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A Different Cw Concept To Spice Things Up?


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#1 Duke Nedo

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Posted 25 December 2014 - 09:29 AM

Chrismas means no gaming time, but lots of thinking time... :) I'd like to throw an idea of a different concept for CW out there for funs. The idea is to make every match count, and even make every single kill able to affect the outcome of the conflict.

I havn't had near enough CW drops to have any idea about tuning something like this, but this is a concept I'd love to drop more in. I'll put all numbers in bold, these are just placeholders for something more appropriate.

What I propose is a system where a unit initiates a campaign when they want to invade an open planet. For a basic invasion, the unit pays N units of the resource X to launch an invading force of say 300 dropships. At this moment, the invading unit could choose the scale of the attack, pay more and launch say 330, or 360, or perhaps up to 600 dropships.

The defenders would have something like 150 dropsships worth of defending mechs for free, but could choose to reinforce a planet once each campaign by paying N units of resource X.

The first conceptual difference now would be that the attackers have a finite number of attempts
(dropships / 3 matches) to get a certain number of wins (territories). They way I imagine this, the defenders would be on the defending side throughout the campaign and need to deny the attacking force any wins. That means that every single match counts.

The second conceptual difference would be that every player can only use say 20 mechs in each campaign. When a mech has been destroyed it can not be part of the drop dock in another match. This would make things interesting imo. First of all, it would mean that if you are losing, it still matters if you manage to take a few of the opponents with you because these particular mechs will not be able to make any more attacks for the remainder of the campaign. If your side loses, all mechs are lost so you primary objective will always be to win the match, surviving will always come second and be more like a bonus. Not sure how to handle ejects, but ejecting and winning should give the mech a chance at least to remain available. Swapping modules from destroyed mechs to available ones should be allowed, but probably not equipment and engines for balance reasons (clans have to buy engines for all mechs). A campaign would last until all invading dropships have launched a game, or until the campaign time has run out. It could be say 11 hours from initiation + 1 hour of cease fire or 23+1. To make it fair over timezones, one could make it so that a campaign has to run over three phases, each being 7+1 hour in order to claim 3 regions of the planet.

At the end, either the planet was saved or invaded to keep it simple. Future iterations could allow for planets being contested if 1 or 2 regions were defended, and allow counterattacking or pushed attacks.

This has pros and cons, but I think the pros are a bit heavier

+ You get to use more of your mechs, not just your top 4
+ Every match counts, not just the last 2 hours
+ Every kill counts, you always have something to play for even if your team folds
+ An elite unit can't demand that other less elite units stay out of the campaign because they only drop a finite amount of times, i.e. until their players have run out of mechs
+ Factions need to work together and try to improve each other by sharing tactics etc, opens up for faction warfare
+ Adds some sense of resource management since you can choose the scale of attacks by paying
+ Spreading out cease fire periods (if it comes to that, in most cases they will probably not be needed)
+ More intuitive, easier to display the result/campaign progress graphically

- Some will feel they "must" buy 12 new stormcrows because they refuse to drop in anything else
- New players may only be able to get one dropdeck and thus only be able to drop once per campaign unless they keep winning cleanly (not necessarily a bad thing for the campaign or CW, but for these players personally for sure)
- Would probably not do anything about ghost matches

There are many many details that would need to be changed/tweaked/trashed, but I would be interested about what you think about the concept...

#2 Dagadegatto

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Posted 25 December 2014 - 11:43 AM

View PostDuke Nedo, on 25 December 2014 - 09:29 AM, said:

Chrismas means no gaming time, but lots of thinking time... :) I'd like to throw an idea of a different concept for CW out there for funs. The idea is to make every match count, and even make every single kill able to affect the outcome of the conflict.

I havn't had near enough CW drops to have any idea about tuning something like this, but this is a concept I'd love to drop more in. I'll put all numbers in bold, these are just placeholders for something more appropriate.

What I propose is a system where a unit initiates a campaign when they want to invade an open planet. For a basic invasion, the unit pays N units of the resource X to launch an invading force of say 300 dropships. At this moment, the invading unit could choose the scale of the attack, pay more and launch say 330, or 360, or perhaps up to 600 dropships.

The defenders would have something like 150 dropsships worth of defending mechs for free, but could choose to reinforce a planet once each campaign by paying N units of resource X.

The first conceptual difference now would be that the attackers have a finite number of attempts
(dropships / 3 matches) to get a certain number of wins (territories). They way I imagine this, the defenders would be on the defending side throughout the campaign and need to deny the attacking force any wins. That means that every single match counts.

The second conceptual difference would be that every player can only use say 20 mechs in each campaign. When a mech has been destroyed it can not be part of the drop dock in another match. This would make things interesting imo. First of all, it would mean that if you are losing, it still matters if you manage to take a few of the opponents with you because these particular mechs will not be able to make any more attacks for the remainder of the campaign. If your side loses, all mechs are lost so you primary objective will always be to win the match, surviving will always come second and be more like a bonus. Not sure how to handle ejects, but ejecting and winning should give the mech a chance at least to remain available. Swapping modules from destroyed mechs to available ones should be allowed, but probably not equipment and engines for balance reasons (clans have to buy engines for all mechs). A campaign would last until all invading dropships have launched a game, or until the campaign time has run out. It could be say 11 hours from initiation + 1 hour of cease fire or 23+1. To make it fair over timezones, one could make it so that a campaign has to run over three phases, each being 7+1 hour in order to claim 3 regions of the planet.

At the end, either the planet was saved or invaded to keep it simple. Future iterations could allow for planets being contested if 1 or 2 regions were defended, and allow counterattacking or pushed attacks.

This has pros and cons, but I think the pros are a bit heavier

+ You get to use more of your mechs, not just your top 4
+ Every match counts, not just the last 2 hours
+ Every kill counts, you always have something to play for even if your team folds
+ An elite unit can't demand that other less elite units stay out of the campaign because they only drop a finite amount of times, i.e. until their players have run out of mechs
+ Factions need to work together and try to improve each other by sharing tactics etc, opens up for faction warfare
+ Adds some sense of resource management since you can choose the scale of attacks by paying
+ Spreading out cease fire periods (if it comes to that, in most cases they will probably not be needed)
+ More intuitive, easier to display the result/campaign progress graphically

- Some will feel they "must" buy 12 new stormcrows because they refuse to drop in anything else
- New players may only be able to get one dropdeck and thus only be able to drop once per campaign unless they keep winning cleanly (not necessarily a bad thing for the campaign or CW, but for these players personally for sure)
- Would probably not do anything about ghost matches

There are many many details that would need to be changed/tweaked/trashed, but I would be interested about what you think about the concept...

+1

Wow, nice writeup. A lot of good ideas but as you pointed out yourself some potential downsides as well.

I love the resources idea or specifically the idea of having a limited number of matches to win over a planet. If nothing else, I would love to see this implemented in some way.

I also like the idea of locking Mechs that are destroyed, forcing players to play with more and different mechs. One of the solutions to the difficulty a player with only a few mechs might face would be to lock mechs for each planet separately and perhaps only lock mechs if your side looses or just lock them for 1 or 2 games so you effectively need a drop deck of 8 or 12. Any player with not enough mechs can just drop on another planet.

#3 LordKnightFandragon

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Posted 25 December 2014 - 03:47 PM

Yeah, a logistics system added into CW would be awesome.

#4 Duke Nedo

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Posted 26 December 2014 - 03:46 AM

Aye, allowing to drop on different planets sounds like a good idea to help players with fewer mechs, good call!

#5 zeves

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Posted 26 December 2014 - 04:18 AM

If there would be some kind of Mech limitation it would prob be a individual player limit of mechs to use each day, witch would be booring. if faction limit on mechs in any way we will prob see griefing. without any way of stopping it,
At the moment we need new maps and phases.
Im not sure if theres a reason the CW maps were made so small ether because of some memmory limitation or just because of that it was rushed. but what about say instead of counter attacking you get a fight where both teams have bases. so whoever wins get a base point.

#6 Duke Nedo

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Posted 01 January 2015 - 06:55 AM

The point of restricting dropping in the same mech over and over again on the same planet fight is to give some meaning to every kill you make, even if you get stomped. If you stick in there and manage to take a mech with you you have actually achieved something for your side. That's the idea atleast. I like that part a lot, from both perspectives!

It would also have the effect that really new players would only drop once or twice per planet conflict, thereby giving the more elite units a bigger impact on the end result and it would do this in a soft way... almost like in a cup fashion, at the end of a conflict only experienced units with many wins would have mechs left and would fight each other for the finale... or perhaps it could be tuned in such a way that it would be likely to happen....

#7 Deathlike

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Posted 11 January 2015 - 10:01 AM

It sounds nice, but I'd expect a multi-dropdeck selection implementation to be added first before this idea even gets more traction.

#8 Joseph Mallan

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Posted 11 January 2015 - 10:14 AM

Except what about us that have zero interest in playing more and different mechs. I am playing for the Lyrans. I want to only use Lyran Mechs for instance.

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 11 January 2015 - 10:14 AM.


#9 Davers

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Posted 11 January 2015 - 12:53 PM

Which defender would pay for reinforcements? How do solo players fit in? Do they take up some of the slots the attackers/defenders paid for? Do they have to buy their own 'ticket' to the battle?

#10 Duke Nedo

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Posted 12 January 2015 - 12:52 AM

I don't want to pretend to have any detailed answers to anything really, when I wrote this up I just wanted to share some christmas-thoughts I had about what would make CW more attractive to me. It's more of a crude direction that one could take to:

1. Make every fight more meaningful

I think this has been thrown around a lot, every single fight needs to count somehow, not just the last few hours. I believe it would go hand in hand with the introduction of logistics to have a limited # of dropships per conflict.

2. Every kill more meaningful

I like the idea of making every single kill an achievement that means something for the outcome of the conflict. By making it so that a destroyed mech can't drop again on that planet for the duration of the campaign would achieve that.

These are the two thoughts I wanted to seed, an actual finished implementable solution will be for someone else to figure out. :)





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