271 replies to this topic

[Mystere]

BLOOD WOLF, on 21 June 2014 - 07:46 AM, said:

yea, I would say the matches were really enjoyable. Not only that they seemed to last a bit longer.

You totally did not answer my questions.

[Sandpit]

SLDF DeathlyEyes, on 21 June 2014 - 02:20 AM, said:

My biggest fear is that 3/3/3/3 will force high ELO groups into playing 3 assault 1 heavy or a mixture combination

This is exactly what I see happening as well. Most premades are going to wind up taking all 3 assault slots or, as you stated, a combination of heavy and assault. This is the problem with any kind of random MM in a team based game though. You have no idea what kind of teammates you're about to get.
Essentially it boils down to this.

You're going to fight to take or keep planetary control for your faction. Unfortunately, you're required to fight alongside 8 others who may or may not give two shits about winning, strategy, teamwork, etc. So then it becomes "I've got to take the biggest mechs if I want to be able to help carry a couple of joe derp teammates"

This always gets dismissed but it's a very important aspect in my opinion. If this were a fast paced twitchy shooter like planetside, it would be different. There you have random teamamtes but you can still team up with and easily communicate with teamamtes. You always have teamamtes that are available and regardless you can still pick and choose who you "blobl" up with. This is why the current random MM system will not work here.

You can't be competitive unless you run a 12man. Now what I mean by "competitive" is consistently performing at a high level as an entire team. I don't mean competitive as being able to win a match or even the score at the end of the round. I'm just speaking to being able to know your team and consistently improve tactics, strategy, etc.

That's yet another reason I don't agree with the rule of 3.

[Sandpit]

Deathlike, on 21 June 2014 - 03:14 AM, said:

length

Exactly

We've been through this kind of MM system before. It didn't work well then and I don't see it working well now. If anything this system will encourage min/maxing. That's the thing, everyone (PGI included) continues to want to dismiss the imapct that premades will have on this. You're going to have a lot of pug-only matches. (My personal opinion is that the majority of PUGs are going to regret wishing for that but that's really here nor there I suppose) because the PUGs that want to ride around in an assault aren't going to have many open slots available as most premades are going to have those slots filled already.

It's going to lead to longer wait times, especially if your Elo is an extreme edge case on the high or low end. It's going to lead to less choice available to the players. It's going to hamper the MM ability to find matches. I'm not even talking server population at this point.

Server population is generally considered to be down form what it used to be. The smaller the player pool the longer the wait times. Now if players are spending more time searching for and dropping into games they will move on to something else. There are so many more options available for an MM system that many feel would work much better, improve the NPE, as well as imrpoving the quality of matches.

[Mystere]

BLOOD WOLF, on 20 June 2014 - 11:09 PM, said:

It balances the teams in terms of classes, restricts a team from having more of any 3 in a class. Leave it at that.

And that is exactly what I do not want ... at all. I will no longer face Steiner scout lances. I will no longer face light wolf packs. I will no longer face any of the other crazy team compositions that 3/3/3/3 will make extinct. Boring!

Edited by Mystere, 21 June 2014 - 02:28 PM.

[Sandpit]

Mystere, on 21 June 2014 - 07:33 AM, said:

Do you know what is the best way to mitigate roflstomps? It's by practicing more. Something people would rather ignore and instead just whine, whine and more whine

If people would only

I honestly believe the best way to alleviate roflstomps is to separate cadets into their own queue and start new players at the bottom of the Elo ladder instead of the middle. Then when they graduate from being a cadet they're not immediately dropped in with average and above players. They're playing lower tier opponents and will ahve a LOT more leniency with mistakes while they learn the nuances of the game.
3/3/3/3 is not, can not, and will not help mitigate roflstomps (and yes the devs have stated that that is one of their main goals with their MM system as well as improving the NPE) so it IS designed to address those issues. It just fails to do so

[krash27]

Dakshinamurthy, on 21 June 2014 - 07:42 AM, said:

The point is if the other team is 50% lights/mediums and you are medium or a light you actually have a significant impact. If both you and the other team are only 25% lights/mediums none of you really have much of an effect, you are worth far less than everyone else. Obviously if you play a light or a medium you will always be worth far less to your team, but now its just completely out of whack.

Again I can't be the only person who finds playing matches with a balanced number of lights/mediums/heavies/assaults vastly more fun right? I find it farcical I even have to make these points and ask that question but it seems on the forums even the most simple things need to be laid out clearly to be understood.

What if there are not enough of one weight class to top up all the games requesting that weight class? Does the MM wait for untold amounts of time for said weight class? Or does it fill it as best it can?
Or are you saying force people to play weights/mechs they don't want to play?

In a perfect world there would be an even split between all weight class but that isn't the case.
It gets frustrating that you refuse to see this point also.

It is obvious that a perfect weight split (assuming perfect pilot skill matching were possible) would be optimal, But what people keep trying to point out to YOU and people like you is that it is not possible as people will play what they want to play, which will never be your perfect 3/3/3/3 split.

[BLOOD WOLF]

Mystere, on 21 June 2014 - 07:47 AM, said:

You totally did not answer my questions.

no it wasn't a good sample size.

[Agent 0 Fortune]

Mystere, on 21 June 2014 - 07:33 AM, said:

Do you know what is the best way to mitigate roflstomps? It's by practicing more. Something people would rather ignore and instead just whine, whine and more whine
If people would only

I'm a little late to this party, but I would like to point out how this is 100% incorrect.
You are essentially saying that if MWO were baseball, a high school team matched against a professional team is an accepted matchup and that the high school team just needs to L2P to beat them. I am saying that those teams should be in different leagues, and it is the matchmakers responsibility to enforce those invisible boundaries.

That is a pretty simplistic and hyperbolic example, but it was intentional so you would understand that not every player will be at the same skill level or want to be. That a mediocre player should not have to practice all the time to avoid roflstomps, they should be pit against players and teams of the same skill level.

[Mystere]

Dakshinamurthy, on 21 June 2014 - 07:34 AM, said:

It's not that you can't have a good game as a light or medium when its 70% heavies/assaults, its that it isn't fun.

Do you even know how fun (or terrifying, depending on POV ) it is to see a light wolfpack obliterate a quad Atlas Steiner Scout Lance, or even any lance for that matter?

For those of you who never have, well, you never will once 3/3/3/3 gets out.

Edited by Mystere, 21 June 2014 - 08:16 AM.

[krash27]

Agent 0 Fortune, on 21 June 2014 - 08:12 AM, said:

I'm a little late to this party, but I would like to point out how this is 100% incorrect.
You are essentially saying that if MWO were baseball, a high school team matched against a professional team is an accepted matchup and that the high school team just needs to L2P to beat them. I am saying that those teams should be in different leagues, and it is the matchmakers responsibility to enforce those invisible boundaries.

That is a pretty simplistic and hyperbolic example, but it was intentional so you would understand that not every player will be at the same skill level or want to be. That a mediocre player should not have to practice all the time to avoid roflstomps, they should be pit against players and teams of the same skill level.

At the cost of huge wait times?

[Mystere]

Agent 0 Fortune, on 21 June 2014 - 08:12 AM, said:

I'm a little late to this party, but I would like to point out how this is 100% incorrect.
You are essentially saying that if MWO were baseball, a high school team matched against a professional team is an accepted matchup and that the high school team just needs to L2P to beat them. I am saying that those teams should be in different leagues, and it is the matchmakers responsibility to enforce those invisible boundaries.

That is a pretty simplistic and hyperbolic example, but it was intentional so you would understand that not every player will be at the same skill level or want to be. That a mediocre player should not have to practice all the time to avoid roflstomps, they should be pit against players and teams of the same skill level.

Well, I got better at <unnamed sport> precisely because I practiced with people better than I was. But that was not my point ...

3/3/3/3 will not prevent roflstomps ... not even close. People will have a better chance of mitigating it by getting better. That was my point.

Edited by Mystere, 21 June 2014 - 08:28 AM.

[Sandpit]

Dakshinamurthy, on 21 June 2014 - 07:34 AM, said:

It's not that you can't have a good game as a light or medium

I agree with you. I'd love to see more variety on the battlefield. This system just isn't going to accomplish that. Dropship mode would have helped a lot if used in combination with a personal restriction on the tonnage amount a player could carry with them based on something like rank. You're never going to get rid of metas and cookie cutter builds as long as their is customization and they can't get rid of customization so the best they can do is come up with ways to encourage more variety.

This isn't in line with 3/3/3/3 but I think it fits into how to help create more mech variety which IS one of the key features I think an MM system should have for MWO.

A dynamic market and BV would be perfect for this without actually putting hard limits on a player's choices. We used a system very similar to this in MegaMek: Mekwars.
So for example:

Jenner cost a base of 1000 cbills.
Every time a Jenner is bought the price is inflated to help represent a supply and demand dynamic. Or every 5th jenner bought inflatges the price, or every 10th, etc. You get the point.
So after a week the Jenner's base price is not 2000 cbills

Meanwhile

Nobody buys the poor Locust.
It has a base price of 1000
As its use and popularity drop so does the price. Based on the total % of light mechs bought, lets say (for example purposes) only 2% of the light mechs purchased that day, or week, or every 3 days, etc. were locusts. It's price drops to reflect supply and demand. After a week it becomes 600 cbills.

That's hwo you start to encourage players to buy and use different less "popular" mechs. As newer players come in, they see the better price on these mechs and have an easier time getting into the customization portion of the game.

But Sand, how is that going to make those mechs more useful?
Well, I'm glad you asked! lol

The way it increases the number of these mechs used in battle is two-fold.
First, it means you have more players buying them and using them. The naturally increases the number of them you see on the field. That's going to naturally increase their numbers within the mech population. As they become more popular themselves their price will inflate just as the Jenner did. Then the next unpopular mech becomes the new "bargain" and gets used more often as it's purchased more often. If you're worried about prices inflating beyond the average player's ability to afford then you can always put hard limits on both, the top and bottom prices.

But Sand, that does nothing to increase the mech's "value" as far as becoming more viable on the battlefield.
You're right! But wait, there's more!

Now instead of using weight class, tonnage, etc. for the MM system, you use some sort of BV system. Each chassis and weapon and system in the game has a BV (I'm just using the BV term because I know many are familiar with it due to experience with Btech)
BV = Battle Value
You can title it whatever you like but the principle is still the same. BV is a number that's assigned to a weapon or chassis or system that represents how "powerful" it is.
Example:
Medium Laser has a BV of say 100. That means every ML you add to your mech increases the BV by 100. Every part has its own BV so they all work together to give a custom mech a total BV.

But Sand, that STILL doesn't give value to less popular mechs and their performance and being outclassed.
Oh ye of little faith, I shall explain how

So now we have an MM system that uses a BV of some kind. That BV becomes dynamic just as the cost of a mech does. So the more MLs that are bought and used in the game, the higher the BV of that weapon. So the popular meta builds that like to boat and/or stick with a specific weapon type have their BVs inflated as a result. So instead of worrying about matching up by chassis, which is where the current MM goes wrong in the first place in my opinion, you match up by BV. A heavy mech could easily have a BV higher than some of the less popular assaults. Lights could easily have a higher BV than some of the less popular heavies.
This creates a dynamic system that doesn't force but does entice and encourage players to use other mechs and builds. This is also where you get more variety in general.
Example:
Jenner base BV = 100
it increases as it becomes popular so it then gets inflated to 200 and continues to increase until it becomes less cost-effective and people start looking at other mechs to take out instead.

Locust base BV = 100
As its use and popularity drops the BV drops to 50 and continues to drop until it becomes more cost-effective to take.

Now all of this is then tied into the entire community's w/l records. As a mech "wins" more often the price and BV also inflate. That means the meta builds have to get put away from time to time while other builds get taken or you run the risk of getting outmatched by players who are taking more BV value with less popular mechs and weapons.

It can be done and it works quite well. It has served the Mekwars Megamek server well for a decade now and it was all done in Java. Now obviously a direct translation to MWO wouldn't work but I just wanted to show an example of a different type of MM system that WOULD accomplish things like increasing variety and mitigating roflstomps.

Mystere, on 21 June 2014 - 08:27 AM, said:

Well, I got better at <unnamed sport> precisely because I practiced with people better than I was. But that was not my point ...

3/3/3/3 will not prevent roflstomps ... not even close. People will have a better chance of mitigating it by getting better. That was my point.

I get what you're saying but I also understand AoC's point as well

Yes, to get better you practice. TO get even better than that you play against opponents that are better than you. This is true in any kind of competitive environment. The thing is, with video games like this there still has to be a balance so that new, casual, and players who just don't WANT to become "better" (because they simply enjoy stomping around and shooting stuff which there's nothing wrong with that) can come into the game and enjoy it as well.

[Screech]

I would think that any 4 man that felt like had to take 3 assaults and a heavy in order to win is ignoring other major issues. Acting like all pre-mades are equal is a really bad premise.

[Mystere]

Sandpit, on 21 June 2014 - 08:32 AM, said:

Yes, to get better you practice. TO get even better than that you play against opponents that are better than you. This is true in any kind of competitive environment. The thing is, with video games like this there still has to be a balance so that new, casual, and players who just don't WANT to become "better" (because they simply enjoy stomping around and shooting stuff which there's nothing wrong with that) can come into the game and enjoy it as well.

I guess you got me there because I have been frequently accused of being ultra-competitive, even though I do not see it myself. As such, I just might not be able to empathize with people who "just don't want to be better" .

[Dakshinamurthy]

I'm thinking more along the lines of a 3/3/6 with roughly equal tonnage per team. 3 lights, 3 mediums, and 6 heavies/assaults per game. Even a 6/6 might be fine.

But i'll make it simple for you guys. There is this idea going around that a significant amount of the players will quit the game if they don't get to play the mech they want and with a quick search time. Well they sound like ******** and I would be glad if they quit. You can't just cater to the most selfish part of your player base. How many players that we actually want to play would start if we got rid of them, and why do I never hear that brought up? Right now we have a system that drives away the people we want while encouraging those we don't want around.

Furthermore I think the initial premise that people will stop playing the game is overstated. Really? Stop playing and go play where? The true fans of mechwarrior, the people who actually invest time into the game wont leave. At worst you might see some casual players driven off but I doubt it because they likely wont be having the long wait times. It's the die hard mechwarrior fans who spent time/money to get their favorite mechs that will have longer wait times. They might ***** and moan in the forums but it doesn't mean that they wont keep playing. They might stop playing for 2 months. They'll be back. All the while the games will be getting more fun for everyone.

Edited by Dakshinamurthy, 21 June 2014 - 09:03 AM.

[Wispsy]

3-3-3-3 is a silly idea...if 80% of people are in heavies/assaults in queue there is a reason for it...I mean all you guys go "yeah it will be more balanced, my medium can run around and not get wrecked by assaults and heavies all day!" except you will still get wrecked by the heavies and assaults just like now...just think about it...I mean if you drop light you risk not being able to carry...if you drop heavy/assault you can carry in games as it is now...how ******* stupidly easy do you think it will be to carry when half the team is guaranteed 2shots running about in classes often hovering around 10-14% of the player base at any given time (for a reason).

I mean say what you like about even matches making lights and mediums better because there is less weight on the field...IT IS EVEN EASIER TO CARRY IN A HEAVY OR ASSAULT BECAUSE OF THAT....logic plx...works both ways....

[Dakshinamurthy]

Wispy it's hard for me to be patient here because to my mind this is actually a really simple concept that you just aren't getting. But here goes

If you are a light or a medium in a 75% heavy/assault game game you might be worth say .4 of a player slot. If you are a light or a medium in a game with 50% heavy/assault game you might be worth say .7 of a player slot. I can't explain it anymore clearly than that.

Furthermore what are we suppose to take from this sentence, "if 80% of people are i heavies/assault in queue there is a reason for it" ...... okay......

Edited by Dakshinamurthy, 21 June 2014 - 09:12 AM.

[Sandpit]

Mystere, on 21 June 2014 - 08:48 AM, said:

I guess you got me there because I have been frequently accused of being ultra-competitive, even though I do not see it myself. As such, I just might not be able to empathize with people who "just don't want to be better" .

well in my opinion that's the biggest problem with this community and the development of MWO as a whole. Everyone wants it catered to their wants and their wants alone. it winds up alienating and segregating and pushing out others though. That's why I constantly say "options instead of restrictions". Successful games do this. They develop portions of the game to make sure EVERY player who plays their games feels included and a valuable commodity.

[Sandpit]

Dakshinamurthy, on 21 June 2014 - 09:03 AM, said:

The true fans of mechwarrior, the people who actually invest time into the game wont leave.

really?
Ok Russ
This is the exact kind of rhetoric that is just wrong.
I've played Btech for 30 years
I was a FASA commando
I've run tournaments
I've played every iteration of MW there is to play
I've helped create, guide, and admin Megamek
I've droped thousands upon thousands of dollars on Btech over the years
I've dropped hundreds on THIS game

So tell me again how "true" fans won't leave?

It's not about that. It's also silly to try and dismiss anyone talking about not enjoying the game or leaving for other gaming ventures as not being "true" fans.

Now can we get back on topic regarding the MM system and suggestions and feedback on that as opposed to trying to prove who the "truer" fan?

[Shakespeare]

You're right. It's WAY better, what we've got now.


That was fun! I look forward to doing it again - only this time in my medium so I can insta-die!

The assault/heavy arms-race has ALWAYS been a problem to some degree. I don't especially love the solution as proposed, but I absolutely loathe the alternative. The worst of it is, with so many people dropping solo, there's currently no guarantee at all that the next match you drop will have a useful combination of mechs, and it's not even something any one person can take steps to avoid.

Just think of every conquest match where you've dropped in a 64 kph heavy, thinking 'well, I'll bring a little extra firepower to help the fight out, but I'm sure a few people will bring lights/meds and cap.', only the be the lightest mech on the team.

So you take the opposite approach, and pick the best goddamn capping chassis you've got - only now you've got 7 mediums on your team, and it's river city, and you get obliterated.

I agree with the argument that there are many useful combinations - and that '3 of everything' could devolve into something stale.
But the glut of new, high-powered mechs - indeed, mechs that depend on more teamwork to survive - has absolutely flooded the matchmaker. Even with the 'soft' tonnage match setup we've got now, it just feels so futile to drop in any role-style chassis (light/med hunter, in-fighter, sniper), when the matchmaker has so many options with which to screw you - including your ELO, and the map selection. It's a dice-roll. And not the tabletop kind.
THATS one of the sources of the endless and ubiquitous line of poptart mechs, both solo and in lances - it's one of the only designs that always works, in nearly every map, and doesn't depend on anyone else playing a part other than cannon fodder.
(of course, it's not like they'd really be too sure what to do anyway, since there's no in-game voip to improvise/cooperate easily with.)