PUG Crate Changes

[Xeon Wraith]

Hey guys.
Following on from the recent PUG poll on crates, we’re going to be adjusting the availability and values of the crates in the PUGs. We’re focusing on toning down the randomness and snowball effect, but still keeping some of the crates that produce interesting gameplay.

Here’s the changes we’re going with currently and the reasons why:

 

REMOVED:
Nuke crates
Occasionally hilarious, but often devastating in a competitive environment. This crate punishes everyone nearby a crate and offers no meaningful counterplay against it. Telling players to not pick up crates works for rushes that last for a minute or two, but not for battles on field that last the majority of the game. It’s far too punishing for something random.

We still want to discourage picking up crates mid-rush though, so we’re shifting the responsibility over to the Radar Scan crate. 

BlazingYoshi died for this.

Vanilla Renegade X vehicle crates
Not to be confused with the Tiberian sun or Classic vehicle crates. This crate is far too random in what it provides and has too big of an impact when a player lucks into higher tier vehicles. A losing field can easily snowball into a solid baselock with a lucky Flame tank or Mammoth tank crate. Worse, it doesn’t actually provide any new gameplay and only clutters comms with “Who got out of their vehicle?!”.

 

Epic character crates
While not as impactful as some of the other crates being removed, epic characters are still quite difficult to kill. Combined with strong infantry players who are usually also hard to kill, this crate becomes a bit too strong in maintaining consistent infantry or anti-tank presence. 

 

ADJUSTMENTS:
LOW-IMPACT CRATES (60%)
These are the majority of the crates. They’ll provide a small personal bonus. As they’re low impact, we’ve spread the percentages out evenly. All of these are available at the start except for the Money crate, which becomes available after 5 minutes. This is to prevent immediate APC rushes.

 

• Speed upgrade crates : 10%, available immediately.
• Damage resistance crates : 10%, available immediately.
• Weapon crates : 10%, available immediately.
• Veterancy crates: 10%, available immediately.
• Refill crate : 10%, available immediately.
• Money crate : 10%, available after 5 minutes.

 

HIGH-IMPACT CRATES (15%)
These are the more powerful crates in the selection. These’ll provide a team benefit, either in the form of economy or field control. All of these crates are available after 10 minutes.

Classic vehicle crate (7%), available after 10 minutes.
This crate can either give the Recon bike or Bradley light tank. As they’re generally weaker than the Tiberian sun vehicles and aren’t as impactful as the super money crate, the percentage of getting this crate is a bit higher.

 

Super money crate (5%), available after 10 minutes.
This crate can provide a very large economic benefit, sometimes exceeding 8000 credits with top rolls. This in combination with a dedicated banker in the team can result in considerable additional infantry or vehicle presence. Still, there are quite a few times where additional credits don’t do anything. This is particularly true for winning teams and makes for a good anti-snowball crate. As a result, we’re keeping this crate’s probability higher than the Tiberian sun vehicle crate.

 

Tiberian sun vehicle crate (3%), available after 10 minutes.
All Tiberian sun vehicles are quite strong, as they possess good firepower combined with exceptional speed or range. Even the Wolverine can do good anti-infantry work when used in a supporting role. Due to the strength and consistency of this crate, this is the rarest crate in the selection.

 

MIXED CRATES (10%)
Sometimes good, sometimes bad. Depends on what you already have. All of these crates are available after 10 minutes. Spy crate would go here once when it’s readded.

Random character crate (5%), available after 10 minutes.
This changes your character to a random paid character, excluding Hotwires and Technicians. This crate is pretty inconsistent in what it offers. Sometimes it adds a sniper menace to the game. Other times it’s a quick trip back to the purchase terminal. We’re keeping this crate’s percentage intentionally low as a result.

Spy crates (5%), available after 10 minutes.

This changes your character to a random enemy character, excluding Hotwires, Technicians and SBH. Unlike the random character crate, you can also get free infantry as well. This crate is also super inconsistent with what it provides, but it can make for some interesting strategic plays if used well.

 

NEGATIVE CRATES (15%)
These are the bad crates and your incentive to let someone else pick up the crates.

Radar scan crate (12%), available after 5 minutes.
This crate doesn’t harm players directly, but it does give intel to the enemy. Intel can be a powerful tool, especially when used by players with good game sense. Of course, if no enemy uses the intel, then this crate does nothing.

This is a particularly good crate for countering snowballs in PUGs as the winning team tends to pick up crates the most. This provides more intel to the losing team and potentially provides opportunities to exploit.

This crate has been restricted to after 5 minutes so early game rushes are not affected.

 

Abduction crate (3%), available after 10 minutes.
A simple death crate to make up the remaining percentage.

 

BUILDING DEATH INCREASES
We’re using the same percentage increases to crates on building death as before the changes. The only change is that they’ll get applied to our new crate values. This is:

•  If Power Plant dies:
  • Money crate weight increased by 2%.
  • Super money crate weight increased by 100%.
• If Refinery dies:
  • Money crate weight increased by 109%.
  • Super money crate weight increased by 300%.
• If Barracks / Hand of Nod dies:
  • Random character crate weight increased by 150%.
• If Weapons Factory / Airstrip dies:
  • Classic vehicle crate weight increased by 150%.
  • Tiberium sun vehicle crate weight increased by 100%.

INCREASES OVER TIME

Same values as vanilla. This also works to provide more strategic options in the later phases of the game. This is:

• Spy crate weight increases by 10% for every minute after 20 minutes. Capped at 200%.

 

DISCLAIMER
Crates use “weights” internally to determine the likelihood of getting a particular crate. This means an increase for a particular crate’s weight doesn’t quite result in the same increase for their chance of appearing and also decreases the chance of other crates appearing.

If you’ve got any concerns or suggestions, throw a post down below or let us know on Discord.

[NodSaibot]

9 hours ago, Xeon Wraith said:

We’d like to hopefully get a mutator in future to specifically disable SBH spies. We’ll readd this crate when that happens.

Sent some code in that will be in the next patch, adds a boolean option to enable or disable stealth spies within the crate settings. It could be fashioned into a mutator if you don't want to wait for the next patch, whenever that is. I'm sure one of the devs would be more than happy to provide, as the code is already written for it.

[rm5248]

11 hours ago, Xeon Wraith said:

Spy crates (For now!)

 

We don’t have any issues with this crate except with SBH spies. They’re extremely difficult to kill, very easy to sneak with and provides a massive strategic advantage to a team, even if they’re just being used for intel. It’s a far too impactful for a competitive environment, despite the rest of the crate being fine.

We’d like to hopefully get a mutator in future to specifically disable SBH spies. We’ll readd this crate when that happens.

 

Here's a thought on SBH spy crates: what if they're a very low percentage of the character you could get(<2%), unless GDI has lost at least two buildings, in which case it becomes equally common with all the other spy crates?

 

This is probably rather complicated to do though, and I'm not sure it would really have any impact on the game.

[NodSaibot]

25 minutes ago, rm5248 said:

 

Here's a thought on SBH spy crates: what if they're a very low percentage of the character you could get(<2%), unless GDI has lost at least two buildings, in which case it becomes equally common with all the other spy crates?

 

This is probably rather complicated to do though, and I'm not sure it would really have any impact on the game.

In terms of code, it's pretty easy. But rather or not it adds a layer of complication that's necessary or intuitive, is up to personal discretion.

[bred]

7 hours ago, rm5248 said:

 

Here's a thought on SBH spy crates: what if they're a very low percentage of the character you could get(<2%), unless GDI has lost at least two buildings, in which case it becomes equally common with all the other spy crates?

 

This is probably rather complicated to do though, and I'm not sure it would really have any impact on the game.

The goal is to restrict RNG deciding a win or a loss in a PUG. It tends to ruin its competitive setting, which is why we removed it, as we've had people who just sit in the enemy base for 40+ minutes only giving intel and ruining every rush. While it doesn't work as effectively in a public game, it ends up being a game-changer in PUGs

 

SIDE NOTE : These crate changes only apply to the Weekly Pick-Up Games on Saturday and Sunday. Normal public game crate rotation is the same.

[limsup]

On 6/12/2021 at 5:58 PM, Xeon Wraith said:

Tiberium sun

 

[Xeon Wraith]

Heads up, we've updated the crate chances following the new spy crate settings:

Spy crates : Reintroduced at 5% chance after 10 minutes. SBH spies disabled.

Scrin crate : Reduced from 8% to 3% chance.