179 replies to this topic

[El Bandito]

I prefer combat, but there are times when you are forced to cap--like multiple teammates dying in the first 2 minutes or get disconnected--which puts you at significant disadvantage.

[Zerstorer Stallin]

The tears from spider capturing base while you slug along in a 6 PPC stalker are delicious!

[Atheus]

Pater Mors, on 05 May 2013 - 01:14 PM, said:

I think you're misrepresenting Neverfar a bit there. His tactic is to begin a base capture to draw some of the enemy team back from the front line and split the enemy force. Yes, he occasionally captures early when people cry like little girls just to annoy them (which is admittedly a bit trollish, but I can't say I blame him), but splitting the enemy team is a perfectly valid and good tactic to use. I started doing it last night and won nearly every game I played.

If people want to continue playing "MechWarrior: British Redcoats" edition, then that's what's going to continue happening.

Whether or not he intends to fully cap the base, the whole tactic is only effective because the enemy has to assume that he's there to fully cap it out — and needless to say, that's exactly what usually happens when a team decides to "call the bluff" and not send anyone back to defend. What I am seeing in this poll, though, is that generally speaking, capping out a base early in a match will undoubtedly leave at least some players from both teams very dissatisfied with the match.

This is not healthy for a game — it is one thing to be frustrated about being outplayed and defeated head-on. It's entirely another to feel your presence was pretty much circumvented in a way you could not reasonably contest. It will leave you with negative feelings toward the other players, and negative feelings toward the game.

Any "Defend the base" concept is just unrealistic in a map where the halfway point is literally 2.5 km away from the bases (~2 minutes of walking at 70 km/h). Both teams can not defend their base on such a map while also attacking the enemy forces without dividing up in a rather suicidal manner, just as lights can't both attack the enemy base and defend their own base. It's no secret that most base rushers who admonish you for not defending your base had no base defense on their side either.

My main suggestion is that playing a game should always be fun — win or lose. That is clearly not the case, here.

Edited by Atheus, 08 May 2013 - 10:02 AM.

[Pater Mors]

Atheus, on 05 May 2013 - 06:12 PM, said:

Whether or not he intends to fully cap the base, the whole tactic is only effective because the enemy has to assume that he's there to fully cap it out — and needless to say, that's exactly what usually what happens when a team decides to "call the bluff" and not send anyone back to defend. What I am seeing in this poll, though, is that generally speaking, capping out a base has a large probability of leaving many players very dissatisfied with a match.

Your poll is very biased sorry to say. You ask leading questions. It's very hard to create an unbiased poll so I put basically zero stock in the polls on these forums. That is not an attack at you, it is a simple statement of fact. It is why a newspaper poll means nothing and a poll from a professional polling agency does.

Atheus, on 05 May 2013 - 06:12 PM, said:

This is not healthy for a game — it is one thing to be frustrated about being outplayed and defeated head-on. It's entirely another to feel your presence was pretty much circumvented in a way you could not reasonably contest. It will leave you with negative feelings toward the other players, and negative feelings toward the game.

What it leaves me with, when it happens to me in my Highlander, is the feeling that I should have done something more to influence the outcome of the game. I've never felt negative towards someone (unless they were blatantly being a troll, which is not what we're talking about) or the game. If communications between the team aren't happening then you're already at a massive disadvantage, which is why I always make sure to break the ice at the start of the match.

Atheus, on 05 May 2013 - 06:12 PM, said:

Any "Defend the base" concept is just unrealistic in a map where the halfway point is literally 2.5 km away from the bases (~2 minutes of walking at 70 km/h). Both teams can not defend their base on such a map while also attacking the enemy forces without dividing up in a rather suicidal manner, just as lights can't both attack the enemy base and defend their own base. It's no secret that most base rushers who admonish you for not defending your base had no base defense on their side either.

The problem here is Matchmaking, not the game mode or the size of the map. If every match were evenly weight balanced (2 lights, 2 meds, 2 heavy 2 assault for example) the problems with capping almost disappear totally. There is also literally no reason to walk so far away from your base that you can't get back, especially if your scouts happen to pick up lights headed your way and especially in the current snipe-fest meta game. The matches run for 15 minutes. Surely, you can spend a few making sure any incoming fast lights are dealt with before you trudge that 2.5 km to start the brawl?

[Atheus]

Pater Mors, on 05 May 2013 - 06:28 PM, said:

Your poll is very biased sorry to say. You ask leading questions. It's very hard to create an unbiased poll so I put basically zero stock in the polls on these forums. That is not an attack at you, it is a simple statement of fact. It is why a newspaper poll means nothing and a poll from a professional polling agency does.

While I do not pretend the poll is totally unbiased, it certainly is not biased to the point where the data are worthless.

Pater Mors, on 05 May 2013 - 06:28 PM, said:

What it leaves me with, when it happens to me in my Highlander, is the feeling that I should have done something more to influence the outcome of the game. I've never felt negative towards someone (unless they were blatantly being a troll, which is not what we're talking about) or the game. If communications between the team aren't happening then you're already at a massive disadvantage, which is why I always make sure to break the ice at the start of the match.

Communication won't always solve your problems - as I'll explain in my response to your next statement.

Pater Mors, on 05 May 2013 - 06:28 PM, said:

The problem here is Matchmaking, not the game mode or the size of the map. If every match were evenly weight balanced (2 lights, 2 meds, 2 heavy 2 assault for example) the problems with capping almost disappear totally. There is also literally no reason to walk so far away from your base that you can't get back, especially if your scouts happen to pick up lights headed your way and especially in the current snipe-fest meta game. The matches run for 15 minutes. Surely, you can spend a few making sure any incoming fast lights are dealt with before you trudge that 2.5 km to start the brawl?

Ok so, the matches run for 15 minutes, so you hang around in your base to deal with incoming lights - however no lights will come if you hang around your base, so of course that is a complete waste of time. Eventually you will have to leave the base to find your opponents. According to your own philosophy, you won't find them any closer than halfway across the map since "there is literally no reason to walk so far away from your base that you can't get back" - except there is, especially on a large map, since halfway across is already too far to get back before a pair of lights can cap you out with time to spare. Once the shooting begins is usually when that clever light will step onto your base.

All this is basically how a team who does not wish to base cap deals defensively (with some measure of futility) with teams who do, though. The team that does send their lights to base cap is not a team who defends their base, because by aggressively attacking the enemy base you are automatically at a significant advantage. Against a slow team, there is literally no risk involved with rushing the enemy base once they have extended halfway across the map - only reward. If a slow mech that your light mech can't kill manages to get back to the base in time, you just leave and come back when they're gone. If they stay to defend the base, you certainly aren't hurting your team at all since you've effectively removed a mech from their side forcing them to stay at base while you can quickly run back and forth between the front line and the enemy base.

Long story short - being the guy who hates cap rushing involves a massively more difficult tactical puzzle to solve than being the guy who makes a habit of cap rushing.

Edit: I nearly got derailed here - none of these considerations about the feasibility of base defense change the fact that base captures - especially premature base captures - leave certain people with a sour taste in their mouth. That kind of person is not in the minority.

Edited by Atheus, 05 May 2013 - 07:11 PM.

[Pater Mors]

Atheus, on 05 May 2013 - 07:03 PM, said:

Ok so, the matches run for 15 minutes, so you hang around in your base to deal with incoming lights - however no lights will come if you hang around your base, so of course that is a complete waste of time. Eventually you will have to leave the base to find your opponents. According to your own philosophy, you won't find them any closer than halfway across the map since "there is literally no reason to walk so far away from your base that you can't get back" - except there is, especially on a large map, since halfway across is already too far to get back before a pair of lights can cap you out with time to spare. Once the shooting begins is usually when that clever light will step onto your base.

All this is basically how a team who does not wish to base cap deals defensively (with some measure of futility) with teams who do, though. The team that does send their lights to base cap is not a team who defends their base, because by aggressively attacking the enemy base you are automatically at a significant advantage. Against a slow team, there is literally no risk involved with rushing the enemy base once they have extended halfway across the map - only reward. If a slow mech that your light mech can't kill manages to get back to the base in time, you just leave and come back when they're gone. If they stay to defend the base, you certainly aren't hurting your team at all since you've effectively removed a mech from their side forcing them to stay at base while you can quickly run back and forth between the front line and the enemy base.

Long story short - being the guy who hates cap rushing involves a massively more difficult tactical puzzle to solve than being the guy who makes a habit of cap rushing.

First, in reply to your final sentence - Good. Tactical puzzles are what MechWarrior and Battletech have always been about.

To address the rest - On a map like Alpine there is no reason to over extend yourself. It happens all the time in PUG games because people just want to get to the fight, tactics be damned. So the answer to most peoples problems here is remove more valid tactics from a game that's already sorely lacking in tactical thought so that we can have our slug-fest. This is not good enough in my opinion.

What happens when a heavy exposes his back side to an Atlas? The heavy dies because he made a tactical error. What happens when your team over extends in a PUG? You lose because you made a tactical error. The problem is not the tactics being used to win games (trolls aside), the problem is two fold:

1) Matchmaker often stuffs up and puts the majority of lights on one team. This is definitely unfair and frustrating. I fully agree that a drop like this is broken. In reality, unfair match ups would happen all the time, but this is a game, not reality, so the match up's need to be reasonably fair at least in terms of tonnage.

2) People do not communicate. Usually in a PUG you've got perhaps two or three people per team communicating. The rest just either blindly follow what pops up in text chat, without contributing, or ignore it completely. Another tactical error and one which will result in a loss if the other team is communicating with each other.

The solution to these two problems is not to remove valid, fun tactics from the game. It is to fix matchmaker, implement voip and make communications for people who aren't using voip a hell of a lot easier than just a text chat and then reward people for using communication to win matches.

I pilot a medium, an assault and now a light too. By far the most fun I have had so far is in the light running cap distractions and splitting the enemy team. It's an effective tactic and it's not a 'bluff' as you say; if you don't send someone to take care of me or defend your base you're going to lose it. I will wait there until I can see which way the battle is going to swing and if it looks like a defeat, I will cap you. Since people don't communicate and just want a slug-fest we end up with endless forum spam about how capping is lame instead of good topics on how to run counters to it and how to come up with game winning tactics.

Edited by Pater Mors, 05 May 2013 - 07:23 PM.

[Atheus]

Pater Mors, on 05 May 2013 - 07:22 PM, said:

First, in reply to your final sentence - Good. Tactical puzzles are what MechWarrior and Battletech have always been about.

To address the rest - On a map like Alpine there is no reason to over extend yourself. It happens all the time in PUG games because people just want to get to the fight, tactics be damned. So the answer to most peoples problems here is remove more valid tactics from a game that's already sorely lacking in tactical thought so that we can have our slug-fest. This is not good enough in my opinion.

What happens when a heavy exposes his back side to an Atlas? The heavy dies because he made a tactical error. What happens when your team over extends in a PUG? You lose because you made a tactical error. The problem is not the tactics being used to win games (trolls aside), the problem is two fold:

1) Matchmaker often stuffs up and puts the majority of lights on one team. This is definitely unfair and frustrating. I fully agree that a drop like this is broken. In reality, unfair match ups would happen all the time, but this is a game, not reality, so the match up's need to be reasonably fair at least in terms of tonnage.

2) People do not communicate. Usually in a PUG you've got perhaps two or three people per team communicating. The rest just either blindly follow what pops up in text chat, without contributing, or ignore it completely. Another tactical error and one which will result in a loss if the other team is communicating with each other.

The solution to these two problems is not to remove valid, fun tactics from the game. It is to fix matchmaker, implement voip and make communications for people who aren't using voip a hell of a lot easier than just a text chat and then reward people for using communication to win matches.

I pilot a medium, an assault and now a light too. By far the most fun I have had so far is in the light running cap distractions and splitting the enemy team. It's an effective tactic and it's not a 'bluff' as you say; if you don't send someone to take care of me or defend your base you're going to lose it. I will wait there until I can see which way the battle is going to swing and if it looks like a defeat, I will cap you. Since people don't communicate and just want a slug-fest we end up with endless forum spam about how capping is lame instead of good topics on how to run counters to it and how to come up with game winning tactics.

Your whole conversation here is about interesting tactics, but at the same time you're pretending that it's possible to fight on Tourmaline and Alpine without "over-extending", which pretty much completely ignores the dynamic nature of front-line tactics. The ridge that most fights take place on is already over-extended for both teams, and quite frankly there comes a point in most matches where advancing on the enemy's position is the right move. In fact, never over-extending would pretty much mean that you never go into enemy territory, which basically makes having a base an annoying albatross around the neck of anyone genuinely interested in battle tactics.

Sure, you can force your enemy to deal with the base or lose, but the fact that this involves a decision does not make it interesting or fun.

Your last paragraph you pretty much contradict yourself saying first that when you base rush, you'll cap it out if they don't try to defend it, but then claim you wait to see whether your team is losing before capping it out as if that has anything to do with it. It seems every cap rusher has some weird justification for what they internally recognize is unpopular and aggravating behavior. Some are more inflammatory than others, but it seems like all have this sort of arrogant and condescending attitude about the superior and well-deserved control they gain by playing their trump card every time despite the fact that no actual skill is involved other than getting lucky enough to sneak past the enemy's advance undetected and picking the right timing to step on the cap box.

If you're such a fan of tactical puzzles, why are you doing he 6-piece puzzle for ages 2-4 rather than something a little more complex? It's like saying you're a fan of interesting music then saying you're primarily listening to Justin Bieber.

[Keifomofutu]

Atheus, on 05 May 2013 - 09:30 PM, said:

Your whole conversation here is about interesting tactics, but at the same time you're pretending that it's possible to fight on Tourmaline and Alpine without "over-extending", which pretty much completely ignores the dynamic nature of front-line tactics. The ridge that most fights take place on is already over-extended for both teams, and quite frankly there comes a point in most matches where advancing on the enemy's position is the right move. In fact, never over-extending would pretty much mean that you never go into enemy territory, which basically makes having a base an annoying albatross around the neck of anyone genuinely interested in battle tactics.

Sure, you can force your enemy to deal with the base or lose, but the fact that this involves a decision does not make it interesting or fun.

Your last paragraph you pretty much contradict yourself saying first that when you base rush, you'll cap it out if they don't try to defend it, but then claim you wait to see whether your team is losing before capping it out as if that has anything to do with it. It seems every cap rusher has some weird justification for what they internally recognize is unpopular and aggravating behavior. Some are more inflammatory than others, but it seems like all have this sort of arrogant and condescending attitude about the superior and well-deserved control they gain by playing their trump card every time despite the fact that no actual skill is involved other than getting lucky enough to sneak past the enemy's advance undetected and picking the right timing to step on the cap box.

If you're such a fan of tactical puzzles, why are you doing he 6-piece puzzle for ages 2-4 rather than something a little more complex? It's like saying you're a fan of interesting music then saying you're primarily listening to Justin Bieber.

It's not the cappers fault but the game mode relys on a mechanic that tethers each team to their base. And on the large maps it's far too short a leash. People say it makes the game mode more dynamic but in reality the tether ensures that the conflict happens on the same part of the map almost every time.

Edited by Keifomofutu, 05 May 2013 - 09:48 PM.

[FunkyFritter]

PPCs are the metagame right now, which means positioning is supremely important. Threatening a cap is the answer to that lance of stalkers sitting on a hill, you can use it or you can charge that entrenched position and complain when it fails miserably.

[Pater Mors]

Atheus, on 05 May 2013 - 09:30 PM, said:

Your whole conversation here is about interesting tactics, but at the same time you're pretending that it's possible to fight on Tourmaline and Alpine without "over-extending", which pretty much completely ignores the dynamic nature of front-line tactics. The ridge that most fights take place on is already over-extended for both teams, and quite frankly there comes a point in most matches where advancing on the enemy's position is the right move. In fact, never over-extending would pretty much mean that you never go into enemy territory, which basically makes having a base an annoying albatross around the neck of anyone genuinely interested in battle tactics.

Exactly my point - there is zero need for everyone to trudge to the same ridge every time and then whine when they get capped for being over extended. There is far more to tactics than, "All line up roughly in the middle and pound each other until no one is left". That is a tactical error, simply because you'll get capped.

Atheus, on 05 May 2013 - 09:30 PM, said:

Sure, you can force your enemy to deal with the base or lose, but the fact that this involves a decision does not make it interesting or fun.

Speak for yourself.

Atheus, on 05 May 2013 - 09:30 PM, said:

Your last paragraph you pretty much contradict yourself saying first that when you base rush, you'll cap it out if they don't try to defend it, but then claim you wait to see whether your team is losing before capping it out as if that has anything to do with it...... trump card every time despite the fact that no actual skill is involved other than getting lucky enough to sneak past the enemy's advance undetected and picking the right timing to step on the cap box.

There is no contradiction there. I would rather let my team win by destroying the enemies than by capping if possible, however if we're about to lose then I will finish off the cap. How is that a contradiction? I cap to split the team, destroy the defenders (if possible) and then wait to see the outcome of the main fight.

Yes, it is a trump card if I play it properly. Bad tactics will lose to it nearly every time at the moment. Is it impossible to defend against? Hell no. It's also takes more than just 'luck' to scout through enemy lines, spot and call targets and stay undetected on the way to an enemy base, all of which I do.

[Caustic Canid]

Not sure what this says about capping but... at the beginning of matches I'll tell people to stick together and focus fire. We typically default to heading to the same location that the combat happens every time (since we're a PUG), however, sometimes there are no enemies to be found. At that point, the only thing we can assume is that the whole mass of them is heading to our base, so our options are A.) Turn around and slog it back to base in hopes that we can stop them in time (unlikely on a large map) or B.) Keep heading straight to their base and cap with as many mechs as we can.

I've seen the outcome of both options in numerous games, and I can attest that option B is seldom successful. We usually get bogged down by the few heavies/assaults that have since started heading back in our direction (From our base) while the lights dance about in our cap zone.

It seems in games like this, the only option we have is to cap, since if we had left a few mechs at base to defend, they would have been flattened anyway.

In response to the actual question, is capping fun? For me, no. But it's part of the game. I just wish we got more from it than the meager XP/Cbills we do. Seems like a lot of time to waste for so little. I also think maybe the time to cap should be doubled on the larger maps to give people more time to respond.

I think a lot could be gained by adding a big cash bonus to defending your base. Cash for damage done/kills could be doubled or tripled for shooting/killing someone close to your base. People would be more hesitant to approach a base since there would more than likely be a few defenders, and more people would defend in hopes of larger payouts.

Edited by Caustic Canid, 05 May 2013 - 10:41 PM.

[Atheus]

Neverfar, on 05 May 2013 - 09:28 PM, said:

Why do so many people make loaded polls? I know the cheap payoff of it: "Hahaha if you answer I forced you into a demonized category if you disagree with me!". Still, It's silly.

Were you unable to find an answer that reflects your play style?

Neverfar, on 05 May 2013 - 09:28 PM, said:

Reading the poll's possible answers, come on now. Apart from a few dedicated griefers (all games have these) very few people that cap bases actively seek to end the match immediately.

And yet that's exactly what you're threatening to do by stepping on the cap early in the match. If it's just an empty bluff, you'll get off it as soon as you realize nobody is coming, right? Is that what you do?

Neverfar, on 05 May 2013 - 09:28 PM, said:

Also, please spare me that stupid self-gratifying "skill versus X" where X is whatever tactic you don't like. You don't think evading your blob and sneaking to the base is "skill" and I don't think a bunch of guys huddled in middle calling primaries is "skill". Maybe we both have a bias, and the important thing is, you don't have a monopoly on "skill" because you pilot a bloat boat so don't kid yourself.

Do you call it a skill to sneak into an enemy's base? Certainly it's not something that can be done carelessly, but I'm pretty sure any moron can navigate to the enemy's base without being detected with a little luck and a little ECM.

"bloat boat" - polarizing much? So every mech that isn't a light is now a bloat boat. I guess it's really an us and them thing for you. I did the entire tourney in my Hunchback 4P. It's pretty difficult at times getting in close for those medium lasers, but fun. Sure, it's a boat, but then so are most Jenners. I guess you're a 3L pilot, though, so you're not a boater, just an ECM an streak user, right? Nobody ever claimed 3L's were cheesy.

I read through most of what you had to say in that other thread, and it really cracked me up how much you were repulsed by the intellectual stuffiness of your detractors using things like ellipses in their writing, while you come across even stuffier in just about every post.

For example: your favorite "PPC's and tiny engines" line, as if medium-assault mechs have the option to go over 95 km/h. In general they move about half as fast as your average light, but that's just how the game is designed. You are pretending the mechs are slow due to some sort of strategic deficiency of their pilots, rather than the fact that engines over the 300 rating penalize you heavily in weight, thus making everything 50 tons and over slow by design. You're apparently at odds with the game design when it comes to 3 of the 4 weight classes' design, but perfectly happy with game design when it comes to victory conditions.

Or are you trying to suggest that Assault pilots are just playing the game wrong because they chose an assault chassis? They deserve to lose because they chose a mech built purely for combat rather than a mech built for reconnaissance? Or is the match maker to blame for putting them in a match with nothing but other slow mechs, perhaps?

Your whole thread sounds like you're a fairly intelligent guy who has come to the forums to try to justify your actions while internally recognizing that you just enjoy being a bit of a douche. You even go so far as to point out how when people verbalize their aggravation with base bandits you make a special effort to cap their base as quickly as you can, so you obviously have a bit of that going on. If you're here to defend the practice of base capping as some noble and legitimate game tactic, you're really not a very good ambassador. Imagine if you had some empathy and just played in a manner that everyone respected, or even put your intellect toward conceptualizing and lobbying for a game mode that didn't so often leave people feeling cheated, bypassed or like someone just wasted their precious free time.

Edited by Atheus, 05 May 2013 - 10:21 PM.

[jeffsw6]

Davers, on 05 May 2013 - 04:10 PM, said:

I remember reading a Dev post last week that said that 19% of Assault games end with a base cap. I thought it was by Omid Kiarostami, but after looking through the Dev tracker I cannot find it anywhere.

What would be nice to know is how many assault matches end in a capture that began before any players died. I'd like to know that on a per-map basis and how often each team ("sigma spawn" or "gamma spawn") wins through each mechanism.

Here are four scenarios for assault-capture, which explains why "death match mode" would be stupid, but the current mode is even worse:

Scenario#1 Early rush of 1 mech can provide a tactical advantage to the rushing team, esp. on Alpine/Tourmaline, but you'll have players on both teams QQing about it because of the rage caused by the other strategies.

Scenario#2 Early rush of 2+ mechs almost always results in a cap-win, certainly on Alpine or Tourmaline; not because it's a "good tactic" but because the bonus from having that second mech in the red base is too great; and because defending a base is a dumb thing to do on most of the current maps, which have badly-designed bases that are largely indefensible (attackers have the advantage, not defenders.) The retreating team's slowest mechs (their assaults) will be lost if that team does bother to defend its base.

Scenario#3 Early rush of 4 mechs virtually always ensures a win for the rushing team.

Scenario#4 Base capture after most mechs on one or both teams have been destroyed, and remaining mechs are having trouble finding each-other; or some are deliberately hiding (griefing.) This is the reason why bases on assault mode exist. You can't remove it completely, because people would go power off their mech and wait for the time to expire.

If they simply eliminated the capture speed bonus for having multiple mechs in the red base, until several minutes into the match, and adjust the amount of time required to capture bases (and max conquest resources) to be appropriate for map size, then scenarios #2 and #3 will be fixed.

Scenario#1 will be less effective early-game because the red team will be able to send someone back to examine the cap-force and they will have time to request reinforcements if there are multiple enemy cappers. However, it will remain effective later into the game.

Scenario#4 will be unaffected. The anti-griefing mechanism will still work. In addition to the multiple-mech assault capture bonus only existing after several minutes, it should be "turned on" once half of either team has died. This way, it is still possible to win if you lost 4 of your mechs; and if one team is almost wiped out early in the match, the red team will not have to wait 4 or 5 minutes to capture the base quickly and win the match.

Pater Mors, on 05 May 2013 - 07:22 PM, said:

To address the rest - On a map like Alpine there is no reason to over extend yourself.

Dude, Alpine is a ****** map where the North team has a huge terrain advantage, while the best thing for the South team to do is to camp its own base. It's garbage.

Edited by jeffsw6, 05 May 2013 - 11:14 PM.

[Atheus]

Neverfar, on 05 May 2013 - 10:41 PM, said:

Many things wrong with this. I will try to be as categorical as possible and address them in the order I find them.

1. "Was I able to find an answer that reflected my play style?" as it is written, no. I play this game to pilot a robot and fight other robots. Sometimes too many robots huddle comfortably in one place and it becomes stupid and boring to me. So, I trigger a cap at those times to force a few of them to break ranks, to improvise, and in a best case scenario, for some of them to chase me. I don't always win when this happens, but even when I lose, I enjoy the fight.

2. The "Skill play versus speed play" is laughably shallow bias, written directly into your poll. You may want to work for a political party and help them dream up new ways of asking questions like: "Are you for freedom or for government oppression, high taxation and job-killing regulations?" or, before someone starts a political flamewar, "Are you for clean air and water or do you like it when corporations dump toxic into your backyard?"

I don't buy the "skill" thing when it's already pretty darn easy with the way convergence works to line up all the PPCs on a Stalker into a single pinpoint. It's nice to have good aim, but if that's your only defining feature for a "skilled" player, you may be better off finding an arcade emulator for Silent Scope. Warning, you only get to fire one gun at a time.


3. Saying "any moron" after pretending to be fair-minded a sentence before is pretty laughable too. I can say stuff like that in the same format: Any moron can hop from behind a rock and dump a bunch of long range shots on the same target, because the convergence in this game is so automatically tight, the "skill" there involves keeping the robot in the crosshair. Challenging!

4. Adding "much?" in a passive-aggressive Reddit-warrior way to any argument, far as I'm concerned, is a shot in your own foot and makes you less persuasive. "Polarizing much?" Compared to the "moron" talk you're spewing out, you're at least as, if not more, polarizing. I never called bloat boaters morons before this post. But thanks to you and your example, I'd at least have justification to start.

5. False equivalency fallacy in the same area. "Every mech that isn't a light is bloat boat to you". Nice try, but I never said that. And I made entire posts advocating for a lot more love and attention for mediums, a class of which I don't own a single Mech of. Try again and quit pretending to speak for my point of view.

6. I assume they have tiny engines because when I pilot my assaults (I have an atlas, an awesome, and yes, a highlander too), none of them (especially not the awesome) have much trouble hurrying back to defend the base if necessary. Either they are packing very tiny engines or are simply useless like you and want everyone to politely walk up to their guns. If you refuse to leave your comfortable little sniper zones and come chase me, well, tough. There's one tiny corner of the game right now where bloat-boating doesn't always win, and every time I do it that way, it encourages people to consider "hmm, maybe I should be ready to defend my base".


7. I can very, very easily accuse you of the same thing you accuse me of, only I have much more evidence (the evidence being in the very post I am replying to now): that lights are "playing the game wrong" because they're using their speed for something other thank running into your firing lines. Before you give some ivory-tower dismissal and say that lights can outmaneuver assaults if they would only be so kind as to brawl in the middle with your bloat boats, I say back to you, what good does that do that another assault couldn't do better? If you had your way, we'd have EVE Online's pvp here: a blob here, a blob there, people call primaries, the side with primaries called fastest wins. It somehow works in EVE (because there's so much more to do there, maybe), but here? Not so much.


8. Pathetic attempt at pop-psychology in your last paragraph. Like the passive-aggressive crap I mentioned in the earlier part of your post (by definition passive-aggressive. I dont need a crystal ball or a PhD to find textbook examples), you attempt a half-hearted complement as if to sugar-coat that insult you put immediately after. Funny. For all the "insulting" I do, it's the people white-knighting against my posts that seem to be the ones to sling the "douche" and "moron" talk. Like you.


9. Until/unless you whine and complain enough where the last viable purpose for smaller, faster, less-armed and less-armored Mechs is edited out of the game, I will continue to play my way (when I'm not playing one of my three assaults, which I also play, if not The One True Way). I post here because people like you sometimes get surprised when others disagree with your assessment about how "unskilled" we are because we don't indulge your tunnel-vision view of the game.

10. Funny. All that "cheated, circumvented wasted free time" is how I'd summarize the complaints of the friends I invited to this game, most of which quit because they logged in and got alpha-boated the moment they walked from the dock to the water in the middle of River City. Wring your hands and call it "skill" all you like and look down on people who find bloat-boating boring, but there may very well be consequences to the game overall if your little country club of "skilled" people get your way and turn this game as stale, dry, and predictable as the post I've just picked apart.

1. Funny, I think I see answers in the poll which reflect this play style fairly reasonably.

2. While aim alone is certainly a skill, there are plenty of other combat techniques and habits that determine how well you'll do in a firefight which I would also describe as skill. Making the trek over to an undefended base, though, certainly does not qualify as a skill. Do you disagree with this?

3. Just because I point out that a moron can do a simple thing like walking into an undefended base means I'm being unfair?

Concerning combat, in fact, it is quite challenging, especially with lasers while moving over bumpy terrain, turning and torso turning to try to keep the crosshairs on the CT of a target 400+m away while you stream the lasers for 1 second. Ensuring you minimize your exposure and utilize battlefield distractions to their best effect. There was a pretty substantial difference between Koreanese's scores in the tournament and everyone else's. Do you suppose his individual skills had nothing to do with that?

4. Not a Redditor myself, but what does that have to do with anything? You don't like my tone? Well, darn.

5. You got me there. What exactly were you trying to say about the bloat-boaters, anyway?

6. There are plenty of ways to split up a group that doesn't involve base capping, not to mention how incredibly effective it is to sandwich a group of 8 with 2 lances of 4, since they can't turn fast enough to suppress fire from front and rear and usually crumble in a pit of confusion. If they try to retreat to the side, or push on one of the lances, they'll get all kinds of hurt no matter what.

7. I didnt' say they were playing it wrong - I did imply that many people despise base rushers, and they're really ******* those people off. I don't think I'm off-base in saying so! Also, you're being pretty obtuse if you're saying the alternative to base capping is just running into the enemy's firing lines. I think we both know that's not how you play a light. What can a light do that an assault can't do better? Strafe. Squirrel. Kill lights. Backstab. Just use your imagination for a second you'll surely come up with a lot more.

8. Pop-psychology huh? Are you trying to say you're not actually being a bit of a douche when you make that special cap rush effort for the guy who's *** is chapped by cap rushes? You don't enjoy being douchey in that situation? Ok, my bad, I guess that's very adult of you.

9. Did you happen to see the score boards for the tournament? The lights scores were pretty much the same as the mediums, heavies, and assaults. The scores are based on kills, assists, damage, and survival/win. Lights played with the intent of doing damage tend to do pretty well.

That aside, go ahead and play your way, but don't expect people to accept it quietly if it doesn't satisfy their idea of fun gameplay.

10. Gotta get one last jab in - my first thought was maybe they left because they were sick of waiting 2 minutes for a match to initialize, getting into the game only to have it get capped out 3 minutes later before anyone even got to fight. I imagine if they were playing with you a lot of games would go about like that.

Quote

One more little note before you flame back: I'd love it if base capping was replaced by something more interesting and complicated, like actual base defense, VIP/vehicle escorting, or search-and-destroy territorial objectives. What you seem to want is some deathmatch mode, with the game roughly as broken as it is now, but with even less for people to do who aren't into your self-declared "skillful" bloat boating.

This I agree with wholeheartedly. Creative game objectives are high on my list of wants, but dull garbage objectives that pull the rug out from under an otherwise gloriously bloody match, not so much.

[Atheus]

I'm not actually in favor of removing base cap. I proposed earlier that bases be immune to cap for the first 5+ minutes of a match (depending on map size), but someone else mentioned making bases only be vulnerable to cap after 4 mechs from that team were killed (or maybe I'm bastardizing someone's suggestion here). I like that even more, but would go along with any adjustment that at least eliminates the matches that end without a shot fired. Those games are too pathetic to be acceptable, and are a complete waste of time. (at least 62% of people feel that way in this poll). This may not eliminate every last frustrating cap-out, but at least it would make it so every match has a reasonable level of fighting going on.

[Pale Horseman]

Davers, on 05 May 2013 - 04:10 PM, said:

I remember reading a Dev post last week that said that 19% of Assault games end with a base cap. I thought it was by Omid Kiarostami, but after looking through the Dev tracker I cannot find it anywhere.

Was Bryan who mentioned it.

Bryan Ekman, on 25 April 2013 - 11:30 AM, said:

Interesting stat - 19% of Assault wins come from Base Caps. 81% of victories come from destroying the opposition.

jeffsw6, on 05 May 2013 - 11:13 PM, said:

What would be nice to know is how many assault matches end in a capture that began before any players died.

1.2% of Assault matches end in 0 deaths according to Bryan's twitter.
https://twitter.com/...561168543686660

[Atheus]

Pale Horseman, on 06 May 2013 - 01:09 AM, said:

Was Bryan who mentioned it.
1.2% of Assault matches end in 0 deaths according to Bryan's twitter.
https://twitter.com/...561168543686660

He also posted:

Quote

Assault Matches End with
0 - 10%
1 - 12%
2 - 10%
3 - 8%
4 - 9%
5 - 9%
6 -13%
7 - 26%
Deaths before Win by Capture.

So if you combine that with the 19% that end by capture, you get:
1.9% end with 0 deaths
4.2% end with <=1 death
6.1% end with <= 2 deaths
7.6% end with <= 3 deaths
9.3% end with <= 4 deaths
11% end with <= 5 deaths
13.4% end with <= 6 deaths
18.4% end with <= 7 deaths
(strange that the statistics don't match up to his original quote of 1.2% end with 0 deaths)
(on second thought, it makes sense if the 1.2% reflects 0 deaths from both teams, and 1.9% is 0 deaths on the winning team)

That helps a lot. Thanks for that link!

These numbers feel about right to me - especially considering that when a base gets rushed many people will attack very aggressively in the little time left before the match ends, resulting in a few deaths.

Edited by Atheus, 06 May 2013 - 03:26 AM.

[jeffsw6]

Unless I misunderstand the information in Atheus' post, or it is incorrect, it looks to me like 10% of games are definitely a joke.

Also, notice that I asked how many games end by a capture that BEGAN before any mechs died. If half your team has to RTB to stop a 2-light cap (which can finish off a base in Tourmaline or Alpine before anyone can even RTB) then the match was trash EVEN IF SOME MECHS DIED, because they probably died due to half your team being forced to retreat, because of the busted capture mechanic!

Further, we all know that, once that base capture bar is going down so fast you know for sure your team is going to lose, many people charge in and die because they are just hoping to get a kill before the match is over.

So we do not really have enough information to know how broken the game is, other than our own experiences. My experience is, it's pretty ******* broken. Conquest has more battles than Assault. Yeah, that makes sense. Not.

Neverfar, on 06 May 2013 - 01:02 AM, said:

So, base capping only when that team's going to win anyway?

I know that some people have suggested that, but it is not my suggestion.

I simply think that base capture speed should not be faster if there are multiple mechs in the box, until 4 or 5 minutes have passed. This would eliminate the 2-light / 4-light early captures but it would not eliminate the need to RTB entirely.

Notice I also think the time-to-capture should be raised on large maps (Alpine, Tourmaline.) This would give you time to send someone back to your base, evaluate the enemy force, and either engage or request reinforcements.

I don't want base capture to be useless. I want it to be useful, but not ruin games. I think my idea is really good.

Edited by jeffsw6, 06 May 2013 - 01:42 AM.

[Atheus]

I'm thinking he must have been talking about deaths on the winning team, in that tweet, although he didn't say so explicitly. All the percentages there add up to 97%, and I can't imagine that only 3% of win-by-cap have between 8 and 16 deaths. I'm sure it's just rounding that accounts for that 3%, and he's talking about the winning team's casualties only.

[JuiceKeeper]

isnt this game is supposed to be sim little bit? then u need tactics right? going allways to middle to meet enemy in middle to bash each other allways same way i dont find interesting. Cap is one of MAIN OBJECTIVE also with killing enemy mechs. So if u would start to thing in match where to position ur self and have little bit of situational awareness u wouldnt get outcapped by for people. Simple like that. If u ignore part of mission objective get ready to be on losing side. It can be frustrating to kill 6 mechs in middle then got capped by 2 other which went around. But if nobody from ur team saw them and nobody was even thinking u can get capped from side then problem is on ur side not on opfor for doing what are they supposed to do.