Please stop letting the Director spawn Specials right behind you with NO WARNING

#1

This is absolutely ridiculous. Here’s a scenario that just happened literally five minutes ago.

Three of our teammates were downed, with our Bardin running along coming to pick us up. The rest of us were providing feedback on where things were coming and trying to help him out while he battled to come get us.

He was doing fine until literally a packrat spawned behind a box he had just passed and hooked him with NO WARNING AT ALL. There was literally nothing he could have done about it, it appeared instantly behind him, ran out and hooked him, all in the span of .5 seconds.

This was on Champion difficulty. Fix this, if we’re comparing to a superior game, Left for Dead, this never ever happened in that game because they spawned Specials with enough time to find and kill them instead of this cheating AI. Fix your AI director please!

Thanks for listening.

25 Likes
70 urgent changes this game needs. Reasoning included
#2

That is when I stopped reading.

10 Likes
#3

Well you read my entire post, so it doesn’t matter, mission accomplished.

4 Likes
#4

Yeah, read it and I don’t agree to be honest.

Being the last standing should be scary and most of the cases kill you (if you play on high difficulty).

Sometimes you are lucky and get to revive, sometimes you are going to be f’d.

1 Like
#5

I totally agree with you and think that Left 4 Dead’s design is far superior to what Fatshark has done in this game. It’s not even just specials, you can get groups of rats spawning right next to you and then they’re able to instantly attack you right after spawning. It’s stupid.

It’s especially bad during horde or boss attacks when you can’t hear any audio cues AT ALL.

6 Likes
#6

Hmm.

See, there’s a thing called “not being fair”. The AI Director in 98% of the games is being completely idiotic and unfair.

A video game should not just outright kill you because it wants to or is programmed incorrectly. You should have every ability to go and revive your teammates by playing well (this is called skill). Not by some arbitrary algorithm that says “you die now for no reason”.

And thank you, TripSin, I have also seen enemies pop into existence right in front of me, and attack me without me being able to react in the slightest. They pop in and attack (with their INSANE REACH btw.) I have never seen this happen in Left for Dead.

8 Likes
#7

It’s okay if your effed because you missed a shot or didn’t react fast enough. What ins’t fair is a gutter runner spawning directly on your head,with no sound cues and literally no time to react. You can’t do anything about it and it just sucks.

Hell,I had STORMVERMIN PATROLS spawn directly in front of me, where they triggered and hit me right as they spawned. This has nothing to do with skill or luck,it’s just extremely broken mechanics.

13 Likes
#8

anyway, here’s proof from my own recording of the game where it happened. https://clips.twitch.tv/PerfectFairWebBlargNaut

He had absolutely no time to react whatsoever to the packrat behind him. Nobody even knew about it until it ran directly up behind him and snagged him, even if we caught it there was no time for him to spin around and shoot it (which probably would not have stopped the animation of the hookrat hooking him because this game does not let you stun Specials, again, like Left for Dead does) or even dodge to avoid the hook. It’s complete BS.

5 Likes
#9

Sneaky spawning like that is not ok.
But you can dodge sideways to avoid hooks, gutter runner pounce and leech attack.

#10

Its known since beta that special sounds are next to unhearable in a fight (! its incredible easy to hear gutters or hooks clonk-clonk when you arent fighting), or that you cant hear lesser enemies at all, unbelievable annoying when you hack at them, move over a presumably dead body, but the Nurgle guy with only one arm decides he isnt, but instead of body blocking you when he fell to the ground, you can pass him and is now hitting you in the back.

IF the dodge animation doesnt sperg out or IF you dont lag - in my opinion block, aimed directly in a straight line at them, not facing away from the special, should also stop a hookrats and runners attempt to get you.
But as long as specials dont even FLINCH when you hit them with a strong attack and STILL do their animations, its not worth discussing over this - and yes they SHOULD flinch if you are able to be so fast to hit the hookrat with a strong attack before he grabs you.

1 Like
#11

Agreed, a well timed push or strong attack should be able to interrupt.
Can you push-interrupt gutter runners midair? Would be cool.

#12

While I’ve not played L4D except for two measly hours, and I think everyone is entitled to an opinion in even more severe matters than ranking of games, making that comparison just invites needlessly angry people. Hyperboles like 98% don’t help much.

Anyway, there is nothing fundamentally wrong with the AI director itself, but areas where spawn occur should not be within visual range and instabounces and instant hooks should not be a thing. Luckily those are rare, at least from what I’ve seen, and judging from that clip that hooker had to walk at least several seconds, which is good enough for me as that gives a fighting change even if there wouldn’t have been 3 other people watching out for him. While hook rats do not cause characters to call them out unless in visual range, which is different from every other type of special, they still do make noise.

3 Likes
#13

Can you push-interrupt gutter runners midair? Would be cool.

Not sure if it was client lag causing it, but I did it an hour or so ago. I also think I saw j_sat do it on one of his recent youtube clips while hosting.

2 Likes
#14

I gotta try this, I always try do side-dodge if I don´t have time to use ranged.

#15

It requires some stupidly well timed pushing if it is a thing at all.

#16

I’ve pushed a leaping gutter runner once, it was more of an accidental thing though.

But that’s irrelevant in this case because the game sometimes does NOT GIVE YOU TIME TO REACT.

This is not fun, it’s not interactive, it doesn’t allow you to outskill the enemy, it’s not smart design. You didn’t see this happen in L4D, except maybe in versus mode where humans control the specials spawning - but even then there were restrictions on how close and where you could spawn.

#17

Yes, there are cases where game does not give you time to react and they should be looked at, but those are far rarer than what this thread seems to suggest.

And before people start beating around the bush without even realizing there is a bush, real question here seems to be what is the acceptable time to give for the players to react in. I’d say around a second, but as I don’t count time while playing, my assessment of my own usual reaction time might be a bit off. And then again, using me as a basis for design hasn’t won any awards yet, for some reason.

#18

Yes this is an issue. I believe in the idea that no matter the situation, if played absolutely perfectly, a player should be able to succeed.

Another circumstance springs to mind in that the Leachers will teleport on top of you, dealing damage through block instantly, even if you kill them before they make their grab.

#19

I think that happens only when team is too clumped up. Not sure though.

#20

Yeah left4dead was a terrible and shameless cash grab by Valve. XD