Flea

Just went online today and there were no games and no servers. Looks like it's dead Jim. If it officially dies, I wonder if Ilfonic will release the source code ...

I'm waiting for player hostable dedicated servers. The closest Illfonic servers are ping>240 away from me. It's ok, we are used to being forgotten on this side of the world, but if we can host our own server (NOTE that I don't give a rats about hosting ranked servers), then we will have an 'always on' server to send new recruits to.
Second, max 8 players is probably not enough in the long term. Short term OK, if we can get a dedi quickly, but long term I think you would want to be able to have AT LEAST 12 player slots.
Last, spectator mode needs to have 'ghosting' of players. Competitive tournaments are a non-starter without that.

Here is my sig: "You've been lasered by Flea."

The melee has a chargeup actually. A long one, at that. It's also pretty weak, outside of having bizarrely long range for a melee attack.
Also, it's a starting weapon, so you don't want to get spawncamped because everyone's camping weapon spawns and you can't even do any damage because some people think it's more fair that after dying, you should be left completely and totally helpless. The shotgun is already weak at any range, unless you can get in a melee hit.
If anything, they should just significantly widen the spread, but I'm guessing too many profags would rage that it's "spammy" and "too easy" because you don't have to aim much to get in an easy 2-12 damage or so at range. That would significantly reduce it's appeal, as short-range only weapons are always at a disadvantage, while still making it competent if you can catch someone off-guard, and unless you're super critical health, a shotty isn't going to do much at medium or long range.

I prefer that the Nexuiz/Xonotic shotgun was more like the Quake shotgun, devastating at very close range, but only a fleabite at any other range.
Classic Nexuiz spawn was broken, not sure if it has been fixed in Xonotic, but spawn frags are much harder if you spawn with a weapon that had some punch to it, not too much, but some. For example if you have a battle and get fragged, but you take the enemy down to their last 10 health, you should be able to respawn and finish them off with the starting weapon. That forces the other player to go around the map and re-stack giving you a chance to pick up a better weapon. If the spawn weapon cannot finish off a 10H enemy, then you just get spawn fragged over and over again.

That's the thing I really hate about the Xonotic SG secondary. The original triple shotgun was quite a good defense against spawn camping, but the melee is useless because an enemy fully weaponed up will kill you in literally 2 seconds before you get anywhere near them for the melee shot.

I'm glad you enjoyed Sirlin's book.  The man really knows what he's talking about, and you can apply most of his philosophies to other game genres, not just fighting games.  All that stuff about scrubs is right on the nose, and I've heard the rants from scrubs in every competitive game.  And usually the more competitive the game is, the louder the whining.  Often times, the very techniques they whine about are the techniques that separate the casual players from the hardcore players.  However, it's important to not dismiss every complaint a whining, as some game are simply broken.

I'm curious about the change to the Rail Gun from Q3 to Quake Live from 100dmg to 80. Id do not make weapon balance changes lightly, so the arguments from scrubs and pros alike must have raged before that decision was made. It's true that a good railer can be devastating when you spawn with 100 health, but the rail gun has a long reload time, and changing the RG damage has highlighted just how devastating the Lightning Gun is. The funny thing is that the LG was always devastating, and probably relatively overpowered, but it's use was kept in check by the Rail Gun (LG is a hard weapon to use 'on the move', so using it makes you more vulnerable to rail). When I was still playing Quake Live, especially in Clan Arena, it was constant LG whoring in T3 down. T4 and above not so much, but it is strange how a change to one weapon's balance can have such a large 'butterfly effect' on the other weapons and even the game play in general.
The big advantage that commercial studios with deep pockets have over open source projects is that they can thoroughly test the weapon balance on large numbers of people to tweak the balance before releasing. In open source games,releasing a bad weapon balance can cause a mass exodus from the game that is very hard to recover from. On the other hand, open source projects, if responsive to feedback, can release new versions much faster than commercial studios, and have a potential advantage in that respect, if they are able discern majority opinion from 'squeaky wheel' aristocracy.

Anyway, it's been a fun debate, but I think we are gonna need to agree to disagree at this point.  I honestly can't argue about pre Nexuiz 2.5.1 vs Xonotic because I didn't play it.  I only know that I thoroughly enjoy Xonotic and I hope others might give it a fair chance.  If they don't enjoy it, well that's ok.

I'm happy to agree to disagree. If you enjoy Xonotic, I wish you all the best. I can't really look at the game with 'fresh eyes' the way someone like yourself can. I find Xonotic too much like Nexuiz to be considered a truly new addition to the genre, but too different to the old Nexuiz to really have the depth needed for broad appeal. Time however, will tell. I am sure the game will go through many iterations and enhancements before it reaches 1.0. It may even become a great FPS game with depth, specialisation and broad appeal at that point. If it is, I will play it, and I will convince others to do so. Right now though, it's not for me (or anyone else in my part of the world apparently).

The link you posted earlier (Sirlin) was very interesting. A couple of sections in the book resonated. One was the section on 'the scrub' (http://www.sirlin.ne...ates-guide.html) and the other was on 'What should be banned?' (http://www.sirlin.ne...-be-banned.html).

Both of these chapters describe EXACTLY what happened in classic Nexuiz. Constant whining from Nex Jedis along the lines of "Oh, the Crylink is just spam. The mortar is too powerful. The laser does too much damage, too much push. I was killed with a spammy weapon by some noob. wah wah wah cry cry cry moan moan moan".

According to Sirlin, the game is the game, the weapon is the weapon, the moves are the moves. If you start nerfing weapons, changing physics, because some people specialise in 'spammy weapons' or 'cheap moves', you are removing depth from the game and making it shallow.

I think it's funny that you say Xonotic is too hard for new players because many Nexuiz players have complained that some things, like nerfing the laser and making fast movement easier, lowered the skill ceiling.

I think it's ironic you find that funny. Making fast movement easier is exactly the kind of shallowness that started back in 2.5.1 There used to be players that specialised ONLY in movement. Yes they could frag, but their real skills were in movement and fast flag capture. This is exactly the kind of thing that scrubs like FruitieX complained about. It's WHY the laser was nerfed. So the Nex Jedis didn't have to worry about learning movement, just press forward and spacebar.

In other words, Nexuiz used to have specialisation, and in that regard, it had a depth that went beyond most FPS arena games. That specialisation was rendered moot, and the game became shallow. Now Xonotic is the ultimate triumph of shallowness.

Sorry, but I have to agree with everyone else then if you complained that the game is not noob friendly enough.

I loled.

Also, about the statement you made, "I think that has more to do with who is playing than the game itself".  Are you suggesting that the game is imbalanced because some players are extremely good at it?  Is this something you actually consider to be a problem?

No, I am suggesting that the game has been changed to suit a certain type of game style and eliminate every one else from the game. Hence my comment about confirmation bias and group-think that you seem to have missed. I base this conclusion on the players who remain and the players who left. Not just noobs, but some very highly skilled players. Whole clans have disappeared.

I'm actually surprised that you played classic Nexuiz, given your statements about Xonotic being too hard.  Xonotic is hard for new players, but then so is UT and Q3.  That's how arena FPS are.  If the game was designed for instant gratification, it would just be too casual for me.

I've played all the games you mention above and more.(UT99/2003,Q1,2,3/QL,Nexuiz,Assault Cube,Urban Terror++) and have enjoyed them all. In fact, I have been playing video games since 1980. I played the original Space Invaders, Galaga, Asteroids, Battle Zone and Defender in the arcades. I don't know much about games, but I know what I like.