if you want the best chance to find other players before they find you? Stealth perks and silencers. What you've just realized isn't a weakness in the game's multiplayer, it's actually the entire lynchpin behind the idea of stealth-based builds. The one who wins is usually the one who gets the drop on the other guy. And if he sees you first? Think fast. Give him the runaround. If you're good, you can stab him in the back while he's chasing you before he even realizes what just happened.

In short: You're wrong but only because you're just discounting an entire skillset out of hand.

(And yes, this is coming from a guy who prefers BFBC2 to MW2. Black Ops was really a return to form after a number of baffling design decisions in MW2.)

 

[beema]

How about some commentary on the PC version? I've heard the multiplayer is all kinds of messed up on PC. I can't justify spending $60 when half the game isn't working properly.

 

[demoman_chaos]

While true, you're overlooking something simple but quite relevant. There's a reason the better players consistently wind up getting the drop on other players and that has a lot to do with map familiarity, muscle memory, and just being a craftier bastard than the other guy. Think of it like Poker. Sure, on paper it's about getting the right hand, but the real heart of poker is in outwitting your opponents in a more social sense. Luck plays a large enough factor in the proceedings that newbies can feel confident that they can win a few times and might come out with a profit if they know when to quit. But beyond the element of luck there's a layer of skill that, in the long run, will more consistently win due to making fewer mistakes and knowing when to make their move.

Kills and deaths come and go quickly enough that simply getting killed once or twice isn't a terrible setback. As play continues, the law of averages would accurately predict that randomness gives way to more constant factors--including skill.

So yes, it's true that you could face the best CoD player of all time and take him down if you found him first. It's also true that, in all likelihood, he'd find you first 7 times out of 10. And if you watch the death replays sometimes you even learn a thing or two.

Simply put, there's more skill involved than you realize. The design of the game is simply such that deaths and kills happen fast enough, and quick enough, to afford less-skilled players a chance to get lucky and--ideally--get better over time while minimizing downtime or personal stress.

But if you want the best chance to find other players before they find you? Stealth perks and silencers. What you've just realized isn't a weakness in the game's multiplayer, it's actually the entire lynchpin behind the idea of stealth-based builds. The one who wins is usually the one who gets the drop on the other guy. And if he sees you first? Think fast. Give him the runaround. If you're good, you can stab him in the back while he's chasing you before he even realizes what just happened.

In short: You're wrong but only because you're just discounting an entire skillset out of hand.

(And yes, this is coming from a guy who prefers BFBC2 to MW2. Black Ops was really a return to form after a number of baffling design decisions in MW2.)

Your whole argument is it takes skill to find someone first. I strongly disagree. Tis more luck in spawning than anythign else. I've killed a few dudes as they just spawned and have been killed by fresh spawners. There is no skill in spawning.
After you spawn, you run around until you find someone. Since you don't know where they are, knowing the map better isn't going to be of much use. They could be going through the buildings, or they could be wandering around the jungle on the other side of the map. You don't know until you look and looking may put you in front of them.
You skill argument would have some ground if I (who only put up with the BS long reach to reach lvl 7) defeated level 40's in 1 match, then lost horribly on another. If it required skill, I wouldn't be all over the scoreboard, I'd would be either consitently near the top or near the bottom. It doesn't take skill to go online and look up the best camping spots for the maps (those with the best K-D ratios are campers, and they generally use the noobtube).

If they icnreased the health, it would fix the big issue. I played the Uncharted 2 beta quite a bit and I liked the health on there. Getting the jump on the enemy gave you a big advantage, but the other guy still had a chance to turn around and kill you. In CoD, you get the jump, you get the kill.

 

[Dorian Cornelius Jasper]

*snip*

Actually, the highest consistent scorers I've seen are Lightweight rushers due to the fact that the fighting tends to surge around the map and people in search of kills will rush to where the fighting is. Mobility is key, and just getting to the exploitable spawn areas requires that you go past the immediate contact zones and rush past them. The Lightweight perk is extremely popular because you get more kills, faster, and can even react faster if you stay on the move and keep the pressure up. (Killcams also tend to discourage camping, as it's all too easy to get revenge on a camper once you know where they're camping.) Noobtube campers are less common than you think. Noobtube rushers not so much, though. Familiarity with maps does imply some familiarity with where people are likely to go and where you're likely to find a camper or a possible rusher.

You say you only put up with the game until Lvl 7. From my experience, that's actually a very, very short time. I doubt you're working with a very large sampling size, so your picture of what the bulk of multiplayer looks like might be a bit skewed.

For all I know, you just got lucky and took that as an excuse to say the game is skill-less, or you're familiar with FPSes and therefore are more skilled than the tone and content of your comments imply (which would undermine your complaints horribly). When I say long-term, consistent trends, I mean over the course of hundreds of matches. Actual long-term, even. Where the sample size is large enough for the law of averages to reassert itself. Simple luck isn't enough to maintain a positive kill-death ratio over the course of thousands of combined kills-and-deaths.

And don't tell me people don't play that much CoD. Otherwise there would be no rank 30+ players at all. As a Lvl 7 player, you've probably played a tiny fraction of that. I got to level 10 in one night, the experience requirements for low-level advancement are practically negligible compared to higher-ranked play.

 

[L8NEYET]

Agreed! After being suckered into buying the craptastic stimulus package, I feel that Treyarch has finally one-upped Infinityward with a better multiplayer experience.