70 replies to this topic

[Riverboat Sam]

I've never encountered an online game before with such a complex matchmaking system. I'm sure you all understand what I mean. Most games just set up a lobby where like minded folks can post proposed games and wait for takers. If an organized 12 man is looking for a match they just pick a map and game type and wait to see if someone wants to take them on. If there aren't any suitable 12 man teams out that night then maybe they try 8 or 4 man.

The matchmaker could give the challenging group a "rank", of say, elite down to novice - based upon their average elo. That way any takers would be well advised of what they're getting into.

I think some nights people might be in the mood to take on some really good players for the challenge of it, and to learn. Other nights, playing with their beer buddies, they might want to limit themselves to teams at the level they think they can handle.

How could giving players the choice be a bad thing? It seems no one really likes the matchmaker. Perhaps the matchmaker is just a bad idea?

[Quxudica]

Enlil09, on 20 September 2014 - 11:54 PM, said:

I've never encountered an online game before with such a complex matchmaking system. I'm sure you all understand what I mean. Most games just set up a lobby where like minded folks can post proposed games and wait for takers. If an organized 12 man is looking for a match they just pick a map and game type and wait to see if someone wants to take them on. If there aren't any suitable 12 man teams out that night then maybe they try 8 or 4 man.

The matchmaker could give the challenging group a "rank", of say, elite down to novice - based upon their average elo. That way any takers would be well advised of what they're getting into.

I think some nights people might be in the mood to take on some really good players for the challenge of it, and to learn. Other nights, playing with their beer buddies, they might want to limit themselves to teams at the level they think they can handle.

How could giving players the choice be a bad thing? It seems no one really likes the matchmaker. Perhaps the matchmaker is just a bad idea?

Random Matchmaking has steadily become the norm in many games. It started (for me) with Halo on console (yeah, filthy consoles) and in the time since I've seen more and more games stop using a server browser system in favor of these random set ups.

I can't tell you how much I despise it. It so heavily restricts the community and how you want to play the game, it makes it next to impossible to play with the same people for extended periods unless you friend them (one match with a stranger is not enough time to decide to friend someone imo) and it's basically the death of "Novelty Rooms".

Back in the day, I could browse a bunch of player made lobbies if I didn't feel like or couldn't get into the official rooms. I could come in and play with a group of total strangers for as long as I wished, talk to them over VoiP work together as a team, coordinate with them and have a blast. I could even have a blast getting to know the guys on the other team between matches, maybe we'd switch up teams or just talk in the lobby to eachother while people picked their load out and we decided on a map. If one particular weapon was "over powered" we could use "house rules" to ban it's use if everyone was ok with it. Hell more than that I would often specifically look for what I refer to as "Novelty Rooms", player lobbies made with special and often silly house rules. Pistols only games, Sniper Rifles only games, Melee only games, Rocket only games etc. It was so much fun to join a game where everyone was restricted to the worst weapon as we'd bounce around trying to kill eachother with a single shot breach loading sniper rifle that did terrible damage without a head shot without using the scope. Silly? sure, fun? **** yes.

Hell even in other genres, I remember joining player lobbies in Diablo II where the entire point was to bet on Golem duels. Get two Necromancers together with their chosen Golem out, turn on PvP and let the golems fight it out while the others bet on the outcome. Same went for Mercenary Duel rooms and all manner of other silly set ups.

Not having player created lobbies with a server browser hurts the ability to meet new people, to grow the community *inside the game* and so heavily restricts how the game can be played.

Sad thing is, once upon a time I put a lot of hours into a third person military shooter that used dedicated servers with a server browser. It allowed player created lobbies in addition to the official ones, it had in-lobby text chat where both sides could talk to each other and to their own team privately, it had integrated push to talk voice chat in the lobby and in the game, it allowed map selection and even map "play lists" to automatically queue up the maps in the order the host set, it allowed the host to choose the game mode or modes, the sequel to this game even expanded this and allowed the room host to set custom rules so that players could not pick certain weapons or equipment if the host so desired (basically officially acknowledging how much the community loved the unofficial house rule rooms from the previous title) . It let creativity flourish in the house rules and most importantly it gave the community and in game means of growing, you could fire up the server browser pick a game with a title that sounded interesting (novelty room, clan tryout, practice, ranked, shooting the ****, whatever) and you could potentially spend hours with generally the same people - maybe even make new friends or find a clan. Rooms could be set with rank requirements, so newbies could join indicated newbie rooms, advanced players could join high rank rooms and if you wanted you could make rooms with no rank req and welcome all. If people left more came, if the host left someone else became host. it was great. Sad thing about all of this?

This game with so many options to encourage player choice and freedom? It was SOCOM: US Navy Seals and it's sequels, a console series on the PlayStation 2 from a decade or so ago. I can't tell you how depressing and honestly aggravating it is that a console shooter from back when I had bloody dial-up gave me better choices and options than a pc game in 2014, and I don't just mean MWO.. even bloody Diablo 3 uses the Random Matchmaker bullshit these days.

I don't mind Random Matchmaking being a thing, I just detest that it's the only way to play a game unless you form a friend party. Let me make my own lobbies again and sit there for a few minutes while random strangers join, odds are it will be a blast even if I don't ever see them again. Even more it helps detoxify the community, players that verbally abused their own team, glitched, cheated or exploited or were simply unpleasent could just be vote kicked. The occasional bad apple gets weeded out as the game eventually fills up with pleasant people to play with, and most people in general are less inclined to be ******** to others when they aren't put on a team full of anonymous randoms they will likely never see again after the game ends by a computer algorithm.

This is one of my buttons when it comes to PC gaming, I tend to rant about it. I know dedicated servers are expensive and making a functional server browser system can be demanding, but the benefits to the game just seem so very worth it to me.. I really dislike that so many games elect to not use it these days.

[Dahnyol]

Yes ! please give us more ways communicate! I understand we can all download team speak and yatta yatta but that really doesn't argue against having a gaming lobby. With voice comm (even if it is lance only) I can imagine combat will be much much different than it is now. People who want to listen will focus fire during brawls and change up the 5 minute peak a boo. Please don't say there will be trolls - MUTE

[Quxudica]

Dahnyol, on 21 September 2014 - 12:53 AM, said:

Yes ! please give us more ways communicate! I understand we can all download team speak and yatta yatta but that really doesn't argue against having a gaming lobby. With voice comm (even if it is lance only) I can imagine combat will be much much different than it is now. People who want to listen will focus fire during brawls and change up the 5 minute peak a boo. Please don't say there will be trolls - MUTE

I'll say that a lobbie system and integrated in game comms both contribute heavily to improving pugging experience. A group of random people are entirely 100% capable of working together, of using tactics and strategy, they won't be as good together as a group that has played with the same people for 100 hours, but they can be surprisingly effective - especially if one or two are veterans. The problem with PuG's isn't that solo queue is full of bad players that refuse to work together, it's that the game does not give them the tools needed to facilitate communications. Text is impractical in combat and while the command functions are nice, they are no replacement for being able to speak or having time to talk pre-match. I've been part of PuG's full of nothing but strangers in many different games that have accomplished some great things - even beating static premades on occasion.

Having the ability to use VoiP services like Teamspeak or Mumble or Ventrillo does not negate the need for an integrated and functional option, odds are the vast majority of your players will never come to the forums and thus won't even know these exist let alone how to get in on them. It's nice to have them, but that's not an excuse to exclude such important functionality from your team-based game.

Again I know it's resource intensive to develop an integrated voip system, but its just one of those things that adds so very much to the game, just like player created lobbies.

[Riverboat Sam]

Quxudica, on 21 September 2014 - 12:39 AM, said:

Random Matchmaking has steadily become the norm in many games. It started (for me) with Halo on console (yeah, filthy consoles) and in the time since I've seen more and more games stop using a server browser system in favor of these random set ups.

I can't tell you how much I despise it. It so heavily restricts the community and how you want to play the game, it makes it next to impossible to play with the same people for extended periods unless you friend them (one match with a stranger is not enough time to decide to friend someone imo) and it's basically the death of "Novelty Rooms".

Back in the day, I could browse a bunch of player made lobbies if I didn't feel like or couldn't get into the official rooms. I could come in and play with a group of total strangers for as long as I wished, talk to them over VoiP work together as a team, coordinate with them and have a blast. I could even have a blast getting to know the guys on the other team between matches, maybe we'd switch up teams or just talk in the lobby to eachother while people picked their load out and we decided on a map. If one particular weapon was "over powered" we could use "house rules" to ban it's use if everyone was ok with it. Hell more than that I would often specifically look for what I refer to as "Novelty Rooms", player lobbies made with special and often silly house rules. Pistols only games, Sniper Rifles only games, Melee only games, Rocket only games etc. It was so much fun to join a game where everyone was restricted to the worst weapon as we'd bounce around trying to kill eachother with a single shot breach loading sniper rifle that did terrible damage without a head shot without using the scope. Silly? sure, fun? **** yes.

Hell even in other genres, I remember joining player lobbies in Diablo II where the entire point was to bet on Golem duels. Get two Necromancers together with their chosen Golem out, turn on PvP and let the golems fight it out while the others bet on the outcome. Same went for Mercenary Duel rooms and all manner of other silly set ups.

Not having player created lobbies with a server browser hurts the ability to meet new people, to grow the community *inside the game* and so heavily restricts how the game can be played.

Sad thing is, once upon a time I put a lot of hours into a third person military shooter that used dedicated servers with a server browser. It allowed player created lobbies in addition to the official ones, it had in-lobby text chat where both sides could talk to each other and to their own team privately, it had integrated push to talk voice chat in the lobby and in the game, it allowed map selection and even map "play lists" to automatically queue up the maps in the order the host set, it allowed the host to choose the game mode or modes, the sequel to this game even expanded this and allowed the room host to set custom rules so that players could not pick certain weapons or equipment if the host so desired (basically officially acknowledging how much the community loved the unofficial house rule rooms from the previous title) . It let creativity flourish in the house rules and most importantly it gave the community and in game means of growing, you could fire up the server browser pick a game with a title that sounded interesting (novelty room, clan tryout, practice, ranked, shooting the ****, whatever) and you could potentially spend hours with generally the same people - maybe even make new friends or find a clan. Rooms could be set with rank requirements, so newbies could join indicated newbie rooms, advanced players could join high rank rooms and if you wanted you could make rooms with no rank req and welcome all. If people left more came, if the host left someone else became host. it was great. Sad thing about all of this?

This game with so many options to encourage player choice and freedom? It was SOCOM: US Navy Seals and it's sequels, a console series on the PlayStation 2 from a decade or so ago. I can't tell you how depressing and honestly aggravating it is that a console shooter from back when I had bloody dial-up gave me better choices and options than a pc game in 2014, and I don't just mean MWO.. even bloody Diablo 3 uses the Random Matchmaker bullshit these days.

I don't mind Random Matchmaking being a thing, I just detest that it's the only way to play a game unless you form a friend party. Let me make my own lobbies again and sit there for a few minutes while random strangers join, odds are it will be a blast even if I don't ever see them again. Even more it helps detoxify the community, players that verbally abused their own team, glitched, cheated or exploited or were simply unpleasent could just be vote kicked. The occasional bad apple gets weeded out as the game eventually fills up with pleasant people to play with, and most people in general are less inclined to be ******** to others when they aren't put on a team full of anonymous randoms they will likely never see again after the game ends by a computer algorithm.

This is one of my buttons when it comes to PC gaming, I tend to rant about it. I know dedicated servers are expensive and making a functional server browser system can be demanding, but the benefits to the game just seem so very worth it to me.. I really dislike that so many games elect to not use it these days.

EXACTLY! +1,000,000 to your post!!

[Thorn Hallis]

Can't remember any F2P game of late to feature a lobby system.

That being said I think some sort of (moderated) general chat would do good to the game.

[Kavoh]

While I have seen some good experiences come from online games hosting their own VoIP, its generally a mixed experience for most people. I generally never used them as there is always "that guy", and more... sensitive individuals would probably be hurt by some of the more personal (due to voice) actions of other players, which can lead to blame on PGIs part. TS/Vent/etc leaves it up to the player to want to get more personal and coordinated with others.

Just my 2 cents.

As for lobbies, I don't think it would work with our population/game style.

Edited by Kavoh, 21 September 2014 - 01:12 AM.

[Superslicks]

Ahh, the days of Rainbow six raven shield, so many fond memory's of player made lobbies, and the freedom to create and play any map of your choice, so many a late night

[Moonlander]

Thorn Hallis, on 21 September 2014 - 01:10 AM, said:

Can't remember any F2P game of late to feature a lobby system.

That being said I think some sort of (moderated) general chat would do good to the game.

Oooh yes, when in your Mech lab, have the ability to see a /world channel or something. Would be so awesome! I have literally zero friends in-game because this is the only real way to communicate with others outside of a match.

[Quxudica]

Kavoh, on 21 September 2014 - 01:12 AM, said:

While I have seen some good experiences come from online games hosting their own VoIP, its generally a mixed experience for most people. I generally never used them as there is always "that guy", and more... sensitive individuals would probably be hurt by some of the more personal (due to voice) actions of other players, which can lead to blame on PGIs part. TS/Vent/etc leaves it up to the player to want to get more personal and coordinated with others.

Just my 2 cents.

As for lobbies, I don't think it would work with our population/game style.

You need the option mute specific players, disable voice chat completely and the ability to vote kick someone. And it absolutely has to be push to talk only (voice activated or always on are more responsive, sure, but no one wants to hear you slurping down food or listen to the constant clicking).

As for hurting peoples feelings? I free admit, I am a carebare, I don't like trash talking and I don't think there is ever any need or reason to make other people feel like ****. It's a game to have fun and the bullying and toxicity can be left elsewhere. But even so I grew up with voice enabled games and the ******* never sent me running for my security blanket (mine was blue one with Optimus Prime on it!). People are just fine and the blanket "Your Online Experience May Vary" addendum added to every online games ESRB rating seems to be plenty enough to shield the devs and publisher.

As for lobbies not working in MWO, I see no reason they wouldn't. In fact the ability to know what map you are dropping on, custom fit your mech for it, and pre-discuss tactics with your team fits right in with the fluff.

[Dark DeLaurel]

Thorn Hallis, on 21 September 2014 - 01:10 AM, said:

Can't remember any F2P game of late to feature a lobby system.

That being said I think some sort of (moderated) general chat would do good to the game.

World of Tanks has an all chat channel for that server and one for companies i think dunno dont read them lol. But it does have a form of global chat in it, so you can form platoons, etc.

here we go a screenie that has the chat options at the bottom, the one that is open is the platoon one so you can talk to the folks in your premade easy.

Edited by Dark DeLaurel, 21 September 2014 - 01:34 AM.

[El Bandito]

Enlil09, on 20 September 2014 - 11:54 PM, said:

Why Doesn't Mwo Just Use A Gaming Lobby, Like Every Other Game Out There?

Because



never gets old.

[Dark DeLaurel]

that dude has a new series out now, need to try and remember what it is and see how it is.

[Troutmonkey]

I think that the Matchmaking should stay, but give premium users the ability to host "public" custom matches.
Add a lobby where anyone can join these servers and you're set.

I would also very much like to see VOIP, with the default set to on but the ability to instantly mute people / report them in game. Given how PGI recently set all chat to off by default, I can't see this as being likely in the near future

[STEF_]

I really miss mw3 lobbies.
That system was so simple.... I imagine it could be easily done with chat and voip too.

[Angel of Annihilation]

You must not have played many games then.

WoTs and War Thunder, which are both really very similar to MWO and kind of direct competitors in terms of the type of game with the only difference being a historical basis instead of Sci Fi, both use random MM. Both are very successful and WoTs actually might have larger numbers than WoW to be honest (I know they have over 10-15 million active players world wide).

In any case, it is a very common format for these games, at least within my experience.

Now if you talking a Chat Lobby well yeah I don't have a fricken clue what the heck is wrong with PGI in that regard. I mean it is kind of important. I can't count the times I just wanted to log into the lobby and discuss a build, get opinions and/or just get some clarification about a promo or something in real time. Really sucks not to have that option and kind of makes it hard to have any real community without it.

Edited by Viktor Drake, 21 September 2014 - 04:55 AM.

[Jonny Taco]

excessive match making is the bane of modern gaming...

[P5YCO]

Hawken has lobbies of sorts, you can join a specific server, or drop in a random one. Another good thing about server lobbies is you get to continue playing with the same group of players if you want. Another thing that would boost in game community instead of building teams outside the game they can form within it!

[orcrist86]

Other games use lobbies for two real reasons: persistent dedicated servers. If a player acts as a server everyone who joins stays on that server until the server is disconnected or shut down. This is the same if a server is truly dedicated, like the ones you make or rent for counterstrike, or battlefield. In this situation the server browser is necessary because a player will want to choose the best server for their tastes and location. Though really, most games have a quick match button that will do the same thing. MWO matches are not persistent despite tracking (which is similar to hlstatsx). Every match is an instance, players do not continue on and are simply disconnected after a period of time.

The second reason is that these games lack the same kind of customization that MWO has. Every player is essentially equal minus whatever kit options they may have. The differences in firepower and tonnage in MWO completely negates that kind of balance, making a lobby system unusable without even stricter and onerous balancing tactics.

There are advantages to the MWO MM system however, though most of them are back-end. The servers can be run more efficiently because they throttle up and down depending on need, rather than running at peak 24/7. Balance, while arguable not fantastic, is better than what you would get in trying to find a lobby full of people willing to choose a chasis or weight class they don't favor.

[Carcass23]

There is this; https://mwolobby.com/ but I hardly ever see anyone on it.