Being dead is boring

by FancyDani
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Original Post

Being dead is boring

[ Edited ]
★★ Apprentice

Of course being dead is boring, that isn't unusual or inherently bad. The bad thing about this is that reviving is good. Why is it good? It is good, because it is way way faster than respawning in Turf Takeover and even negates a point the other team gets in Team Vanquish. But rarely does anyone try to even wait for their teammates to show up and revive them, because it is too boring to stay dead. The player can practically do nothing, can't interact with anyone and can't even look around fully to see if someone is coming and try to revive them, so why wait, just respawn.

 

Is this a problem? I think it is, not a gamebreaking one like server lag or performance issues, but one that reduces the amount of fun one has by just a little bit everytime it happens. Therefore I want to suggest ways in which it could be made more engaging, so players don't feel bored when waiting to be revived by a teammate, so they can do something.

 

  • Show the name of upgrades during the victory slab animation
    • The symbols tell me nothing, the name alone might not tell me much more for most characters, but if they did use a character that I know and like to play, I would be interested to know which upgrades exactly they use.
  • Allow full 360° view during the death cam
    • I don't know why this is not a thing already, but when dead, I should be able to look around all the way and see how the fight is progressing and to see if someone is even bothering to come and revive me.
  • Better notification to teammates that I am dead close to them (or include a "Hey, I want to be revived" ping button)
    • When I am pretending to be a leaf lying around dead, teammates often don't notice it, because I am either off screen or they are busy looking and focusing on something else (which happens to me too often, and I need to remember to look around to see if anyone near me is still alive). And how often has it happened that a Sunflower has been sniped behind an Oak and the Oak never noticed that he stopped getting heals? Teammates should be told more clearly that there is someone to be revived, especially when it is really close to them (hopefully without adding making any potentially new UI elements too distracting for them), so they can help their team more often.
  • Give XP even when you are not the one who initiated the revive
    • Reviving together is good, because it revives faster. However, people that helped revive don't get as much (or any, I am not sure right now) reward as the person that initiated the revive, which seems like a punishment for not being the first. Don't punish for not being the first, the game should reward a player for being a team player and for helping getting a person back into the fight.
  • Make it so respawning/changing character requires the button to be held down for short time instead of just pressing it
    • This is so that accidental respawns are avoided. Sometimes I am impatient (playing a hectic game that fills a person with adrenaline and stress can cause that sometimes) and spam the spacebar to respawn as soon as I can only to see that someone did try to revive me, but I already accidentally spawned. Forcing the player to hold down the button for a second or two should avoid this issue almost entirely.
  • The main menu should be openable while dead
    • This should not need any explanation. The main menu should always be openable (yes, even in the character selection screen and during the victory slab animation). The best time to check character level progress or fiddle around with graphic settings or the controls is when you are not playing, which is exactly when you are dead for 20+ seconds.
  • The scoreboard should be openable while dead
    • Similarly to the main menu, the best time to look at stuff that isn't about "Who do I shoot next" is when you are lying around on the floor, not able to shoot at anyone.
  • The emote menu should be openable while dead
    • Yet another thing that rarely sees the light of day during a game. Of course I don't expect the dead Scientist to suddenly stand up and dance (although that would probably be funny and fitting for a zombie), but at least all the text bubbles should be usable (even if it doesn't make sense "because you are dead", this is a game where plants fight zombies, it already doesn't make sense). Now finally all those 30 000 coin investements might actually be used. And more importantly, you can say "Thanks" to the person reviving you, before you are alive and getting shot again while having the emote menu open. Oh and while we are at it: I honestly don't know if this is a thing already since text emotes get used so rarely, but they should be transparent sometimes, especially when aiming through them, so a dead person isn't covering your screen when saying "GNOMES" for fun.
  • Allow to skip the animation of the victory slab
    • Because sometimes you don't care about the person that defeated you and just want to see what is happening on the battlefield or interact with people rather than being forced to look at them (I especially don't want to look at them if I have already seen them 4 times before.

Bonus question: Why are we not allowed to at least jump while reviving? Characters already move so slowly without sprinting and even slower when not walking directly forward, it honestly feeld pretty terrible sometimes, even if the upgrade to do so costs only 1 point (I don't want to use abilities, I just want to be able to jump and pretend I can survive the lone enemy trying to stop me from reviving).

 

What does everyone else think? Are there other things to help encourage revives?

Message 1 of 4 (496 Views)

Re: Being dead is boring

Champion (Retired)

I think we all want revives to be better.  

I made a post about bringing back GW2’s jumping revives and think many of your ideas are great.

 

Nice post!

Message 2 of 4 (470 Views)

Re: Being dead is boring

★ Guide

Thank you for speaking for me, I wanted to talk about this but was too lazy to type.

Message 3 of 4 (406 Views)

Re: Being dead is boring

★★ Apprentice

@spIash_damage Thanks!

 

@DarkLanX Yeah, I had the same issue. All this was in my head for at least a week now, haha

Message 4 of 4 (367 Views)