Double Gun Nerf and Pvp

PC tryhards aiming while switching while jumping while eating. I have two thumbs.

Play on console servers then, problem solved.

I honestly think that Rare wants to make this change while at the same time being afraid of doing so and losing a good portion of its players...

Removing the double gun will probably reduce a lot of the toxicity and cheating on the seas, there are players who use double guns and like SOT but there are also players who just like that aspect of combat and PVP... this second type of player is the one who usually brings problems to the game environment, who modifies game files and who doesn't care about any other aspect of the gameplay.

Besides removing the double gun would also reduce the existing distortion in SOT regarding difficulty, Rare makes PVE absolutely easy and friendly to everyone while letting PVP be something hardcore for new players... the sword can be a lethal weapon while also being a slower combat and easy for everyone to learn.

@fysics3037 I didn't say that PVP players in general are problematic, not even those who only like PVP. I said that within the category of people who use DG there is a considerable portion who ONLY LIKE THIS TYPE OF PVP, that is, they don't care about naval, they don't even care about winning, they want TDM... I don't have data to say but it seems pretty obvious to me that most cheaters are precisely in this category of people. They even created games that copied SOT's Double Gun combat for this audience.

I played a lot of Hourglass and saw countless secondary account players who didn't even care about winning the match, they wanted to get on my ship to spawnkill, I NEVER saw a sword player doing that.

@wolfmanbush

The large majority of toxicity in SoT has very little to do with the specifics of combat. It's people losing and winning poorly

It depends on what type of toxicity we are talking about, vocal or text insults are actually present in every category of player, even though this manifests itself mostly in PVP it is something general... however, there are types of toxicity intrinsically linked to PVP such as spawnkill, this usually happens to players who use Double Gun. And within the category of players I mentioned, this type of toxicity is practically unanimous, precisely because these people are not interested in winning, or stealing, or progressing in any aspect of the game, their intention is just to kill using two guns. That's exactly why they use secondary accounts.

I've fought/been camped by tdm style pvpers for years in random adventure. Very very rarely were they toxic encounters. Most of it's chill when people don't turn it into some big deal. Regs in general typically are more invested and aren't looking to catching some sort of ban

If their intention is to simply spawnkill until they get tired, that is already toxicity even without saying a word. Whether in the hourglass or in adventure mode, if they jump on your ship and kill you without even trying to make holes, or if they keep removing your water to continue killing you, that is toxicity in itself.

The question is, if the double gun were removed, would this type of toxicity decrease, I am absolutely convinced that it would. Apart from cheats, which are obviously mostly used by double gun players.

@wolfmanbush
I mentioned some aspects of why removing the double gun is necessary or good, the toxicity I referred to is the spawnkill... you justify that "it's easy to get out of combat" and that in your experience it's not a problem, although I find it a somewhat questionable statement when it comes to the type of players I'm referring to, but I'll assume it's true, it's still something very subjective.

Since you yourself admit that spawnkilling in that scenario is against the rules, it doesn't really matter if you handle it well, it's still toxicity. The point is that this kind of thing comes mostly from double gunners, it's a playstyle intrinsically linked to spawnkilling, so removing it would absolutely decrease it.

But as I said, reducing this behavior is just one aspect that would improve the game.

@fysics3037

tdm is like 1/1000 of the PvP player base. You're talking about the smaller possible number of people. And furthermore, only like 1/3 tdm people are toxic/cheat so even less.

These are very questionable numbers, even an exaggeration. But well, You say that the minority of TDMs are cheaters, ok, let's assume that, even so the vast majority of cheaters are TDMs/double gunners, or do you deny that someone who installs an Aimbot will use doublegun and try to spawnkill? It doesn't matter if cheaters within that class of players(tdm) are the minority if among cheaters the majority are in that class of players.

Therefore, my statement that with the removal of the double gun there would probably be a significant decrease in the use of cheats is true. A good part of them would lose interest in the game without being able to kill quickly with two weapons. A decrease in the number of cheaters leads to a decrease in investment in the creation of such software.

Now, about those numbers:

It's pretty safe to say that a significant portion of PVP players or those who have more than a thousand hours of gameplay use Double Gun, even without precise data I would probably say it's almost half, if it's only in PVP, maybe they're the majority... And among the doubleguns there is a significant portion that does TDM, but even those that don't use this combat to spawnkill (although not in a toxic way but only to sink the ship)

And this gets into the other issue I raised, double gunn is not a friendly combat, it is a play style that clashes with the rest of SOT, PVE is absolutely easy while PVP with the double gun is absurdly challenging. While there may be a level of excellence with the sword, it will always be a slower combat, melee combat is incapable of killing a player as quickly as long-range. It makes no sense with the whole proposal of SOT to maintain hardcore combat based on muscle memory and advanced reflexes, it simply does not fit with the game.

To sum it all up, removing DG results in a considerable decrease in cheating, decrease in spawnkills, adjusts the PVP difficulty level to something that fits into SOT, gives more importance to naval than board/tdm...

@wolfmanbush

Not friendly combat? It's all the same lol.
Pressure is pressure in sot combat. Whether it's naval or deck fighting or island fighting or this or that.

To say that it is to deny the obvious, it makes no sense to say that a style that fights more frenetic, that requires more reflexes and precision is equally accessible to the casual public when compared to a slower combat. And if it demands more reflexes, precision and speed it is automatically less accessible to the general public, and in SOT the tendency is to be friendly to the casual players. This is not even a matter of opinion, it is an objective fact.

So, using DG is not accessible to everyone, it is a faster and more frantic combat, and to address another complementary aspect to this discussion, it has an advantage over sword combat.

With the exception of specific scenarios, such as closed areas and rooms, DG will always have an advantage over sword combat. Many people disagree with this, but it is something quite simple to define: the ability to kill at long/medium range is more advantageous than someone who will only be able to kill at close range or with a surprise dash.

In 1v1 in most cases between players with more or less the same level of hours played and experience in PVP, the double will win.

@fysics3037

They aren't solely responsible for cheating, and even if they were, removing a massive amount of freedom in the sandbox would be the worst way to go about addressing that.

I didn't say that the cheating problem should be solved by removing the double gun, I said that the consequence of removing the double gun is a significant decrease in the use of cheats and alteration of game files. But I put this argument forward as one of several reasons for removal.

Also you seem to say that most 1000+ hour double gunners spawn camp people, regardless of whether or not they enjoy tdm.

Also no, I said that most of those who do this are double gunners, and I use "most" as a conservative term, since it can be said that it is unanimous, the sword's own limitation prevents an effective spawnkill.

There's no "stages of a Sotter" where after 1000 hours we morph into spawn camping cheaters

I mentioned 1000 hours just as a metric to define players who have already acquired some experience in the game, and with that to say that among these players a very considerable portion, perhaps more than half, choose double gun. I used this number just to not mention all players, since among casual players it is practically unanimous to use swords, however they are not significant for the argument since they do not actively participate in PVP.

An argument that a sizable portion (not a majority) of the tdm community are known for toxicity or cheating is fair.

The argument is that among cheaters it is practically unanimous that they all use double gun and do TDM. By ending the double gun, a good part of them would stop playing the game because they would lose interest in combat.

And just to quote my own experience, I only saw 1 cheater using a sword in all these years of SOT, in fact I saw 2 but the first one (2018) was a newbie and didn't know he could equip two weapons, he soon found out and went around killing everyone by piercing objects and killing instantly(the weapon switch was instantaneous). The second one I saw through a video, he was just using a sword for fun, his combat was usually with DG too.

The argument that a majority of top level PvP players that double gun are ruining the game by spawn camping and cheating is ridiculous. There is no evidence or basis that the top level players regularly engage in that

I didn't say that, I said it in the same sense as about cheats, the majority of those who do this kind of thing are TDMs, not that most TDMs do it. Therefore, removing the double gun would reduce this. But again, this is not the main point or the only point for me to support the removal of the double gun, there are just two positive consequences of this change.

And regardless of the actual statistics, it makes absolutely no sense to remove double gunning to address those issues.

It is not for this purpose alone that I support this change... as I said before.

Your point about how it ruins the combat of SoT is also just not right. Like on release and for the entire existence of SoT, double gunning has been available.

That's an interesting point, were you there? Or did you see what it was like? The double gun was released without any kind of balance, it's literally like the developers never tested this style of play.

It was possible to kill a player INSTANTANEOUSLY, without any delay to switch weapons, it was IMPOSSIBLE to win a fight against a DG by hitting kill... Really, it's as if no one had ever tested the possibility of switching between weapons. In the same way that no one seems to have done the flying dash with the sword. So it's kind of flawed to say that combat has always been like this when it seems like it wasn't even intentional... after they started using this combat there were complaints and they blamed the delay on weapon switching.

Another interesting fact, the case I mentioned of the cheater using DG in 2018 was my first contact with this style of combat, it's kind of ironic that it was a cheater...

And having done over 100 levels of hourglass using the sword, it's not even that bad. In fact, it's actually quite good if used properly. You aren't losing matches because they're double gunning and you're using the sword, you're losing matches because you're just generally worse. They could use the sword and still beat you.

Warning, I am not trying to appeal to more experience to justify my arguments.

I've been playing this since 2018, over 10k hours of gameplay, currently level 1450 and 1225 in PVP factions with solo sloop, with 100% achievements... I did all this without using DG, just with sword. My conclusion is this:

DG has a clear advantage over the sword, this is obvious by the very nature of combat (melee vs ranged)

It doesn't mean that it's impossible for a good swordsman to beat an equally good double gun, but the advantage is always at long/medium range... so those who use melee weapons always need to resort to strategies to achieve victory, whether it's taking them to tight spots, using a surprise dash, or bombing. The DG, on the other hand, just needs to jump around, eat and not get close.

There is also a distortion that I didn't mention in the arguments of this topic. It is easier for a player with a lot of FPS experience to do well in SOT combat even without having experience or knowledge in the game, just because of that combat, than someone using a sword in the same period of time of play.

A considerable portion of players who have exceptional aim and easily spawnkill other crews do not know how to play naval, they do not know the game mechanics, they do not have the time to repair/shoot, they are easily sunk, but thanks to DG they have prominence in PVP with board.

@fysics3037

In 1v1 in most cases between players with more or less the same level of hours played and experience in PVP, the double will win.

This isn't true though? I mean you yourself have stated that a casual players has an easier time with the sword due to its simpler slower combat. And that double gunning takes a certain amount of practice or skill beyond that of most casual players. So how does it stand to reason that for casual players without the time in game to become good at double gunning, that the double gunner will win?

A casual player using double gun vs a casual player using sword, I still think DG is more likely to win. But this is not a contradiction with what I stated, since this casual will probably never adapt to hardcore DGs. As for the sword, being slower, even in the hands of someone experienced, it is closer to the casual player than DG.

That margin is not enough to determine who wins a fight for 99% of players. Only at the highest level where any micro mistake is instantly punished would it make a difference.

It's like comparing an individual with a knife and an individual with a revolver 10 meters away, the knife is lethal if it gets close but getting closer is the issue... it's not a literal equivalence, but it illustrates the issue, you can't say that a long-range fight has no advantage over hand-to-hand combat, it doesn't make sense in most cases.

You are simply making misleading or misrepresenting facts to create an argument that holds no weight if you take into account all the facts of the case. SoT should not change it's entire combat system because you want slower more casual fights. It's an FPS game, and there's a wide breath of casual PvE content offered.

I could say that SOT shouldn't keep this combat style just because you like it... See, I said that combat being Hardcore doesn't fit with Rare's trend of making the game friendly for everyone, it doesn't make sense to attract new players with an easy PVE if the next moment they can be facing a PVP at the level of competitive FPSs.

Now, in my opinion, with everything I see Rare doing and from conversations I've had with several players, and some statements from streamers, Rare only tolerates this type of combat out of fear of repercussions or loss of audience, unfortunately these players tend to be very loud in their criticism, I can't give a specific example because of the NDA, but you can be sure that it's not just my wish.

@fysics3037

What are the other reasons for removal?

• It will reduce cheating
• It will decrease spawnkill (toxic, not to win or sink)
• It will balance the combat to a more casual level, moving towards what the rest of the game is.
• It will prevent people from getting ahead in PVP because they have skills in other FPS games, making learning in this area more organic.
• It will reduce the emphasis on the board and prioritize the naval (although it is subjective, in my opinion a game about piracy should focus on this)

You say that double gunning might not have been intentional with your only evidence to back it up being the glitchy state of the game on launch. I mean was Season 7 intentional? What about Season 8? What about any number of updates that have brought glitches and bugs to the game.

The issue was not a glitch, not even an exploit, this was released without anyone realizing that it would be possible to hitkill using two shots, it is something so basic to realize that the only reasonable conclusion is that it was not intentional.

When CSGO pros moved to Valorant and easily became pros there, was it a failure of Valorant's dev team? NO!

These are two competitive FPS games, it is expected and normal that players who have previous skill in games of the same category do well in others, what is not normal is a game with horizontal progression where everyone should be equal in principle, differing only in their level of knowledge about the game, having a good advantage in combat due to a characteristic that does not involve learning how to play.

Cheating, specifically macros, spiked significantly after the removal of QS.

This is pretty obvious, these players want to use the double gun while continuing to take advantage of the exploit that has always been present in this type of combat. That's why I'm proposing to remove it altogether and not nerf it.

I also doubt that cheaters would continue to play once the gameplay stops being interesting... even so, it is certain that the number of these people would decrease.

So you think that a casual with 2 guns is more dangerous than a casual with a sword, despite you also thinking that a casual will find more comfort and success with a sword compared to 2 guns. Glad we didn't have any contradictions there

What is the contradiction with everything I said? He will probably beat someone of the same level of experience as him because of the advantage of long-range combat. As I said, hitting shots is not something exclusive to SOT, when dealing with two casual players it is quite reasonable that he kills the opponent before the other even gets close.

At the same time, this casual player with DG will never reach the level of an experienced player who uses this same combat style... while the one who uses a sword, even if he has not become a "sword lord", will still have a smaller gap separating them in the ability to beat an experienced opponent precisely because the combat style is slower and easier to become good at.

Also you have clearly never shot a revolver because hitting a target from 10m away with one is pretty dang difficult.
...
Also the game is specifically designed to be fair, unlike real life. In real life, the sword does not let you fling yourself across a boat or across the sea a stupidly far distance...

I said it wasn't an example with literal equivalence, it was just to illustrate the advantage of long range when your enemy can only kill you at close range.

The flying dash can be cancelled by damage, has a delay before it actually hits someone and if it misses you are still paralyzed, and worse, the damage is only 65%... it is the attack with the highest degree of miss punishment in the entire game. This is the only attack that can raise the sword to a medium range level to match the advantage of firearms.

There is no balance in this, denying the advantage of long distance makes no sense at all.

Also in 99% of scenarios this game does not require playing on the level of competitive fps player and in less than 99% of scenarios it does not play like a competitive fps. The whole idea of the "top 1%" is that they are 1% therefore the likelihood of encountering one is 1% and the likelihood of 2 meeting each other is 1% twice

I didn't refer to the top 1% or make reference to a professional skill level, I classify the combat itself as hardcore, more frenetic depending on each person's skill level, but an average/good/experienced/top player in any of these degrees is already a level equivalent to any competitive FPS like COD, BF, Valorant, CS...

And at the end of the day it isn't about what Rare wants, it's about what the players want. Because yeah, people would quit. And also we're in a feedback forum where Rare tries to collect data on the desires of the player base. So it's even less about what Rare wants, really it's about what we, the players, want. So I'm just going to dismiss that point.

That's not true, the will of both has a weight in the decision... The entire audience can ask for a crossover, a new mechanic or anything else, it will only be done if it is convenient for Rare. If they decide that removing aspects of PVP or changing them will be positive for their strategy for the game, that's what will happen.

Well, I've said it all, I'll stop here because I don't intend to stay in this discussion forever.