Halo 3: ODST Forum
This topic has moved here: Poll [20 votes]: Should ODST also bring with its release a new skill system for Halo 3?
  • Poll [20 votes]: Should ODST also bring with its release a new skill system for Halo 3?
Subject: Should there be a new skill system with the launch of ODST?
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Poll: Should ODST also bring with its release a new skill system for Halo 3?  [closed]
Yes. It could do with some major improvement.:  40%
(8 Votes)
Yes. It could do with some improvement.:  25%
(5 Votes)
Yes. It could do with some minor improvement.:  10%
(2 Votes)
No. Simple is better, even if it can be unfair.:  10%
(2 Votes)
No. It's perfect as it is.:  15%
(3 Votes)
Total Votes: 20

Halo multiplayer is okay, but I find I can't stand playing ranked for more than a few games at a time. Why? The so-called "skill" statistic. It is the single most unnecessarily frustrating statistic ever invented, as it's about as accurate an estimate of a player's actual skill as throwing custard over a wall and counting the lumps.

Seriously, I played six team games today, and in five of them I got lumped with a team of idiots who didn't seem in the least bit interested in actually playing the game-type (CTF) and just wandered about getting themselves killed.
In two of those games I got a capture, and in the others I at least got a few grabs (one of which made it to within 2m of the base at which point my team happily let the enemy reclaim it as I only tried to get it).

Yet because of those games I lost a skill point, even though in all of them I had the highest K/D ratio of my team, and was the most useful overall on my team (two of them I got MVP!).

I think Bungie should seriously reconsider how the skill stat is measured; they have a wealth of information to go by, so why does it suck so badly? I think in general the scoring could do with being tweaked, so that you get points per match, and these are used to determine the top X players, and thus the skill they accumulate, with a bonus for the winning team.

For example, in a CTF game you might get:
- 1 point per kill.
- 25 points for a capture (split between all people that carried the flag before it was captured).
- 10 points for a carrier kill.
- 5 points for a flag-return (adjusted depending how long you're on the flag for).

In a 10 player game, these would be calculated, first place would get 60% of the reward for that match, 2nd would get 50%, 3rd 40%, 4th 30%, and 5th 20%. The winning team will then get a 40% bonus, so you will only get the full reward (experience and skill) by being the most useful player, and winning. This way, a player who easily did the most in the game, can get more than a winning player who does very little.

It's just to give the basic idea, and it shouldn't be too complicated for players to understand if the points you got for each column in the after-game stats is shown, and what the top scores were.

As it stands now the skill system is pathetically simplistic, and overly frustrating. Even on lone-wolves if you get joint 3rd you get nothing if you have one more death or whatever than the other guy, or in really close-fought battles where there's only one or two points separating last-place from first.
It's a bit embarrassing really if you compare it to the much better scoring system from the Myth metaserver, which takes into account damage-inflicted, time on objectives etc., in addition to captures/kills/whatever, and that was a game made by Bungie!

  • 07.05.2009 3:04 PM PDT

i have played 26 games in a row with winning, without ranking up...

it needs MAJOR improvment

  • 07.05.2009 3:32 PM PDT

not with the launch but it need improvement. it needs to be harder to get a 50. way to many people who have 50s dont deserve them at all and people who do deserve them dont have them. then i hate when i win games and dont rank up i have actually won games and ranked down and no i didnt have -30 k/d i actully had +20 k/d with 6 land grabs mvp and ranked down to 24 when i was 25. (back during RBTB)

  • 07.05.2009 3:36 PM PDT
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Halo 3 Forum Mah Friend

  • 07.05.2009 3:39 PM PDT
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Yes, there should be a new skill system because after losing say 15 matches in a gametype from there it will take atleast 5 wins to go up a rank. Right now, on my xbox live account i can't rank up in any ranked playlist

  • 07.05.2009 8:06 PM PDT

Posted by: will 146
i have played 26 games in a row with winning, without ranking up...

it needs MAJOR improvment


Sure you have...

Why does everyone assume that Bungie is still adding entirely new game features into ODST? It is 3 months from release. The game is done.

  • 07.05.2009 8:39 PM PDT

Charge...BACKWARDS!

Wow, sorry to be mean, but..where's the "There is NO multiplayer/player vs player in ODST, so they cant even launch a new skill system"

For that fact.. This is the wrong forum.

  • 07.05.2009 8:49 PM PDT
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Posted by: Kyro Thanatos
Wow, sorry to be mean, but..where's the "There is NO multiplayer/player vs player in ODST, so they cant even launch a new skill system"

For that fact.. This is the wrong forum.

And where does this information come from? All other information available (from reliable sources) points out that ODST's second disk will allow players to play regular Halo 3 multiplayer with all the map-packs bundled along with 3 new ones, plus presumably some custom game-modes with ODST health/weapons, and hopefully a new ODST character model (with female variant please! The gender selection in Halo 3 is pointless).

My point in posting here is that the launch of ODST is the perfect time to launch a simultaneous patch for Halo 3 (so Halo 3 players can see ODST characters, but not play as them), and also do a game-type/skill reset and introduce new rules. I don't mind so much if comes later, but on release makes a lot of sense.

What are the rules regarding cross-posting btw? I'll post a thread linking to this one in the Halo 3 forum if it's allowed.

  • 07.06.2009 4:24 AM PDT

If you would like to hear the list of the ways technologies have failed to make life easier, press 3

what i reckon would be good....

xp, aquiring and losing


killing gets you xp

dieing takes your xp

scoring objectives gets you xp

losing objectives takes your xp

betraying rapes your xp


except have the amount of gaining to losing a bit higher

like a 3:4 or 1:2 ratio

e.g: getting a kill gets you 20xp, getting killed takes 10 or 15 xp (depending on the chosen ratio)

  • 07.06.2009 4:58 AM PDT
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Well, I think it depends a lot on the game-type in question. For example, a good player in a slayer match gets lots of kills, but would be penalised for getting too many deaths. So, the scoring in that case might be based on the top X players for their kill/death spread, with a bonus for players who won, for example, in a six-player free-for-all, you would get 60% for top K/D ratio, 40% for 2nd K/D ratio, and 20% for 3rd K/D ratio, plus 40% for finishing 1st (top kills), 30% for second, and 20% for third. So to get 100% of the game reward you'd have to get most kills and get the best K/D ratio, i.e - be the best overall player, not just the top scorer.

In this way, a player who does not get a top-three number of kills, but plays well will get some reward, even if it's not great. Additionally in such games, if the spread of kills between 1st and last (ignoring players who drop), is low then the rewards may extend to all positions (even last), and the overall reward would be reduced, since everyone killed pretty much equally, but (most likely) the top player just got lucky by finding targets more easily or so towards the end.

I won't bother try putting that into an actual formula or anything, but hopefully you get the idea. Skill/reward would become based on how well you did related to other players, but also count how well performed in stats other than the scoring statistic. I also haven't noted negative results (skill-loss). I'm unsure regarding it being easier to gain skill than lose it, as otherwise anyone could probably slowly creep up to 50, whereas ideally you'd eventually find a middle-ground where you're playing against people your level.

On a somewhat unrelated note; why do we have the experience stat in social? All it does is make games that are supposed to be purely casual into another formed of ranked/competitive game. I mean, sure you should still try and win in social, but there should be no perceived penalty for not winning, which players will hurriedly point to if your exp stat is low compared to total games played.

  • 07.06.2009 10:02 AM PDT