I wasnt sure to write it or not, but who cares :) ESR loves drama and whining :p

I have played/watched a lot of matches of Quake 3 (osp, cpma), Quake 4 and Quakelive. I have seen/played many different players and their gamestyles, always been a 1vs1 fan.

Ok, this is the end of foreplay, going to the point now :)

I have been playing QL since the closed beta and these are my observations. The base of the game is good, I mean weapon balance in taking damage - 777 lg especially, I would say 80 dmg from rg is nice too and other similar basic things. But when you take a look a little bit deeper - the game conditions always create concrete styles, the winning styles exactly. I would say QL is based on defensive style of playing, examples are below:

Rapha
Well known of it, generally there is nothing to explain.

Cypher
Comparing to how he has been playing in 2008 (cpma) and even in quakecon 2009 (ql) to how he is playing now - He understood that aggressive style is not longer worth. Who would have thought that he will be winning games in hockey scores.

Strenx
Well known of his LG rushing but in the last events he has played much more defenisve and he started to using rocket launcher :p

Avek
Comparing how he has been playing in q3 he is much more defensive player now (until he is not falling into emo-style:p)

Avek, cypher, strenx - these players had to change their styles in the greatest extent in my opinion.

Which factors influence on defensive play? As always, the devil is in details:

Timelimit 10:
There is no time to comeback, so thats why the first frag is so important and makes the game like a chess. Besides it how many retaken control of the map we have got? 1-2? Thats why we have no risks.

Rocket launcher:
Yes, yes - higher speed of the missiles makes it easier to use (great +back weapon)

Railgun:
Hard to explain, its much easier to use even with 80 dmg. The frequency of hitting is bigger than like it was in q3/q4

Spawn system/spawn protection:
Spawning on the other side of map reduces pace of the game. What thinks the player who was killed few times in a row on a spawn points? "Fuck I have to do sth!" - natural aggression is released.

Why I am writing it? No, its not whining, I can deal with it :) But in my opinion pushing game into only one side of style of playing is not good. Dont force smb to change his playstyle or favourite others. The are opportunities to make ql more balanced of ways of winning. Let the players show their strenghts, not to force them.

Sorry for my english, I had so many things to write about, but I didnt know how to explain.

I would like to know, whats your opinion about this "balance" that I have written about.

Greetings