It would take me probably less than a minute. This change would totally ruin the tactics in dmm4 maps like end. It would also negatively affect hitting flick shots with rl, because at least I rely on the pitch limit when I shoot fast rockets up and/or down.

its been fine for 20years?

Just let them do their thing man. Bring an argument, not nostalgia

How is asking you for a demo a "thought experiment"? You explained yourself poorly, and then when I pointed that out you called me a dipshit and a cunt.



This thing about flick shots sounds like what vb is saying, I think..?
So what I'm curious about is whether people could re-learn those flick shots with the new extra-wide pitch limits. Maybe it's too hard? How would we know without trying, though?

Let's a do a thought experiment after all: What if the pitch limits had been set to something really horrible like {+30, -30}, and left for over a decade? Would we be defending them right now?


Really high-level posting. Thank you!


Well, yeah. If you can't bring a demo of the things you're talking about in the game that has 18 years of demos, you better at least bring an argument.
I can't see the world through your view to know what these fancy grenade angles are.

Aren't the dmm4 maps intended to just aid in improving your aim? Why would you want to abuse something like pitchup limits in situations like this for 'guaranteed accuracy' shots rather than actually practicing? That argument seems to defeat the purpose of the maps themselves.

Wow, you're still being a cock. I will concede that sometimes I'm not the best at explaining things but please point out where I said asking for a demo is a thought experiment. Or better for us all, just stop being precious about your beloved novelty. Sorry I didn't rush out and give you a demo, it's not really my job to record myself looking straight up and firing a grenade. I meant nothing with the thought experiment comment except to try and motivate you to perhaps help yourself as again, it's not my job champ

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Moving past the silliness....

Regarding lowering the LG damage per cell: Knockback is proportional to damage. One of the great things about the Q1 LG is how it can be used to hold people in the air with the LG's knockback. Lowering the damage would make this harder.

You could however, just adjust the knockback when the damage is inflicted by a cell :> This is exactly what I did with JawnMode, and never told anyone at first to see if anyone noticed. I lowered the damage to 24 per cell (*) and increased LG knockback from (damage x 8) to (damage x 10). Nobody noticed the lowered damage

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Trivia and food for thought:

Interesting to note is that some of the mods still played today are actually derived from pre-2.3 QW code. Frogbot, TF and Clan Arena for example. In all 3 of these mods, knockback is actually (damage x 11)ups for damage that is less than 60. It's easier to hold someone in the air with LG in CA/Frogbot than it is in DM

* Also note that 24 damage per cell causes Quad to need to hit fresh spawners with 2 cells instead of 1 to kill them

It might sound silly, but I actually stopped reading your post here. Good work I guess.

In fbca the knockback is direction * 8?



If you wanted to nerf the LG, maybe give full damage to a direct hit and incorporate trace_fraction to reduce on a sliding scale? Could even increase the max damage in that case and reward those hitting the opponent dead centre (and those dodging). This should raise the skill ceiling further.

You're right, I had forgotten I told ParboiL about it years ago



Interesting idea. CPMA did something similar but with the RG based on distance

For reference I no longer nerf the LG to the same degree, it's back to one cell to kill spawner with quad (but still less than 30)

I think we should allow cl_iDrive in all rulesets (namely smackdown).

What is iDrive?

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong here. My understanding is that cl_iDrive changes only what happens when both +left and +right are pressed.

For example:

• With iDrive 0 (off), if you are holding +left and then push +right you stop.
• With iDrive 1 (on), if you are holding +left and then push +right you move +right (with a normal transition as if you immediately released +left)

Why should it be allowed?

• iDrive is a choice of behavior. If players still want the old behavior they may keep it.
• iDrive is a software fix for a possible hardware issue. Some keyboards (laptops) do not respond as quickly to depresses as others.
• iDrive better matches the players intent.

What would this mean for players?

• Players with iDrive enabled may have improved movement both on the ground and in the air

Anecdotally I had been trying to beat a race record for over a year. I enabled iDrive and broke the record on my 2nd try. I then went on to beat another race record in 5 minutes by a ridiculous margin. I also complete trick maps (ztricks2 and unreleased) significantly easier with iDrive enabled.

I think team overlay should always be allowed.

Why should it be allowed?

• Improves playing with rookie players, because better players can track them and rookies don't need to learn to spam their location.
• Improves mm2 (say_team) communication. Team messages have more importance than just spamming location.
• Improves mm3 (voice) communication. Less time can be spent voicing locations.
• Improves teamplay. From seeing team information you can understand more other players situation. Did they just take an item? Did they just get attacked?
• Improves tactics. A player may call out commands after seeing information in the overlay. "That armor will be soon." "Stacked guy at low rl can you get quad?"

Why shouldn't it be allowed?

• I've heard from others that "some qw clients don't have it". It could be claimed that this gives some players an unfair advantage.
• Quakeworld players still value outdated skills. Whats next, item timers?

Many other highly competitive team games have similar information. Take CS:GO for example, which allows you to see your teammates health and even has a map overview where you can see teammates on the map and even see if they glimpse enemies. In my opinion it improves team play. It gets rid of mundane communication and opens the door up for higher level tactics.

Hello, many of you will not have a slightest clue who I am, and I've never seen 99% of the people here while playing. I normally go by a bunch of aliases, and 1000's others via a random name generator. The only real way you'll know it's me, if I were to spam my silly quote binds, or display my stream channel.

Can't say I'm even a decent player, but I've enjoyed QuakeWorld for nearly 3 years. Coming from OpenArena and Quake 3, I do enjoy QuakeWorld the best (mainly because the lack of the railgun, and faster gameplay).

Of course, starting was a pain, and getting use to how powerful the weapons are is no easy task. Physics for me wasn't as hard, since I played the Quake 3 CMPA mod, and the Defrag mod, so I caught on pretty quickly. I should mention, I made a mod based on Quake 3, which mimics QuakeWorld's physics, and used it to understand the physics a bit more. Today, I'm neither a pro nor a newb, just suck in general, since I only really play for fun.

Anyway, with that all squared away, the real reason I'm posting...

The main thing I like about QuakeWorld, is that battles don't last long, and will end within a second, unlike some games that take too long to end. LG can frag within just a couple of hits, while rockets and grenades are super scary when it comes to splash damage. Reducing damage on these weapons would make each batter drag out more, and for me, I do get bored quickly. This applies to QuakeLive, Xonotic and warsow, which each game have long battles, and tends to break off without a winner. If I'm going to lose, make it quick. Just a quick example, I was playing a Xonotic FFA match a couple weeks ago, and was neck and neck to the lead. The match went into overtime, however, after 15 minutes and 2 minutes into overtime, I got bored and tired and just GG'd the match. For me, the match just dragged on for too long, and I just couldn't care less.

One fact, is that other than experience, reflexes and the initial spawns, no one has an advantage over the other player. Reducing the LG to 24 damage per hit, will not make the match easier for new players. It will instead make the LG more harder for them to win a battle. The mention of using DM6 to justify nerfing the LG will not fix DM6, and most of the time, I lost due to rockets rather than LG.

The anti-lag netcode factor is flawed, simply because the game was based on a LAN or a superb internet connection. When people played on those kind of networks, they did not experience delayed actions (QuakeWorld fix most of the issues anyway). People who had higher pings, were SOL, and it was best to grab their friends and have a LAN session of their own. This also applies to Quake 2 and Quake 3.

While some of the stock maps can be very one sided, these stock maps were designed without bunny hopping in mind (unlike for example, Aerowalk). Also, there's the fact that they had been released under GPL, which allows for them to be modified (as long as you supply the modified source). Therefor, you can test which modification works best. Do note, that people may still reject map changes, even though you may think it's way better. I can only suggest to simply make brand new maps. I myself was making a couple maps, but never finish them, due to the last of interest.

Changing the maximum pitch limit, is indeed changing the game's ruleset. While it's nice to remove that limit, it does effect people (even if just a few) who relay on the limited pitch limit for different reasons. Coming from Quake 3 where the pitch limit is 90 degrees, getting use to the limited pitch limit wasn't too hard to deal with though. In matter of fact, it was just something I dealt with, and accepted, since it was a part of the game. If the community does choose to change it, may I suggest to allow it to be an option per player, rather than being forced to have this modification?

I'm sure I had other things to say, but simply forgot what they were. Anyway, it's getting late, and my brain is going into sleep mode. Remember, this is just my opinion, and I don't discourage anyone creating a custom server, with these modifications made. Just note, that these changes should not be considered THE default ruleset. IMHO of course, so don't take my comment too seriously.

tl;dr version: If it ain't broke, don't fix it... IMHO. :3

Let's keep it clean, people!



The point of this thread isn't to change things. Most of us understand how comically unlikely that is. I'd be content to see a civil discussion where people come up with interesting ideas, argue for/against those ideas, and hopefully learn a bit in the process.

Anything beyond that is a bonus.




Well damn you all!

The point of the hypothetical item editor is to give players the ability to modify items on a map as they see fit. Don't like my variations? Make your own. Replace all weapons, armors, and ammo packs with GL's for all I care Some people hate DM4 because of all the GL spam around corners, though.



Would .ent files allow changes in respawn times? For example, having RA respawn every 40 seconds instead of 20?

Regardless, having togglable .ent's would be fantastic. I envision players typing, say, "entlist" to bring up a list of available .ent's on the server, and then choosing the specific .ent they want with, say, "ent xxx".

.ent files only determine items and item locations, respawn times are in the mod's code

I experimented with 25 second armors once (a la CPMA). 40 sec would be waay too long though

Looking forward to Jawn Mode re-release, enjoy your thought experiments

There have been numerous dmm4 tournaments so no, their sole purpose is not just to improve your aim. And do you actually think that it doesn't take practice to learn when you can actually "abuse" the pitch limits? I'd like to see how someone hits these 'guaranteed accuracy' shots without actually practicing, like you put it.



I think we shouldn't allow cl_iDrive in the smackdown ruleset.

iDrive isn't just a fix for possible hardware issue. It takes skill and practice to learn not to press keys you aren't supposed to press to not lose speed. You could use most of the arguments your listed to defend almost any kind of feature that makes playing easier. We shouldn't make the game easier just because someone plays with sub-optimal hardware.



I think we shouldn't allow team overlay in any (official) games.

Once again a feature that takes a huge amount of skill away from the game. It lessens the benefits of good communication and general awareness of the current situation. For example when sitting at ra in dm3 4on4 your team has to give you the information about enemies (or mates) coming from tunnel so you can spam (or not spam) the entrance when you hear the player picking up the nail pack there. With team overlay you don't need to communicate anything because you just see everything there on your screen.

Welcome to the qw.nu forum! Had to approve your first post before it showed up so "bumping" it here so people don't miss it as there were posts after it before it even showed up in thread.

Could you please elaborate a bit on the concept of "outdated" skills? Indeed, by this logic item timers should be next. There's absolutely no difference, timing items is also an "outdated" skill as there are games with timers enabled and why should you be counting anything when you could instead spend more brain resources to plot how to surprise your enemy, for example. Since you know what spawns when through the map you can analyze all the possible enemy routes and position yourself accordingly, while your opponent is doing the same. Thing is - it's an entirely different gameplay, is it not?!

CS:GO is a bad example. You do realize that these changes (radar/map, enemy sightings, visible teammate health, many other things) were not meant to 'improve' the official competitive side of the game, the one that actual pros are playing? They were meant to make matchmaking (read: playing mixes with random people) much easier, because proper communication is more often then not nigh impossible there. It was a necessary move, it was also necessary to align the changes with pro scene as well, otherwise talented young players would have to learn too much new stuff once they get to a level where they have a chance to be invited to -real- competitive play. A necessary change is not always an improvement. Still, there are things like showing how much damage you did to whom during the round after you die that aren't allowed at pro events. I hope you won't argue that dumbing down movement in comparison to 1.6 was NOT an improvement to the game?
I'm sorry, I don't mean to come off as a smartass and know-it-all regarding CS, but seriously, this statement is just funny. There is no such thing as mundane communication in CS and btw sighted enemies and teammate positions get called anyway.

The main point of what I'm saying is: reducing the number of rules or skills that any game requres is not a way to improve it. Even if the skill or rule seems to be unnecessary from some perspective - you have to realize that it's still a part of the game. Remove it and you get another game, because it already has a different gameplay. Changes tend to cause chain reactions, you change one seemingly small thing but then the rest adjusts itself and what you have in the end is much more different from the original than you've ever intended. And allowing teamoverlay is no small thing.

I want to be able to look straight up! ^.^
But I'm a bit scared... because I don't know the consequences or if I'll like it at all

that is not a conclusion you should make from what I've written. Perhaps I wasn't clear enough on what changes I deem dangerous in these last sentences. I'm only against dumbing things down. Especially reducing the necessary skillset of the game. Any game, not just QW.
Changes to the item placement on certain maps are actually interesting but there's a question of how many people will actually support them. Needs a poll or smth. With our not so vast player base we may be risking losing far more people than we'd potentially gain by improving the maps...

(Edited 2015-10-01, 18:03)

I would like teamoverlay was a voted setting instead of a toogle. Teamoverlay is useful on mixes. Currently it just takes one player in the mix who doens't like teamoverlay and thinks it shouldn't be used to disallow it. which often "ruins" the mix.

about 90º view - it should be an option on the client imo.


about different .ent files on selected servers: im all for it. make poll for new item position on each map and ill spawn some servers with the new .ents


about cl_idrive: i'm all for it. milton's argument is invalid imo. ghosting is a problem and cl_idrive minimizes it. test your keyboard. note: on my mechanical keyboard i can press all the keys at the same time and they're recognized. on my laptop only a couple are.

lg damage: it is too high for 2015 hardware. that alone should be enough to adjust it.


my 2 cent

So certain clients get a strict advantage because they turned the option on?



Why not have a new dmm4 tournament with the raised pitchup/down limits and see whether the sky starts falling?



I've already had one really bad experience where I walked into a modded server and didn't realize until a couple (strange) games had passed.
The guy had made direct rockets do double damage, and made the explosion radius much smaller.

If we're going to start doing changes for the sake of change, maybe they should be wrapped in mods like fbca or whatever that rude guy was pimping out earlier?

This is exactly the answer I'd expect to hear from stubborn older players. "It takes skill". Honestly, I don't think it takes much skill. I think it takes more skill to learn the best curves / positions than it does to press keys perfectly every time.

And playing the game "easier" (in my opinion "better" would be the word to use) is precisely the point. Would you disallow playing with a mouse because it takes skill to play keyboard only? That sounds ridiculous. Would improved movement with iDrive make the game more interesting? I think yes.




Why do you think it takes "a huge amount" of skill? Tapping a key every few seconds? Reading team binds that are often poorly presented?

"It lessens the benefits of good communication and general awareness". Please elaborate how an optional hud feature can actually lessen something? Do you think new players that learn to play with overlay won't learn how to use team binds? I think it would be the opposite, they would learn to use team binds when it is important.

As for the dm3 example, I would highlight that as precisely a case where you still want to use mm2 / mm3 communication along with overlay.

I would have to agree with Milton here. My experience is that people are horrible today with using teamsays due to teamoverlay. Why? Because of the sole intent of team overlay: they never have to look at teamsays so why would they become good at reporting them to others? It's just plain logic

With teamoverlay, you don't only take a away the skill aspect of learning how to communicate, but also a lot of tension and fun included by not knowing if it is a teammate or enemy making that sound. It is an OK feature for mixes I guess, but it ruins a lot of the nerve that makes 4on4 fun. Your comparison with CS didn't make much sense. CS is a completely different game, with too many differences from QW to even start listing.

Thought experiment time:
Every form of team communication is available, all at once. Your team can use chat binds, the team overlay shows all the things chat binds can say, and you're all on a VoIP program together.

What happens next? What do the best teams do (communication-wise) that makes them win? When do the tools (team overlay, binds etc) get in the way? When do they help?

Probably every player and team answers this differently...and that's why making changes to these things is really hard to justify. 'Logic' like the above posts won't always apply to people who communicate differently (as players or as teams).

Just change ktx to use vote system to manage teamoverlay. Other than that:

- Leave LG as it is, so I still get motivation to improve my hitscan weapons skill.

- Leave items and spawns the way they are. Luck is a important component in any kind of game. If you feel like a map is unbalanced or whatever, first prove your point. Have two div0 players playing 10 times that map and see if the results are exclusively related with first spawn / kill. I think this 'balanced' map talk is much more about your skill level than anything else. If you have bogojoker playing against Brazilian aln, bogo will always win on aero and alien will most likely do the same on dm6, regardless the spawns.

- Don't change aiming limits. I rely on those limits to do thousands things in game, from certain rjumps to some precise shots.

- Don't allow cl_idrive. It becomes ridiculously easier to do whatever you want. The magic of quakeworld is that the game always reward your efforts and as long as you keep practicing, there are always things to be accomplished... Shortcuts will only make the path less pleasant.

Come on guys, if this game wasn't so good the way it is, would it still be around?

Just to be clear, I don't dislike the discussion itself.

Okay, you can say that but you have to answer my ~THOUGHT EXPERIMENT CHALLENGE~

i.e. would you have learned to use the +30/-30 max angles for particular shots and become unwilling to raise the limit to 31 and see what lurks beyond your tiny bubble?



It will always reward your effort unless you need to aim up at a 75 degree angle to shoot someone.
Also, isn't using aim limits as a crutch sort of like a shortcut? Like, if you could aim freely past 70 degrees and had to actually learn to aim...wouldn't that be something to practice?

Do you see where I'm going here?

An outdated skill to me is one that has since been replaced by something better. In my opinion mm3 (voice) does a very good job of replacing most mm2 (say_team) communication. mm2 still has something to contribute but I think most players would rather use voice and it is more effective. That is certainly what I've seen in quakeworld competitions.



There is at least one glaring difference to me. Teammates can tell you where they are and what their health is by sending you mm2 messages. Items can't. Team overlay is nearly equivalent to something that is already possible (a person sending you a message). Items telling you when they spawn is not currently possible and you cannot accurately determine this if you did not hear or see when it was taken. If there is, do let me know!



I won't discuss item timers here because it always spirals out of control and people yell at each other. But I do consider them different.




Thanks for a nice description of CS:GO. I was not aware of the history, I only recently started watching it.

Has radar/map ever been disabled for competitive play? Do any players play with it off? If not, I still think that is a very apt comparison. It may have been added for mix, but it is still a feature used in the competitive play I've seen.

Of course people call out sighted enemies, it is important information. I should clarify my opinion: radar/map/overlay doesn't eliminate important communication. That seems to be a common point made in the arguments against it; namely if team overlay is enabled suddenly other communication won't be used and players will do stupid things. Do people really believe that? It sounded like that is exactly what dimman argued. Would you then say these players will get better without overlay?

As for mundane communication I suppose that is personal. If a player said in voice every 2 seconds "I'm still hiding at banana" when there is no radar/map/overlay then it is important (qw). With radar/map/overlay then by the 3rd time yes I'd consider it mundane and clutter. That is effectively what mm2 position spams are.

Arguments in this thread seem to fall into two camps. I'll call them traditionalist and functionalist. I am sympathetic to both.

The traditionalist viewpoint is by nature conservative. It urges caution before making changes. Because:

(1) The game is great the way it is. Correct. Furthermore, it's in large part *because of* the lack of careful balancing that the game works. If a 1996 id software had been able to foresee how Quake would develop, Carmack et al would have lowered movement speed, removed rocket jumps, and disabled bunny hopping. Over-balancing stems from good intentions.

(2) Elite players should not have their hard-practiced skills nullified by unnecessary rule changes. Quakeworld is unique in that its community is extremely high-skilled, but at the same time older than most similar games. Many of the best players are at points in their lives where, even though they still enjoy playing, they know they will never, ever have significant time to dedicate to this game again.

I respect these older, less active players. It's important to me that changes don't fuck up the game for them.

The functionalist viewpoint, at its purest, ignores the traditionalist viewpoint completely. It cares not about history or practicality. It answers only to this question: All else being equal, how is Quakeworld best?

(Conflict theory is our bonus paradigm! It posits that any attempt to tweak game rules is akin to a Marxist uprising of mediocre players against elite players. This discussion is thus distilled into a power struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeois. Let's avoid viewing the discussion through this lens. It is insulting to everyone taking part.)

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Opposing changing view pitch because it would require changes to strategy and relearning of certain flick shots/rocket jumps is a valid traditionalist argument. But let's be clear: it isn't a functionalist argument. No one has articulated why, all else being equal, lower absolute pitch angles are better.

Likewise, if people are against any changes ever to LG dmg/sec, that is traditionalist argument (but not a great one, considering that people weren't doing nearly as much LG damage in QW's earlier days). But let's get functional: if you think 270 dmg/sec isn't enough, then what makes 300 dmg/sec the perfect amount? Why not 330? 360?

And will 300 dmg/sec still be optimal in ten years, when we're easily hitting 60% LG while playing 10,000 fps Quakeworld on our 500 hz LCD's?