172 replies to this topic

[oldradagast]

Okay, I'm confused: The new spawn points, which split up the teans more, have made artillery and air strikes more powerful? How can that be - you can no longer just drop a strike on all 12 enemies since they are no longer clustered in a single big murderball.

That being said, they probably do need to check the strike timers and such in 12-mans, and strikes should never result in head shots.

Edited by oldradagast, 05 December 2013 - 09:22 AM.

[Storyteller]

In a weird way it is like this. It's easier now to place air/artillery strikes now, because on some maps you never know where the next enemy mech is coming from. Placing you near the center of the map, it happens very often, that you're suddenly under attack from the flank or rear. Before they changed the spawnpoints, you could figure out, where the enemy is coming from. And if he showed up, you could make him pay for placing the strike.

But now in those crazy brawls, there are no frontlines anymore and sometimes its hard to say, if the strike was placed by your people or the opponent. But yes, on most maps you won't hit as many targets as before. There are still exceptions, like Forest Colony where PGI changed litte to nothing.

[Joseph Mallan]

oldradagast, on 05 December 2013 - 09:22 AM, said:

Okay, I'm confused: The new spawn points, which split up the teans more, have made artillery and air strikes more powerful? How can that be - you can no longer just drop a strike on all 12 enemies since they are no longer clustered in a single big murderball.

That being said, they probably do need to check the strike timers and such in 12-mans, and strikes should never result in head shots.

I was with you up till this last bit. A head cap should be as easy/difficult to get with arty as it is any other way. War is hel an War games should be a bummer.

[Novakaine]

Novakaine approves these changes.
PGI did it right - this time.

[Trauglodyte]

I think the problem with the spawn points is more that people continue to think "go straight ahead". So, if you're on the flanks, everyone immediately pushes up only to find themselves either out quicked or out numbered and out quicked. Nobody thinks to fall back and consolidate their forces. It is like the new spawn points made the Leeroy Jenkins types even worse with their need to charge into the fray out numbered and out gunned. As a friend of mine told me back in my soccer playing days, "Going forward isn't always the best move. Use the entirety of the field."

[AgroAlba]

I really really dig the spawn point changes. Kudos on those. Artillery really feels like a threat, which I'm very happy to see. Stand still long enough and you get pounded. I myself have missed noticing the red marking smoke, and that's just my fault.

[Name113995]

Storyteller, on 04 December 2013 - 03:17 PM, said:

No, it is not. Its not fair, like it isn't fair that bombs and artillery shells raining down randomly, hitting the left arm of the enemy Highlander while destroying the head of my Atlas-D-DC. So the random factor in MWO is getting bigger and bigger.

Arty shells are never 100% accurate in real life, sometime you will lost a leg and sometimes a head.
It's bad luck, you hod shell in head so? It's not like every time you got shelled to death by head shooting.
Once I was peeking over hill and I got head shot with enemy ac 20. Do I complaining about it? No, because enemy had skills and luck.

[Blurry]

Joseph Mallan, on 05 December 2013 - 04:47 AM, said:

I play in both as PUG and PreMade so just STAHP! Its a team game played in teams where the better team wins. Every time. To me that sounds like it is working as intended. And I dropped for 2-3 Hours last night as a PUG and another 2 In a 4man. I did not see any change other than the guys I was with had a higher Elo than me!

can we still have solo q.
And no the team with the greater tonnage wins and obviously those that have ground master and put in the special flavor of the month in the slot win.

SO again please can we separate the qs? for a team in voice and above it really is far superior and kills the game but who cares about solo pug players. they dont count and they dont spend money.

[The Basilisk]

Karl Streiger, on 05 December 2013 - 01:16 AM, said:

While your journey to military history is nice....it is not the point in Storytellers story.

The point is the rising numbers of RNG mechanics so many of you are opposed.

Its random were you start on the maps.
Its random were your other team mates are placed on the map.
If i shoot at a enemy and his ammunition explodes - its random
If i shoot with SRM at a enemy and hit registration doesn't work - its random


So basically - MWO is a kind of
"Because you don't know anything, and eveything is random - the difference between victory and defeat is random too)

I don't know about enemy support units (in form of Airstrike and Artillery strikes, its force composition, in PUGs i don't even know the exact force composition of my team, and of course i don't know how the lance look like i will start in. So having a Atlas in a scout lance is always a joy.=

For a game that should "simulate" military combat in the 31st Century ... the numbers of informations that are unknown is bad.

The only thing that is not random in MWO in its current state is where you click with your mouse at the picture of a enemy mech.

What Karl says here can't be pointed out loud and often enough.
At first I was happy with the new spawning mechanics because it adds a new flavor to the quite chewed out game mechanics and ever recuring maps without any changes.
Randomness in respective to deployment and tactical abillitys of a team are an absolute no go in MW (the thinking mans shooter one of the devs called it)
Besides: If ALL of your hit detection/ targeting would be chance based like in the TT and can only be gradualy influenced I would be fine with this because its a rule for ALL players. But the devs choose to ignore this element of the tabletop and implemented a simple shooter like targeting mechanic instead. So...stay with this.
(For SRMS it would be a quite simple thing to just change the firering mechanic to start only 2 rockets per launcher at a time. Those rockets could fly straight to the point where you've aimed but with a SRM6 you would shoot 3 volleys with 2 rockets. So a lot of chances to distribute dmg for the enemy.)

[Shadey99]

Joseph Mallan, on 05 December 2013 - 04:06 AM, said:

Guys wanna play fighting (war) games, when they get a sniff of war they whine. Working as intended.

Well I dislike the random spawns (mostly because I seem to invariably end up stupidly near the enemy team). It's hardly like a 'real war' or 'real warfare' when I arrive in a random location with no information other than "they have a 'base' at X and you have one at Y". It's not even very BT as one would think we would arrive on the same dropship.

So far it seems more like this was done to get one lance screwed by being way to close to the enemy. A few games where your jumped by a double or triple set of enemy lances that cause you to try to evade in the first minute of the game as you have no support is just horrible. It also reinforces the 'blob or die' gameplay.

As I've said before we need multiple mission objectives to handle at the same time if we want to counter blobbing. Moving our lances further apart certainly doesn't do that.

[Black Ivan]

The new spawning points are utterly nonsense

[AgroAlba]

Shadey99, on 05 December 2013 - 10:08 AM, said:

As I've said before we need multiple mission objectives to handle at the same time if we want to counter blobbing. Moving our lances further apart certainly doesn't do that.

In the rounds I played yesterday, the spread out spawn points (at least in PUGS) totally negated the blob or die mentality. Each time, we had lance on lance combat instead of lance on entire team combat. IT was really refreshing.

[Kenyon Burguess]

current meta is to min/max 12 mechs to do as much damage as possible with the largest weapons by installing XL engines and shaving armor. autocannon and LRM heavy, they cluster up so they can focus fire one target down at a time while, under constant ECM umbrella, while 2+ allies rain lrms constantly from behind to suppress enemy movement. it all equals easy wins on teamspeak. random hit arty/airstrike and moved spawns ruins that meta. random hits prevents them from torso twisting to protect ammo stores or the spots they overloaded with weapons. different spawns prevents them from quickly forming their picket lines and marching towards the enemy. these changes are good for the meta, mech builds will be forced out of the min/max stage and closer to balanced designs for survivability until ingame organization can occur.

[Trauglodyte]

Geist Null, on 05 December 2013 - 10:29 AM, said:

current meta is to min/max 12 mechs to do as much damage as possible with the largest weapons by installing XL engines and shaving armor.

Wrong. The current meta is the min/max 12 mechs to do as little damage as possible while getting more kills faster than the opposing team. You want to be as efficient as possible. Random damage does you no good.

[William Mountbank]

Everyone was pushing 'buff SRMs' to promote brawling, but it turns out just changing the spawn point to drop you in amongst the enemy was the best cure for that whole ranged weapon meta thing.

Unfortunately it also cures tactical positioning and support builds.

But I'm definitely in the minority because I'm not a great fan of twitch shooters and instant, if brief, action.

[Capfailboat]

The spawn points aren't random. Beginning with Crimson straight, your spawn was related to your ELO so you would be encouraged to do certain things to minimize your impact in the early stages of the fight. Now it is the same on other maps.

Arty is great in pre-made twelve mans BTW. If you say otherwise you either don't play enough/ at all or you are really bad.

[Almond Brown]

Karl Streiger, on 05 December 2013 - 04:21 AM, said:

THIS
No time to prepare - and you don't know if the other guy has a makeshift knife - or chain or just his fists....oh and you don't know if you have to fight at the yard - or the laundry...

Well lucky this isn't war - and because it isn't war some DEV could start to change some colors.... i want the enemy mechs in violet rectangles. Oh and the smoke must to become pink - have problems with red
But why is there smoke at all?
However - did you read the post? In confined spaces in heavy brawl - you realize that some of the other guys is just dropping smoke at your position - and ignoring the blue guys?
Have seen it several times... artillery strike right into the middle of a fight - i really wish that Blue on Blue becomes costly

40,000 x 2 x 12 =960,000 C-Bills. If the Team wins and uses all 24 strikes (unlikely) the actual funds won in total would likely not exceed 1,400,000 C-bills. 440,000 /12 is not a very profitable victory.

The smoke should only be for the Airstrike as the aero-tech pilot needs a marker. Arty should just be straight GPS based Steel Rain.... LOL

[Artgathan]

In the immortal words of Prince Victor Steiner-Davion: "It's better to be lucky than good."

[Almond Brown]

Joseph Mallan, on 05 December 2013 - 07:04 AM, said:

I had a spawn point on River City that was on the West side of the map half way between the normal and Upper City. It actually seemed as though the Lights that went to to normal Base site was confused as to where the base was.

Have you played Chess in the last few Decades? Thought the King is the most important piece it is weak compared to everything else!

If current, and I assume it is, here is the River City Base and Spawn changes. Very different indeed.

[Black Ivan]

Sigh. It's everytine the same the PGI. Instead of thinking about a decent solutuion to a problem the take the big hammer and hammer something into the game. Won only a single game today and that by chance. Because of the new spawn points the company was picked apart peace by peace.