152 replies to this topic

[Teralitha]

Sybreed, on 27 March 2013 - 06:05 PM, said:

dude, what is this game !?!?! I want

I will say I like those maps better than the MWO maps. Tourmaline is their best map, but I think I would like the WOT style maps instead.

[Wrenchfarm]

I 100% agree with the spirit of this thread and the OPs concerns.

My time playing MWO has been a lonely uphill battle of trying to get any of my usual gaming buddies to join in. I wrote about the game in my blogs, I tweeted about it constantly, I spoke (mostly) highly of it in person. Nothing. Not only were most people just plain not into a mech game based on a licence they may or may not remember, the few I actually roped into the game dropped it like a sack of bricks in the span of a few rounds. They would all describe the sheer overwhelming nature of just being dumped into the game with no tutorial and complain that all the enemies seemed infinitely more capable in everyway, stronger weapons, more durable, seemingly no concern for heat, ect.

It got to the point where I wrote an exhaustive new player guide you can still find in my sig (although some of the info is a little dated). I tried to cover all the salient points in the most conversational un-intimitading way possible, and it ended up being over 3000 words of crazy specific rules and assurances that everything will be better once you get past the trials. This was still back in the days of Repair&Rearm and no cadet bonus in sight. When the trials went from XL engine Assaults to the next and pathetic Dragon load-outs. Ridiculous.

None of my friends have joined MWO, and I don't blame them. If you don't have a deep abiding love for robots (I do) then there is NOTHING for you as a new player in MWO. Which is a shame because I truly believe there is a fun and engaging game to be had once you get over the hump, but you will never get the average gamer (even core gamers that spend their time in gaming blogs and such) to invest in the intitial period of punishment - the hours and hours of humiliation and frustration before it "gets good". **** it, why should they when there are so many other great games out there that don't make themselves a chore to play?

The game desperately needs a tutorial.

It needs trial mechs that are at least somewhat competitive. I understand the aspirational element of starting in a crappy mech and working up to a good one that makes business sense with a F2P game, but you need to actually hook players in for that to work.

It needs voice coms. Every person I tried to get to play was astounded the game lacked voice support. Some insisted I must have just missed some option box or something. yet even not, months after the start of OB, we rely on Teamspeak and Vent. Ludicrous.

These are simple things we have been shouting to the heavens for months now. I have no idea what is going on at PGI that they don't fix these obvious problems.

[Sayyid]

valkyrie, on 26 March 2013 - 11:33 PM, said:

I've been playing World of Tanks a little bit as of late. Why? Because I'm a huge weeaboo who loved Girls und Panzer and had this nearly unscratchable itch to play around in a PzKpfw IV. World of Tanks looked to scratch that itch, and I figured "well, why not, it's halfway up the tech tree, can't be too hard to unlock."

Sounds like you should have played World War II Online.
http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/

There.

WWIIOL has realistic weapons physics, tanks are tanks, and infantry are targets.

Edited by Sayyid, 28 March 2013 - 05:50 AM.

[Karl Streiger]

Wrenchfarm, on 28 March 2013 - 05:03 AM, said:

...

Same here...I did all i could to recruit new members... at work, friends, WoT players...
but based on what I see, what I have experienced few had changed in the past.

Actually the game is as good - or as bad - question of your pov - as it was in the Closed Beta. I can't hardly see any positive development since December.

I dunno...mabye the audience should be arcade fps players - but i'm sure it fails to achieve that. But I'm pretty sure it fails to adress die hard BattleTech fans like me.

I'm little bit dissapointed. Hope things will change...but as is said: Hope is just a illusion

[Bishop Steiner]

@Thirdstar

"you're allowed an opinion, and I'm allowed to call that opinion uninformed and myopic"

So..... Now who's telling people " get offs my damn lawn"?

More syllables doesn't make a post any less condescending that calling someone "kid" or "Timmy". hence my general issue with your issue with me. We all do it, even if we shouldn't, but we only notice it usually when we disagree with the poster. Just sayin.

[Thirdstar]

Your comparing apples and oranges Bishop.

Poster stated that the new player experience doesn't need to be improved but should instead be handed over to player run groups. This is absurd, I hope I don't have to explain why, and I pointed that out.

You on the other hand jump into threads about heat balancing and loudly complain that participants are 'console kiddies' and how 'entitilement' is ruining the game.

These two instances are not similar.

[Bishop Steiner]

That you don't see that they are (aka 3rd party stepping into middle of absurd speculation/argument, answering with condescending answer) is why we will never see eye to eye. The absolute absurd bully team crap you and the Kongers pulled on qki further demos that. But believe what you will.

[valkyrie]

Matthew Craig, on 28 March 2013 - 02:10 AM, said:

Just wanted to respond to the OP, it seems fairly safe to say that tutorials and tweaks to the matchmaker will happen. We agree that we don't want the matchmaker throwing new players in with even average players as they need time to adjust. It's also no secret that the UI is getting work for helping new users and that testing grounds opens us up to do better tutorials.

With regard to trial mechs there's been internal discussion but its best if I leave it for design to speak about anything in that area.

Thanks for the well thought out post, as usual we hear you and share similar concerns :-)

Thanks Matt! I'm glad to know you guys are listening. Keep us updated!

[Henchman 24]

Karl Streiger, on 27 March 2013 - 12:28 AM, said:

I think the first ideas of tutorials and guidance are as old as the forum itself.

Older....some of the first posts never made it back after the redesign.

[Alex Wolfe]

Karl Streiger, on 27 March 2013 - 12:28 AM, said:

I think the first ideas of tutorials and guidance are as old as the forum itself.

It is indeed, the difference is that it used to be hard to punch some reason through the wall of "IT'S A BETA GIVE THEM TIME STOP BEING ENTITLED FREELOADERS SHOULD BE DISADVANTAGED NOT CATERED TO" logic, which continued for months despite all the warning signs.

Nowadays it appears that the political climate has changed... or rather, reality came crashing down. It's a welcome change, the only question is whether it's not too late.

Edited by Alex Wolfe, 28 March 2013 - 06:34 AM.

[Alienfreak]

Teralitha, on 27 March 2013 - 06:58 AM, said:

I would have to say that my favorite f2p title is league of legends. I dont really have anything negative to say about it.

You never have to play ranked if you dont want to. Ranked play is completely separate from the other levels.

They have 2 level systems. 1st is out of game, your toon can reach a max of lvl 30, and you do not have access to ranked play until you reach it. It takes maybe 100+ matches to reach lvl 30. Each match lasts a minimum of 20 minutes, and has an infinite timer. A match can potentially last forever. Though most are over in 20-30 minutes. It can take a long time to reach level 30 if your a casual player.

Next they have player v AI. Dont want the stress of dealing with unpredictable players or harassing? You can play agaisnt the AI, which can actually be quite challenging if your not used to the AI quirks They are always tweeking them to be smarter, and many casual players play nothing but AI games.
Next is normal solo q. the first level of player vs player. This is not ranked. Its a good place to practice for ranked and learn the meta.

Last is the ranked play and matching uses an ELO system. The normal play also uses ELO but that one is hidden. Ranked ELO is available for all to see. AI mode has no matchmaker or ELO.

The best F2P is DotA 2.

LoL wants you to spend money for getting progress or farm endlessly for their about 150+ heroes. Which are not there because they are needed but because you need more things to spend your money on. Otherwise you will be stuck with 10 randompicked heroes or whatever that was.

DotA 2 has no such limits. You can do anything and everything at any time.
Everything you can spend money on are just visual candy items. Different courier, different clothes your hero wears. But none of them changes anything about the mechanics.
There is no grind for anything. Plus you get a free item every few matches for level ups (probably every 6 games) as well as you can get them on a random basis (pure luck) after a match. Plus they have an ingame function to spectate games. If you watch tournaments or leagues everytime someone gets a double killl (or better), Firstblood or wins one of the spectators even gets an item that is signed with a text refering to that occurance. Can I marry Valve for making the best F2P game ever?
The only downside of DotA 2 could be that you cannot see your ELO rating openly. But ELO works pretty well and you get fitting enemies. You can try that if you open a twink or play with someones twink and you just stomp people like no tomorrow.

DotA 2 also has no Hero Mechs you can buy with realmoney only. DotA 2 has no GXP that is nothing but a realmoney bait because you get it so slow.
AND MOST IMPORTANTLY: DotA 2 has no realmoney consumables that make you BETTER than the people who don't spend it. Cool Flush, Premium Artillery Strike, Premium Airstrike come to mind here...

P.S.: DotA 2 also has Botmatches to train and has a tutorial plus some single player stuff I haven't tried yet

Edited by Alienfreak, 28 March 2013 - 07:02 AM.

[Alienfreak]

Beef Hands, on 28 March 2013 - 07:36 AM, said:

Mechwarrior has never been new player friendly. This is not the call of duty crowd and I have no problem throwing my money at this project to keep it on track so it doesn't have to kowtow to the moronic masses. Sorry about your unpleasant WoT experience. It brings a tear to my eye that newbs are still getting stomped just because they lack experience with gameplay, familiarity with core tactical concepts, and mastery of basic controls.

But you need a certain influx of new players in a F2P to keep it alive. 10.000 hardcore fans who throw money at PGI now and then will not suffice.
And the less people play the less attractive it becomes for new players.

[mattkachu]

Don't want to attack OP, but really, its not HARD to get a pz4 in WoT.

He said "not all the amount of gold can buy me one" but if you're willing to spend 60 bucks, its like 10 games of playing and you got yourself a pz4. If you're abysmal @ the game (new) then it might take you more games, but you can use premium account to offset this.

step one: buy yourself a tier 8 premium. keep "rapid crew acceleration" off

step two: make your team rage because you have NO idea how to pilot a tank

step three: still make 20k silver and 500xp for doing absolutley nothing

step four: convert XP to free xp like how you do in mwo. bam 15k GXP

Not to split hairs, but the pz 38t is a 2:1 tank, and by that i mean 2 kills per 1 game, not KDR

[Alex Wolfe]

Beef Hands, on 28 March 2013 - 07:36 AM, said:

[uphill in the snow both ways]

The whole point is that for "accessibility" - a word that has become a curse to the players - the GAME doesn't have to be dumbed down, only presented and explained better. The core experience remains the same.

You don't need to beat someone down to see who's worthy of playing, invite people instead, get them interested and entice them to stick around. You get to play with more people, they improve faster and present a good challenge, the game is fun and creates revenue, everybody's happy. As it is now MWO is, and has always been an extremely punishing experience that one needs a special mindset to deal with. It's neither a way to keep players (and I'm pretty certain it's hemorrhaging even die-hard veterans at this point), nor a sustainable business model.

[Wildstreak]

I am not surprised World of Tanks is bad in some ways, I saw that when I looked it over. Some things in WoT do not compare with MWO and on certain subjects, I really wish comparisons would not be made.

But regarding new player experience, the OP may well be right.

I play another MMO, Lord of the Rings Online, in there new players have special safe zones they go through for the first 5-7 levels before being put into the regular game world and there are other limitations to reach before getting into the PvP section.

To me it seems to have become a standard for the better MMOs to have certain concepts in place for new player expereince.

In MWO, making new Trial Mechs as shown in the recent contest is 1 improvement, another might be having a mew player only be put into matches for X number of matches against new players. I figure this could be done since new players already have the feature to get a C-Bill bonus for X number of time/matches, since the game can already record such a value it should be doable. Perhaps also make the matches 4v4.

Edited by Merchant, 28 March 2013 - 10:04 AM.

[WardenWolf]

OP is absolutely, 100%, spot-on in terms of what MWO needs for the new player. I am hoping that the 'new user experience' revamp coming soon hits at least a couple of these points.

[Irvine]

Beef Hands, on 28 March 2013 - 07:36 AM, said:

Mechwarrior has never been new player friendly. This is not the call of duty crowd and I have no problem throwing my money at this project to keep it on track so it doesn't have to kowtow to the moronic masses. Sorry about your unpleasant WoT experience. It brings a tear to my eye that newbs are still getting stomped just because they lack experience with gameplay, familiarity with core tactical concepts, and mastery of basic controls. When I first played CS 1.6 I was awful, but I got better by emulating better players, when I started WoT I was awful, but I got better by emulating better players, when I started EVE I got faceraped by goonswarm and got better by emulating better players, etc. ad infinitum. MWO may be tricky to grasp at first, but any grown human could master this game, it's really not that difficult.

I'm sorry but when CoD must have done something right when it consistently has a giant player-base/revenue. Call of Duty actually has a good new player experience.

[LaserAngel]

I hope some Elo tweaking is made soon since we have over a month of live data and three solo drop tournaments to normalize the committed player force.

[Gopblin]

Comments on WoT:

I haven't played WoT recently, but I was in a clan and leading companies for over a year there, so I think I can give some advice on how to get in the game.

You happened to land in the single worst possible position in the entire WoT: Out of the tier 1-2 "kindergarden" into the cold and unwelcoming world, trying to fast-grind a bad tier III "medium tank" of all things. This is horrible for a number of reasons I won't get into here, suffice to say the following:

- Always unlock at least basic upgrades with free XP, grinding stock tanks is a complete nightmare

- Know the game:
Some tank models are just better than others, I have a hunch you'd be better off going towards the PzIII tree
Pick your battles, some opponents you should just flank or avoid entirely. Go around them and rush their base/arty
A lot of heavier tanks have weak spots, at the very least even a tier 1 can track a tier 10 (yes, I've done it a few times in company play)

- WoT strives to be semi-realistic. This means lower-tier tanks just won't be able to penetrate higher-tier opponents. Therefore
Always mount the highest-penetration gun you can get (like 57mm needler on a T34)
If you wanna never ever be useless, play light scouts, Tank Destroyer or Arty
There are some exceptions to this rule (Tier 5 KV was able to pen tier 9s with its 107mm before the nerf). Know them.

To sum this up, if you want to try WoT again and be competitive, start with Tank Destroyers or fast tanks (arty is really it's separate game, if you like it more power to ya, you can definitely be very effective).
Lights can act as scouts/arty killers, and TDs generally mount a big enough gun to pen almost anything they encounter - just snipe from bushes and you'll be good.
IMO T82 is the single best vehicle in the game, even after the nerfs - really good view range, a needler that is very accurate and fires ridiculously fast and easily pens everything up to T5 heavies, which is the maximum you'll encounter. Perched in a good bush, you can win a lot of games pretty much by yourself. German and Russian TDs aren't far behind.
Use the free xp you get from these victories to unlock better guns/tracks on your PzIII so the grind to PzIV isn't so painful.

To be continued with experience as a new player in MWO.

Best wishes,
Daniel.

[Jakob Knight]

Very nice post.

I think all players agree that this game is not as developed as it should be at this point, with the development that has taken place in the wrong areas. Rather than constructing a good foundation game (3025 tech units, but with an established chat system and/or tutorial missions), the devs have put out a combat game and focused on introducing advanced play options to keep current players 'wow'ed' instead of making it more understandable for players just trying to break into the game.

The biggest problem is the lack of a chat system, and the ability to have other players drop into training areas with new players. The chat system would at least allow veteran players to assist new players outside of combat without worrying about a countdown timer and the need to support the battle. A dedicated co-op training field would allow vets to actually assist new players in learning the ropes, giving the playerbase the ability to accomplish what the devs don't seem to have the time to do. Right now, the lack of either one is forcing new players to jump right into the frying pan in order to get any kind of useful feedback, and that often comes either during periods when their team can't afford the time to chat, or at the business end of the enemy's autocannon.

Instead of continuing to introduce more advanced features (consumables, cockpit decorations, the Clans, ect.), the devs should prioritize the basic foundations their game needs.

Edited by Jakob Knight, 28 March 2013 - 11:41 AM.