I'm sure others have gone through this also, and I was wondering if anybody has any advice on how to get to the next level in Scrum? I consider myself to be one of the better players now (I hardly ever play under Demolition anymore btw), but I was playing team scrums with Bolo today (I was playing as Mmm Braains) and he was absolutely unstoppable. I work hard at getting better, but I just don't see how someone can be THAT much better than everyone else. I know most of the advice is just going to be to play more, but I want some concrete stuff. For those of you who have played with me, feel free to critique what I'm doing wrong...what are my strengths and weaknesses? (some of my other names are Dirty & Moxy) I know there is a lot of luck involved, and I know it's just a lot of little things that add up, but if anyone wants to help me get better I would appreciate it.

@Demolition

I feel your pain, man. First of all, you're talking about one of the Hall of Famers. It's WAY too soon to compare your game to one of the legends (his head is big enough, I know, I know). Yes, practice will help...playing the best there is in the game is the best way to learn (they usually play at night on the frantic maps). Also, read the tactics forum all the way thru. Lots of great advice there.

As for your game, as I mentioned in another thread, you've improved a lot...but still have a habit of battlemoding a tad too much for most player's tastes...but that's getting much better too. It's a tough habit to break, I know. I mean, our tanks come with guns, right? They provide powerup weapons, right? There are also some great players who really enjoy smoking your arse (Bolo, Burnsie, Hanky, etc.), so how bad can it be?

Just keep playing...with the best...and you will only get better with time. Most of all, just enjoy the game, man. After all, the whole point isn't who is the best or what the score is, but whether or not you had a great time...as well as the others you "played" with. Is it worth it to win at the cost of pissing off most of your opponents because of your tactics? I've given up many goals just because I didn't want to play dirty.

This has been discussed before. It's the Bolo code. He basically has ThinkTanks steroids added into his game. Boosts send him further, jump pads bounce him higher, and he can actually steer himself while in the air. He has larger rounds and they hit harder. He has a magnetic tank so that if you SLAM into him head on, he'll still hold onto the ball. We've all been trying to get a hold of this code to improve our game and level out the fairness when playing him, but he just won't budge. If you have a grand to two you might able to buy it off him.

@LilAlienD

Lol. Great...you're going to mess with his head now. I was the one who coined that term, "The Bolo Code", after watching a special on that idiotic book on the best sellers list "The Da Vinci Code" and then reading an interesting post from Bolo about the ways that some players hack their system to play better. His conclusion was that you could only really tweak things so much and it only makes a big difference if you host your own server. I think that's what it was.

Hey, I teach a clinic on how to beat bolo and make him look silly. C'mon down. I'll give you a post office box to mail in your checks. Comes with a t-shirt.

Stinky

This wasn't meant to be a "How do I beat Bolo?" thread...We were playing on the same team...maybe he was scoring all those goals because I was such a good teammate, I don't know. The only other person I've seen that can dominate like that was Reagent X. Man, I have to get that Bolo code.

Just keep playin'. When I started, yeah I thought they were unstoppable. Now that I've become quite a bit better and made my place in the game I can hang w/ the best of em, even come out ontop a few times. My first time seeing Bolo in a game was a team scrum w/ him on the other team, we came out on top. There's just alot of factors involved in the game.

Just keep practicing.

Last edited: Tuesday, June 08, 2004 at 7:16:21 PM

If you knew my current financial situation.....ill sell it for a big mac....extra cheese??

Demolition you played well I thought...in teams the person that scores the most is just a matter of getting the flag...some games I break 10, others I get 0....either way u can still be a big help no matter if you score much or not....teams takes some getting used to. Its very different from singles...

The best advice I can give you is positioning....whether you carry the flag, setup a pass, block, defend, swipe, whatever....positioning is the KEY...it takes time to get aquainted with positioning with 12 different maps and different lineups, as well as the randomness of the flag and player spawns...

Shooting is another huge key in any game type. I like to warm up in BM and then goto scrum.....the better u get at shooting and dodging bullets the more successful you will be to score and pass...

Stink u SOB :)

B

Anticipation of the opponents takes a lot of time...comes with practice...never stop looking at radar

Most important: always try to play with people that are much better than you....try to go against them if possible....the more you lose the quicker you learn......i got my ass handed to me for months.

Some players are kind enough to show you some of their moves...the rest u have to pick up

@ Bolo/other great scrummers:

How much of your game info do you get from the radar? Or, to put it another way, what % of the time are you looking at the radar as opposed to the screen? I find the radar to be way too small...I wish they would make it bigger. Do some of you have scripts that do this?

As far as my team scrumming goes, I truly am a team player. I don't care if I score 0 goals, but my team ends up on top more often than not. I usually end up somewhere in the middle of the pack in scoring, but I do whatever it takes to help my team win, although admittedly I am still learning. Is battlemoding the other team as poo-pooed in team scrum as it is in solo? Obviously clearing the goal is a good thing, but what about the general battlemoding? I think it really helps the team as long as you don't do it at the wrong time and don't lose sight of the big picture.

D.lition

BMing and camping are essential to team scrum. I never stop looking at radar.

If its too small try the double or triple size radar depending on your resolution.

2Xradar

3Xradar

See my radar dots post to increase the size of the radar dots.

B

Last edited: Wednesday, June 09, 2004 at 1:36:05 PM

Where do you place these files?

@Bolo: Excellent! Can't wait to get home and try it out! Thanks for posting this. -Rx

Now thats the kind of info I was looking for when I posted this thread a while back

B.

Perhaps I shouldn't be one to post advice here since I am not one of the 'greats' nor do I have any desire to be. But I did do something on accident that I found improved my game. It started out as skins-gone-wrong, but it turned into a fun little experiment which made me a better player.

I made a couple sets of skins. One of the sets was nothing more than white (or any bright color) terrain skins. With these skins loaded I was able to see every little nook 'n cranny on a given map. I was able to see bumps and dips that may have been camouflaged by the default textured skins. These brighter, solid-colored skins make it a bit harder on the eyes though, so I didn't use them on a regular basis. But they definitely did help me learn the lay of the land much quicker. I also used a set of terrain skins that consisted of nothing more than a grid... Black criss-cross stripes on a white background. It worked well if I was just driving slowly around a map and investigating things, but it proved to be too confusing for real-time game play (and again there's eye strain).

The other set I made was just the opposite. It was a set of black terrain skins and all black tank skins. You can still see the 3D shapes of the land and tanks, but there is obviously much less contrast. It forced me to rely more on my radar.

I'm not sure if these things will help you or not, but they are kinda fun little things to play around with anyway.

Last edited: Wednesday, June 09, 2004 at 11:49:22 PM

@MM

Good stuff, thanks! I noticed something similar when I started using a reflective chrome skin!

@Demolition

Were you Napolean? That guy's game also resembled your's a lot. Just wondering...

Sorry, Napolean is not me

BTW im not sure who originally created the radar graphics I posted....i got them from a friend who got them from a friend...etc...i assume they are public domain...the dots post was info from -z- with some added common sense from me...if u want more info on that ask one of the modders.

The radar files just replace the files with the same names in your client/UI folder....make sure u back the old ones up first. Also backup the main.cs file b4 u try to add anything. Post questions here...

Ive never done any skinning....does it improve any game play??? I have heard that it does....opinions??

B

NNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

MY RADAR'S HAVE BEEN PUBLICLY DISTRIBUTED!! God Damn it :( Just can't trust team mates anymore... Tisk tisk.

Last edited: Thursday, June 10, 2004 at 11:09:43 AM

Try this again... Typed out a LONG entry and Safari suddenly quit on me.

So yes, secrets out. Well, not really I posted it a while back in the Skins thread. I feel that I owe alot of my game to the modifications I've made to the ui and some of the skins.

-First off, I changed my reticle (scope/aim) so that it was less obtrusive on the screen and allows me to see the hit point (red dot) much better. Download Reticle

-Secondly, I adjusted the colors of each tank so that I can distinguish them all much easier, even from across the feild. Download TankSkins

-Third, I figured out how to increase the size of my pen... I mean radar . This is a HUGE advantage. I probably spend ALOT of my time watching the radar rather then the rest of the screen, even when I'm real close to both the goal and the scrum. I've even rammed poeple and stolen the ball while driving backwards. Treat this one like GOLD!! RadarTankSkins

To install simply replace the files where instructed. I suggest backing everything up before getting into it (especially with the radar).

Install Windows;

Go to this directory

Radar: Program Files > BraveTree(or Shockwave) > ThinkTanks > game > client > ui

Tanks Skins and Reticle: Program Files > BraveTree(or Shockwave) > ThinkTanks > game > data > shapes > tanks

Install Mac:

Select the ThinkTanks application and choose "Show Package Contents" Go to this directory

Radar: Contents > Resources > game > client > ui

Tanks Skins and Reticle: Contents > Resources > game > data > shapes > tanks

When all is said and done everything should look like this, minus the WEB skin on the radar. I've given ya'll enough :)

Last edited: Thursday, June 10, 2004 at 12:05:46 PM

Thanks LilAlien. I've said it before & I'll say it again. I really like that radar!

_{Normally I don't look at other men's radar, but WOW!! How can you miss that?}

I tried all those fly by-night annoying ads about how to increase the size of my radar, but nothing worked. Then I stumbled into this thread and Gosh! It really works! I feel more like a man, the wife has never been happier, and I got that big promotion at work!

KBC

The radar enhanced.

Was the radar I posted yours lilalien? I thought I looked different....if it is im sorry and ill take it down if u want

B

@KBC

Lol.... Hey, remember, it's not the size of your radar that counts, but how you use it!

Being Italian, of course, that means I don't suffer from radar-envy.

;)

Size does matter.....well at least if u ask LC

B

Bolo,

Nah its all good. It is my radar, but I just put a more standard skin with it. I was planning on finally releasing it over in the Skins section earlier this week, just didn't get to it. This just saves me the trouble :)

But lilalien are you going to release the web radar the one you released is good but the web one is WAY better.

Thx again,

--Tankster

Is this how it should look in the main.cs file? (if you use 2x radar)?

RadarHud.dotWidth = "256";

RadarHud.dotHeight = "256";

Those would be HUGE dots! 256 x 256 is the image size of the radar files. "radar_base.alpha.jpg" and "radar_base.jpg".

They're located in Contents > Resources > game > client > ui on real computers, and

Program Files > BraveTree(or Shockwave) > ThinkTanks > game > client > ui in those PeeCees.

Their current size is 128 x 128 pixels. If you open them in some image editing software and double the size, it's 256 x 256 pixels. However, the game still doesn't know that you want to use that size. The "playGui.gui.dso" file will tell it to do that. It's included in the files on Bolo's links.

For double size dots, I'd probably try;

RadarHud.dotWidth = "12";

RadarHud.dotHeight = "12";

Or better yet, use Bolo's script. It will automatically do it for you.

RadarHud.dotWidth = RadarHud.dotWidth + RadarHud.dotWidth;

RadarHud.dotHeight = RadarHud.dotHeight + RadarHud.dotHeight;

Last edited: Friday, June 11, 2004 at 2:52:31 PM

Yo Demolition, you want to get to the next level?

Next time I'm playing just ask for advice.

Bolo and jangles did and Im proud to say they are some of the most elite scrummers. I have no problem giving out tips and tricks in TT accept for those who are too hardheaded or arrogant to take advice.

;)

@KBC

Thanks! Now it makes perfect sense!

@Hanky

Really? You would actually assist noobs? Awesome!

I will look for you.

@lilalien

Plz release the web 1 I like that 1 (the other 1 is cool 2 (but I like this 1 better :P))

Heres the secret of my succes, first off, try being competitive, u cant expect to be the best in just a few days, u must have the will power to try to do better and better every time (I already made myself a promise to do my best no matter what (due to that jerk Annonimous who wouldnt leave me alone, and I made up my mind to give it my all)

Step 2, harness anger, (a long story) 1 day I was playing arround in a scrum server, when a #1 Tankster joined the game (an impostor) I looked up to him because he was awsome, and I asked him

He said

At that point, I felt really angered, and kindled a flame in me that improved my perfprmance...

I shall continue later, gtg :P (public internet, ya know =) )

Cadc (SA) (Leader)

Okay, here is my success secret...oh wait, I don't have success. Never mind!

Too arrogant to take advice? Wataputz. Let me give you some advice...cut the braggin and get some practice. Bolo drives and shoots far better than you do...and you said you eat him for breakfast...wataputz.

Who eats me for breakfast?? A few people can in battlemode but other than that I can put up a good fight :)

Stinky u still giving clinics?? Lol...can I attend the next vashstinkpede lecture? Where u boys been lately??? SOB

Only an idiot thinks he knows it all...i learned a great deal from my BM team and I still take tips from the top scrummers.

B

I been playing bo...haven't seen vash. A couple days ago your "mentor" there claimed to eat you for breakfast. Whatever. I'm just setting him straight. If I was playing for money, I'd rather face him than you.

Clinics? Naw, cancelled for lack of interest...mine. ;)

By the by, I'm back to the states on friday for summer vacation...no access to TT there so be good for the next couple of months.

Cya in august you SOB

Stinky

Awwwwwwww..

Take care stinky

SOB

B

LOL Bolo XD

Anyways, where was I? Ah yes got very angry, that day I played that impostor, and gave him the beating of his life in scrum, then I posted it, and then realized that I hadnt played the real #1Tankster, then 1 day I met the real thing, and asked him to challenge me, I actually won that scrum game!

C, as long as ur able to use anger to ur advantage, then u will be able to tap into hidden powers in ur body, and become a better and more experienced player by each time u play B)

Cadc (SA) (Leader)

To fix that... Some games I break 10, but often though I get 0

XD