Battlefield 3

[FifaInspected]

I was thinking that it would be fun to assemble a "tank killer" squad and pick on match to just rain hell on the tanks. Forget anything else. Just one match to hunt tanks. Mines and rockets.... Disable, kill, destroy. Repeat.

[RobVarak]

I was thinking that it would be fun to assemble a "tank killer" squad and pick on match to just rain hell on the tanks. Forget anything else. Just one match to hunt tanks. Mines and rockets.... Disable, kill, destroy. Repeat.

Wait a minute, isn't that what we've been doing all along?

[Teal]

Okay. I'll just say it. I hate hardcore mode in this game. Gotta agree with Rob on this one. It's just...well, it's just stripping away everything that this game was made to do well, and it winds up being overly and unnecessarily difficult. If it's a room full of like-minded people, who all WANT to slow down, and be smart, and PLAY it hardcore, that might change things. But that's not going to happen, so if I never play, at least Rush, on hardcore mode again, it'll be too soon.

I love Op:Flashpoint. It's damned tough compared to-well, anything else on consoles. But it's designed to be realistic. BF just isn't. Neither, really, is CoD. I understand the desire for more realistic gameplay, but the game's just not meant to be played that way.

We did pretty well in the last match, actually capturing some areas, but thing is, I wasn't having any fun with it. Honestly, it seems like Rush in this game is not as good as Rush was in BF:BC2. Just rather play Conquest. Maybe the new Conquest mode coming with Karkand will be the middle ground between the two. Dunno.

[FifaInspected]

Speaking of BF:BC2. I'd still love to play a few rounds of that game from time to time.

[pk500]

Played my first game of Team Deathmatch last night. Also will be my last. Basically Halo with fatigues and current weapons.

Horrible mode. It might have been fun if I was 30 years younger and mainlining Mountain Dew and Mentos, but those days are long gone.

[Spooky]

I felt bad about talking you guys into playing HC mode last night. I absolutely sucked in that mode last night too. But I think it will still be my preferred mode.

While I understand the frustrations you guys were mentioning, like the inability to use mines and mortars and no spotting, I think it provides a different approach that I like better.

Mines and Mortars - to me, always feel like cheap and frustrating deaths. That not to say they don't have their place in the game. But they are SO overused in regular mode that I get pretty frustrated. If they are used more sparingly because you actually have to be concerned about friendly fire then I am all for it. Funny thing is that you guys seem SO baffled and frustrated by a Team Kill. That s*** happens quite a bit in real combat. Just have to be more careful. If you're strategy of just blindly attacking everything in sight without any reagard for other teammates feels like a constraint rather than a more disciplined approached, then yeah, HC mode won't be great for you.

Here is a good example of how I have to shift my own gameplay style (for the better IMO). Typically in the regular mode when I am trying to go after an objective to disarm it (on defense) I would throw a grenade blindly into the area of the objective to hopefully flush out any enemies that might be hiding near it. that's kinda of a cheap tactic but it works. In HC mode, i can't rely on that anymore because half the time I have a teammate that is already there about to disarm it and I accidentally kill them.

Spotting - this is another feature that I LOVE when used 'correctly'. Problem is that it rarely is. I aslo end up relying on that feature far too much to act as my virtual eyes rather than just relying on my own sight. I'll spot someone WAY far away just because I thought someone might be out there and took a chance with using the spot button. Also, as in real life, you have to communicate to your teammates about where someone is or might be rather than randomly finding someone and then tracking them because there is a giant orange triangle above their head. I also just end up just helping random teammates out to pad their stats by taking "my kill".

KillCam - LOVE that this feature is missing in HC mode. It's just another cheap tactic for people to come and find me after I've killed them that is not realistic.

Bullet Damage - Here is another area that I think frustrates some but I love. The higher and quicker bullet damage in HC is SUCH a gift for me. It completely erases the entire 'chicken dance' thing (of which I am always on the losing end) and it takes away the feeling of having to unload an entire clip into someone else before they go down. It also helps conserve ammo and let's me actually use the single shot mode of a gun rather than burst. I understand that I also die quicker from an enemies fire but it seems to be a very fair trade off. (oh and you can actually be an effective Sniper with the higher bullet damage).

Believe me, I was as frustrated as you guys wer last night - but it was because I was just sucking and not because I couldn't play in a less disciplined manner.

I don't hate the regular mode or anything (I know I'm coming across as a HC mode snob - lol) but I think that in the right mindset and group it's the better mode. I think last night was just a really sh*tty group too. I was on a team last week that was so awesome and communicated and played so well together that what was suposed to be a quick round or two for me ended up being like 8-9 rounds and friend request to the guys in my squad. That's how HC is suppose to feel.

[pk500]

Now I'm intrigued by the HC mode, even though I might be the world's worst BF player. But hey: I earned four-digit point totals in two games last night, even reach 2,700 with four kills in one Conquest game!

[RobVarak]

My detailed critique of HC is a few pages back, I think. But the short version is that by minimizing the utility of explosives has two effects that I find less than fun. First, it turns the game into a gunfight only. Worse, it makes the armored vehicles overly powerful. With only the threat of AT rockets on the map, a skilled tanker will just dominate. The game is balanced to include all the perks and just feels off without them.

It also has a third and more visceral effect. Mortars, mines, claymores and grenades make things blow up. Blowing s*** up is fun. Less s*** blowing up = less fun.

[Teal]

Team kills might be more 'realistic', but it's not more fun. There's a severe lack of necessary communication in a game where you only talk to your 3 teammates, and there's always some dumbass jumping in the way of a clear shot you have. Sometimes I want realism, and when I do, I'll play Op: Flashpoint. Sometimes I just want to play a video game that 'feels' a little realistic, but not be killing my own teammates with mines and errant shots. Then, I'll play Battlefield. Other times, I just want to shoot something. Thus, CoD and GoW. All can be tactical, but I'll reiterate that, while I love a good realistic shooter, BF3 just wasn't created for that, and it doesn't work well. For one thing, I could get into HC mode more if our mines didn't team kill, nor mortars. Mortars don't really friggin' do enough damage anyway, so that one's a wash. But team kill mines completely take mines out of the equation, unless you're a d*****bag that doesn't care about your team. Mines are a key part of the Battlefield experience.

Also, I didn't see any difference between the bullet damages by going to HC mode last night. Just didn't. I still pumped dudes full of lead just to get hammered by someone who shot me less.

[Spooky]

Fair points from you guys. Thing is that I don't use mines or mortars so it really has no effect on me. But to say that HC mode makes defending against tanks useless is wrong. Just gotta bring a rocket launcher or some C4.

I do understand that making a game more realistic for people who won't play it realistically (the majority) is counter productive. But I do think that those who do venture into HC mode have a slightly different mentality and want to play the game more realistically. Last night's group was maybe not a great example of that though.

[RobVarak]

Fair points from you guys. Thing is that I don't use mines or mortars so it really has no effect on me. But to say that HC mode makes defending against tanks useless is wrong. Just gotta bring a rocket launcher or some C4.

That should be the case, but the fact is that it takes 2-3 AT rockets to knock out a tank. The better tank/eng teams can easily withstand an entire engineer's allotment of rockets. I often toss a frag to brush off any engineers, but this is hit or miss at best and suicide if the tank is observant. LOL

[Teal]

I know what you're after, and what you want, Spook, and I want that, too-to be able to play a military shooter with nothing but grownups who will play it the way it's supposed to be played. Felt like we were playing against some top-shelf Halo junkies last night, the entire time. I hate that. I wish Halo and CoD acolytes would just stay in Halo and CoD, and stay out of games like BF3. It would SEEM, in theory, that HC mode would curb that sort of gameplay, slow things down. At least last night, it didn't...at all. So if they're going to continue to play in a way other than what I'd like to play, then I'd prefer to have every gameplay element available to me (spotting, all that) to combat them.

Again, I understand what you're after, and I want that, too. So go get Red River! LOL

[Naples39]

I don't like friendly-fire in these games at all.

For one, destruction is kind of the point of this game. Look at the trailers, destructible environments....

Second, FF is a huge risk in real life, but that's why these guys spend years training for these maneuvers and working together. Not so fun with, random, silent gamers on XBL.

Unrelated question though--what is the difference between the two different kind of weapon silencers? Maybe one effects accuracy, while the other effects stopping power? Do they both prevent you from appearing on the mini-map when firing? That is the million dollar question for me.

I also say you guys should try a squad deathmatch. Team deathmatch is crap in this game, but squad deathmatch is much slower and you will find each team tightly sticking together and picking their fights (unless you have some gutless snipers sitting in the corner of the map on some tower....). I need to know how silencers work in this mode though!!

[dbdynsty25]

I've played some Team Deathmatch the last couple of nights just to give it a try and I'm not a huge fan, but it's okay. Definitely more run and gun and I'm still not quick enough on the sticks to really compete, but by the end of last night I was averaging around 10/10 as far as K/D ratio goes so I'm getting better. Still no where near as proficient as on the PC, but I am adapting. If I'm going to run around with my head cut off, I might as well play MW3...seems to be a better deathmatch experience, especially with Kill Confirmed.

I'm definitely down to try some Squad Deathmatch...get a nice little party going amongst us and hop online and f*ck some kids up.

[RobVarak]

Unrelated question though--what is the difference between the two different kind of weapon silencers? Maybe one effects accuracy, while the other effects stopping power? Do they both prevent you from appearing on the mini-map when firing? That is the million dollar question for me.

I also say you guys should try a squad deathmatch. Team deathmatch is crap in this game, but squad deathmatch is much slower and you will find each team tightly sticking together and picking their fights (unless you have some gutless snipers sitting in the corner of the map on some tower....). I need to know how silencers work in this mode though!!

From the Battlefield Blog

Suppressor
The suppressor is available on most rifles and sniper rifles, reduces the noise and removes the muzzle flash when equipped. However, it also deals less damage at all ranges.


Flash suppressor
Unlike the regular suppressor, the flash suppressor doesn’t dampen the noise, but it greatly reduces the flash weapons give off, while still retaining the same damage inflicted to opponents.

As for the mini-map implications, somebody has tested it:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/lv? ... rue&gid=15

But there are folks saying that DICE has admitted to there being a bug which allows suppressed weapons to appear on the mini-map. They claim DICE has said this will be patched. I was unable to find any direct evidence on this matter, only hearsay.

[Naples39]

Typical battlefield hidden mechanics.

The quote from the Battlefield blog, which I have seen, is completely uninformative as to the minimap consequences.

Also, unless I'm reading it wrong, the spreadsheet doesn't make sense to me. It says nearly every engineer weapon shows up on the minimap when fired even with a suppressor? And a random mix of AR's and LMG's are invisible or invisible on the minimap when suppressed? What? I also don't see any differentiation between the two different types of suppressors on that chart.

Maybe I'm reading it wrong.

[RobVarak]

Typical battlefield hidden mechanics.

The quote from the Battlefield blog, which I have seen, is completely uninformative as to the minimap consequences.

Also, unless I'm reading it wrong, the spreadsheet doesn't make sense to me. It says nearly every engineer weapon shows up on the minimap when fired even with a suppressor? And a random mix of AR's and LMG's are invisible or invisible on the minimap when suppressed? What? I also don't see any differentiation between the two different types of suppressors on that chart.

Maybe I'm reading it wrong.

I don't think that this was all planned. I think this was the result of the author's testing and a bug of some sort, so the inconsistencies are unintentional. I think both suppressors are meant to obscure you on the mini-map, with the flash suppressor providing the additional benefit of being hard to spot in the 3D "world".

[Danimal]

Private matches problem solved with hardcore or not hardcore.

In order to do this on the PC you need your own server which is like $65 a month or something.

I still think the rush solution is easy. Set the AO for the defenders to a limited area around the defensive position. You know that screen you see (well I see) when you fly a plane out of the AO. Make it the same for defenders in rush and then you'll get much more coordinated attacks and defenses instead of guys running to spawn points to increase their kill ratio.

[Macca00]

Conquest tonight? Had a lot of fun last Friday, who's up for some more?

[RobVarak]

Conquest tonight? Had a lot of fun last Friday, who's up for some more?

In.

[RobVarak]

That was awesome tonight, guys. Really well done all night long.

[Teal]

EPIC. We were undefeated until the very last match, and played every single map. Of course, the last one was Metro, so it doesn't count...

[Naples39]

Question for the PC experts.

At the risk of throwing away my money, I bought Battlefield 3 PC on BF for $30 (gotta try that 64 player madness). I don't have a 'gaming' PC, but with an i5, 4GB RAM, and gt 330m gpu, I figure I should be able to at least run it with settings bottomed out. Xbox version is basically low settings and 30fps anyway.

So far no luck, due to driver checks.

-If I try to launch the game, it tells me I need to update my drivers.

-I go to nVidia webpage, and autoscan tool says for my PC (Sony) I need to get drivers directly from them.

-Get the latest drivers from Sony support, which are a year old and the game rejects them on launch.

-Directly download latest nVidia mobile drivers (which are for 300m series cards), but the installer runs a system scan first and says can't find compatible hardware, preventing installation.

Is there any way to bypass these system checks, either on the drivers or BF3 itself?

[Danimal]

I'm assuming this is a laptop.

They do some funky crap to stop you from installing driver upgrades. Your best bet is to call them if you can find a solution by googling it.

[Diablo25]

EPIC. We were undefeated until the very last match, and played every single map. Of course, the last one was Metro, so it doesn't count...

Looks like I missed another good night. Fn birthday party keeping me away from BF!
I'll be on tonight.