76 replies to this topic

[UnsafePilot]

Rushing the enemy has always worked fine for me when I wanted a quick out of a match.

[Malleus011]

Would it make any difference if the 'withdraw' spot was a particular point on the map, say right behind the base/start point? This might make an 11-1 match a race to see if the lone surviving ECM Raven can slip the net and make it to the escape point before he's intercepted. It removes the 'hit a button and quit' issue, while still allowing 'mechs the option to attempt to leave the field alive.

[Kain Demos]

Reno Blade, on 22 September 2014 - 03:25 AM, said:

My biggest issue with such an option would be a chain reaction/snowball effect.

You already see the following:
2 disconnect at the start -> someone typing "we lost already, I'm out" and he disconnects too.

If you could eject/retreat/withdraw, then you would see people doing it even more so than DC already.
And it's not really a difference to DCing, is it?

Agreed. I've been on streaks where 5-6 matches in a row we have a disconnect right at the start of the match on our team.

[RussianWolf]

Kain Thul, on 22 September 2014 - 07:53 AM, said:

Agreed. I've been on streaks where 5-6 matches in a row we have a disconnect right at the start of the match on our team.

do they say something or just drop? Sometimes is connectivity issues on their end (which I wish the game would recognize and not let them drop is they aren't stable.)

[Kain Demos]

RussianWolf, on 22 September 2014 - 07:59 AM, said:

do they say something or just drop? Sometimes is connectivity issues on their end (which I wish the game would recognize and not let them drop is they aren't stable.)

The guys who never even connect to the match. They show zero ping in the loading screen and never get into the game.

[RussianWolf]

Kain Thul, on 22 September 2014 - 08:13 AM, said:

The guys who never even connect to the match. They show zero ping in the loading screen and never get into the game.

Sometime they will get into the game only to drop out immediately. This can still be a connectivity issue.

Now if they drop in a game and see "LORD Whosit" and are saying "screw this" and dropping out.....then yeah, valid complaint.

[SI The Joker]

So if you withdraw from battle... and if I have an empty mech bay to fill... do I get your mech variant as salvage for my stable while you lose it in yours?

[Joseph Mallan]

SI The Joker, on 22 September 2014 - 08:32 AM, said:

So if you withdraw from battle... and if I have an empty mech bay to fill... do I get your mech variant as salvage for my stable while you lose it in yours?

You could get it while I keep mine. That'd be fair. Outside of Combat I am a Bajillionaire you see.

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 22 September 2014 - 08:34 AM.

[Kain Demos]

RussianWolf, on 22 September 2014 - 08:27 AM, said:

Sometime they will get into the game only to drop out immediately. This can still be a connectivity issue.

Now if they drop in a game and see "LORD Whosit" and are saying "screw this" and dropping out.....then yeah, valid complaint.

He was talking about people quitting because of the disconnects and an ensuing chain reaction which I could see happening.

[Mystere]

Outside of Community Warfare, I do not think this is worth the effort. Just quit the match if you think you are beat. Are you worried about your stats?

Edited by Mystere, 22 September 2014 - 09:37 AM.

[1453 R]

Hmm.

I’m seeing an awful lot of p!ss and vinegar and “suck it up, nub” in this thread. While not entirely unexpected, it is dismaying. I recall that in the days of R&R back in closed beta, an honorable surrender was offered by simply shutting down, and players would respect the defeated remnant’s wish to avoid a humiliating demise and simply finish out the match via the game objective.

Where did that go? When did the attitude switch to “If you want to end the game, then you’d best throw yourself into the teeth of our guns so we can get paid and you can get laffed at, nub”? I’m not asking for you guys to not get paid – hell, give every player on the enemy team a free assist bonus for every withdraw, whether they got guns into him or not – I’m simply asking for a bit of sportsmanship and quiet dignity for players who’d rather not pursue a fruitless, frustrating train wreck of a match.

If that means you guys would rather me hard DC (in an obscure spot, after shutting down) because nobody wants to discuss the option of an honorable withdrawal from a terrible match, then a’ight. I’ll do just that, since y’all are already forcing me into Skirmish mode against my desires. I suppose it really is too much to expect this player base to try and work towards compromise and at least some measure of satisfaction for all parties involved.

Mystere, on 22 September 2014 - 09:16 AM, said:

Outside of Community Warfare, I do not think this is work the effort. Just quit the match if you think you are beat. Are you worried about your stats?

Stats, no. I just dislike the notion of being ripped to bits like a hamster in a shark tank in order to escape a bad match. As I said, I would mostly just like the option to bail out of the sort of match I laid out in the original post without being reported to the GMs.

[Joseph Mallan]

SOME players accepted. Those same players would now too... if they were still here!

[Mister Blastman]

OP: What do you propose we do with players that refuse to fight and instead hide behind rocks the entire game while their team tries to flank and make something happen--thus causing their entire team to lose because four or five of them didn't want to play the game beyond camp in a spot?

It is a slippery slope giving people a withdraw option.

Perhaps more time should be spent educating the community on the merits of playing with offense rather than defense. Offense wins wars and conflicts. Defense buys you time. Limited time. Time that must be used to make a withdraw and then immediate counter-attack or repositioning that can lead to an offensive posture.

[Scratx]

Joseph Mallan, on 22 September 2014 - 09:21 AM, said:

SOME players accepted. Those same players would now too... if they were still here!

There's also the fact that back then there was an actual point to surrendering. It would minimize your repair bill, and possibly minimize the opposition's, too. Without RnR there is no point. You should just go down guns blazing in full glory. Or kill 'em all in an epic show. Either works.

[Duncan Jr Fischer]

Sadist Cain, on 22 September 2014 - 06:21 AM, said:

No way in hell, I've had matches before where 3 of us took on 7. Things like that don't happen with a run away button forcing other people to stop their games because some idiots died or get upset that they're outmatched.

There's this feature in NS2 and its horrible, people surrendering all because they didn't get a position they wanted.

All this will result in is people quitting because they haven't taken the hill in alpine and all that jazz

Very much this! There was a match with 2 of us left against five, and we won, the other guy perishing in the process, but we destroyed them all. And there are times when you still lose, but even left alone manage to take 2 or 3 more enemies with you and thus die with honor.
That's the way of the Warrior, withdrawals are for cowards.

And the experience of other games shows clearly that one player quitting results in chain reaction, as with every leaving player the chances of the team get slimmer.

Edited by Duncan Jr Fischer, 22 September 2014 - 09:38 AM.

[AssaultPig]

what would be the actual purpose of this feature? I can always just quit the match via menu anyway, so why would I use 'withdraw?'

[Jetfire]

No, this is part of what I cannot stand about Dota. The match is only 15 mins long. Either fight or wait. There are enough suiciders as it is, we don't need to open it up at the 8 min mark for free suicide.

[1453 R]

Mister Blastman, on 22 September 2014 - 09:23 AM, said:

OP: What do you propose we do with players that refuse to fight and instead hide behind rocks the entire game while their team tries to flank and make something happen--thus causing their entire team to lose because four or five of them didn't want to play the game beyond camp in a spot?

It is a slippery slope giving people a withdraw option.

Perhaps more time should be spent educating the community on the merits of playing with offense rather than defense. Offense wins wars and conflicts. Defense buys you time. Limited time. Time that must be used to make a withdraw and then immediate counter-attack or repositioning that can lead to an offensive posture.

Those players are rewarded for their timidity by losing the game. It’s a shame that their team gets dragged down with them – as I well know, as I’m usually one of the dead ones who tried mightily to get them out from behind their rock by leading a forlorn push.

I’m not asking for an excuse to bail on an unfavorable match. If I have guns left and enemies to shoot, I’ll generally find enemies and shoot them. Heck, just this morning before I came in to work, my Stormcrow lost both arms (all its beams) and shot its torso-mounted SRM launchers dry. I was down to zero guns – and rather than just shut down somewhere, I went and found an enemy Dire Wolf backpedaling away from fire my team was slinging at it, outflanked it, and stood directly behind it, as in up its oversized metal exhaust port. At which point I yelled “STORMCROW DOORSTOP, WHALE MAN” in all chat as the guy tried to figure out why he wasn’t going backwards anymore before my team blew his core out (and failed).

Didn’t get the assist for that Dire Whale, but I helped kill it all the same.

No, what I’m asking for is an option to honorably concede a match where my own team is telling me to hang myself in a corner rather than helping to form up a push against entrenched enemies, or to retreat with some dignity from a match that went 11-2 after I fought hard enough to end up unarmed. Because every time I’ve had weapons left by that point and decided to do the BANZAI! Thing, only to get a “lol dumbass” from the enemy team, it’s made me wonder why I didn’t sit in an obscure corner and shut down instead.

Smack is one thing, and is frankly a time-honored online game tradition, but the petty-spirited meanness I’ve seen so often in this game gives me a sad. Good smack raises spirits on both sides; this bullscheiss I’m hoping to partially defuse with a withdraw option as opposed to “DC, lose rewards, get reported” needs to go.

Also: I’m not suggesting that a withdraw’s ‘Mech unlocks any sooner than it naturally would. Obviously it’d still wait until the game was done, but the pilot would be able to bail on a match he has no business being in anymore and move on with another machine, same as now. Just with what he’s already done intact and without a “report to GMs” option being levied against him.

[Mystere]

1453 R, on 22 September 2014 - 09:19 AM, said:

I recall that in the days of R&R back in closed beta, an honorable surrender was offered by simply shutting down, and players would respect the defeated remnant’s wish to avoid a humiliating demise and simply finish out the match via the game objective.

Assuming the opposition is willing, that is still possible in Assault and Conquest. Unfortunately, that is not the case with Skirmish. Either one side has to be completely eliminated or the timer runs out.

Usually, I'll just shout in chat "Banzai!", die in a blaze of glory, and quit. But I do remember one time in which I just bid everyone farewell and quit the match. My sanity was more important than anyone else's in that match ... or any match for that matter.

[Murphy7]

Scratx, on 22 September 2014 - 09:30 AM, said:

There's also the fact that back then there was an actual point to surrendering. It would minimize your repair bill, and possibly minimize the opposition's, too. Without RnR there is no point. You should just go down guns blazing in full glory. Or kill 'em all in an epic show. Either works.

"In the 31st century, life is cheap. Battlemechs aren't."

Or something to that effect was written on the boxed set as I recall. Surrender / retreat are viable lore options, that do not have a fitting place in our current game.

I am all for surrender / retreat conditions in Community Warfare when it arrives. I just don't see the point in our current game modes when I consider it against the potential for abuse.