Flag Ideas

[The Gecko]

I know there is a flag list at bzflag.org, but maybe you haven't been able to get your ideas onto that list. Or maybe there is a flag on that list that was voted against that you would like to see in the game. Here's your chance!

It would probably be a good idea to read the flag list, at http://bzflag.org/wiki/FlagList before listing your ideas.

If there is one flag I would like to see, it's Show Off!
(Check out the description of Show Off at the flag list).
Who thought that one up?

Some of my ideas include:
Auto Teleport (AT)
Ice Laser (IL)
Swallow Tanks (SW)
Friend Flag (FD)
Score Flag (SF)
Black Death (BD)

Tell me all your flag ideas...

[The Red Baron]

and what do those flags do?

[DooDooJew]

Something that I would like to see, is being able to mix flags. Imagine being able to have Wings and Guided Missiles. Or even Cloaking and Stealth. If it were to happen it should show flags in black that you are able to combine the flag that you have with.

[sid6.7]

Something that I would like to see, is being able to mix flags. Imagine being able to have Wings and Guided Missiles. Or even Cloaking and Stealth. If it were to happen it should show flags in black that you are able to combine the flag that you have with.

if you'll read that page above you see that there will never be a combined
arms flag its too powerful and ruins game play totally....


whats amazing is the yes and no votes on flags
they said yes to some really patheic flags and no to
a few interesting ones...

french fry flag? yes? whoever voted for that should
get 5 upside the head...

raining frogs? yes? use it once then never again
well that was worth while wasnt it....

i do believe we have some problems with who is
in charge of the direction bzflag is going...

[The Gecko]

and what do those flags do?

Go to the flag list at bzflag.org to find out.

[The Gecko]

whats amazing is the yes and no votes on flags
they said yes to some really patheic flags and no to
a few interesting ones...

french fry flag? yes? whoever voted for that should
get 5 upside the head...

raining frogs? yes? use it once then never again
well that was worth while wasnt it....

i do believe we have some problems with who is
in charge of the direction bzflag is going...

I think sid6.7 has a point, but for the most part, I think they did a good job choosing flags. I wouldn't go so far as to say there is a problem with who is in charge.

Speaking of who is in charge, who IS in charge?

[The Gecko]

Another flag I would like to see is, Guass Gun (GG).

It would have bullets twice as big that go twice as fast as normal bullets, and it would have a twice as long reload time. Also, when the bullets hit something, they explode with a small radius of damage.
The tank would move kick back when it fired this weapon.

[RPG]

I think that'd be a little unfair. Maybe giant bullets but normal speed.

[The Gecko]

Maybe if Guass Gun had a really long reload...?

[Valoche]

I'd say giants bullets with half the speed. You don't want to create a weapon that's too powerful. Those totally ruin the game.
Remember the fun in BZflag is tactics and skills, not the ability to find a good flag that will give you easy kills.

Valoche

[Smidge204]

AutoTeleport

Pros: Would make it easier to get to some otherwise hard to reach places.

Cons: How would you handle areas that have multiple levels/buildings? This is especially important since many maps have EXTREMELY high areas with many levels below them. You would need a mechanism to specify what elevation to teleport to. (Failing that, always teleport to the same elevation as your current position, and if you get sealed in a building you will have to self destruct)


Ice Laser

Since this weapon flag is non lethal, there isn't much use for it. Freezing the other player would not give you a point, and if the player doesn't die when shot then there isn't even any advantage to freezing him in the first place. You may as well use a normal laser and kill him. Also, "White" is a valid tank color in Rabbit mode.


Kamakazi Attack

Bad flag, if anything. You will almost always lose points on this one, moreso if you're on a team, since the possibility of killing teammates becoems rather high...


Swallow Tank

Limited usefulness, although there might be some advantage. Tanks in the air are easily picked off though, so the chance of the "swallowed" tanks makign it to the ground are not so good... probably leading your teammates into a death trap. (Also, "SW" is already taken)


FrienD flag

Probably the most useful of the bunch, however I would expect the shot to not go through freindly tanks, just not kill them. Also, flag should be dropped automatically on the first friendly fire hit.


Electricity Bolt

Too much like "The finger of god".


Score Flags

You'ld need this just to make up for all the points you'ld lose from the other flags you suggested!


Black Death

Again, too much like a "finger of god" flag. this one is especially bad since it would require NO skill at all to use... just get lucky enough to be the first guy to find it.


------------------------------

Now, I'd be all in favor of a steerable bullet flag. If any of you are old enough to remember "Combat" for the Atari 2600, there was a game mode that linked the direction the shot traveled with the rotation of your tank, allowing you to "steer" the shot around walls. This would be a really sneaky weapon, but would actually require skill to use (gasp!) and would leave you vulnerable while your attention is focused elsewhere.

=Smidge=

[The Gecko]

Thank you for taking the time to comment on those flags, Smidge. Very well done.

Maybe Auto Teleport shouldn't be used on maps with lots of levels.

You're right, SW was already used, so was ST...Hmmm...what does that leave? SA? You can't shoot eveyone at once, so some of the players popping out would have a chance. Maybe there is a different method of ejecting the players...any ideas?

Ice Laser being non-lethal doesn't mean it's not useful, it can greatly hinder the other team.

For the Friend Flag I like your ideas, I think you are right, the flag should be dropped after you shoot a teammate (or yourself).

What is the "finger of god?"
Electricity bolt would require skill, you have to get close enough to a building to shoot it, it's only short range.

I think you miss understand what black death is... It's a flag for CTF. When you take it to your base and capture it, you kill all the other teams, instead of capturing a certain colored flag and only killing the team of that color. So intead of 2 or more flags on a CTF map, there would only be one. Everyone would be trying to control the Black flag. The only drawback would be that the winning team could have someone waiting at the flag drop sight and just capture it again and again. This could be stopped or slowed by making the bases hard to get to, or having a time limit before the flag redrops after it's captured (allowing the other teams time to get to the drop sight), or when the flag is captured, the losing teams respawn randomly (not back at their base). If the losing teams respawn randomly you could say that this flag is like genocide...Not really, you can't kill ALL the other teams with genocide unless you shoot a player on each team, I think it would still be fun.

Your idea for a steerable bullet is a good idea. They are already thinking of making GM steerable, but a steerable bullet would be different. What happens if someone fires the bullet and backs up? Does the bullet slow down? This would be kind of a cheat.

By the way, Kamakazi Attack wasn't my idea, but feel free to comment on any flag idea.

[Valoche]

I just had an idea: the Hot Potato (bad) flag.

If you get it, a 30 seconds coutdown (or more, server configurable) begins, and your tank becoms just as fast as when you have Thief. You can fire a little beam, with instant reload. Of course, you cannot drop the flag, except when you die.

If you hit a tank with your beam, *he* gets the Hot Potato flag, loosing the flag he had before. The coutdown resets to 10 (it's like he just picked the flag).

If the coutdown reaches 0 while you carry the flag, you are dead.

Valoche

[sid6.7]

I just had an idea: the Hot Potato (bad) flag.

If you get it, a 30 seconds coutdown (or more, server configurable) begins, and your tank becoms just as fast as when you have Thief. You can fire a little beam, with instant reload. Of course, you cannot drop the flag, except when you die.

If you hit a tank with your beam, *he* gets the Hot Potato flag, loosing the flag he had before. The coutdown resets to 10 (it's like he just picked the flag).

If the coutdown reaches 0 while you carry the flag, you are dead.

Valoche

this is kinda been done there is even a league for it...HTF
"hold the flag"....i think

[SilverFox]

Veloche, I think that's an AWESOME idea! (though not like HTF really)

The flag carrier would have to have some serious advantage though. Maybe wings and faster speed and turn, etc...

It'd help if the map was a little smaller than normal too.

[Smidge204]

Maybe there is a different method of ejecting the players...any ideas?

Yeah, have the players inside die as well if the carrier tank gets hit. Basically, you'ld be modding the tank to be a container, so if the container gets destroyed everything inside of it would, too. For offloading, just drop the flag and all the other tanks would just reappear at that spot.

What is the "finger of god?"

That name implies the weapon is so amazingly powerful that it makes it unstoppable and brutally unfair. GM is almost at that point but it can still be dodged and there needs to be a reasonably clear shot. SW is almost at that point except is has a fairly short range.

Electricity bolt would require skill, you have to get close enough to a building to shoot it, it's only short range.

Define "Building". Everything is made of blocks, pyramids, cylinders and cones. A "building" would likely be a commection of these objects, so now you need a way to associate all these objects as being part of the same structure.

Your idea for a steerable bullet is a good idea. They are already thinking of making GM steerable, but a steerable bullet would be different. What happens if someone fires the bullet and backs up? Does the bullet slow down? This would be kind of a cheat.

No, the way I imagine it working is that the bullet's vector and the tank's (actually, the player's camera) vector would remain parallel. For example, if you shoot due north then turn and face east, the bullet would go north and arc as you turned and eventually go east as well. But, because the bullet is always moving, it would take a curved path and end up northeast of you instead of due east. (It wouldn't stay directly in front of you). Your own forward/reverse speed would be irrelevant.

It also wouldn't ricochet. If it hit a wall it would just fizzle.

If you're good (or stupid?) you could shoot yourself in the back with it, assuming the shot lifetime is long enough.
=Smidge=

[JeffM]

Define "Building". Everything is made of blocks, pyramids, cylinders and cones. A "building" would likely be a commection of these objects, so now you need a way to associate all these objects as being part of the same structure.

A building can be a mesh now in addition to a primitive. There are Groups as well in the 2.0 format so you could apply atributes to them.

Not that I think you'd get Tim to approve any of these, your going very complex and that breaks the simple nature of the game.

[netochka nezvanova]

how about a "drop flag" flag

works only if you already have a flag
if you drive over the 'drop flag' flag you drop the current flag

so it's carefull driving when you own a superflag you never know if there is a 'drop flag' flag ahead ...

[So an So]

I just had an idea: the Hot Potato (bad) flag.

If you get it, a 30 seconds coutdown (or more, server configurable) begins, and your tank becoms just as fast as when you have Thief. You can fire a little beam, with instant reload. Of course, you cannot drop the flag, except when you die.

If you hit a tank with your beam, *he* gets the Hot Potato flag, loosing the flag he had before. The coutdown resets to 10 (it's like he just picked the flag).

If the coutdown reaches 0 while you carry the flag, you are dead.

Valoche

This sounds like a great flag!!
someone please make it happen

[Scorch]

yes hot potato sounds great.

[trepan]

some hot potato history from a year and a half ago
(there are other related posts as well):

http://my.bzflag.org/bb/viewtopic.php?p=11230#11230

[Men Without Hats]

Noticed the Flag List...

Cow launcher?

Poor cows.

[The Purple Panzer]

When reading the Flaglist, I kept thinking that it could get extremely confusing (even now in 2.0 I see new flag abbreviations that take a few seconds to figure out). It'd be nice if we could get most of these new behaviors by combining partial flags, or otherwise factoring the abilities/liabilities into a small set of basic attributes.

Think for example of quarks, which have different properties and combine in different ways to produce subatomic particles. "Partial flags" could each affect some attribute (maneuverability, weapons mode, sensors), so there would be a relatively small number in each category. You could accumulate partial flags (but perhaps only one of each type), giving you the sorts of combinations that the Flaglist shows.

If there were such a list of 'normal' partial flags (normal meaning independent, and ideally spanning the full range of a category), it'd be a lot clearer to figure out how to get the abilities you want, or understand the abilities you have. You'd only have to learn the partials in each category, and you'd know what all of the possible combinations would do.
Some partials could be the negatives of others, so combinations like Laser/Cloaking would arise naturally.

I expect this might be too idealized to be practical, but I still think there's something that might be useful lurking in the idea. Maybe you don't pick up partial flags (which would get into the 'multiple flags' problems), but when you grab a flag for a category, you have to pick one of that category's subflags, or you get to choose from a set of attributes.

[Valoche]

some hot potato history from a year and a half ago
(there are other related posts as well):
http://my.bzflag.org/bb/viewtopic.php?p=11230#11230

Hum...
But what do *you* think about this flag?

[SilverFox]

This doesn't sound terribly hard. Basically, use the self-destruct routine, but make it a longer value based on a bzdb variable. (say _potatoTimer), but it would require a different game type specified.

You could base the game type on rabbit chase, and select the initial player to be "carrying the potato", of course there is no reason to make a flag for this, just the tank would be white, and would have to kill before time runs out (or make it more interesting and have it so they can either kill or get a remedy flag, in which case the tank farthest away would become the hot potato.)

Of course "hard" is relative. Its terribly hard for a newb like me, but any one of the l33t dev's would probably say it wouldn't be completely unreasonable to do.

Anyhow, I dig it.