We’re talking two completely different games here. Capture the Flag is NOT Hide and Seek. Its a game where you have to get the most captures before the other team. In a game like this that’s centered around fighting for the other flag and actively doing stuff, suddenly being forced to stay at your base waiting and hoping you don’t get cursed and then killed immediately by two people with not much to do feels so awkward, and it ruins the flow of the game. And if you do get cursed and no ones there to protect you, there’s nothing you can do. You won’t be able to fight them off, and you’ll lose your flag. I just don’t see how that’s balanced at all.
Again, let’s look at CubeCraft CTF as an example of a version of CTF without this feature. In this version, despite not having a feature that stalls gameplay, you can’t just run in and get the flag without fighting since there is a pickup delay. You need to find a way to fend off the people defending the flag, then run away with it and capture it. That to me is way more balanced than what Hive has.
I’d say if anything, Hive encourages you to run away without fighting more than CubeCraft since the flag pickup is instant and there are routes you can use that have launchpads to quickly get to your base. Not just that, but whenever a stalemate happens, blockspam tends to happen way more often whenever someone tries to kill the other team’s flag carrier without being killed by people behind them. It also often happens whenever someone trying to kill you while you have the flag gets confronted by your teammates. I agree that its annoying to deal with, but the more we try to draw out matches with features like this, the more its gonna happen, and the less fun to play it becomes.
I do agree that curse isn’t balanced, but thats a whole separate post.
CTF might be a game you don’t like, and thats fine as everyone has their preferences.
Personally what I do when I have their flag and someone on their team has my flag is I run back and return the flag and grab it again before they can score. Granted, if noone on my team is chasing the guy with our flag that strat gets harder, but for the most part it works and breaks stalemates.
Not being able to cap ur flag unless ur flag is returned is a mechanic in CTF that I would miss if it was gone. I prefer Hive CTF to cubecraft CTF, and this is one of the reasons why. If you wanna play cubecraft CTF just play cubecraft CTF, let Hive CTF stay good.
Ultimately, what you’re saying is that not being able to capture without your flag there is a bad thing, but this allows for cool plays like grabbing their flag to prevent them scoring or fighting a 1v6 to get your flag back. Its a part of the game and it’s not a bad part (it being bad is personal preference) so I see no reason to change it.
The way I see it, games like this work better when they depend on the players to determine how long a game is, and not the game itself interfearing by having some obstacle (Such as a stalemate) that haults progress. It feels better and more enjoyable to play when its the players in control and not the game.
I guess it allowing for cool plays is a fair point. But still, even if I’m able to do a little bit of cool plays like that in between the stalemates, it rarely ever feels satisfying since I’m just going in with them wanting it to end instead of enjoying it. And like I said earlier, I can enjoy a long match as long as I feel engaged and have fun. But the stalemates in CTF can drag it on for so long that the game becomes exhausting to play. Though I can now kinda understand why you enjoy them, and more power to you for enjoying them. Sometimes those cool plays can be a bit of fun to pull off.
All in all, my reasoning for wanting this to change was because Hive adding their spin on Capture the Flag was something that I was looking forward to ever since I first played it on Lifeboat, then InPvP when they had Tower Wars, and then CubeCraft when they added their Block Wars game selection.
Though I will say at first I did get enjoyment out of Hive’s CTF when I first played it (I gave it a 7/10 in my now deleted arcade review post), and I was impressed with the item shop, upgrades, coin system, and overall polish the game had. However, the more I played it, the more the magic for me started to wear off because of how much the matches dragged, and it only got worse when flag curses were a thing. And tbh, I was a bit disappointed because I wanted to like it, but I just didn’t enjoy it the same way I did with other CTF games.
But I can now see how pushing a change like this would be a bit much for some people who actually enjoy what Hive did with their CTF. So, I guess what I’ll do now is take my votes back on both my post and the original post and just stick to what I enjoy playing.
I’ve made simon says in scratch before, so believe me, that isn’t bad game design.
On a more serious note, I think that with coordination, it’s never just a stalemate. Flag curse makes things a lot easier, and everyone has different coin count.
With communication, you can let everyone know if you see someone, so they can be prepared. CTF is perfectly fine, when you can talk to the people on your team.
Of course you can’t have that if you are playing in public lobbies, but you shouldn’t fundamentally change the game because of that, especially when it is still possible to have fun and be skilled in the public games.
The problem is, most people in this game either don’t chat or don’t read messages, so its kinda hard to communicate unless you’re in a vc party. Also, the flag curse can also work in the other team’s favor and not just yours, and you will barely even stand a chance against the other team if you get it and they start coming for you.
Yeah, looking back now, that was a pretty stupid take from me. Though I still stand by how it feels awkward in this game.
I do just wanna say that I would like this as a cs feature. It would be good for scrims where all the players have similar skill levels. (I don’t do scrims that was just an example.)
This is one of the best sentences I’ve seen on here.
I don’t think this is necessarily a problem, since this is where flag curse mainly comes in. Plus, Hive purposefully made it to where you automatically get the flag, since the game is a fast-paced pvp one. As I said above, flag curse mainly solves this problem, and being able to capture the flag without having to have yours at your base would ruin the gameplay, resulting in less players playing it, ending up killing CTF.
I like that you’re trying to nerf it a little, but this has its own problems. It seems a little underpowered to wait three whole seconds to catch a flag, because the players who have just spawned could hit you out, and even if you do kill them, you have to wait again. And it would be too overpowered with flag curse. It’s just best to keep the current flag-stealing/capturing settings.
Why did you feel the need to bump this even after I already changed my mind on this idea? Also, this suggestion wasn’t even about my skill. It was about the game itself not being fun. Think before you post.
If haven’t read further down, I already stated that I changed my mind on this idea.
This is one of the best sentences I’ve seen on here.