11 replies to this topic

[Leadpaintchips]

I started playing MWO not that long ago, and the sheer amount of grind involved to get anything good is daunting. So I started going to the forums to see if there's an effective way for me to make this grind a bit more bearable. Almost everything that I read involving the currency was "Dive in, hit as many as you can, and when you die, load up another mech and repeat."

This might be good if I bought a heavy or an assault mech (probably not), but I have a light mech. I go squish if anything looks at me funny, and if 5 heavy/assults all glare at me? I esplode into lots of even smaller bits.

I've seen and read how a light SHOULD be played, but that's not as effective for getting me those items that I desperately need to actually run it well. Right now, I don't have the speed that I need to bounce in, strike and bounce out. I don't have the xp to buy any of the modules, and I don't have the spare cash for different loadouts.

This first month is crucial in setting the foundations for how someone even thinks about a game, much less how someone plays it, and right now it's encouraging me to go all sorts of all in crazy ******* up. Don't get me wrong, I love playing this game, but the current amount of money that I'm making (or more specifically, NOT making), is making it so that I am making poor decisions, so I can get out of my current match and into another one as quick as I can.

[Ceesa]

Your experience is pretty representative of what all new players are going through. PGI's current stance is that there shouldn't be any problem with getting new players started in the game because of 3PV, cadet bonus, and the new tutorial. However, once you spend your cadet bonus you're left with a long grind until you can get your next mech, and that's assuming you spent your cadet bonus perfectly. To get a top of the line light mech, you need to spend more than your cadet bonus. The total cost of a standard 6 ML jenner F with endo, FF, DHS, and a 300 XL is 10.1 million CBills. That's ALL of your cadet bonus and then some, just to buy a light mech.

I wouldn't be surprised if some new players, having spent their cadet bonus improperly, are now making new accounts just to get their bonus money back so they can spend it more wisely. And I wonder what that would do to the account retention statistics that PGI is looking at.

[Veranova]

Yup it's affecting us long term players badly too. They recently reduced the amount we earn to balance our earnings against 12v12, and also reduce us down to a 20 hour grind for an Atlas.

The excuse for the latter, is "that's about what other F2P titles take to get the top character".
My response to that, is just because that's what everyone else is doing, it doesn't make it right.

I really think PGI need to think about their unique selling points in terms of economy.
They have copied the F2P model in almost every aspect, but F2P is rather unfriendly to players. We're all used to spending £30-40 for a game and getting all the content at a fun grind, after all.

[Kushko]

"that's about what other F2P titles take to get the top character" is all well and good, but PGI seem to fail to realize that we actually need to get 3 of our "top characters" to actually have a "top character" making the grind 3x longer than whatever F2P model they are trying to emulate. Not to mention the cost of weapons, chassis upgrades (dhs, endo and ff), engines (esp XL) and modules.

The current grind is in no way acceptable and is doing great harm to both MWO and its players.

Edited by Kushko, 09 September 2013 - 06:46 PM.

[Angel of Annihilation]

Kushko, on 08 September 2013 - 08:01 PM, said:

"that's about what other F2P titles take to get the top character" is all well and good, but PGI seem to fail to realize that we actually need to get 3 of our "top characters" to actually have a "top character" making the grind 3x longer than whatever F2P model they are trying to emulate. Not to mention the cost of weapons, chassis upgrades (dhs, endo and ff), angines (esp XL) and modules.

The current grind is in no way acceptable and is doing great harm to both MWO and its players.

This is a very good point. We need 3 of everything to max out the skills on even one of them and that is one of the things that makes the grind so overwhelming. I mean buy a new mech and it only takes me like 20-30 battles to get my basics unlocked. However 20-30 battles is no where near enough to be able to buy the second mech and start on it, let along getting the third. Instead I find myself at a great big wall with zero progression going on while I wade through a hundred plus matches to earn the second and thrid chassis and the right to unlock elite efficiences.

[ollo]

Viktor Drake, on 08 September 2013 - 10:51 PM, said:

This is a very good point. We need 3 of everything to max out the skills on even one of them and that is one of the things that makes the grind so overwhelming. I mean buy a new mech and it only takes me like 20-30 battles to get my basics unlocked. However 20-30 battles is no where near enough to be able to buy the second mech and start on it, let along getting the third. Instead I find myself at a great big wall with zero progression going on while I wade through a hundred plus matches to earn the second and thrid chassis and the right to unlock elite efficiences.

The other downside is that you are forced to play mechs you don't like. I'd only play my fast hung-lo-wang, but to max it out i have to get in other awful variants i hate. Same with the 9M.

[BadBird]

ollo, on 10 September 2013 - 02:20 PM, said:

The other downside is that you are forced to play mechs you don't like. I'd only play my fast hung-lo-wang, but to max it out i have to get in other awful variants i hate. Same with the 9M.

x2 Grinding a mech (or 2) you dont like just level a mech you do is a real pain. Only made worse by the fact that you have to grind c-bills just to get to the xp grind!

[Bhael Fire]

They mentioned that they will be revising the rewards system soon to reward players much more for performing their chosen roles on the battlefield.


While I find the gimped c-bill rewards extremely annoying and I often feel like hamster on a treadwheel playing this game, I'm going to refrain from complaining about it (too much) until I see the new system in place because it sounds promising.

[Angel of Annihilation]

Bhael Fire, on 10 September 2013 - 05:33 PM, said:

They mentioned that they will be revising the rewards system soon to reward players much more for performing their chosen roles on the battlefield.


While I find the gimped c-bill rewards extremely annoying and I often feel like hamster on a treadwheel playing this game, I'm going to refrain from complaining about it (too much) until I see the new system in place because it sounds promising.

Here is the thing. I can completely understand them revamping the rewards system, I am cool with that but why nerf the economy BEFORE they are ready to implement the new reward changes? The answer is because they realized that with the beta tag being removed in a few days, it would be alot harder to sell the player base on reduced rewards than it is now.

Rewards aren't going to change, not really. The even said they thought we were making too much.

One of the biggest issues with this game is that everything out of their mouth sounds promising but what they deliver is far short of the mark.

Edited by Viktor Drake, 12 September 2013 - 01:10 PM.

[Archio]

I recently made a new account because I got tired of making 40-50k C-bills a match. I used my cadet bonus on my new account to buy the Victor I had wanted. Now Im back to making less than 100k on matches... with 5.5 million C-bills to go just to buy an XL engine so I can even start working on my build.

This is ridiculous. I cannot recommend this game to anyone as it is now.

[LastPaladin]

If you want to do the "assist" grinding in a light and you can't wade in, just mount a long range weapon, like an ER PPC or an ER L Laser. Find a spot where you can hit a couple mechs, get your assists, then move to another firing position before their snipers can blast you to pieces.

Sure, you will be practically worthless to your team with such a strategy, but that seems to be what PGI wants, so I say, so be it.

[Primez]

Archio, on 12 September 2013 - 12:05 PM, said:

I recently made a new account because I got tired of making 40-50k C-bills a match. I used my cadet bonus on my new account to buy the Victor I had wanted. Now Im back to making less than 100k on matches... with 5.5 million C-bills to go just to buy an XL engine so I can even start working on my build.

This is ridiculous. I cannot recommend this game to anyone as it is now.

Reasons like this is why I keep seeing the same players over and over again. New people won't stick with this game because of the grind. Wake up PGI