Inspired by an item timing script from Quake, I decided to see if it was possible to create a similar script in Team Fortress 2.
This script tells the user and their team the fastest possible time the enemy team can get uber/kritz from a user-supplied time. Basically, this means you can know when they definitely don't have uber, allowing you to know how much time you have left to pick the medic before he can uber.
I had intentionally wrote this as a medic-only thing, figuring that they had the most time to monitor enemy medic spawns, but I found myself doing it as other classes so I made it a general thing.
Here's the readme while I wait for jaeger to upload it.
<README>
Author: Lopert
Special Thanks -----------------------------------------... klown, whom I know through QuakeLive, and who gave me his config and item timing script.
Jaeger, for hosting this on his awesome website.
Objective -----------------------------------------... Inspired by an item timing script from Quake, I decided to see if it was possible to create a similar script in Team Fortress 2. This script allows you to easily calculate the fastest possible time the enemy team can have their uber / kritz charge ready.
Installation -----------------------------------------... Follow these steps.
1. Extract the .cfg files from the archive to your Steam\steamapps\<your account>\team fortress 2\tf\cfg folder.
2. Add the lines from the ADD_THESE_TO_AUTOEXEC.cfg config file to your personal autoexec.cfg, this will bind your numpad keys to the required aliases. You can delete "ADD_THESE_TO_AUTOEXEC.cfg" once the lines have been added.
Usage -----------------------------------------... 1. Press the NUMPAD_PLUS key to prepare the number keys, this tells the script that you wish to time uber/kritz. (More "items" may be added later, such as timing jarate, etc. I felt the only real important thing to time at this point was the medic's charge)
2. When the enemy medic spawns (you can see this by holding the scoreboard open), make a note of the current time, and enter the seconds on the NUMPAD. Ex: If the enemy medic spawns at 8:46, enter 46 on the NUMPAD.
3. This will send a team message with times stating what the fastest possible time the enemy medic can get uber/kritz. Ex: Entering +46 will generate "say_team Enemy Uber @ :06 - Kritz @ :16"
</README>
Any questions / comments can go in this thread. If you find a bug let me know and I'll fix it, but it should be fine as I've been using it for awhile myself now. :D
<FAQ + ADDITIONAL NOTES>
I'm getting the impression that some people believe this to be "automatic" in the fullest sense of the word. A snippet from another of my posts
QUOTE:Once again, I emphasize the script does NOTHING automatically, it requires teams to be actively paying attention to another very important detail I feel is often missed. Even with the script, I don't catch it and print it 100% of the time, as I am often busy doing other things.
Won't this destroy "mindgames"?
QUOTE:Mindgames only work if your opponent isn't already timing you. I can tell you of numerous times where I timed enemy medics and laughed when they bluffed ~25seconds and proceeded to stomp them. Once again, I emphasize the script does NOTHING automatically, it requires teams to be actively paying attention to another very important detail I feel is often missed. Even with the script, I don 't catch it and print it 100% of the time, as I am often busy doing other things.
With uber, I often fake when I am 75% charged (30 seconds is 75% of 40 seconds :D), even if you are timing me with this script, there are still a few possibilities: I could have kritz, I could have 75% uber, or I could have nothing. With kritz, I often conceal when charged, and fake 10 seconds later, making the possibilites: I have uber, I have kritz, I have nothing.
Not really, the timing script just tells you what is possible, if they charge perfectly. Most of the time teams will charge uber slower than this but you can still fake your uber at the perfect timing. Although you can call bs if they call charge before its possible.
I see your point, but anyone half decent would know that if you fake uber after being only being up for 10 seconds, etc.
If you fake uber 40 seconds after you respawn, you might have it, you might not. They'll know that that's the time to have it, but have to either assume you charged all the way and had it, or you didn't and hope you were faking.
For example, you could fake at exactly 32 seconds after respawn, and they would assume you have crits, and back off, giving you the extra 8 seconds you need to charge the actual uber, then you can conceal it and suprise them, etc.
agreed with TheFragile, at some point you just have to learn to play the game as it was supplied to you. Some modifications and simple scripts are obviously ok to use, but at some point it's just too much. All I can say is, learn to play the game effectively without addons like this (and there are surely more to come) and you will be much better off.
#5 dunno why you'd fake uber after 10 seconds, expecting them to fall for it :p.
regardless, it takes strategy out of the sense that you can either be super sure they don't have uber with the script, or reasonably/somewhat sure they do/don't have uber (without the script). i know scripts are all nice to have, but it may mean bad business in terms of keeping things interesting.
also, i know for a fact everyone has fallen for what they thought to be a fake uber, when it was a real uber call. this keeps things very interesting, because medics can definitely ward off incoming rushes with a reasonably timed fake uber, all to the point where the other team hesitates and decides to just wait for a pick rather than rushing in. to have this possibly crushed by saying "omg, i heard them call for uber, but my nifty uber timer says that's 8 seconds too fast! quick guys! let's rush in and get the medic" compared to "hmm, they actually might have it."
to have that kind of interesting strategy taken away is kinda silly.
#8 The biggest thing that messes it up is when a point is captured, because the timer will usually reset to 10 minutes. A possible work around would be to use remaining map time, but that's really impractical as I doubt everyone would run around with the scoreboard on to see it.
Looks like a fairly pain-in-the-neck script to read, but from the looks of it (and your docs), all this does is send a team message with <arg> + 30sec and +40sec, and most of the lines are dedicated to making the numpad thing work.
I'm not really seeing the huge competitive advantage of this, since if you're watching for a medic spawn already you can just do the mental math (adding multiples of ten, so hard) and broadcast it over mumble.
Ugh, this really hampers mindgames in general and puts training wheels on all everyone to give them the easy way out. Knowing what % charge the opposing medic is from your own timing in your head has always been an acquired skill that certain medics honed to near perfection. This just throws all of that in the garbage and holds your hand through everything.
Seriously, these kind of mindgames you can master and now it's like just giving everyone and their brother the keys to the city.
It's just a pity to see something that you put time/effort into perfecting into it's own art form now being semi-stripped of the skill it took. Sure.. I guess there will still be faking uber/mind games, but it's far from the same.
Mind games can still be had, it will just separate the men from the boys. Handicaps are good, as the SH*TTY teams will depend on them and better players will learn to capitalize off the assumptions they will be making using this silly script.
Its things like this which will further separate top tiered teams from those under them. Using code to make up for their lack of experience/skill.
Yet, since this exists, and you should all play to win, better get used to it as baddies are gunna be alllll over it.
I'm not sure exactly what the negative comments in this thread so far--especially #6 and #15--are getting at. It sounds like they're saying, or at least implying, that there's something morally wrong with using this script or that Lopert did something wrong when he made it. What does it actually mean to say something like "at some point it's just too much" or "this just throws all of that [skill] in the garbage"?
It sounds like those comments are trying to imply that players should not use this script because it's morally wrong to do so, and that it's morally wrong because it sucks some of the skill from the game. Even if we assume this script would in fact make the game less skill-based over all, it doesn't follow that either its creator or the players who would want to use it are are wrong and bad.
In any competitive game, each player is going to be looking for ways to do as well as possible while remaining within the rules of the game. It's the nature of competition. If this script helps people win while remaining within the rules of the game, why would they have some kind of obligation to avoid it? I'm sure most people would agree that playing engi takes less skill than playing scout, soldier, or demo, but no one raises their arms in outrage when teams run engineers on gpit defense. If it's effective and not against the rules, a truly competitive team should use it. I feel the same way about the complaints about FaN-users: sure, you can complain that the gun was a poor addition to the game, but now that it's here (and not banned in leagues), you can't seriously complain if someone uses it to gain a competitive advantage. In this analogy, the choice to use the FaN (or to run an engi) is like the choice to design or use a script like this one. Valve's choice to add the FaN in the first place (or to include engis) and the leagues' choice to keep it (or engis) unbanned is analogous to the way Valve left the tools to make a script like this one unlocked and the leagues have left them unbanned. Given all that, the decision to make or use a script like this one, assuming it does provide an advantage, isn't morally wrong--it's just smart.
Whether this actually does provide an advantage is a separate question I'm not trying to answer. But if it does, everything I wrote above applies perfectly; if it doesn't, there's even less reason to complain about it. And I'm also not trying to argue that scripts like this one should not be banned, if that's what people want. A ban is a separate issue, and that's fine. But as long as it's unbanned and useful, complaining that someone might want to use it makes no sense whatsoever.
Automating/completely destroying 90% of the mindgames =/= separating the men from the boys.
You don't understand, it's not like I can "mindgame harder" or "more accurately" to counter someone using this script. This isn't like a pistol script, or anything like that situation like you described. Mind games are just that, subjective tricks you play on the other team. Having some timer destroy 90% of mindgames available for both teams really is going to make things stale.
#18 using an engineer is a selection of strategy. using a timing script literally gives you a complete advantage over not using the script. I'm not sure how that analogy worked, but not running an engineer is sometimes necessary for, again, the selection of strategy.
and no one said (or seemed to imply) that it's morally wrong to run the script. I'll personally say that I'd probably be a bit disappointed in anyone that used the script, just for the fact that it takes strategy out of the game. Keeping this game as strategically open as reasonably possible is ideal (as it would be in any game). A timing script, especially for something important as uber, only narrows it down. Again, scripts are usually bad business for people that refuse to play the game in its entirety, more or less.
Right. Like I said, I'm not arguing that against the idea that this script hurts TF2 by removing some of the skill. That's fine. What I'm saying is that even things that remove some skill and hurt the game aren't "bad" for a player to do. If they're bad for the game, the leagues or Valve itself should remove them. But, assuming they do provide an advantage, competitive players should use them until they're banned.
#21 well it's difficult to defend the script for not being banned yet, compared to some other weapons that are/aren't banned, simply for the fact that this script was released 3 hours ago.
#22 I'm not really "defending the script," if that means saying it's a good thing because it's not banned yet. That would be silly, I agree. But I'm not really concerned with whether it's a good thing or not--whether it harms or helps TF2 as a whole. It's more like I'm saying that even if this script is a "bad thing," there's nothing wrong with players choosing to use it for as long as it remains unbanned (assuming it ever is).
luv you lopert, but i've always been against scripts that take away any type of skill/strategy away from the game. play the game like it's meant to be played.
This thread reminds me of people on steampowered who bawww about autoreload and autoheal scripts for medic. "TOO LAZY TO HIT YOUR R KEY TO RELOAD?" "THIS SCRIPT ENABLES BAD PEOPLE TO BE BETTER."
It was already possible to do mental arithmetic when watching the enemy medic spawn, this just allows you to get a machine to do the math for you. To be honest I find the mental computational method far less cumbersome, as there are times when I don't want to be stuck using my right hand to punch stuff in using the numpad. Plus, if one of my teammates uses this script, am I really going to look at the team chat and check it against the game clock every time I hear "I am fully charged"?
All in all, I don't see this script drastically altering gameplay. I can see it raising awareness for timings in general, though. I'm usually not very cognizant of enemy ubercharge other than in the general "we have it, they don't" sense, but I might get in the habit of watching the scoreboard for times. The script itself isn't particularly useful, but this discussion might make some people smarter/better players. And I think that's a good thing.
lol @ DL(#13), if this was the math you were doing at 5th grade.... <stops himself> Did you have to go out to a trailer outside of the school for math class? I don't think Jeff Foxworthy is going to be calling on you anytime soon. (just playin, DL=)
To be fair, I'm surprised by the negative reception of this.
#11 That is correct, the actual math part is not hard, and I originally thought of writing a script that just printed out whatever number you typed on your numpad, but discovered I could just move the chat messages around to make it even easier to use. The only reason it is "so complicated" is because I wrote it with the objective of being extensible, so if new "items' come into the game, integrating them into the script will be relatively easy.
#25 has it spot on.
This script does absolutely nothing without user input. His bind does the exact same thing my script does, just without the math. I say again, it is not "Automatic" as some people seem to believe. There are no hooks in this that detect when the enemy medic spawns. You must make the conscious effort of watching for enemy medic spawns, and then entering the time.
I used to do this all the time in my head before I wrote this script, and the only issue I was running into was how to tell my teammates this information. Sometimes I would type it out as they were busy fighting and I had noticed it while I was respawning, and found this to be very effective, because they could read it when they had time, and could make better decisions based off their own knowledge, instead of me being like "Go now, you have 4 seconds to kill him".
If you aren't doing this already (watching for enemy medic spawn times, then doing -40 / -30), then all this script will do is add a layer of understanding to your game. If you're "pro" and haven't been doing this, well, I'm not sure what to say.
Mindgames only work if your opponent isn't already timing you. I can tell you of numerous times where I timed enemy medics and laughed when they bluffed ~25seconds and proceeded to stomp them. Once again, I emphasize the script does NOTHING automatically, it requires teams to be actively paying attention to another very important detail I feel is often missed. Even with the script, I don 't catch it and print it 100% of the time, as I am often busy doing other things.
With uber, I often fake when I am 75% charged (30 seconds is 75% of 40 seconds :D), even if you are timing me with this script, there are still a few possibilities: I could have kritz, I could have 75% uber, or I could have nothing. With kritz, I often conceal when charged, and fake 10 seconds later, making the possibilites: I have uber, I have kritz, I have nothing.
All in all, it comes down to choice. I could argue that auto-heal "removes skill" from the medic class as it completely eliminates reaction time when it comes to catching someone falling or just outside the range of your medigun. Some people use it, some people don't. No one is forcing you to use it.
I wrote this to see if it was possible, and in the end it came out as a success. I could have kept it to myself, allowing no one (or a select few) to have the knowledge ("advantage" some will say) I discovered, but I'd rather have it out there, and have people realize the important of timing, instead of hiding it like particle sploitz (lol glowing stickies).
The complaining in this thread seems to be mostly coming from "career" medics who believe that some sort of holy power has infused them with a special ability to play "mind games" with people.
1: If anyone making calls on a real team doesn't already do this using, as DL pointed out, simple 5th grade math they're dumb
2: Quake has had item timing scripts forever and it hasn't destroyed the mind games of using red armor or mega as a lure.
3: If you really believe this is a big reduction in the skill set of a medic your really really overthinking the power of the medic to solely produce "mind games."
tl;dr
In this thread "career" medics try to defend the fact they only play medic.
This script didn't do anything that I didn't do already when I played. I don't know of many medics that didn't take note of when their counterpart died/respawned to know how much % (roughly) that they had on them.
As for 'mind games', I'll agree with lopert. Since faking uber and concealing became more widespread amongst all levels of medics it became more important to time this. Personally, I just always assumed the fast rate for the enemy, giving them the benefit of the doubt and due dilligence. If you kept those in mind and were able to subtract you could entirely know if that call you heard was bullshit or not.
The 'mind game' basically boils down to do they have kritz or uber, which is basically the point of faking now, which lasts about as long as your medic isn't in the general view of anyone.
The only thing this script does, is make it easier for lower level teams that were either ignorant of timing or people that are really bad at math. In reality all it has done is spark a discussion and make teams more aware of the importance of timing the enemy medic.
Meh. The hate for this thing is kind of amusing. This only helps people who can't do math in their heads (and otherwise over-complicates things, IMO), and only hurts people who fake way before they could possibly have uber anyway.
Not to put down Lopert's incredibly clever scripting, but it'd almost be easier to keep a kitchen/egg timer on your desk that you wind to 40 seconds when the Med spawns.
why are people acting like it's hard to tell what the other meds uber is at? just remember the last time both meds died, look at your meds % and it will be extremely easy to tell what the other is at.
#39 yeah, that's what most good medics do (compare percents when the other medic spawns, or vice versa, etc). however, it's a timing script. yeah, you could look at the clock (which is perfectly fine, by the way). but to have a script so it's one less thing you need to worry about is what bothers me.
#34 I can't remember if it was CPL or ESWC that banned timing scripts in quake 3 after one year czm used it, but that's the thing. obviously no one thought it was a crime to time stuff via looking at the clock when you use it/pick it up in any game, but to have an actual script to do the math/notice for you is when it gets to the point that you're just being way too lazy / taking strategy out. by that i mean, learn to multi-task.
also, if the people that are saying "omg it's only 5th grade math so it's okay to use it," that's a terrible argument. if something was seriously that easy, then why is it so necessary to have a script for it?
i'm not sure what the argument of an auto-heal script was either (in a previous post), considering if you're talking about a script that mouse1's all day, then you'll constantly heal the wrong targets, and if you have a script that you only need to click once to constantly heal someone, the Steam version of the script is really bad/buggy, and any other version is probably better, but not nearly as versatile just manually clicking. however, there's no negative/con to using this timing script. none at all.
All the script does is add a visual text to what you should already be doing. Hell, if you have been playing TF2 for a while you don't even really need to look at the specific time. Know when the medic came up and you can pretty much do the timing in your head even if you didn't look at the clock. It's not doing anything automatic it's just making things more clear so you don't have to interrupt calls to say "They are going to have uber in 5 seconds".
Faking uber hasn't had a noticable effect on the game in months, except maybe bluffing you have crits or maybe holding off a push for a short second while the other team relays that it was in fact a fake and to keep moving. Both of those can still be done with this script being used anyways.
There are also a lot more timings to keep track of at one time in quake, making it an actual test of skill. In TF2 the ubercharge is all there is to time, so this doesn't really make the game any easier in that respect unless you are pretty bad to begin with.
i just asked torbull/ehfk what was going to happen with it in ESEA. they said it's banned, but that goes for all scripts too (that give an advantage/screw with hitboxes). but regardless, they specifically said this script is banned.
I support Lopert in this, because he needs all the help he can get in scrims and is too poor to hire someone to assist him. Seriously this script is just replacing with a computer what you could do by hiring an asian boy to stand behind you with a stopwatch
This doesn't really give you any greater of an advantage over the enemy than a medic script that says "I USED UBER" when you right click. In fact I am going to go ahead and say that the text indication of the exact time you popped uber is far more helpful to your teammates overall. In both cases you can easily call what the script did, but one is exact (popped uber script) and the other is fairly inaccurate (this script). I don't care if this is banned or not, I'm not going to waste my time using it, but I think you are overreacting a bit.
ok maybe im an idiot but hows this different than say an alarm that you have where everytime you hit it, it counts down from 30 seconds? people who complain about these kinds of things are the same idiots who think we should all use 75 fov for the sake of fairness
Fragile it's not a timing script. It's a simple arithmetic script.
With a simple bind, you can currently do this:
QUOTE:"bind KEY say_team They will have uber in 40 seconds or kritz in 30 seconds.
The script does this:
QUOTE:"bind KEY say_team They will have uber at the x-40 second mark or kritz at the x-30 second mark."
That's it. It does no timing for you, does not announce when it actually happens, and does not automatically start for you when the enemy dies. It does not provide an advantage other than that it does mental math. You still have to remember to use it, and you still have to remember the time it says for when the enemy actually gets it. This has zero impact on real strategy.
In fact, if a point is captured, the script has a decent chance of causing your team to get the time wrong if you forget to recalculate it yourself.
You honestly get more advantage using an egg timer than this script gives. Banning it is just silly.
!-- Begin comScore Tag -->
Medic Charge Timer Script
http://www.mikemarcin.com/gaming/team-for..
</DOWNLOAD LINK>
Inspired by an item timing script from Quake, I decided to see if it was possible to create a similar script in Team Fortress 2.
This script tells the user and their team the fastest possible time the enemy team can get uber/kritz from a user-supplied time. Basically, this means you can know when they definitely don't have uber, allowing you to know how much time you have left to pick the medic before he can uber.
I had intentionally wrote this as a medic-only thing, figuring that they had the most time to monitor enemy medic spawns, but I found myself doing it as other classes so I made it a general thing.
Here's the readme while I wait for jaeger to upload it.
<README>
Author: Lopert
Special Thanks
-----------------------------------------...
klown, whom I know through QuakeLive, and who gave me his
config and item timing script.
Jaeger, for hosting this on his awesome website.
Objective
-----------------------------------------...
Inspired by an item timing script from Quake,
I decided to see if it was possible to create a similar
script in Team Fortress 2. This script allows you to easily
calculate the fastest possible time the enemy team can have
their uber / kritz charge ready.
Installation
-----------------------------------------...
Follow these steps.
1. Extract the .cfg files from the archive to your
Steam\steamapps\<your account>\team fortress 2\tf\cfg
folder.
2. Add the lines from the
ADD_THESE_TO_AUTOEXEC.cfg
config file to your personal autoexec.cfg,
this will bind your numpad keys to the required aliases.
You can delete "ADD_THESE_TO_AUTOEXEC.cfg" once the lines
have been added.
Usage
-----------------------------------------...
1. Press the NUMPAD_PLUS key to prepare the number keys, this
tells the script that you wish to time uber/kritz. (More
"items" may be added later, such as timing jarate, etc. I
felt the only real important thing to time at this point
was the medic's charge)
2. When the enemy medic spawns (you can see this by holding
the scoreboard open), make a note of the current time,
and enter the seconds on the NUMPAD.
Ex: If the enemy medic spawns at 8:46, enter 46 on the
NUMPAD.
3. This will send a team message with times stating what the
fastest possible time the enemy medic can get uber/kritz.
Ex: Entering +46 will generate
"say_team Enemy Uber @ :06 - Kritz @ :16"
</README>
Any questions / comments can go in this thread. If you find a bug let me know and I'll fix it, but it should be fine as I've been using it for awhile myself now. :D
<FAQ + ADDITIONAL NOTES>
I'm getting the impression that some people believe this to be "automatic" in the fullest sense of the word. A snippet from another of my posts
Won't this destroy "mindgames"?
</FAQ + ADDITIONAL NOTES>
If you fake uber 40 seconds after you respawn, you might have it, you might not. They'll know that that's the time to have it, but have to either assume you charged all the way and had it, or you didn't and hope you were faking.
For example, you could fake at exactly 32 seconds after respawn, and they would assume you have crits, and back off, giving you the extra 8 seconds you need to charge the actual uber, then you can conceal it and suprise them, etc.
Mind games remain! :D
regardless, it takes strategy out of the sense that you can either be super sure they don't have uber with the script, or reasonably/somewhat sure they do/don't have uber (without the script). i know scripts are all nice to have, but it may mean bad business in terms of keeping things interesting.
to have that kind of interesting strategy taken away is kinda silly.
I'm not really seeing the huge competitive advantage of this, since if you're watching for a medic spawn already you can just do the mental math (adding multiples of ten, so hard) and broadcast it over mumble.
Seriously, these kind of mindgames you can master and now it's like just giving everyone and their brother the keys to the city.
It's just a pity to see something that you put time/effort into perfecting into it's own art form now being semi-stripped of the skill it took. Sure.. I guess there will still be faking uber/mind games, but it's far from the same.
Its things like this which will further separate top tiered teams from those under them. Using code to make up for their lack of experience/skill.
Yet, since this exists, and you should all play to win, better get used to it as baddies are gunna be alllll over it.
It sounds like those comments are trying to imply that players should not use this script because it's morally wrong to do so, and that it's morally wrong because it sucks some of the skill from the game. Even if we assume this script would in fact make the game less skill-based over all, it doesn't follow that either its creator or the players who would want to use it are are wrong and bad.
In any competitive game, each player is going to be looking for ways to do as well as possible while remaining within the rules of the game. It's the nature of competition. If this script helps people win while remaining within the rules of the game, why would they have some kind of obligation to avoid it? I'm sure most people would agree that playing engi takes less skill than playing scout, soldier, or demo, but no one raises their arms in outrage when teams run engineers on gpit defense. If it's effective and not against the rules, a truly competitive team should use it. I feel the same way about the complaints about FaN-users: sure, you can complain that the gun was a poor addition to the game, but now that it's here (and not banned in leagues), you can't seriously complain if someone uses it to gain a competitive advantage. In this analogy, the choice to use the FaN (or to run an engi) is like the choice to design or use a script like this one. Valve's choice to add the FaN in the first place (or to include engis) and the leagues' choice to keep it (or engis) unbanned is analogous to the way Valve left the tools to make a script like this one unlocked and the leagues have left them unbanned. Given all that, the decision to make or use a script like this one, assuming it does provide an advantage, isn't morally wrong--it's just smart.
Whether this actually does provide an advantage is a separate question I'm not trying to answer. But if it does, everything I wrote above applies perfectly; if it doesn't, there's even less reason to complain about it. And I'm also not trying to argue that scripts like this one should not be banned, if that's what people want. A ban is a separate issue, and that's fine. But as long as it's unbanned and useful, complaining that someone might want to use it makes no sense whatsoever.
You don't understand, it's not like I can "mindgame harder" or "more accurately" to counter someone using this script. This isn't like a pistol script, or anything like that situation like you described. Mind games are just that, subjective tricks you play on the other team. Having some timer destroy 90% of mindgames available for both teams really is going to make things stale.
There are just some things you don't automate.
and no one said (or seemed to imply) that it's morally wrong to run the script. I'll personally say that I'd probably be a bit disappointed in anyone that used the script, just for the fact that it takes strategy out of the game. Keeping this game as strategically open as reasonably possible is ideal (as it would be in any game). A timing script, especially for something important as uber, only narrows it down. Again, scripts are usually bad business for people that refuse to play the game in its entirety, more or less.
this should not be allowed anywhere
If I bound the following:
"bind mouse4 say_team They will have uber in 40 seconds or kritz in 30 seconds."
That would have the exact same effect as the script except for the automatic subtraction only.
Is that really so bad?
#1 youre an enabler
It'd be much easier to just do the math yourself than try to play with your numpad in the middle of a game.
It was already possible to do mental arithmetic when watching the enemy medic spawn, this just allows you to get a machine to do the math for you. To be honest I find the mental computational method far less cumbersome, as there are times when I don't want to be stuck using my right hand to punch stuff in using the numpad. Plus, if one of my teammates uses this script, am I really going to look at the team chat and check it against the game clock every time I hear "I am fully charged"?
All in all, I don't see this script drastically altering gameplay. I can see it raising awareness for timings in general, though. I'm usually not very cognizant of enemy ubercharge other than in the general "we have it, they don't" sense, but I might get in the habit of watching the scoreboard for times. The script itself isn't particularly useful, but this discussion might make some people smarter/better players. And I think that's a good thing.
#11 That is correct, the actual math part is not hard, and I originally thought of writing a script that just printed out whatever number you typed on your numpad, but discovered I could just move the chat messages around to make it even easier to use. The only reason it is "so complicated" is because I wrote it with the objective of being extensible, so if new "items' come into the game, integrating them into the script will be relatively easy.
#25 has it spot on.
This script does absolutely nothing without user input. His bind does the exact same thing my script does, just without the math. I say again, it is not "Automatic" as some people seem to believe. There are no hooks in this that detect when the enemy medic spawns. You must make the conscious effort of watching for enemy medic spawns, and then entering the time.
I used to do this all the time in my head before I wrote this script, and the only issue I was running into was how to tell my teammates this information. Sometimes I would type it out as they were busy fighting and I had noticed it while I was respawning, and found this to be very effective, because they could read it when they had time, and could make better decisions based off their own knowledge, instead of me being like "Go now, you have 4 seconds to kill him".
If you aren't doing this already (watching for enemy medic spawn times, then doing -40 / -30), then all this script will do is add a layer of understanding to your game. If you're "pro" and haven't been doing this, well, I'm not sure what to say.
Mindgames only work if your opponent isn't already timing you. I can tell you of numerous times where I timed enemy medics and laughed when they bluffed ~25seconds and proceeded to stomp them. Once again, I emphasize the script does NOTHING automatically, it requires teams to be actively paying attention to another very important detail I feel is often missed. Even with the script, I don 't catch it and print it 100% of the time, as I am often busy doing other things.
With uber, I often fake when I am 75% charged (30 seconds is 75% of 40 seconds :D), even if you are timing me with this script, there are still a few possibilities: I could have kritz, I could have 75% uber, or I could have nothing. With kritz, I often conceal when charged, and fake 10 seconds later, making the possibilites: I have uber, I have kritz, I have nothing.
All in all, it comes down to choice. I could argue that auto-heal "removes skill" from the medic class as it completely eliminates reaction time when it comes to catching someone falling or just outside the range of your medigun. Some people use it, some people don't. No one is forcing you to use it.
I wrote this to see if it was possible, and in the end it came out as a success. I could have kept it to myself, allowing no one (or a select few) to have the knowledge ("advantage" some will say) I discovered, but I'd rather have it out there, and have people realize the important of timing, instead of hiding it like particle sploitz (lol glowing stickies).
1: If anyone making calls on a real team doesn't already do this using, as DL pointed out, simple 5th grade math they're dumb
2: Quake has had item timing scripts forever and it hasn't destroyed the mind games of using red armor or mega as a lure.
3: If you really believe this is a big reduction in the skill set of a medic your really really overthinking the power of the medic to solely produce "mind games."
tl;dr
In this thread "career" medics try to defend the fact they only play medic.
Good script lopear.
As for 'mind games', I'll agree with lopert. Since faking uber and concealing became more widespread amongst all levels of medics it became more important to time this. Personally, I just always assumed the fast rate for the enemy, giving them the benefit of the doubt and due dilligence. If you kept those in mind and were able to subtract you could entirely know if that call you heard was bullshit or not.
The 'mind game' basically boils down to do they have kritz or uber, which is basically the point of faking now, which lasts about as long as your medic isn't in the general view of anyone.
The only thing this script does, is make it easier for lower level teams that were either ignorant of timing or people that are really bad at math. In reality all it has done is spark a discussion and make teams more aware of the importance of timing the enemy medic.
Not to put down Lopert's incredibly clever scripting, but it'd almost be easier to keep a kitchen/egg timer on your desk that you wind to 40 seconds when the Med spawns.
well put!
takes a rocket scientist to do this.
#34 I can't remember if it was CPL or ESWC that banned timing scripts in quake 3 after one year czm used it, but that's the thing. obviously no one thought it was a crime to time stuff via looking at the clock when you use it/pick it up in any game, but to have an actual script to do the math/notice for you is when it gets to the point that you're just being way too lazy / taking strategy out. by that i mean, learn to multi-task.
also, if the people that are saying "omg it's only 5th grade math so it's okay to use it," that's a terrible argument. if something was seriously that easy, then why is it so necessary to have a script for it?
i'm not sure what the argument of an auto-heal script was either (in a previous post), considering if you're talking about a script that mouse1's all day, then you'll constantly heal the wrong targets, and if you have a script that you only need to click once to constantly heal someone, the Steam version of the script is really bad/buggy, and any other version is probably better, but not nearly as versatile just manually clicking. however, there's no negative/con to using this timing script. none at all.
Faking uber hasn't had a noticable effect on the game in months, except maybe bluffing you have crits or maybe holding off a push for a short second while the other team relays that it was in fact a fake and to keep moving. Both of those can still be done with this script being used anyways.
There are also a lot more timings to keep track of at one time in quake, making it an actual test of skill. In TF2 the ubercharge is all there is to time, so this doesn't really make the game any easier in that respect unless you are pretty bad to begin with.
edit: http://esportsea.com/index.php?s=content&..
-esea
Looking forwards to the scrim where the enemy Medic gets picked because he took his hands off WASD to type my spawn into the numpad.
....but hey, maybe base 6 his hard for some people.
With a simple bind, you can currently do this:
The script does this:
That's it. It does no timing for you, does not announce when it actually happens, and does not automatically start for you when the enemy dies. It does not provide an advantage other than that it does mental math. You still have to remember to use it, and you still have to remember the time it says for when the enemy actually gets it. This has zero impact on real strategy.
In fact, if a point is captured, the script has a decent chance of causing your team to get the time wrong if you forget to recalculate it yourself.
You honestly get more advantage using an egg timer than this script gives. Banning it is just silly.
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