GST 2016: Thoughts

So GST 2016 is behind us, and I just want to thank everybody for coming out-- viewers, those who played, and those who helped in the moderation on the Twitch chat.

Congratulations to Shrekt, for continuing their reign as champions!

To the other gangs who competed - better luck next time!
I feel like everybody who participated this year benefited in some way.
True, the achievement of a goal is a great thing, but never discount the value of pursuance.

It's great fun pursuing a goal -- the week leading up to GST, I joined Enigmatic during their training sessions, and went many rounds in BaseBattle as they went against one-another in their sub gang.
I don't know about them, but I had a blast playing, and joining their voice chat Discord channel.
There was also one night when I raided Neo Zone with a couple Club members-- again, I had a blast.

So if you're feeling down about the loss, remember the fun that you had in the pursuance of that goal.
If you're anything like me, you'll have some nice moments to dwell upon.

At any rate, I've watched and listened to the YouTube upload twice this since its airing, and replayed a couple parts.
Below is a couple things that I've noted; while the match was going on, and in hindsight as I watched the archived stream.

• My internet connection was choppy at certain parts.
  I apologize for this; I realized that I was lagging at certain points (and noted it in the commentary). Unfortunately, there wasn't much I could do during the event-- Next time I'll try and reset my modem and router prior to streaming; and maybe use an Ethernet connection versus WiFi.
  
  
• Matches were dragged out.
  Last year, we received complaints that the arena was too easy to exploit-- gangs only had to rush the bottom, and push their opponents upward. Our response to that was to fill the bottom with water, so that people would have an extreme vulnerability as they make their trek into enemy territory.
  Well it worked-- and in my opinion, it worked too well. Practically every match was a cold war-- everybody was holding their respective positions, and not much movement was being made. (Thank goodness for the pushers out there who took risks and made it interesting!)
  Moving forward, I want to revisit the arena layouts; and find a happy medium between last year and this year. I want some slight vulnerability, so that the matches don't last so long, but not too much vulnerability that the recipe to victory is clear-cut.
  
  
• I reportedly butchered some names.
  Hey- I'm not perfect =D!
  
  
• I was the only commentator.
  We planned on my brother joining us, but he couldn't make it that morning. No matter though - I've done commentary by myself for years. Going into this, I knew that I could talk forever, and I expected the matches to be as fast-paced as they were last year. That latter part, I couldn't have been more wrong. I didn't anticipate the arena discouraging offensive plays as much as it did.
  
  It is a commentator's job to keep things interesting throughout the duration of the stream, even when nothing is going on. And for the most part, I feel that I do this very well and natural. I've been told that it is the on-the-spot nicknames that I give people, and the impromptu story lines behind them. Even when I'm not streaming, my brother and I have always done this -- I don't know about him, but this is how I commit people to memory.
  
  At any rate, this is what keeps everybody(including myself) entertained when I'm the only commentator is on deck, and I can keep it up as long as there are things going on -- I don't like sounding redundant. I feel that I'm doing myself, and everybody else a disservice if I'm repeating myself.
  
  I confess, the way the matches were dragging out this year, really made me wish I had somebody else on the microphone to bounce some conversation off of. Last year I had Zenthor+Casper, and it worked really well. It also allowed me to give some attention to the Twitch chat, because Zenthor was keeping me up to date on the happenings there.
  
  So moving forward, I'm going to make sure I have at least 1 person commentating with me.

Post any comments you had on GST2016 - what you liked, what(or how) you think it could be improved moving forward, etc.

I do like the player response that we had, and I really had fun hosting it!

I think that, moving forward, I'm going to be doing some more commentary on smaller events
(randomly sitting in on basing fights, gang spar battles, base battle, etc.)

Thanks in advance!
Meph

Honestly I didn't like the arena as it felt like every match was being fought using roughly the same tactics (though it'd be hard to create an arena that helped to make each match different, unless it were randomized)

I didn't really like the mirror thing going on at the bottom, nor the T. I think the bottom of the map should be worked on more for next year.

Haven't been around fully see everyone in gst but it was good.
The arena looked a little bit Empty, but what made it better is that most of the pushing was all depending on who won the top.
Each player who had mid was locking it down and scared to push up in a fashion order.
The Bottom was like a resting zone, and it seems as if shrekt had each player who got tired take a break while other gangs just stayed on going without rest.

Maybe i'm wrong? Maybe I'm not?
Other then that, it was worth to come back to see what's going on.

Haiii.

I had a lot of fun during GST season, from the GST loggings in Base Battle to the event itself. :)

My thoughts on this GST is with two issues:


Narrow hallways
I think the main issue with players not pushing much was due to the narrow hallways joining the two sides of the arena together, the top lane being the only exception. Having that lack of space to maneuver allowed players to trade bullet streams through those hallways but without having a good chance at pushing through them (which is also a big issue with bases too). The common result was a stalemate; waiting for one team to make minor mistakes and break down before the big push.

Originally, I was supposed to position myself at the top-middle lane (center), but during practices I was unable to play at my best due to the restrictive space I had to be confined in, along with the fact that I use a 10-freeze gun, thus maintaining a counterattack a bit difficult if I got caught in waves of bullets. Just hours before GST started, my position changed to starting at the top instead, and from there I felt more comfortable since I had plenty of space to work with. I noticed in GST a lot of yellow and orange guns, and those players came prepared for the hallways.

But if those hallways were more wider like the top, players would feel more confident and find more room in pushing to dodge bullet-storms when possible, and for defenders, they would have to relay more on their skills to dodge as well and push back the opponents. The top saw the most action since it provided the most spacious area for the two teams to meet. Even when one team had control of the top, the other still had a chance at pushing back -- good ol' peekaboo.

Best of 3 finals
The best of 3 rounds starting at the semi-finals seemed to really drag it out for me, I feel it would be better to save that for the finals only. It keeps the last match-up of the GST more interesting.


Great work on the stream and commentary :) I really enjoyed that. A big thanks to the host Anero for toughing it out for 7+ hours as well and keeping GST organized. :D

Also, congratulations to Shrekt on winning GST a second time in a row!

What the hell.. I miss it? I tho it was gonna be at 21st august..

Too much ec given out, I believe Freeze and Shrekt made over 50+ ec.

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Originally Posted by Zernov

Too much ec given out, I believe Freeze and Shrekt made over 50+ ec.

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I mean this is a hard event to win and it is deserving of such rewards.

I have a lot of things to say about this GST. This GST had a lot of positive aspects that I liked a lot, and it should be keep like that to the next GST's.

This GST was a innovating one, I had a lot of fun even though I only got to play 1 match, but it was everything intense, and that's a good thing, but even though this was a fun GST, this one had some minor things, some major, to be improved.

First of all, i'll point out the things that they did excellent. As Meph said before, the bottom was not the main focus this year, and that's really good, the arena was made for the action be at the top or the middle, and the arena was a main focus on that. Even though the arena was decided as the public wanted, I really felt that it was made for playing defensive, and that's why every match lasted about 30 mins, something that was not as usual as on the past GST's. And I felt really bored on watching all the matches being defensive, something that it comes to be really boring for everyone since it's way more fun a GST were you could take risk's and rush.

Talking more about the arena layout, I felt that this arena was too small, I saw other GST videos and this arena was too small compared to others, so instead of making small arenas, for the next time I would make it more bigger, and more aggressive, it's fun to watch some action happening and that will make the GST shorter.
Adding the idea of making the arena more aggressive will have a important role on everyone too - it will make everyone have a important role in the GST.

Another thing to point out: the arenas on the next GST's should be tested before, since it can happen as it did on this year, to have changes when few days are left for the GST and make it harder to practice everything again.

Going to the positive things, this year livestream was awesome, I liked a lot how the made rosters for some of the gangs, and the livestream was very well organized in general, some little aspects that people were pointing out is that the livestream was too laggy, which that's a little detail to improve for the next time, but I completely understand to be laggy since you're making a livestream. Maybe for the next time, Meph should make more rosters for the gangs, since it was a very cool detail.

A thing that bothered me though, was the best of 3 at the semis, I don't see any reason of doing this since the livestream was taking too long, and making it to the best of 3 makes it even longer, also I think that this year gave out a lot of EC's, so adding the best of 3 would provoce people to get even more EC's. So maybe for the next year they should make it the best of 3 only in the finals, since the GST takes a lot of time.

Also, I liked a lot the change they made this year, of adding a new way to logging in into this tournament, and taking one that didn't require skill at all. Implementing Base Battle was a excellent idea, and it was very fun to log in by Base Battle, I had a lot of fun doing it. A change I would make for hte next time is to take the basing logging, since the GST now are based on Multiplex guns, a thing that basing doesn't use, and putting in the Gang TTS (not released yet) I would make it a fun way to qualify.

And the last thing, commentating this year was very good, I really like how Meph makes comments, but it would be more interesting to have someone else, I could think of Meph to be really tired. For the next time inviting someone else for the next GST will make it more fun, maybe inviting Anero wouldn't be a bad idea.

This year GST was very intense, and they did a lot of good things overall, thanks to all the staff's that got involved into this and made this thing happen!

I'd be more than happy to commentate with you. My friends often call me Radio Man, or the guy with a youtuber voice and I've been wanting to put it to use.

I'd be interested in commentating next year as well. I'm not a staff or anything fancy but I could view the matches from a spectators pov and address the twitch chat. As for this year's GST, I really enjoyed watching it even though it was lengthy. One thing I'd like to see changed is the amount of stand off areas. The outcome of matches usually tends to be whoever moves out of position at the wrong time and just gets flooded. I'd like to see more straight up player battles and less bullet spamming down a hallway praying that something hits. The commentary was pretty nice, not to be a suck up but your voice is pretty damn fresh Meph. Anyways, pretty good GST, can't wait till next year's.

Overall this GST was good, my only complaint is how dragged the matches were. They went on for way too long. I also agree with Ren that the best of 3 should be saved for the finals.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by D12*

Going to the positive things, this year livestream was awesome, I liked a lot how the made rosters for some of the gangs, and the livestream was very well organized in general, some little aspects that people were pointing out is that the livestream was too laggy, which that's a little detail to improve for the next time, but I completely understand to be laggy since you're making a livestream. Maybe for the next time, Meph should make more rosters for the gangs, since it was a very cool detail.

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The team line-up graphics already took me over 20 hours, and I was halfway through.
If the teams were known weeks before, I could have probably made it.
I had to search for the player's heads, their locations, place their flags - it looks like it's easy to make but it was really tiring.
Overall, I invested over 100 hours into the livestream.. looking for music and buying licenses for a couple, making graphics, making 2D/3D animations..

BO3's happened because I wanted to see who was the best team. Best of 3's are better.
Maybe, with a more open arena, it would've looked differently.

For next year, I'll try my best to get Meph's brother on here.
Meph and Masa are the best possible duo in my eyes and I'd rather not have people who I do not trust, commentate. We don't want to hear the complaints from pre-2015 GST.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Anero

The team line-up graphics already took me over 20 hours, and I was halfway through.
If the teams were known weeks before, I could have probably made it.
I had to search for the player's heads, their locations - it looks like it's easy to make but it was really tiring.
Overall, I invested over 100 hours into the livestream.. looking for music and buying licenses for a couple, making graphics, making 2D/3D animations..

BO3's happened because I wanted to see who was the best team. Best of 3's are better.
Maybe, with a more open arena, it would've looked differently.

For next year, I'll try my best to get Meph's brother on here.
Meph and Masa are the best possible duo in my eyes and I'd rather not have people who I do not trust, commentate. We don't want to hear the complaints from pre-2015 GST.

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When I read that "BO3" I was like "tf? Black ops 3?" Lel

I was in 2016 gst only lasted 1 round doe and it was a good gst tbh
the commentating was great and the
arena was good aswell but the bottom was the bad part it was practically never fought for somebody even got kicked for afking at bottom the water idea was good tho
The matches took awhile cause after every match yall did a 5-10 min break
Overall it Was Decent

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Originally Posted by MAD MONEY

What the hell.. I miss it? I tho it was gonna be at 21st august..

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There's so many threads about it....

Meph, you mentioned how the matches were dragged out, and I have a couple of ideas to throw around in consideration for GST 2017.

Move or Die (Yes, based on that one game)
As you said, a majority of the matches were pretty much like a cold war, until a few pushers decide to rush and deal some damage before dying/ killing someone. Since no one moves, an idea that I have is to make it so that if a player does not move for x amount of seconds, x amount of damage is either dealt to them OR an effect, such as a stun or a knock-up will be dealt upon the player.

While this does make holding a tactical position challenging (which I do understand), this would prevent a gang from rushing a place that lets them spam infinitely without any danger. Also, this would add a variable that players have to take into account while fighting, which I hope, would help solve your problem of players endlessly spamming and encourage planned out movement to avoid dying from not moving and dodging bullets.

Stages
I watched parts of your stream and (sorry to whoever designed the arena) the background was kinda harsh on your eyes (or I could have the eyes of an eighty year old man) and gets dull. Although blue is my favourite colour, I am sure people who were watching were probably getting bored of seeing it + watching extended fire fights with absolutely no change for minutes.

Hire the best and brightest GFX minds of this forum! I am sure they could whip up a few background designs here and there, put furniture that would serve as barricades instead of just solid black lines across the screen. Make it fun! Although GST is 90% players, 10% players watching the players compete, don't forget about the 10%! Make sure that GST is as inclusive as you can. A tropical background with palm trees and sand, an island map, where players would travel on water and fight on patches of land, etc!

Going off varieties of stages and my previous idea (above) we could mix in a few stage specific (possibly) fatalities here and there. The island map for example, could have piranhas that would snap at people's ankles if you stay in the water too long/ get shot while in the water. We could have a volcano map, where occasionally lava would shoot up, burning players, a skate park map, where players would have to switch between their guns and their skateboards to navigate, a labyrinth map, where the stage changes every couple of minutes and a spot where you could spam safely would suddenly be wide open. There are TONS of ideas that could come from this, and I think we could utilize it. I would like to see more interactive backgrounds, instead of the blue carpet.

Oh! I would also like to add that adding a variety of backgrounds for different stages of the tournament (ex. lava stage for 16 teams, island stage for 8 teams and so on) would prevent teams from immediately rushing to a familiar spot- they would have to try things out intuitively and play as they go, breaking a stalemate. Also, I would love to be a part of the commentary for you! It seems like so much fun! :)

- - - Updated - - -

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Anero

The team line-up graphics already took me over 20 hours, and I was halfway through.
If the teams were known weeks before, I could have probably made it.
I had to search for the player's heads, their locations, place their flags - it looks like it's easy to make but it was really tiring.
Overall, I invested over 100 hours into the livestream.. looking for music and buying licenses for a couple, making graphics, making 2D/3D animations..

BO3's happened because I wanted to see who was the best team. Best of 3's are better.
Maybe, with a more open arena, it would've looked differently.

For next year, I'll try my best to get Meph's brother on here.
Meph and Masa are the best possible duo in my eyes and I'd rather not have people who I do not trust, commentate. We don't want to hear the complaints from pre-2015 GST.

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Anero, maybe you could ask a couple of the GFX artists we have on forums. Many of them make amazing graphics and animations and I am sure they would have been happy to help. :)

Boring as hell to watch. Not because of you just because wasn't much happening at all.

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Originally Posted by Czar Misago

Boring as hell to watch. Not because of you just because wasn't much happening at all.

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Constructive criticism or helpful suggestions please.
Also, your signature is missing an e at the end. :)

GST 2016 was hella fun to be honest and I really wanna thank you and Anero for hosting the event in such a moderated and organized fashion.
Matches took very long like for example; against Magus both our matches combined took 46 minutes x.x

Anyways, we won and I would like to congratulate everybody else who participated for giving it a shot and making this event even better!

Good Game Messiah, Wario, Magus, and iFreeze

Just had a quick question- was this year's GST purely multiplex guns only?

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Originally Posted by Jazzy

Just had a quick question- was this year's GST purely multiplex guns only?

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Yes. This year they relied on pure skill.

Had a blast boy


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