91 replies to this topic

[Diamondwing]

Now, I am no veteran of Clan Warfare but I can definitely see from the current state of affairs that it is in need of dire repair. We have currently a few queues at a time popping because of the gross imbalances currently in play. Let's take a look at what I'm talking about exactly.

• Group Stomping

What this entails is a group of pugs vs a 10-12 man pre-made. But lets get more to the point of the matter and why this is such a terrible topic to bring up. It's full of vitriol players who insist that the CW portion of this game is the "end" game kind of how COD players insist that their ranking matters. CW's are not the end game...If it was then you wouldn't have access to it prior to obtaining pilot rank X, Y, Z or some other form of hard wall. So lets just say this, people sometimes PUG. I personally prefer to pug. You have some die hards that just insist that it is like the cool-kids table to be in a big team.

I don't dispute that team play is highly important and should be complimented.

However, I do think that a design choice should of been made early on to impliment the "pug queue"

I know for a fact that this has been openly discussed before, but implimenting a PUG queue would be for teams of 4 or less and involve a more "lance" based queue in order to minimize the auto-lose scenario. This also allows more casual players to casually influence the big CW's.

"Well that isn't fair to the group players" - Some Try-hard Scrub

Well, lets put it into a different perspective. What if 10-12 man premades DID influence the territory control more so than pug matches? Would this not suit the angry ****'s of the butt-devestated try-hards? Probably not but it's a good incentive to continue full on groups.

• Clan vs IS debate

Seriously guys. Clan VS IS is just getting old at this point. I've been lurking these forums for awhile now and at first it was "CLAN OP NERF CLAN!" - Some bad IS player to "IS OP NERF IS" - Some bad Clan playe

I don't dispute that there are gross-imbalances in some of the mech choices. I mean hell, some don't even get played. When was the last time you saw an Ice ferret or an urban mech? Well that's just because the ratio of Damage vs Survivability is WAY off right now. I've noticed that, honestly, skill has very little to do with it and it's more about strategical positioning and zerging than it is landing your shots. Yes, not hitting is certainly a good way to lose but right now personal skill has very little to do with your success in this game. Weapons just do not have the individual impact that they ultimately should have and the game just comes down to a spam fest of frusteration. This needs to be fixed. Personally I am an advocate of not complaining if I don't have a solution and my solution is to raise the individual impact of weapons by about 50% to even 100%, make weapons scale. An assault mech should FEEL and BE much more deadly at the expense of slow movement and being a gigantic target. A light mech should do little impact but have the ability to strafe and get to places it needs to get to.

Overall everything above is my personal impression of the CW problem, because it is a problem, the numbers and the gameplay show it. I'm not here to argue with anyone or wave E-peen, I just want to see the game playable for more casual players who want to contribute.

[sycocys]

4 man in a pug queue is a bad, to borderline terrible idea. 4 players will end up super farming pugs and using 8 players as distraction shields.

-- Also, I've got an Urbie in my current deck. All it takes is a particular drop weight for certain mechs to become viable.

[Diamondwing]

sycocys, on 28 January 2016 - 08:25 PM, said:

4 man in a pug queue is a bad, to borderline terrible idea. 4 players will end up super farming pugs and using 8 players as distraction shields.

Then you've just proven my point further. Make a queue specifically for pugs. No groups allowed. Let them influence the CW but on a lesser percentile then the true unit warfare. Gives incentive for pugs to actually play CW and doesn't remove incentive for unit play.

[kesmai]

hello op.
i am going to translate your post for others:
i want the free cw stuff, but neither iwant to put any real effort into it , nor i want to join a unit. I am THE special snowflake and i demand this because i already played this game for 6 days.

[Ssamout]

Diamondwing, on 28 January 2016 - 06:08 PM, said:

I don't dispute that there are gross-imbalances in some of the mech choices. I mean hell, some don't even get played. When was the last time you saw an Ice ferret or an urban mech? Well that's just because the ratio of Damage vs Survivability is WAY off right now. I've noticed that, honestly, skill has very little to do with it and it's more about strategical positioning and zerging than it is landing your shots. Yes, not hitting is certainly a good way to lose but right now personal skill has very little to do with your success in this game. Weapons just do not have the individual impact that they ultimately should have and the game just comes down to a spam fest of frusteration. This needs to be fixed. Personally I am an advocate of not complaining if I don't have a solution and my solution is to raise the individual impact of weapons by about 50% to even 100%, make weapons scale. An assault mech should FEEL and BE much more deadly at the expense of slow movement and being a gigantic target. A light mech should do little impact but have the ability to strafe and get to places it needs to get to.

Umm, feels like you havent met skilled players. Or havent been targeted by few semi competent assault pilots at the same time. Try tanking against few Dires simultaneously and say they dont feel deadly.

[Willard Phule]

One thing you have to keep in mind, OP, is that CW has no matchmaker.

Regardless of how well the matchmaker in the "quick play" queue works (group and solo), the concept is to separate players based on their PSR (Pilot Skill Rating). For the most part, being T2, I don't see a lot of T4 and T5 in my matches.

But CW, on the other hand, is "first queued, first dropped." Unless you're part of a premade group going in, you just roll your dice and take your chances on teams. If you're Clan Wolf, odds are good you're going to end up with over 75% new players in trial mechs. And you'll be going against premade groups that will stomp you into the ground.

The very first thing that needs to be done is to make the Tutorial mandatory before allowing entrance into CW. If you don't want to do the tutorial before jumping into live play, then join the "quick play" queue and learn like everyone else did.

The second thing they need to do, regardless of population, is to separate players by skill. Only T5 and T4 should be allowed to drop with trials. Doing it that way prevents stomps by organized groups of veterans against new players. They just won't see each other until the PSRs are equal.

Seems simple enough.

[Vxheous]

Diamondwing, on 28 January 2016 - 08:57 PM, said:

Then you've just proven my point further. Make a queue specifically for pugs. No groups allowed. Let them influence the CW but on a lesser percentile then the true unit warfare. Gives incentive for pugs to actually play CW and doesn't remove incentive for unit play.

I can tell you exactly how a pug vs pug CW game is going to go (because late night pug vs pug games still happen). You are going to have 2-3 players on each team that will do 2.5K-4K damage (each with 5-15 kills, and 20+ assists), and 9-10 players that are doing 200-600 damage (each with 0-1 kill, and 4-10 assists). The games are going to end 48-30ish, something in that range. So really, 4-6 guys in that game are going to stop the other 18-20 players, but because it's not a "unit" stomping pugs, it's going to be ok. As one of those bad players (200-600 damage/CW game is like 50-150 damage done/mech) your C-bill earnings are going to be south of 200K/match, but hey, those big bad 12 mans can't hurt you anymore, so internally, it must make you feel better about yourself.

Edit: When running a Unit group, we often intentionally drop on defense to encounter more groups (since groups typically drop on Attack in CW), so no, I do not enjoy pub stomping. C-bill earnings are far higher when I solo drop CW than when I drop as a unit, so contrary to popular belief, pub-stomping with a good 12 man doesn't actually earn great c-bills.

Edited by Vxheous Kerensky, 29 January 2016 - 11:01 AM.

[Zolaz]

They have a special PUG queue, it just isnt in faction warfare. Put your floaties back on and splash back on over to the shallow end of the pool. Or maybe, you could adapt to faction warfare? Who are we kidding, it is easier for you to ask PGI to change everything to suit your needs.

[Kieva]

A big thing about the PUG queue idea in CW is actually a logistical/wait time issue. If you are a 12-Man and have to wait for another 12 man, you're going to encounter two problems: What if the other faction can't muster up that organized group. And what if you encounter the same 12 guys over and over and over again?

Even when I drop for Clan Wolf right now, what I see when I attack FRR for hours at a time, with only 2 active dropships worth of pilots against us, is skittles. If they had an active 12-man at the time, we'd eventually run in to it. You're asking me to wait for the enemy to form a full and organized group, or go to ghost drop. Excessive wait times will reduce the desire to group drop.

Furthermore, you lose all variety. Let's say your 12-man drops and defeats an 8+4 man or another 12 man. That 12 players is the only active non-PUG group against you at the time, you're going to see that same group, over and over and over and over again. It will actually get to the point where players will change their drop-deck to specifically counter the drop deck of the opponents they know they're going to get. You can't implement a forced-cycle rule where you end up against different opponents, if your side has 24 attackers in the unit queue, vs 12 in the opposing queue, one team is forced to ghost drop, each time, which would alternate back and forth. You'd still get the same opponents. Even worse, what if there's only 12 each? Then you fight once and bam, done with that planet until another 12 man forms.

We do that in CWI already. When we get the same general tactics on a given map over and over, for example, two waves of IS quirk-oriented Long Range mechs, EG: a ton of Thunderbolts and Battlemasters with ERLL, we load up our dropdecks with multiple arctic Cheetahs, beat their big guys, then bring in our heavies which are specifically loaded out to counter lights, and brawl.

In short, the CW community is not large enough to support the concept of a PUG and group queue. It is however, large enough to warrant a better opportunity to communicate with your teammates pre-drop, that alone would be immensely helpful.

Edited by Kieva, 30 January 2016 - 01:08 PM.

[Davers]

Diamondwing, on 28 January 2016 - 08:57 PM, said:

Then you've just proven my point further. Make a queue specifically for pugs. No groups allowed. Let them influence the CW but on a lesser percentile then the true unit warfare. Gives incentive for pugs to actually play CW and doesn't remove incentive for unit play.

CW is too empty for that to work.Too easy for players to just disband their unit and just drop together on the same TS. After all, what does being in a unit get you other than the hatred of pugs?

[Wildstreak]

Generic Responses Post

"Learn to ******* team up and join a Unit!"
"I ain't joining any **** Units!"
"Git Gud. L1k3 my 3n6l15h?"
"IS OP, my Clans need buffing!"
"Clans OP, my IS need buffing!"
"This is all Davion's fault." - Liao Loyalist
"This is all Liao's fault." - Davion Loyalist
"We tried to be good neutral Space Bacon sellers but no, Davion and Liao just had to poke us." - Marik Loyalist
"I spent (insane amount of money) on this game and have had enough, we should all close our wallets."
"Let me teach you why you're wrong with sarcasm and condescension plus I have too much time on my hands." - Alt spam account
"I am Top Tier so you should all shut up because you are not skilled enough."
"What's your stats?"
"I am the Toxic Avenger, bring on the toxic forum comments!"

Which ones did I miss?

[Leggin Ho]

Said it before and will say it again, remove all trial mechs from CW and that will fix 75% of posting like this because folks are too lazy to read a pop up that TELLS them that CW is the "Hard" mode in MWO, there is no Match Maker and you enter at your own risk.

[Sandpit]

Diamondwing, on 28 January 2016 - 06:08 PM, said:

It's full of vitriol players who insist that the CW portion of this game is the "end" game kind of how COD players insist that their ranking matters. CW's are not the end game...If it was then you wouldn't have access to it prior to obtaining pilot rank X, Y, Z or some other form of hard wall. So lets just say this, people sometimes PUG. I personally prefer to pug. You have some die hards that just insist that it is like the cool-kids table to be in a big team.

You should really do some research before posting stuff like this,

PGI declared it endgame content. Not players.
PGI declared it "hardcore" mode. Not Players
PGI declared it no separation queues. Not Players

Davers, on 30 January 2016 - 01:37 PM, said:

CW is too empty for that to work.Too easy for players to just disband their unit and just drop together on the same TS. After all, what does being in a unit get you other than the hatred of pugs?

Russ pointing out that you're the reason CW sucks

[DarklightCA]

First of all Community Warfare is end game content, you require to have 4 primary mechs of your own that are elited equaling out to 240-260 tons. Unless you are using clan mechs that usually means 4 entirely different mechs. That is a bit of time in game and cbills to grind. The problem effecting Community Warfare in the fact players are getting stomped is because it's not being treated like the end game content it is.

The fact new players from steam can load a deck full of trial mechs and jump straight into it with their training diapers still on is ridiculous. The fact casual players can jump into it thinking it's just another version of regular queue that they can casually play and get easy rewards is ridiculous. Community Warfare is a gamemode designed around planetary conquest which is Unit's competing against other Unit's and teams to conquer planet's in a no match making environment. Nothing about that sounds casual at all.

People can come into Community Warfare and play it without a unit and solo queue but they are just playing it for the gameplay and LP rewards as they have no effect on the map. Every time you hit a queue you are gambling on who your teammates are and who your opponents are and that aspect is why Community Warfare is great, the complete unknown of who you are facing and what advantage/disadvantage you would have.

Teamwork, Communication and Coordination is what wins game, aside from any skill gap that is what gives Unit's a advantage. However the flaw of the system is not Unit's vs Solo player's. Solo players can use Teamwork, Communication and Coordination as well. 12 solo player's all working together in the same manner that Unit's do won't likely get 48-0'd. Those matches will be a lot more drawn out and closer than what current Solo vs Unit matches are.

Why that's currently not happening is because you have solo players who are currently doing that or would do that mixed up with new players driving trial mechs and no idea how to play the game as well as casual players who will bring whatever mech they want to regardless of what map they are playing and have no intentions to ever bother using Teamwork, Communication and Coordination. They will go into a match doing whatever they want, no intention of pushing with you through gates or supporting you in engagements however are always suprised why they lose games so much in this wacky team based gamemode.

[Willard Phule]

I don't know where you guys get this whole "end game content" stuff.

Beginning of the game is...wait for it....running around in trial mechs, asking questions like "how to moving forward" or "what is meaning lock targets?" That's how it starts.

End Game is...again, wait for it....fully mastered, customized and moduled mechs competing for something tangible.

So why, if it's "end game content," are brand new players allowed to even participate with trial mechs in the first place....or, why are they put into the same population as the organized premade groups?

Even the "quick play" queues (where'd the pull that name out of?), there's a matchmaker. Granted, an underpowered and easily confused matchmaker (it's PGI, after all) that at least tries to keep people separated by PSR. CW doesn't even have that.

They need an "active reserves" sort of queue for the PUGs in CW. Instead of queuing up for a planet, you jump into the "first come, first served" queue. It puts you to a planet that needs warm bodies or filler for a group of less than 12.

Or, we could just leave it as it is. Most of us have been predicting the downfall of MW:O for quite some time. This could very well do it.

[DarklightCA]

Willard Phule, on 02 February 2016 - 06:19 AM, said:

I don't know where you guys get this whole "end game content" stuff.

Beginning of the game is...wait for it....running around in trial mechs, asking questions like "how to moving forward" or "what is meaning lock targets?" That's how it starts.

End Game is...again, wait for it....fully mastered, customized and moduled mechs competing for something tangible.

So why, if it's "end game content," are brand new players allowed to even participate with trial mechs in the first place....or, why are they put into the same population as the organized premade groups?

Even the "quick play" queues (where'd the pull that name out of?), there's a matchmaker. Granted, an underpowered and easily confused matchmaker (it's PGI, after all) that at least tries to keep people separated by PSR. CW doesn't even have that.

They need an "active reserves" sort of queue for the PUGs in CW. Instead of queuing up for a planet, you jump into the "first come, first served" queue. It puts you to a planet that needs warm bodies or filler for a group of less than 12.

Or, we could just leave it as it is. Most of us have been predicting the downfall of MW:O for quite some time. This could very well do it.

End Game definition, "the final stage of a game". Being Community Warfare is the final stage in this game besides for maybe a Solaris it requires or should require 4 elited mechs to even begin to compete with every other player. Which takes a bit of time grinding in the quick play queue.

Being in a better designed Community Warfare new players would have to require to grind those 4 elited mechs first before being able to play Community Warfare and by that time would have learned how to properly play the game in a actual match making environment.

Also being Community Warfare is designed to be hard in a no match making environment designed around Unit's competing for planetary conquest, one could say that it's not designed as a new player experience but more as a gamemode designed for more experienced players (with actual mechs).

Everything about that says end game content being by every other games definition the content that requires you to spend the most time grinding towards it and to become a more experienced player in order to play it is end game content.

Edited by l)arklight, 02 February 2016 - 07:18 AM.

[Willard Phule]

l)arklight, on 02 February 2016 - 06:50 AM, said:

End Game definition, "the final stage of a game". Being Community Warfare is the final stage in this game besides for maybe a Solaris it requires or should require 4 elited mechs to even begin to compete with every other player. Which takes a bit of time grinding in the quick play queue.

Being in a better designed Community Warfare new players would have to require to grind those 4 elited mechs first before being able to play Community Warfare and by that time would have learned how to properly play the game in a actual match making environment.

Also being Community Warfare is designed to be hard in a no match making environment designed around Unit's competing for planetary conquest, one could say that it's not designed as a new player experience but more as a gamemode designed for more experienced players (with actual mechs).

Everything about that says end game content being by every other games definition the content that requires you to spend the most time grinding towards it and to become a more experienced player in order to play it is end game content.

Makes sense to me....except, if this is the case, then why is CW open to people that just downloaded the game? I've met any number of people in CW that don't even know how to join the solo queue.

No, it really looks and feels like a new player experience. Granted, the content is too advanced for new players to understand, but the lack of complexity and requirements before being allowed to join definitely point to a "new player experience" model.

Seriously. If PGI wanted CW to be some kind of "end game content," they would have specific requirements...like successfully completing a Tutorial for CW or having to own all 4 mechs that you drop with. They wouldn't allow people to simply pick one of the free "trial" mechs and jump right in.

I mean, if they did that, they'd sort of be cutting their own throat to spite their face. They want a higher population, but can't keep anyone around long enough to get better at the game. Seems to me that throwing the pee-wee players out on the ice with the adults will always result in the same thing....crushed pee-wees.

Based on their past performance of balances and matchmaking, I really have to conclude that this is their actual model. Since open beta, it's been "the better you are, the harder you carry." Seems that's the way they want it, as opposed to separating people by ability.

[DarklightCA]

You are really giving PGI too much credit for planning if you think them not creating a barrier between new players and Community Warfare is game design. Everything so far is them creating content by demand and updates based on problems that are created atleast from my point of view.

They created Community Warfare and likely by all there expectations they thought it was going to be highly popular. With so little content added, bad map design and lack of really any point in maintaining a interest in it the population really sank after a few weeks. The kind of updates that they are releasing in phase 3 should have really been added for Community Warfares launch. Creating a planetary conquest gamemode without any reason to actually conquer planets is poor planning.

Lack of focusing on Unit vs Unit content really dropped interest in Unit's to maintaining interest in playing it. Lack of proper community recruitment tools beyond a forum post makes it really difficult for struggling units to recruit a proper playerbase to actively play such a gamemode though LFG was a nice touch.

Right now solo queue dominates the gamemode too heavily and those solo queuers consists of unit players who don't have populated units. Units struggling to recruit players has been a problem since beta and has been brought up many times and would have helped units fill out 12 man teams to play Community Warfare with.

Community Warfare is end game content, new players shouldn't be allowed to instantly join it to be slaughtered in trial mechs. This is a problem and like everything else in this game that started as a design flaw it will hopefully be corrected.

Edited by l)arklight, 02 February 2016 - 10:59 AM.

[Sandpit]

Willard Phule, on 02 February 2016 - 06:19 AM, said:

I don't know where you guys get this whole "end game content" stuff.

Russ Bullock
PGI

Now that I've answered that question (twice now in this same thread) got any other questions?

[PerfectDuck]

l)arklight, on 02 February 2016 - 04:29 AM, said:

The problem effecting Community Warfare in the fact players are getting stomped is because it's not being treated like the end game content it is.

The fact new players from steam can load a deck full of trial mechs and jump straight into it with their training diapers still on is ridiculous. The fact casual players can jump into it thinking it's just another version of regular queue that they can casually play and get easy rewards is ridiculous.

The mentality of OP in his opening statements proves your point.

Willard Phule, on 02 February 2016 - 06:19 AM, said:

So why, if it's "end game content," are brand new players allowed to even participate with trial mechs in the first place....or, why are they put into the same population as the organized premade groups?

For the love of god it wasn't us premade and organized players who wanted it to be like this! We're as much the victims in this as everyone else. We're trying to actually play the game here, not to say that there aren't a few legitimately teamwork-focused solo players who also do their best to coordinate. Clueless players that tip the balance against their own team waste everyone's time. The only difference is on our side we have these hundreds of millions of surplus c-bills we don't even know what to do with anymore because we can make 800k in 14 minutes and the pugs aren't as dubiously pocket-stuffed. I know, as a unit player, I'm pulling the victim card and that might come as a shock to some people who think 'what could possibly be so bad about that' but trust me, we're losing pilots in our unit because they're moving on to more exciting games to play. After watching so many stomps it becomes the same old.