What if instead of leveling up, between each mission/deployment you are given a set amount of time (could vary between missions to keep realism there of different rest periods) that you could spend in training, break it up however you want but your character could eg; get slightly faster reload as time acrues in certain training tasks - tasks that dont increase one ability alone but different tasks will increase things to different degree's. nothing to get it too high but the idea of maintaining skills... like spend time on the firing range increases draw time, reload and accuracy slightly.

Although the idea of a 'training time' is a little cool, it seems to detract from the idea of a solo game. However if the developers could somehow create a training situation for the entire team that somehow does not pigeonhole players into one specialization or the other early on could possibly be an interesting aspect of cooperative play. I'm not sure as to how that would work, this is my best impression:

The first training room would have every possible way to approach the problem with almost no difficulty (no specialization required for any method), but later on the training rooms would require more specialization for different methods (those who focused on weaponry will only be able to hack simple things, but those who focused on hacking will be able to hack the more complicated stuff)

ontop of this you could slowly learn skills from actions you have to do in game, ie, mission required you to hack a termial you might gain a skill in electronics to mess with something in your downtime a little better, choose to cut through a door or weld something together to progress ingame that could effect what mods you can do...

Um, well, I really don't understand the difference between that and leveling up like in the game Killing Floor.

How about developing our own weapons? I do have an idea for that, very simple plan! ;D

Although that does sound pretty cool, I'm not sure what that would contribute to a cooperative environment Weirdoo. If different character specializations could assist in creating different weapons with other players, that does sound cool; However, I think that adds a layer of complexity that may detract from cooperative gameplay (any players of MMORPGs will be familiar with 'crafting' systems and their pitfalls for a more instantaneous form of play that an FPS is)

Yea you have a good point there, i did play WoW and crafting was boring. Thought creating your own gun would be more awesome, i already had one in mind: the Chuck Norris ;D

So then, i'm sticking to my improvized grenade! ;D

Honestly, I don't find weapon customization all that necessary. Let me choose my optics and I am good. If I remember correctly, they said there would be something like 24 weapons in the game. If you can only carry a few of those at a time, there will be plenty of variation.

Although the idea of a 'training time' is a little cool, it seems to detract from the idea of a solo game. However if the developers could somehow create a training situation for the entire team that somehow does not pigeonhole players into one specialization or the other early on could possibly be an interesting aspect of cooperative play. I'm not sure as to how that would work, this is my best impression:

What about having all weapons have 'behind the scenes' ratings and all weapons belong to a certain class (even if they're the only weapon in the class) that also have their own 'behind the scenes' ratings.

The weapon ratings could affect properties such as stability/accuracy (depending on how accuracy is handled in this game), reload speed, and ability to customize (my idea is based on total time of use, but feel free to change it). The class ratings would also affect these things, but to a lesser extent and across all of the weapons in it's class. You could also tie access to better and/or more specialized weapons and upgrades to that particular class rating.

Your level in each property would rise either by a level system or linearly according to it's corresponding action's use (i.e. you reload a lot because you like to go full auto on everything you meet you're going to have a faster reload time then your Designated Marksman buddy who tries to make the most out of each bullet). You wouldn't 'choose' levels per se, but would improve in areas that you use most often. Now, after all of the properties in that weapon rise a certain amount it would affect your overall weapon rating and to a lesser extent the class rating. This concept needs quite a bit of fleshing out but the overall idea is ( Weapon property -> Weapon -> Class ).

Now, every character would start at a 'base' level in all areas and after the first mission or two it should start to become apparent that your abilities in different areas aren't matching exactly. The rate of growth would have to be tweaked a lot to make this work properly, but the real danger with this system is towards characters that are near the end or have completed the campaign. You cannot have characters running around with every ability in the game at their (immediate) disposal. You would have to limit the amount of Class skills to a set number most likely. Now what I can't figure out in this setup would be, do you limit the character to a set number of "Weapon" classes and a set number of "Ability" classes, or do you just give them a set number of classes and be done with it? You could still improve in other areas then you're 'specialized' classes, but you could not achieve nearly the same level of proficiency as them.

Anyway, I could go on, but that seems like a good place to stop and get feedback.

I agree with you Tacticalspoon. However, other players assisting with the effectiveness of attacks in a way other than just being an extra gun is a great idea for cooperative play. As with the aforementioned "painting a target" idea for a missile or perhaps if a player specializes for a certain kind of optic or whatever will highlight weaknesses in enemies for the rest of the team.

The weapon ratings could affect properties such as stability/accuracy (depending on how accuracy is handled in this game), reload speed, and ability to customize (my idea is based on total time of use, but feel free to change it). The class ratings would also affect these things, but to a lesser extent and across all of the weapons in it's class. You could also tie access to better and/or more specialized weapons and upgrades to that particular class rating.

I think you're referring to the class/perk system of Killing Floor which is a nice edge that you get from using certain weapons/abilities. However, to prevent you from being an absolute badass at everything, only one perk can be active at a time. You can improve all perks at the same time, but only one will be active.

The downside of this of course is this: What if I want to mix and match certain things that make sense to me, like if I'm a really good marksman, perhaps I want to become good at being a medic too (as long as I'm not in the line of fire!) or hacking electronics.

There are a lot of decisions that have to be made for a great coop game, and I hope we can help ZPS out with this thread. Keep posting guys!

lots of interesting stuff here

i honestly think we need to know a bit more about the current design of the game - as it is we got no idea how relevant these disucssions really are because we know so littel about the gameplay that ZP are aiming for

@Ghost Now that indeed deserves feedback :-).

You know, I try to get the whole picture of gaming sometimes, and from a very general point of view, we're going from plain simulation to complex 'virtual reality'. Before, all we could do was to assign some points to some skills of some character and say that it would represent his abilities in the game. Now, as it already has been pointed out, we have gamers that themselves will make a direct difference. It's just not necessary to simulate accuracy, you can really have it or not, depending on your real mouse skills.

IMHO, the best bet is always to let things go natural, whenever it's possible. The less you have to simulate, the more real it will feel. I know that it seems absolutely obvious, but it might not be about everything. Your reloading speed example is good, it's just more natural that, as in everything, the more you do something, the more you train at it, the better you do it, the quicker you can do it. If the game could adapt your character skills to your real skills, or could evolve the character's way of doing things to reflect the way you're actually doing them, it could be the answer to the everlasting hard question of "how should we handle this in the game?" that surely comes back all the time, for every situation that needs some sort of arbitrary decision at design time. Well it's just an opinion.

You seem to have a clear idea for implementing this in some situations however, and it'd be nice to develop it (or maybe it's just me that can't get it completely), and eventually these could be really cool reference ideas.

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Just a quick concrete one more on topic: Let the players exchange things, particulary ammo. Right now I imagine an animation of a marine throwing a mag to another, in the heat of the action. Yeah.

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@forgefire I agree, they might already have gone through all this. Anyway, as Aebonka intended this thread to be, it's mainly a reference of randomly thrown ideas that maybe will catch attention somewhere. If everything goes as planned, there's a trilogy coming, so I guess it's never too late for any idea.

i honestly think we need to know a bit more about the current design of the game - as it is we got no idea how relevant these disucssions really are because we know so littel about the gameplay that ZP are aiming for

Well ya, it's just kind of fun to brain storm something and refine it until it's something that sounds both feasible and really, really cool. I doubt most of any suggestions towards game play posted in a forum will get more then a read through, but... well, the more practice you have in thinking something out the better you can do it later on when it matters.

i recall too there will be 24 weapons in the game, they should make a list of it. I can then plan my weapons here and now instead in the game.

Here is my new idea:

Throwing weapons, yea i mean, what good are they when they run out of ammo and there are no ammo for that particular weapon on that map. So what you can do is, run out of cover, throw the weapon at the bad guy, if the weapon hits him it throws him off and you can finish it off with the knife! If we have one of course.

Hows this? (:

@Ghost1800:

I honestly cannot say that I like that system. I am not going to lie, I am a habitual min/maxer in games. If I see something that lets me exploit it to make a god character, I will do so.

What do I see myself doing in a game with a system like yours? Lots and lots of skill grinding. If I ever have full ammo, and there is more on the ground, I will shoot it all off for that little extra skill, etc. Basically going out of my way to work the numbers in my favor. And breaking the flow of the game in the process.

Personally, I would be happier with a game that lets you simply, say, purchase a single perk at certain timeframes. Like, you start the game able to use grenades, the standard rifle, and pistol. You finish level one, and you are awarded a perk. Here is where the fun happens. If you have a lot of RELEVANT choices, damn near everyone will be different. The key to this system working is having a bunch of choices that are all highly desirable.

From one of the articles: Create a stealthy medic with hacking skills, a heavy armored sniper with explosives or maybe an officer with excellent strategic abilities and a minigun? Think about it... To make a stealthy medic with hacking skills in a system where doing the skill = earning skill ups, that would be quite annoying. In a simpler system, like the one I outlined above, it would be much easier to create these types of things. It would not be as realistic, no, but crazy people like me would not be breaking the flow of the game just to min/max their marine :) Just my 2 cents.

throws carbine at land shark

'Have at you!'

pulls out knife

land shark eats carbine

;_;

@TacticalSpoon:

Well, you could very easily keep the above system in place for weapons and have a more traditional "Pick out your skills" type leveling system for abilities (I can't honestly see how it would work otherwise now that you mention it). Then again you could implement your system the whole way through as it has been successful for other games. The major problem with those is that they have to be well thought out to make sure you don't have game breaking combinations, redundant or just plain pointless perks, and their strengths must be carefully measured to keep people from using them as a crutch.

You bring up a good point though of how there are several ways of approaching this.

P.S. In regards to your example of having an excess of ammo around, they could make it so that if you were to fire off rounds like that you would alert enemies within a large radius to your location. Some might simply rush you (land sharks!!!) while others might surround you, wait for reinforcements, and either then rush you or wait in ambush. You can counter act some exploitative behavior with in game consequences that might not even be that unwelcome. Of course this is relying on the strengths of the enemy AI, so this might not be a legitimate point.

P.S. In regards to your example of having an excess of ammo around, they could make it so that if you were to fire off rounds like that you would alert enemies within a large radius to your location. Some might simply rush you (land sharks!!!) while others might surround you, wait for reinforcements, and either then rush you or wait in ambush. You can counter act some exploitative behavior with in game consequences that might not even be that unwelcome. Of course this is relying on the strengths of the enemy AI, so this might not be a legitimate point.

You realize in this situation, I would be looking for more enemies to kill, to get skill ups right? :) BRING THEM ON!

I didn't say it would be a bad thing necessarily XD

If nothing else, it would make you actually work for what your earning.

My humble opinion....

The characters (assume) are all trained soldiers and now in elite team. So they all pretty handy with the weapons they trained with. I would not like an "accuracy bar" that spend points on to make character more "accurate".

In "reality" a trained warrior is not going to get much more accurate after several days/ weeks using the same weapon they have used for the past years.

I have found in many games with "accuracy bar" type character development by the end of the game I am shooting the wings off flies while jump dodging with my hand gun from 100 feet away:) Game loses challenge and "believability".

I have also found that in games where ballistics of weapons are modeled well I the actual player get better at aiming and hitting as I get better feel for the type of weapon.

Maybe don't need this kind of accuracy bar since the actual player actually gets better with weapons the more they use and understand their advantages and weaknesses.

As for the "trained soldier" thing, I disagree. There is a reason militaries around the world continue training nonstop. Skills and training need to be constantly reinforced or they will deteriorate. When I was in the military, I was considered "trained", but my marksmanship continued to improve throughout my career, so I disagree and say even trained, there is always room for improvement.

If the Government ran the Interstellar Marines...

"What !? They're late on their re-qualification!? Quick, get them out of that mutant infested space station and on the range! There are ticky boxes to fill out!

You put in a lot of stuff there colinthe26, so I'm going go at this in pieces, okay?

Alright. As I was thinking over the first point, i thought: "wouldn't it be interesting (getting a little ahead into AI here) if, depending on the creatures you were defending against, your team strategies might change because of the AI itself. What if there was a creature that instinctively went for the moving targets? or on the flip side, another kind of creature that instinctively goes for the weakest, least defended targets? And of course those crazed creatures that really don't care who it is as long as they can eat it...

A reference I can think of for this would be the threat system in World of Warcraft. The system makes it that monsters will attack whoever is generating the most threat by dealing damage, healing, whatever. Threat is also defined by how close you are to the monster, and the weaker/lower level you are the greater your threat radius. I'm definitely adding this (in a more broader term) to the list! Edit: Also this reminds me of Flesh Pounds in the game Killing Floor, which are very dangerous if not watched because they will enrage if they take too much damage and will rush and try to kill a random player.

Also, some well flowing defend position sections might be cool too. You don't often see those in games. Or, at least not ones that are well done.

I don't quite follow, could you elaborate on this?

Moving on to the Customization... I've read several comments already posting about weapon and character customization. As far as reality goes, attributes and RPG style elements are... well... out of the picture pretty much

Will someone please show me where they explicitly say this is a super realistic game? Also: If it is, where can I fight some landsharks in real life? :[

Also, from a pure teamwork standpoint, it would be cool if players could lend each other gear and, ammo, and the like.

I absolutely agree. If not ammo then at least weapons.

Will someone please show me where they explicitly say this is a super realistic game? Also: If it is, where can I fight some landsharks in real life? :[ Well, realism is a bit different than believability, and I guess that's what he meant here.

Those were all very good points.

If the Government ran the Interstellar Marines...

"What !? They're late on their re-qualification!? Quick, get them out of that mutant infested space station and on the range! There are ticky boxes to fill out!

LOL so true. Don't forget the yearly legged-shark chamber qualification. They have to make sure you know how to use your armor.

Will someone please show me where they explicitly say this is a super realistic game? Also: If it is, where can I fight some landsharks in real life? :[

The way i see it, its more of it being feasible, like was mentioned by thib. By looking at some of the backstory articles, I have determined that the game is, at a minimum, 100 years in the future. I mean really... There are people, right now, trying to clone dinosaurs, just like jurassic park. They are confident they will be able to sufficiently alter say, an emu egg, to revert it to more raptor-like. The guy that was working on it, had an estimate of 60-100 yrs before possible. So yeah, sharks w/ legs in the IM time? Perfectly feasible to me.

As for how the game will actually play, ZPS hasn't revealed much. We know they are trying to make a game that is immersive and believable, but nobody really knows if we are getting a game that plays like Halo, a CoD, or even ArmA2. We'll just have to wait for more info.