UT’s starting system in duel is broken

I am an old UT player. I’ve played thousands of UT duels and I was very happy to see UT come back. If you are playing as well, here are a few thoughts I had on a new item spawn system in the game that I think is currently broken.

(Please note that the game is in pre-alpha phase, so the dev team simply might have not had the time to look into this system!)

UT has a setup where the armors spawn after 30 seconds after the start of the game and the shield belt spawns after 60 is interesting. I assume its intended purpose is to mitigate the luck of a bad first spawn that could seriously set a player back in early game.



If that is indeed the purpose, then the current system is not serving it. This is because the shield belt and the armor do not spawn at the same time, but within thirty seconds of each other. Ergo, whoever wins the first fight for armor (positionally or with a kill) is in a great position to have full map control. He or she will pick up the armor and will likely be able to bully the opponent off the first belt thrty seconds later. If that player wins the first fight comforably, then he or she will can delay picking up the first armor, thereby making sure that the first belt and the second armor don’t both appear at the same time.

That is not good at all. With or without the big powerups on the map, the first spawns are still categorized into more and less desired ones. You can spawn close to a weapon that allows you to efficiently zone out attack routes to the first armor and if you play your hand correctly, there may be an opponent can do to pick up that first armor (depending on the map).

Spawning close to the right weapon to defend that first armor is just as lucky as spawning right next to a belt in UT99. Except in UT99 the other player could pick up the armor and not run around naked for 90 seconds. If I competed in professional tournaments, I’d take the UT99 system over the current UT system any day of the week because it’s fairer.

There is obviously the odd case in UT99 where both players started at belt and the luckier player got the belt, possibly the kill, the armor and full map control for the minutes to follow. And that’s something that shouldn’t be happening. This exact situation is why I assume the big powerups have a delayed spawn in the new UT.

There’s a really simple fix to the system: the belt has to spawn at the same time as the armor. In which case both players can carve out their own luck with the hand they were dealt. If one player can get a good defensive position around belt and the other player can’t do much about it, he or she can fall back and pick up the less valuable armor and still be okay.

That’s much, much fairer than the current system. It would be the fairest system in a deathmatch game to date.





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Here is Zaccubus vs. Hypno on DM-Lea with an example of spawning in the right area, with the right weapon and zoning the opponent out correctly. Credit to Zaccubus for making the very most of a very unlucky start.

