Get Smart (TM) - Buy Systems

[two and a half limericks]

Limerick's Get Smart Guide for
Buy Systems
...gamemodes where you have to buy your weapons

im not a game designer but i feel like as someone who plays these kinds of servers i have some level of input

1. The PEASHOOTER

 "The Peashooter" is usually a basic and near worthless gun, and the first gun the player can acquire (its free) It does minimal damage, is very inaccurate, has a short range, but will usually have a high fire-rate. the problem with the peashooter is that its boring. starting off the game with it is essentially a grind to the next gun which is actually worthwhile. the peashooter isnt fun to use, good, or even interesting. it serves no purpose but to be the starter weapon, easily forgettable in the sea of other weapons which are much better. Every time you start a new game your stuck with it. its bland and uninteresting

2. Fair??!?!

Fair? whats that? Is your new player steadily equiped with the peashooter? well forget him, he gets a near impossible kill? the same points as the guy with the super-shooter 900k. no matter what weapon you use or how you use it, you'll get the same amount of points (Which is usually 1.) good luck!

3. What am I shooting at?

Visualize a scenario where you've just joined a server, late in the game. plenty of people have much better weapons then the peashooter, including the classic *insert bushido weapon here* or the funny gimmick weapon which does way more damage that it should. trying to score kills here without dying or without somebody taking your kill is near impossible unless you get the drop on them or you get lucky. this is worse in gamemodes like endless zombies, where the zombies health increases but the points given per kill and the damage of weapons does not, meaning anybody with 'the peashooter' is stuck shooting aimlessly at enemies which his friends are mowing down. he might ask the question, "What am I shooting at again?". which is nothing.

4. Easy

Finally! you've gotten a better weapon, whether that be The Shotgun (tm) or Some Automatic Rifle, you can kill things now! Hopefully. So what happens now? Well, now you get to have fun! Hope you don't get bored, shooting at the same enemies, over and over again, until you can get a better gun. Then you do it again. And again. And again. An- yea, it gets boring. The grind to the next weapon, fortunately its a lot easier, in fact everything is a lot easier now, the peashooter really is worthless! the game starts out hard and gets easy! like, incredibly easy. Before having to carefully choose your targets to get a singular point, now only having to point and shoot at whatever's close to you - or not, it doesnt really matter.

whatta do? my server has these problems? how do i fix them.
Well, a few fixes is to make the peashooter not the only avaliable option upon spawn, another way is what i like to call getting....

Eco-nomySmart!

Eco-smart will gives player money based on how far the players before them are doing. If they have a high amount of money and gear, the new player should get a good amount too. Not exactly as high as the players before them --- that would make the players who earned their gear through playing feel inadequate, like they had accomplished nothing, since this guy got all the stuff they worked on for free, however, the new player should get some money.


of course, the best solution is just to not have a money system. seriously its loving stupid. just add like a class system or a choose your weapon system. buying items is an unnecessary middle-man, and it really isnt fun to grind up from the peashooter.

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[two and a half limericks]

this guide sucks, 2/10

[Drydess]

he's right

[gr8dayseth]

these are actually very good points

i used to host many a gun-fighting server back in the day, and i even used to do this "buy system" thing with my coffee table dm
i think while it was kinda "clever" how i did it, it wasn't rly a good idea overall, and i feel like the other gun-fighting servers i've done after that were much better handled and more liked partly due to me going with things like spawn-with-these-5 or classes or choose-ur-own or the traditional pick-em-up-off-the-floor or even randomizer in less serious cases!

[Conan]

resource buildup and discrepancy is a big thing in game design, esp mmos. there's a lot of strategies to deal with it, to make earning points feel as valuable (or not feel like pointless grinding) as early on.

one method is to have levels, like prestiging - giving up all or a lot of your progress for a small % bonus in income. the allure/appeal comes from status (usually prestiging gives special resource points and banners) and the promise of leveling up faster (re-experiencing the grind without it being as much of a grind)

another method is to have expensive non-gameplay related stuff, like cosmetics and hats. also serves as status symbols of sorts, and it gives players a bit more feeling of freedom.

theres a bunch of videos on this problem and the potential solutions (and each of their downsides), you can look them up. extra credits has a good one.

[Clear Glass]

You have good points, but I have to disagree with some of it. Especially,

of course, the best solution is just to not have a money system. seriously its loving stupid. just add like a class system or a choose your weapon system. buying items is an unnecessary middle-man, and it really isnt fun to grind up from the peashooter.

I have been hosting for years and so far my two most popular servers are Fort Wars and Trench Wars. Now here is something I noticed between the two. I can only host Fort Wars (with a high player count) for 1/4th the time I can Trench Wars. Never really understood why, but then it hit me awhile back. In Fort Wars you build your base, spawn whatever weapons/vehicles you want, and go out and fight. Ok, that was fun for a bit...what now? There was no progression. Nothing to work toward.

Meanwhile you have Trench Wars, you start out with two capable (of course not the best by any means) weapons, then you can buy new things such as pills, grenades, guns, etc. It gives players something to work toward, a reason to keep playing. Also, the player is at no significant disadvantage (this applies to my Trench Wars, cannot speak for other servers) because in Trench Wars its about strategy. If you have the lowest tier gear, are you going to want to run across an open field against someone who has an M27? Probably not. You have to adapt, change your tactics. So in that case you would want to build a Trench or a Tunnel and go under, or flank around the enemy until you can get close, where their superior weapons are less of an advantage.

I realized I rambled on a little (just got home from a 12h nightshift so im a bit tired so sorry for any typos or anything), but the money system has both advantages and disadvantages. If I knew how to solve everything I would.

[Shift Kitty]

My at most major concern with these kinds of systems is that these players have these weapons permanently. Not saying they should lose them on death, but they should at least lose them on round resets.
It becomes blatantly unfair when one team happens to get like 5 or 6 players that have been playing the server for a week, and the other happens to get 5 or 6 completely new players.
And when you are that new player, all you're accomplishing is feeding into one of those higher players' score pool. And when you're one of those regulars, all you're doing is picking off a bunch of people who are at a disadvantage. People are likely only playing to grind in these kinds of servers.

And yes, it is stupid. I've seen plenty of trench wars work without shop systems. And I assure you people were actually having fun.

I have never seen such a drastic grinding progression system placed in a deathmatch. Even those free to play action games. Sure they have progression, stats, and all that nonsense. But none of them pit new vs old. And even if that option is there, the players all still have access to the same weapons and classes, just the older players will have better versions of them.
So... Why does it work for them and not for your single Blockland server? Because those are games with thousands of players, playing in hundreds of lobbies. Not 20 players all forced to play with each other. No option to play with other new people then move up.
Then, you look a other games like C&C Renegade, Savage, or Counter Strike, which also had thousands of players, playing in hundreds of lobbies. Which would work for a single server, as the currencies in those games were per server, and were not permanent. For example, Renegade. You start off with one of the free classes, which when compared to the higher costing classes, might as well be using a pea shooter (except not to the absurd extent that BL servers tend to have). Once you kill some players or attack/protect the objectives (usually at the start, you're attacking/protecting the harvesters. damaging the enemy harvester gives you credits. when yours returns to base safely, your whole team gets some extra credits), you can buy one of the better classes. If you die, you have to rebuy that class.


Could you imagine going into a League of Legends match, going top, just to find out the enemy top laner is already max level and fully built? That wouldn't really be a fun game would it? That's the same experience these cancerous shop system gives our Blockland DMs.

[two and a half limericks]

My at most major concern with these kinds of systems is that these players have these weapons permanently. Not saying they should lose them on death, but they should at least lose them on round resets.

i forgot to put this in the thread, this is probably the worst thing about these servers