Stronghold rant...

[Hitchhiker 42]

Just to address a few points from my point of view:

Originally Posted by Briansmithtown

The game play was kinda boring, too. Everyone was mainly going for the one task, drive over the defenses.

Sure, the early stages of the game became boring: driving over defenses, again and again. But, from what I saw, there was plenty of peril and heart-pounding moments: "Will they get to the batter?" or "Can they finish off the CDF?" It's these moments that make the game good. And, as the game progressed into DCMPs and CMP, more and more robots were shooting, defending, etc.

Originally Posted by Briansmithtown

Cool at first, boring 90 matches later.

Isn't every game after you've watched it over and over again?

Originally Posted by Briansmithtown

There wasn't that much defense, either. Besides the obvious field defense, robots didn't pay too much attention of defense. The goal had too many obstacles, and it basically forced many of the robots to do the same thing.

I would tend to disagree. Sure, in qualifications there was not much defense, due to the extra RPs for what you do (not what you stop your opponent from doing). But, when the alliances got really good, defense became a big factor. I think it was 1405 on Einstein that had shut-down defense, leading them to finals. That was exciting to watch.

Anyway, these are my opinions.

[Briansmithtown]

I respect your feedback, and thank you for commenting.

[Sperkowsky]

Out of the 3 games I have watched in person its ranked 2.

1. 2014
2. 2016
3. 2015

My gripes of 2016
The outer works provided too much protection
climbing should have been worth more
the reffing was terrible (I saw soo many bad calls this year more then usual) not due always to bad refs but too many game aspects for them to handle.
not enough defense
the field was too cluttered
the defenses were boring

Overall it was fun to play and watch imo but was not as interesting as 2014 after a few weeks of the season.

[Briansmithtown]

Originally Posted by Sperkowsky

Out of the 3 games I have watched in person its ranked 2.

1. 2014
2. 2016
3. 2015

My gripes of 2016
The outer works provided too much protection
climbing should have been worth more
the reffing was terrible
not enough defense
the field was too cluttered
the defenses were boring

Overall it was fun to play and watch imo but was not as interesting as 2014 after a few weeks of the season.

I agree. This game wasn't the worst, but its not nearly the best. Also i had a hard time really trying to keep up with what was going on. I would watch a robot go over a defense and hope it was about to do a cool play, only to turn around and go back to the middle.

[Knufire]

This is also one of my favorite games that I've competed in (since 2010). Not as good as 2013, but it's a tossup between this and Rebound Rumble for #2.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Sperkowsky

My gripes of 2016
The outer works provided too much protection
climbing should have been worth more
the reffing was terrible
not enough defense
the field was too cluttered
the defenses were boring

You should know what happens when you make the gripe I've bolded...

If you're out in SoCal in late September, I think I've got a ref shirt with your name on it. Otherwise, I suspect any local offseasons that are short on ref-power would be more than happy to put you on the crew. I assume that you know the game at least as well as the refs do in order to make that statement.


That being said, I did see some "odd" calls. Whether or not that means the reffing is "terrible" is up to the viewer, I suppose.

[Sperkowsky]

Originally Posted by EricH

You should know what happens when you make the gripe I've bolded...

If you're out in SoCal in late September, I think I've got a ref shirt with your name on it. Otherwise, I suspect any local offseasons that are short on ref-power would be more than happy to put you on the crew. I assume that you know the game at least as well as the refs do in order to make that statement.


That being said, I did see some "odd" calls. Whether or not that means the reffing is "terrible" is up to the viewer, I suppose.

already signed up to be a ref at a few offseason comps.

I have no problem becoming a zebra if it means teams have a better experience.

[Briansmithtown]

Originally Posted by EricH

You should know what happens when you make the gripe I've bolded...

If you're out in SoCal in late September, I think I've got a ref shirt with your name on it. Otherwise, I suspect any local offseasons that are short on ref-power would be more than happy to put you on the crew. I assume that you know the game at least as well as the refs do in order to make that statement.


That being said, I did see some "odd" calls. Whether or not that means the reffing is "terrible" is up to the viewer, I suppose.

Oohohohoh shots fired by Eric! Nice!

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Briansmithtown

Oohohohoh shots fired by Eric! Nice!

And ably deflected, I might add. Seeing as how he's already volunteering, there isn't much I can say further. Must have read my mind.

[Briansmithtown]

Originally Posted by EricH

And ably deflected, I might add. Seeing as how he's already volunteering, there isn't much I can say further. Must have read my mind.

I think he took your metaphoric ref tee-shirt. ~groovy~

[CalTran]

I suppose if we're all airing grievances, next year please don't make me look at both sides of the score board if I'm curious about one alliance. (I'm looking at you, Red-defenses-breached-on-the-Blue-side-of-the-board. -.-)

[emeraldstorm]

Originally Posted by CalTran

I suppose if we're all airing grievances, next year please don't make me look at both sides of the score board if I'm curious about one alliance. (I'm looking at you, Red-defenses-breached-on-the-Blue-side-of-the-board. -.-)

This! I hated how one moment I'm checking the status of one team's tower, and have to take a double take for counting, and am now 2-3 seconds behind in scores for the match.

I'm guessing the blue/red tower thing would be obvious to a quantity of people out there, but with so much going on at once, it would be nice to have the simplest, most straightforward scoreboard layout.

[VacioArconte]

Opinions will vary on how fun Stronghold was to watch, and how hard it was to ref, and so forth. But the fact remains that the GDC made a game that less experienced teams could still compete in. A drivebase alone could score 20+ points this year. Much better than last year where a drivebase could maybe spend the whole match carefully pushing a tote over to the scoring platform.

[kyle_hamblett]

Stronghold was definitely a great transition from Recycle Rush. I see this game as having a fairly low skill floor where rookie teams/low resource teams can still help their alliance out, with the skill ceiling being extremely high and allowing for some of the most entertaining matches at the highest level of play. While the theming of it was a little cheesy, it was a fun game.

[cj3958]

Originally Posted by EricH

You should know what happens when you make the gripe I've bolded...

If you're out in SoCal in late September, I think I've got a ref shirt with your name on it. Otherwise, I suspect any local offseasons that are short on ref-power would be more than happy to put you on the crew. I assume that you know the game at least as well as the refs do in order to make that statement.


That being said, I did see some "odd" calls. Whether or not that means the reffing is "terrible" is up to the viewer, I suppose.

Can we please stop this "you can't blame the ref" culture. I know they have an impossible task and it is very hard to make every call right, but there are definitely times where people can say that the refs screwed up and made a lot of bad calls. That isn't to say they aren't trying, or they weren't prepared, but it is to say that the refs are not as good as would be expected of a normal sport. The GDC can design games that are easier to ref or require more training etc. to fix this problem. Also, some people are not in the position to just "get up and grab a ref shirt", for example they may be actually competing, or have a day job. Just because someone criticizes a group as a whole doesn't mean they can do better themselves. I can't play professional football but I sure as hell can say that U of M's kicker screwed up on the last play of the game vs. MSU and tried to kick the ball instead of falling on it leading to a MSU win on the last play of the game.

Please stop allowing anyone to even have a discussion about the quality of reffing, because it clearly needs to be talked about.