June 2019
@EA_Blueberry Sry man but... "So far the feedback we're seeing in this in favor of the changes"... where are you seeing that?! Most of the comments in this thread either seem to be totally against it or at least saying (like I did) that the current damage is going way way way too far.
Sure there is the odd comment here defending the change saying it's fine, but sry, that's the internet and comments generally... you will always get the odd devils advocate who will simply contradict the majority no matter what the topic.
The "justification" for this change is that it is preventing "people camping outside the ring"... but honestly I have yet to see anyone present much compelling proof that this is such a widespread problem that it is undermining the Apex experience for most people.
In my experience of the game I don't believe this is really major issue at all. It's like people saying we have to introduce drastic measures to end "voter fraud"/"gender pay gap" (delete as appropriate depending on your political views xD - I cannot think of an example atm which isn't going to trigger one half of the people reading this). The point is that the changes have negative consequences for a large number of honest and legitimate players whilst addressing a "problem" that seems relatively minor or non-existent to many of those players.
And if there is really a problem to be addressed then there are about a million better ways to address it which wouldn't significantly change things for legit players. As @coletrain714 suggested, you could scale the damage depending upon the actions of the squad/player up to that point. He said relate it to damage, the more damage you do, the less you take from ring... I think that is a good base to start, although I would also add in a scaling for time, in that the longer you haven't been involved in combat the more damage you take... and if you are currently involved in combat then you take minimum damage possible from ring until it ends.
The have also been quite a few sensible suggestions that damage could scale the longer you are in the zone... once again I think that could be mixed with other variables. Such as if you have just been respawned or have used a beacon, you get a short period of time before the damage starts scaling up. If you are still really concerned about these out of ring "campers or looters" you could also simply lock all supply bins once they are outside the ring, or make it harder to pick up items (say you have to wait for a second or two) to discourage looting.
Another possibility is when the player is first crossed by closing ring the game calculates a straight line vector from the players position to the center of the next ring and creates a virtual "corridor".. so long as the player stays in this corridor they wont take such high damage, but stray outside of it and the damage starts ramping up (and if you want, outside the corridor it is simply impossible to pick up items. Scale damage from the ring up if the player isn't constantly moving in the direction of the ring at more than an average speed.
This is all just off the top of my head, I am sure a designer with some time could quite easily develop a system where campers or looters outside the ring are penalized heavily, whilst players who were simply in a fight, are stopping to loot after a recent fight, are respawning teamates near to deathboxes, have just been respawned, are moving towards the zone whilst grabbing and extra stuff they can on the way are all left pretty much alone with the system how it is.
If the base damage of the first ring is 5 per tick, but then you scale that down to whatever the damage was before based on the criteria I suggested (damage done, time since in fight, time since respawn, direction of movement) then that would discourage anything outside of legit reasons to be outside, and this problem of camping/looting (if it's really that widespread which imo still remains to be shown) would be quickly ended. 5dmg per tick is still way to high to make anything except heading towards the zone worth it. Jeez, you could even scale the time it takes to actually heal as well.
I personally believe that putting the damage way up is like the aforementioned issues, you are putting in drastic, sweeping measures which is negatively effecting a large percentage of players in a wide variety of situations in order to punish/deter (imo) a much smaller percentage of players who are doing one specific thing.
June 2019
June 2019
@Vhalei wrote:
@mastiffslingerThere is a certain amount of rng to the game, thats kinda the point. Drop relay and zone is in thunderdome? Bad luck, better move quick. Complaining about that rng element is akin to complaining about loot tiering. You drop on a mazibique, your enemy drops on a peacekeeper? Bad luck, try again. You really are given quite a lot of time to get a wriggle on at the start. Almost immediately after you drop you know where the ring is going to go, and if its far away you should start planning for that immediately and not waste time in a 5-10 min poke battle.
You're saying that by having more damage and being faster, the circle amplifies the affect of RNG in Apex Elite compared to ordinary Apex because players have less time to prepare for battle. You believe that if looting is even more of a lottery in Apex Elite that it will prove who the real Champions are even though or even because the result is more dependant on RNG?
If that isn't what you're saying then why are you advocating RNG in Elite Queue?
Surely the fairer and more equal a game is the more likely you are to find who has the more skill and is the best?
If the game is more random than ever then surely the results are more random as well?
June 2019
the first circle doing 15% damage is an absolute joke.. Myself and a friend got 2 legendary shields from relay (NOT NOTICING THIS WAS ELITE SINCE IT AUTO CHANGES) and we had to run the distance of HALF THE MAP, we couldn't even heal and both insta-died.
GREAT CHANGES!
June 2019
The problem to me isn't so much that the circle does too much damage (because they have their reasons and so far it's working), but rather that the circle moves INCREDIBLY faster then the standard queue. In the standard queue you could catch up to and then eventually overtake the storm. Where as in the Elite Queue the storm doesn't even give you a chance to run away. It's actually SUPER frustrating. Apex. FIX IT.
June 2019
This is probably the worst approach to addressing camping. If people get caught in a fight, they basically either try to run and get picked off, or fight and lose regardless. Doesn't matter elite or not. Instead of doing an increase in damage and making the game less enjoyable to play, approach camping with a time limit based on distance to the inner circle, if they can't make it by a few seconds after the circle closes, then they can get kicked out, but not giving the opportunity to run back is totally ridiculous as a "fix" for camping.
June 2019
The topic is feedback on the increased circle damage. I gave mine. I also responded to an earlier statement about deciding to land outside circle because in the context written it sounds like an informed choice. Which obviously it isn’t since it is random.
June 2019
June 2019 - last edited June 2019
This change doesnt make sense based on the reasoning we were given for it being implemented, namely that people were camping in the zone in order to get top 5. This does not make sense for two seasons.
1. You can quite literally camp inside the circle if you wanted to. Theres plenty of places that most players will never go where you can just hide all game long and likely never be found. Granted the zone is 'safer' if you have the meds to sustain it, but lets be realistic here, no one is running around to odd hidden places on the map looking for people. If you're going to go through with this change for the reasons stated, you might as well make people take damage for standing still for too long, if people want to camp to top 5 placement and avoid fights they're gonna find a way to do it regardless.
2. This change is essentially saying that Respawn wants us to fight and be aggressive, not passively camp the zone for placement. This is contradictory however because these zone changes actually DISCOURAGE a lot of fighting and is causing people to run away from or outright avoid fighting. You cannot fight people on the way to the zone and drawn out fights on the edge of the map either result in a loss for all squads involved or getting out with no loot. Avoiding or running a way from a fight is a valid tactic in BR games, but this change literally forces it on in a lot of circumstances, its no longer a strategic choice.
Additionally this change removes all zone based gameplay. Gameplay that is a core and fun part of the game. Things like reviving people in the zone, re-positioning in the zone and fighting in the zone. The complete removal of this is not a cost worth paying for preventing campers.
Furthermore this change exacerbates the RNG nature of Battle Royale, People far away from the circle have no time to either loot or fight, so if they dont get lucky with loot they will arrive at the new circle severely outclassed by people with better loot.
Finally it adds the problem of edge of circle camping where squads fleeing the zone have little chance, with a squad infront of them with good positions and a zone behind them that will instantly kill them if they stop.
Overall Zone camping is not that big of a deal. It requires a considerable investment of consumables in a lot cases and while you're sitting there you're not gaining additional loot, perhaps putting you behind. Id be perfectly fine with zone damage doubling for the values in normal mode for the first 2-3 circles, but the current values are beyond extreme and egregious.
June 2019 - last edited June 2019
@EA_Davidcan you add now a new badge "Dumb ways do die" with tracking deaths outside circle?