272 replies to this topic

[Nyden]

First, off topic, is Russ Bullock replying to this thread at 10pm on a Thursday night?

Holy $***balls Batman!

Thanks, Russ.





C), I like the idea of respawns, if they're done right. I think doing it in waves, as has been mentioned is important to prevent abuse and I would suggest less than 4 waves, but I guess that comes down to match length.


2. I like the idea of resetting the map periodically in order to prevent one team from dominating endlessly plus it gives PGI a lot of room to play with the rules. I'm all for preventing stagnation.

And Last, as for limiting mechs by faction, I would suggest going a step further and limiting access to hero mechs and perhaps certain high tech variants to control of specific planets. Resources to fight over, as it were. It may also give reason for the clans and IS factions to fight each other.

Edited by Nyden, 11 September 2014 - 09:29 PM.

[Lord de Seis]

In regards to how quickly conquest will be...

Why not follow the MPBT 3025 model? Planets could be captured relatively quickly but no faction could ever get reduced to zero planets (if they were down to 1 it could not be captured). I played that beta a lot and you always saw the map staying relatively balanced. There were times where say Kurita totally took over all of Davion except for their last planet but it would never last and either the next day or two the map would be back to that way it was.

If conquest is slow the problem is reconquest will be slow as well and certain factions will dominate the map.

Edit: Just saw your posts Russ, if you are keeping in mind the MPBT model remember that outer planets were light mechs and the deeper you got into a house's territory the higher tonnage of mechs you could take. I know you aren't planning anything like that but it did affect gameplay a lot, the game was mostly lights and mediums, heavies occasionally and assaults were very rare.

Edited by Lord de Seis, 11 September 2014 - 09:43 PM.

[StillRadioactive]

AgroAntirrhopus, on 11 September 2014 - 08:21 PM, said:

Respawns are fine with me, but just make it FEEL right.

Respawn as a defender? Mech spawns in a mechbay, and you pull out of the mechbay onto the field to defend the base. Attacker? Spawn in the exit gantry of a dropship, down the ramp and to the battle.

It'd be way cooler than just popping into existence in the battle

Especially if we have to see the 'mech powerup sequence every time.
Step 1) Die.
Step 2) Spectate until the next spawn time.
Step 3) Fade to black.
Step 4) Show pilot flipping switches and hear Betty's status report
Step 5) Walk out of the dropship door.

[Kilo 40]

I thought each faction would have a group of core worlds that couldn't be taken over. That would keep each faction in game, keep the borders fluctuating, and not require a reset.

[MechWarrior319348]

So, who is in control of overall faction policies? For example, who gets to say, "Ok Lyrans, let's go make war on house Liao." I would imagine a house wouldn't be too happy about a single unit going off and starting a war without the support of house leaders.

Also, would two factions be able to team up to campaign on an enemy planet together, in other words, will there be alliances.

Oh, can mercs or lone wolves be used by factions?

[TinFoilHat]

Loving the updates right now....just can't help wondering how long all of these brilliant ideas are going to take to make it into the game. Will things like Drop Ship mode or Seasonal Resetting make it in for CW Launch, or are we likely to get an initial CW Release patch and they'll follow later on?

[Sereglach]

These last two posts are absolutely incredible information! Thank you to everyone involved in working to make this all possible. It paints the picture of a great rebirth for MWO.

I only have one major question for these last two posts from Paul about CWO phase 2: Where do us Lone Wolves (and our Clan Dagger-star counterparts) fit into the picture?

[TheCaptainJZ]

dak irakoz, on 11 September 2014 - 06:10 PM, said:

Sounds good, but my only worry is that many people (me included) don't have a clan mech for each class, meaning we're barred from siding with the clans?

They could always have a trial clan mech or IS mech for any players missing a mech in a weight class. The system is already in place. Obviously, you'd want to get your own as soon as possible.

[Ozric]

Don't just shoe-horn respawns into the game if they don't fit. By all means have a pop at dropship mode, but if it turns out to just be another way to encourage cascading failure leave it out. Respawns are immersion breaking enough with out a weird mode to support them.

[TheCaptainJZ]

SirDubDub, on 11 September 2014 - 07:09 PM, said:

I would still like to see an individual total drop weight, even if class slots are implemented. This is to prevent players from only using the heaviest end of the weight classes. You want to drop in an Atlas? You'll have to trade that tonnage from somewhere else by playing a catapult instead of an Orion, or a Cicada in place of a Shadowhawk.

TigersRoar, on 11 September 2014 - 07:27 PM, said:

I only run mediums, so one of each weight class will not work for me, nor do I want to be forced to buy and pilot mechs that I do not want, only to participate in CW. Simply let me pilot my mediums and I will be happy.

Perhaps a compromise could be a player total tonnage range with a min and max. There would be problems with this approach though too.

[ArchSight]

For drop ship mode coding advice I recomend getting a hold of member's from timegate studios that closed in 2013. They made a mechanic that spawned player's in the sky that allowed them to drop down where ever they chose from a map in their Section 8 game. It's possible to do but knowing how to do it in the cry engine is another question all together that they might not have the answer too.

Edited by ArchSight, 11 September 2014 - 10:38 PM.

[Kmieciu]

When I heard "respawns" I immediately thought about a long line of players wanting to defend or attack the contested planet.

If someone dies, he automatically exits the match and another player from the line takes his place.

An attack would take a set amount of time - 30 minutes for example or even an hour. That would introduce a interesting dynamic, where ammunition-heavy mechs that are so dominant right now (LRM, SRM, AC, Gauss) would finally have a downside compared to lasers and PPCs.

[Johnny Z]

Jakob Knight, on 11 September 2014 - 06:16 PM, said:

I have to say that I'm not at all thrilled with the idea of making this game any more an e-sport or arcade game, such as is being proposed with re-spawn functionality. Maybe in the public games, as they were always supposed to be 'not real'/'don't count' games, but not in CW! Let CW be actual warfare, where you only have one life, and you have to be careful how you use it.

This is especially true if, as has been commented on, CW is intended as the 'hardcore RP' experience used to justify unit selection limits. Never, in any battle in the MechWarrior universe, did a pilot who was just shot out of their mech simply run over to the dropship, climb into a new mech, and run right back out into the same battle within seconds of their first mech dropping. If anything, CW should bring home the idea that this isn't just a mech brawling arcade game but one that requires careful strategy and tactics. One of the core strategic concerns in any actual battle is asset preservation and deployment.

As far as this representing 'reinforcements', why is it simply assumed the defender will always have reserves that they won't commit to battle? We had this with the Conquest game mode before turrets were introduced, and those teams who decided to not withhold a portion of their team for defense often had to pay the price for the increased combat power of not defending their own base of operations. That was a strategic decision, and just about the only one in the game, and it was removed as a consideration when turrets were installed to remove the work of strategy from those players incapable of understanding that there is more to fighting than charging in with everything you have. Now, you want to put that further with this? Is there going to be an inherent advantage to the attackers that will make this balanced? Maybe the games will be 6 defending vrs 12 attacking, because that is the only way this could be seen as balanced.

I strongly hope any respawn is kept out of CW. If you have to make the arcade and e-sports players happy, keep it in the part of the game that isn't supposed to be serious.

Great points and a good reply. I keep thinking, "my kingdom for a horse." The idea that a dismounted mechwarrior that had to eject from a burning mech has brought his best mechs in his dropship to an important battle, actually fits with the middle ages theme in a way.

Yes its assuming all mechwarriors are Nobles and can afford such a thing, but who knows how they go about this, maybe newbies have to earn enough for a dropship?

Will eject have anything to do with the dropship mode at some point? Failing to eject means you cant get to the other mechs in your dropship?

Also lets not forget Luke Skywalker when he lost his snow speeder in The Empire Strikes back and survived to get to his other mount the x-wing. This idea isnt totally immersion breaking in a given story, where unlimited respawn most definately is.

And the big one is this adds to tons of the content already in game much like decals thats being added soon, does. Didnt see decals coming at all myself but im glad they will be added soon.

[MischiefSC]

Pics pls? If you've got all this stuff mostly done, can we get pics of the unfinished stuff? Screenshots. Instagram them. Put them on your twitter, someone will move them here.

Something to see. Please?

[Legend_]

Seasonal reset, while potentially immersion breaking and such, is the best and most viable option here. I like it.

A lot of games right now run through seasons for their various competitions and the like because of the flexibility from season to season that it allows.

Rule shifts, balance tweaks, mechanic altering, it all feeds from one season into the next for a better effort next time around.

All in all I'm liking what I'm hearing but, so far I'm only hearing things. I know the plan is to get this going before the end of the year but I lived through the days of closed beta, the launch event announcements etc. so until I see some good, hard, solid stuff being laid down in front of me I'm going to remain quietly sceptical, albeit somewhat hopeful.

Good luck, regardless, I really hope you guys can pull this off.

[Kinski Orlawisch]

Allow us to write history here. No reset of the map please.

[Johnny Z]

The season reset is a good start.

Everything on the faction wars front looks either amazing or is a great start for an initial drop into Mechwarrior. This is such a huge new game system being added, its hard to even know what to ask or give comments about it until it is in.

[MischiefSC]

You've got to have the reset or it'll spiral into imbalance in favor of one faction or another at some point.

[EvilCow]

Please make the Dropship Mode happen, it is the kind of depth this game need. Everybody is bored to death of 15 minutes deadmatch games.

IMHO resets present a risk, persistence is a hook for players retention, voluntarily removing that hook is not the best idea. Consider other balancing factors to prevent a too quick invasion or stalls: costs, supply lines, limitations in tonnage if you go too deep into enemy territory etc.

[Biruke]

a reward for not respawing will help the respawn haters )