66 replies to this topic

[Varent]

Sybreed, on 01 February 2014 - 04:29 PM, said:

Troll detected

Whatever helps you sleep better at night.

[Sybreed]

Varent, on 01 February 2014 - 04:32 PM, said:

Whatever helps you sleep better at night.

is that it?

[Varent]

Sybreed, on 01 February 2014 - 04:35 PM, said:

is that it?

Sybreed, on 01 February 2014 - 04:29 PM, said:

Troll detected

1) CS:GO dared change sacred cows like the glock and the Deagle. It now has over 50k concurrent players playing competitive games, while they only had 10-15k when the game launched. Even if a game, or mechanics, date from 15 years ago, that doesn't mean they can't be changed for something better. Pulse lasers still need tweaks, flamer is horrible, NARC has been horrible for way too long, ECM is still too good, heat scale shouldn't even exist. If you have items in your game that are either so terrible or so good that they're always skipped or used, then yeah, something is extremely wrong.

2) So, why does he like the idea now and not last year when we asked for the same thing?

3) I'm sorry for wanting a better game. But please, let's keep the statut quo and see how long this game lasts.

Varent, on 01 February 2014 - 04:03 PM, said:

3) See 1). Alot has changed just not things you want changed.

I dont think i really need to say much else honestly. Im sorry you feel they arent listening to you? They obviously are listening to people and deciding among there group what they feel is best for mwo. You disagree. End of story. They are going to do what they feel is best for mwo among the suggestions they feel are best and have tested themselves. They arent going to listen to general rage or a small group of people (which the forums actually are).

[Deathlike]

I'm sure the "balance team" has conclusively allowed Command Console to be useless since the beginning.

Excellent, the status quo is intact.

[Sandpit]

Nick Makiaveli, on 01 February 2014 - 10:37 AM, said:

Do we have any proof that Paul doesn't have a team?

Do we know for sure they don't have secret testers from the community?

Have we considered that maybe the 2 hour "test" was more about giving the players a preview of what was coming and less about actual testing?


The above all stem from the fact that we are working from incomplete information and therefore all conclusions are suppositions at best.

No, we don't, just like anything else people provide "facts" about.

[BrockSamsonFW]

Khobai, on 01 February 2014 - 11:00 AM, said:

PGI doesnt need a balance team FFS. Half the monkies on this forum could do a better job of balancing the game (the other half just fling poo at PGI). What PGI needs to do is listen to their players. We tell them how to balance their game. They just completely ignore us and nonchalantly add game ruining mechanics like ghost heat instead.

Its the same exact issue its always been: A communication issue. Communication is a two way street. What PGI needs to do is establish a more active presence on the forums, appoint some community representatives, have them read all the threads and sort out what the major issues are with the game, and work towards fixing them. Not only is that easy to do, but volunteers dont cost any money either!

Exactly. Communication is the issue and it's why I haven't spent any real money on this game yet. The balance problems don't bother me as much as the complete lack of communication from the developers. Are they aware of the issues that concern the community? Are they discussing them or doing any testing to see if they really are valid concerns or just incorrect perceptions of the players? Are they considering any changes or solutions to the problems that turn out to be legitimate issues?

The fact that they don't tell us this implies, to me, that they simply don't care. It seems like they make some minor ill-conceived changes every few months just to shake things up and make us think they are still working. I'm sorry but that simply isn't good enough if they want me to take out my credit card and buy some garage slots or premium time.

World of Tanks, with it's flaws, got me to spend money. I did it happily because the developers are active, both in communication and action. They have an interest in making their own game better and an interest in keeping their game alive and popular. I don't feel that from PGI and I'm not going to invest money in something that seems like it could die at any moment.

I am a programmer, as are others on the forum. I have experience with multiplayer game balance (from the developer side), as do others on this forum. I would happily volunteer some time and effort to improve this game, as would others on the forum. The lack of resources is questionable but legally understandable. The lack of communication or community interaction, if they want me to spend money, is unacceptable.

Varent, on 01 February 2014 - 12:04 PM, said:

what you might be misinterpreting is something that many misinterpret.

Your basing alot of your post off of a few assumptions.

1) you feel the game is horrible un-balanced. While others may disagree.

2) you feel that your not being listened to. When in fact the narc change shows the devs are in fact listening.

3) your assuming no changes means the game is having issues with balancing. Wich in fact those changes not being implimented might mean the game is more balanced then you think.

Without starting a balance discussion, the fact that there are quite a few weapons and even entire mechs that are essentially not used is a good indication of there being a few balance issues with the game. The fact that some of these weapons or mechs have been in this state for months on end with absolutely no changes or comments from the developers is a serious concern.

[Sybreed]

Sandpit, on 01 February 2014 - 05:56 PM, said:

No, we don't, just like anything else people provide "facts" about.

well, there is no proof there is a team either, so I'll just go the cracked.com route and assume there is none.

[Col Jaime Wolf]

and zero, on 31 January 2014 - 11:20 PM, said:

If you are making a comment poking fun at people demanding a balanced game, you have no idea what balance is. Balance is not 10 weapons that are all the same. It is 10 weapons that are all different yet equally useful in different ways/situations.

And technically, if there were only medium lasers, the game would be in a perfect state of [very very boring] weapon balance.

he was being sarcastic, read his sig

[Sephlock]

Sybreed, on 31 January 2014 - 06:43 PM, said:

There has been countless of brilliant ideas, countless of less brillant ideas, and yet, there is no one to listen to them except for the community itself. (narc being the exception to the rule, although it took an entire year and a thread created by one of PGI's favorites to listen to us).

Narc has been poop since the beginning, hasn't it?

[Sybreed]

Sephlock, on 01 February 2014 - 07:45 PM, said:

Narc has been poop since the beginning, hasn't it?

yes it has

[Col Jaime Wolf]

Fooooo, on 31 January 2014 - 11:36 PM, said:

Well, in that situation I would say that the mechanics of LRMS need to be changed, not the stats of the actual weapon.

If by making the weapon useful at high play, in turn makes them way op at low play, then there is something wrong with the way the weapon works. (that is ofc if you want you games weapons to play well at all ranges of skill that is.)

Some would just say that is good balance and lower players need to skill up or progress to the next level.
(ie learn the game and move up, not be catered to etc......just like moving from your provisional racing licence to an actual one or any other type of activity you must learn to progress to a higher class)

In which case that may be what was intended by the devs in the first place.


It really depends on the game and what you want from it....well what the devs want from it.


I really don't mind either direction tbh.

You either fix the mechanics of certain weapons if they cant be fixed by stats alone, or you tell the playerbase these weapons are fine at the top levels (once you make them that way) and that other people below have to learn to progress.

see we wouldnt have any problem between "casual" players and "hardcore" players if we just had simple things like real lobbies.

games can be built to sort out balance issues on their own. problem is in this game, everyone gets thrown into the same pot. stirred around then spit out into some kinda of Counter Strike clone with big stompy robots and objectives that amount to "camp here" then move over and "camp there".

simple things like custom combat variables (gravity, heat scale, est) for matches would go so far in restoring our faith in PGI.

but instead all they do is make more mechs, skins and maps. when it comes to the mechanics of the game PGI overwhelmingly says "working as intended" and part of the problem is that they wont admit that they have been wrong about alot of things for a long time. it shows how little they care about mechwarrior and actually making a good game, it shows that they really just care about the money and not the quality of their product.

no amount of lies and carrots on sticks will make people turn a blind eye and accept your lies.

honesty hurts sometimes, but humility lets you see things you wouldnt let yourself see before as a result of your pride.

this is also the reason why good games ARE balanced from top down. it does not make sense to make the game balanced around the lower 99% because it makes it impossible to for it to be balanced on the competitive level, something the mechwarrior franchise is never going to shake.

PGI has been lying to themselves and it shows because they say things like "we need to appeal to the broader community of online gamers".....

well sry to hurt your feelings PGI or whoever, but you dont get to "define" what mechwarrior is, it has already been defined for a long time and those that love this franchise are your only hope of ever reaching a sustainable gaming population. PGI should have known this from the start.

not trying to be mean at all but honestly the casual gamers will come and go, those that try this game for a week and stay were predestined to love mechwarrior.

those that play this game then write it off exactly the same. they would have left anyway no matter how "broadly" you attempt attract them.

me as an example, i love mechwarrior and because of that i try to make the most of this pile of {Scrap}. that includes things like b(redacted)ing-out the devs out for being lazy, wasting my money or otherwise being incompitent about something i think is worth the time and money to make into a great game for everyone.

if i didnt love mechwarrior i wouldnt even try to improve or help at all, i would just leave straight up. same for anyone else who didnt see the value as i do.

Edited by Mellifluer, 01 February 2014 - 08:10 PM.

[CrashieJ]

Davers, on 31 January 2014 - 09:06 PM, said:

To play Devil's Advocate for a second...

If balance was done at the highest levels then things like LRMs (which are pretty bad due to ECM and generally better positioning of players at high Elo levels) would get a big buff to make them 'competitive', but would totally lead to another LRMageddon at the PUG level.

So, do you balance around the 1% or the 99%?

Easy you balance the game around the hardcore 1% who spill 25 hours a day into competition and smile as it trickles down to the other 99% who learn that "one trick ponies" are easily countered by "Multitools"

Blizzard did it with Starcraft's Broodwar expansion and Starcraft 2, testing it with the most prestigious South Korean Players as Beta-testers and they came back with more awards in 1999 and 2013 than they know what to do with.

[Corvus Antaka]

The problems/solutions have been warned on and existed for 2 years.

We can only hope that this year will bring us the solutions.

Plenty of us are on the same page, even those of us who disagree don't disagree by that much, we all know/see the same problems.

My #1 gripe is that nothing in this game currently trumps the PPC & long range meta. PGI has massively stacked the game towards 1 style of gameplay - pop-tart with very slow mechs. My best guess as to "Why" is because they feel people are to incompetant to master the "piloting" of a mech, despite 4 previous iterations of the franchise to prove them wrong.

we are lacking tonnage balance, DFA, collisions, proper jumpjet design and objective based gameplay - all things that where significant factors in making previous versions of the game so successful.

nevermind running & destroying stuff in your way, buildings, etc. cryengine can do these things. previous games could.

Time is ticking to bring this game up to par with previous titles.

Once the clan fervor dies down there won't be much left but vultures otherwise.

Edited by Colonel Pada Vinson, 01 February 2014 - 10:07 PM.

[Deathlike]

Colonel Pada Vinson, on 01 February 2014 - 10:06 PM, said:

Once the clan fervor dies down there won't be much left but vultures otherwise.

The irony of that is that there may be a Clan Pack bonus (like the Saber Pack) that would feature the Vulture (Mad Dog), but I'm sure you knew this was coming.

[EvilCow]

Balance by committee, that would totally work.

[mike29tw]

Colonel Pada Vinson, on 01 February 2014 - 10:06 PM, said:

The problems/solutions have been warned on and existed for 2 years.

We can only hope that this year will bring us the solutions.

Plenty of us are on the same page, even those of us who disagree don't disagree by that much, we all know/see the same problems.

My #1 gripe is that nothing in this game currently trumps the PPC & long range meta. PGI has massively stacked the game towards 1 style of gameplay - pop-tart with very slow mechs. My best guess as to "Why" is because they feel people are to incompetant to master the "piloting" of a mech, despite 4 previous iterations of the franchise to prove them wrong.

we are lacking tonnage balance, DFA, collisions, proper jumpjet design and objective based gameplay - all things that where significant factors in making previous versions of the game so successful.

nevermind running & destroying stuff in your way, buildings, etc. cryengine can do these things. previous games could.

Time is ticking to bring this game up to par with previous titles.

Once the clan fervor dies down there won't be much left but vultures otherwise.

Holy **** even Pada Vinson agrees with this thread.

Now I know where Sandpit and Varent lie on the white knight spectrum.

[nemesis271989]

Sybreed, on 31 January 2014 - 06:43 PM, said:

I've always had the impression (and correct me if I'm wrong) that balancing the game felt like a burden to Paul. Ultimately, the game extremely suffers from the very little balance changes made throughout the course of the development of the game.

There has been countless of brilliant ideas, countless of less brillant ideas, and yet, there is no one to listen to them except for the community itself. (narc being the exception to the rule, although it took an entire year and a thread created by one of PGI's favorites to listen to us). I suggest that PGI creates a small team of 1 dev/1 engie/1 community rep to help balance the game in a better direction.

The goal isn't necessarily to balance the game strickly through community feedback, but at least try new mechanics and post about these to us so we can know what to expect/what to suggest.

In the end, having such a team would be a lot more beneficial to MWO, even if it slows down CW dev time by 1-2-3 weeks. Personally, I doubt balancing the game to a better state would require massive efforts, but then again, we need dev input to figure that out.

Aaaannd PGI says : "What is a Dedicated Balance Team"?

[Ghogiel]

The beta testers will only be giving certain types of balance feedback.

eg: new hero mech> PGI asks them to test> They play it, they break it> they give feedback on said asset> asset gets tweeked> asset gets released.

eg: new map> PGI asks them to test> they break it> they give feedback on stuck points, performance, annoying ****> map gets tweeked> Map gets released.

Their input on anything beyond the specifics asked of them isn't going to extend to much further than a lowly forumite. About the best they have is knowing that PGI actually listened to their feedback specifically (and subsequently dismissed 90% of itfor reasons such as they are just bad ideas or they are bad TT things already tired in past games ( which all had a badly balanced multiplayer. yes, compared to MWO)

[TB Freelancer]

One of the biggest things holding this game back is the completely broken heat system. The threshold vs dissipation relationship of heat sinks is completely out of whack. Energy builds are completely screwed over in this title. There's not a mech in this game from light to assault that can run an energy build based on medium lasers without stalling out in a minute or so. The bigger the weapons get, the sorrier situation becomes.

Reversing the threshold/dissipation relationship and lowering starting thresholds is probably what should have been done. But for some reason they went the opposite route. Something that made SHS completely worthless the instant DHS were available.

There's not really much point to whining about balance while the foundations that all weapons in this game sit on are completely broken. When a mech with 26 DHS can't sustain fire a brawl with 6 medium lasers, something is totally F**ked.

(minor edit)

Edited by TB Freelancer, 02 February 2014 - 02:08 AM.

[NextGame]

Sybreed, on 31 January 2014 - 06:43 PM, said:

I've always had the impression (and correct me if I'm wrong) that balancing the game felt like a burden to Paul. Ultimately, the game extremely suffers from the very little balance changes made throughout the course of the development of the game.

There has been countless of brilliant ideas, countless of less brillant ideas, and yet, there is no one to listen to them except for the community itself. (narc being the exception to the rule, although it took an entire year and a thread created by one of PGI's favorites to listen to us). I suggest that PGI creates a small team of 1 dev/1 engie/1 community rep to help balance the game in a better direction.

The goal isn't necessarily to balance the game strickly through community feedback, but at least try new mechanics and post about these to us so we can know what to expect/what to suggest.

In the end, having such a team would be a lot more beneficial to MWO, even if it slows down CW dev time by 1-2-3 weeks. Personally, I doubt balancing the game to a better state would require massive efforts, but then again, we need dev input to figure that out.

Doesn't need a team.

What they need is a community manager who actively engages with units and longer standing active players and collates rationalised feedback about whats working, and what isn't, and clear suggestions for improvement, and then feeds it back to Paul etc in a concise & structured manner in order that he can get clear feedback without having to wade through a shower of conflicting nonsense.

Edited by NextGame, 02 February 2014 - 02:41 AM.