Free Camera Abuse

[tabten]

Why does WoR have the free camera for spectating available to everyone during the game?

Anyone can use it and instantly see where opponents are all over the map, thus negating surprise flanking manoeuvres.

Without surprise flanking attacks the game will just end up in head to head slugfests of attrition.

Don’t get me wrong, free camera looks great on YouTube videos to show what’s happening in battles, but it is naive in the extreme to believe this feature will not be rampantly abused when the game goes public.

It’s bad enough when we have spies in PvP games sharing info via Teamspeak.

This feature will make cheating easier than ever.

Can I suggest the only spectator view should be friendly player view?

[GeneralMatt1440p]

I agree with this. It is a really cool way of getting beautiful pictures in battles but I’ve seen it happen now and then and it makes it less fun on certain maps like they know exactly what flank your going towards and how many guys are there in whichever flank. I will admit I have used it once to tell my guys in my company where they are strongest but I didn’t tell anyone else in game.

[[CG]TrustyJam]

Removing the WoR Cam won't change the possibility of ghosting as you can just have a single guy playing on the other team and relay the information to your group.

- Trusty

[tabten]

Originally posted by CGTrustyJam:

Removing the WoR Cam won't change the possibility of ghosting as you can just have a single guy playing on the other team and relay the information to your group.

- Trusty

Hi Trusty & thanks for the reply.

What you say is true, but that form of cheating requires some effort and a certain amount of pre-meditation. I acknowledge that in my post above.

And a ghosting player cannot be all over the battlefield at once and can miss a lot in first person view compared to the free camera.

By comparison, the free camera seems so easy to abuse and substantially increases the likelihood of cheating, which in turn can affect gameplay quality and the fun factor as ‘surprise’ moves and flanking attacks are regularly countered.

Isn’t this a case of harm minimisation? If you remove free camera, you substantially reduce the chances of cheating and increase the fun factor for all?

Surely game integrity and fun should rank over some pretty screenshots?

[[CG]TrustyJam]

A ghosting player doesn't need to be all over the battlefield at once in order to be effective. He just needs to stick to the largest group of players and report their position.

- Trusty

[tabten]

But a ghost on one part of the battlefield is still nowhere near as affective as a one-button push “spy in the sky” any player can use at any time and see everywhere.

Is your position “spies might be inevitable, therefore making it easier for everyone to see everything doesn’t matter.”?

Surely you can see this should be a harm minimisation issue rather than throwing up the white flag and making this too easy?

[tabten]

Sorry Trusty I don’t mean to badger you on this, I just think the implications go beyond people cheating.

We run the risk of the game just being a defensive slugfest, with the attacker always at an obvious disadvantage. Not to mention a potentially toxic environment with constant accusations of free cam abuse.

Your game looks beautiful and I get the importance of screenshots and videos. But a lot of these can be taken in drill camp (using free cam) or from the first person view.

[Sweet Nerevar]

Can it be limit to just server admins and moderator?

This way server admins or owner can chose trusty person who can spectate an event.

[Josh]

ridic answer. All FPS games were dead with such camera....nothin to do with cheating ghost players on nmy team, thats realy not the same.