18 replies to this topic

[GuardDogg]

When Alpine Peaks, Tourmaline Desert came out, I was in awe, and saying to myself finally a huge map. Realizing now, today, they are not huge anymore. In Conquest: On map "Alpine Peaks" after the start, everyone runs to Epsilon (both teams). Players are not putting a variety on the map. They go straight to the battle, epsilon. No strategy, no formations, no defence players holding position, nothing, lights cap. It gets really boring. The round is 15 minutes and round is over in 4 minutes. Its like why play conquest when playing in Assault mode. Tourmaline Desert, lights run to a cap, and while doing so, other mechs go to theta, and round over in 4 minutes. Same, same, same. Map is now small. In Assault mode teams go to center, like a black hole is created a gravitational pull to teams. MWO has created a lance mode, and no formation, or work together. Lance Alpha go here, and lance Bravo go here and lets pull the enemy here and there, wiping out enemy. Appears we need 100x map sizes to get some fun rounds going.

[Atheus]

Just need voice comms. People can't be bothered to coordinate their attack over text chat, so what you get is the occasional one-word observation like "push" or "D6" or whatever. The rest is just what people can read from body language, once the fighting starts.

[Wintersdark]

Atheus, on 11 May 2013 - 10:12 AM, said:

Just need voice comms. People can't be bothered to coordinate their attack over text chat, so what you get is the occasional one-word observation like "push" or "D6" or whatever. The rest is just what people can read from body language, once the fighting starts.

This. In organized play, things are very different.

The way games play out in PUG's is perfectly natural and will happen no matter how large the maps are. People find optimal strategies to deliver a good game, and they repeat that. You CAN have games play out differently, just take a command role and give directions. Despite what people say, i've never, ever, seen people reply with "YOU CAN'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO". That said, if you ask people to do stupid things, you're more likely to get stupid responses.

Since starting in November, I can count on one hand the number of matches I've lost when someone stepped up and took an (active, polite, intelligent, non-belligerent) command role. Many, many victories, but precious few losses. Note the parentheses there, though! If you berate people, if you're rude, or if you're just and ***, nobody is going to listen to you.

The upside is your opposing team is going to be playing very predictably - you've got pretty good odds that you know exactly what they are going to do, this makes for an easy victory if you bother to rustle your team into an organized force.

[Oppresor]

Wintersdark, on 11 May 2013 - 12:10 PM, said:

This. In organized play, things are very different.

The way games play out in PUG's is perfectly natural and will happen no matter how large the maps are. People find optimal strategies to deliver a good game, and they repeat that. You CAN have games play out differently, just take a command role and give directions. Despite what people say, i've never, ever, seen people reply with "YOU CAN'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO". That said, if you ask people to do stupid things, you're more likely to get stupid responses.

Since starting in November, I can count on one hand the number of matches I've lost when someone stepped up and took an (active, polite, intelligent, non-belligerent) command role. Many, many victories, but precious few losses. Note the parentheses there, though! If you berate people, if you're rude, or if you're just and ***, nobody is going to listen to you.

The upside is your opposing team is going to be playing very predictably - you've got pretty good odds that you know exactly what they are going to do, this makes for an easy victory if you bother to rustle your team into an organized force.

You're absolutely right, the best missions tend to be those where there is dialog over the chat line. True in many cases this is just basic commands or comments from the grave, but they all help, even if it's just encouragement.

Although I haven't taken a command role yet, I often ask potential Recon units to feedback target info and grids, especially in Alpine or Tourmaline where Recon can play a major role. The thing with both of these scenarios is that if you pilot an Assault (in my case an Atlas Sniper) your top speed is about 48kph, it can take ages before you even see an enemy unit. For this reason Recon becomes essential; if the correct data is fed back to the assault group they can focus their assets more effectively.

You are also correct in that so far no one in a light unit has told me to "wind it in" or "get lost" when I have asked them to help the fire group with Recon work; they tend to take it as it is meant, and realise that they are very important.

If we do get much bigger maps like VeeDog has mentioned; the role of Recon will become even more important as will the new UAV support when it arrives. We live in interesting times.

[Wintersdark]

Oppresor, on 11 May 2013 - 02:42 PM, said:

You're absolutely right, the best missions tend to be those where there is dialog over the chat line. True in many cases this is just basic commands or comments from the grave, but they all help, even if it's just encouragement.

Although I haven't taken a command role yet, I often ask potential Recon units to feedback target info and grids, especially in Alpine or Tourmaline where Recon can play a major role. The thing with both of these scenarios is that if you pilot an Assault (in my case an Atlas Sniper) your top speed is about 48kph, it can take ages before you even see an enemy unit. For this reason Recon becomes essential; if the correct data is fed back to the assault group they can focus their assets more effectively.

You are also correct in that so far no one in a light unit has told me to "wind it in" or "get lost" when I have asked them to help the fire group with Recon work; they tend to take it as it is meant, and realise that they are very important.

If we do get much bigger maps like VeeDog has mentioned; the role of Recon will become even more important as will the new UAV support when it arrives. We live in interesting times.

Indeed. Likewise, it's been my experience that most light pilots actually want to scout, but they generally don't really do it much because of how often they are simply ignored in PUG's. Give them an opportunity for the mission they signed up for, and they'll almost always jump at it eagerly.

This applies to other roles as well. Fast mediums and heavies, for example, are often quite willing to flank an opposing force. Ask people to do things that their mech is well suited to (sincerely, and not as some snide "here's how the game is stupid" belligerent ********) and they're almost always chomping at the bit to do it.

The problem is while everyone likes to think of themselves as The Fearless Leader and all their pugmates as Terribads, people very rarely step up and take command. And those who complain about people not listening are almost always the same ones who aren't leading, they're just ranting.

Edited by Wintersdark, 11 May 2013 - 03:22 PM.

[Sephlock]

OR COULD IT BE THAT WE JUST DON'T WANT A 15 MINUTE LONG GAME CONSISTING OF 3 MINUTES OF WALKING FOLLOWED BY 3 MINUTES OF FIGHTING FOLLOWED BY 9 MINUTES OF LOOKING FOR A ******** RAVEN?

Nah, it must be those gosh darned lowbrow pugs.

[Sephlock]

If the maps get any bigger we'll have a 1:1 scale representation of the Inner Sphere.

[Bridgeboy]

Seems to me that it's a problem of incentives. There's very little to be gained by capping in either mode (both in terms of fun and money/XP). So people prefer to just fight it out. Not that surprising. I blame the present game modes.

[Sephlock]

Big maps are bad maps.

[Sephlock]

Sephlock, on 11 May 2013 - 03:43 PM, said:

OR COULD IT BE THAT WE JUST DON'T WANT A 15 MINUTE LONG GAME CONSISTING OF 3 MINUTES OF WALKING FOLLOWED BY 3 MINUTES OF FIGHTING FOLLOWED BY 9 MINUTES OF LOOKING FOR A ******** RAVEN?

Nah, it must be those gosh darned lowbrow pugs.

No reply to my bold statement of the facts?

You dare refuse my batchall?!

[Theodor Kling]

Wintersdark, on 11 May 2013 - 03:22 PM, said:

Indeed. Likewise, it's been my experience that most light pilots actually want to scout, but they generally don't really do it much because of how often they are simply ignored in PUG's. Give them an opportunity for the mission they signed up for, and they'll almost always jump at it eagerly.

Yep, I am one of those ligths. And I always delgith if someone actually wants e scouting, or I get other lights for pack hunting.
But scout or not, I mostly stopped bringing TAG, since next to noone actually got LRMs to benefit from it these days.

[CeeKay Boques]

When this gets real, and competitive, big maps will matter, don’t worry. When you know that the squad you are going up against USUALLY takes long range energy, or are pop snipers, missile lovers, brawlers or whatever it is, and you have your special load out and abilities, and stuff is on the line, and surprise of contact, positioning or loadout could be the difference between a win and a loss, big maps will matter, a lot. As long as we’re just shooting at each other for cash and xp? See you at Epsilon.

Kudos to PGI for thinking ahead.

Edited by Technoviking, 14 May 2013 - 10:23 AM.

[Oppresor]

Theodor Kling, on 14 May 2013 - 10:02 AM, said:

Yep, I am one of those ligths. And I always delgith if someone actually wants e scouting, or I get other lights for pack hunting.
But scout or not, I mostly stopped bringing TAG, since next to noone actually got LRMs to benefit from it these days.

I know what you mean and I think it's partially down to a misunderstanding of what TAG is for. I must admit, if I am in range, and see a TAG beam pointing towards enemy units I will blind fire my LRM 15's in that direction.

The gamble is that to carry the TAG often means forgoing your one defensive weapon. I had this exact situation with my Recon Spider. I thought I would give the TAG route a try, but like you, found no body fired any LRM's on what I was Tagging. I had even told the lance that I had TAG and was going to use it.

[Durahl]

Just played 6 Maps today... 2x Tourmaline Desert, 2x Alpine Peaks and 2x Frozen City.
Except for the 2 Frozen City maps everything else was boring as hell... Like always.

Kept walking around mountains searching for enemies just to get the usual "Base is beeing captured" warning.
I still believe that beeing able to win the game without pulling a trigger is a major designflaw in this particular game.

The game just isn't fast paced enough to valid such a design decision in order to keep things interesting for the majority of players which I believe are PUGers like myself.
They should have kept the mapsizes small and interesting where it was still possible for some of the Assaults to react when the need arised.

Playing anything else but a Light or Med on Maps of this size with Assault beeing the Maptype just ends in frustration.

[Sephlock]

In order to make up for the atrocity that Alpinemaline has been, the next map should be set entirely in a broom closet (as opposed to a vast, empty wasteland).

[Ryebear]

We have built-in lances for pug games, why not spawn them significantly far apart in conquest for big maps. Maybe each team starts at a cap point with 1 neutral cap. As it stands every just fights at Theta/Epsilon for Tourmaline/Alpine. At least mechs will come in from different directions when converging on the same spot, or possibly result in two different firefights at two different parts of the map. And while they are at it, why not make the two points be two random adjacent cap points so more parts of the map get used.

And frankly for Assault, if the maps themselves aren't mirrored, why do they have the same objective. Maybe 1 team has to cap a base to win and the other team has to defend base and kill off at least 4 enemy mechs before time runs out as a win condition.

[Rabid Dutchman]

The 'problem' that you've described isn't a fault of the developers, it's simply how people play the game. You can't ask everyone to play the game a different way simply because you don't like it.

I mean, you can try, but we'll probably laugh at you and make rude gestures

[Sephlock]

Niko Snow, on 30 May 2013 - 10:40 AM, said:

It's not unusual for players to start to develop a habit of pathing down particular lanes.
This can lead to them getting ambushed by those who have learned thost most common lanes.
The open nature of these maps allows players to generate a number of different paths, so communicate with eachother via chat and Lance Command to help ensure greater survival.

[Ryebear]

Niko Snow, on 30 May 2013 - 10:40 AM, said:

It's not unusual for players to start to develop a habit of pathing down particular lanes.
This can lead to them getting ambushed by those who have learned thost most common lanes.
The open nature of these maps allows players to generate a number of different paths, so communicate with eachother via chat and Lance Command to help ensure greater survival.

Niko its not that you are wrong per se, that is exactly what people should do, but it ignores human nature an the face that this is a game we play primarily for fun and not competition, winning is secondary to fun. In PUG games, team speak is a separate app and not commonly used, and while I often do try to take a communicative roll in matches, sometimes Im not up for it, and I cant be effectively fighting while typing or looking at the map. And without a doubt some maps are so big that it just isn't fun for slow Heavies and Assaults to march around for minutes without engaging so they take the quickest routes to where the enemy will be and are far less open to being directed around the map than more nimble mechs.

Your statement might be logically sound, but the heatmaps for the Alpine and Tourmaline show that the the logic fails in the face of reality.

Edited by Ryebear, 30 May 2013 - 06:17 PM.