6 replies to this topic

[Blue Hymn]

This may have been brought up before, but I think that MWO needs weather patterns or environmental events that come forth to affect battlefield awareness. That, and with the stagnation of most of the matches, a bit of weather change/event occurance would make combat more dynamic and interesting if PGI were to implement it.

IF they can implement it.

Such changes should not be too much of a problem for the developers to implement - after all, look at Frozen city Daytime for example with its whiteout. Consider some potential weather effects during combat;

This is example 1, where we just change the weather.

Forest Colony. Rain starts to fall during the midst of combat. A storm quickly forms, causing visibility to drop, and masking some heat signatures for light mechs. Not much so for heavy and higher. Random chance for this to occur in a match.

For example 2, we initiate an event that affects the player's mech in a given location.

Crimson Strait. Rogue wave occurs, hitting the shorelines of the city. Any mechs that are in water during the strike gets knocked down. Takes a short time for the mech to get up once the Rogue wave subsides.


And if the Developers can up the example 2 idea a notch, after acquiring more programmers...

Alpine Peak. In mid-combat, all combatants receive radio warning of incoming meteor shower (or space debris from combat in the atmosphere, whatever) dropping down at a general specified grid, ETA 3 minutes or something, give or take. Cue in streaks from the sky, and some explosive effects in the air when it gets close to the 3 minute mark. Any mechs in the general grid will be damaged to a certain extent if they linger in the strike zone.

A general rough idea, but would be great to see implemented. Of course, we'll need to then figure out how the likelihood of encountering these random occurrences, their duration, impact to the battlefield, and roll them appropriately so that you never can tell if you're just gonna get a normal map, or a potential event trigger in the game.

[Hoffenstein]

How about a small squad of attack helicopters coming in and either spotting enemy Mech's or attacking them with SRM-2's/MG's on the River City maps? Day/Night, fog, weather, all those things would make every battle epic . There's an airplane sim game out there that does this, MWO would certainly benefit from it.

[CyborgDragon]

I'd like to see a random sandstorm on Tourmaline. It blocks out your view (and can also hide your 'mech) as it passes through areas of the map

[Green Mamba]

I would love it but I think it may beyond their ability for the game

[Blue Hymn]

Green Mamba, on 20 February 2014 - 08:02 PM, said:

I would love it but I think it may beyond their ability for the game

Being beyond their capabilities for the game does not mean that the suggestion should not be considered. Look how long it took for them to finally put in turrets. The key issue is that each match in MWO feels like any other matches, other than the occasional heat issues depending on the map. Without some variations to the formula while all of us are waiting for Community Warfare, adding subtle effects to the game's immersion will help a long way, one in giving more strategic value during combat, and two, some renewed faith in PGI's work ethics.

They have implemented weather before. As mentioned, look at Frozen City day's whiteout, and River City's snow weather. They can do something similar with rain for example, and experiment with its effect in combat until they hire more programmers to implement more ideas into the game.

[DI3T3R]

If they can make standing turrets, they can make floating turrets (a dropship) and flying turrets (aerospace-fighters or helicopters).

For example: Helicopters fly across the map at the same course, over and over again, and shoot at anything in range.

And for the weather:
They already have everything they need: Fog in Frozen City and falling snow in Forest Colony Snow. Chaneg some parameters and you get sandstorm and rain. It would take less than a month to implement and test that, but I guess that is still too much for them, given they are working on the launch-module, CW and Clans.

[sokitumi]

dynamic weather was one of their original goals, as can be seen on frozen city. But we all know how reaching goals goes around here.

Edited by sokitumi, 21 February 2014 - 09:11 AM.