Battlefield 3 gameplay and design issues

[Drexion]

BF3 is an amazing game and one of the best FPS games to be released in years. However the more I play it, the more I come across frustrating issues which many other FPS games don't suffer from. When it's going great it's awesome, but when it's going bad it's astoundingly frustrating. And sadly the latter happens more often than not, due to gameplay design by the developers of the game. Kind of sad the games with awesome visuals always have questionable gameplay design, why couldn't the CS games look like this. Unless you're playing one of the couple maps with ok-ish design, everything else just degenerates into either a meat grinder, 20+ people camping in bushes/rooftops/dark corners, or a combination of both. Funny, I watched PC Gamers praise this game and bash CoD games for a year, yet this game has 100 times the campers/hiding spots/noobtubes/frustration/poor map design than that of a CoD game.

Here's some things I would suggest:

(1) Maps need more walls
- The game needs more walls (or something which separates areas more frequently). FPS strategies revolve around walls, which segregate maps into areas which teams/squads base their strategies around. Since this game has no walls, and is just one huge sandbox, strategy goes out the window and it too often just degenerates into a meat grinder or camping fest. A side effect of this is the 'die instantly as you spawn' scenario, even if you spawn at one of your bases.

(2) Game design should favor aggressor, not camper
- Takes too long to (a) stop sprinting, (b) bring up your gun, (c) aim down sights, then (d) start shooting. With about a half a second for each of the above steps the camper automatically wins and the aggressor loses. This setup only encourages people to camp in some dark hole, rather than try to move towards the objective. A lot of players must think "Why bother when you're gonna die to a camper inevitably ?" The animations for all those things should be MUCH faster. CoD games even have ADS perks which speed up those animations.

(3) Anti Vehicle weapons should not work on infantry
- Talk about noob tube spam. 100 times as much as any CoD game I've ever played. Why ? For some reason the developers decided that anti vehicle weapons will 1 hit kill infantry units. So you now have a situation where people are equipping anti vehicle weapons such as RPGs but just spamming them against enemy infantry instead of focusing on vehicles like they should. Some maps are nothing but noob tube spam NON STOP in key areas of the map. After years of FPS players complaining about noob tubes, you would expect other PFS game designers to learn from the feedback.

(4) There should be no man made camping spots
- The game is a sandbox type game, which naturally means that there will be tons of camping spots all over. Ok fine, most players can look past that - so why the hell would the developers manually design even hundreds of more camping spots on top of that ? They scattered accessible ladders / rocks / rooftops / towers / platforms etc ALL over all the maps - now you don't even need to think about where good camping spots would be, the developers have made these hundreds of spots just for you. No need to think anymore, just go up the nearest ladder and camp to your heart's content.

(5) More basic transport (non aggressive) vehicles needed
- On the large size maps, there needs to be more basic non-armed transport vehicles, like some jeeps which at least spawn at the deployment points during the match. Too often you might be in a situation where your team has to spawn back at the deployment point but there are no vehicles or just one slow one. So now you need to trek back 500 meters to get to the closest capture point. The time lost results in too large a ticket loss punishment, the boon to the other team is too high.

(6) Bullet damage per distance penalty is too high for assault rifles
- Simple enough, it's quite annoying to put 15 bullets into someone at a distance and they not die, as the damage drop penalty is too high. They probably did this to balance sniper rifles, but nevertheless they should use different values for the assault rifles. If anything it's the tanks which need to have their bullet damage over distance nerfed, no reason a tank parked 150m away should be able to completely lock down a spawn point because its artillery is so damn effective even at very long range.

(7) The contrast / lighting needs to be tweaked
- Due to the contract / lighting on most maps, the player character model blends in with the environment too well. And if it's an indoors to outdoors lighting scenario - the indoors usually so dark to the player outdoors that they are practically invisible. The windows on Siene Crossing or destroyed buildings on Firestorm are an example, the players camping in them are practically invisible. Indoor areas need brighter lights so that players in them are not invisible or completely blended in. Also affects the large buildings whose walls were destroyed, the inside of the building doesn't have enough light and players inside them are almost invisible.

(8) More consistent terrain traversal needed
- Sometimes you have no problem jumping over a 5 foot stack of bricks, next second you're stuck on a 5 inch high pavement. One moment you can jump through a window no problem, next moment you're stuck on the windowsill. (yes the glass is broken). Sometimes its no hassle jumping over the train trolleys, next time you character can't even clear a 2 foot fence. I don't know if it's due to server side checks or what, but stuff like that should be handled totally client side for a more consistent experience.

(9) Spawn protection (sometimes) or better spawn points
- I understand if you take the risk of spawning on a teammate it can mean instant death - fine. What should not be happening is if you spawn in a base you control you die instantly. There should be at least about 2-3 seconds of spawn protection (cancelled if you fire a gun during this time), to break the cycle of 'spawn - die instantly - spawn - die instantly - spawn - die instantly'. Now I can see how some will argue you should spawn at your deployment point, but spawning 500m away is not fun (see point (5)), and ridiculous when something as better spawn points or 3 second spawn protection is imo a better solution.

(10) Rush mode is too often pathetic
- It works in CS and CoD because those games don't suffer from all the issues listed here. Those games have walls (point (1)), the bomb points are not close together, and the defending team don't respawn close to the bomb site making it an endless meat grinder. On some maps (like metro for eg.) there's nothing the attacking team can do, as the entire defending team just camps in bushes 100m away.

(11) Focus should be on rifles vs rifles
- You join a game, and within the first few minutes you've died from nades, tanks, rpgs, anti vehicle weapons, choppers, jets, jeeps, humvees etc WAY MORE than you've died to an automatic rifle being aimed by another player. It's great the game offers all these options, but the problem is that it takes no skill to kill someone with a tank, or a rpg, or a nade etc etc. Rifles you actually have to aim and shoot, and the opponent has a split second to retaliate. In a tank for example, you just randomly point somewhere in the general direction of the guy and boom he's dead in one shot; no skill involved. I would prefer if the game encouraged rifle vs rifle combat and discouraged the noob tube spam.

(12) Assault/Medic class completely useless around opponent vehicles
- I understand not all classes will have all functionality, but seriously its so annoying when you're playing assault and a tank rolls around. There's nothing you can do except run away like a little biatch and hide. Give them C4 or something, anything. I've contemplated if the assault class getting a vehicle damage boost to their M320 attachment would help this situation, they already have to sacrifice the med kit for it.

(13) Shouldn't be about being shot from behind
- I've never played an FPS game where such a high percentage of your deaths are a 'shot from behind by someone who you can't/didn't see' situation. This is related to camping and lack of walls somewhat - but more so is a combination of factors, including map and gameplay design. When you play a game like CS, the game pushes you towards a situation where you and your opponent each enter the other's peripheral view, you both aim and then fire at each other - the player with higher accuracy/speed/reaction etc wins the encounter. That imo is what FPS gaming is all about. Now BF3 has sandbox type maps, but there are fixes to help this situation, primarily not having character models blend in so well with the background.

(14) Too easy to completely lockdown the other team
- On some maps, it's quite common to see one team completely lock down the opposing team once their team's campers setup shop at the key junctions of the map. Those junctions have no alternate routes or flanking options, so it becomes a long distance meat grinder. With engineers camping with rocket launchers being as effective as they are against infantry, the game becomes entirely pointless for the other side. This obviously doesn't affect the open areas maps as much, but maps with corridors/bridges like Siene Crossing are highly affected by this scenario. This point is related to (1) - if there were more god damned walls in the game the campers would not have such a huge advantage.

Most of the issues I list above occur whether or not you're playing with a squad or solo, whether you're on a 32man or 64man server, and whether you're using teamwork or not. I don't like how some fanboys of the BF3 series spout 'use teamwork noob' as a rebuttal when legitimate issues the game has are brought to light. Some people won't agree with some or most of what I've posted above - but everyday as I get more and more hesitant to double click my BF3 shortcut in lieu of other games, I feel I should at least post my opinions on some of the issues which affect the game. There are many other issues of course, (grrr IRNV), but I think that they could or will be patched so I didn't bother to mention them.

 

[Chubz]

(7) The contrast / lighting needs to be tweaked
- Due to the contract / lighting on most maps, the player character model blends in with the environment too well. And if it's an indoors to outdoors lighting scenario - the indoors usually so dark to the player outdoors that they are practically invisible. The windows on Siene Crossing or destroyed buildings on Firestorm are an example, the players camping in them are practically invisible. Indoor areas need brighter lights so that players in them are not invisible or completely blended in. Also affects the large buildings whose walls were destroyed, the inside of the building doesn't have enough light and players inside them are almost invisible.

. . .

(13) Shouldn't be about being shot from behind
- I've never played an FPS game where such a high percentage of your deaths are a 'shot from behind by someone who you can't/didn't see' situation. This is related to camping and lack of walls somewhat - but more so is a combination of factors, including map and gameplay design. When you play a game like CS, the game pushes you towards a situation where you and your opponent each enter the other's peripheral view, you both aim and then fire at each other - the player with higher accuracy/speed/reaction etc wins the encounter. That imo is what FPS gaming is all about. Now BF3 has sandbox type maps, but there are fixes to help this situation, primarily not having character models blend in so well with the background.

Those two points are the killers for me. The warehouses on Operation Firestorm are simply way, way too dark. The interiors in the buildings on Seine Crossing are way too dark, too. You hit the nail on the head with those comparisons. It's literally impossible to see anyone if you're outside until it's too late. The only chance you have is using the already overpowered IRNV attachment to see them.

Also, being shot in the back is a major problem. My friends and I have actually been discussing this a lot. I get shot in the back more in this game than I ever have in any other game, period. I don't think I can pinpoint exactly what causes it, but I have a feeling the map design and spawn system help contribute to it. Bad Company 2 was nowhere near as bad for being shot from behind. Here, it happens on a constant basis. It's where over half of my deaths usually come from. It never feels like there's a true "front line" and people always seem to mysteriously get behind us, even when they shouldn't have been able to.

 

[bob saget]

yet this game has 100 times the campers/hiding spots/noobtubes/frustration/poor map design than that of a CoD game.

you're joking right? just from that statement, you pretty much render all your other arguments obsolete. Map design in Cod games since Cod4 has been TOTAL CRAP.

(1) Maps need more walls
- The game needs more walls (or something which separates areas more frequently). FPS strategies revolve around walls, which segregate maps into areas which teams/squads base their strategies around. Since this game has no walls, and is just one huge sandbox, strategy goes out the window and it too often just degenerates into a meat grinder or camping fest. A side effect of this is the 'die instantly as you spawn' scenario, even if you spawn at one of your bases.

I wouldn't say "the game" needs more walls. I would say CERTAIN SECTIONS OF MAPS do. Obvisouly the first section of Metro is the one that comes to mind. Other maps, tehran, seine, etc, are fine imo.

(2) Game design should favor aggressor, not camper
- Takes too long to (a) stop sprinting, (b) bring up your gun, (c) aim down sights, then (d) start shooting. With about a half a second for each of the above steps the camper automatically wins and the aggressor loses. This setup only encourages people to camp in some dark hole, rather than try to move towards the objective. A lot of players must think "Why bother when you're gonna die to a camper inevitably ?" The animations for all those things should be MUCH faster. CoD games even have ADS perks which speed up those animations.

Nope. Attacking is harder, as it should be. Pressure is on the offensive team to engage. I don't know a single mp FPS that favors the attacking team

(3) Anti Vehicle weapons should not work on infantry
- Talk about noob tube spam. 100 times as much as any CoD game I've ever played. Why ? For some reason the developers decided that anti vehicle weapons will 1 hit kill infantry units. So you now have a situation where people are equipping anti vehicle weapons such as RPGs but just spamming them against enemy infantry instead of focusing on vehicles like they should. Some maps are nothing but noob tube spam NON STOP in key areas of the map. After years of FPS players complaining about noob tubes, you would expect other PFS game designers to learn from the feedback.

This is just personal experience, which is a non-argument. IN MY EXPERIENCE, COD has WAY more noob tube spamming. In which areas exactly are you getting rocket spammed? I get killed by rockets/tubes WAY less than in Bad Company 2 or Cod4.

(4) There should be no man made camping spots
- The game is a sandbox type game, which naturally means that there will be tons of camping spots all over. Ok fine, most players can look past that - so why the hell would the developers manually design even hundreds of more camping spots on top of that ? They scattered accessible ladders / rocks / rooftops / towers / platforms etc ALL over all the maps - now you don't even need to think about where good camping spots would be, the developers have made these hundreds of spots just for you. No need to think anymore, just go up the nearest ladder and camp to your heart's content.

sounds to me like you are not playing smart. also, please don't tell me you are one of the morons that complains about the defenders on rush/conquest maps camping

(5) More basic transport (non aggressive) vehicles needed
- On the large size maps, there needs to be more basic non-armed transport vehicles, like some jeeps which at least spawn at the deployment points during the match. Too often you might be in a situation where your team has to spawn back at the deployment point but there are no vehicles or just one slow one. So now you need to trek back 500 meters to get to the closest capture point. The time lost results in too large a ticket loss punishment, the boon to the other team is too high.

possibly, but i always manage to find vehicles. sometimes you have to wait for ~30 seconds, which is tolerable. which maps are you having issues with?

(6) Bullet damage per distance penalty is too high for assault rifles
- Simple enough, it's quite annoying to put 15 bullets into someone at a distance and they not die, as the damage drop penalty is too high. They probably did this to balance sniper rifles, but nevertheless they should use different values for the assault rifles. If anything it's the tanks which need to have their bullet damage over distance nerfed, no reason a tank parked 150m away should be able to completely lock down a spawn point because its artillery is so damn effective even at very long range.

15 bullets? right tanks are fine... whenever a team has a tank, the other team usually has one too. get in it and blast away.

(7) The contrast / lighting needs to be tweaked
- Due to the contract / lighting on most maps, the player character model blends in with the environment too well. And if it's an indoors to outdoors lighting scenario - the indoors usually so dark to the player outdoors that they are practically invisible. The windows on Siene Crossing or destroyed buildings on Firestorm are an example, the players camping in them are practically invisible. Indoor areas need brighter lights so that players in them are not invisible or completely blended in. Also affects the large buildings whose walls were destroyed, the inside of the building doesn't have enough light and players inside them are almost invisible.

agreed.

(8) More consistent terrain traversal needed
- Sometimes you have no problem jumping over a 5 foot stack of bricks, next second you're stuck on a 5 inch high pavement. One moment you can jump through a window no problem, next moment you're stuck on the windowsill. (yes the glass is broken). Sometimes its no hassle jumping over the train trolleys, next time you character can't even clear a 2 foot fence. I don't know if it's due to server side checks or what, but stuff like that should be handled totally client side for a more consistent experience.

agreed. it can be very annoying, but i find this issue is such a rare occurrence for me.

(9) Spawn protection (sometimes) or better spawn points
- I understand if you take the risk of spawning on a teammate it can mean instant death - fine. What should not be happening is if you spawn in a base you control you die instantly. There should be at least about 2-3 seconds of spawn protection (cancelled if you fire a gun during this time), to break the cycle of 'spawn - die instantly - spawn - die instantly - spawn - die instantly'. Now I can see how some will argue you should spawn at your deployment point, but spawning 500m away is not fun (see point (5)), and ridiculous when something as better spawn points or 3 second spawn protection is imo a better solution.

nope. it's fine.

(10) Rush mode is too often pathetic
- It works in CS and CoD because those games don't suffer from all the issues listed here. Those games have walls (point (1)), the bomb points are not close together, and the defending team don't respawn close to the bomb site making it an endless meat grinder. On some maps (like metro for eg.) there's nothing the attacking team can do, as the entire defending team just camps in bushes 100m away.

Metro is the only real one where there is an issue, and that is only on the first checkpoint. de_ and S&D matches that I have played (in CS:S and Cod4) DON'T EVEN HAVE re-spawning so if you die, you wait for the round to finish. At least that's how it was when I played.

(11) Focus should be on rifles vs rifles
- You join a game, and within the first few minutes you've died from nades, tanks, rpgs, anti vehicle weapons, choppers, jets, jeeps, humvees etc WAY MORE than you've died to an automatic rifle being aimed by another player. It's great the game offers all these options, but the problem is that it takes no skill to kill someone with a tank, or a rpg, or a nade etc etc. Rifles you actually have to aim and shoot, and the opponent has a split second to retaliate. In a tank for example, you just randomly point somewhere in the general direction of the guy and boom he's dead in one shot; no skill involved. I would prefer if the game encouraged rifle vs rifle combat and discouraged the noob tube spam.

flat out wrong.

(12) Assault/Medic class completely useless around opponent vehicles
- I understand not all classes will have all functionality, but seriously its so annoying when you're playing assault and a tank rolls around. There's nothing you can do except run away like a little biatch and hide. Give them C4 or something, anything. I've contemplated if the assault class getting a vehicle damage boost to their M320 attachment would help this situation, they already have to sacrifice the med kit for it.

you are doing it wrong. classes are balanced fine.

(13) Shouldn't be about being shot from behind
- I've never played an FPS game where such a high percentage of your deaths are a 'shot from behind by someone who you can't/didn't see' situation. This is related to camping and lack of walls somewhat - but more so is a combination of factors, including map and gameplay design. When you play a game like CS, the game pushes you towards a situation where you and your opponent each enter the other's peripheral view, you both aim and then fire at each other - the player with higher accuracy/speed/reaction etc wins the encounter. That imo is what FPS gaming is all about. Now BF3 has sandbox type maps, but there are fixes to help this situation, primarily not having character models blend in so well with the background.

a very minor issue imo. usually if I get shot from behind, it is either because I didnt check a corner, or because I got sucked into camping a building or corner and got raped. if you stay mobile well, you will hardly ever get killed from behind.

(14) Too easy to completely lockdown the other team
- On some maps, it's quite common to see one team completely lock down the opposing team once their team's campers setup shop at the key junctions of the map. Those junctions have no alternate routes or flanking options, so it becomes a long distance meat grinder. With engineers camping with rocket launchers being as effective as they are against infantry, the game becomes entirely pointless for the other side. This obviously doesn't affect the open areas maps as much, but maps with corridors/bridges like Siene Crossing are highly affected by this scenario. This point is related to (1) - if there were more god damned walls in the game the campers would not have such a huge advantage.

Meh, maybe. But inevitably skills are going to be unbalanced, and as such, teams are going to be constantly raped. you've never been on teams that win rush rounds in like 7 minutes as offense? Nothing really you can do about this imo.

... when legitimate issues the game has are brought to light.

unfortunately, a good chunk of your "issues" are not legitimate.

 

[Magezilla]

I actually agree with the OP on most of the issues. Especially issue #9. In Operation Firestorm I admit I will camp A out by the road near the crates. People will keep spawning in the same exact spot and I mow them down. It's cheap and I shouldn't do it, but I can and I will take advantage of the lack of randomized spawn points.

I disagree with the statement that it has more campers/noobs than COD. COD is notorious for that.

Overall, pretty good analysis.

 

[nutcrackr]

(1) Maps need more walls
Don't agree, the maps have plenty of walls, containers and rocky outcrops for infantry to move behind. I have no issue with the cover placement.

(2) Game design should favor aggressor, not camper
Although Rush typically gives high kills to defenders, the conquest mode has always rewarded attackers. You can't just defend flags and win. You end up with no flags and get restricted to the deployment.

(3) Anti Vehicle weapons should not work on infantry
Splash damage should be reduced, or greatly increased back splash. So you have to hit people dead on to kill them and you can't just use them up close. I think it's a minor issue, imo they travel pretty slow and if they miss you will eat them with a conventional weapon

(4) There should be no man made camping spots
Doesn't this come back to 1? You are saying not enough walls but too many camping spots? QUE? Campers rarely do well, especially with kill cam.

(5) More basic transport (non aggressive) vehicles needed
Agreed, some large maps, 64 players need more transport vehicles. Not huge amounts more, just a couple

(6) Bullet damage per distance penalty is too high for assault rifles
To a certain extent I agree, but I think it's too early to talk overarching balance issues.

(7) The contrast / lighting needs to be tweaked
Probably why the IRNV is so powerful, I don't mind the lighting. I think the game looks amazing and you should be advanataged indoors.

(8) More consistent terrain traversal needed
Was a problem in BC2 (much worse) and still an issue. It's better, and the parkour jump makes movement a lot better in general. But those issues are still present. They really need to make it easier to walk over 3cm rocks and such.

(9) Spawn protection (sometimes) or better spawn points
3 second spawn protection is insane. You can spawn on contested areas and run to where the enemy is invincible to damage. This is a bad solution. The solution is better placed spawns, or smarter spawns that put you in non trafficed areas, not invulnerability. That would not work.

(10) Rush mode is too often pathetic
CS isn't really rush mode, nor is COD. Rush mode is two bombs, then two further on. I think rush in some maps is better than BC2 ever was due to the open levels. 80% I play conquest anyway.

(11) Focus should be on rifles vs rifles
Part of the series, I think it's fine. There are plenty of modes and maps if you want gun on gun stuff. Or you could play COD. The real 64 player battles need the vehicles to give the variety and sense of danger. If you focus on rifle vs rifle too much the maps become too large and you lose the core of the series.

(12) Assault/Medic class completely useless around opponent vehicles
Recon is the same, They have the soflam but its no direct damage. Assault heals and revives. If you wanted to give each class the chance to take down a tank well that's a different story. I think it's fine how it is.

(13) Shouldn't be about being shot from behind
I don't get this much at all. Recenlty when I die, 98% of the time I know where it was from before the kill cam comes up.

(14) Too easy to completely lockdown the other team
Rush seems easier to lock down. And Damavand and Metro in conquest. Apart from that I disagree. BC2 had much worse lockdown rates and even BF2 had some pretty crazy spawn pushes.


In short: disagree with most things.

 

[SoCalMX70]

I also disagree with a lot of the OP... ESPECIALLY the 2nd and 11th points.

I know the game isn't real life, but I like things to be somewhat as realistic as possible. Pick up a gun, run, stop, and aim and tell me how long that takes you. And rifle vs rifle? This isn't COD, or CS... or whatever. It's BATTLEFIELD.

One other thing, I hardly ever see noob tube spam... guess I'm lucky?

A couple valid points were brought up... I (and most everyone) agrees the IRNV needs to be nerfed.

 

[wc326]

i have one issue, the game doesn't even run when i press join server from the webpage.

 

[demo]

Good post OP I agree with most of it. I feel the maps need more cover in general and there needs to be more emphasis on rifle vs rifle combat. Mortars, RPG's, Claymores etc are just so random and nub.

What happened to games that took skill? The only hope is the new Counter Strike really, other than that everything is a random nub fest these days..

 

[spindoctor]

can't say i agree with all the points in the original post but battlefield 3 definitely has a whole lot of design problems. there are times when the game is extremely frustrating to play for no fault of your own.

for me, the biggest failure of the game is the maps. when you ship a game with only 9 maps, there is absolutely no margin for error in their quality. even a couple of maps not playing well significantly reduces the content of the game. unfortunately, there are a lot of maps that don't work well with 64 player conquest which was supposed to be the highlight of this game. seine, bazaar, metro and damavand completely break down in 64p conquest, while tehran just lags out like crazy. that leaves only 4 maps where the game mode can even work, which is ridiculous. they should have built individual maps around a particular game mode and player count, instead of building maps and then trying to fit in all game modes and number of players into them.

 

[Chubz]

for me, the biggest failure of the game is the maps. when you ship a game with only 9 maps, there is absolutely no margin for error in their quality. even a couple of maps not playing well significantly reduces the content of the game. unfortunately, there are a lot of maps that don't work well with 64 player conquest which was supposed to be the highlight of this game. seine, bazaar, metro and damavand completely break down in 64p conquest, while tehran just lags out like crazy. that leaves only 4 maps where the game mode can even work, which is ridiculous. they should have built individual maps around a particular game mode and player count, instead of building maps and then trying to fit in all game modes and number of players into them.

I agree completely. The map design is terrible, and literally the worst we've seen from DICE up to this point. There are only 3-4 maps I enjoy playing with 64 players. The rest are garbage and feel too small and spammy. Damavand Peak and Operation Metro are the most obvious offenders.

 

[spindoctor]

I agree completely. The map design is terrible, and literally the worst we've seen from DICE up to this point. There are only 3-4 maps I enjoy playing with 64 players. The rest are garbage. Damavand Peak and Operation Metro are the most obvious offenders.

the others are just as bad. you can't move 10 feet in bazaar without getting shot by a rocket launcher. i don't even bother to go to the central flag point in the alley anymore. same goes for seine and mortar strikes with the bridges acting as chokepoints. damavand is just one long, dark tunnel full campers that becomes nothing but a meat grinder. and the less said about metro the better. that map is just a joke.

 

[Chubz]

the others are just as bad. you can't move 10 feet in bazaar without getting shot by a rocket launcher. i don't even bother to go to the central flag point in the alley anymore. same goes for seine and mortar strikes with the bridges acting as chokepoints. damavand is just one long, dark tunnel full campers that becomes nothing but a meat grinder. and the less said about metro the better. that map is just a joke.

Yep, those are my experiences too. Oddly enough, I don't experience the severe rubber-banding in Tehran like I did shortly after the game's release, but it's not a very good map even when you can play it properly. The points feel as if they're too close to one another and I don't like how if the Russian team controls every point, the U.S. team is forced to travel down a rather lengthy, steep hill and will inevitably be spotted and shot up in the process. I always hate being on the American team on that map if I'm stuck with crappy teammates, because it becomes a death trap the moment you stick your head out and start walking or driving down the hill. The map design itself is just full of problems. I would love to have a larger night time city to fight in rather than a tiny area under a highway overpass. That map feels exactly like something from Bad Company. It's not quite as frustrating and full of spam as the other four you mentioned, but it's not much better either.

 

[spindoctor]

i think even dice admitted that tehran needed some optimization. it is the only map that lags consistently for me. all the others work fine without lag, so it's not a problem with my connection or the servers. some servers just drop the map from their rotation because of the lag issues.

and you're right, the map isn't that good anyway. it's just one long road with people fighting from both sides. like you, i find it unfortunate that it's the only night time map... i like playing night maps in these games. as for the american spawn issue, there was one time i saw 5 people sitting in the american spawn location using mortars. 5 people in a ****ing row doing nothing to help the team

 

[demo]

I agree with you guys about the maps and lack of good ones, however I hate CQ and 32 is too many for Rush.. I try to play on 24 slot rush servers if possible.

 

[Jandar]

The main problem I have is the stupid origin installer, no default way to make games install to a bigger/faster drive. It defaults to c:

Sure, there are ways to trick it to installing it to a RAID setup or something, but still, how freaking hard is it to understand that if we point Origin installer to another drive, the games should be installed on that drive.......

 

[wc326]

i think the maps are bad is because of the console.

since console only does 24 players max..... those big map are empty with only 24 players.

so they decide to have some ****** map lol

 

[spindoctor]

The main problem I have is the stupid origin installer, no default way to make games install to a bigger/faster drive. It defaults to c:

Sure, there are ways to trick it to installing it to a RAID setup or something, but still, how freaking hard is it to understand that if we point Origin installer to another drive, the games should be installed on that drive.......

my games install to another drive without any trickery. not sure why you're having issues. you can specify the path for the games and downloads in the settings.

 

[Sharkfood]

my games install to another drive without any trickery. not sure why you're having issues. you can specify the path for the games and downloads in the settings.

Yep, I did this without a hitch as well as my C/System Drive is tiny, whereas my D: is my game drive with over a TB of space. Just going into the settings and specifying a path on D: and everything went there without a single problem.

On the OP issues- I also disagree with most of them. The mp dynamic for Battlefield games IS that of attacker vs. defender, so it makes sense for someone to be frustrated and continually use the word "camper" if they don't understand this dynamic. Games like CoD are much more like "1 on 1 deathmatch with objective distractions" so the whole attacker vs. defender dynamic just isn't there plus the whole feel of lonewolf overwhelms the experience. In BF3, if you want that 1 on 1, lonewolf feel- you just wont get it. It's about squad play and focus on objectives. Nothing wrong with either, but they are totally different gameplay dynamics.

 

[wonder squirrel]

Quote:
(1) Maps need more walls
- The game needs more walls (or something which separates areas more frequently). FPS strategies revolve around walls, which segregate maps into areas which teams/squads base their strategies around. Since this game has no walls, and is just one huge sandbox, strategy goes out the window and it too often just degenerates into a meat grinder or camping fest. A side effect of this is the 'die instantly as you spawn' scenario, even if you spawn at one of your bases.

I wouldn't say "the game" needs more walls. I would say CERTAIN SECTIONS OF MAPS do. Obvisouly the first section of Metro is the one that comes to mind. Other maps, tehran, seine, etc, are fine imo.

I agree with this. Some sections need more, but not every map.


Quote:
(2) Game design should favor aggressor, not camper
- Takes too long to (a) stop sprinting, (b) bring up your gun, (c) aim down sights, then (d) start shooting. With about a half a second for each of the above steps the camper automatically wins and the aggressor loses. This setup only encourages people to camp in some dark hole, rather than try to move towards the objective. A lot of players must think "Why bother when you're gonna die to a camper inevitably ?" The animations for all those things should be MUCH faster. CoD games even have ADS perks which speed up those animations.

I disagree with this. If I'm camping somewhere and your running down the road towards my base, why should you get the drop on me if I've been watching you and waiting for a good shot?


Quote:
(3) Anti Vehicle weapons should not work on infantry
- Talk about noob tube spam. 100 times as much as any CoD game I've ever played. Why ? For some reason the developers decided that anti vehicle weapons will 1 hit kill infantry units. So you now have a situation where people are equipping anti vehicle weapons such as RPGs but just spamming them against enemy infantry instead of focusing on vehicles like they should. Some maps are nothing but noob tube spam NON STOP in key areas of the map. After years of FPS players complaining about noob tubes, you would expect other PFS game designers to learn from the feedback.


There is alot of rpg spamming for sure, but if those weapons didn't kill regular soldiers, the game would feel weird. Think of your firing a rpg at a tank, engineer pops out to repair. Your rpg goes through soldier hitting the tank and doing nothing to the person.


Quote:
(4) There should be no man made camping spots
- The game is a sandbox type game, which naturally means that there will be tons of camping spots all over. Ok fine, most players can look past that - so why the hell would the developers manually design even hundreds of more camping spots on top of that ? They scattered accessible ladders / rocks / rooftops / towers / platforms etc ALL over all the maps - now you don't even need to think about where good camping spots would be, the developers have made these hundreds of spots just for you. No need to think anymore, just go up the nearest ladder and camp to your heart's content.

sounds to me like you are not playing smart. also, please don't tell me you are one of the morons that complains about the defenders on rush/conquest maps camping


This. Also if your playing the Firestorm map and your on a roof top/ crane/ top of rocky outcropping/ the 2nd and 3rd floors by the filling station, your as good as dead. Trust me, I'm getting proficient with the sniper rifles


Quote:
(5) More basic transport (non aggressive) vehicles needed
- On the large size maps, there needs to be more basic non-armed transport vehicles, like some jeeps which at least spawn at the deployment points during the match. Too often you might be in a situation where your team has to spawn back at the deployment point but there are no vehicles or just one slow one. So now you need to trek back 500 meters to get to the closest capture point. The time lost results in too large a ticket loss punishment, the boon to the other team is too high.


Agree'd. I find this happens quite abit.

Quote:
(6) Bullet damage per distance penalty is too high for assault rifles
- Simple enough, it's quite annoying to put 15 bullets into someone at a distance and they not die, as the damage drop penalty is too high. They probably did this to balance sniper rifles, but nevertheless they should use different values for the assault rifles. If anything it's the tanks which need to have their bullet damage over distance nerfed, no reason a tank parked 150m away should be able to completely lock down a spawn point because its artillery is so damn effective even at very long range.


I disagree completely with this. Nothing like sniping, getting a hit from 100-150m and the guy turns around instantly and sprays an assault rifle killing me.


Quote:
(7) The contrast / lighting needs to be tweaked
- Due to the contract / lighting on most maps, the player character model blends in with the environment too well. And if it's an indoors to outdoors lighting scenario - the indoors usually so dark to the player outdoors that they are practically invisible. The windows on Siene Crossing or destroyed buildings on Firestorm are an example, the players camping in them are practically invisible. Indoor areas need brighter lights so that players in them are not invisible or completely blended in. Also affects the large buildings whose walls were destroyed, the inside of the building doesn't have enough light and players inside them are almost invisible.


Somewhat agreed, somewhat disagree.

Quote:
(8) More consistent terrain traversal needed
- Sometimes you have no problem jumping over a 5 foot stack of bricks, next second you're stuck on a 5 inch high pavement. One moment you can jump through a window no problem, next moment you're stuck on the windowsill. (yes the glass is broken). Sometimes its no hassle jumping over the train trolleys, next time you character can't even clear a 2 foot fence. I don't know if it's due to server side checks or what, but stuff like that should be handled totally client side for a more consistent experience.


I completely agree with this. I get stuck on random things ALOT. There is a wrought iron fence on Sienne by the D spawn point (north in the main spawn area) that I cannot jump a single try. I've tried it over and over and have never made it in one jump.


Quote:
(9) Spawn protection (sometimes) or better spawn points
- I understand if you take the risk of spawning on a teammate it can mean instant death - fine. What should not be happening is if you spawn in a base you control you die instantly. There should be at least about 2-3 seconds of spawn protection (cancelled if you fire a gun during this time), to break the cycle of 'spawn - die instantly - spawn - die instantly - spawn - die instantly'. Now I can see how some will argue you should spawn at your deployment point, but spawning 500m away is not fun (see point (5)), and ridiculous when something as better spawn points or 3 second spawn protection is imo a better solution.


Only on certain maps like Bazaar or Sienne where mortars can easily be setup to spam the spawn is this a problem. Typically in larger maps spawn campers don't last too long in my experience.


Quote:
(10) Rush mode is too often pathetic
- It works in CS and CoD because those games don't suffer from all the issues listed here. Those games have walls (point (1)), the bomb points are not close together, and the defending team don't respawn close to the bomb site making it an endless meat grinder. On some maps (like metro for eg.) there's nothing the attacking team can do, as the entire defending team just camps in bushes 100m away.


I thought the whole point of Rush was to make it a fast paced, endless meat grinder?


Quote:
(11) Focus should be on rifles vs rifles
- You join a game, and within the first few minutes you've died from nades, tanks, rpgs, anti vehicle weapons, choppers, jets, jeeps, humvees etc WAY MORE than you've died to an automatic rifle being aimed by another player. It's great the game offers all these options, but the problem is that it takes no skill to kill someone with a tank, or a rpg, or a nade etc etc. Rifles you actually have to aim and shoot, and the opponent has a split second to retaliate. In a tank for example, you just randomly point somewhere in the general direction of the guy and boom he's dead in one shot; no skill involved. I would prefer if the game encouraged rifle vs rifle combat and discouraged the noob tube spam.


flat out wrong.


Agree'd. I like the variety. It does get frustrating sometimes, but overall its fine.


Quote:
(12) Assault/Medic class completely useless around opponent vehicles
- I understand not all classes will have all functionality, but seriously its so annoying when you're playing assault and a tank rolls around. There's nothing you can do except run away like a little biatch and hide. Give them C4 or something, anything. I've contemplated if the assault class getting a vehicle damage boost to their M320 attachment would help this situation, they already have to sacrifice the med kit for it.
you are doing it wrong.


classes are balanced fine.


Agree'd for the most part.


Quote:
(13) Shouldn't be about being shot from behind
- I've never played an FPS game where such a high percentage of your deaths are a 'shot from behind by someone who you can't/didn't see' situation. This is related to camping and lack of walls somewhat - but more so is a combination of factors, including map and gameplay design. When you play a game like CS, the game pushes you towards a situation where you and your opponent each enter the other's peripheral view, you both aim and then fire at each other - the player with higher accuracy/speed/reaction etc wins the encounter. That imo is what FPS gaming is all about. Now BF3 has sandbox type maps, but there are fixes to help this situation, primarily not having character models blend in so well with the background.
a very minor issue imo. usually if I get shot from behind, it is either because I didnt check a corner, or because I got sucked into camping a building or corner and got raped. if you stay mobile well, you will hardly ever get killed from behind.


Mostly agree with this.


Quote:
(14) Too easy to completely lockdown the other team
- On some maps, it's quite common to see one team completely lock down the opposing team once their team's campers setup shop at the key junctions of the map. Those junctions have no alternate routes or flanking options, so it becomes a long distance meat grinder. With engineers camping with rocket launchers being as effective as they are against infantry, the game becomes entirely pointless for the other side. This obviously doesn't affect the open areas maps as much, but maps with corridors/bridges like Siene Crossing are highly affected by this scenario. This point is related to (1) - if there were more god damned walls in the game the campers would not have such a huge advantage.



This is a player skill issue thats exacerbated by teams not auto balancing. Sucks being pushed back into spawn by a team raping you and then check the scoreboard and see they have way better players and eight extra people on their side.


Quote:
... when legitimate issues the game has are brought to light.
unfortunately,


a good chunk of your "issues" are not legitimate.


Mostly agree'd.

 

[Jandar]

my games install to another drive without any trickery. not sure why you're having issues. you can specify the path for the games and downloads in the settings.

Origin let me pick the drive for Origin, not for the games. Didn't notice any options to change it, will reinstall it tonight. My C: drive is just a standard SATAII 7200RPM.