XML FeedsThe Silver Lining
By indy on Sep 22, 2011 | In Musings of a Scenario Troll
Some people like to say I never have anything good to say about things. Usually, I don't... lots of silly shenanigans out there. There's some stuff out there being done though that I think deserve some mentions.. even if I deliver them with some left-handed compliments... :)
Tactical in Harwood is running a 3 sided game. This is a good idea! Why? Just read my previous posts about why having more than 2 sides is a really, really good thing. Too bad some of the players are timid when it comes to hard nosed competition in scenarios.
Geddon's Games is talking about putting on a 6 sided game! I think it's airsoft, and he'll need a new venue now that Warzones is toast... should set that shit on fire with the cigarette butts from Nudi's yard... but that's certainly an ambitious gaming idea and I wish him the best on it. In Geddon's games, his format actually has generals creating their own missions. I'm not sure if I like that, it's not something I would ever implement, but it seems to work okay.
Amber @ Mad Ivan's seems to have a better grip on technology and how it can apply to events than anybody on the production side I've met so far. It would not surprise me at all to see them run the first Field Day Messenger assisted paintball games.
Viper had a... somewhat strange... idea he floated to me before the last event of his I attended (deadlands 3 or some shit). The idea is/was 2 different scenarios, running in parallel at the same venue, with the main field split in half. You can't cross into the other game. The entire field swapped at half time, so you basically played 2 different 12 (13?) hour scenarios, with storylines tied together via Stargates or something like that. It doesn't exactly fix the game mechanic problems of scenarios, if anything it multiplies them by 2, but I still think if implemented properly, it's an idea that would be worth playing at least once. What would have sunk it is the propensity for players to go to bed early that's been en vogue since I stopped playing actively. Trying to have a proper balance of play time on the different fields over different segments would be a nightmare.
The guys over at LCP are starting to get on the right track. Right idea, wrong implementation. They put up an obstacle course that's the basis of some competition. Great idea! Maybe not the implementation that could put on the best event though...
Anybody else a fan of the toughness challenges that are on the rise all over the world? Iron Man, Tough Guy, Spartan Race, Military Combine, and more. Never heard of them? They are some of the most ferociously tough competitions available. Most people do not finish them. Some people have died trying. It's like a small taste of BUDS for civilians (and no SEALs talking shit to you). I'm willing to bet there are enough hardcore paintballers to bring those elements into a proper big-team (50+ per side) format competition that would be appealing to the hard-nosed scenario, milsim, and even tournament players.
Now, I've been talking about Augmented Reality for some time. Recently, I read an article that reached off the paper, and slapped me across the face with its genius. A company used one of my favorite bits of software called Layar, which works for iPhone & Androids. What did they do that was so genius?
Well.. they took the 22 most popular shopping districts on the planet, and built virtual t-shirt stores at each one that can be seen through Layar. Virtual stores superimposed over where real stores are.
The remix of that for paintball is blatantly obvious. Instant access to company stores at every major paintball field. Virtual tent exhibits at World Cup, D-Day, the college series, etc, etc, etc. Want to talk about marketing? What if I just looked at a tournament field through my phone, and it told me exactly which Pro player that was, bio, statistics, and sponsor links because it could recognize his jersey and rough size? The ground work is there. When will somebody, besides lowly little me who has zero money invested and doesn't really give a shit if paintball disappeared tomorrow, start utilizing it?
7 comments
I hope this Tactical game goes better than the last 3 sided game they did, Gears of War back in '07. 
Great post, but most people will only like this sort of thing until someone uses it against them to beat them, then they will hate on it like every other tech or innovation that has been put forward.
Lone, so do I. Adding extra sides is hard. Part of it depends on the cleverness of the players in the game. Part of it depends on an experienced, well-considered production.Starcraft may be the case study on 3-sided scenarios. It had multiple implementation flaws from the harvesting, to the carriers, to the AA fire. All of that is fixable though, and overall, it was a pretty good game.
TB, meh, haters hate. Hell, I hate. Time for them to bump "On To The Next One" & "Death Of Auto-tune" over & over until they get the point.
lonegunm4n, What was wrong with GoW?Sure, it turned into the 2 "home" teams against our 1 team, but our side still won. The only thing I think we should have done different is maybe moon the other two teams at the end-of-game ceremonies.
And the more I think about it, the more I think we should have let Jud have his way with that piece of crap that assaulted his wife. I saw several potential burial sites during that game.
By default, most multi-sided games will feature the leader getting ganged up on.That's a good thing.
If you're playing to compete, you get a higher difficulty level when you do really good.
If you're "just there to shoot paint", you have more people to shoot at, and significantly increased odds of your team not collapsing and being trapped in their base in a 1-sided shellacking.
The promoter wins because of the above 2 giving the chance for more paint to be shot, and that's what it is all about at the end of the day, paint sales. This is especially critical in the current economy that's $5 trillion smaller than when all these promoters & fields went into business.
Actually the last Viper game I played in (or ever will play in for that matter) was a a 3-Sided game down at Petty Paintball in Bastrop, Tx back in early 2009. I enjoyed the concept and the mechanics weren't too bad, no more so than normal, from what I recall. Each side shift clockwise at the break to the next base. This did create an issue where one base was a bit easier to defend at night than the other two, but that was really the biggest issue on the scenario game play. He did try to incorporate a 3 on 3 tourney into it where every hour or two throughout the length of the event, each commander had the option to send a 3 man team to the speedball field for a round robin tourney with the ability to wager points on the ability of your team to finish first or second.
While I this was an interesting wrinkle, the implementation of it was a bit on the gimpy side because nobody wanted to pull players off the field to send them to the tourney.
Cayjunn,Pretty much. 3 sides fixes a bit, especially on the business side... but some game mechanics, like sniper cards, are just shit, and will always be shit. At least some people are taking baby steps. Some people have pretty spiffy new ways of doing things that should of, but haven't yet, caught on to mainstream scenarios.
As to base switching, I hate it. It's a ridiculous idea. It's never written properly into story lines, or have replacement maps for the magical new place you're in.
There's only 2 real reasons for it:
1) The field is so unbalanced you have to trade sides to make it fair.
2) To prevent one side from taking the walk.
Well, on #1, that field should not have been selected. It's like CPX. Great venue. Great for fun ha-ha games. Great for poobah events. Great for competitive scenarios? No, too narrow, switching sides just means you see the choke point from the other side.
#2 is the real reason you see side changes. I'm one of the people that had to take the walk to Protoss base @ PBUSA (txr, whatever, it's still pbusa to me). I know how much it can suck... but how simple is the fix? Very simple. A tram system. I find it hard, very, very hard to believe that out of, lets say 100 paintball players, you could not come up with 1 4-wheeler and a $300 trailer to serve as a tram. That, and a driver, any one of the dozens of camp followers at every event, would be more than sufficient. In fact, if you've ever had the chance to read any rule set I've personally written, it is in plain english urging generals to supply their own tram (event will provide insurance, fair enough right?).
As to the 3man tourney, it's not a bad plan... but the fault is obviously giving people the option, and making it a wager. There's a reason the saying is "Carrots & Sticks", not just "Carrots". You have to make attendance into missions, for fixed points. To prevent 3 ringers from being recruited to just run the tournament all game, randomly require specific roleplayers there on personal missions. Ta-da! Now it's show up or lose. The irony of it all would be mouth wateringly delicious. Sending scenario players, who for years cried about those dirty, cheatin', hyper-competitive "tourney players", on a mission to play a tournament... fucking hysterical.
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