Problems with Insurgency

[JAMTAM]

I'll get straight to the point on why I think Insurgency needs tweaking. After playing insurgency with the new .95 update, I noticed that this asymmetrical game type is starting to feel a lot more like Vanilla and a lot less like the intended "mil-sim" shooter. This is due to the fact that insurgents are too powerful or equal to BluFor's (western army) capabilities:

1. Insurgents are too accurate
The accuracy of Insurgents with small-arms seems to be on par with Western armies, and is therefore unrealistic. Insurgent forces tend to be comprised of lightly armed militia men with introductory training on small arms. They are civilians who have decided to become combatants. They are not professional soldiers, and as a result should not be as skilled as a conventional soldier. The accuracy of RPGs in the hands of Insurgents is a prime example of how unrealistically accurate and competent the insurgents are with these weapons. Hummers and APCs are essentially RPG meat due to the unrealistic effectiveness posed by insurgent forces. LAVs and strykers should intimidate the opposition.

2. BluFor should control the battle-space
The current counter-insurgency wars fought in Iraq and A-stan demonstrate the superiority of Western armies against local militias, and therefore should be reflected in-game. Hit-and-run tactics, as well as ambushes are the name of the game for irregular forces facing a more technologically advanced foe. In PR however, a squad of insurgents vs a squad of Marines is a fair fight. Force on force contact is the exception not the rule in the conflicts involving the US and irregulars for example. Irregular forces should have to rely on cunning as oppose to direct action when facing an opponent armed with APCs, advanced optics etc.

3. Modern western soldiers are very difficult to kill
Reference actual Battle Damage Assessments yourself (ie Wikileaks lol!). As stated earlier, BluFor is generally defined as being a well-trained, highly lethal, technologically advanced fighting force. The battles in Iraq and A-stan can produce an estimated kill ratio of 30:1 or 50:1 in favor of BluFor depending on the source. I'll reckon that the kills gained by BluFor and Insurgents are pretty much equal, where significantly more kills for BluFor would be more 'realistic'.

I believe tweaks should be made to the aforementioned issues above. People playing as BluFor should have a feeling of superiority when confronting the enemy. Insurgents should have to rely on cunning and unconventional tactics in order to succeed. Destroying an enemy Stryker or Tank should be a big accomplishment when playing PR. I'd be interested to know how often BluFor actually wins rounds, because it appears to be an increasingly rare event.

I propose that:

1.Insurgent forces have their accuracy decreased especially in regards to the use of RPGs.

2. BluFor is given fewer tickets and a greater penalty for losing assets such as tanks, helicopters, APCs.

3. Remove field dressings from Ins forces

In conclusion, tweaks that decrease the battlefield effectiveness of Insurgent forces and increase the cost and reward of losing or destroying BluFor heavy assets should help in reestablishing the feeling of a asymmetrical conflict. To my critics who argue that these changes would be "unfair", I'd say that is the whole point. AAS provides a gametype of 2 forces of similar capability fighting for the same objective. Insurgency is at its essence an asymmetrical conflict and should be designed as such.

Thanks for reading and look forward to hearing your thoughts!

[Infantry4Ever]

Do you know how hard it would be to code this? Just by having insurgents be less accurate would probably cause a drop in insurgency

[Rissien]

Go play .85 than because at least as far as insurgent accuracy and your feild dressings there it is. We had it, and improved.

[samogon100500]

BLUFOR need more power?I don't think so.
This is Player vs Player battles,not Player vs Bot.They must be have balance for both sides,or it makes non-interesting fights for both sides(1s side died at 10 seconds after spawn,2nd side just shooting and don't try to find caches).

[Exterior]

Actually in Afghanistan the Taliban have been training to fight all their life, sure not as good of training as the Blufor but atleast some training. The Taliban will actually set an ambush then stay and fight. Insurgents are the ones who can't hit a thing, they are too accurate in game, but hey..some things need to be sacrificed for gameplay...no one woulld play as insurgents if they couldnt atleast stand a chance to kill someone.

[dtacs]

1. Insurgents are too accurate
The accuracy of Insurgents with small-arms seems to be on par with Western armies, and is therefore unrealistic. Insurgent forces tend to be comprised of lightly armed militia men with introductory training on small arms. They are civilians who have decided to become combatants. They are not professional soldiers, and as a result should not be as skilled as a conventional soldier. The accuracy of RPGs in the hands of Insurgents is a prime example of how unrealistically accurate and competent the insurgents are with these weapons. Hummers and APCs are essentially RPG meat due to the unrealistic effectiveness posed by insurgent forces. LAVs and strykers should intimidate the opposition.

It isn't at all. The AK-47 is considerably unnaccurate at range. It doesn't take a trained soldier to use a rifle properly either. If you want to get in deep, imagine that the Insurgents have had training on the rifle, firing in single shots and aiming for centre mass. There are hundreds of tips on shooting rifles available on the internet in addition to all the US Army soldier manuals, not to mention training camps throughout the Middle East/Central Asia.

Whilst the conventional tactics that Insurgents can use are highly successful, decreasing their accuracy is a silly way to increase the already prevalent imbalance on Insurgency maps.

2. BluFor should control the battle-space
The current counter-insurgency wars fought in Iraq and A-stan demonstrate the superiority of Western armies against local militias, and therefore should be reflected in-game. Hit-and-run tactics, as well as ambushes are the name of the game for irregular forces facing a more technologically advanced foe. In PR however, a squad of insurgents vs a squad of Marines is a fair fight. Force on force contact is the exception not the rule in the conflicts involving the US and irregulars for example. Irregular forces should have to rely on cunning as oppose to direct action when facing an opponent armed with APCs, advanced optics etc.

The reason they are balanced is because this isn't real life, and balance is key to the success of a video game. If the Insurgents had little weapons and were forced to do only ambushes and whatnot, every Insurgent would Alt+F4 when they see the map loading.

Nobody wants to play a game where one team is simply getting raped as they are not given the assets to defend themselves. Honestly this topic has been bought up a ton of times, but bad luck, societies cannot be properly replicated on the engine so the Insurgents acting in their civilian form is impossible to show.

3. Modern western soldiers are very difficult to kill
Reference actual Battle Damage Assessments yourself (ie Wikileaks lol!). As stated earlier, BluFor is generally defined as being a well-trained, highly lethal, technologically advanced fighting force. The battles in Iraq and A-stan can produce an estimated kill ratio of 30:1 or 50:1 in favor of BluFor depending on the source. I'll reckon that the kills gained by BluFor and Insurgents are pretty much equal, where significantly more kills for BluFor would be more 'realistic'.

I believe tweaks should be made to the aforementioned issues above. People playing as BluFor should have a feeling of superiority when confronting the enemy. Insurgents should have to rely on cunning and unconventional tactics in order to succeed. Destroying an enemy Stryker or Tank should be a big accomplishment when playing PR. I'd be interested to know how often BluFor actually wins rounds, because it appears to be an increasingly rare event.

Nope, you're making the suggestion, so you reference it. If you state facts and don't reference them, you're going to find yourself swiftly infracted and banned.

If they should rely on cunning and unconventional tactics, find another engine and develop your own game, or wait for PR2/PRA, because replicating a proper Insurgency on the BF2 engine is impossible.

1.Insurgent forces have their accuracy decreased especially in regards to the use of RPGs.

Whilst in real life the RPG-7 is terribly inaccurate at large ranges, making it even more inaccurate is silly. When you're still and you aim the perfectly cleaned and maintained RPG at enemy armor then it misses, the last thing you would want is it going off even more.

2. BluFor is given fewer tickets and a greater penalty for losing assets such as tanks, helicopters, APCs.

They may have an overload of tickets, but the BLUFOR take a terrible loss from assets like choppers already. Increasing ticket loss for assets isn't a good idea.

3. Remove field dressings from Ins forces

Why? First aid training is readily available both through the internet and local establishments. Dressings can be bought both online and in pharmacies or even an old torn shirt will do. I know, because I have my senior first aid certificate. In addition, an Insurgent shouldn't be punished for dying simply because he fell down a 1ft ledge and began to bleed out.

In conclusion, tweaks that decrease the battlefield effectiveness of Insurgent forces and increase the cost and reward of losing or destroying BluFor heavy assets should help in reestablishing the feeling of a asymmetrical conflict. To my critics who argue that these changes would be "unfair", I'd say that is the whole point. AAS provides a gametype of 2 forces of similar capability fighting for the same objective. Insurgency is at its essence an asymmetrical conflict and should be designed as such.

Basically, I'll end it with this. There is a very fine line between realism and practicality, making the BLUFOR a godly force that obliterates the Insurgent factions whilst taking minimal casualties is silly and not in spirit with the game. The aim of Insurgency is for both teams to be equally balanced in their own rights, but removing alot of the Insurgents' positive traits will just ruin this gamemode furthermore. I completely disagree with everything you have said and I'm not alone in saying that, you'll also find that your suggestions have been made many many times and not one has been implemented.

[Dev1200]

I think it would be fair to add more deviation for insurgents, especially with RPG's. Removing medical equipment would be dumb, as it would be impossible to heal unless all insurgents stay near caches and a civi camps at the cache and heals everyone.

[PoisonBill]

Don't underestimate the Taliban, but if you want too you can see the Taliban on the Taliban maps as elite Taliban soldiers who don't fall back and fight till the death, Taliban.

[JAMTAM]

H[=Rissien;1521464']Go play .85 than because at least as far as insurgent accuracy and your feild dressings there it is. We had it, and improved.

Contrasting 0.85 to 0.95, I'd argue that 0.85 was far better at depicting asymmetrical gameplay than our current version. For some reason I remember BluFor being a tougher opponent, and the difficulty of destroying Tanks/APC gave them greater importance. Perhaps my rant could just be an observation on my part that the pendulum has swung too far in favor of insurgents. Am I on my own in saying that generally BluFor wins fewer rounds than the insurgents? Back in the ole 0.85 days, being a fragile insurgent facing armor and helis was part of the fun and helped differentiate the gameplay of Insurgency from AAS. I hope I don't open a can-o-worms but I think the changes to the RP system really gave the insurgents a huge advantage over BluFor.

So yeah, basically I do think 0.85 insurgency was overall better. Lastly, are 0.85 servers still around? If they are than I guess all of this is moot and I should be there as oppose to posting in the suggestion forums!

[ComradeHX]

I think it would be fair to add more deviation for insurgents, especially with RPG's. Removing medical equipment would be dumb, as it would be impossible to heal unless all insurgents stay near caches and a civi camps at the cache and heals everyone.

I agree to adding 0.01 to 0.1 onto base deviation for insurgent weapons to simulate poor maintainence and condition.

I'll get straight to the point on why I think Insurgency needs tweaking. After playing insurgency with the new .95 update, I noticed that this asymmetrical game type is starting to feel a lot more like Vanilla and a lot less like the intended "mil-sim" shooter. This is due to the fact that insurgents are too powerful or equal to BluFor's (western army) capabilities:

1. Insurgents are too accurate
The accuracy of Insurgents with small-arms seems to be on par with Western armies, and is therefore unrealistic. Insurgent forces tend to be comprised of lightly armed militia men with introductory training on small arms. They are civilians who have decided to become combatants. They are not professional soldiers, and as a result should not be as skilled as a conventional soldier. The accuracy of RPGs in the hands of Insurgents is a prime example of how unrealistically accurate and competent the insurgents are with these weapons. Hummers and APCs are essentially RPG meat due to the unrealistic effectiveness posed by insurgent forces. LAVs and strykers should intimidate the opposition.

2. BluFor should control the battle-space
The current counter-insurgency wars fought in Iraq and A-stan demonstrate the superiority of Western armies against local militias, and therefore should be reflected in-game. Hit-and-run tactics, as well as ambushes are the name of the game for irregular forces facing a more technologically advanced foe. In PR however, a squad of insurgents vs a squad of Marines is a fair fight. Force on force contact is the exception not the rule in the conflicts involving the US and irregulars for example. Irregular forces should have to rely on cunning as oppose to direct action when facing an opponent armed with APCs, advanced optics etc.

3. Modern western soldiers are very difficult to kill
I propose that:

1.Insurgent forces have their accuracy decreased especially in regards to the use of RPGs.

2. BluFor is given fewer tickets and a greater penalty for losing assets such as tanks, helicopters, APCs.

3. Remove field dressings from Ins forces

In conclusion, tweaks that decrease the battlefield effectiveness of Insurgent forces and increase the cost and reward of losing or destroying BluFor heavy assets should help in reestablishing the feeling of a asymmetrical conflict. To my critics who argue that these changes would be "unfair", I'd say that is the whole point. AAS provides a gametype of 2 forces of similar capability fighting for the same objective. Insurgency is at its essence an asymmetrical conflict and should be designed as such.

Thanks for reading and look forward to hearing your thoughts!

1. If you had noticed, the RPG hits at that kind of long range depends on luck, a lot.

2. Not really fair for Blufor because one Gary in the base = Blufor fail.

3. That will be unrealistic.

Also, Insurgency already has asymmetry: no optics on most insurgent weaponry; no RP; no UAV; no armor; suicide-bikes; less grenades...etc. In addition to in-game elements, most INS game are stacked, with clans on the BluFor and random people on Insurgent/Taliban...etc side; very realistic.

[JAMTAM]

There is a very fine line between realism and practicality, making the BLUFOR a godly force that obliterates the Insurgent factions whilst taking minimal casualties is silly and not in spirit with the game.

Interesting point and I appreciate the time you took in responding to my post.

I'll have to say that I disagree that our current iteration of insurgency is "less silly" than the 0.85 version. In fact, I think it is more silly that the insurgents can engage BluFor toe to toe.
Like I said before, insurgency is about asymmetric warfare. A local militia facing off against a superpower is unbalanced, and in my opinion is the spirit of the gametype. AAS has 2 sides with the same objective. Insurgency has 2 sides with different objectives. Insurgents want to rack up BluFor body counts to erode public support for the war at home. This is represented by bleeding BluFor of its tickets. BluFor wants to crush the insurgency by removing safehouses and weapons caches. "Killing them all" is impractical and unrealistic and therefore the aim of BluFor is not to rack up kills.

The aim of Insurgency is for both teams to be equally balanced in their own rights, but removing alot of the Insurgents' positive traits will just ruin this gamemode furthermore.

This "equalization" only erodes the concept of asymmetrical warfare and makes both sides have similar capabilities, yet different objectives.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy PR 0.95. IMO I just miss the unique and challenging game type that the older versions of Insurgency offered.

And finally kudos on bringing up the horrific image of the poor Ins player who scrapes his knee and must now bleed to death. On second thought, field dressings are a very reasonable addition!

[dtacs]

This "equalization" only erodes the concept of asymmetrical warfare and makes both sides have similar capabilities, yet different objectives.

They don't have similar capabilities at all. While the Insurgents have to be up and close (less accurate weapons, anti-armor vehicles having to be relatively close bar the SPG technical) the BLUFOR can engage from range, which is often why getting as close as possible is the best choice.

While it does get further away from the concept that Insurgency is trying to achieve, there is only so much the developers can do. One thing would be to drastically increase cache amounts, but when there were 10 caches it seemed to be a tad unbalanced to the Insurgents, surprisingly enough.

In my opinion, the failures of Insurgency are down to a map by map basis. While Archer and Kokan offer a somewhat substantial amount of hope to the Taliban, Basrah and Karbala are rape sessions thanks to the drastic overload of US vehicles which whist realistic, pummel the Insurgents and stem their movements around the city, which is somewhat unrealistic considering they live and work in them.

[Herbiie]

3. Remove field dressings from Ins forces

NO.

It was HELL when insurgents didn't have field dressings, "Oh, I appear to have fallen of a roof. I'm going to slowly bleed to death now!"

We're never going to get a realistic insurgency, your suggestions just won't help. Reducing BluFor tickets will just make insurgents win, and Insurgents already can't engage BluFor at long range, a squad of blufor vs a squad of insurgents at a range greater than 100m would mean the Blufor win.

You forget that most engagements in PR are far too close, if you get a realistic fire fight distance of 200m+ then Blufor will win every time, just go & play operation Archer.

We simply can't give the Insurgents the advantages they have in real life, knowing the ground acting as civvis etc.

[Thermis]

PR game play is aimed at balance and fun, along with realism. Realistically the insurgents wouldn't be able to stand up to western force, but that wouldn't be too much fun in the game now would it?

Everything you have suggested has been suggested before, and either deemed unfeasible in the engine, or not a good idea for game play reasons.

You need to search and make sure we haven't talked about your ideas in the past, I know this sucks because you have to read a lot of things and actually put effort into your posts. But its better because you won't make team members unhappy because they have to read the same thing over and over and over again because people don't want to research their suggestions.


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