The point of factions would be to present one of three 'career choices' for a new mechwarrior:
1. House Unit Pilot
2. Mercenary Pilot
(3. Clan Pilot)
Each with it's own set of pros and cons, quirks, freedoms, restrictions, economic implications and career paths/titles etc. House unit pilots for example would be very restricted, but also economically covered and carefree (only house variants, no ammo or repair expenses, etc.), while mercenaries would have a lot more freedom, but also a lot more risk, and no fancy titles or ranks to show off (apart from their internal merc unit ranks, that is).
Pretty much like "choose your pilot's nation" (or simply character's alignment) in other games.
It would also define your role in the whole Inner Sphere territorial warfare thingy that is soon
™ to come.
But wait.. I should really stop daydreaming..
Meh
DarwinsDisciple, on 07 May 2014 - 04:13 PM, said:
PGI has checked their server info and found 85% of players are currently Lone Wolves. Therefore they've decided that obviously people don't actually care about factions. So they're putting the time and resources into things people want like new mechs, skins, and different shades of red.
While this sounds like PGI (or any contemporary game developer for that matter) logic and reasoning, I would like to comment that how on earth are players supposed to care for something that is pretty much non-existent??
And for something that isn't fleshed out in the least bit, there is actually A LOT of faction specific organisation and care going on in the Forums and out of game. Those 85% of players would simply be the come-and-go casual players who can't possibly be convinced to engage in faction specific gameplay, when there is none to begin with! In order to get them into factions and stuff there would have to be something you could offer them, in order to get them interested or hooked.
Of course people are likely to choose Lone Wolf, as that probably sounds a lot cooler than belonging to some random Faction you know nothing about.
Edited by John Norad, 07 May 2014 - 04:51 PM.