21 replies to this topic

[Thomas Covenant]

I was having one particularly frustrating session of MWO, when this question came to me. In my poor mood, I was thinking no.

But I've had a breather, I actually played the game flow, and thought more about it.

How does an adrenaline junky, blow em up like MWO support flow?

Well, two things came to mind as contenders first: elo, and flexibility of battlefield role.

Elo is the equation that always tries to pit you against evenly comprehensive players. Does it work? Well I'd say in general I'm placed where my team will lose or win about evenly as much. Sometimes My team will win inspite of me, sometimes I will be the last one standing before defeat. The team factor would seem to allow elo to drift a little more than if I were to judge my individual performance as "winning" or not. Overall it will keep you in a middle area more or less.

Man this sure can make you feel like a loser. A single player game for example, in which the main character loses half the time would make you feel like a total wash out.

Understandably you can't ask the elo to give you a couple easy matches to paden your ego... could you? Well, I guess its possible, if you got just as many players wanting a "hard mode" its possible.

In flow the video game you eat pulsing red enemies to make it harder, or pulsing blue for easier.

Elo does its part to give you atleast an even match, but what about during a fight?

Well you can, depending on the leadership structure of the lance, go after different objectives that are easier or harder. I find this to be really present in conquest mode.

I can, at its easiest pilot a light mech from one non contended node to another, and if I see an enemy caught off guard, maybe I can choose to engage. Also I have the choice to hunt down the human players directly for more challenge.

Leadership is I think, a large part of the personal answer to the question, does mwo support flow, for the individual A pug group for example has next to no expectations of what you are doing as long as you seem to be doing something, where some lances want you to literally be, an arm of the commander's will, caring out what ever errand is sent down the chain of command.

It's something to think about when choosing what level and type of team dynamic to commit to in the long or short run.

Flow is linked to happiness and good feelings. If you feel this way after a session of MechWarrior then congratulations, you've found flow.

[Solomon Ward]

Thomas Covenant, on 10 April 2013 - 02:46 AM, said:

Flow is linked to happiness and good feelings. If you feel this way after a session of MechWarrior then congratulations, you've found flow.

Flow happens.

It is not necessarily linked to happiness and good feelings.

I had Flow with and without it.

It is being very present and focused - interpreting your surroundings instantly,
acting with no delay and maximum precision.

Edited by Solomon Ward, 10 April 2013 - 02:58 AM.

[Thomas Covenant]

And that state of mind feels good, does it not? As apposed to frustrated or bored.

[ElliottTarson]

I have to deal with Flow once a month in the form of a wife with Knives, I'd rather not have it in the game...

All kidding aside, I find the flow in MWO to be paced correctly for my playstyle. YMMV

[Khanublikhan]

How very interesting. That flow link is very entertaining. Thank you for supplying the link.

I really hope the developer's investigate this as a concept. There is, at the moment, too much a sense of anxiety in how the game unfolds. There is too much an emphasis on SPIKE! damage and not enough emphasis on being a master of your role. As players we gain skills on our mech character sheets; we struggle, we grind - and yet at times we can end up feeling like novices regardless.

I think part of the problem is the binary nature of the battlefield. There is very little fog of war (a soft battlefield, to coin a phrase). You have a lock, you don't. You have ECM cover, you don't. You strike precisely where you aim, you don't. A weapon does full damage or none.

Here are some suggestions to 'soften' the battlefield (increase the fog of war) -- which would allow a sense of 'flow' or mastery to grow.

• Have locks on enemy mechs decay with time and distance (not simply line of sight).
  
• Allow mech's to dispense smoke with a module (which blocks line of sight and effects the decay rate of the weapon lock).
  
• Include MASC as a fade & retreat option (pending).
  
• ECM should offer soft benefits and have soft counters.

In short, I think the game would benefit from being 'slowed' down. Not much. Just a little. Lowering the anxiety levels of players, so that their sense of enjoyment can grow.

edit: I have just noticed how wonderfully well chosen the music / sound effects on that flow game are. They help to create a gentle mood and rise to create a sense of imminent capture. Music & changing to battle music would be another way to put a player in the right frame of mind, appropriate for the moment in the game (MWO should change from gentle music to battle music when the first enemy mech is damaged as a means to control the mood and say to a player - concentrate!)

Edited by Khanublikhan, 10 April 2013 - 03:44 AM.

[Tekadept]

I used to have flow but now I have lost it. Maybe I let it flow a little to hard to begin? every few days I jump on with the intent of finding the flow but all I get is boredom followed by the occasional trickle. A trickle is definately got satisfying after experiencing the flow.

[Thomas Covenant]

I often wonder about that. Is a war game less because it supports flow, perhaps in spite of the real life counterpart? I think the assessment of priority falls under the question, are you preparing people for a war scenario, or trying to entertain them?

One will give you a community of players that are centered and in a mindset to be more supportive and sincere of sportsmanship, and the other will give you bitter forum posters that act like they've suffered war trama.

Edited by Thomas Covenant, 10 April 2013 - 03:58 AM.

[Khanublikhan]

Thomas Covenant, on 10 April 2013 - 03:58 AM, said:

I often wonder about that. Is a war game less because it supports flow, perhaps in spite of the real life counterpart? I think the assessment of priority falls under the question, are you preparing people for a war scenario, or trying to entertain them?

One will give you a community of players that are centered and in a mindset to be more supportive and sincere of sportsmanship, and the other will give you bitter forum posters that act like they've suffered war trama.

I think the developers and the community at large have become so preoccupied with game balance they have forgotten about game pacing (flow). Game pacing is a related concept to game balance, but is not exactly the same.

By way of example, compare the amount of time it took to complete a Mechwarrior single player mission to how long it currently takes to complete a round of Mechwarrior Online combat. i.e. a MWO combat map takes six minutes or so. I bet a Mechwarrior singleplayer mission is easily double that.

Not only that, but the Mechwarrior single player missions - by design - controlled your mood through the use of music and crested and fell in mood as you battled, travelled to waypoints, and battled again. Mechwarrior Online is a frenzy of activity, leading potentially to disappointment (insert disappointing sex anology here).

Mechwarrior Online suffers from a lack of mission structure and composition; its hard battlefield. It is two stags butting heads for sexual supremacy.

All these Mechwarriors fighting? It's sexual.

Edited by Khanublikhan, 10 April 2013 - 04:23 AM.

[Thomas Covenant]

I was just thinking about how mech combat is stylized. Kind of like two stag beetles fighting on a log, a good method of determining a winner but not necessarily lethal, as a wasp injecting venom into its prey for example.

I recall in a ATD, Garth said mech combat wasn't a very realistic or likely evolution of combat.
Well I think if it did evolve instead of something more lethal and precise it(mech combat) would be of a social choosing. A formalized way of contending for turf. Isn't it so nice that both teams wait for 'GO' before starting.

Edited by Thomas Covenant, 10 April 2013 - 04:41 AM.

[Khanublikhan]

Thomas Covenant, on 10 April 2013 - 04:30 AM, said:

I was just thinking about how mech combat is stylized. Kind of like two stage beetles fighting on a log, a good method of determining a winner but not necessarily leathal, as a wasp injecting venom into its prey for example.

Exactly. We were thinking on similar lines. It is all about sexual display and the desire for (safe) sexual dominance.

The furore regarding the inadequacies over a certain weapon's performance is because players are comparing that weapon to their *****. By having that weapon underperform (and by having pink highlanders) the state of the game is challenging that player's sexual identity.

But we are getting sidetracked. We were talking about Flow. Which in and of itself is an important characteristic in game design.

Edited by Khanublikhan, 10 April 2013 - 04:36 AM.

[Khanublikhan]

Thomas Covenant, on 10 April 2013 - 03:58 AM, said:

I often wonder about that. Is a war game less because it supports flow, perhaps in spite of the real life counterpart? I think the assessment of priority falls under the question, are you preparing people for a war scenario, or trying to entertain them?

It is a balancing act. You need to entertain. You need to instill a sense of self-preservation into the player by having that war scenario seem real. A respect for that one 'life' in that particular combat round.

It is why games like Call of Duty multiplayer are unrewarding for me. Other players do not have a respect for that game life. They know they are going to respawn in 20 seconds (or the next round) so they zergrush to the combat zone. It is gameplay consumerism. Oh another game, as long as I pop another quarter in (play longer). It is the bad side of 1980's arcade games.

Edited by Khanublikhan, 10 April 2013 - 04:50 AM.

[Khanublikhan]

Thomas Covenant, on 10 April 2013 - 04:30 AM, said:

I was just thinking about how mech combat is stylized. Kind of like two stag beetles fighting on a log, a good method of determining a winner but not necessarily lethal, as a wasp injecting venom into its prey for example.

I recall in a ATD, Garth said mech combat wasn't a very realistic or likely evolution of combat.
Well I think if it did evolve instead of something more lethal and precise it(mech combat) would be of a social choosing. A formalized way of contending for turf. Isn't it so nice that both teams wait for 'GO' before starting.

Think on how the clans declare a batchall (i.e. bid on what assets to bring to bear, to avoid excessive loss / risk). This arose because their isolation in exile left them with inadequate resources to survive, so those assets became valuable - leading to the development of the batchall honour declaration. It is a parallel to a sexual duel.

So, Mechwarrior combat *is* highly stylized and ritualistic - at least amongst the clans.

[Thomas Covenant]

Now this sounds like you are going against what you said. Its seems you have a difference of preference than those individuals, is all. If you are really for flow as you say you are, then you would be ok with people enjoying themselves this way(as respawns in call of duty). You want the experience of fighting for your life, you want to tell that story, which this mode in cod is not very conducive of, but going back to what you seemed to be saying, in support of flow, they themselves are not wrong for choosing it for themselves.

You bring up some what I quantify as good points about breaks in flow.
You have to tend to it like a rubber band. If it's too tight, it snaps. If too loose, it may fall off. Music and pacing was a tool used in single player MechWarrior campaigns, but it is an art form flow, and thus there is no one right way to do it. I think once flow is embraced in gaming the way native elements in film and art, there will be no more question that games are an art form, few stragglers that there may be.

I feel I should add. Some do seek out the snaps found in mwo. I admit, the ECM felt a little heavy handed when I first encountered it and its still feels more than a bit much, but yes some of those snaps are directly connected to the story we are trying to tell. Maybe a customization of what elements you might experience would be nice.

Edited by Thomas Covenant, 10 April 2013 - 05:19 AM.

[Thomas Covenant]

I think we are not so off track. I'm sure the losing stag beetle doesn't feel dejected. He's busy on his way to present for the next female.

[Khanublikhan]

My personal preference is not for respawns. My personal preference is for a slower combat.

At the same time I'll readily accept that Flow is subject to personal intepretation. What might suit me, might not exactly suit another player or the developers.

Flow as a concept in game design should have a wide enough cast of the net to envelop as many players as possible. To gratify as many players as possible.

[Khanublikhan]

Your reference to game design being an art form flow, like music, is a good point.

It makes me think. Is a game designer or a musician a creator in isolation? Or a creator with, an audience? That is, creating a game like Mechwarrior Online, is in fact a sexual display, a male buck displaying for a female doe? Should the game designer or musician vary his performance based upon the admiring (or disapproving) glances of his intended conquest?

[Thomas Covenant]

The customer is always right, except when they are wrong.

[Thomas Covenant]

Ideally, you play the song you want to play, and you attract those to you whom admire your true song.
In video games, you can do the same thing. It is like crossed lovers when the designer finds his audience.
A shame, when we find something that is so close, but not complete. Can the customer be wrong? I think if a player is in flow, and then it starts to suffocate, then his complaints are valid for him, whether it is up to him to find something else or the designer to fix it who's to say. Its a discussion. I guess it never hurts to ask?

[Thomas Covenant]

Tekadept, on 10 April 2013 - 03:35 AM, said:

I used to have flow but now I have lost it. Maybe I let it flow a little to hard to begin? every few days I jump on with the intent of finding the flow but all I get is boredom followed by the occasional trickle. A trickle is definately [not(?)] satisfying after experiencing the flow.

You are bored? I Figured Mech combat in the game leaned more towards frustrating than boring. Though I guess if a person got burnt out on only feeling frustrated all that would be left is boredom. Are you winning most of your matches/ not getting matched well by the elo system?
To be concise I am asking why exactly are you bored.

[Zyllos]

Khanublikhan, on 10 April 2013 - 03:28 AM, said:

Here are some suggestions to 'soften' the battlefield (increase the fog of war) -- which would allow a sense of 'flow' or mastery to grow.

• Have locks on enemy mechs decay with time and distance (not simply line of sight).

This is a good suggestion. Honestly, sensor locks should be immediately lost when LoS is lost on the target. This helps mechs hide and confuse opponents when running between locations.

The module would increase the time to 0.5s, which is plenty enough to determine their current path after running behind a building.

The BAP should provide the largest benefit, possibly 2.0s after losing LoS. It should also allow you to see non-LoS sensor targets within 180m. So, chasing that target and dodging between buildings and terrain but within 180m, no worries with the BAP! You can continue to track them.

But if you do not have BAP, then you will be losing that track either immediately or really quickly with a module.