353 replies to this topic

[RustyBolts]

First...Thanks for the great update and communication.

Second....Please do not implement seasons. Instead give players a chance to change factions(at a cost of MC) every 90 days. Resetting the map every 90 days is going to piss off your players.

Third....How many respawns are there going to be? 4 since you have 4 mechs? If you respawn 4 times in the first 30 minutes of a 2 hour battle are you locked out for the remaining 1.5 hours?

Four...If I commit to the offensive and I respawn the max number of times can I then switch to defend another planet if I am locked out of assaulting a planet?

I do not want endless respawns, but I also dont want to be sitting around for 1.5 hours before I can fight again.

Edited by RustyBolts, 25 September 2014 - 02:37 PM.

[Kirkland Langue]

Ok Actual question:

Will different planets impact the likelihood of getting different maps? I know that new maps will be created for CW but I suspect there will still be some hot maps, some cold maps, some goldilocks maps. If I click on a map that appears to be a ball of ice, and I drop onto a map of lava.... that's not going to be good times.

[Karl Marlow]

So the question that immediately jumps to mind is this

Why should we defend our planets?

If we don't defend the enemy cannot take them because they can't get 10 tokens.

[LoneGunman]

This should be interesting. I played the beta of a BT game ages ago that had CW in from the start. There were times when you'd come back to the game the next day and Davion conquered everything forcing them to reset the map. You'd get pushes from different houses because people in a certain region or timezone were mostly aligned with specific houses so that house would make a big push and take over 2/3 or 3/4 of the IS map (they didn't have clans so earlier in the timeline). Even so, the conflicts were fun as hell. You'd see that border world being taken so you'd rush in there to get on 4-man teams to drop (it was all 4 v 4 at the time) and try to push things back. But then, the drops were guess work and not totally balanced (we might have two lights and a medium and they'd have an atlas plus two mediums and a light or something).

I guess we'll see how it goes...definitely makes things exciting...I just hope the support for Lone Wolves will get put into play sooner rather than later.

[Tolkien]

Nightcrept, on 25 September 2014 - 11:47 AM, said:

I have only one real question and it's probably due to me not being around for awhile.

When exactly are we getting cw?

I really don't care if I have to sit at my computer wearing a fez, a giant diaper, nipple rings and sucking my toes so long as i finally get to play cw.

Their 5th and most recently stated deadline to deliver CW is 21 December 2014 given by Russ in the Reddit AMA.
(The 4th was given in the 2013 state of the inner sphere post from Russ as being Sept-Oct 2014)
(The 3rd was given in ask the devs 30 back in April 2013 as being during 2013)
(The 2nd was given by Bryan or Russ in a game developers conference interview in march 2013 as being all of it up to launch)
(The 1st was given by Russ in closed beta as being Dec 2012-January 2013)

LoneGunman, on 25 September 2014 - 01:50 PM, said:

This should be interesting. I played the beta of a BT game ages ago that had CW in from the start. There were times when you'd come back to the game the next day and Davion conquered everything forcing them to reset the map. You'd get pushes from different houses because people in a certain region or timezone were mostly aligned with specific houses so that house would make a big push and take over 2/3 or 3/4 of the IS map (they didn't have clans so earlier in the timeline). Even so, the conflicts were fun as hell. You'd see that border world being taken so you'd rush in there to get on 4-man teams to drop (it was all 4 v 4 at the time) and try to push things back. But then, the drops were guess work and not totally balanced (we might have two lights and a medium and they'd have an atlas plus two mediums and a light or something).

I guess we'll see how it goes...definitely makes things exciting...I just hope the support for Lone Wolves will get put into play sooner rather than later.

That was probably Multiplayer Battletech 3025 back in 2001, and it's what some of us have been hoping MWO would deliver for the last 2.5 years.

Edited by Tolkien, 25 September 2014 - 01:59 PM.

[OznerpaG]

ThomasMarik, on 25 September 2014 - 01:50 PM, said:

So the question that immediately jumps to mind is this

Why should we defend our planets?

If we don't defend the enemy cannot take them because they can't get 10 tokens.

if you don't defend then the attacker takes it - ask a certain country where just that happened happened to them this year

if there's no defense on a planet then the attacker gets a free token every x minutes until he gets 10 tokens. the defense's job is to stop the attacker from getting tokens

Edited by JagdFlanker, 25 September 2014 - 02:12 PM.

[Bront]

MadTulip, on 25 September 2014 - 01:19 PM, said:

"Is there a possibility of a some type of reward for piloting a mech that are popular amongst your own particular faction? For example a Kurita mechwarrior piloting a Jenner 7-F would be in line for a small reward of some sort or extra compensation?
This isn't planned at the moment but is a very cool idea. Open for discussion on it."

i would directly couple this with the idea that owning certain planet allows for discounts on buying mechs. Buying mechs is not something you do on a regular basis. CW games are. You want some benefit which is reflected often like best in every match from owning a certain planet.

"now that we have the planet that produces the JNR 7-F we secured them as the light mechs which are avilable to us in larger numbers on the frontlines. They are thus common, cheap to get by and common to see in battle."

- Mechs are produced on some planet (or multiple which all produce parts for it)
- If you faction controlls say a JNR-7F factory (by controlling a planet with such a factory) then dropping with a JNR-7F is less expansive then dropping with some other chassis where you do not own a factory. (instead of buying your JNR-7F is less expansive)
- If you faction own multiple factories for JNR-7F price degrades with diminishing returns.
- Alternatively to CB coffer costs for entering a CW drop you could modify the ammount of "tokens" beeing taken when a battle is won. If the defender used all "cheap in house produced mechs" and looses the loss doesnt weight as much as if they would have lost theire "elite, hard to get by rare chasis".

- There should be motivation to USE the mechs which are available to your houses military. The mechs that your house can produce are those that it will (have to) field (represented by the players). Players should thus be rewarded for playing the mechs that the faction has available.

- Factories for items like AC20 or ammo types (if included to the game at some point like swarm LRMs) can later be added. -> "we lost all AC20 ammo factories ... thats bad, 1t AC20 ammo just gives you 3 shots instead of 7 in CW now." Connections like this between the IS map and theire planets and borders and the actual matches should be there as much as possible to spice things up and to make the map count something instead of just beeing another kind of matches. I wouldnt mind if the ATL just becomes unavailable to drop with because my faction lost its factory or if i can not bring any more XL300 because we lost its factory. I believe CW is not about beeing fair and fully balanced all the time. if your faction looses territory you should feel that.

- Factories can be build during a full CW cycle (you mentioned 3 months). The whole faction can vote/pay/influence/depending on individual campaign success somehow which kind of factory they want and where.

That ads a lot of extra complications. More likely a simpler solution to start with would be:

Run a pure faction mech, get a 10% bonus in C-Bill earnings, 5% loyalty bonus, and 10% drop-cost reduction because that common faction mech is easier for the faction to maintain and represents the faction well. It's like a mini-hero bonus for staying loyal.

[MATRAKA14]

Please take in consideration this post as a suggestion.

http://mwomercs.com/...-dropship-mode/

[Bront]

RustyBolts, on 25 September 2014 - 01:43 PM, said:

Second....Please to not implement seasons. Instead give players a chance to change factions(at a cost of MC) every 90 days. Resetting the map every 90 days is going to piss off your players.

Ugh, no thanks. 3 months should be enough time for someone to "win". A reset lets us keep things fresh, while also allowing a 3 month cycle where they can put in system improvements into CW for the next round and re-balance things. If they time the balance cycle right, it has the potential to feel like a new game every 3 months.

RustyBolts, on 25 September 2014 - 01:43 PM, said:

Third....How many respawns are there going to be? 4 since you have 4 mechs? If you respawn 4 times in the first 30 minutes of a 2 hour battle are you locked out for the remaining 1.5 hours?

They were aiming at 25-30 minute matches on average (I'd guess the time on them would be 45 minutes to an hour)

RustyBolts, on 25 September 2014 - 01:43 PM, said:

Four...If I commit to the offensive and I respawn the max number of times can I then switch to defend another planet if I am locked out of assaulting a planet?

You'd need to line up a team, which might be hard. I think they need to get the match length down first before they figure that part out. My guess is that you'd probably be locked in CW, but could drop in the normal queue.

[Karl Marlow]

JagdFlanker, on 25 September 2014 - 02:09 PM, said:

if you don't defend then the attacker takes it - ask a certain country where just that happened happened to them this year

if there's no defense on a planet then the attacker gets a free token every x minutes until he gets 10 tokens. the defense's job is to stop the attacker from getting tokens

What happens in the real world does not apply to fantasy land big stompy robots. What happens here is only what is actually programmed in to happen.

Where is this rule you are talking about that says free tokens are given our every X minutes?

[Nemesis Duck]

Read some concerns about medallions and clan players....some concerns about solos and mercs and their role. Have to agree...

[OznerpaG]

ThomasMarik, on 25 September 2014 - 02:40 PM, said:

Where is this rule you are talking about that says free tokens are given our every X minutes?

there isn't - you brought up a great point, and i suggested a solution for the devs

[Wintersdark]

Almond Brown, on 25 September 2014 - 09:58 AM, said:

Then it would seem reasonable to have the Groups police their own ranks in regard to activity. No one can actually expect PGI to track player activity on a "group by group" basis right? Sounds like an internal Team management issue.

Bilbo, on 25 September 2014 - 10:01 AM, said:

Especially considering there is not a buy-in requirement. It wouldn't be hard to purge when required and re-invite later.

Groups can do that, but why should they have to? Why do groups have to measure the worth of their players based on their activity? I understand some will do that regardless, and on a group by group basis that's fine - set whatever criteria you like for your members, after all.

But why should less active players be a direct drain on the unit? Why should a unit basically be forced to pay for players who play less?

That's just bad game design. From a game design viewpoint, you want to remain inclusive, to not punish players who already suffer for being unable to play often. Charging a unit on a per-member basis whenever they drop results in a unit being forced to weigh players financially: Is their presence in the unit a net loss? If that player only plays, say, a few matches per weekend, but the unit is large and runs CW drops daily, the unit is going to have to pay to keep that player on their roster even if that player isn't directly contributing to CW, and even though that player happily donates his percentage of his per match earnings to that unit's coffers.

Now, i can image some saying this is fine, if he's not contributing to CW directly, maybe he should get out of the unit? But that's a terrible, terrible way to force units to be. Again, some units may choose to be exclusionary, and that is their right, but from a game design standpoint you absolutely do not want to punish units for being groups of friends first and foremost.

[HlynkaCG]

Bront, on 25 September 2014 - 01:20 PM, said:

Just a thought on costs.

Perhaps rearm and repair could come from Unit funds? It would scale well (with larger units involved in larger scale battles needing a larger war-chest), and it wouldn't hurt the individual players. Non-unit players would simply be considered part of the local militia rather than dedicated house units, and you could even have rewards that go directly to the units for wins to help cover some of these costs beyond simple volunteer donations.

...

I really like this idea

[RustyBolts]

Bront, on 25 September 2014 - 02:39 PM, said:

Ugh, no thanks. 3 months should be enough time for someone to "win". A reset lets us keep things fresh, while also allowing a 3 month cycle where they can put in system improvements into CW for the next round and re-balance things. If they time the balance cycle right, it has the potential to feel like a new game every 3 months.

They were aiming at 25-30 minute matches on average (I'd guess the time on them would be 45 minutes to an hour)


You'd need to line up a team, which might be hard. I think they need to get the match length down first before they figure that part out. My guess is that you'd probably be locked in CW, but could drop in the normal queue.

I really dont think 3 months is giong to be enough time for a faction to "win" 6-8 planets open for battle for 24 hours. Lets say its 9 planets per day and you win every planet in 3 months that is 900 planets. There are more than that on the map. I do gree with updating and balancing, but I do not want to work my ass off and have to start over every 3 months. But thats my opinion.

2 hours or 45 minutes, my point still stands as do my questions. The two hours is the time frame that was given for the planets to be open for battle.

I dont really care if I can drop in the normal que. I wanted to know about CW.

Please dont take any of this wrong. I know that chat can be easily taken out of context.

[ImperialKnight]

skimmed through a few pages and not sure if anyone asked this.

Are we going to be fighting on the same CW map over and over and over regardless of what planet is being contested? Which seems to be the case.

Unless you're releasing a map for every planet, which I doubt is going to happen

[PhoenixNMGLB]

Wintersdark, on 25 September 2014 - 02:46 PM, said:

Groups can do that, but why should they have to? Why do groups have to measure the worth of their players based on their activity? I understand some will do that regardless, and on a group by group basis that's fine - set whatever criteria you like for your members, after all.

But why should less active players be a direct drain on the unit? Why should a unit basically be forced to pay for players who play less?

That's just bad game design. From a game design viewpoint, you want to remain inclusive, to not punish players who already suffer for being unable to play often. Charging a unit on a per-member basis whenever they drop results in a unit being forced to weigh players financially: Is their presence in the unit a net loss? If that player only plays, say, a few matches per weekend, but the unit is large and runs CW drops daily, the unit is going to have to pay to keep that player on their roster even if that player isn't directly contributing to CW, and even though that player happily donates his percentage of his per match earnings to that unit's coffers.

Now, i can image some saying this is fine, if he's not contributing to CW directly, maybe he should get out of the unit? But that's a terrible, terrible way to force units to be. Again, some units may choose to be exclusionary, and that is their right, but from a game design standpoint you absolutely do not want to punish units for being groups of friends first and foremost.

Very good argument and one I whole heartedly agree with.

[Rebas Kradd]

Wintersdark, on 25 September 2014 - 02:46 PM, said:

Groups can do that, but why should they have to? Why do groups have to measure the worth of their players based on their activity? I understand some will do that regardless, and on a group by group basis that's fine - set whatever criteria you like for your members, after all.

But why should less active players be a direct drain on the unit? Why should a unit basically be forced to pay for players who play less?

That's just bad game design. From a game design viewpoint, you want to remain inclusive, to not punish players who already suffer for being unable to play often. Charging a unit on a per-member basis whenever they drop results in a unit being forced to weigh players financially: Is their presence in the unit a net loss? If that player only plays, say, a few matches per weekend, but the unit is large and runs CW drops daily, the unit is going to have to pay to keep that player on their roster even if that player isn't directly contributing to CW, and even though that player happily donates his percentage of his per match earnings to that unit's coffers.

Now, i can image some saying this is fine, if he's not contributing to CW directly, maybe he should get out of the unit? But that's a terrible, terrible way to force units to be. Again, some units may choose to be exclusionary, and that is their right, but from a game design standpoint you absolutely do not want to punish units for being groups of friends first and foremost.

Additionally, given the benefit of playing larger groups in CW and the difficulty of organizing timely matches, units will have reason to keep more players around to fill gaps.

[Wintersdark]

Rebas Kradd, on 25 September 2014 - 03:06 PM, said:

Additionally, given the benefit of playing larger groups in CW and the difficulty of organizing timely matches, units will have reason to keep more players around to fill gaps.

This, too.

I understand that they need to curtain a very large unit's ability to utterly dominate CW by dint of having virtually unlimited funds, but you want to be sure that players are not judged by their play time.

Otherwise, a unit benefits heavily from having a smaller, extremely active player base.

(numbers for illustrative purposes only)

20 players that run 100 matches per week on average, earn 2000 payoffs per week from taxes, and pay 20*N per drop in CW.
40 players that run 50 matches per week on average earn 2000 payoffs per week in taxes as well - the same income - but they pay 40*N per drop in CW: That is, each drop in CW costs them twice as much as the former unit, despite having the same income.

Such a design unfairly disadvantages more casual players, who are already (fairly) disadvantaged by having less practice time etc. It also pushes units to be harsher on their players, demanding a certain amount of activity to hold their spot in the group.

This does not lead to a fun overall experience for a huge portion of the playerbase.

[OznerpaG]

knightsljx, on 25 September 2014 - 02:57 PM, said:

skimmed through a few pages and not sure if anyone asked this.

Are we going to be fighting on the same CW map over and over and over regardless of what planet is being contested? Which seems to be the case.

Unless you're releasing a map for every planet, which I doubt is going to happen

i believe it's the same maps as we use now - either they pick 1 map to represent that planet and everybody battles on that, or it's still random maps (assuming there's more than 1 battle for each specific planet - maybe not). it's the outcome of all the battles that decides who gets the planet - it would be more immersive if a specific climate was used for individual planets, but then again all the climates are available on this single planet Terra as we speak lol

Edited by JagdFlanker, 25 September 2014 - 03:17 PM.