79 replies to this topic

[Ryoken]

So first off, I am a team player! There is nothing I want more than to play in a group with my buddies! And I absolutely reject the 4 player limit because we have to turn the 5th player down or have to split our group!

Yet I do often drop alone in a short break when I find the time for 2-3 games. But because PGI brutally missinterprets their data I am afraid to do this now. Because if I do PGI will decide to further punish and reduce teamplay!

So by playing a casual game I do kill the team game aspect that I did fund and pay this game for?

PGI I beg you stop this nonsense!

Edited by Ryoken, 28 February 2014 - 01:59 AM.

[Name115734]

Bravo for pointing out the large gap in their data, they forced players to PUG by their inane decisions to remove 5-7 then 5-11 man teams, then pat themselves on the back on their ability to get more people to PUG, the exact opposite to what this game was initially intended to do.

Good job PGI for proving yet again your bassakwards approach to development is truly bassakwards.

But wait there's more... Soon we will be able to PAY for the privilege of playing this game as a team, oh, PGI, how you love your community so.

We truly appreciated the thought and dedication you have show how the next developers of this title of what NOT to do, very good lessons, here.

[Kommisar]

I can't like the OPs post enough.

I'm part of a large(ish) (use to be larger...) group/unit/guild/whatever-term-you-like that use to do weekly 12-mans and groups as much as possible. Well, it's been getting tougher to form a group on TS; what with our players getting bored and frustrated here and moving on. Plus, as an independent contractor, I can have free time at odd hours. So, I'll just drop casually for some fun.

Now, I too am worried that this is adding to PGI's metric-view that I don't want further team play. Guys, it's not that I don't want team play... you've just made it so utterly difficult to do! The personnel management alone makes it almost not worth it. Especially when you have to be the guy in the unit that makes the call as to which of the guys gets to be included or excluded from the group.

[Sephlock]

But wait... their data is showing that you are playing solo X amount of the time... which is a fact even if you also like to play in teams.

Are you suggesting that there are a ton of groups with exactly 5 members, with the odd man out always being forced to drop solo, thus skewing the data?

[Joseph Mallan]

I know in my case, other than the camaraderie there isn't any reason to drop in group any more. 18 months of the same game with Zero advancement why drop as a team to play? Give us a reason to be a team, give us missions with rewards, planets and factories to aquire. That is worth playing. W/L records if for kids needing Epeen enhancement.

[Strig]

I play solo all the time because every single one of my clan-mates left when we could no longer group. We routinely get 5+ players online at a time... usually more joining throughout an evening while others leave ... but rarely 8 and almost never 12! These were all Founders of various levels and if they could play together they would have stayed and paid ...

[Name115734]

As an observation, this whole subject line is again proof that PGI is not interested in retaining its player base, rather trying to find more new players to fund its search for even more new players.

[Randalf Yorgen]

Is there anywhere that PGI posted a spread sheet of their data that we can have a look at? We usually drop in 4 man groups. When a 5th shows up we will split into a 3 man and a 2 man and try to sync. Next person in makes it 3/3 and so forth. We've even gone so far as to try a 3/3/3 or a 4/4/3 (no point in doing a 12 man with just 11)

Iwould like to see the actual data because in the back of my mind I have a suspicion that they only looked at those dropping in the "SOLO" que which includes 4/3/2 man teams and counted all of them as "SOLO/PUGS" and only looked at those dropping as formed up 12 man teams looking to battle with other 12 man teams. If they screwed the pooch like I think they did it's no wonder they numbers sound so wrong, counting the 2/3/4 man teams as SOLO/PUG rather than team metrics is a huge mistake that PGI needs to make sure that they didn't make.

[Artgathan]

I'm wondering if they accounted for the fact that playing in groups usually means playing less games.

By this I mean that when I play in a 4-man, we usually have a slower rate of play (since we don't just quit out of the match, but stay around to watch our comrades). However when I'm playing solo I can power through games, easily reaching double the number that I would have played had I been in a group.

[HeavyRain]

Randalf Yorgen, on 01 March 2014 - 05:53 AM, said:

Is there anywhere that PGI posted a spread sheet of their data that we can have a look at? We usually drop in 4 man groups. When a 5th shows up we will split into a 3 man and a 2 man and try to sync. Next person in makes it 3/3 and so forth. We've even gone so far as to try a 3/3/3 or a 4/4/3 (no point in doing a 12 man with just 11)

Iwould like to see the actual data because in the back of my mind I have a suspicion that they only looked at those dropping in the "SOLO" que which includes 4/3/2 man teams and counted all of them as "SOLO/PUGS" and only looked at those dropping as formed up 12 man teams looking to battle with other 12 man teams. If they screwed the pooch like I think they did it's no wonder they numbers sound so wrong, counting the 2/3/4 man teams as SOLO/PUG rather than team metrics is a huge mistake that PGI needs to make sure that they didn't make.

Listen to the podcast, they gave specific percentages about 12-mans, 4-mans, 3-mans, 2-mans.
Most of the grouped players drop in 2-mans. Not 4-mans with the 5th player going solo.
So yeah, no.

[BlackDeathLegion]

" But wait there's more... Soon we will be able to PAY for the privilege of playing this game as a team, oh, PGI, how you love your community so. "

Aye aye man, this is complete and utter bullshit!

It's ok though, this will be the slow Death of MWO!

Not a big deal, it was Fun as hell the first Month I played this game. Over the past Year of playing, just your typical "GRIND". I've only bought a few MC to get a few Mech Bays. Nothing More!

[Goosfraba]

BlackDeathLegion, on 01 March 2014 - 06:06 AM, said:

" But wait there's more... Soon we will be able to PAY for the privilege of playing this game as a team, oh, PGI, how you love your community so. "

Aye aye man, this is complete and utter bullshit!

It's ok though, this will be the slow Death of MWO!

Not a big deal, it was Fun as hell the first Month I played this game. Over the past Year of playing, just your typical "GRIND". I've only bought a few MC to get a few Mech Bays. Nothing More!

What's really funny is that under the new system you are encouraged to communicate with players since the only way you'll ever be able to play with more than 4 friends is having a friend list long enough to fill 24 slots.

So, ir order to play with friends you'll need more friends.

Edited by Goosfraba, 01 March 2014 - 06:09 AM.

[BlackDeathLegion]

No Remorse, on 28 February 2014 - 09:20 AM, said:

As an observation, this whole subject line is again proof that PGI is not interested in retaining its player base, rather trying to find more new players to fund its search for even more new players.

Yep, less "Passion for doing the thing you and others Love" and more of a business Money grab. Its just Human nature!

[Sinthrow]

I too would like to see groups of 5-10 find a way into the queues, but you all do remember the steamroll stomps when you didn't have a group gaming against one, right?
So the question is, how do we set up matches with odd sized groups and not wait forever?
Is it ok to know that if you drop with a 5 man group you could face a 6 or 7 man group? if you dropped in a 8 man group you might face a 9 or 10man group? would this be OK? Could solo players get a cb or xp bonus for filling in the gaps
These are my questions.
PGI please don't give up on this.

Peace out,,, forget that, war your hearts out

[HeavyRain]

Sinthrow, on 01 March 2014 - 06:23 AM, said:

I too would like to see groups of 5-10 find a way into the queues, but you all do remember the steamroll stomps when you didn't have a group gaming against one, right?
So the question is, how do we set up matches with odd sized groups and not wait forever?
Is it ok to know that if you drop with a 5 man group you could face a 6 or 7 man group? if you dropped in a 8 man group you might face a 9 or 10man group? would this be OK? Could solo players get a cb or xp bonus for filling in the gaps
These are my questions.
PGI please don't give up on this.

Peace out,,, forget that, war your hearts out

It would be similar to the present state, when we drop 11vs12 or 10vs12 quite often.
Not to mention that there would be plenty of solo players willing to go into the group queue to fill the empty spaces, i know i would.

[HammerSwarm]

Bump because this topic deserves it. My group Taw.net has about 24-36 people who play this game a few-several days a week at different times. In the evening EST we run between 4 and 8. When we have 5 we run 2 and 3, or 6 - 3 & 3. People trying to make money solo drop and chit chat.

We Want Larger groups so that we can take our 5-6-7-8 guys and get together and do well.

I can't shout loudly or often enough to express how terrible I think PGI's decisions are here. Why not give us the tools and let us tell them what's best?

A clean lobby, with a minimum of 22 players to launch (max 12 man on teams) Fill the lobbies from the public que, try to match various groups queuing together with other groups of similar size and similar elo. Show the tonnage of a team before hand so you can decide if you want to grab a larger mech and then go with it.

You've just eliminated the tonnage gap by letting player self balance.
You've matched or tried to match groups by size.
All players are the sameish ELO in a lobby.

Instead we get rigid 3/3/3/3 matching, and then weight matching so that if you play a blackjack you'll see a blackjack, or an orion you'll see an orion.

[Alex Warden]

Ryoken, on 28 February 2014 - 01:51 AM, said:

So by playing a casual game I do kill the team game aspect that I did fund and pay this game for?

PGI I beg you stop this nonsense!

No Remorse, on 28 February 2014 - 03:27 AM, said:

But wait there's more... Soon we will be able to PAY for the privilege of playing this game as a team, oh, PGI, how you love your community so.

We truly appreciated the thought and dedication you have show how the next developers of this title of what NOT to do, very good lessons, here.

now that´s finally the point where i seriously doubt that i´ll stick to MWO for much longer... seriously

basically that´s the implementation of "force to pay", since me and alot of other people in my FL are mostly interested in company level gameplay... plus labeling us as "the competitive niche" has a really really bad taste... most of us are just CASUAL players with the desire to play TOGETHER....

Elite:Dangerous, Elder Scrolls, Star Citizen, The Devision and some more games, all of which encourage Teamplay in PvP, and most of them won´t limit me in being able to tactically play with a whole bunch of friends... (those are my personal favourites, so spare me with "xxx is cr4p" or what ever ^^)

in short, there are more than enough alternatives out there, and more to come... sad that MWO obviously doesn´t want to be one of them... sad for the universe i love, but i still have the books and good memories ...

HammerSwarm, on 01 March 2014 - 10:18 AM, said:

A clean lobby, with a minimum of 22 players to launch (max 12 man on teams) Fill the lobbies from the public que, try to match various groups queuing together with other groups of similar size and similar elo. Show the tonnage of a team before hand so you can decide if you want to grab a larger mech and then go with it.

oh you mean those fancy lobbies that exist like... forever... in every goddam shooter out there?

Edited by Alex Warden, 02 March 2014 - 01:44 AM.

[Reitrix]

Alex Warden, on 02 March 2014 - 01:21 AM, said:

now that´s finally the point where i seriously doubt that i´ll stick to MWO for much longer... seriously

basically that´s the implementation of "force to pay", since me and alot of other people in my FL are mostly interested in company level gameplay... plus labeling us as "the competitive niche" has a really really bad taste... most of us are just CASUAL players with the desire to play TOGETHER....

Elite:Dangerous, Elder Scrolls, Star Citizen, The Devision and some more games, all of which encourage Teamplay in PvP, and most of them won´t limit me in being able to tactically play with a whole bunch of friends... (those are my personal favourites, so spare me with "xxx is cr4p" or what ever ^^)

in short, there are more than enough alternatives out there, and more to come... sad that MWO obviously doesn´t want to be one of them... sad for the universe i love, but i still have the books and good memories ...


oh you mean those fancy lobbies that exist like... forever... in every goddam shooter out there?

Most of those shooters you refer to, use Hosts rather than a dedicated server.
Lobbies are coming, And when they do, they will be Lobbies on Dedicated Servers.

[Kommisar]

I think several people have stated another valid flaw in all of this. Your XP/CB grind is far more efficient in solo drops. My unit (Dire Wolves), likes to play grouped when we can; but if someone is trying to grind through something, solo is so much faster. And, sadly, all this game has is the grind. All grind... nothing else. And the devs have even come right out and encouraged the use of and are balancing the economy (for what it is) on guys solo dropping, quitting as soon as they die, and dropping in another mech before the first match ends. You know, the power grind model.

Which is just another nail in the coffin of this game supporting the guys that want co-op play. Even including the win bonus and you assume that dropping as a group will net you more wins per drop; the power-grind solo will net you more C-Bills per unit of time.

They create the incentives to solo drop, read the return metrics and then say that they players prefer rapid solo dropping. They created their own feedback loop and, from everything I've seen, they are happy with it. I suppose, in the end, we are just wasting our time. Including me writing this.

Well, Kerbal Space Program is launching their multiplayer soon... so at least I have that.

[Durant Carlyle]

No Remorse, on 28 February 2014 - 03:27 AM, said:

Bravo for pointing out the large gap in their data, they forced players to PUG by their inane decisions to remove 5-7 then 5-11 man teams, then pat themselves on the back on their ability to get more people to PUG, the exact opposite to what this game was initially intended to do.

Good job PGI for proving yet again your bassakwards approach to development is truly bassakwards.

But wait there's more... Soon we will be able to PAY for the privilege of playing this game as a team, oh, PGI, how you love your community so.

We truly appreciated the thought and dedication you have show how the next developers of this title of what NOT to do, very good lessons, here.

Let me get this straight ... because you can't drop as a (for example) 7-man, you all split up and drop solo? Bull puckey. A REAL team would drop as one 4-man and one 3-man. Those wouldn't show up in the solo drops percentage.

"But I only wanna drop as a 7-man!"

Get over it.

Besides, 84% is WAY too high to just be teams that couldn't drop as a full team due to odd numbers. It actually means the majority were intending to drop solo.

And yes, you can pay to play as a team with odd numbers in private matches, like your 7-man. It's called having Premium Time, which a lot of people have anyway, for the 50% bonuses to C-BIlls and XP. You wanna drop with even teams in private matches? You don't have to have Premium Time. Stop reading "PGI is evil" into everything they put out.