The Spawn Camping discussion - Please stay constructive

[SAUBER_KH7 3,326]

What does the Community think? This subject is on: Spawn Camping.

 

What would You say is your personal view of the matter? I am personally interested to see what the community thinks about the matter. Keep in mind this is not an official Topic, and is not endorsed by Gaijin or the Dev's. Why have I created this discussion topic? Let me explain.

 

So recently on the suggestions section of the forum, I have noticed a slight increase of people complaining about the spawn camping ingame, as well as in the threads archive. When I did research on it, it turns out there are quiet a few topics about it both on the forum, and other sites like Reddit and the Steam Forum. This makes it difficult to gather feedback about the matter, and causes topics to be created all over the place. What I thought was this: to make a pinned topic for members to discuss their view of the matter with out spamming the forum with their own threads. Kind of like how there is a special topic for discussing Battle Rankings, Bias, etc...

That's the reason why I have created this topic, to make things a bit more organized, and allow members to come (appropriately) discuss their views on the matter.

So with out further a due,

 

Post Your view(s) of the matter and if you see fit, possible solution(s).

 

Attention! Please keep it nice. Respect the opinions of your fellow players, and follow the rules.

 

Edited December 15, 2016 by SAUBER_KH7

[TheHalfSlav 679]

I find sown camping in some cases natural... especially when the whole team advances as one and crushes it's enemy. In this case what do you do? You spawn camp with your teammates.

[Bunnymanxx 493]

It's there, there isn't too much done to avoid it so certainly be around.

 

Varies depending on maps, so 'reasons' like you didn't guard your flanks are totally meaningless on maps like poland where you can shoot into spawn after maybe 10 seconds (depending on speed of tank). But in maps like Kursk are fully valid.

 

And pretty easy to avoid, just don't respawn and move to the next game.  But that's maybe my personal spin on the game as due to a long string of changes, I'm pretty apathetic about games now anyway, so bailing early for me isn't a big deal.

 

 

NOW, for one reason why I don't like it in general and it's nothing about fairness etc. It's the same reason I didn't like it in it's various forms in WWIIOnline.  

 

The game no longer plays like a WWII game, and I'm here to play some WWII stuff, not a FPS with tanks.

WWIIOnline had it's campers, hell there were even 30 people squads who specialised in it.  I joined a squad that SPECIFICALLY had a 'no camping' pact with the German squad we usually butted heads against (camping was pretty easy to do).  Even though that made capturing more difficult.  Why that insanity?  Why make it more hard?  Because winning was a side goal, playing a game that looked and felt as much like WWII as we could possibly get it was the primary one.  And sitting parked outside a spawn for minutes at a time certainly wasn't that.   So both sides were like minded in that goal and to this day that game gave the best tactical WWII shooter gameplay, because of that pact.

Camping and any system that games the game mechanics (as opposed to using WWII like tactics) removes that immersion.  Which is why I don't like anything like that.   

 

Edit: and in case you're wondering if I expect that in WT, god no.  Can't compare two groups of people who fight each other daily (I'd guess around 60 each), to a massive group of randoms you get in games.  And even in WWII the pact was a minority.  On you had the pact'ers, the 100% campers, and the rest who kind of winged it.  Not avoiding camping, and not specifically trying to camp.

 

Edit2: makes me thinkg of the question, does GJ care?  If the playerbase really is FPS with tanks, and the talk of a deathmatch mode is making me lean this way, then I don't think camping has that much of an impact on players in general (yeah some won't like it).  WT has already lost its tank 'sim' title (along with the mode, mostly).  

But if they wanted to keep, or get that realistic distinction, that's the type of gameplay you would try and design away as much as possible.

 

 

Edited December 15, 2016 by Bunnymanxx

[cavalo_mORTO 883]

Possible solution, illustrated with Poland map: 

 

Spawn 1 would be available at the beggining of the match, spawns 2, 3 would open within 5-10 min of the battle. Mind you, blue is for friendlies, red is for the enemy.

The player would select his spawn, like it's done right now, and randomly spawn in line along the borders, highlighted in yellow.

[thedab 737]

In armored warfare their got pillboxs with anti-tank guns around the spawn site. that's one way to stop spawn camping

[Steve8066 560]

This is a topic which has various variables associated with it imo.

 

One is that spawn points are too close together/close to cap points. Specically, El Alamein. In the top right hand corner you have 2 spawn points and a cap point. These are that close together that if you hold the cap, you cant fail to camp aswell as the spawns are far too close to the held point. With the map having so much unused space, its quite easy to move the spawns away from this cap. Agreed it wont stop it 100% but it will certainly help.

 

2nd is that some spawns can be overlooked from too far away and although its not camped as in the enemy is inside the spawn, its still camped. Solution is to make sure the spawns cant be seen from half the map away. Ash River has this, also Berlin does but i see that both have received balance issues in the 1.65 update so not sure if these are still evident.

 

3rd is where the enemy just sits inside the spawn point. Have an invisible circle around spawn points in which any enemy entering gets a return to battlefield countdown.

[alexport007 420]

It's fine sometimes, like when your team has squashed the other one and is at their spawn waiting for the couple of players.  It's pretty stupid when a team is losing and one player is spawn camping at the back instead of helping his losing team..

[cavalo_mORTO 883]

11 hours ago, thedab said:

In armored warfare their got pillboxs with anti-tank guns around the spawn site. that's one way to stop spawn camping

 

AI in this game is way too much wallhack, aimbot. Picture the Kursk map, one cannot push trough the middle of the map with a light tank, because the bots will all engage you, revealing your position and crippling you. They can engage from quite afar, which makes it ever more awful.

[sigma__zero@psn 4,650]

I like the spawn campers. The spawn immunity often gives enough time to disable and destroy at least one of them for an easy kill. If there are two or more or in a tough position to kill, choose another spawn or quit the game, your team already lost anyway.

[Brave_Idiot 1,292]

The productive way to address spawn camping is map by map.

 

If every map is simply refined over time spawn camping can be a mute point.

 

Edited December 17, 2016 by fisher4444

[Steve8066 560]

41 minutes ago, fisher4444 said:

The productive way to address spawn camping is map by map.

If every map is simply refined over time spawn camping can be a mute point.

 

 

I do agree with that. Certain maps ive never been camped unless we've been steamrollered to oblivion. Others like Advance to The Rhine has camping everytime i seem to play it.

[Twisted_Tea 327]

I do not think anything should be done for the air or ground spawn camping.

 

On the ground side if you are being spawn camped then your team left their flanks open and let a spawn camper by. when he enemy team all goes down the middle then I happily go to the outside and flank around to shoot the enemy as they spawn in. It causes a very quick and easy disruption to the enemy forces as they stop attacking the objectives and begin attacking me. It gives my team a chance to take the objective or get in a better position to defend it. It's a valid tactic that if used correctly can help win games.

 

On on the air side of things, if you are being spawn camped and you spawn in the air..... Just dive away. Any experienced spawn camper will not dive down too far to chase you and you can get away and climb back up and get into the battle. Very simple and easy to do.

 

On on the ground side spawn camping is a valid tactic but on the air side it has a minimal effect if you are camping the enemy and they know how to handle it so the campers are essentially just wasting their time and leaving their team one player short in the battle.

 

[OtherACTION 5]

There are ways to prevent spawn camping or even camping in general by putting in limitations. Limitations to players such as getting too close to the enemy spawn would trigger a warning as if you are leaving the map, which in this case getting too close to enemy spawn. For general campers who sit and hide should be limited with a time limit as if they are AFK, such as if they dont move for a certain amount of time then they automatically get kicked from the game as if they were AFK.

With limitations added to the game would make matches from all game modes move faster and less waiting time in queue, it would also force players to actually play instead of staying in a single spot and causing their team to lose due to not help advancing and gaining the objectives.

 

Limitation range for spawn camping could be within a 100m radius of the spawn area so players can safely get out of spawn or at least get ready for the fight instead of being bombarded with shells after spawning. AFK rules applies as well to spawn campers so that if they spawn camp from long distances then they would get kicked due to inactivity, such as movement of the vehicle, not just using the gun or turning the turret which would render this system useless & instead of just small movements to cheat the system just make it and area of 10-15 meters so they have to constantly move around which they should be doing and ground units.

[Serpiko82 7,875]

3 hours ago, Myrgtabrakke said:

Tldr: I'm done with this dead game, screw you all. 

 

Said the player who just bought access to Naval CBT. Seriously, man, we all have our bad days and ranting posts once in a while, but the game is currently quite far from dead and this comment is totally irrelevant here (that may explain why you have troubles with moderators).

Edited December 17, 2016 by Serpiko82

[PL_Andrev 7,386]

 

Why people camps? Because they can.

 

There are generally two solutions to fix spawn camping:

1) random and not-visible spawn points for enemies on current maps,

2) moving spawn points (only for big maps like Kursk, Mozdok, El-Alamein, Hurtgen Forest, Normandy) where:

- captured zone changes to spawn point,

- enemy spawn point changes to new zone capture,

- new enemy spawn is activated,

main topic here: 

https://forum.warthunder.com/index.php?/topic/322045-ractangle-maps-moving-spawns-system/

Edited December 17, 2016 by PL_Andrev

[wilfang 123]

On 16/12/2016 at 11:40 AM, thedab said:

In armored warfare their got pillboxs with anti-tank guns around the spawn site. that's one way to stop spawn camping

This would only superficially remove spawn-camping, but this changes nothing. This only delay the "camping" from within the spawn to when they just leave the spawn point, unless the design of the map relevant to the spawn allows players to choose to leave the spawn from a range of exit options, hence their exit route is unpredictable and enemy can't intercept them effectively (an example I could think of is TF2, of course the game is irrelevant to this discussion but I guess it show my point if anyone had tried it before).

 

It is just like in air RB which some players insist on never killing enemies that are on the airfield. Respectable, but I don't see how much better it is, say, if you kill them only after they took off. At low energy state, they are still sitting ducks, and it basically makes no difference between you kill them now or simply strafe their runway in the first place.

[Serpiko82 7,875]

(Talking about Realistic Battles)

 

As I said in other related threads, I don't think that "spawn camping" is a totally game-breaking thing. Imho it should be allowed, but more discouraged than it currently is.

 

In RB air, main airfield AAA could possibly be tuned to have a 66 to 75% chance of being lethal to enemy planes coming within 1.5-2.0 km from the airstrip AND below 800m altitude (that means, they are most likely strafing the runway), So you can repair, take off and spiral up building some energy inside a relatively "protected" airspace. Outside of this "umbrella", AAA should work normally. 

In RB ground it is more difficult to find a proper solution. Right now, when a spawn point is under attack, the advantage is mostly on the attackers' side. In order to discourage spawn camping, a way should be found to effectively shift the tactical advantage to the defenders in the spawn area. 

 

Currently, "spawn campers" can hide in a safe spot while knowing where they can expect enemies to appear. A respawning player, instead,  just pops "pants down" in the middle of an open field, and the current invulnerability timer is most of the times insufficient to repel attackers and secure the spawn, since precious seconds must be spent just to locate an enemy who's usually behind you behind cover and/or angled, already aiming his gun at your ammo rack. In this sense, the solution would be to reverse this situation, by automatically revealing the position of an enemy who's attacking someone inside of the spawn zone, while at the same time making the spawning location of new units more unpredictable, and giving to defenders of the spawn zone every possible tactical help so that they can effectively fight back (but still without making the spawn zone an area of total impunity). The goal is to make it more convenient for enemies to hold back and engage respawning players only after they leave the spawn, rather than rushing in and spawn camp them. 

 

Some suggestions have been already made about this, like automatic marking on the map all enemies in proximity of the spawn zone (and a clearly visible pop-up message "the enemy is attacking our base!"), creation of "dynamic" spawn zones preventing people from spawning right into some enemy's jaws, automatic artillery on spawn attackers, ans such.

 

I would personally add to these suggestions an extended invulnerability timer at spawn (30 seconds), allowing you to fire multiple times even if you move, and possibly being also invisible to enemies until you fire your first shot. Of course, both of these protections would expire immediately if you drive outside of your spawn. 

[MarcialMoose 0]

Most spawns points are open to attack from many angles; it doesn't seem they were designed to prevent spawn camping in the first place. I don't bother re-spawning if my team is on the defensive and the spawn point is undefended. 

Edited December 20, 2016 by MarcialMoose

[The_Doctor_084 1,583]

The major issue with spawn camping often lays with people that forgo objectives on modes like domination and conquest.   Some of it could be alleviated by having ai emplacements in or near spawn zones, other things would be when an opposing player is in the spawn zone if he fires he appears on the mini map for X seconds (for example 10 seconds).  On modes like Battle where the objective is so close to the spawn it's going to end up that one team is being spawn camped because of that.  Some of it is the maps, which is part of the reason I advocate for larger maps, the longer it takes to cross the map the more likely people are to go for the objectives first simply because that's where the action will be and it's more convenient  in terms of being closer to your spawn zone relative to spending the whole time crossing the map and not seeing anything.

[Alfury 178]

I would like to know how the FXXXK a su 85M could stand over 300 20 mm shots of a wirblewind at less that 20m (65 feet) and survive easily OS me? Knowing that at that distance the pen of the 20 mm is over 60 mm and the armour of the su 85 m was only of 45 mm where I was shooting?

 

Nice job GJ.... STalinium armor again?

[Mr X 0]

On 18-12-2016 at 1:01 PM, Tanaj said:

 

 

Nice answer, I dont usually spawn camp, I just wanna know the perfect moment to advance, and stay still, aim, fire, and repeat.

[anothersunday 37]

In red versus blue, once things have progressed to the point that red team player is sitting still in blue's spawn zone, waiting for players to magically appear and become solid so that red can outclick blue, the match is more or less over. At the very least, the point of interesting challenge is over since it's just become Whac-A-Mole.

 

Given the direction that things are going for the game, I don't really expect anything to be done to change this but I will make some suggestions. This is directed at ground forces. Air has slightly different issues.

 

If spawn points are not to be protected from enemy players by in-game mechanisms, allow spawn points to be captured. If you are red and in blue's spawn point, you are capping it *and* simultaneously preventing blue from spawning on that point. Fully capping it destroys the point or randomly relocates it. Capping all enemy spawn points ends the match. Thus, incentive for players who want to get kills is to stay out of the cap, since spawn camping no longer creates Whac-A-Mole situations.

 

To facilitate this, spawns would have to be better shielded from long-range direct-sight visual sniping. Situations could still arise such that players could get trapped in a killzone formed outside the spawn point. But IMO that is better than the current situation.

[Serpiko82 7,875]

4 hours ago, anothersunday said:

allow spawn points to be captured. If you are red and in blue's spawn point, you are capping it *and* simultaneously preventing blue from spawning on that point. Fully capping it destroys the point or randomly relocates it. Capping all enemy spawn points ends the match. Thus, incentive for players who want to get kills is to stay out of the cap, since spawn camping no longer creates Whac-A-Mole situations.

 

I like this idea as well, particularly the highlighted part. Still needs refinements though, in some maps it is easy to sneak BEHIND a spawn point and spawn kill from there. 

 

This suggestion could be merged with those asking for spawn zones to be off-limits to the enemy team. We could have something like this - example with Eastern Europe map: the spawn zones at the outskirts of the town can be reached and captured; if they are not in full control (captured by the enemy or being decapped) players are forced to respawn in the other, further away spawn zones (those used in the larger version of the map), and those will be deep inside "return to battlefield!" territory for the enemy team. 

[shortplayernameshortplayername 1,026]

I think spawn camping is an issue on a good handful of maps, but that is more because of poor design over anything. Maps like Poland have cap circles 100m from a spawn with a tiny hill to cover the fresh spawns. There are times where one team powers through to a cap, kills most of the team and then keeps powering towards the spawn. I'm okay with that situation except for being forced to spawn with the penalty of a crew lock for not wanting to waste SL on an useless SPAA truck. The only other scenario I can think of that is common is when a handful of one team flanks around and sits in the enemy's spawn or behind their cap zone. 

 

Some easy fixes would be to add AT bunkers that can possibly be destroyed or have a small range circle that only covers a spawn zone. Add AI AT infantry that can't be killed that constantly mark and shoot an enemy tank if they are in a spawn (behind where the tanks spawn). 

 

Redesign maps with poor protection and give them buildings, broken walls, etc that the enemy can't abuse. 

 

Remove the crew lock system if a match has gone longer than X minutes or 1 team is at X total tickets so you aren't forced to spawn in to get instantly killed. 

[Drag0nBait 9]

Its one of my biggest gripes with this game.

I despise spawn camping. I refuse to do it myself.

I was always taught that when playing a social game (which WT is), you have an obligation to your fellow players not be a douche, to provide a climate of fair play and hte old fashioned "Give everyone a fair go".

Unfortunately, alot of people just couldn't care less about the people they are playing with and whether their actions are having a negative impact on them. edited behaviour that is allowed to continue and propagate is not a healthy thing for any multiplayer game(not healthy for anything actually).

It shouldnt be a question of "Well, Im allowed to do it and everyone else does it so why shouldnt ? It should be "hmmm.. I hate it when I get spawn camped and it really is pretty crappy behaviour and I know it just annoys people. Maybe Ill just setup an ambush along their major routes of travel between spawn and the objectives"

It could be addressed in several ways. A few good suggestions have been forward in this topic already.

Spawn camping is edited at the highest level and it needs to be addressed.