91 replies to this topic

[Catho Sharn]

I regularly play in a 2 man group, and it is annoying when you're split for over half your matches. Yes you can work around it, but improving the lot of the split is fairly easy:

1. Randomize which groups get split. Splitting one off a 10-player group is less impact than splitting a two-player group. Share the burden.
2. Outline your group icons in white, so they're easier to spot. Or invert them. Give us some way to easily spot our group-mates.
3. While we're at it, how about a different icon for turrets? Drawing squares instead of triangles can't be *that* hard.

[Cimarb]

Catho Sharn, on 09 July 2014 - 11:16 AM, said:

I regularly play in a 2 man group, and it is annoying when you're split for over half your matches. Yes you can work around it, but improving the lot of the split is fairly easy:

1. Randomize which groups get split. Splitting one off a 10-player group is less impact than splitting a two-player group. Share the burden.
2. Outline your group icons in white, so they're easier to spot. Or invert them. Give us some way to easily spot our group-mates.
3. While we're at it, how about a different icon for turrets? Drawing squares instead of triangles can't be *that* hard.

1. A 10/2 split is not the issue. It is when there are several odd-numbered teams and they get split all over the place.
2. Totally agree and hope they do this soon. Having a mouse over on the battlemap so I can see who is where would also be phenomenal.
3. They changed the turret icon last patch - happy birthday!

[Djinnhammer]

Nikolai Lubkiewicz, on 03 July 2014 - 04:38 PM, said:

Keeping in mind that we have a limit of three lances and four players per lance, and that we also want to keep matchmaking within acceptable time parameters: I'd invite you to offer a suggestion of how you would rather see this implemented.

Now we are being forced to go against tourney level tryhard teams, whilst dropping casually it does not help when I can't see where members of my "group" are. Can I suggest the dorito above their heads and the markers on the battlegrid are gold instead of blue?
Because splitting us up reduces our effectiveness quite a bit and now we are being thrown to the wolves we might be able to stand a a better chance if we can co-ordinate that little bit better. At least then, I could see where my groupmates are , irrespective of lances?

I'd appreciate it if you'd consider that.

[Tyman4]

Ah, so that is why. I just thought people were grabbing the drop commander tag and shifting our 2 man around.

Tyman

[Galenthor Kerensky]

what i ahve seen as odd is a 4 man group being split up on dropping... would think the game would keep a 4 man group together

[Rayne Vickers]

I'm not happy with the new Matchmaker. I was one of the ones begging and crying for it to be implimented. The problem is that you listened to the (whining) vocal minority, and *had* to allow for odd team sizes, and this is the direct result. Change it back, and stop splitting my 2-3 man lances. Thank you, drive through.

[Cimarb]

Precocious Rayne, on 11 July 2014 - 02:36 PM, said:

I'm not happy with the new Matchmaker. I was one of the ones begging and crying for it to be implimented. The problem is that you listened to the (whining) vocal minority, and *had* to allow for odd team sizes, and this is the direct result. Change it back, and stop splitting my 2-3 man lances. Thank you, drive through.

You complain about PGI allowing odd team sizes, then complain about them splitting your 2-3 man lances?... Do you not feel that is a bit confusing?...

[CMetz]

Please, for the love of all that is sacred, do not go back to dropping 3 lances all together and encouraging deathball tactics from the start. That made for some of the most boring tactics I have ever seen. Here's an idea... just meet up somewhere on the map. I did it 8 times last night with a guy that I was paired with.

I also find it great that my groups occasionally run up against comp level teams in the group queue. You don't get any better at this game by playing against a group of potatoes.

[Sethliopod]

I realize there are other issues here, but no drop that I've seen in my limited exp. has been forced to abandon their slow Mechs. It's just easier to leave them.

[RogueLdr]

Splitting groups causes several problems.

1. If your group dropped in slow mechs it will take forever to link up.
One part of the group has to either stand around and wait for the one that got moved, leaving you well behind the rest of the team. Or both stray off by themselves to get together at some middle point, this leaves them vulnerable to being picked off by fast movers.

2. Even when you do link up, it can be difficult to pick out your group mate when he's not marked by the squad color.
One blue direwolf looks pretty much like another blue direwolf.
There have been times when i actually started following the wrong mech if it's of the same type only to catch the name tag a bit later and go, *#$^ that's not him.

Being in voip doesn't really help these issues much.
Knowing your friend who's walking over to you is getting attacked by lights isn't gonna get you to his side any faster, and him saying "i'm to your right" isn't very helpful when there's a clump of blue triangles all milling about off to your right.

The simplest solution would be to just add another squad as required.

It really wouldn't change anything if you think about it.
If you get moved to a dif lance to fill it up because they're short, what's the first thing we're going to do once we drop?

That's right, we're gonna run off and move to our group, basically leaving them with a 3 person group anyway. I wasn't in voice with them in the first place, odds are they would go off and do their own thing anyway.

So what's the difference if they start out with a 3 man group, or they start with a 4 man and one guy runs off and never comes back?

[Gothatron]

thanx for the info !

[Talono]

How do you react to this fantastic PGI decision mate ? I always just leave my lance and just run towards my friends that i am in TS with.

Anyone reacting differently ?

[IIIuminaughty]

Nikolai Lubkiewicz, on 03 July 2014 - 04:38 PM, said:

Keeping in mind that we have a limit of three lances and four players per lance, and that we also want to keep matchmaking within acceptable time parameters: I'd invite you to offer a suggestion of how you would rather see this implemented.

well you guys could start by dropping in a group again. or give us the option (for future cw purposes), to choose where we would like to drop. has to be with in the drop zone tho. (near bases).

[Kyynele]

How about just highlighting the people that are in your premade instead of the people who are in the same lance? This doesn't obviously solve the different starting points, but at least one could see where the guy one's talking to is when they get split in a 2-man.

I understand that you want to promote playing as lances because it's BT, but seriously, in a match, I stick to the guys that have loadouts and playstyles that work well with what I'm doing, and that usually isn't the lance I was randomly thrown into.

Highlighting the people that you're truly communicating with is awesome, and because the lance highlight often highlights your friends when you get to the same lance, it feels like a great feature. Sadly, it would be a BETTER feature if this happened intentionally instead of a side product of lance highlight, because highlighting the lance doesn't really have any value in itself. Even with friends, unless there's exactly 4 of you, it can be distracting since you unnecessarily have to spend time figuring out which of the highlighted people actually hear you, and which are just randomly prancing around.

[Amardez]

While I understand that not all people want to sit around and wait and wait i am Patient enough to wait a few extra mins to get landed with my group mates esp when we are coms and have all worked out a set or mechs that work well in a 3 or 4 man group.

This may be something that has already been said but after talking to several of the people i studied computer science with why not just add a button to the team interface saying don't allow my group to be broken up and if it is over 4 people simply LET the group leader set out how the lances are to land.

It may be more work but seeing as PGI seems unable to provide a TS service for its players why would they continue to punish those who are going to the effort of getting it for themselves. Having said that if they DID get the in game TS working all these arguments in my mind anyway become null in void if the players on the team can communicate it should not matter who you get dropped with too much (yes i know skill levels will vary but) .

[Sneakypoop]

Armadez :

It really looks like you do not understand the issue here : "Let the group leader set out how the lances are to land".

- Who's that "group leader" you are referring to ?
- When __and__ how would he do that, precisely ?
- How much longer would that take ?
- How less frustrating would that be ?

Maybe you have some idea here, but you did not describe it clearly enough. As for now, it is not understandable.

[Sneakypoop]

RogueLdr, on 15 July 2014 - 12:29 PM, said:

Splitting groups causes several problems.

...
The simplest solution would be to just add another squad as required.

It really wouldn't change anything if you think about it.
If you get moved to a dif lance to fill it up because they're short, what's the first thing we're going to do once we drop?

That's right, we're gonna run off and move to our group, basically leaving them with a 3 person group anyway. I wasn't in voice with them in the first place, odds are they would go off and do their own thing anyway.

-- The simplest solution would be to just add another squad as required.
I do not see that as a simple. On the contrary. What we have is simple, what you propose is complicated.
-- It really wouldn't change anything if you think about it.
Then let's not do that. I see no good reason to do something that would change nothing.
-- That's right, we're gonna run off and move to our group,
You're doing it wrong : that's precisely what not being supportive of the team is. The match is not about your own 2-10 men group. It's about the whole team.

Edited by Sneakypop, 30 July 2014 - 07:13 PM.

[Galaxy Crusader Puppeteer]

I couldnt read all the posts here, so sorry if im copying some one , this just my peace of mind on the subject.

I dont know if it can be done or not but here is the general idea, say you have 10 ppl in a group, give the leader an option to move pilots around 3 lances , same as in a private lobby. So when a 10 man drops in 2 last random/grouped ppl get in two other empty slots. If its to hard on the matchmaker side of it , u could create a failsafe that lances cant be 4-3-3 in a 10 man but 4-4-2 so that last two players join in the same lance.

I dont know even if this is gonna be read by some one who can influence on game development.

But yeah i kinda agree on drop zones being too far away from each other. Perfect example is a Direwolf in a charlie lance on Tourmaline desert. At least 5 grids away from rest of the team , droped with lights and mediums who will abandon him to meet up with the rest of the team. He will slowly leg it , just to figure out that he has min 4 mechs in front of him all ready. Realizing hes prolly gonna eject real soon opens fire on a 1st target to trade kill for a kill. Dies in vain, and quits the match.

Mechwarrior has allways been a thinking game, not call of duty.
You can do all the corrections your self on live patch right now , just let your team know not to press that ready button. take command and make your lances. Match starts , converge on assaults , ecm at the back , and ecm at the front searching for those enemy mechs. All done , chances of victory improved by 20% ish.

Edited by CL7K20, 01 August 2014 - 09:12 AM.

[RogueLdr]

Sneakypop, on 30 July 2014 - 07:11 PM, said:

-- The simplest solution would be to just add another squad as required.
I do not see that as a simple. On the contrary. What we have is simple, what you propose is complicated.

What we have is irritating and serves no real purpose. Programming notwithstanding, how would this be more complicated? I suppose not bothering to fix something people complain about would be easier, but that doesn't make it better.

Quote

-- It really wouldn't change anything if you think about it.
Then let's not do that. I see no good reason to do something that would change nothing.

Not do what? Fix what your customers don't like? Also, yes, it would change something for people that drop in voice. In fact i pretty much described what it would change in detail.

Quote

-- That's right, we're gonna run off and move to our group,
You're doing it wrong : that's precisely what not being supportive of the team is. The match is not about your own 2-10 men group. It's about the whole team.

So you're suggesting that blindly following around 3 people that cannot coordinate, cannot hear my warning, or calls for focused fire and are in all likelyhood going to mill around doing whatever they want anyway is somehow more helpful then moving to be with my friends who are in voice coms, where we can actually hear warnings, draw up tactics on the fly, focus fire etc...
Not going to start throwing insults saying your a pugger, but i think you need to think that one through a little more.

[cb216]

Hi guys, just my 2 cents...for now, probably more to come, but its 4.18am here and this is all my sleep deprived brain can oooze out.

1. I like the idea of increasing the amount of lance's (from 3 to 4 or 5), especially for larger groups and private mathces(12v12) this will allow for much finer control of mech types in lances.
eg. For the times I 12v12, i can have a lance of scouts, a lance of medium flankers a lance of heavy hitters and a lance of tankers all knowing the men in thier lance is in the same role/class of mech and following the same strategy.

2. I also like the idea of highlighting (changing colour or icon) group members on the battlefield but i want it to go further, When you hold down the tab key to see players i want to be able to highlight players on my team (by clicking thier name), these highlighted players than have either a different colour on the battlefield or a diff icon aove thier head, this optoin should have mutiple colours/icons so i can set up different groups i want to kep an eye on.
eg. I can click on my group members names once each to make them yellow in game, i can then click twice on other players with mechs of the same class as me (ie lights) and they are highlighted purple on the battlefield, i can then click on other players names (in assaults, so i can keep an eye on them and assist if the are in trouble from lights) 3 times and they are highlighted green on the battlefield.
Doing this will allow me (as a solo or group player) to have a greater insight as to what is happening around me. Allowing me to respond more rapidly to the ever changing battlefield. Slightly eliminating the need and reducing the time for me to hold q and look around to find the 1 mech that needs my help right then,

Cb216

Point 2 is something i have been thinking about for a while as i mainly play support or scout roles and when ur far off from the rest of your team and hold the q button all you see is a blob of blue, where names overlap.

oh and my brain is so tired right now that it took me over an hour to write this post as its now 5.34am. I gotta get to bed.......