1 reply to this topic

[Artgathan]

The title is a bit of a misnomer, as I feel that there are several issues with invasion mode. The confluence of these issues has culminated in the current 'Zerg Rush' tactic that is arguably the best way for the Attackers to win.

Many have voiced that they want more 'battletech' style battles (where the attackers attempt to overrun the defenders by actually engaging the defenders instead of simply running past them). The issues are thus:

• While the number of mechs on the field has quadrupled, the amount of time available to engage them in has not.
  
• Defenders spawn directly atop of the objective they are to defend
  
• Attackers spawn far from the objective
  
• Chokepoints increase the effectiveness of air and artillery strikes

The first point means that the attackers, if they want to destroy the defenders before attacking the base, must play very aggressively in order to make up for the short amount of time available. However the Attackers are further penalized by the fact that they spawn far away from the objective (meaning that they must spend time walking to engage the enemy), as well as the fact that the Attackers must usually wait for a majority of their group to respawn before moving up (meaning that they will also lose time waiting for people in different respawn waves to arrive).

Using slow-moving Assault and Heavy mechs to assault the base is also difficult as an intelligent defending force will maul these large mechs with Air and Artillery strikes as they pass through the doors to the base.

If the attackers do manage to gain ground, they typically cannot hold it. Assuming that both forces suffer roughly equal casualty rates in a given engagement, the defenders can reinforce their position much more quickly (allowing them to easily overrun the remaining attackers before the Attacker's reinforcements can arrive). Even if the Attackers manage to completely wipe out a defending team, they'll be facing fresh defenders within 30 seconds.

Since the Attackers and Defenders have the same number of mechs available to them, a war of attrition favors the defenders (especially since they receive support fire from turrets and incoming dropships).

Ways to fix these issues including:

• Moving the Defender respawn points away from the base
  
• Moving the Attacker respawn points closer to the base as the battle progresses (for instance, having a secondary drop port on the map that the attackers can capture, and if they do, can choose to spawn there)
  
• Reducing the number of mechs available to the Defenders (for instance, bring 4 mechs, only drop with 3 - I realize this can easily be abused)
  
• Increasing the width of the gates

These changes may necessitate an increase in the number of static defenses in the defender's base to compensate for their reduced number of mechs.

That said, I think Invasion is a nice change of pace from the regular battles we've seen. I'm really enjoying CW so far, I think there simply needs to be a few changes made in order to help get us to that 'battletech/thinking man's shooter' level that PGI is aiming for.

[InspectorG]

I basically posted the same in the Suggested Features thread. Time will tell how much a problem it will be.

I have an idea vs Zerg rush but im not sharing...yet