311 replies to this topic

[Threat Doc]

I was honored this past week with Paul Inouye taking time to answer some of my questions concerning Community Warfare, for which I am grateful, even though I am only now coming to the point where I will be able to read the answers, and make return answers of my own.

Let me start off, however, first by apologizing to Paul Inouye for only now being able to get to these; the work week, now that I've been able to return to work after such a long hiatus, was utterly grueling for me, and I literally had zero time to even acknowledge the answers give in the thread for Community Warfare - Phase 2 - Update, at http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__3844331 . Answers to my questions are three posts down, but it best to start at the beginning, with this thread, as there is some fantastic information to be had. I'm still uncertain about how Factions and Loyalty Points are going to work, so I'll wait to find out; PGI has put some bone-headed things up in text that, later, turned out to be pretty cool in the game, so I'll hold judgment until I can actually play with these. Programmers are, typically, English-challenged and expression-challenged, and that's a natural trait of those capable of doing what I am incapable of, so we all should set back judgment until we get to play with the new mods in-game. I, on the other hand, have been patience-challenged and I tend to say stupid things before I understand the whole truth; that may not change, here, depending on the answers I have received, but I will try to refrain from my normal course.

I am also uncertain I like the idea of taking out a 1, 2, or 4 month, or permanent contract with any one particular faction, and then fighting their battles for them. I'm hoping this is just a prelude to an actual, robust contracting system similar to those written into the Merc's Handbooks, or at least a prelude to getting some individualized contracts, where we're not tied to a faction at all?

Paul Inouye, on 22 October 2014 - 07:25 PM, said:

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Will there be a drop statistic recorded for these things, when a ‘Mech is dropped off. I ask because I have a HALO Achievement for each of the weight classes, but each requires a certain number of HALO drops to earn the Achievement.

Will will be tracking drops just like any other action in the game. As for separate low altitude drops vs high altitude drops, that will probably fall under one stat if we do implement both types of drops. We have to be very careful if we plan on doing high altitude drops because depending on the height of the Drop Ship, players may see beyond the modeled world space of the level. The latest I've heard from rendering and art teams is that they're leaning toward the low altitude insertions. No concrete confirmation on which direction has been made quite yet.

This would be pretty cool; I don't need the tracking between high and low altitude, but I'll have to be able to track between weight classes, somehow. I can't show you how I have my MechWarrior's post screenies of their stats so I can get some of the rewards to them; so, if we can track those somehow, that would be pretty nice. If not, I'll do things the old-fashioned way; perhaps having my MechWarrior's express which Drop Decks they're running with, and then calculating iterations by weight class would be alright... okay, I'm just really excited we're getting a DropShip mode.

Thank you.

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I don’t know how a defense will be mounted against aggressors on worlds where my players are not able to be present?

I'm not sure if you're assuming that only 1 unit can attack a planet or not. There will be plenty of units attacking/defending planets and not every single border planet will be up for conflict at all times. For day 1 of CW we're planning on putting 2 planets on each side of a Faction border up for conflict. (2 inside Davion space and 2 inside Kurita space for example and for every border between the other Houses) Any number of units can attack and any number of units can defend as long as they're aligned with either of the two Houses involved in the conflict. As mentioned in other answers above, the time windows we're working with (prime times with highest player counts) should ensure that there are always plenty of attackers and defenders available. If these time windows are opened too wide or the number of planets in conflict is too high, then and only then would stalls start to happen and that's when we would adjust as needed.

I understand about multiple units being able to attack or defend a world at the same time, but where does that lend to individual accomplishment for Armageddon Unlimited, once we're actually on our feet, again? Okay, great, so we're working for House Davion for a one-month contract and we're assigned take Proserpina from Kurita, but we can't do it because House Davion has to pick up seventy-five percent of the fights because I don't have enough guys on to handle it -in our present state we would not be able to, either- over a twenty-four hour period. So, where we should be taking the flag for that world away from Kurita forces, we can't get that flag because all of the tokens have been taken by our Davion counterparts.

We, as Commander's, need to have the opportunity to develop drop dates and times for battle's royale so we can have the opportunity for the accomplishment without having to rely on outside interference so much.

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I would request that the maximum of 4 ’Mechs remain, while the minimum number is removed. My reasoning is this... a player bringing too many ’Mechs can really upheave a match, because they can come from multiple directions, at great speeds, and build extraordinary disruptions over the course of a drop period. However, someone bringing fewer than four is simply putting themselves at a disadvantage, as higher numbers on the other side could be used to still overwhelm the fewer numbers of available ’Mechs for the field, but not to such a great degree that better pilots will discontinue being able to drop more ’Mechs with their fewer. As well, if both sides took fewer ’Mechs to the field, the battle will be completed more rapidly, anyway.

You kinda talked yourself through the process of why we are requiring 4 'Mechs in your Drop Ship. Everyone should be bringing as many 'Mechs as they can or you'd be doing your team a disservice by not bringing the additional firepower to the battle. Keep in mind, not all teams going into a conflict consisting of 12 players in a single group. Smaller groups and solo players will also be dropping. Players bringing less than 4 'Mechs, again, are doing nothing but denying their team additional support even if their skill isn't as high in other weight classes. In a mode that will be as long in terms of playtime like Invasion will be, every single point of damage on target is going to help a team achieve victory.

The point was that it should be OUR CHOICE. I, myself, am developing my Drop Decks with four 'Mechs, falling within the rules. With the 'Mechs I have, I can build four Decks with utilizing only one 'Mech twice, and NOT using two of my BattleMaster's. I WANT the Hellslinger, and I'll be purchasing an Oxide, to help fill out two of those four Decks, but I know I could develop a fifth Deck if I could take only three 'Mechs, instead of the required four. I can't speak to others, but it would be invaluable to allow the choice, if possible, rather than hard numbers.

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Is EVERY MechWarrior presently engaged in a single mercenary unit required to join the SAME House? If I have fifteen active people in Armageddon Unlimited, would ALL of us have to be registered with House Davion, or would EACH MechWarrior be allowed to select their own alignment, and then the compiled Loyalty Points be the overall calculation for the mercenary unit, as was discussed in the first posting concerning Loyalty Points?

When a UNIT decides to align themselves with a particular Faction, everyone in that UNIT will be automatically aligned to that Faction. If a player leaves a Unit, and joins another Unit, that player will be automatically aligned to the Faction that the new Unit is already aligned to. There will not be a mix of alignments within a Unit. If you are a part of a Unit, you fight for that Unit and its cause/contract alignment.

If at the end of a contract, a Unit switches Factions, everyone who is still inside that Unit will be automatically aligned to the new Faction.

Okay, my understanding, and this is borne out from some of the original Blogs you guys had about Loyalty Points and Factions, was that EVERYONE would begin as aligned to a House. Later, when Mercenary Units began to propagate, people would be able to change to the Mercenary Unit, but would maintain, as a background element, perhaps, their original House. That's been a topic of conversation off and on since 2012. However, if I understand you right, now, everyone WILL align themselves to a House, but then it sounds as though you're making the Mercenary Unit's Factions in and of themselves.

So, a couple of clarifying questions: 1) I will, invariably, choose House Davion as my faction, period. From what you've said, if I'm understanding it correctly, ALL of the MechWarrior's in Armageddon Unlimited, would then become aligned with House Davion, correct? In essence, AU will cease to exist, in this scenario, and my people will be pissed off, because there are bloody few of us who like House Davion; in fact, I think I stand alone.

2) If Mercenary Unit's are their own Factions, now, if my people are aligned as a Mercenary Unit under the Armageddon Unlimited standard, nothing will change, correct?

I know it might seem like clock work to you guys at PGI, but a lot of my people and, I would presume, a lot of other folks, are confused, or under-informed about exactly what Faction changes proposed by PGI will mean for them? Finally, I'm not certain you guys understand precisely how important Faction's in this game are. For a real-world example, pay a visit to Seattle on Blue Friday -any Friday-, because these people are nuckin' futs about their Seahawks... they're absolutely crazy for their football team, and it's not an organization ANY of them belong directly to, like a Mercenary Unit in this game.

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Please consider allowing unit commander’s to set up times and days for this? Three separate times/dates, three for each Commander, as proposals for the other Commander, should work. If the two commanders are incapable of getting people to any of the proposed times, there should be proxy units proposed by each Commander, and then each Commander can try getting a game together, the first to reach that goal being the winner, by each negotiating with the proxy unit proposed by the opposing Commander. It’s simply extremely UNFAIR and wrong for a group to work hard to gain control of a world, only to have it taken from them, without a fight, because they can’t get anyone there.

I think we have some crossed wires here. First and foremost is that what can be considered 'fair' for your Unit can be considered 'unfair' to another unit. Remember, as mentioned before, your Unit is not the only Unit that will be attacking/defending any given planet. If you work hard gaining a lead on the planet zones, and your Unit logs off because they're going to a party or something, there are still other Units from your Faction attacking/defending that exact same planet. It later time zones when your Unit is asleep, there are other Units from the other peak time zones also helping capture/defend the same planet. The bigger lead you provide, the easier it is for other Units in your Faction to keep that lead.

Do you understand what you've just said, here? If my unit works hard to take a planet, and has to log off for a party... Paul, please put down the Ganja-mon. Party... sleep... work... family... real-world stuff that has to be done so we can CONTINUE TO HAVE THE FACILITY TO PLAY MWO!!! If Armageddon Unlimited works hard to take Proserpina, but simply cannot complete, due to pitched battles, we then LOSE THAT PLANET because no one can remain on to finish off the conquest of it all. You DO understand what that's going to do to the morale of my MechWarrior's, right? You DO understand that we will simply resign ourselves to the PUG queue because... it's like me laying down two-hundred-fifty missiles on a Dire Whale, only to have Smokeythewonderchicken come along and TAKE MY KILL, right?

If a planet is being contested, it should be done by ONE element, that planet LOCKED OFF until the attacker wins and takes the planet, the defender wins and keeps the planet, or one of the two elements fails to show up for twenty-four hours straight, forfeiting the planet to the other element, thereby unlocking the planet. If a Commander wants to allow for help to come in, they should have the OPTION of doing so, leaving the planet unlocked, so they can receive assistance. This allowance of multiple units on a single planet, whether for the sake of attack or defense, is silly, and it's GOING to drive people away.

Look, the old planetary leagues allowed Commander's to set up dates and times, typically three each of them, to select for continuing play, and NO OTHER FACTION was allowed on-world at the time; you couldn't even bring down reinforcements, whether from your own faction, or from allies, during the time the planet was being contested, and it was a system that worked. Don't reinvent the wheel, PGI... look and listen at the GREAT things your forebears did, and do them.

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There's a common misconception out there that our player counts are far below Closed Beta. This is not the case. Every day we cycle through hundreds of thousands of players worth of games. Two weekend events ago we ran out of dedicated servers (match servers) which caused people to get the "cannot find server" error. Our concern when creating these timezone windows is not based around not enough people playing CW... it's about starving the public match queue if too many people swing over to CW. If it does start to starve out the public queue, at least it will only be during those CW windows instead of the entire 24 hour day. Conversely if, to our surprise, the majority of players do not swing over to CW, we will have a case of planets not being fought over at all. We just don't know what player behaviour will be until we see how it rolls out. We are choosing these timezone windows to be during peak player times so that even if a large majority of players swing over to CW, the public queue will still have enough players to keep kicking of public matches. If not enough players swing over to CW, then we can adjust the planet conflicts, time windows to fit whatever solution works best for everyone participating in both queues.

You keep telling us the population is just fine, and I'm sure it's enough, but when I face off against, or have on my team, THE SAME PILOTS through between three and a half-dozen games... come on, now...

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Okay, so the unique factions you have set up are, indeed, not unique at all, except in a very notional fashion? I understand the population is low, right now, but when it picks up, will you be looking at greater faction separation? When I say faction, as a veteran BattleTech player, it’s not just Clan on one side, and IS on the other, but it’s Clan Wolf, Clan Jade Falcon, Clan Smoke Jaguar, etc., and it’s House Davion, House Marik, etc., Magistracy of Canopus, Lothian League, etc., Wolf’s Dragoons, Armageddon Unlimited, etc., St. Ives Compact and Free Rasalhague Republic. Methinks y’all better get your heads out and understand the importance of these factions, and that it’s NOT just Clan vs. Inner Sphere. You opened an amazingly HUGE can of whoop-ass, and now you gotta live with it, guys, hehe.

From the very start we stated to the community that we were going to reserve all canon Units/Factions from the very start. This allows us to roll in these Units/Factions as we start developing the intricacies of CW and overall Faction gameplay. Will you be able to align to Wolf's Dragoons? Possibly. Take control of that Faction? No. This is all stuff that will be added to the game as we keep developing CW as a whole.

Paul, you missed, utterly, like a AC/20 round hitting a hillside instead of the TWolf standing right in front of you, what I was talking about with faction importance. Perhaps it's because I used Canon factions rather than non-Canon... what I was trying to get across is, as I stated earlier, the Seattle Seahawks, and how absolutely NUTS Washingtonian's get for this football team, and they are ONLY PERIPHERAL to the team itself. Whether it's the 228th IBR, Seraphim, BWC, or any other non-Canon unit out there, our jersey's are important to us, the Faction we have joined is extremely important to us. We're building our own mythologies, our own team standards, because you guys told us NO ONE would be playing in Canon Factions... I thought YOU would have understood that from me, by now... I read a LOT on these forums, and I understand and, sometimes to a limited extent, agree with most of what you've done. However, I don't think you guys have put enough stock in Faction development, because it IS all about the Faction an individual is in to them. Those are the friends they drop with, smoke and joke with, whose banner, flag, or standard they have taken on so they could be part of that team. That camaraderie is cause, much of the time, for fanatical loyalty, and for getting people to play EVERY NIGHT, even if they continually have mud hole's stomped in them night after night.

You need to take the non-Canon Faction's you've made to be part of this game seriously. If I'm going to fight to take a world, it needs to be myself and the enemy team; ONE enemy team only, Vasili.

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This is all fine and good and dandy, but it’s bass-ackwards. Contracts should be made between the Employer and the Merc Unit, the money goes to the Merc Unit, and then is dispersed per a system set up by the Unit Commander and/or their Command & Staff.

The Unit Coffers are meant to cover costs of operations. The Contracting Faction would have nothing to do with it. Further plans for the coffer come into play after we start adding logistics to the CW feature but that is not part of CW Phase 2.

Again, you've missed well over half the question, here, Mr. Inouye. However, it's something we have time to hash out, since you're going to be enormously late with CW Phase 2, and we will not likely see the next Phase until March or April of 2015.

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Will we be able to have any input, whatsoever, on what we would like to see in the Faction Management interface? Will we be able to select plug-in/module items to build our own management interface?

Either I mis-read the original question or you are assuming there may be something there that will not be.

I think it was me reading the question wrong. Either way, let me clarify. No there will not be player councils governing Factions.. there are WAY too many variables there and it would be near impossible to set up something that would be considered fair when it comes to player to player interaction at that level. For example, for every player that supports a given "counsel" member's idea, there are just as many who do not agree. This opens a political nightmare and also starts to cater to special interest groups and that is something we'd rather not put our player base through. To that end, no, there will not be a Faction Management interface.

For the love of Mike!!! You DO read English, right? (scratches head)

Are you telling me the interface we have in the Faction tab in the game, right now, is all we're getting? That's it? What happened to being able to add awards, MechWarrior management as it were, and being able to have MechWarrior's view their record in the interface, to see their accomplishments?

A player council? Give me a break... I would NEVER recommend something so very stupid and clearly unnecessary in an interface... that's why we have the forums! I've tried to re-read what I wrote several times, and there is ZERO possibility you could have gleaned from my statements that I wanted a PLAYER COUNCIL. What the hell, man...

I would like to be able to give out unit-based awards to my MechWarrior's, to keep records, to write nice things about the things they've accomplished for AU in the game, some of which are gleaned from the MWO Achievements you guys gave us a while back, and which I support whole-hearteadly.

Again, Paul, I thank you for taking some of your extraordinarily hard-to-find time to answer my wall-o-text; I understand you may be exhausted, especially with the long race you guys at PGI have been running since the end of October 2011, so please forgive my frustration at having some of my questions so badly misinterpreted that they raised my ire. I am grateful, nonetheless. I just wish I could have a face-to-face discussion with you about some of these things, because text does NOT relay the emotion placed behind a question, a statement, or even a joke; thus, sometimes it's very difficult to convey what one is trying to ask. I try to write in an emotionless frame but, more often than not, that goes up like a fart in a lead balloon.

[Sam Slade]

Kay Wolf, on 25 October 2014 - 10:38 AM, said:

We, as Commander's, need to have the opportunity to develop drop dates and times for battle's royale so we can have the opportunity for the accomplishment without having to rely on outside interference so much.

This will sound harsh but everything in that post which stems from the above sentiment is hubris and doesn't reflect the nature of the majority... the majority of PGI's customers are your "outside interference"... CW needs to function accordingly.


EDIT: Should add that that majority includes potential customers; the judgemental, snarky types who only give a game an hour at best before keeping or trashing it... they must be catered to also or the game isn't factoring in growth.

Edited by Sam Slade, 25 October 2014 - 11:38 AM.

[Threat Doc]

TygerLily, on 23 October 2014 - 10:31 AM, said:

So...where's the post by Kay Wolf that Paul is referencing? I'm interested to read it!

http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__3805787

Sam Slade, on 25 October 2014 - 11:27 AM, said:

This will sound harsh but everything in that post which stems from the above sentiment is hubris and doesn't reflect the nature of the majority... the majority of PGI's customers are your "outside interference"... CW needs to function accordingly.

You, apparently, never played MechWarrior before MWO. That's okay, I understand ignorance of what came before, especially if you have no reference. However, there are definitely better ways, probably easier for PGI to deal with, as well, for making Community Warfare operable in a fashion far better than the choices PGI have made, to this point.

Oh, and Sam... you're not interference, but a target.

In all seriousness, the kind of interference I'm talking about is having multiple units under, or allied to a single Faction working on the same planet. There is no exclusivity for Merc units, at all, in that instance and especially not for smaller units who work very hard to capture objectives, to work over a world, etc., only to have all of that hard work taken away, jacked, by 'friendlies'. "Yeah, thanks for your service, Armageddon Unlimited, but you couldn't stay on your full range of time, across three different fight times, to capture a world, so you don't get anything. See ya next time." Yeah, thanks a lot PGI for setting up a bogus system.

This is not a recruitment problem, not a training problem, it's a time problem. I currently have one MechWarrior in AU capable of remaining on the better portion of the time, and even he's getting to be damned tired of doing so. I also have about four MechWarrior's capable of remaining on for more then three hours at a time, so that's five, as long as the conquest of a world doesn't take too long and there's enough variation to make the game worth it -at present, it is not for this sort of thing. I cannot stay on more than three hours per night, even on weekends -I'm busy taking care of unit stuff, or trying to relax a bit before returning to work on Monday morning, usually very damned early-, and I'm looking at cutting those down to two, because real-life activities are beginning to suffer as a result of my being on too long each night.

No, the system being introduced is not realistic, it's not fair to unit's who get on for more than just PUGging, and it's something that should, very seriously, be reconsidered. A view to the lore of the game would definitely be of assistance in this instance, as many of the answers to what SHOULD be put in this game, especially because it will need to be adapted from the base, but could all be modeled without sapping the fun out, as so many ignorant of the rules of BattleTech -and all of its supplements- continually cry about, are found in those materials.

[Cimarb]

With all due respect, you cannot expect them to design the whole system around an admittedly small unit. You have some GREAT ideas, do not get me wrong, but like Sam said above, the majority of us are this "interference" you are talking about.

Based upon your comment above, it sounds like you think the last unit to attack and win gets it, and that is not how it has been described. If your unit wins the most number of battles, you get your pretty little "tag" on the planet until it is conquered by a different faction. If your unit did not win the most, why should they get their tag on it? It should go to the unit that put the most effort in it. If that is your unit, great! If not, be happy for the unit that put the most effort in and they should thank you for your help (if there is a way to even show that help, which I hope there is).

If you do not have the time to dedicate to winning the majority of a single planet - or hopefully this is even broken down into the "planetary zones" that was hinted at - how do you think they can have a whole planet's win or loss be locked into the single conflict between two units, who only number about 5-10 active players? That is just not feasible.

As a clarification, your unit's faction is set to whoever you are contracted to. As a mercenary unit, you can take a 1-month contract for Davion (faction for everyone set to Davion), then take a 1-month contract for Clan Wolf (faction for everyone changed to Clan Wolf), then take a 3-month contract with Marik (faction for everyone changed to Marik). The only time you are locked to a specific faction permanently is when you make that choice, and if you so choose that, anyone in your unit that does not agree with it is free to switch units.

I am quite interested in how they are going to stop people from breaking contract by switching units every day, though...

For a lot of your comments, though, I think that there is a communication issue between you and Paul. I know you are trying to be funny in some of them, but a few of the comments ("do you even speak English?", for instance) are downright insulting. He has singled you out to answer a lot of your questions - because you have some good ones - but my goodness, man, have some tact!

Lastly, a lot of what you are looking for will be implemented in a future Phase of CW: logistics. That is where we will have all of the micro-management features that you are diligently doing already with AU, but finally in-game. THAT is when CW will finally truly be implemented, imo.

[Hoax415]

Wow Kay Wolf. Do yourself a favor man, actually go back through the CW updates we have been getting every two weeks and familiarize yourself with the systems as they currently stand. You wrote such a massive post that's based on obvious ignorance of what the CW systems are and how they have been described as functioning.

Its getting quite tiresome that in every one of these threads over half the questions are prefaced with: "I didn't read the thread" or "I haven't read all the updates" and even when they aren't prefaced with that admission they are posts like Wolf's where its obvious he hasn't actually been paying attention to what's going on as he repeatedly bases what he's saying on incorrect information or incorrect interpretation.

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Dracol, on 25 October 2014 - 10:11 AM, said:

As for the multi character discussion, it boils down to "You can please some of the people all the time or all the people some of the time". IMHO, the compromise they have now (min 1 month with a faction but ability to play any owned mech in general queues) is a good middle ground between the two camps. But, I also understand both camps... those who wish to have CW be more then just faction hopping and those who wish to use all of their purchases in the next evolution of MW:O.

Exactly. There is already a series of massive compromises with how a lore/faction purist would want CW to function for the overall enjoyment of the entire community.

Examples of compromises that lore purists are graciously accepting while Logan Hawke and his ilk cry constantly about not being able to use every mech all of the time in CW include:

-That Clan factions even have a "contract" system.
-That Clan factions will probably "pay" players to fight for them in cbills.
-That you can swap between a Clan and IS faction at all.
-That "merc" players on short term contracts will probably be treated the same as "faction" players who opt to permanently align themselves.
-That all factions get the same mech rosters (all IS get full IS mech stable, no restrictions of any kind).

And so on. But its all good. Every rational person realizes that Paul and Russ and PGI need to worry about creating something that is fun and engaging that people will want to play even if that means sacrificing some of the lore in "the hardcore RP mode" (Russ' words not mine).

BUT, all these compromises and the ability to swap factions every month aren't good enough somehow. Instead lets throw out what seems to be the last remaining difference between the clan and IS factions. That only the Clans are using Clan mechs because that is just too much to ask!

1. You can swap factions from Clan to IS to back again every month if you wish to.
2. You can create a sub-unit for your players to join that is on the opposite faction.
3. You can play normal queue whenever you have the itch to use XYZ mech.

Any restriction will result in players being forced to make decisions. But the people crying about their clan mechs here are no more reasonable than the guys who demanded that PGI let players take four Daishis in drop deck mode.

Some players just can't see past their own nose to care about what having things their way would mean for the game and its community in full I guess.

I get it, there may be small units (say 12 or less pilots) that are full of players who only want to use clan mechs and others who only want to use IS mechs. BUT they love the unit they are in and wouldn't want to play without those guys. Well, I'm sorry, that sucks and to work around that some of them will have to make some kind of sacrifice.

But the alternative is turning CW into normal queue but with a map and scoring and worse matchmaking.

If you find yourself in that kind of situation, I highly suggest you just find a different unit or play solo in CW and just drop with your unit buddies in normal queue. I get that that isn't ideal but having mixed tech for everyone or letting anyone switch factions at any time or giving everyone alter egos (which is effectively the exact same thing) affects the entire game and the entire playerbase. Its not just about you.

Edited by Hoax415, 25 October 2014 - 04:34 PM.

[Cimarb]

Hoax415, on 25 October 2014 - 04:08 PM, said:

Exactly. There is already a series of massive compromises with how a lore/faction purist would want CW to function for the overall enjoyment of the entire community.

Examples of compromises that lore purists are graciously accepting while Logan Hawke and his ilk cry constantly about not being able to use every mech all of the time in CW include:

-That Clan factions even have a "contract" system.
-That Clan factions will probably "pay" players to fight for them in cbills.
-That you can swap between a Clan and IS faction at all.
-That "merc" players on short term contracts will probably be treated the same as "faction" players who opt to permanently align themselves.
-That all factions get the same mech rosters (all IS get full IS mech stable, no restrictions of any kind).

And so on. But its all good. Every rational person realizes that Paul and Russ and PGI need to worry about creating something that is fun and engaging that people will want to play even if that means sacrificing some of the lore in "the hardcore RP mode" (Russ' words not mine).

BUT, all these compromises and the ability to swap factions every month aren't good enough somehow. Instead lets throw out what seems to be the last remaining difference between the clan and IS factions. That only the Clans are using Clan mechs because that is just too much to ask!

1. You can swap factions from Clan to IS to back again every month if you wish to.
2. You can create a sub-unit for your players to join that is on the opposite faction.
3. You can play normal queue whenever you have the itch to use XYZ mech.

Any restriction will result in players being forced to make decisions. But the people crying about their clan mechs here are no more reasonable than the guys who demanded that PGI let players take four Daishis in drop deck mode.

Some players just can't see past their own nose to care about what having things there way would mean for the game and its community in full I guess.

I get it, there may be small units (say 12 or less pilots) that are full of players who only want to use clan mechs and others who only want to use IS mechs. BUT they love the unit they are in and wouldn't want to play without those guys. Well, I'm sorry, that sucks and to work around that some of them will have to make some kind of sacrifice.

But the alternative is turning CW into normal queue but with a map and scoring and worse matchmaking.

If you find yourself in that kind of situation, I highly suggest you just find a different unit or play solo in CW and just drop with your unit buddies in normal queue. I get that that isn't ideal but having mixed tech for everyone or letting anyone switch factions at any time or giving everyone alter egos (which is effectively the exact same thing) affects the entire game and the entire playerbase. Its not just about you.

Reposting that just in case anyone failed to read it. ^ this

[Kyone Akashi]

Corralis, on 25 October 2014 - 07:59 AM, said:

How very condescending of you. So let me get this straight, you don't want to see random players in Clan Mech's during CW if they are fighting for the IS side? Well I don't think it's right for you to decide how other players have fun in this game. That is solely up to the developer.

Then why did you bring it up as a complaint, if it is up to the developer? Is my criticism towards your opinion less valid than your criticism towards the dev?

Corralis, on 25 October 2014 - 07:59 AM, said:

Oh and just so you know, I have a lot of knowledge of the Battletech universe but this is not a matter of lore, this is a matter of forcing players to play a game a certain way and maybe there are some people out there that don't want that restriction being placed on them (like me for example).

So, let me get this straight. You:

• were aware that in the universe of Battletech, Clan-tech in this era is reserved for the Clans
  
• are unwilling to use the compromise of being able to switch back and forth IS and Clans in CW
  
• are also unwilling to simply miss out on CW and use the "anything goes" normal drop queue

Do you at least realise that there are "maybe some people out there" that do want to see these restrictions enforced, because they are playing this game because it is Battletech (like me, for example), rather than just "Huge Robots Fighting" without care for the background?

This has nothing to do with being "condescending". I do not wish to ruin your enjoyment of the game, but you have to understand that our interests and wishes for this game are conflicting, and so you should not be surprised to see people arguing against something you proposed. Simply because they just want to have fun, too.

[Prussian Havoc]

Community Warfare for the better than 500 units (likely more, though this number is based on a viability check of http://mwomercs.com/...35#entry3848435) will preclude all but the largest units from ever "tagging" a planet. The wil be no exclusive contracts with individual units. All 500+ Units will be engaged in a Grand Melee, a free-for-all in pursuit of the ever precious "Token."

(I just hope my small unit gains a single token to call its own! If there were some ingame way for PGI to make these tokens persist in a small but meaningful fashion... maybe like Battle Streamers on the guidons/flags of real-world units. In MWO it might only ever be a line of text under a tab of the Faction page but if these wins/tokens could end up being represented on individual unit Faction pages, that would be something that smaller / micro units could hang their hats on, when the 100+ gamer units claim planet after planet.)

One thing that I completely support from PGI's earlier CW updates is that MWO's CW effort needs to be iterative. "Seasons" are a great way for PGI to take some risks with CW design and then "learn lessons" with each Season.

I would like to see PGI given license to be aggressive in crafting a Community Warfare eperience that isn't forced (because the Forum Community has flamed so hotly and persistently against "Season") to be so very "Vanilla" that it has built into it mechanisms that pretty much freely allow gamers to transition back and forth across the MWO-permeable boundary between IS and Clans. "Month-long" contracts AND mercenaries working for the Clans!!! This makes the lore-loving part of me cringe. But unless we as a forum community get behind "Seasons" or some other form of iterative flexibility for PGI, we are in effect forcing PGI to give us a version of MWO CW that is so bland, vanilla, non-attributional and without either positive or negative consequences that there will not be much difference from the public or CW queues. "Drop in whatever Mech you want, it really makes no difference."

Sure, "Seasons" will end... BUT while "in- season" and if PGI gets aggressive in game design (and not trying to pleas so many people that well, the Clans end up hiring Mercenaries!) these "in-season" CW experience can be meaningful and loaded with both positive and negative consequences.

I would much prefer a "Season" of comparatively deeper BattleTech immersion, than an endless CW experience where the Clans hire Mercs!!

Edited by Prussian Havoc, 25 October 2014 - 06:03 PM.

[Logan Hawke]

Hoax415, on 25 October 2014 - 04:08 PM, said:

-snip-

I'm guessing you decided to claim that I support non clans using clan mechs because I offended you by responding to your less than stellar civility in kind? Try reading through the last couple of pages, you know, the ones where arguments, opinions, and ideas were fleshed out and an understanding was reached more or less instead of throwing accusations and seeing where they stick.

Prussian Havoc, on 25 October 2014 - 05:59 PM, said:

-very good points and explanations-

You see, this guy gets it. He gets why seasons are better than 'in the grim darkness of the far future there is only war'. With seasons you can have impactful decisions, you can have faction mechs, you can have meaningful repercussions, you can have all of that good lore and RP friendly stuff without players being upset and unable to experience the game in its entirety thanks to the very nature of Seasons.
Remember in MW4 Mercs you could fight the campaign from both lyran and davion sides? Did anyone not play through both campaigns to get the different experience?
I bet people would be more open to the idea if they were called 'campaigns' instead of 'seasons'.

Edited by Logan Hawke, 25 October 2014 - 07:06 PM.

[Prussian Havoc]

Logan Hawke, on 25 October 2014 - 06:46 PM, said:

...You see, this guy gets it. He gets why seasons are better than 'in the grim darkness of the far future there is only war'. With seasons you can have impactful decisions, you can have faction mechs, you can have meaningful repercussions, you can have all of that good lore and RP friendly stuff without players being upset and unable to experience the game in its entirety thanks to the very nature of Seasons.
Remember in MW4 Mercs you could fight the campaign from both lyran and davion sides? Did anyone not play through both campaigns to get the different experience?
I bet people would be more open to the idea if they were called 'campaigns' instead of 'seasons'.

Glad I was able to contribute to the ongoing discussion.

And who is to say once PGI has a few iterations under its belt and a viable/enjoyable set of CW mechanisms that "Campaigns/Seasons" can't run longer and longer or are eventually eliminated all together?

My point is that PGI needs maximum flexibility to both assure itself that inaugural MWO CW can't harm the size of the "paying" player base AND that PGI needs to be aggressive in moving toward substantive, and increasingly Lore-centric Community Warfare.

A period of Iterative/Seasonal/Campaign "learning experiences" just may serve to finally move us toward the MWO CW we all thought we would have many months ago.

[Hoax415]

Logan Hawke, on 25 October 2014 - 06:46 PM, said:

I'm guessing you decided to claim that I support non clans using clan mechs because I offended you by responding to your less than stellar civility in kind? Try reading through the last couple of pages, you know, the ones where arguments, opinions, and ideas were fleshed out and an understanding was reached more or less instead of throwing accusations and seeing where they stick.

You can't expect me to bother with you after you pretend direct quotations aren't quotations so you can dodge owning up to your own words.

Edited by Hoax415, 25 October 2014 - 08:36 PM.

[Cimarb]

If you want a leaderboard system and to play the same "seasons" over and over again, please check out the MRBC, MCW and similar leagues that are already in the game. They cater to this type of playstyle.

We want Community Warfare, where there is a persistent and growing/evolving "world" that is not stuck like a broken record.

[Prussian Havoc]

Cimarb, on 25 October 2014 - 10:01 PM, said:

If you want a leaderboard system and to play the same "seasons" over and over again, please check out the MRBC, MCW and similar leagues that are already in the game. They cater to this type of playstyle.

We want Community Warfare, where there is a persistent and growing/evolving "world" that is not stuck like a broken record.

PGI needs to be able to govern and manage any incarnation of MWO CW.

That is why only two planets between House boundaries will be open for Attack and Defense per side. Gamer-distribution in no why approximates BattleTech force distribution between Houses. IMHO Steiner (with remarkably few exceptions) has the numbers and quality of MechWarriors to soon dominate the other Inner-Sphere Houses in any manner of unconstrained CW. Then Steiner would largely be annihilated by Clan overmatch in the numbers of MechWarriors. IMHO this Clan overmatch is so very much more pronounced in MWO whereas in BattleTech the Clans were significantly less numeric but were able to at least during the initial waves of invasion "consume the Inner Sphere elephant, one bite at a time."

Just look at the upcoming Quirk Pass... to even stand a chance in a Mech on Mech contest for Worlds, the IS needs upwards of 50% performance buffs (just check out the Awesome hero for an example of this upper limit buff.) These quirks along with limiting the number of planets a House or Clan can lose in a given week are just two of the levers PGI has put in place in an attempt to prolong the initial attempt at CW.

A third significant mechanism is PGI's attempt at using Market dynamics to get gamers to quickly and efficiently transition between mismatched combatants. Higher rewards for contracts to losing Houses ect will drive us so far past the "persistent and growing world" you are looking for that the Clans will even need to be able to hire Mercenaries in order to maintain ANY resemblance to a lore-centric (or otherwise) balance between Clans.

That is why seasons (at least initially) makes sense. Give PGI a chance to run some iterations and look into the resulting game/faction/unit metrics before there is blood in the forums over a "persistent BattleTech Universe."


Does that not appear prudent?

[Sam Slade]

Kay Wolf, on 25 October 2014 - 11:47 AM, said:

http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__3805787


You, apparently, never played MechWarrior before MWO. That's okay, I understand ignorance of what came before, especially if you have no reference. However, there are definitely better ways, probably easier for PGI to deal with, as well, for making Community Warfare operable in a fashion far better than the choices PGI have made, to this point.

Oh, and Sam... you're not interference, but a target.

In all seriousness, the kind of interference I'm talking about is having multiple units under, or allied to a single Faction working on the same planet. There is no exclusivity for Merc units, at all, in that instance and especially not for smaller units who work very hard to capture objectives, to work over a world, etc., only to have all of that hard work taken away, jacked, by 'friendlies'. "Yeah, thanks for your service, Armageddon Unlimited, but you couldn't stay on your full range of time, across three different fight times, to capture a world, so you don't get anything. See ya next time." Yeah, thanks a lot PGI for setting up a bogus system.

This is not a recruitment problem, not a training problem, it's a time problem. I currently have one MechWarrior in AU capable of remaining on the better portion of the time, and even he's getting to be damned tired of doing so. I also have about four MechWarrior's capable of remaining on for more then three hours at a time, so that's five, as long as the conquest of a world doesn't take too long and there's enough variation to make the game worth it -at present, it is not for this sort of thing. I cannot stay on more than three hours per night, even on weekends -I'm busy taking care of unit stuff, or trying to relax a bit before returning to work on Monday morning, usually very damned early-, and I'm looking at cutting those down to two, because real-life activities are beginning to suffer as a result of my being on too long each night.

No, the system being introduced is not realistic, it's not fair to unit's who get on for more than just PUGging, and it's something that should, very seriously, be reconsidered. A view to the lore of the game would definitely be of assistance in this instance, as many of the answers to what SHOULD be put in this game, especially because it will need to be adapted from the base, but could all be modeled without sapping the fun out, as so many ignorant of the rules of BattleTech -and all of its supplements- continually cry about, are found in those materials.

So, just a thought... there are perhaps 10 really(stress really) highly regarded Merc units in BT lore and only half that number are truly feared by IS House and Clan alike... how many of these Mercs can boast a landhold of their own?(Arc Royal Defence Cordon doesn't count, took Wolf in Exile to cement it).

Point of this is that the attitude to mercs, by and large, really is 'Thanks now get of my planet while I let you keep your salvage'. Seems to me that quite a bit of the home baked lore attached to player factions is getting far to big for its boots; we are not the Morgan Kell's, Jamie Wolf's and Grayson Carlye's of the universe... because those guys I just mentioned are.

So, you fought and died and loved and lost and oh the humanity to take this world... here's your two pennies for the ferry man. Deal with it or quit the merc life and drive an Agri-mech.

Edited by Sam Slade, 26 October 2014 - 01:39 AM.

[Bongo TauKat]

Awesome! I have been looking forward to CW for awhile, sticking it out and not giving into the "it will never happen" movement. I do have a question. With the rank specific items are we talking about faction ranks or ranks based on our individual unit basis? I see a numeric value for each one of ours and would assume that it would be the ladder.

[Logan Hawke]

Hoax415, on 25 October 2014 - 08:34 PM, said:

You can't expect me to bother with you after you pretend direct quotations aren't quotations so you can dodge owning up to your own words.

That statement is so disconnected from reality I don't know how to respond to it. Have fun in whatever fantasy world you're living in.

Cimarb, on 25 October 2014 - 10:01 PM, said:

If you want a leaderboard system and to play the same "seasons" over and over again, please check out the MRBC, MCW and similar leagues that are already in the game. They cater to this type of playstyle.

We want Community Warfare, where there is a persistent and growing/evolving "world" that is not stuck like a broken record.

He wasn't talking about leaderboards, he was talking about 'campaigns' giving us a the ability to have truly meaningful decisions and actions. We could have faction specific mechs without it being a problem, we could have true weight behind actions because though they are permanent within the campaign, in 4-6 months a new campaign will begin so it's not permanently restricting like applying the same thing to the 'endless war' would do. It's a way for there to both be hardcore RPing and casual players all enjoying the same mode without it ruining immersion.

And try thinking about them like D&D campaign modules instead of seasons, it's closer to what it would be and it might make you feel less like it's supposed to be 'sooper leet competitive', you know? The name 'season' really doesn't give the right message, just like the name 'player council' gave a different impression from what it was supposed to be

Edited by Logan Hawke, 26 October 2014 - 08:40 AM.

[Threat Doc]

Okay, there are a few things I think you're not right about, here, and I'll go through them as I read...

Sam Slade, on 26 October 2014 - 01:36 AM, said:

So, just a thought... there are perhaps 10 really(stress really) highly regarded Merc units in BT lore and only half that number are truly feared by IS House and Clan alike... how many of these Mercs can boast a landhold of their own?(Arc Royal Defence Cordon doesn't count, took Wolf in Exile to cement it).

Point of this is that the attitude to mercs, by and large, really is 'Thanks now get of my planet while I let you keep your salvage'. Seems to me that quite a bit of the home baked lore attached to player factions is getting far to big for its boots; we are not the Morgan Kell's, Jamie Wolf's and Grayson Carlye's of the universe... because those guys I just mentioned are.

First, you've missed the idea that, though we may eventually see the Canon Merc Unit's in this game, PGI have said no one will ever control them, and that we are to make up our own... well, everything. You know what that makes our combat elements within MechWarrior Online? Canon. Within MechWarrior Online WE are the Canon elements that will participate in this game. The character I have built for command of Armageddon Unlimited, as with his Grandfather before him, is every bit as good as Morgan Kell EVER was, and is better in certain ways, and worse in others, but every bit as epic. You might not like that idea, but that is what it is, because specific Canon units are not allowed, only the House's and Clan's, at this point.

Second, you are absolutely right that Mercs are terribly mistreated within the lore of BattleTech; however, that mistreatment is based off systems set within the lore, systems that -much to my chagrin- PGI are ignoring wholesale. They are, instead, going for a system where even a Merc Unit can work hard enough to take and hold a world, to have their flag fly over it until that world is taken from them. I disagree with this wholeheartedly, and believe PGI should pay more attention to the lore than their very obvious means of development AWAY from the lore.

I keep hearing how the Engineers are cringing at certain things, such as objective warfare and a true-to-game contracting system, because they don't know how to make them happen. Tough *****, they are there to do a job, and that job will force them to learn how to do more, will push them to their limits and make them better, and we will get a better game as a result. It's not up to the Engineers to cringe and cry and say it can't be done; it IS up to management to say "this is what we're doing, figure it out", and then ensure that gets done. Russ Bullock and Bryan Ekman and Paul Inouye gave us the basic specs of what they intended to do with this game very early on in development, through various means, including blogs and Q&A threads, and though we have received the mechanically safe portions of that, the release of items that are vital to a successful BattleTech-game-on-the-computer have been avoided or changed to the point where the original plan is not only unrecognizable in the work, but development has been to the detriment of the game overall.

For the game that it is, I agree with a lot of what has been done by PGI; however, they have seriously missed the mark and, even though I am a unit leader, a Commander, and I have done tens of thousands of man-hours worth of work on the present and prior web sites, on recruitment, on ladder development for those who want positions of authority in the unit, who wish to advance and help me run things, and even though I think the 'Mech Combat Simulator portion of MWO is very nearly perfect, I have been thinking a lot about leaving, lately.

Except for ECM and Light 'Mechs, the MCS is nearly perfect, as I expressed, but the MCS is not holding my interest, anymore, and some of my most stalwart people are leaving. Why? The MCS is not enough, that's why, and with the BS that PGI have been coming up with concerning how Community Warfare will work... I doubt many Commander's will stick around; if they don't stick around, neither will the players, or else PGI will get a bunch of free-wheeling twitch Commander's who will form their units, stay for a few months, and then go play something else. PGI is NOT taking the logistics and warfare portions of Community Warfare seriously, they are all but ignoring the importance of Factions, they are going against, or short of, everything that NEEDS to be seen in Community Warfare, and they have not queried the community, not one bit, about how it should be designed. They should have a Commander's Council already, and should have been asking, perhaps for the last year, what Commander's will be looking for in CW. Instead, we get a "robust" contracting system that allows you to align yourself and your unit with one of the five House's for one, two, or four months, or permanently, and we're not even getting the **** contracting system that was mentioned in September 2013 at the shindig they had here in the U.S. We're not getting, to the best of my knowledge, stupid bounties, planetary assault contracts, anything, let alone those things that hail out of the Mercenary's Handbooks.

We were told we would have means of really managing our units, including awards, and we've not only seen nothing of that, yet, but we're not going to see it, now, if I understand what's been written correctly.

Why should there be a Commander's Council, to help design Community Warfare? Because the larger portion of us are logistical experts as a result of BattleTech, have moved into real-life positions of authority and management, have budgeted and moved around, whether in our real-world jobs or on paper for BattleTech, forces to accommodate better prosperity and effectiveness for our units, and we understand what Merc Unit management, contracting, objective warfare, and drops for objectives and planetary assaults should look like, according to the available mechanics and source information for BattleTech. We are far more qualified than the lot at PGI to develop what Community Warfare should look like, but we are ignored, shunted off to the side, and the most ridiculous decisions are being made, right now, by the majority of people at PGI who couldn't care less about the mechanics or lore that should be shoved as tightly as possible into CW. Russ, Bryan, and Paul may care about it, and there may be some working at PGI who understand what it's about, but when Engineer's who don't know how important it is come back and say, "we have a better way to do this", that's what gets done, instead of what would be right to get done.

A lot of that is going to be financially driven, because PGI has to get to the end-goal, even if that end-goal is little more than a faint shadow of what was originally planned, because PGI would not hear us, period. Had this game been developed, especially the MCS, from the ground up the way PGI said they were going to do it, which is where they derived all of their initial money from in the first place, from the Founder's pack sales, because the Founder's came here to have a BattleTech-on-the-computer game, there would be no question that PGI would be swimming in cash, that the 90% of BattleTech and MechWarrior veterans who have now vacated this game would not have done so, and there would be cash to spare. Now, however, if I fail to ignore the obvious signs of this game's development, I think we'll be lucky to see ANY portion of CW designed as originally planned, or EVEN as re-stated at the 2013 shindig.

How does all of this relate to the silliness being planned and implemented, now, that will not allow a Merc Unit to do its job and have even the remotest opportunity -unless that Merc Unit is huge- to take and hold a world? Really piss-poor design choices, and more of an 'ooh cool' factor than a 'stay the course' one, and a distinct lack of money and population as a result. If this game turns out as Paul and the gang have now described it, if more work is not put into it, and the workmanship comes out to be crap for the CW side of this game, and development for the Factions is not more robust in the end, taken a great deal more seriously than it is, now, in all likelihood I will not play that weak-ass crap, and will stay PUGging, or will cut my losses and go do something else. That 'ooh cool' factor is killing this game, period.

Trust me when I tell you it's not just about me wanting to have the game I want to have, period; I'm not selfish like that. However, it IS about PGI not staying the course to build the game they wanted to build from the get-go, and worse than that, they're building nothing more than an economy simulator to control how drops will work in the MCS. I honestly try to not be negative when I'm posting... I hate it, especially since my life is much improved over what it was months back; however, all of these things are striking me, this morning, and it's been eating at me for a VERY long time that this game is nowhere close to what it should have been by COB 2012, and again by COB 2013, and what has been promised for COB 2014. Sometimes, I have to vent; so, I can only apologize and ask for forgiveness if I've poured a little poison into the well. However, I also think it's par for the course, that if the majority of gamers once on this site were ignored, and they were smarter than I am and got out early, that someone needed to stay and be a voice for them.

So, circling back to the subject at-hand... the way planetary warfare is being planned will disallow, heavily, for my Merc Unit to be able to do anything that will allow us the opportunity to win on ANY world, unless we build up a huge reserve of MechWarrior's and go straight to combat EVERY SINGLE TIME. Smaller units should have objectives they can take, and a contracting system that will back them up to do so, while medium units should be able to take larger combat contracts, and huge units can also either farm out smaller portions of their units to do small to medium contracts, or they can just start taking over planets at their leisure.

Understanding that Paul has explained, twice now, that Community Warfare Phase Two will not be much more robust than fighting on a basic objectives map, and that what will be in the contracting system for Phase Two will only be the beginning, in all likelihood, and that bigger things are planned for at least one further Phase down the road, my only hope is that PGI will be returning to the game-plan they developed from the beginning, eventually, and that a more veteran-friendly environment will make this game last, in the end, a very long time.

I apologize about the wall-o-text.

[Sam Slade]

Kay Wolf, on 26 October 2014 - 09:11 AM, said:

First, you've missed the idea that, though we may eventually see the Canon Merc Unit's in this game, PGI have said no one will ever control them, and that we are to make up our own... well, everything. You know what that makes our combat elements within MechWarrior Online? Canon. Within MechWarrior Online WE are the Canon elements that will participate in this game. The character I have built for command of Armageddon Unlimited, as with his Grandfather before him, is every bit as good as Morgan Kell EVER was, and is better in certain ways, and worse in others, but every bit as epic. You might not like that idea, but that is what it is, because specific Canon units are not allowed, only the House's and Clan's, at this point.

Second, you are absolutely right that Mercs are terribly mistreated within the lore of BattleTech; however, that mistreatment is based off systems set within the lore, systems that -much to my chagrin- PGI are ignoring wholesale.

Ok, I think you may be putting the cart before the horse a little here. Many of the concepts you touched on are still quite possible as the framework of CW is developed; that said I would simply advocate waiting until they see how this architecture works.

However, on the notion of any players home made merc unit being the equal of the BT story worlds defining merc groups I would say it is pie in the sky ambition. Consider that perhaps CW for Pugs/Casual players will need end game content, that the semi-permanent nature of these canon corps contracts in the story world makes them a great editorial 'ace in the hole' to hold onto in CW development, that specific events involving the daring and decisions of these merc groups in the time line is a great sales tool... consider all the options and more and then reflect on exactly how canon and important the plethora of player made merc gangs are; I stand by my prior allusion to pennies for the ferryman.

[Macksheen]

Is there a way to simplify this a bit? Something that seems - dunno - less complex?

Make it so there are three kinds of games - public, private and invasion. Public and private stay largely the same.

If you choose invasion, you will have a smaller pool of maps and game modes.

Every match , say, pick a different "focus area" of the invasion. Maybe it's Wolf invading Steiner.

People playing in lore-appropriate faction mechs (Steiner, Wolf) also get some sort of loyalty points, win or lose. You have to play IS v clan, but again bonus points for running a Steiner mech in Steiner space.

Before you can go ready / play / whatever (solo or group), you're drop-ship bays have to be ready as well. Your entire dropship has to be IS or clan, but you can mix it up w/ which mechs are usually Wolf vs Jade Falcon / whatever. Again, you get bonus points for being in-match for a faction appropriate mech. Groups can't launch until the whole group is ready (drop ship) and lore appropriate (groups fight on the same side).

Weekends have special events with a focus battle - and weight most of the matches for that weekend to be that battle (Steiner vs Wolf). These count more for "moving the map". Each win slightly moves the map one way or the other, but the focus on this area represents big pushes. How you move the map is up to you, but maybe you announce it weekly in a news arcticle.

----------------


This bid/etc. thing seems really complicated ...

[CyclonerM]

I do not think it is complicated. If anything, it simplifies too much imho