342 replies to this topic

[Billygoat]

Bryan Ekman, on 08 April 2013 - 09:35 AM, said:

However, we will hold firm that aggressive and threatening behaviour towards staff of fellow MechWarriors will never be acceptable and will result in banishment for those who do so.
I take solace in the fact that this behavior represents the minority, not the majority of our amazing players.

Threatening? I know people get hot over some stuff (though some folks, I think, overestimate what "rage" on an internet forum really means), but threats? Sorry, but that seems a bit far fetched without more detail into what was actually said or done.

Colour me incredulous for now.

[Moku]

I'm pretty sure players that want private matches put in more money into the game than those that don't. Having more dedicated players who encourage building teams retains more players. Believing you can charge them for it is like shooting yourself in the foot and sounds like a bunch of you know what. I can understand maybe programming it in might cost some, but it's a basic game feature that all online games have so it still sounds like a sad excuse. Throwing out the private server costs as a reason also sounds really lame when we're all playing the game and spending mc on mechs, paint, and boosts.

They should at least be able to match up two group leaders who want to drop against each other and programming in no rewards/stats or keep separate private match stats.

Being able to set up matches and play against another team or group of players online that they know has been one of the things almost all mechwarriors have experienced and expected from the start.

Edited by Moku, 09 April 2013 - 05:58 AM.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Moku, on 09 April 2013 - 05:38 AM, said:

I'm pretty sure players that want private matches put in more money into the game than those that don't. Having more dedicated players who encourage building teams retains more players. Believing you can charge them for it is like shooting yourself in the foot and sounds like a bunch of you know what. I can understand maybe programming it in might cost some, but it's a basic game feature that all online games have so it still sounds like a sad excuse. Throwing out the private server costs as a reason also sounds really lame when we're all playing the game and spending mc on mechs, paint, and boosts.

They should at least be able to match up two group leaders who want to drop against each other and programming in no rewards/stats or keep separate private match stats.

This is the exact same crap they pulled with Coolant Consumables.

Them: "HEY GUYS WE ARE ADDING COOLANT, IT IS BETTER WITH MC"

Us: "OH HELL NAW"

Them: "HAHA JUST KIDDING, WE ARE ADDING COOLANT BUT IT'S NOT BETTER WITH MC"

Us: "Ok...wait...what? Crap."

-----

Them: "HEY GUYS WE GONNA BE CHARGIN LOTS O MONEY TO BE A MERC"

Us: "WHAT THE SH*T, HELL NAW"

Them: "OH HAH JUST KIDDING GUYS, THAT INTERVIEWER WAS DUM, WE JUST GONNA CHARGE FOR PRIVATE LOBBIES, OH AND SOME RANDOM PUNK KID THREATENED ME ON THE INTARWEBZ AND WE ALL CRIED"

Us: "I'm so sorry guys, you are the best, those heathens! Take our money!...Oh wait, what?"

[Ransack]

This answer is acceptable.

[Kommisar]

Billygoat, on 09 April 2013 - 05:03 AM, said:

Threatening? I know people get hot over some stuff (though some folks, I think, overestimate what "rage" on an internet forum really means), but threats? Sorry, but that seems a bit far fetched without more detail into what was actually said or done.

Colour me incredulous for now.

*Shrug*

This sort of behavior occurs all the time. There are a LOT of unbalanced individuals in this world. The really unbalanced ones generally end up spending a disproportionate amount of time deeply involved (emotionally and otherwise) with online games like this. They have burned a lot of bridges in their life, have trouble connecting with and maintaining that connection with people in their real world environment, and use their online interactions as a substitute.

This is not me being mean or mocking. These are people with a range of serious medical issues.

I ran an online Forgotten Hope tournament for just over 10 years. We were never huge or anything; but I ran into these people quite a bit. They were always VERY emotionally driven and attached. And if I tweaked the recoil value for the MP-40, they were going to let me know. If something more drastic occurred, then the threats would come out. Had one guy threaten to drive to my house and beat my daughter with a bat. Even started going around the forums and TS trying to find information he could use to find my real name or address. And I can't even remember what that was actually over! And that was just a little non-profit BF2 mod tournament with a player base in the hundreds (at best!).

It happens. All the time. I would be really surprised if this was PGIs first threat. After all, they released the Jaggermech BEFORE the Highlander.

I'm not a Dev apologist. Given an outlet, I have not held back telling them where I think they have screwed up. But I don't insult them and I sure as heck sympathize with having to deal with a player base.

Edited by Kommisar, 09 April 2013 - 06:07 AM.

[Storyteller]

Thank you for the clarification, even if there are still many open questions. And I'm really sorry to hear about this personal shitstorm, some of PGI had to suffer.

Keep your heads up, you're doing a great job.

Cheers,
Storyteller

[Lazydrones541]

Good show. Looking forward to community warfare.

[Purplefluffybunny]

Why does this thread have no view or post count in the thread listing for this subforum?

EDIT: Ah, I see those numbers on the other index for 'hot topic', just not in announcements.

Edited by Purplefluffybunny, 09 April 2013 - 09:18 AM.

[Hylius]

Bryan Ekman, on 08 April 2013 - 09:35 AM, said:

If we decided to launch Private Matches, they will likely require a Premium Account to cover costs of hosting a match on our hardware.

Look, don't insult us. You want to try to make money off a lobby system (something that any game I've ever played has provided freely if it was in there, even if limited), fine. But don't insult my intelligence by painting it as "hosting costs". 16 (or 24) people playing costs the same amount of server resources regardless if they're randomizing with PUGs or if they're on their own private game. Heck, if anything, we'd be saving you the resource costs of finding partners and attempting to balance the game, pick a map, etc. We'd do all the work for you.

Be honest with us. That's all most of us ask for, and is the reason a lot of people flip out. The lack of honesty and upfrontness is getting old. You want to grab money? At least man up and admit it.

[Purplefluffybunny]

Why is it that this thread does not appear on the 'most recent active' list on the index listing for the forums?

EDIT: Ah there we go, thread is under general still.

Edited by Purplefluffybunny, 09 April 2013 - 09:17 AM.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Hylius, on 09 April 2013 - 09:15 AM, said:

Look, don't insult us. You want to try to make money off a lobby system (something that any game I've ever played has provided freely if it was in there, even if limited), fine. But don't insult my intelligence by painting it as "hosting costs". 16 (or 24) people playing costs the same amount of server resources regardless if they're randomizing with PUGs or if they're on their own private game. Heck, if anything, we'd be saving you the resource costs of finding partners and attempting to balance the game, pick a map, etc. We'd do all the work for you.

Be honest with us. That's all most of us ask for, and is the reason a lot of people flip out. The lack of honesty and upfrontness is getting old. You want to grab money? At least man up and admit it.

I definitely enjoy when you post.

I hate that it is because the devs are doing such a poor job.

The second part of that is spot freaking on.

[Sprouticus]

I think a good compromise for the private matches would be to make it so that more than half the people in the match must have premium time. So in a 12 man, 7 players would need active premium (including whomever started the match). It allows new/poor players on some teams to participate as long as the rest of the team is ok picking up the slack.

The coding would be fairly simple as well. the leader cant invite a non-premium player unless there are more N+1 premium players.


And for those asking about resources, I think their primary concern is a bunch of people doing 1v1 or 2v2 duels/training/etc and such instead of going 12v12. This could cause severe server load compared to the same umber of players playing 12v12.

[Karl Split]

Thankyou very much for the article Bryan. That has put most of my fears to rest tbh.

I can appreciate your worry about the private matches, although I feel your fears may be missplaced as I believe the more people playing the game the better as it will in the end build a bigger meta for the game and increase longevity if a lot of fan made tourneys come about.

Have you considered maybe just charging a setup fee for private matches for a large amount of cbills or mc paid by the leader of each side rather than forcing each member to have premium time to do it?

[James DeGriz]

As much as I understand that ideas about implementation change, and as much as I'm looking forward to CW and positively dribbling with anticipation every time a snippet of new info comes to the fore there is one thing that is niggling at the back of my mind. Two previous high profile issues have started with "There will not be", morphed into "We are looking at" before ending up as "This is being implemented."; namely consumables and 3PV.

I do understand the use of "soft" words like "possibly", but given your past history when these words have been used, you can understand peoples concern. I do welcome the additional info, and I'm also quite aware the way journalists will take comments out of context and then swear blind that they're reporting verbatim, but I remain skeptically cautious until the full details are announced.

[Purplefluffybunny]

Hylius, on 09 April 2013 - 09:15 AM, said:

Look, don't insult us. You want to try to make money off a lobby system (something that any game I've ever played has provided freely if it was in there, even if limited), fine. But don't insult my intelligence by painting it as "hosting costs". 16 (or 24) people playing costs the same amount of server resources regardless if they're randomizing with PUGs or if they're on their own private game. Heck, if anything, we'd be saving you the resource costs of finding partners and attempting to balance the game, pick a map, etc. We'd do all the work for you.

Be honest with us. That's all most of us ask for, and is the reason a lot of people flip out. The lack of honesty and upfrontness is getting old. You want to grab money? At least man up and admit it.

Thanks for saying this!

[Coolant]

Phalanx100bc, on 08 April 2013 - 01:17 PM, said:

While I'm glad Bryan also sees the passion this community has for MWO, don't forget that MANY of us are also PAYING ADULT CUSTOMERS with the understanding that this is a work in progress. ( and from the looks if it we will be paying into MWO even more in the future as CW coalesces ).

That being said, a certain amount of customer service is appreciated insofar as information on game progression and timely resolution of issues. Which in turn gives us the confidence to keep spending real money and convincing others what a great product this will be.

This...as an adult paying customer, I did not appreciate being talked to like a little child. Banning those responsible from the game and from the forums should be enough, and I understand the need to let everyone know the consequences to those that participate in that type of behavior in the future...but I felt like I was given a time out by Bryan. PGI seriously needs a Press Secretary. The moderators do a decent job at keeping the forums themselves moderated, but someone in an official capacity needs to represent PGI to the public who has serious people and communication skills.

Edited by Coolant, 09 April 2013 - 11:08 AM.

[Alex Warden]

Billygoat, on 09 April 2013 - 05:03 AM, said:

Threatening? I know people get hot over some stuff (though some folks, I think, overestimate what "rage" on an internet forum really means), but threats? Sorry, but that seems a bit far fetched without more detail into what was actually said or done.

Colour me incredulous for now.

i know what ppl around here are capable of in the "public" of the forums, don´t wanna know what they are capable of in the "secrecy" of a fake e-mail account...

Edited by Alex Warden, 09 April 2013 - 12:44 PM.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

Xander Pappyson, on 08 April 2013 - 05:52 PM, said:

So much bashing Ugh <sigh>....really?

PGI is not government funded. This isn't a charity project either. These are game makers who have chosen the path of programmer and 3D graphics artist to make a living. They need to make money to provide this product. All of you "free to play" players, PLEASE tell me how, HOW does PGI make money to provide us this product if it all must be free to us? How?

In truth "free to play" is a false primes. This game is not free to make so it can't be free to play. It can be mostly free to play and patterns and colors will only go so far. This is really a subscription based game with free to play aspects. If you see it any other way then this world OWES you a hell of a lot more than a free game. Everything should be giving to you freely with little effort on your part, Right?

No.

Also, "free to play" does not mean decision by communal forum council. It pain me, and those that I play with, deeply when PGI "caves" to what the forum "masses" cry for. It doesn't happen much (thank god) but it does happen.

"FREE to PLAYer" This isn't your game your not paying for it's development so quit with the QQ'ing already. You can't demand and change the course of something you don't OWN or haven't investedcapital in. Really?

For those of us that have paid for something we thought worth paying for, we invested in an idea we didn't by a chair on the council. Threatening hostile action to get ones way is ignoramus and primitive. If you are able to write on the forums you are above that. (<sigh> but apparently not)

It doesn't matter what I say we all have our opinion I just hope PGI keeps the open channels to the community even though we seem to bash them every time they give us something to chew on.

if they dont know how to fund a free to play game then they shouldnt have MADE it free to play.

Purplefluffybunny, on 08 April 2013 - 06:03 PM, said:

EDIT: I just realized that you, Bryan, said 'There is no pay wall here but there is indeed one over there' *points to private matches*

he does that lol

Quote

Players will never be forced to use or play against other players using 3rd person.

Quote

You will have the following options as a player:

• Play against 1st and 3rd person players.
  
• Play against 3rd person players only.
  
• Play against 1st person players only.

lol you wont be forced to... unless of course the other two ques dont have enough players to support them.......

[repete]

LordDante, on 09 April 2013 - 02:24 AM, said:

lifetime ban !

With the understanding that a lifetime ban doesn't fully 'fix' anything. Different email address/credit card and you're back. But in theory it may help regulate unacceptable behaviour or sent a message when it occurs.

[Kill Dozer]

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