472 replies to this topic

[BlakeAteIt]

Oh, dude come over and GET PAID!

[MischiefSC]

BlakeAteIt, on 03 January 2015 - 02:46 PM, said:

I agree with most of these. I haven't grouped with Liao pugs as much. Is that really a thing that is happening, or is that trolling?


Sorry, haven't been around today. Shooting turrets is boring, pretty much.


I guess you would know, being the expert in fighting both? FWIW, though, it goes both ways if it's not certain units in FS.

I would say that when I dropped against Liao that probably 75% of my drops were against units of mostly pugs. I realize the opposite happens all the time; I can drop on a front (Clan, Liao, Marik, doesn't matter) with 6+ members of my unit, win 80% of our matches and then still lose the planet. When I pug solo on any front I would say the vast majority of my drops when I pug are with other pugs + at most a 4man. I would suspect this is exactly what is handing streams of victories to the Clans; most people in CW are (or at least were, hard to say if the stocking stuffer event affected it) pugs, either pugging unit members or straight up lone wolves. Due to the cost of entry for Clans most of their players are experienced players in units. Most of the lone wolves seem to go to the Clan borders.

Where this becomes even more of an issue though is IS vs IS borders - all your pugs can either go fight Clans (which for a pug is like pugging in the group queue) or.... they can drop on the Davion border, which isn't much better.

I don't have an easy fix to it. A 20 hour cycle will help but every faction has european players; population disparity is population disparity. The bigger issue and the big elephant in the room is...

do we want to fix it? Right now it's actually against Davion - Marik and Kurita are eating us up and likely will for a bit unless we really, really double down. I fully expect to lose 1 or 2 worlds a day for a bit if they keep coordinating and focusing on Davion. If Kurita turns back to the Clans we'll probably be happy to break even.

Do we want PGI to create a behind the scenes Elo and act to keep anyone from 'losing'? That's what we're really talking about here. FRR and Liao are, out of the gate, underdogs. Both are pretty doomed. People went into it on both locations knowing (or should have known) that they were in a bad place. Even beyond that, suppose tomorrow all the big comp teams decide to join Kurita and just roll through Davion. Are they not allowed to? Outnumber us 4 to 1 and just keep up a 24x7 stomp. We lost to ghost drops yesterday and today; we were outnumbered and some ghost drops on Davion worlds happened. That's cool; it's the product of superior numbers and how it's represented in the game. In this instance should PGI change something to ensure that we don't lose because of that?

We've got two camps now in regards to CW. One says that it should work much like pug/premade queues do. Things should be balanced regardless of player populations, strategies, etc. The other says CW should be no holds barred, last man standing.

We've already got the first one. I'm in the second camp. The question is do we actually let people lose? Some people will absolutely not play CW because of that - they do not enjoy a situation where things can be absolutely stacked against them. Where the lay of the field can be absolutely and consistently against them.

So the question then becomes do we make CW fair and balanced for everyone and make sure everyone has fun and goes home with a trophy and nobody wins and nobody loses or do we let it play how it plays?

[Lukoi Banacek]

OP...I feel your pain, but you do realize, PGI can actually see the % of matches that are ghost matches and such in the aggregate or however they want to see it? Your anecdotal experience is not really proof and it's a pretty small sample size.

[BlakeAteIt]

Nah, no elo or whatever. Some kind of pay disparity based on planets owned (more planets = more pay) and population size (fewer people = more pay) would be nice.

Or some other kind of bonus. I'm more interested in the rotating window (20hrs seems ok), and something to get people going into CW. Some kind of major change to the group and solo queues may be required. Maybe shift game modes into CW? I'm not sure what the answer is.

[Gorgo7]

StillRadioactive, on 03 January 2015 - 03:59 PM, said:

Because I can't stand when people say "woe is me" when they have the ability to better their own situation.

OP's looking for a handout from PGI when he should be talking to Goons and asking them to work together... you know, actually playing COMMUNITY warfare as a COMMUNITY.



And this right here is why you have a population issue.

Join us and your opinions will be more warmly received.
Until you do you aren't helping, you are working to divide us. Stop it. We don't need the distraction. We have enough problems.
If people saying "woe is me" troubles you, stop reading Liao posts.
Truely, Woe is us! Or haven't you noticed?? In fact, your posts are part of the Woe is Us issue.

Use your skills to defend the 9S from the Clans, be witty with Davion but do it there, not here.
You spend ALL YOUR TIME telling Laio "how it is" and offering suggestions to improve our game experience and how to "come around" to Davions way of thinking.
That is very insulting and I have reported you for it. I will continue to do so until you and the other two trolls settle down or are kicked from the game.
TO BE CLEAR, PEOPLE LIKE YOU MAKE ME SO ANGRY THAT I CONSIDER STOPPING THE $$$ I SPEND ON THIS GAME EVERY MONTH.
DO YOU GET ME?
Spend more time in game and less trolling here.

[MischiefSC]

BlakeAteIt, on 03 January 2015 - 10:40 PM, said:

Nah, no elo or whatever. Some kind of pay disparity based on planets owned (more planets = more pay) and population size (fewer people = more pay) would be nice.

Or some other kind of bonus. I'm more interested in the rotating window (20hrs seems ok), and something to get people going into CW. Some kind of major change to the group and solo queues may be required. Maybe shift game modes into CW? I'm not sure what the answer is.

Been chewing on it all day. Not sure how to make the disparity work - perhaps the better choice than money is a steep, steep increase in LP?

How about exponentially big increases in payout based on the length of a contract? Like 250k and 200 LP *baseline* for groups that sign 28 days with Liao? That way even if things turn around they're making good money still.

Another option is some way to open another viable front for Liao. Just not sure how. They are in a uniquely bad situation in having only 2 borders; this means that if Davion isn't on and attacking/defending, you've got nothing to do. It means pretty much all your pugs are going to be directly negatively impacting the one location all your groups are playing at.

The more you look at it the more Liao is in a uniquely bad situation. Perhaps a unique solution? Units that sign with Liao can earn LP with another faction by defending there (say, Kurita or Marik) or some other significant additional perk. They are stuck in a bad corner with few options. In the long term CW needs to have a solution specific for that. Suppose Davion signed a treaty with Liao; then what? Even if Davion had fewer units than Liao, again, you've got 1 border to fight on.

The issues you're having are not the same as the other factions. The closest would be CSJ; they however have the benefit of a small but very dedicated and very competitive player base and a neighbor who's already spread way too thin. If Kurita bulked up they'd be in the same boat.

So what's a unique solution for Liao? Maybe alternate only 1 attack OR 1 defend world each cycle? I fear that would just have the same problem but slower. Huge big money and prizes? How about the ability to attack on any Clanner front along with the defending unit and actually get to keep the world?

[Chef Kerensky]

StillRadioactive, on 03 January 2015 - 03:50 PM, said:

If you can muster up 3 12-mans, you can lock a planet out from ghost drops for as long as you can keep those players online. The leaders of those 12-mans just have to talk to one another and make it happen. Dropping at random times ain't gonna make it happen.

If you can't muster up 3 12-mans from your entire faction, you should recruit as hard as you can.

Are you implying that factions with a population deficiency should have 36 players available 24 hours a day to duke it out on planets where they're still outnumbered if they don't want to deal with ghost capping? Am I reading this correctly?

[Scoops Kerensky]

He implies whatever justifies results that just happen to benefit Davion. There's no way demanding people accept unfair mechanics will kill off this entire game mode. It doesn't say beta anywhere on the map, this is a good system and it should be stuck to regardless of how many people complain about it. Everything is fine.

[Chef Kerensky]

StillRadioactive, on 02 January 2015 - 09:52 PM, said:

Is this the thread where I post screencaps of planets racked up to 93-100% against us with nobody on them when I sign on during the day?

Seems like this is the thread for it.

I don't know, is this the thread where you post about how you cancel out every gain the European Kurita players have made in the last few hours before ceasefire? You tell me.

[SecondReversal]

Gorgo7, on 03 January 2015 - 10:50 PM, said:

-Whinging-
That is very insulting and I have reported you for it. I will continue to do so until you and the other two trolls settle down or are kicked from the game.
TO BE CLEAR, PEOPLE LIKE YOU MAKE ME SO ANGRY THAT I CONSIDER STOPPING THE $$$ I SPEND ON THIS GAME EVERY MONTH.
DO YOU GET ME?
Spend more time in game and less trolling here.

Which is an interesting thing, as being barraged by posts about how the world is not fair, and how you're so put upon and should be catered to is something that I find infuriating... I suppose we all get to hang about and be angry, eh?

The Lancers might be a bit smug in their presentation, but is it not warranted? Their results speak for themselves. At the end of the day, Mischief and Radio have in fact offered useful suggestions in this and other threads on the Liao board. They are correct in that one-off, anecdotal screenshot "evidence" as posited by the OP, is nigh worthless in analyzing the situation.

I am distinctly uninterested in entering into a forum feud with anyone in this thread, but come on guys, at some point there needs to be acceptance of personal responsibility here - Davions win a lot of drops. Fact. Capellans are routinely outnumbered. Fact. Davions are not to be blamed for this uncontrollable phenomenon. Fact.

This is the way it is - Accept it.

[MischiefSC]

SecondReversal, on 04 January 2015 - 12:40 AM, said:

Which is an interesting thing, as being barraged by posts about how the world is not fair, and how you're so put upon and should be catered to is something that I find infuriating... I suppose we all get to hang about and be angry, eh?

The Lancers might be a bit smug in their presentation, but is it not warranted? Their results speak for themselves. At the end of the day, Mischief and Radio have in fact offered useful suggestions in this and other threads on the Liao board. They are correct in that one-off, anecdotal screenshot "evidence" as posited by the OP, is nigh worthless in analyzing the situation.

I am distinctly uninterested in entering into a forum feud with anyone in this thread, but come on guys, at some point there needs to be acceptance of personal responsibility here - Davions win a lot of drops. Fact. Capellans are routinely outnumbered. Fact. Davions are not to be blamed for this uncontrollable phenomenon. Fact.

This is the way it is - Accept it.

It's hard to call any of it 'accepting personal responsibility' though. The fundamental issue isn't that Liao units are 'doing anything wrong'. They go out, they play and play well, they win some and lose some (like every faction does) but end up losing the battle. With only 1 open front there is not a whole ton to attract new big units unless they really want to fight Davion on 1 world at a time every single day. We've all taken out stab at the Clan borders and, well, let's be honest - who wants to break their back fighting for someone else?

Going to repeat this here because the more I've chewed on it the more I come to it as a solution, the only real long term solution for Liao (or CSJ) -

They need a means of opening new fronts. Unique to those two factions because both of them are stuck in a corner with no real options. CSJ has Kurita on one side and CSB on the other, Liao is stuck between Marik and Davion - both of which have the largest IS faction loyalist units. While mercs may shift between other factions both Marik and Davion are going to have the largest baseline of players. A map reset isn't going to change that and bigger bonuses won't change that. Liao and CSJ need some unique options for opening other fronts. Two more each IMO; that would put them on par with the 4+ everyone else has. An option to attack a border world of another faction *and keep it*. If Liao, for example, jumps in against CGB and *takes the world* they now have a Liao world on the CBG front that may have belonged to the FRR. It can be taken back by anyone bordering it and they can (if able) expand from it.

This would be very attractive to a lot of big merc groups. Far more so than making a bit more money or LP but being pinned in a corner. It would absolutely not be the biggest act of ****** yet committed by MW:O on the lore either. Just say that when Capellan units go help fight on the borders they get to actually refuse to turn them over to the other IS nation there. Say that they got the Impavido 8 years early - it was the first real IS WarShip design to come out anyway and it could take 2 Dropships with it and a crap ton of mechs. It could carry over 27,000 tons of cargo in addition to 2 Overlord class Dropships (each of which carries 36 mechs).

We can make a lot of excuses for why but without some option for Liao to open 2 more fronts there's not a lot of options for them. Even if you give Liao a number of other perks to serve who is going to be happy only having 1 real front to advance on for the next X number of years?

[Chef Kerensky]

SecondReversal, on 04 January 2015 - 12:40 AM, said:

Which is an interesting thing, as being barraged by posts about how the world is not fair, and how you're so put upon and should be catered to is something that I find infuriating... I suppose we all get to hang about and be angry, eh?

The Lancers might be a bit smug in their presentation, but is it not warranted? Their results speak for themselves. At the end of the day, Mischief and Radio have in fact offered useful suggestions in this and other threads on the Liao board. They are correct in that one-off, anecdotal screenshot "evidence" as posited by the OP, is nigh worthless in analyzing the situation.

I am distinctly uninterested in entering into a forum feud with anyone in this thread, but come on guys, at some point there needs to be acceptance of personal responsibility here - Davions win a lot of drops. Fact. Capellans are routinely outnumbered. Fact. Davions are not to be blamed for this uncontrollable phenomenon. Fact.

This is the way it is - Accept it.

You are very correct. Davion is not to blame for taking advantage of a system that is advantageous to them and unfun for their opponents. Addressing this is PGI's responsibility. Hopefully they'll figure out a solution that leaves everyone happy.

[Stoneblade]

ChefGerstmann, on 04 January 2015 - 01:20 AM, said:

You are very correct. Davion is not to blame for taking advantage of a system that is advantageous to them and unfun for their opponents. Addressing this is PGI's responsibility. Hopefully they'll figure out a solution that leaves everyone happy.

Your joking right? Like balancing weapons and ****?

Edited by Stoneblade, 04 January 2015 - 01:48 AM.

[Grynos]

The key is to make it so that all the IS factions have to worry about losing their own territories from clans. I have discussed about this in another forum but for CW to work as a successful game style, it needs to have more than just three IS fronts. I do not need to hear about the lore that it is not right, because it is irrelevant. Every IS faction should fear losing planets to clans. So I suggest that PGI splits up the clans to the outer perimeter of the IS. That would give factions like Davion,Liao,and Marik something to fight and coordinate with for, and would also ease the burden on the factions like FRR, Steiner ,and Kurita . I mean if you think about it Davion has to really only worry about Marik,Kurita , and Liao. Kurita has their hands full with clans, Marik is trying to push back into what Steiner took from them , and Liao has one border where we cannot win a planet and constantly are losing more every day. Davion is a huge faction, yet does not have any fear of losing territories to clans. If they spread out the clans it would actually make for more diverse gameplay. Where if Davion had to worry about clans taking planets then it might lessen the strain on the Liao front, or if FRR only had to worry about one clan they might be able to get their Capitol back.

[Driftwoood]

Lukoi Banacek, on 03 January 2015 - 05:17 PM, said:

OP...I feel your pain, but you do realize, PGI can actually see the % of matches that are ghost matches and such in the aggregate or however they want to see it? Your anecdotal experience is not really proof and it's a pretty small sample size.

The point of this topic was simply to log a screen cap of how Liao loses a planet every night... a pattern has emerges: Liao now loses its Davion border planet every night by virtually uncontested ghost drops, most nights now completely by ghost drops alone... I'm sure PGI has the numbers somewhere, but someone has to actually look at them to see a problem... maybe they are already aware of Liao's plight... or maybe they think ghost drops make up only 2-3% of peak hours matches and don't affect the outcome for planets, and maybe my daily screen caps will show them they do make a difference...

I'm not here to speculate or brainstorm solutions, I don't have the time or inclination, that's what PGI is paid to do... I just thought I'd help point out a problem, it takes minimal effort on my part to add a screen cap when I'm already online playing... I posted in the Liao forum, hoping to avoid any hubbub ... alas, the trolls be everywhere...

I don't blame the Davrats for ghost dropping our planets, and I'm not sure why they are so defensive about it... the facts are clear and I gave up caring about the blips on the map when I realized that we can't do anything to stop them...

CW is still in beta and ghost drops are just one of the problems with it... another big one I hear mentioned is how the larger force in att/def numbers is favored with more attack/counter attack matches vs defense/hold matches, making it very difficult for the smaller group to increase/hold their tokens... much of it comes back to population imbalances... then there's issues like light rushes...

Lots of issues... I'm sure PGI will fix them... or they won't, whatever... the new game play is fun, so...

[StillRadioactive]

ChefGerstmann, on 04 January 2015 - 12:23 AM, said:

I don't know, is this the thread where you post about how you cancel out every gain the European Kurita players have made in the last few hours before ceasefire? You tell me.

Precisely my point. Davion's NAs have a lot of ground to make up every day because of our deficiency in Euro/APAC time zones.

Getting the ****-end of ghost drops is a phenomenon that's unique to any faction. It happens to everyone.

[Chef Kerensky]

StillRadioactive, on 04 January 2015 - 02:33 AM, said:

Precisely my point. Davion's NAs have a lot of ground to make up every day because of our deficiency in Euro/APAC time zones.

Getting the ****-end of ghost drops is a phenomenon that's unique to any faction. It happens to everyone.

You misunderstand my point. Davion does not have any deficit of players. Kurita suffers from the problem of many of its organized units being European; several are German and any work they do is quickly undone by much larger Davion NA populations in the last few hours before ceasefire. You can talk endlessly about how it's really hard work and how it's so harsh and unfair, the fact is that the numbers and the circumstances favor your faction and neither of those things are reflections of skill.

[StillRadioactive]

ChefGerstmann, on 04 January 2015 - 02:55 AM, said:

You misunderstand my point. Davion does not have any deficit of players. Kurita suffers from the problem of many of its organized units being European; several are German and any work they do is quickly undone by much larger Davion NA populations in the last few hours before ceasefire. You can talk endlessly about how it's really hard work and how it's so harsh and unfair, the fact is that the numbers and the circumstances favor your faction and neither of those things are reflections of skill.

I'm afraid you're not getting what I'm trying to say here. I've never said it's harsh or unfair, quite the opposite. My point is that everyone has to deal with ghost drops when worlds are completely undefended, because they're a mechanic of the game, and that Liao is not unique in that regard.

When Davion can't put up players to defend its worlds, they get ghost dropped to 100%. It's just a thing that happens, and it happens regularly. We play around it.

Edited by StillRadioactive, 04 January 2015 - 03:07 AM.

[BlakeAteIt]

I think that part of the issue is that FedCom is a boring boardstate, too. It forces Liao/Marik to ally or eat each other while the FedCom picks up easy worlds on the borders. This leaves Liao with a hoplesss one front battle, and Marik also pretty bad off.

LC+FWL+CC vs FS+DC+FRR or CC+FS+DC vs LC+FRR+FWL would be more fun, I think. We STILL only fight on one border, but at least the factions that split the map are fighting.

They split the FedCom up in lore for a reason. That reason was that it's boring, and dictates an outcome.

All that said, I'm glad we did ally with the FWL, as at least this way we still have some planets...

[Tiger 6]

The real problem here is that we don't have enough players to make CW work.

Right now we have several issues causing this:

1) The maps are bad.
Boreal Vault heavily favours the defenders (to the point that even if its 12 pugs defending), the defenders either really have to derp hard to loose, or the attacking team is well coordinated.
The actual fighting area on Sulphur is so confined that it's really hard to defend when the enemy team is made of groups with a defined plan - I've found teams like TCAF and GS are especially tough to beat here.

Bottom line: Casual players don't want to wait for long periods in the queue, knowing that they likely have a 3 in 4 chance of getting stomped unless they meet an uncoordinated drop of solos - for me right now, there is not enough variety in maps or possible tactics to make it worth playing the pug lottery.

2) The wait times are too long.
If you are not dropping in a large group and/or are really invested in the idea of CW, you really have no idea how long you will have to wait - people get bored and go back to regular games.

3) The lack of ability to make a group with friends from your own faction, not just your own unit.
I'm sure this is discouraging smaller units from getting involved. My own unit has this problem - we know a lot of good Davion players we would love to group up into a 12 man with, and be able to go into the queue with a defined plan and drop deck.
But right now, sync dropping in a larger faction means that a lot of the time its pure luck whether you meet your friends with you in TS, random strangers on the internet who may not may not speak your language, or just simply a bunch of clowns whose drop decks and general behaviour just destroyed any chance you had of winning.

PGI have already tried the band-aid fix of throwing money at the smaller factions (that 'House of contracts' thread is comedy gold, btw ), but it won't address the 3 problems I listed above.

TL;DR
Blaming the "ghost drop bogey man", or "Dirty Davion's numbers" only addresses the symptoms, not the cause of the problem.

Our message to PGI needs to be find away to get more people involved, by a combination of evening the odds for smaller groups and solo's (faction level grouping and /or less "impossible to win if not in a big group" maps), and by having a shorter queue time (i.e. more people involved and more worlds to fight over).

After all that is fixed, we can argue about whether or not we need ghost drops in the game.