Australian Open

[Felipe.M]

Thanks Carlos, I wish you well for the rest of the season

[eliomelma]

Carlos after your review i should give to Felipe walkover....

[spencercarlos]

Carlos after your review i should give to Felipe walkover....

RELOL well you can try , i was thinking about retiring in the middle of the second set

[Felipe.M]

Carlos after your review i should give to Felipe walkover....

RELOL well you can try , i was thinking about retiring in the middle of the second set

I have been angry if you had Paulina

[ManicMoron100]

TheCooler618 - ManicMoron100 ~ 7-6 6-2 6-1

This match started quite late, we both found it tough to find the right time to play our match. Eventually we did, and boy oh boy, was it an experience for me!

First set, first game i got broken! Brilliant start for me..well he was just serving very well especially down the T and hitting his forehand with a lot of power. As i couldn't read his serves well nor his forehand, the set went comfortably in his favor until 5-4 (his serve).

While serving for the set, i'm not sure if he got nervous , but i really made a hard attempt to return well and force errors + hit some winners. He saved 1 or 2 breakpoints but at 30-40, i got lucky and it was 5-5. I was again under the gun while serving for 6-5, but i managed to pull through. He was in a real hurry to get to a tie break, so we went to one with him winning his service game to love (6-6).

Tie-break i think i had a mini break, but squandered it..by that time i think i mentally gave up and he won the tie break -- 7-6.

2nd set went on serve until he broke me at 4-3 and was able to serve for the 2nd.

3rd was really uneventful since i literally gave up..i had no confidence of coming back 0-2 sets down, also he had more confidence and made lesser number of errors compared to the first 2 sets.

In the end, the better player won.

P.S: i know this post is a bit late and he has already played the next round match and lost, but still felt i should share this with all you guys. Good luck to the rest who remain in the draw!

[VMoe86]

But as for the game as it is now, its incredibly flawed with this stamina feature, its simply outrageous that you hit 3,4 straight hard shots on the line, and Nole (in this case) not only chases them down, but gives me NO short balls at all, he defends them with hight topspin back on the baseline, the point starts over, and he is actually full on stamina (in comparisson to me) so all i can do is pray he misses my eventual sitter because there is no way you can defend with Federer. Neither is a good idea to play the points with full accelerations from the start because you may end up winning a few points, but next thing you know is that you have no stamina for the next couple of points so you are pretty much toasted.

We discussed about making another update during AO, focusing on Stamina and Power. This is however a delicate matter, because matches could have turned out differently before and so on. A hint: I would not stop using Federer that quickly.

manutoo will release another update soon, during our AO:

in a few days, it'll have a new Build trying to make the low stamina more enjoyable (ie: less long unending rallies).

Source

This is regarding those rallies with depleted Stamina, which are the most retarded rallies in TE since Power on shots is lowered too much in comparison to maximum speed of the characters. It is even possible to have a rally with 0 Instant Energy for both characters and the next point starts with 0 Instant Energy (I was then when I saw this last night).

[Elias]

It is even possible to have a rally with 0 Instant Energy for both characters and the next point starts with 0 Instant Energy (I was then when I saw this last night).

Yeah it behaves like if stamina continues to decrease below 0 to be negative, so that it doesn't restores as positive for the next point.

[C4iLL]

As an ITST Devil, I'm sorry to then officialy ask for a rematch. Legally speaking blabla I could argue two hours to prove it's not fair

ps : I'm almost serious !

[spencercarlos]

As an ITST Devil, I'm sorry to then officialy ask for a rematch. Legally speaking blabla I could argue two hours to prove it's not fair

ps : I'm almost serious !

Indeed, i mean you are basically playing two different kind of games. But we could have easily continued playing with the old version (using Hamachi or with private games) and probably not giving Manutoo the "joy" of making us adapt in the middle of important tournaments, because he will always does that.

Its indeed useless actually playing like that because overall players Murray, Djokovic (Nadal previously not sure about now) can easily control the rallies against a tired Federer if both are tired so

[TWM-Fox]

Hello World !

After few discussions with some members of the ITST community, i've decided to express myself on the actual tour organization. First of all, i want to make things clear by saying that i'm not here to make any accusation, i'm not here to point some players, some names, i'm not here neither to criticize the actual job of the staff which i find it really great. No complain about that especially they spend a lot of time in order to bring every day the best tennis experience.
I've think more than twice before posting that message cause i don't wan't in any way disturb the actual spirit of the tour. And i don't wan't it to make it personal, and i'm nobody to judge anyone, and more anyone's work.

BUT, i've disprove in the past some decision and this has been repeated this time and i think it is important to point out that matter. As i've many points to discuss i'll go from general to personal.

Firstly i really didn't understand why does changes are made just before big event such as Australian Open. Actually i think the logicial way should have been using the patch for the whole season untill the end of the AO. People have use this patch, people prepared there self on this patch, but the final decision was to make changes at the last minute which i find it pretty annoying like decision.
The staff spend hours, days, weeks in order to bring the smartest experience of the game. Many tests had been done especially with some new comers in the staff which brought diversity in decisions. Indeed, they are not enough in confidence to continue to use for what they work for ? Does in means that the patch have been released with some flaws without really exploring the limit ? If it is so, well patch should have been realease. In the other way, well what don't we stick to what people get use to it ?

Answer may be manutoo has brought out a new version of TE. I would answer, well we still can use the previous version and the same patch and make changes after AO. It is logicial as the staff knows who the game turn with their patch and as people has use it and train with it. This matter has already been experienced in the past, i think former members could easily testify


In second place, i would like to talk about a thing more personal. I understand that we have maintain a "fair" game by to constantly make adjustment, which brings up minor or major changes such as rebuild of players stats. Changes are also made on animations, as we find out new animations which are better that the older one. Indeed i'm a player who "liked" to stick to Federer cause i've always felt a good game experience with him and i learn to use him.

But what disturbs me is that due to his popularity he his more the aim of lot of changes which personnaly affected my game. I'm not really disturb with the stats rebuild as everybody has to deal with it and its needed, but which as bother me is the animation. I've use in the Olympic, and US Open specific animations especially the forehand. For i don't know which reason his forehand has been replaced. So i needed to get accustom to it, which i think i managed to do. Finally i've seen in the last update that his previous forehand had been brought up. Unfortunatly i could not have time to think about those changes and maybe change my player selection for the AO has we were not given enough time. Patch as been release early morning and returning home deadline was over to make changes.

Well everybody is in the same pot, so that the game and you go on, that one reason i didn't want to bring out a debate for a while as everybody is concern. But i think for sport, competition some decision are not that fair. And i think as a community we should more be involve in decision. Simply cause new patches, things are alter with player returns, experience of the game, if we are part of decisions, we take less risk to bring up imbalance. Of course we cannot that decision that would satisfy everyone, and i think this should be one of the role of the staff. I personally think that this is how things should work.


I hope i've been clear with my message. Once again, i respect the work which has been done, i simply wanted to express my self on some points which i find it not really justifiy at some moment.
Thanks in advance

[C4iLL]

I must say I agree with a lot of things Fox pointed out. I mean the staff does a great work, it's really awesome, but a lot of people here don't have time to practice a lot. Always changing things every 3 weeks create a lot of instability and in a way, it could incent people to give up the tour.

Imagine a guy who invest a lot of time to be used to an animation, and a week afterwards, a new animation is released. Imagine he has now no time to practice anymore : he then lost all in investment.... It's like an unfair expropriation...

We all know animations is important to be good in this game. I then think the best representants of a character should be asked / consulted before a change is done in that domain.
Without the agreement of these best players, who have proven their value & commitment on the tour, nothing should be changed in terms of animations. It should be like a reward to their results, a privilege.

More globally about the stats changes, I think the source of the problem is just Manutoo who keeps tuning the gameplay instead of adding contain. The gameplay was good in 1.0E, it would have been better to implement some new functions people are waiting for...

[inseedious]

Hello World !

After few discussions with some members of the ITST community, i've decided to express myself on the actual tour organization. First of all, i want to make things clear by saying that i'm not here to make any accusation, i'm not here to point some players, some names, i'm not here neither to criticize the actual job of the staff which i find it really great. No complain about that especially they spend a lot of time in order to bring every day the best tennis experience.
I've think more than twice before posting that message cause i don't wan't in any way disturb the actual spirit of the tour. And i don't wan't it to make it personal, and i'm nobody to judge anyone, and more anyone's work.

BUT, i've disprove in the past some decision and this has been repeated this time and i think it is important to point out that matter. As i've many points to discuss i'll go from general to personal.

Firstly i really didn't understand why does changes are made just before big event such as Australian Open. Actually i think the logicial way should have been using the patch for the whole season untill the end of the AO. People have use this patch, people prepared there self on this patch, but the final decision was to make changes at the last minute which i find it pretty annoying like decision.
The staff spend hours, days, weeks in order to bring the smartest experience of the game. Many tests had been done especially with some new comers in the staff which brought diversity in decisions. Indeed, they are not enough in confidence to continue to use for what they work for ? Does in means that the patch have been released with some flaws without really exploring the limit ? If it is so, well patch should have been realease. In the other way, well what don't we stick to what people get use to it ?

Answer may be manutoo has brought out a new version of TE. I would answer, well we still can use the previous version and the same patch and make changes after AO. It is logicial as the staff knows who the game turn with their patch and as people has use it and train with it. This matter has already been experienced in the past, i think former members could easily testify


In second place, i would like to talk about a thing more personal. I understand that we have maintain a "fair" game by to constantly make adjustment, which brings up minor or major changes such as rebuild of players stats. Changes are also made on animations, as we find out new animations which are better that the older one. Indeed i'm a player who "liked" to stick to Federer cause i've always felt a good game experience with him and i learn to use him.

But what disturbs me is that due to his popularity he his more the aim of lot of changes which personnaly affected my game. I'm not really disturb with the stats rebuild as everybody has to deal with it and its needed, but which as bother me is the animation. I've use in the Olympic, and US Open specific animations especially the forehand. For i don't know which reason his forehand has been replaced. So i needed to get accustom to it, which i think i managed to do. Finally i've seen in the last update that his previous forehand had been brought up. Unfortunatly i could not have time to think about those changes and maybe change my player selection for the AO has we were not given enough time. Patch as been release early morning and returning home deadline was over to make changes.

Well everybody is in the same pot, so that the game and you go on, that one reason i didn't want to bring out a debate for a while as everybody is concern. But i think for sport, competition some decision are not that fair. And i think as a community we should more be involve in decision. Simply cause new patches, things are alter with player returns, experience of the game, if we are part of decisions, we take less risk to bring up imbalance. Of course we cannot that decision that would satisfy everyone, and i think this should be one of the role of the staff. I personally think that this is how things should work.


I hope i've been clear with my message. Once again, i respect the work which has been done, i simply wanted to express my self on some points which i find it not really justifiy at some moment.
Thanks in advance

Hi Fox,
I'm gonna sleep so I quickly read your post and I'll give it more thought tomorrow. However I personally didn't agree with the choice of TE2013 standard for AO, but it was a choice of the staff, because the main feeling was that a 168 draw is very slow and hard to follow if anyone has to play with a old version, having to privately host matches.
As regards continuous changes, I can say that this is a very hard testing period, because we have a lot of problems balancing defenders and attackers. At the moment, defense is a bit overpowered and we (especially Elias) are working hard to solve this issue, but our internal testing is just not enough to discover all unbalances (even Activision and Blizzard seem to be unable to do it...), so we have to release more than a fix every month to analyze useful feedbacks from a 150 people community, who will always be more efficient than the Testing Board. We had and still have several problems with Nadal, who is overpowered even after a nerf, so we had to release mod 1.12 just before AO (we couldn't do it before because of Christmas holidays), to avoid a massive Nadal choice.
I'm sorry to say this, but ITST TE community is now 4 times bigger than half a year ago, with lots of pro coming from managames tour, so, even if I was among the oldest ITST TE players like you, I must say that it's no more possible to keep a high level without a constant training. If someone doesn't play for a week, he can be destroyed by outsiders or even less skilled guys.
As regards the last part, I think that we can't involve everyone in testing and/or decisions, as maybe more than half of the total players are newcomers and also because lots of players just use one player and will never say he's overpowered.
inseedious

[spencercarlos]

Hi Fox,
I'm gonna sleep so I quickly read your post and I'll give it more thought tomorrow. However I personally didn't agree with the choice of TE2013 standard for AO, but it was a choice of the staff, because the main feeling was that a 168 draw is very slow and hard to follow if anyone has to play with a old version, having to privately host matches.
As regards continuous changes, I can say that this is a very hard testing period, because we have a lot of problems balancing defenders and attackers. At the moment, defense is a bit overpowered and we (especially Elias) are working hard to solve this issue, but our internal testing is just not enough to discover all unbalances (even Activision and Blizzard seem to be unable to do it...), so we have to release more than a fix every month to analyze useful feedbacks from a 150 people community, who will always be more efficient than the Testing Board. We had and still have several problems with Nadal, who is overpowered even after a nerf, so we had to release mod 1.12 just before AO (we couldn't do it before because of Christmas holidays), to avoid a massive Nadal choice.
I'm sorry to say this, but ITST TE community is now 4 times bigger than half a year ago, with lots of pro coming from managames tour, so, even if I was among the oldest ITST TE players like you, I must say that it's no more possible to keep a high level without a constant training. If someone doesn't play for a week, he can be destroyed by outsiders or even less skilled guys.
As regards the last part, I think that we can't involve everyone in testing and/or decisions, as maybe more than half of the total players are newcomers and also because lots of players just use one player and will never say he's overpowered.
inseedious

Well i actually did not expect that my complaining towards the game state would bring some great debate about how those game changes were implemented, and yeah it really affected the outcome of this tournament without a doubt (and not really my match result IMO although i believe i definetly deserve better than winning just 3 games in 3 sets).

That being said this could serve us for experience and handling this kind of game updates better, because as it has been pointed out, those changes, as "minimal" as they could be, really sets the tone in just about everything about your game, how you serve, how you attack, how you defend, etc, it really changes everything.

Manutoo won't change his approach towads the game, in the sense that he will be constantly updating trying to "please" most people and trying to overcome whatever a previous change brings and this interaction is actually never ending.

What ITST team must analyse better is when to introduce this changes, as i said there were options to continue with TE2011 like Hamachi software (local games) or using IP to set up matches and we could have avoided a lot of this.

[Elias]

I'm not really disturb with the stats rebuild as everybody has to deal with it and its needed, but which as bother me is the animation. I've use in the Olympic, and US Open specific animations especially the forehand. For i don't know which reason his forehand has been replaced. So i needed to get accustom to it, which i think i managed to do. Finally i've seen in the last update that his previous forehand had been brought up.

Federer forehand didn't changed since a long time (it's still the same as Olympics and USO). The old one never has been brought up, did you had some install bug or something ? In the animation log it was notified that we added the new federer forehand (standard+accel) from Lucian, but it was not used for Federer (but binded to Dimitrov and Baggie). The changelog just ment; adding a new federer motion to the mod (we have 3 different fed fh motions), but not binding it to the character, i guess the way it was notified missleaded you to think we changed it, wich wasn't the case. Only the serve motion was replaced.

As for stat changes, well you're forced to consider them when new builds changes the gameplay. We were i think a lot of people here pretty happy with 1.0e + mod 1.08 balance, and we thought we would be able to chill out a bit with balance after countless hours of work testing before USO, just fine tuning it with very slight changes here and there. And there comes 1.0f, movement changes..

Do you realize that, with 1.0f, and -pre AO patches, we decreased the max speeds from 5%, and that it still doesn't fix infinite / too long rallies issues (though this is not only a power/speed issue, but also tied to low stamina gameplay) ? I guess if TE wasn't changing much often, we would be able to stay with a version longer, obviously.

We considered to play AO staying with 1.0f, like we did for US Open with 1.0e. Though Djarvik & Slicer decide about such matters, and by the way 2013 doesn't change much from 1.0f, and trying to fix this Nadal was an urgency before AO. The situation is not the same as it was in early times. The word is spreading about the mod, the facebook page gets new likes every day, new sign ups to ITST Tour, newcomers discovering it via youtube as well.. And it wouldn't be appropriate making their life harder to join us, they would buy the game and figure they can't play with us because they have the official version of the game, etc. That's why for now it's a priority to use the last versions.

Believe me, we'd rather prefer to have only fine tuning to do, not having to react to TE build mechanics changes. But we just have to deal with it. Manutoo desn't update his game in regard to ITST Mod as a priority (though he's very helpful with us and also introduces features for us when we need to, and is considering our analysis and opinions, wich is very nice, his support is really great), he's TE owner and developper and has his own vision of the game, also balancing it out for the "masses", different game modes, Managames Tour, etc.

I think i can find countless examples like the following one in my chat logs :

Code: Select all

[21:08] <R*****> I think every we should go back playing 1.0e ^^
01[21:09] <E****> yeah robbin, make this a public post please :p
[21:09] <C****> to the version used at US Open !
01[21:09] <E****> all vote for 1.0e
01[21:09] <E****> i'm in :)
[21:09] <C****> the best version
[21:10] <C****> 1.e was the one used at us open right ?
01[21:10] <E****> yep
[21:10] <R*****> Problem is it won't attract new players as ITST mod isn't visible in the match lobby anymore
[21:10] <V***> We were so bad back then.
01[21:10] <E****> that was TE 1.0e + mod 1.08 i think
[21:10] <R*****> And a LOT of work for nothing :p
[21:10] <V***> I mean, that Nadal was better than the current one and everyone found him weak. :p
01[21:11] <E****> yeah lol
[21:11] <F******> let me vote for it too even if i never played ITST at that time ;)
[21:11] <R*****> that berdych haha
[21:12] <C****> fact is the gameplay was more dynamic in my opinion
[21:12] <C****> more free
[21:12] <R*****> winners everywhere :p
[21:12] <C****> more offensive then
[21:12] <F******> shots are too precise here now
01[21:12] <E****> not really winner everywhere @ us open
01[21:12] <E****> our chars were faster
[21:12] <F******> so easy to defend very close to the lines
01[21:12] <E****> though the movement was more free for some reason, and the reach was less overhelming as well.
01[21:13] <E****> now they're slower but they change direction faster :s
[21:14] <C****> what is interesting is that you and inseedious stoooped playing after that ^^
01[21:15] <E****> well yep
01[21:15] <E****> i played too much for testing and USO, and didn't liked 1.0f
01[21:15] <E****> that funky auto step feature putted me off
[21:16] <Robbin> +1
[21:16] <C4iLL> yeah inseedious as well
[21:16] <V***> Grand Slams are the worst once you are involved with the Mod.
[21:16] <V***> Look at me at US Open last year, look at F****** and i********* ;)
[21:16] <C****> I don't understand why he never stops touching the gameplay
[21:22] <C****> the 1.0f created an ITST genocide
[21:25] <R*****> Totally understandable
[21:26] <R*****> It was just not as good as 1.0e
[21:26] <V***> I miss the thrill of having 1 out 14 break points converted.
[21:26] <R*****> I dont know why exactly but it doesn't feel right
[21:27] <R*****> Yeah the good old days where you were able to create break chances against me


So basiclly we're just doing our best, to adjust the mod to the new versions. Our chars were faster before, but for some reason the defenders weren't dominating the scene. maybe we were just all noobs by this time, or maybe the fact changing direction seems to be overall easyer/faster now, helps too much defense (even with non-defender chars) compared to 1.0e, that is my opinion, it's probably a mix of both things. The playing field level increased a lot and this is also an important factor revealing imbalances. And also AO surface is much slower compared to USO.

So as you saw, firstly we made a first intent decreasing max speeds. It's obviously not enough. So next we'll probably aim toward power upgrades (stamina as well), and also Manutoo will soon release a new build tweaking the rally dynamics under a low stamina state, to promote ending them faster. I guess we won't ever reach perfection though. We're tied to TE official versions if we want the Tour to grow and get the success it deserves. Sure you can make a private TE Tour using a "rogue" older build, but i think you won't get much people participating. It would be marginal.

It's not like there is no hope by the way. TE 2013 is still a very good game, i'm pretty sure we'll be able to adjust the gameplay to something more pleasant. I bet TE2014 (15?), the future of TE will bring more fine customisation options, like talents replacing game styles so that you'll be able to create hybrid chars, affecting for example a shoulder accel bonus, and a top spin bonus to a char. Obviously for now we have to deal with the platform we have, reacting to build changes, wich may sometimes give an advantage to some playstyles, so we have to react accordingly as much as possible. We're not doing this for a living though, keep this in mind, it's time consuming and we have lives, so it won't ever be perfect (i think balance is barely reaching perfection even talking about huge productions like Wow (oh yes i've been a cheated warlock in the past^^ ) , guildwars etc, wich regularly go for buffs or nerfs reacting to the community feedback).

[TWM-Fox]

Well i've to double check with Federer matter, but i don't really mind about it as it is somehow personal and well i can deal with it that is ok. So sorry if i've misunderstood something. If I talk about it once i'll double check before.

But still i do understand that update of version are done independently of ITST will. Like you said indeed Manutoo help you all by giving informations feedback and all. But what i don't understand is the actual argument you are using. If the roster present a lot of flaws why do a patch as been realeased ? Defenders was a major problem suppose, is it still the case even after working on a new patch ? I mean if the defender issue was link to Nadal, and some things had to been altered well i think at this time this would have been in part solved cause Nadal is in the spotlight for a while with his actual skill.

My way of thinking is that staff received feedback, they have work on it, they have made new balance so they should stick to it. TE 2013 was realeased by manutoo just at the start of AO, so a new patch as to be made in order to make new balances. I understand but this should have been done after the AO which would have put everyone on the same level. We all know the actual patch and version of the game.

By the way i do not understand who this could be a bareer for new commers. The forum is there to help them and if players on the AO Open could deal with it they could do so, they are not different. Changes will surely and have to be made. You all work hard on it constantly and thanks for that, but i really think that this was the wrong decision.

After i'm maybe not well inform as i don't have much time to read all the thread and so on. But this is how i felt things, i think changes and decision has been taken lately and maybe it didn't change a lot actually but keeping the previous version would have avoid any question on the matter.

Anyhow once again just wanted to notice it, maybe i'm short with some information. And i do not complain about anything, everybody is having the same trouble