237 replies to this topic

[Roland]

Joseph Mallan, on 15 April 2013 - 07:19 AM, said:

So this is a complaint that the enemy is making you make a tactical decision. Pull forces to deal with the Cap or keep fighting the main force and hope you finish with time to defend. Sounds like good tactics on teh capper's part to me. How you respond will determine if you used good tactics or not.

Oh really?
What exactly are the "good tactics" in that case, Joseph? Enlighten us with your tactical brilliance.

Generally, in practice, what it comes down to is "Just kill the enemy team, and let them win by cap, because the win doesn't really mean anything." The alternative to that tends to be try and retreat, allowing the enemy to kill your mechs through their backs while you make a futile effort to get back to base to deal with the cap.

At that point, you're basically already screwed. There's no "good tactics" to be had there. Your primary avenue towards victory tends to be to simply outclass OPFOR and crush their main force with such speed that you can THEN get back to your own base in time... but this generally depends on the opponent being trash.

Thus, we illustrate exactly what I stated... the "good tactics" you seem to be imagining simply boil down to not moving your main force beyond a certain fixed distance from your base.

There's really no tactical complexity there, Joseph. Certainly, there's no tactical depth compared to a game where you are free to use the entire map to your advantage, and are thus free to orchestrate complex flanking maneuvers without worrying about being tethered to a red square on the ground.

But honestly, if you want to defend the red square, that is fine with me. But lots of folks aren't interested in that. I see no reason why you are so fixated on forcing everyone to play the game in some way that you apparently enjoy.

It's not like it would take some immense amount of effort to implement a game mode which doesn't allow the current cap mechanics.

[Joseph Mallan]

Thundercles, on 15 April 2013 - 07:17 AM, said:

They are, in fact, separate issues. I'm not saying base-capping in essence is wrong, it's just being handled poorly.

Some people are ok with the current implementation. Some aren't. Based on the frequency of this topic coming up, I'd hazard a guess that a lot aren't.

Thats cause they aren't doing whats necessary to get the fight they want.

Betty calls out I'm taking your stuff.
No one stops me, you lose.
You don't get the fight you say you want.

So I I am at our base come fight me! If you sit there and make insulting posts while I win... I win. If you come and fight me, you get your fight. Anything else is just whining. Unless you are an Atlas or a Stalker you should be fast enough to stop a cap if you react. But you don't want to have to make choices on how to battle, you only want to fight your way.

Best quote for this argument:

Quote

"Don't give them the fight they want give them the fight you want"

If they want to beat you quick and painless, you need to make them suffer! If you don't you ailed to overcome the enemy tactics.

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 15 April 2013 - 07:28 AM.

[Mercules]

Roland, on 15 April 2013 - 07:12 AM, said:

No, it's really not.

However, it's also not particularly entertaining. It means that you cannot move your force beyond a fairly limited area on the map. This is why, if you play assault, large areas of certain maps go completely untouched.

For instance, on maps like Alpine, Caustic, and Tourmaline, there are large sections of the map which you have most likely never even seen. Certainly, if you play Assault you won't see them, because moving there takes you out of range to defend against a cap.

Additionally, if a cap begins during engagement, it's really not a viable option to simply turn your back on the enemy's main force to retreat and stop the cap... And if you only send one light mech back, you run the risk of having him get ganked if more than one mech is on your base capping it.

Really though, it's the first issue there that is the most problematic. Requiring that your team have a majority of its force capable of returning to a little red square in the time it takes to cap it imposes a severe limit on tactical decisions that you can make. It's not that it's impossible to deal with, but rather that it's unnecessarily limiting.

I would disagree. I would say that it is NECESSARILY limiting. If you played MW3/4 multi-player and played non-objective based games such as TDM then you should have an example of why objective based games are preferred by many people. The game typically devolved into multiple assault mechs brawling in one spot or "poptarting".

When we went back to objectives suddenly Lights and Fast Mediums re-joined the game as viable mechs. Sure it was often a specialized stealth mech designed to deliver an Artillery beacon or NARC for heavier mechs to fire LRMs at, or the counter light/medium to run that type of mech down before it could deliver it's "payload" but at least there were lighter mechs on the field with a purpose.

What you miss, Roland, is not that you should be having to decide who to send back to the base, but that from the start of the match your decisions should take heed of the chance you could have someone try to reach your base and taking measures to stop that before it happens. That leads to all kinds of tactical decisions. Get someone out there, find your enemy, and then defeat them. Don't bumble forward till you encounter the enemy and only after the warning comes up go, "Oh, our base!"

As some people have stated, stalling your advance a tiny bit usually allows the team time to find and eliminate the faster mechs that advance without their team. Having someone actively seek them out works really well too.

[Roland]

Scratx, on 15 April 2013 - 07:27 AM, said:

No, we don't need a TDM mode for f'ing fast mechs to grief the (basically winning) other team by outrunning them for 15 damn f'ing minutes.

UNLESS YOU HAVE A DAMN GOOD SOLUTION FOR THIS PROBLEM THERE CAN NEVER BE A TEAM DEATHMATCH GAME MODE, PERIOD, END OF LINE, STOP ASKING, STOP WHINING.


Get it?

Uh, there are already multiple solutions for that problem, including multiple solutions which have been presented in this very thread.

[Thundercles]

Joseph Mallan, on 15 April 2013 - 07:27 AM, said:

Thats cause they aren't doing whats necessary to get the fight they want.

Betty calls out I'm taking your stuff.
No one stops me, you lose.
You don't get the fight you say you want.

So I I am at our base come fight me! If you sit there and make insulting posts while I win... I win. If you come and fight me, you get your fight. Anything else is just whining. Unless you are an Atlas or a Stalker you should be fast enough to stop a cap if you react. But you don't want to have to make choices on how to battle, you only want to fight your way.

Best quote for this argument:


If they want to beat you quick and painless, you need to make them suffer! If you don't you ailed to overcome the enemy tactics.

... I'm not sure why you are so aggressively avoiding the point. The cap mechanics in Assault are pretty shoddy and easily exploitable. It has nothing to do with "forcing the type of fight you want". I'm not trying to take away your precious ability to dictate the position of the fight.

How long, exactly, does it take to fully cap a base with a single mech, no additional augmentation from modules or any of that? By what factor do additional mechs speed up the process? Does anyone have the actual numbers for that?

[DerSpecht]

Roland, on 15 April 2013 - 07:27 AM, said:

Oh really?
What exactly are the "good tactics" in that case, Joseph? Enlighten us with your tactical brilliance.

Generally, in practice, what it comes down to is "Just kill the enemy team, and let them win by cap, because the win doesn't really mean anything." The alternative to that tends to be try and retreat, allowing the enemy to kill your mechs through their backs while you make a futile effort to get back to base to deal with the cap.

At that point, you're basically already screwed. There's no "good tactics" to be had there. Your primary avenue towards victory tends to be to simply outclass OPFOR and crush their main force with such speed that you can THEN get back to your own base in time... but this generally depends on the opponent being trash.

Thus, we illustrate exactly what I stated... the "good tactics" you seem to be imagining simply boil down to not moving your main force beyond a certain fixed distance from your base.

There's really no tactical complexity there, Joseph. Certainly, there's no tactical depth compared to a game where you are free to use the entire map to your advantage, and are thus free to orchestrate complex flanking maneuvers without worrying about being tethered to a red square on the ground.

But honestly, if you want to defend the red square, that is fine with me. But lots of folks aren't interested in that. I see no reason why you are so fixated on forcing everyone to play the game in some way that you apparently enjoy.

It's not like it would take some immense amount of effort to implement a game mode which doesn't allow the current cap mechanics.

Try to look at it from the RP aspect.

"A glorious victory Kurita-san.. we destroyed them without losses"
"Hai.. but where the hell are our dropships? Oo"

[Joseph Mallan]

Roland, on 15 April 2013 - 07:27 AM, said:

Oh really?
What exactly are the "good tactics" in that case, Joseph? Enlighten us with your tactical brilliance.

Generally, in practice, what it comes down to is "Just kill the enemy team, and let them win by cap, because the win doesn't really mean anything." The alternative to that tends to be try and retreat, allowing the enemy to kill your mechs through their backs while you make a futile effort to get back to base to deal with the cap.

At that point, you're basically already screwed. There's no "good tactics" to be had there. Your primary avenue towards victory tends to be to simply outclass OPFOR and crush their main force with such speed that you can THEN get back to your own base in time... but this generally depends on the opponent being trash.

Thus, we illustrate exactly what I stated... the "good tactics" you seem to be imagining simply boil down to not moving your main force beyond a certain fixed distance from your base.

There's really no tactical complexity there, Joseph. Certainly, there's no tactical depth compared to a game where you are free to use the entire map to your advantage, and are thus free to orchestrate complex flanking maneuvers without worrying about being tethered to a red square on the ground.

But honestly, if you want to defend the red square, that is fine with me. But lots of folks aren't interested in that. I see no reason why you are so fixated on forcing everyone to play the game in some way that you apparently enjoy.

It's not like it would take some immense amount of effort to implement a game mode which doesn't allow the current cap mechanics.

Cover your fast movers and fight a tactical withdrawal. Pull back while still engaging the enemy. Tactical brilliance usually came from above my pay grade, but frankly I know not to think one dimensionally. As for the current Cap Mechanics. They are working just fine. If you screw up tactically you get capped.

Generally speaking My Mechs are to dang slow to Cap, But depending on where I am, I am not often to slow to get to base and delay the Cap. When I lose to a cap and We have a numerical advantage... we screwed up, and did not fight the enemies fight. I will say it again... WE SCREWED UP! And got beaten for it.

[Roland]

Here is an illustration of what the cap mechanic causes, in terms of mech movement:


Bear in mind here, this includes both Assault AND Conquest.. .if you limited it to assault, you'd basically see ALL movement confined to the deep red region.

Note a few things... There are actually HUGE sections of this map that essentially ZERO people go into. The entire top quarter of the map, for instance.

And the reason for this is because movement into those regions basically just guarantees that you will lose. You'll be capped out... So your gameplay is limited, and as a result most games all play out in a very limited section of each map.

And here's tourmaline:

Again, virtually all movement is confined to the center strip between the two main bases.... If you removed conquest from the heat map, you'd see an even more clear illustration of the issue.

The overly simplistic cap mechanic essentially penalizes you for flanking, thus resulting in virtually all gameplay taking place in a narrow strip between the two bases.

Edited by Roland, 15 April 2013 - 07:38 AM.

[Mercules]

Roland, on 15 April 2013 - 07:35 AM, said:

The overly simplistic cap mechanic essentially penalizes you for flanking, thus resulting in virtually all gameplay taking place in a narrow strip between the two bases.

Here is what you typically see in TDM for a heat map.


---------------------@---------------------

The two ends of the lines are the spawn points.

[Joseph Mallan]

Thundercles, on 15 April 2013 - 07:34 AM, said:

... I'm not sure why you are so aggressively avoiding the point. The cap mechanics in Assault are pretty shoddy and easily exploitable. It has nothing to do with "forcing the type of fight you want". I'm not trying to take away your precious ability to dictate the position of the fight.

How long, exactly, does it take to fully cap a base with a single mech, no additional augmentation from modules or any of that? By what factor do additional mechs speed up the process? Does anyone have the actual numbers for that?

But you are trying to dictate how a Capper will play the game and thus you are trying to dictate how the game is played. The Cap mechanics are fine. I get capped 1 in 4 matches maybe. and that is in PUG matches. If I am in a faster medium I will break of and try to stop cap, if I can. But My Atlas is my normal ride and 60+ KpH isn't usually fast enough o get back.

[MeiSooHaityu]

It's funny how you can tell from the heat map that Tourmaline is a FAR better map than Alpine.

[Roland]

Mercules, on 15 April 2013 - 07:40 AM, said:

Here is what you typically see in TDM for a heat map.


---------------------@---------------------

The two ends of the lines are the spawn points.

Ya, that's actually not the case in practice. At least, not based on years of experience in NR games back in MW4.

You see, since you don't respawn, your positioning prior to engagement becomes exceedingly important. This tended to result in fairly complex maneuvering prior to engagement, because you needed to find the enemy and then engage them from a position of strength.

Without a capping mechanic, you were free to maneuver your main force to anywhere on the map, allowing you to flank them.

Certainly in games that allowed respawning, your suggestion certainly was the case, because again, it penalized flanking.. if you managed to flank around behind the enemy, and kill them, they started spawning behind you, effectively resulting in you being surrounded.

But in NR game types, your suggestion was most definitely not the case.

[Joseph Mallan]

Roland, on 15 April 2013 - 07:35 AM, said:

Here is an illustration of what the cap mechanic causes, in terms of mech movement:


Bear in mind here, this includes both Assault AND Conquest.. .if you limited it to assault, you'd basically see ALL movement confined to the deep red region.

Note a few things... There are actually HUGE sections of this map that essentially ZERO people go into. The entire top quarter of the map, for instance.

And the reason for this is because movement into those regions basically just guarantees that you will lose. You'll be capped out... So your gameplay is limited, and as a result most games all play out in a very limited section of each map.

And here's tourmaline:

Again, virtually all movement is confined to the center strip between the two main bases.... If you removed conquest from the heat map, you'd see an even more clear illustration of the issue.

The overly simplistic cap mechanic essentially penalizes you for flanking, thus resulting in virtually all gameplay taking place in a narrow strip between the two bases.

Ever think those dark spots are insurmountable terrain? Also Alpine and Tourmaline have very few Rush Caps, and even when Capped I have seen the enemy destroyed to the capper only. He saved his team from a shattering defeat! *SHRUG* I don' have a problem getting capped cause I know who to blame for the defeat. Me and my team. That's who.

[Thundercles]

Joseph Mallan, on 15 April 2013 - 07:41 AM, said:

But you are trying to dictate how a Capper will play the game and thus you are trying to dictate how the game is played. The Cap mechanics are fine. I get capped 1 in 4 matches maybe. and that is in PUG matches. If I am in a faster medium I will break of and try to stop cap, if I can. But My Atlas is my normal ride and 60+ KpH isn't usually fast enough o get back.

I can see that we'll have to agree to disagree, as you don't seem to be interested in addressing the point.

[Sir Crashalot]

The trouble is, Assault in this game is misnamed. You are not really "assalting" anything, the base is just a little square that any Tom, **** or Urbanmech can run into. A good base would be well defended and difficult to breach, perhaps with automatic turrets (which will only work if there are defenders in the base). Right now it is pretty much TDM with a couple of capture points thrown in for good measure, of course there are a few who are smart enough to use these to dictate the course of the battle but if the majority are not interested then it will cause the issues you see in this thread.

How can assault be made more interesting and true to its name?
Perhaps a true assault mode could be added where one side has to attack a fortified base while the other has to defend.
A full frontal assault could be made harder by the addition of fortifications and turrets which would force the attackers to use tactics like sending lights around to "disable" them before charging in. To make things fair the attacking side could be larger (3 lances instead of 2) than the defending side. Bonuses can be rewarded for tactical play as well as fragging. (ie. scouts awarded for disabling base defences) defending team gets a bonus for successful defence etc. Of course it wouldn't be quite so straight forward as this is just off of the top of my head but it would certainly add a new level of challenge and interest to a game that is currently not much more than Quake with mechs. (Ok I might be a little harsh there but still...)

I think both sides of this debate have points, it isn't about right and wrong just differing opinions and I think many of the people in this thread are smart enough to find a real solution and make the game more enjoyable.

[Pakidis79]

I am here for you and I am doing something about this...Im capping for the win with a cap module'd Jenner. You are welcome!

[Joseph Mallan]

Yes I guess we will Thunder. In my months of playing the game I have not seen a problem with the cap mechanics no matter how I have won or lost by them.

[Roland]

Joseph Mallan, on 15 April 2013 - 07:47 AM, said:

Ever think those dark spots are insurmountable terrain? Also Alpine and Tourmaline have very few Rush Caps, and even when Capped I have seen the enemy destroyed to the capper only. He saved his team from a shattering defeat! *SHRUG* I don' have a problem getting capped cause I know who to blame for the defeat. Me and my team. That's who.

No, they actually aren't insurmountable terrain. Which, actually, you can see by virtue of the fact that a trivial number of mechs actually do wander out there periodically (most likely to the chagrin of their teams). But I'm guessing you don't know this, because... YOU HAVE NEVER MOVED THERE, EVER. Because why would you? It means you're going to lose to cap.

And again, if you removed the conquest game type from those heat maps, you'd basically see a single red strip between the two bases... The only real movement you see off to the sides, even in those maps, is minor traffic heading out to cap the auxillery cap points in conquest.

It's funny though... because I'm guessing that you didn't even realize how freaking huge Alpine is..because a large chunk of it has never been explored by you. Over a quarter of that map essentially doesn't exist to you...it midsaswell not have ever been created.

Edited by Roland, 15 April 2013 - 07:53 AM.

[MeiSooHaityu]

Joseph Mallan, on 15 April 2013 - 07:47 AM, said:

Ever think those dark spots are insurmountable terrain? Also Alpine and Tourmaline have very few Rush Caps, and even when Capped I have seen the enemy destroyed to the capper only. He saved his team from a shattering defeat! *SHRUG* I don' have a problem getting capped cause I know who to blame for the defeat. Me and my team. That's who.

I disagree. Alpine has a LOT of base rushing. I actually think the bigger maps are worse for this because the capper knows that the other team has to run FARTHER to get back to their base. If anything, Alpine always seems to have capping going on. What makes Alpine bad for this is not just the large distances you need to run, but with the layout, it is possible for both teams to completely miss each other and both base cap (base race). Also, Alpine sets up a condition where one team defends (high ground) and the other has to go on the offensive (low ground). Alpine is just plain BROKEN.

Tourmaline is a bit different. When I play Tourmaline, it seems like only one base ever seems to get capped and not the other. I want ot say it is the side closest to the drop ship that doesn't ever get capped (seemingly).

Tourmaline offers overall good visibility in all directions, so I notice that it is hard for a team to out flank without being seen. I think that is why base racing doesn't happen as often there.

Either way, Base capping is a huge problem on Alpine, and marginally for Tourmaline if you are the one side and not the other.

[Joseph Mallan]

Roland, on 15 April 2013 - 07:51 AM, said:

No, they actually aren't insurmountable terrain. Which, actually, you can see by virtue of the fact that a trivial number of mechs actually do wander out there periodically (most likely to the chagrin of their teams). But I'm guessing you don't know this, because... YOU HAVE NEVER MOVED THERE, EVER. Because why would you? It means you're going to lose to cap.

And again, if you removed the conquest game type from those heat maps, you'd basically see a single red strip between the two bases... The only real movement you see off to the sides, even in those maps, is minor traffic heading out to cap the auxillery cap points in conquest.

Partly cause I don't have Jump jets, And I am also a primarily Brawler build so I am one of the many meeting up in the red paths because that is where the mass of the enemy is going to be for me to kill. Those less use paths are for scout Mechs to travel or fire support. We would see more movement in the unused areas if caps didn't spawn in the same place every time I would think.