174 replies to this topic

[Kroete]

Pjwned, on 29 December 2014 - 03:52 PM, said:

League of Legends still has summoner levels, rune pages, and actually buying champions can take a lot of time for what you get, and it's not much better than MWO as far as grinding. The only thing that LoL does any better is not forcing you to grind unwanted champions to play the ones you like most, and while that is a big improvement because it sucks so much ******* ass dealing with the mech tree in MWO, it's still not that much better.

But you can grind every game influencing item thats not only cosmetical,
hero mechs on the other side are borderline to p2w,
thats the difference between f2p and f2p that is competive.

[MechaBattler]

Kroete, on 29 December 2014 - 06:55 PM, said:

But you can grind every game influencing item thats not only cosmetical,
hero mechs on the other side are borderline to p2w,
thats the difference between f2p and f2p that is competive.

What makes them pay to win? They don't use unique technology that is unavailable to other mechs. They just have different hard points.

[SleekHusky]

Kroete, on 29 December 2014 - 06:55 PM, said:

But you can grind every game influencing item thats not only cosmetical,
hero mechs on the other side are borderline to p2w,
thats the difference between f2p and f2p that is competive.

Seriously? Very few of the hero mechs are actually the best of their chassis. In fact, very few of them are even good. I personally only have bought the Misery, I wouldn't say it's the best Stalker or p2w considering it plays different than other Stalkers but is also not that powerful compared to other mechs if one looks at numbers.
Misery, Jester, Huginn, YLW, Jester, Flame (maybe?), and FireBrand are essentially the only better than average hero mechs. Most of the others are mediocre or actuall pretty bad. And even then skill > mech/build 90% of the time.
Quirks just make this point even more apparent as hero mechs are just another specialization for the particular variant.

As for the original topic on the grind, I completely understand that.
I would say it should be cut down slightly.
My other possible solution is to actually give players their own mech from the start, one they can actually customize. Or perhaps start them with their choice oh weight class after an improved tutorial that lets them try out a mech of each weight class against bots of some sort instead of players with more skill than they do. That, along with a cadet bonus as is in case they feel they made a mistake or wish to fully build the mech they were given.
My third solution is to actually let you earn MC slowly out of a event. As Kiriesani keeps saying, maybe a 5 MC prize every time you win a round. At least you can use that MC to slowly buy mechbays, hero mechs (although it will take a looong time), and convert mxp to gxp.

However I do not know how to properly make a reasonable grind. Pretty much every other f2p game either makes it too easy to get top level stuff at a rate that is too quick or it is unreasonably long.

[mogs01gt]

MechaBattler, on 29 December 2014 - 07:30 PM, said:

What makes them pay to win? They don't use unique technology that is unavailable to other mechs. They just have different hard points.

Some actually have superior hardpoints. That is where the P2W comes in.

[Apnu]

One Medic Army, on 29 December 2014 - 06:19 PM, said:

That only makes sense if you can pay money to not grind.

In MWO there is only grind, premium time hardly makes a difference, hero/champions don't really matter, and you can only spend MC to convert to GXP if you have the XP on a mech to begin with.

Comparison of MWO and WarThunder (another F2P game).

In WT, Premium vehicles double rewards, both of research and money. MWO you get 30%.

In WT, Premium time is +100% research and +150% money. MWO it's +50% to both.

(Fun fact, in MWO the benefits of premium vehicle and premium time are additive, in WT they are multiplicative, which means using both will yield roughly 4x income)

In WT, you can pay real money directly to unlock vehicle modifications (analogous to the mech-tree). MWO you can spend General XP, but to get more GXP is either a completely obtuse grind or you pay money to move leftover XP from a mech you actually play (You still need to have earned the XP somewhere!).

So? My point still stands. Every F2P game has a grind, and a way to short cut that grind. The fact that WT is more Monty Hall with its players than MWO is irrelevant.

[Big C]

If you do not like the grind then get a hero mech or buy premium time, or both and get a lot of cbills per match. This all assumes you are good and know how to play and aim which sadly many people do not from what I can see watching people play.

[One Medic Army]

Apnu, on 29 December 2014 - 08:43 PM, said:

So? My point still stands. Every F2P game has a grind, and a way to short cut that grind. The fact that WT is more Monty Hall with its players than MWO is irrelevant.

My point is that MWO doesn't really cut short the grind when you pay real money.

I can pay money to WarThunder to alleviate the fact I have a job and can only play 1 or maybe 2 hours a day.

MWO even with paying real money I can't make significant progress in that amount of time. it barely feels worth paying money for, and honestly the grind is one of the reasons why it just doesn't feel rewarding playing.

[MechaBattler]

mogs01gt, on 29 December 2014 - 07:50 PM, said:

Some actually have superior hardpoints. That is where the P2W comes in.

Like which ones?

[DaZur]

One Medic Army, on 29 December 2014 - 09:15 PM, said:

My point is that MWO doesn't really cut short the grind when you pay real money.

I can pay money to WarThunder to alleviate the fact I have a job and can only play 1 or maybe 2 hours a day.

MWO even with paying real money I can't make significant progress in that amount of time. it barely feels worth paying money for, and honestly the grind is one of the reasons why it just doesn't feel rewarding playing.

I hear you... and understand your point. Hell, I'm in full agreement that MW:O premium content falls short on mitigating the grind.

That said, there is a fine line between the "haves" and have-nots" that PGI has to be careful not to cross. Even with the paltry premium time available there is already certain aspects of class warfare rumbling within the community.

[Popper100]

A large part of the game being so grindy isn't the fact that earnings are piss poor. Quite the opposite.

But only if you are putting in herculean efforts every single match. The rewards for heavy solo kills are enough to pad out your Com-account for a long while, but it is a rare thing to get more than one a match. Couple this with a very limited pool of cbills to be split between 24 players and you get what is essentially a hard limit on max earnings and a usual low average earnings since so many other things are paltry in comparison to the big kills.

Another thing that does bug me now is tag/narc kills. They should occur regardless of what kills them, since you are attempting to help the team even though they may have no missiles. Yet we had a specific patch to weed this out, because of a knee jerk reaction to people able to make supplementary income from a support item they should have anyway. This same trend occurs for all the other support bonuses, pitiful bonuses that barely justify taking a gun off your mech.

in summary, it is a grind when you aren't in a killing machine you know forwards and backwards to make those massive damage kills. And that is wrong, support should always be equivalent or better to encourage strong teamplay.

Edited by Popper100, 29 December 2014 - 10:31 PM.

[Golden Vulf]

All my clan mechs I've bought for USD. It is a bit of a grind even though C-bills I just spend on weapons and modules.

Like most freemium games, paying real money gets you stuff immediately, though you'll still have to earn c-bills in game for various items.

Since I can't a la carte the Mad Dog, and the Invasion variant isn't that neat to me, it will probably be my first C-bill Clan Mech.

[Apnu]

One Medic Army, on 29 December 2014 - 09:15 PM, said:

My point is that MWO doesn't really cut short the grind when you pay real money.

I can pay money to WarThunder to alleviate the fact I have a job and can only play 1 or maybe 2 hours a day.

MWO even with paying real money I can't make significant progress in that amount of time. it barely feels worth paying money for, and honestly the grind is one of the reasons why it just doesn't feel rewarding playing.

I also have a job, I play one to two hours a day also. I have 45 mechs (mostly mediums, then heavies, then lights, then assaults), most are mastered. I've earned several hundreds of millions of c-bills. It takes time, but in a weekend, playing 2-3 hours a session, with PT running and a hero, I usually can earn enough c-bills to buy any heavy or less mech I want. Longer, or lighter mech, if I don't run PT and/or a hero.

I've paid for this game when I had money and when I don't, I sit with what assets I have and grind out c-bills and GXP the hard way. I joined a unit and drop with buddies that make the game very fun, I also look for ways to have fun when solo'ing the public queue. For me, rewards aren't strictly tied to c-bills and XP.

Mechs are supposed to be epic and worth blood, sweat, love, and tears. This game isn't meant to be pokemech, were you easily collect a hundred mechs in a few hours of play. You can do that if you put out $ for MC or jump into mech packs, and that's awesome because Devs gotta eat and I can't afford to feed the devs all the time.

So, if someone really wants a normal mech, they can put up MC. If someone really wants a CPLT-K2, right now, they can buy $14.95 of MC and have 3000 MC for the mech and a bay for it (more, actually because of the sale right now). Or they can grind out 5 mil. c-bills for it, and probably 3 mil. more to kit it out the way they like. That can be done, easily, with the newbie c-bill bonus everybody gets.

F2P games have grinds, most are fairly punishing if you want to play the game, strictly, for free or with <$20 investment. I played DDO as a free player for quite a while. It took forever, two months, at 1-2 hours per session, to earn up enough Turbine Points to buy a module so I could access a new set of adventures to grind for TP. Unlocking all of DDO, strictly for free, would take, literally, years of time investment. Compared to that, MWO gives away c-bills like Brewster's Millions.

So War Thunder is more free with their economy, that's their business model. You and I don't know why they give out economy so freely compared to MWO, DDO or other MMO games. At the end of your day, when you're sitting down at your computer, its up to you to decide which game is the most rewarding for you to play.

For me, MWO is rewarding enough, for you... well that's up to you to sort out.

[LameoveR]

It needs to remove c-bills completely.Leave only MC. No c-bills - no grind.
Here will still be trial mechs for "free-to-play". Everyone's happy.
Sounds good, eh?

[Bill Lumbar]

Apnu, on 30 December 2014 - 06:54 AM, said:

Mechs are supposed to be epic and worth blood, sweat, love, and tears. This game isn't meant to be pokemech, were you easily collect a hundred mechs in a few hours of play. You can do that if you put out $ for MC or jump into mech packs, and that's awesome because Devs gotta eat and I can't afford to feed the devs all the time.

After reading your post, this is really anyone need to look at out of the entire reply. Numbers have been run by myself and many others that show clearly even if PGI was to boost the earnings by 30-50% for all players, No one even with buying PT would be getting the 200+ mechs out for C-bills right now anytime soon. Your claim that this isn't pokemech and one shouldn't be able to get hundreds of mechs in just a few hours is laughable and complete BS. Why? Because even if PGI raised earnings by 30-50%, even if PT and hero mechs are used, one would have to play this game 4-8 hours a day, 7 days a week, for 8-12 months at least to obtain and earn what mech's are out for c-bills right now, with more coming everyday. No breaks, no skipping days, just a straight part or full time job.....

As for the Dev's needing to eat.... well, if the prices was lower for many of the Items in game, they might just get more sales from a larger crowd and more often. Plus, if earnings are increased, Mech bay sales would sore at the very least, not to mention colors, camo's, pattern sales most likely would increase also. There is a difference from needing to eat, and greed trying to milk die hard BT fans. Are we all there yet? Well, I believe everyone that plays this game will have to decide for themselves on this subject.

Edited by Bill Lumbar, 30 December 2014 - 07:23 AM.

[Apnu]

Bill Lumbar, on 30 December 2014 - 07:20 AM, said:

After reading your post, this is really anyone need to look at out of the entire reply. Numbers have been run by myself and many others that show clearly even if PGI was to boost the earnings by 30-50% for all players, No one even with buying PT would be getting the 200+ mechs out for C-bills right now anytime soon. Your claim that this isn't pokemech and one shouldn't be able to get hundreds of mechs in just a few hours is laughable and complete BS. Why? Because even if PGI raised earnings by 30-50%, even if PT and hero mechs are used, one would have to play this game 4-8 hours a day, 7 days a week, for 8-12 months at least to obtain and earn what mech's are out for c-bills right now, with more coming everyday. No breaks, no skipping days, just a straight part or full time job.....

As for the Dev's needing to eat.... well, if the prices was lower for many of the Items in game, they might just get more sales from a larger crowd and more often. Plus, if earnings are increased, Mech bay sales would sore at the very least, not to mention colors, camo's, pattern sales most likely would increase also. There is a difference from needing to eat, and greed trying to milk die hard BT fans. Are we all there yet? Well, I believe everyone that plays this game will have to decide for themselves on this subject.

I agree that lower MC prices and higher c-bill payouts is a better idea. But what we are discussing and others say in less articulate ways is what the market value of MWO is. Its the classic push-and-pull of consumer and producer. We, the consumers, believe the prices should be lower, and PGI disagrees.

In time this will all be sorted out. Markets always find equilibrium. Sometimes that means bursting the market to get to the real and fair value, sometimes not.

I've sent very loud and clear messages to PGI about prices. Yes I'm a Founder, Phoenix Overlord, and I am a Resistance Wrath level buyer... but notice all of those things give me significantly more bang for my buck. I also have a stable of hero mechs -- none of which I paid full MC for. I will only buy MC when its on sale, and I only buy heroes when they are on sale. I only buy paints and camos and cockpit items when they are on sale. I'm patient, I wait for sales, I grind with free PT I earn here and there or from banked time and I've collected a bunch of 30% c-bill mechs and a handful of Champions for GXP grinding.

I'm not the only one who does this, and I'm sure PGI is aware they're selling lots of MC and heroes right now because of the sale. Heck I bought two! Sooner or later they'll either clue in that players are willing to buy more at lower levels, or they'll decide they are content with the take they have now and leave it at the status quo.

If they take the latter course of thought, that's a pity. Expected, however, given the bone-headedness that permeates business thought these days. You touched upon that. PGI will either realize this or wither and die. I don't want that to happen. I love Battletech so much, but if push comes to shove, I'll walk away when the game isn't fun and too expensive. And that's for me and no one else to decide.

I hope they analyze this soon, there's pretty stiff competition out there, there are bigger games with more assets and budgets that dwarf PGI. Mucking about with MC and low c-bill payouts won't help their competitiveness against other AAA MMO titles. If they want to truly play in that pool they have to be unique and innovative -- otherwise this game will just be a niche title hidden in the noise.

[Cyborne Elemental]

I miss narc bonus cbills..

[Apnu]

Sleek34, on 29 December 2014 - 07:48 PM, said:

My other possible solution is to actually give players their own mech from the start, one they can actually customize.

I like this idea. It could be tied to a tutorial for newbies about how to build a mech in the mechbay.

[Burktross]

King Alen, on 30 December 2014 - 08:10 AM, said:

I dont really see much of a grind, I enjoy the game. been playing 3 months bought Wave 2 and Resistance packs but other then that bought the rest I have 37 mechs total so far (Most are Mastered) and intend to get them all eventually. Its only a grind if your not having fun and I find a way to enjoy all my Mechs even the crappy ones. My advice is to find a way to enjoy your Mechs and have fun in every game no matter if you die with a smooth score of all 0's lol

God bless you and your attention span, playing the same mechs over and over gets stale after a while, no matter how much shop you wreck in them.

[Stormfury]

The grind in this game is painful and it's a shame because I personally feel it's why we lose so many new players to other F2P games. The grind in this game isn't fun, it's tedious. If it were fun, people wouldn't mind it so much but instead they bolt for other F2P games with easier or more enjoyable grinds.

This over the complexity of controls is the reason we're losing players. It needs to be addressed along with the new player experience and a tutorial.

[One Medic Army]

Apnu, on 30 December 2014 - 06:54 AM, said:

I also have a job, I play one to two hours a day also. I have 45 mechs (mostly mediums, then heavies, then lights, then assaults), most are mastered. I've earned several hundreds of millions of c-bills. It takes time, but in a weekend, playing 2-3 hours a session, with PT running and a hero, I usually can earn enough c-bills to buy any heavy or less mech I want. Longer, or lighter mech, if I don't run PT and/or a hero.

I've paid for this game when I had money and when I don't, I sit with what assets I have and grind out c-bills and GXP the hard way. I joined a unit and drop with buddies that make the game very fun, I also look for ways to have fun when solo'ing the public queue. For me, rewards aren't strictly tied to c-bills and XP.

Mechs are supposed to be epic and worth blood, sweat, love, and tears. This game isn't meant to be pokemech, were you easily collect a hundred mechs in a few hours of play. You can do that if you put out $ for MC or jump into mech packs, and that's awesome because Devs gotta eat and I can't afford to feed the devs all the time.

So, if someone really wants a normal mech, they can put up MC. If someone really wants a CPLT-K2, right now, they can buy $14.95 of MC and have 3000 MC for the mech and a bay for it (more, actually because of the sale right now). Or they can grind out 5 mil. c-bills for it, and probably 3 mil. more to kit it out the way they like. That can be done, easily, with the newbie c-bill bonus everybody gets.

F2P games have grinds, most are fairly punishing if you want to play the game, strictly, for free or with <$20 investment. I played DDO as a free player for quite a while. It took forever, two months, at 1-2 hours per session, to earn up enough Turbine Points to buy a module so I could access a new set of adventures to grind for TP. Unlocking all of DDO, strictly for free, would take, literally, years of time investment. Compared to that, MWO gives away c-bills like Brewster's Millions.

So War Thunder is more free with their economy, that's their business model. You and I don't know why they give out economy so freely compared to MWO, DDO or other MMO games. At the end of your day, when you're sitting down at your computer, its up to you to decide which game is the most rewarding for you to play.

For me, MWO is rewarding enough, for you... well that's up to you to sort out.

And you still haven't addressed my primary complaint:

That premium time and hero/champion mechs don't do much to reduce the grind.

Together, with both, you're not even reducing the time investment required by half. That's crap.