39 replies to this topic

[Von Falkenstein]

Awful decision. Screws up tactics for the first 5 minutes in any 12vs12 premade drop, making this game even more undesirable for coordinated teamplay.

[Xenroth]

I really have to say for pug games these randomspawn new positions are awful!
If at least only Lightmechs would have the close spawn to the enemy, but no also assault brawler mechs can be there which mean, they can kill the other lance which spawns about 1km away from them in the first minute of the game ....

Happened twice to me that I was facing 2-3 AC20 Jagermechs about 1 min after the game started, who simply shot my lance into pieces because our 8 other were still about 1km away ...

[Tekadept]

OH this will make the commander trolling even more fun for ppl, if you move a 4man team around they are gonna be scattered to the four winds. At least they can't teamkill you as they are gonna be 4 grids away.

[AdamBaines]

Levon K, on 04 December 2013 - 05:21 AM, said:

DUDE.. epic Meme. I'm a sofware developer, and yes, sometimes I have made changes with very little time for testing and held my breath while I "chucked it over the wall".

Ahhh....how lovely it is to work in software sometimes eh? I hope you work in a shop where Dev and QA have a good working relationship. I have worked in both and the places where QA and Dev are at each others throats.....those are the worst places EVER to work......

Xenroth, on 04 December 2013 - 06:14 AM, said:

I really have to say for pug games these randomspawn new positions are awful!
If at least only Lightmechs would have the close spawn to the enemy, but no also assault brawler mechs can be there which mean, they can kill the other lance which spawns about 1km away from them in the first minute of the game ....

Happened twice to me that I was facing 2-3 AC20 Jagermechs about 1 min after the game started, who simply shot my lance into pieces because our 8 other were still about 1km away ...

I feel your pian, but in the end, its just learning how to play a little more effectivly and getting used to the new spawning points. Over time we wont even remember what its like to spawn as a big blob.

I Hope......

[Caswallon]

MasterGoa, on 03 December 2013 - 10:00 PM, said:

Yes, this is how a democracy works.
However, if I had only crossed a single player that likes the new
spawns, your post would have some validity. It has neither validity nor substance.
Just like posting a picture. Cut'n'paste is very easy...

Hate to disagree with you MasterGoa but:

• This is not a democracy its a game we play PGI love 'em or hate 'em can do what they damn like (and they do) I thought this was well understood?
  
• I LOVE the spawn change. Do I think its perfect? No! Do I want to go back to the way it was OMG NO NO NO! Keep this and tweak it, which I thought was the stated plan?

Its a poor second to having more modes UI2 CW etc etc but anything that breaks the monotony is a good change for me.

[Voivode]

I kind of like the fact that I might drop directly into a fight. Reminds me of my days in the 82nd Airborne. H-minus, Airborne, All the Way!

[Shade4x]

Caswallon, on 04 December 2013 - 11:10 AM, said:

Hate to disagree with you MasterGoa but:

• This is not a democracy its a game we play PGI love 'em or hate 'em can do what they damn like (and they do) I thought this was well understood?
  
• I LOVE the spawn change. Do I think its perfect? No! Do I want to go back to the way it was OMG NO NO NO! Keep this and tweak it, which I thought was the stated plan?

Its a poor second to having more modes UI2 CW etc etc but anything that breaks the monotony is a good change for me.

The problem here is that you are openly looking for something to break the monotony. That by definition is bad game design. I honestly dont think PGI has access to the source code. game modes, like death match are extremely easy to program in, especially if you already have current modes in which you would just need to remove a base and a win condition.

[Nightcrept]

Personally I think this is the worst thing pgi has ever done. Not the spawn points themselves but placing them in game at this point in the games development.

The new spawn points would be fine if.....

We had a way to see the map and arrange our teams before the game.
And we where all on a ts server or something of the sort.



As is the spawn points are a major advantage to the team with the most players on the same voice server. And then you throw in some luck as to the location of your lances drop points in realtion to the enemies.

Now there is zero and mean zero chance of coordinating with your pugs.
Before with one uniform drop point the pugs could be at least partially counted on to follow the herd that could be lead by the pre-mades movements. Now that option is gone and pugs either run for their lives or rush and die.

Leaving the team with the largest pre-made in a very good position to rally together coordinate and steam roll.

[Victor Morson]

MasterGoa, on 03 December 2013 - 02:59 PM, said:

You are making really hard for me to like you.

Today, I open the announcement section and also Paul's
updates with great expectation.

Someone just promote Thomas to lead and send Paul on a permanent vacation to the unemployment line already.

[Shade4x]

Who ever made the new spawn point system was litterly very stupid. They over looked:
1) All foreign players (in ability to communicate)
2) All mixed games (Pugs or half PUGs)
3) Mech's (how heavy vs light will play at each spawn point)
4) Peoples in ability to want or bother to take "command"
5) people even knowing that you can organize lance's
6) Mech roles (snipers vs brawlers vs LRM's at the new spawn points)
7) The vast majority of the maps
8) The vast majority of the player base.

The main problem is that the maps are asymetrical. This means their will always be a good spawn and a bad spawn. The closer the spawns are, the more dramatic that effect is. In PUG's the only viable strategy, due to lack of communication, is to group up and go as a team to the main fight. I understand the idea of spliting the spawns so it is lance vs lance, however the lances are never balanced out in general. So you have mismatched spawns with mismatched lances on mismatched maps. This is more or less causing one side to ALWAYS dominate. I have yet to be in a game where the winning team even lost half its mech's.

The real issue here is not the spawns, it's the maps themselfs. Teratherma, Caustic valley are prime examples of the worst map designs i have every seen in a game. Their is absolutely no flow, no meaningful alternate routes, and they only support one style of mech and one style of game play. Adding far off spawn points is a bad bandaid applied with bleach, slowly poisoning the game itself. They need to add things in for brawlers like tunnels and large buidings, they need to take away giant 1000M x 1000M platforms and 10km moutains that render LRM's useless. Their is a reason why every competitve build is a sniper, and every match has 80% of the team snipeing. It's the only thing effective on every map.

[Nightcrept]

Shade4x, on 04 December 2013 - 12:43 PM, said:

Who ever made the new spawn point system was litterly very stupid. They over looked:
1) All foreign players (in ability to communicate)
2) All mixed games (Pugs or half PUGs)
3) Mech's (how heavy vs light will play at each spawn point)
4) Peoples in ability to want or bother to take "command"
5) people even knowing that you can organize lance's
6) Mech roles (snipers vs brawlers vs LRM's at the new spawn points)
7) The vast majority of the maps
8) The vast majority of the player base.

The main problem is that the maps are asymetrical. This means their will always be a good spawn and a bad spawn. The closer the spawns are, the more dramatic that effect is. In PUG's the only viable strategy, due to lack of communication, is to group up and go as a team to the main fight. I understand the idea of spliting the spawns so it is lance vs lance, however the lances are never balanced out in general. So you have mismatched spawns with mismatched lances on mismatched maps. This is more or less causing one side to ALWAYS dominate. I have yet to be in a game where the winning team even lost half its mech's.

The real issue here is not the spawns, it's the maps themselfs. Teratherma, Caustic valley are prime examples of the worst map designs i have every seen in a game. Their is absolutely no flow, no meaningful alternate routes, and they only support one style of mech and one style of game play. Adding far off spawn points is a bad bandaid applied with bleach, slowly poisoning the game itself. They need to add things in for brawlers like tunnels and large buidings, they need to take away giant 1000M x 1000M platforms and 10km moutains that render LRM's useless. Their is a reason why every competitve build is a sniper, and every match has 80% of the team snipeing. It's the only thing effective on every map.

I love your post it's dead on.

I can't help but wonder who in the world does their play testing and how are they doing it?

[Chemie]

Look at Tourmaline Desert, where two opposing lances spawn within spitting distance of each other (E4 - D5 about 0.5 km apart). This means the whole match is decided by which ever of those two lances is the heaviest.

[Atheus]

Chemie, on 04 December 2013 - 02:28 PM, said:

Look at Tourmaline Desert, where two opposing lances spawn within spitting distance of each other (E4 - D5 about 0.5 km apart). This means the whole match is decided by which ever of those two lances is the heaviest.

I played the heck out of the game last night in a 4 man and I have to say that generally speaking we demolished every match with few exceptions, which was fun, but also a little problematic. We started of in random mechs, then did 4 LRM boats, then 4 DDC's for a while, then 4 random mechs again. In general, I like the changes, but I can see a lot of problems cropping up with it.

The good:

• At times, combat begins within moments of the start of the battle, rather than after a 2 minute walk. This is a HUGE improvement!
  
• A lance is now an important unit that needs to work together to survive the start of the match. If you have a light in your lance that wants to race off and try to sneak into the enemy base, you're going to be seriously boned as a 3 man group if you can't merge with another lance right away. It's certainly more interesting like this!
  
• Starting closer to an enemy lance than to your own team allows for lance-lance combat, which adds variety to the game. Plus, you never know how quickly either side will receive reinforcements. Interesting!

The bad:

• A commander moving players into different lances before the start of a match doesn't actually teleport them to the other lance's spawn position, so those strategic decisions become fairly meaningless. In fact, it creates more problems than it solves.
  
• It is disorienting at times spawning in an unfamiliar place, with no idea where your team is. We should be able to open the battlegrid before the match starts.
  
• Communication becomes even more vital, now that you must rely so heavily on your lance working together, and finding a way to rendesvous with your team. It's not just a "go with the herd, or leave the herd" decision any more that can be done silently. As a result, voice comms have become even more powerful in a game with no integrated VOIP.
  
• A premade lance with complementary loadouts is incredibly strong in general, but even more so now. A premade lance dropping near a lance of randoms will probably demolish it right off the bat, causing a major imbalance throughout the match.

Diagnosis: It's an interesting idea, and I'd like to keep it around, but the spawn points will need a little more variety and tuning in order not to become predictable and stagnant. I don't want to know that if I'm spawning at point A, there will be an enemy lance at point B that I should immediately attack/retreat from. I would also say that this also brings to fore a certain urgency to an integrated VOIP solution to level out the playing field a bit. I want separate talk buttons to talk to my lance and to talk to my whole team, along with out of match comms, persistent lobby, etc. Make it robust, and make it soon, and the game will transform. Heck, just copy what Star Citizen is doing. That should only cost 25 million or so.

[Saobh]

Atheus, on 04 December 2013 - 03:06 PM, said:

The good:

• At times, combat begins within moments of the start of the battle, rather than after a 2 minute walk. This is a HUGE improvement!

Seriously ? you are playing what is suppose to be the online version of a tactical game and you find that plunging right into the action without having any real choice of your position (or even know your surroundings until the last second) is an improvement ?

What is the point of having a team if they are so far that you nor they can share support, might as well make a 4vs4 mode for that.

Yes lance combat is intersting but forcing it in such a way is tantamount to hitting the player on the head while telling him this is how you must play rather then actually have the gamer mechanic make it an advantage of working as a lance (only being able to share sightings/locks with your lance would have been a way to making players work together)

And its all very well that you had fun with your 4 buddies, but for all the other players who are either pugs, or are only 2-3 and disregarding the numerous times people disconnect/afk that means that lance is pretty much a gonner unless the enemy lance is even more unlucky which only increases the chances of a quick

So rather then let the players actually choose how they want to work together (as yes I've had numerous matches where even pugs where able to work together well and even beat pre mades, people are actually glad to do more then mindlessly do a lemming train ^^) and even better give them tools to do so, players are spread out over the map and forced into one play style.

Players appreciate more liberty and choices not less.

[Atheus]

Saobh, on 04 December 2013 - 03:48 PM, said:

Seriously ? you are playing what is suppose to be the online version of a tactical game and you find that plunging right into the action without having any real choice of your position (or even know your surroundings until the last second) is an improvement ?

What is the point of having a team if they are so far that you nor they can share support, might as well make a 4vs4 mode for that.

Yes lance combat is intersting but forcing it in such a way is tantamount to hitting the player on the head while telling him this is how you must play rather then actually have the gamer mechanic make it an advantage of working as a lance (only being able to share sightings/locks with your lance would have been a way to making players work together)

And its all very well that you had fun with your 4 buddies, but for all the other players who are either pugs, or are only 2-3 and disregarding the numerous times people disconnect/afk that means that lance is pretty much a gonner unless the enemy lance is even more unlucky which only increases the chances of a quick

So rather then let the players actually choose how they want to work together (as yes I've had numerous matches where even pugs where able to work together well and even beat pre mades, people are actually glad to do more then mindlessly do a lemming train ^^) and even better give them tools to do so, players are spread out over the map and forced into one play style.

Players appreciate more liberty and choices not less.

Just because it's an online tactical game doesn't mean you should have to walk for 2 minutes before you even catch sight of the enemy every match. I say you land close to an enemy lance, but they're still ~900m away. You have the option to run the other direction if you don't want to fight them, and they won't be able to do much at that range. If they're so much faster that they can literally chase you down even while you retreat, chances are you're much heavier than them anyway and you can just stomp them into the ground.

You do make a good point about disconnects being more dangerous in these situations. A 4v3 is definitely much more imbalanced than 12v11, but I'm willing to put up with that. If you're in a lance with 3 people, obviously you need to retreat and try to rendezvous with your nearest team lance, rather than try to engage.

This type of start adds some small measure of dimension and variety to a game that had grown pretty static. Weren't you tired of everyone running to radio tower in Alpine, or the standard "lower city or upper city" in river city? Unfortunately frozen city is pretty much unchanged, but at least you start closer to the front line, so you need not waste as much time doing nothing of value.

Edit: Another side effect I noticed is that the "capwarrior online" events seem to be much less common, since a lance can't afford to have its lights race off and try to completely avoid combat, which is a very good thing. MechWalker Online is a pretty dull game.

Edit2: Perhaps even better would be if each lance started with a leader (chosen at random if it's pugs, or the group leader if it's premade) that would choose a spawn point from maybe a set of 5 or 6 options before the match starts. No two lances can choose the same spawn point. Something like that would be interesting as well.

Edited by Atheus, 04 December 2013 - 06:31 PM.

[GeneralGrievous]

If I wasn't grinding to get all the mechs I want to own I'd say I would be bored of this game already. I have been playing for about 2 months and every match is the same script ... one mech goes [insert direction here] and everyone follows that one. So, I think this is a nice change, it shakes things up. But I am sure with in 30 days everyone will be use to these spawn points and a new set of "same old" strategies will emerge.

I will say I was quite frustrated at first because I experienced what a lot of others on here are complaining about in terms of being mowed down, having useless lances that go every which way, and no one coming to your aid. My fix was to make some friends. I got into a lance of 4 on TS and that totally changed the night. I was surviving most rounds and putting up top 3 damages. If you feel like you are getting the raw end of the deal on these new spawn points, add me as a friend and we can watch eachother's back.

I like the developing 'team' aspect of this game. I have been driven out of many a game franchise because it becomes more and more lone wolf ... however this game you truly can't one man it.

It isn't a perfect fix... I think the game needs some more 'simple fix' randomization .. but over all it will keep me interested for another month or two until a new development comes along.

[CrashieJ]

We should be able to chose where we want our drop point to be within a set area by clicking on the map and pressing the "Place Drop Beacon" popup. lances who do not chose get auto-randomed within the set area.

have allied lances with good unit cohesion? drop in a pattern to exploit strengths and cover weaknesses.

have an enemy you want to smack first? Challenge them to "First Blood" by placing your "spawn beacon" closer to the center of the whole map.

not rocket science people, get on it.

[SgtMaster]

people want what they were promised:

- clan mechs, maps, weapons, UI2.0, CW, dx11 different gametypes, lobbies...

instead people got stuff they did not want:

- borken HSR, ghost heat, weapon unbalance, motion sickness, invisible walls, borken matchmaking,
borken spawn...


a pattern for over a year,
they lack programmers to give us what was promised,
yet have too many programmers to give us stuff we do not want...

"coming soon..!" : mech soccer, where the goal is to kick the balloon into the field goal..!

Edited by SgtMaster, 04 December 2013 - 07:58 PM.

[MasterGoa]

Niko Snow, on 04 December 2013 - 07:04 PM, said:

[color=#959595]I've changed the title of this thread. Please keep your topic titles accurate to the discussion at hand. Adding PGI to the thread is generally frowned upon, as it distracts from title specificity (also because all feedback threads are treated as addressed to the PGI and IGP team.) [/color]

Fair enough.

In retrospect, since a few people gave good feedback, I gave it a second run.
Seems that in some maps, like Alpine and Costic, it DOES make sense.

However River City and Terra Therma is real awefull where a single lance
spanws very near to the whole opposite team...

[Cognus]

SgtMaster, on 04 December 2013 - 07:44 PM, said:

people want what they were promised:

- clan mechs, maps, weapons, UI2.0, CW, dx11 different gametypes, lobbies...

instead people got stuff they did not want:

- borken HSR, ghost heat, weapon unbalance, motion sickness, invisible walls, borken matchmaking,
borken spawn...


a pattern for over a year,
they lack programmers to give us what was promised,
yet have too many programmers to give us stuff we do not want...

"coming soon..!" : mech soccer, where the goal is to kick the balloon into the field goal..!

Exactly this, sometimes it really does feel like they have WAY too many cooks in the bloody kitchen... then they give us a menu and tell us we can order what we want, but then they decide on our meals themselves.