34 replies to this topic

[Crockdaddy]

I am somewhat curious. I think of Star League as a place for the Great House's to negotiate and settle their differences and possibly work on mutual defense against the clans. However, this really is "MERC Star League" where large MERC units can threaten, bully, and House / Clan jump every few weeks.

Kurita was on the receiving end of this for several weeks of getting nailed by Smoked Jags whom were buoyed by a large number of MERC units. At the time we said screw it ... lets bide our time and head South to retake our worlds back from Davion and Steiner. We formed our own alliance with Mariki and Liao. Next thing you know Davions were crumbling while Smoke Jag fattened on the MERCs were chewing their way to Luthien and beyond.

Now, after a 150K win bonus bump, MERCs swarmed in to save the DCMS and retake the space around Luthien. Many MERCs are sincere and we appreciate their help. Many are nothing more than manipulating the map to their purpose. I've personally been threatened by various MERC units about toeing the line with whatever it is they want to do or they will pull support and go back to attacking Kurita or leaving us to the tender mercies of the Smoke Jags. Well guess what, before MERCS piled into Smoke Jag Space, Kurita held its own against the clans.

I see MERCs as a serious double edged sword. I'd rather have an honest battle against Clans and Loyal MERC units than the grand House hopping of some large MERC units in the current game. Right now its all about the "pile" into a House to "save" them ... even if it is the same House they were working to bend over just a few short weeks ago.

I know the game is described as MWO "MERCS" ... but it seems like the Houses themselves are nothing but props and there is no real advantage to being in a House unless you are a serious role player.

TL DR

Why bother being in a House when most of the tangible benefits lie with MERC units? Shouldn't the Houses be the bedrock fo stability with the MERCs nudging / tipping the balance here and there. Not being the Tsunami which they currently are?



Last,

Thanks to the MERCs whom are helping Kurita out this week. This isn't an attack thread, just am curious to what others think on the subject. I'd like to see MERCs have a more subtle role than just simply being the massive hammer. I thought the Clans were supposed to be the hammer in this game which the Houses respond too ... not the MERCs.

Edited by CrockdaddyAoD, 10 February 2015 - 01:26 PM.

[Scoops Kerensky]

You basically mirror my thoughts exactly.

There just aren't any gameplay mechanics to really justify being on permanent contract or trying to be a loyalist right now - the appeal has to be some kind of personal identification with a faction. The population imbalance means that mercenary groups are unto themselves an organized power block that's bigger than anyone else in the game at the moment. That's not their fault for being organized or having more members, but it does make for a more boring metagame long-term if you aren't the mercenaries because any particularly contested front will become a steamroll on the paper map as soon as the mercs appear.

The unpredictability of the merc movements means everyone becomes resigned that their closely contested front could become meaningless in an instant - so everyone starts to get less invested in any kind of border or contest between two powers. I'm not sure how you'd address that but it's something on PGI, not the playerbase to fix.

[Vassago Rain]

I'm not saying CW is all sorts of broken, but yes, it is all sorts of broken.

[Vlad Ward]

Merc life ain't easy, bro. You gotta deal with haters from every corner of the galaxy. No matter where you go, there's always someone mad about that planet you took from them a month ago or the fact that you're not willing to put a ring on their faction and defend the gains you've made from now until the servers shut down after playing with them for two whole weeks.

Mercs trade comfort and stability for moderate gameplay benefits (mostly Mechbays, since c-bill gains are way higher for Permcons until they max out). I'm sure the grass looks real green from over there, but it's not all puppies and roses.

[HARDKOR]

As far as I can tell, being a house loyalist is just a good way to self troll. The rules, the reward structure, the message after the match, and even the URL of the site we're posting on right now makes it very clear that everyone is a merc and that none of the "loyalist units" represent the faction in any way other than that they may have signed a longer contract.

It's like if we were playing my little pony online and all the choices of ponies were the normal girl ponies, but some dudes decided they want to roleplay the girl ponies as the boy ponies, and got salty that the rest of the players were not recognizing how manly their trans ponies were and then they tried to make a transpony tumblr and got mad at all the cis ponies for playing the pony game the way the devs made it instead of the transpony way.

[Mystere]

Vlad Ward, on 10 February 2015 - 02:28 PM, said:

Merc life ain't easy, bro. You gotta deal with haters from every corner of the galaxy. No matter where you go, there's always someone mad about that planet you took from them a month ago or the fact that you're not willing to put a ring on their faction and defend the gains you've made from now until the servers shut down after playing with them for two whole weeks.

Mercs trade comfort and stability for moderate gameplay benefits (mostly Mechbays, since c-bill gains are way higher for Permcons until they max out). I'm sure the grass looks real green from over there, but it's not all puppies and roses.

And this is where unit coffers and faction loyalty can come into play:

• Merc units should operate via contracts.
  
• Merc units can get a contract from a House unit (i.e. "permanent" and possibly even "long-term") only.
  
• Merc units can have only one contract at any given time.
  
• Merc and House units should perform their own negotiations on how much the latter will pay the former.
  
• All c-bill earnings generated by Merc actions go to the House unit. How much of that goes to the mercs depends on the terms of the contract.
  
• Either party has the right to cancel a contract at any time.

The above is only a rough draft and is in no way free of potential exploits.

[Vlad Ward]

Mystere, on 10 February 2015 - 02:46 PM, said:

And this is where unit coffers and faction loyalty can come into play:

• Merc units should operate via contracts.
  
• Merc units can get a contract from a House unit (i.e. "permanent" and possibly even "long-term") only.
  
• Merc units can have only one contract at any given time.
  
• Merc and House units should perform their own negotiations on how much the latter will pay the former.
  
• All c-bill earnings generated by Merc actions go to the House unit. How much of that goes to the mercs depends on the terms of the contract.
  
• Either party has the right to cancel a contract at any time.

The above is only a rough draft and is in no way free of potential exploits.

You also have to deal with guys like this ^ trying to nerf you all day erry day.

Merc Lyfe.

Edited by Vlad Ward, 10 February 2015 - 02:57 PM.

[Mystere]

Vlad Ward, on 10 February 2015 - 02:56 PM, said:

You also have to deal with guys like this ^ trying to nerf you all day erry day.

Merc Lyfe.

Are you saying that mercs should be able to go anywhere, anytime, and basically be doing anything they want?

Hell, if that's the case, let the Clans -- and only the Clans, not IS Factions, and most certainly not mercs ( ) -- be able to jump to any planet along their border. In that way, we -- as in the Clans ( ) -- can all finally say goodbye to that darned planet selection algorithm.

Edited by Mystere, 10 February 2015 - 03:04 PM.

[HARDKOR]

And yeah...

as long as the planets we fight on are chosen by an algorithm, pretending this is some sort of strategy game is a crock. Yep, theres a map. Yep, it's got colors that correspond with factions. Nope, it's not a strategy game, it's just another cue that happens to keep track of your wins.

Maybe one day, it'll be more battletech related, but right now, this is as strategic as Mechassault.

[Majorfatboy]

HARDKOR, on 10 February 2015 - 02:37 PM, said:

It's like if we were playing my little pony online and all the choices of ponies were the normal girl ponies, but some dudes decided they want to roleplay the girl ponies as the boy ponies, and got salty that the rest of the players were not recognizing how manly their trans ponies were and then they tried to make a transpony tumblr and got mad at all the cis ponies for playing the pony game the way the devs made it instead of the transpony way.

Although, if one required manly online horse games, that's already a thing:

http://games.adultsw...nline-game.html

[Davers]

I think it would actually make more sense to decide what house you *don't* like, and then just play the factions that oppose it.

[Chef Kerensky]

HARDKOR, on 10 February 2015 - 02:37 PM, said:

As far as I can tell, being a house loyalist is just a good way to self troll. The rules, the reward structure, the message after the match, and even the URL of the site we're posting on right now makes it very clear that everyone is a merc and that none of the "loyalist units" represent the faction in any way other than that they may have signed a longer contract.

Realtalk, you are a hundred percent correct and the game rewards free-roaming merc contracts with every faction possible right now but I enjoy having a stake in the stupid meaningless dots too much to reconcile with that and I'm waiting with bated breath for loyalist rewards that are worth a damn to abate this problem.

Edited by ChefGerstmann, 10 February 2015 - 06:01 PM.

[Vlad Ward]

ChefGerstmann, on 10 February 2015 - 06:00 PM, said:

Realtalk, you are a hundred percent correct and the game rewards free-roaming merc contracts with every faction possible right now but I enjoy having a stake in the stupid meaningless dots too much to reconcile with that and I'm waiting with bated breath for loyalist rewards that are worth a damn to abate this problem.

The game rewards mercs with what, exactly? Mech Bays? Cups of pop? Do you want some of my Gazelle Dropships? You're welcome to them. It's not like these free-roamers are hitting Rank 20 in each faction using 2-week contracts. Sure, eventually they may hit that point, but we're talking months or years down the line. I know this sounds like an issue since we have Permcons running around with Rank 20 already, but most Merc units aren't anywhere near that level.

Using myself as an example, after spending 3 weeks playing with Smoke Jags at the 2-week contract LP bonus level a couple of our most active guys are hovering around Rank 15. That's slightly more than a third of the way to Rank 20. At that rate, it'd take 9 weeks for a Merc operating at the 2-week contract level to max out CSJ LP. To max out all 10 factions would then require a minimum of 90 weeks, or nearly two years, and even that timeframe would only be achievable if the Mercs stayed in each faction for 9 weeks at a time without leaving in order to prevent eating LP penalties.

So, what's left? Planet tags? Mercs aren't winning planet tags because they're allowed to move around the map. If anything it makes it more difficult to maintain tags since you're unable to defend your own worlds once you leave a faction. If a Merc gets a tag it's because they contributed the most to the conquest or defense of a given world on a given night. That doesn't have anything to do with what kind of contract they picked up.

So where are all these benefits to being a Merc? Are people simply referring to the fact that "Mercs do what they want?" Because Faction players are allowed to do that too. Faction politics is 100% player constructed. If people don't want to deal with that crap, they don't have to, Merc or otherwise.

Edited by Vlad Ward, 10 February 2015 - 06:59 PM.

[Tarl Cabot]

It would be great to see PGI game plan for Loyalists, both Clan and House factions, if there are any. But they did have to start somewhere and that was with mercenaries, who would tend to be more independent, flexible, not be as heavily reliant on in-game communication methods as Loyalists would be, never mind if most players would become actual mercs it would make their lives easier. But it hasn't

It would not hurt if there was a long view game plan, to show they path they are trying to follow. In the beginning several things kept throwing spikes under the wheels but recently PGI has been showing some good headway with the plans they have laid out but I believe many of us would like to see where PGI plans to take us.

[Malcolm Vordermark]

I've got an idea. Since you're all banding together for mutual benefit, why don't you just make rules regarding merc interference?

In your next meeting just say "Look, some merc groups are larger than our loyal house units and do not act in accordance with our agreements. We can't stop them but we can work around them." When they arrive at a faction record all the planets they took, and when they leave allow either those planets or an equal number of planets to be returned the the faction that lost them.

If you guys can handle that, there may be hope for you to push back against the Clans.

[Richter Kerensky]

Rouken, on 10 February 2015 - 09:07 PM, said:

I've got an idea. Since you're all banding together for mutual benefit, why don't you just make rules regarding merc interference?

In your next meeting just say "Look, some merc groups are larger than our loyal house units and do not act in accordance with our agreements. We can't stop them but we can work around them." When they arrive at a faction record all the planets they took, and when they leave allow either those planets or an equal number of planets to be returned the the faction that lost them.

If you guys can handle that, there may be hope for you to push back against the Clans.

Kurita has been attempting to do this with Marik but even if Marik High Command agrees it's difficult to enforce.

[Malcolm Vordermark]

Richter B., on 10 February 2015 - 09:24 PM, said:

Kurita has been attempting to do this with Marik but even if Marik High Command agrees it's difficult to enforce.

Well that is my point. If the new Star League cannot keep its members from fighting when mercs stir up trouble, then how do they expect to keep everyone in the fight against the Clans?

[Chef Kerensky]

Vlad Ward, on 10 February 2015 - 06:58 PM, said:

The game rewards mercs with what, exactly? Mech Bays? Cups of pop? Do you want some of my Gazelle Dropships? You're welcome to them. It's not like these free-roamers are hitting Rank 20 in each faction using 2-week contracts. Sure, eventually they may hit that point, but we're talking months or years down the line. I know this sounds like an issue since we have Permcons running around with Rank 20 already, but most Merc units aren't anywhere near that level.

Using myself as an example, after spending 3 weeks playing with Smoke Jags at the 2-week contract LP bonus level a couple of our most active guys are hovering around Rank 15. That's slightly more than a third of the way to Rank 20. At that rate, it'd take 9 weeks for a Merc operating at the 2-week contract level to max out CSJ LP. To max out all 10 factions would then require a minimum of 90 weeks, or nearly two years, and even that timeframe would only be achievable if the Mercs stayed in each faction for 9 weeks at a time without leaving in order to prevent eating LP penalties.

So, what's left? Planet tags? Mercs aren't winning planet tags because they're allowed to move around the map. If anything it makes it more difficult to maintain tags since you're unable to defend your own worlds once you leave a faction. If a Merc gets a tag it's because they contributed the most to the conquest or defense of a given world on a given night. That doesn't have anything to do with what kind of contract they picked up.

So where are all these benefits to being a Merc? Are people simply referring to the fact that "Mercs do what they want?" Because Faction players are allowed to do that too. Faction politics is 100% player constructed. If people don't want to deal with that crap, they don't have to, Merc or otherwise.

Free mechbays and other cash shop goodies every time you hit level 5 in a faction is a pretty nice incentive, yes.

If your mercs have stuck around with a faction a little longer than most then that's chill, I didn't say anything about that, nor did I say the perks of being a merc need to be lessened. I said that being a loyalist or otherwise sticking around a faction long-term ought to be more lucrative.

[Noesis]

I find this interesting and possibly a little confusing.

The SLDF had a very clear vision in trying to maintain peace and prosperity for humanity. They were in effect considered a large faction with most of the military that would act as a deterant to instability. Also their aims where clear in providing a platform for peace to allow for propsperity to happen and to ensure the welfare and technology of humanity where then promoted and traded to all. (Excluding taxation and limits to periphery elements at the time).

MERCs as units or organisations in essence make their money based on warmongering and opportunities and in effect more a element of chaos with ideals ill suited then to the idea of what the SLDF stood for. Although some MERCs will apply honourable affiliation to houses or themselves having some ethical standpoint, the very fact that they chase money and treat warfare as a buisness means they are interested in promoting war and not peace.

As a result MERCs with their philospohy seem opposed to what the SLDF stood for.

This doesn't however mean that they couldn't just set up a super alliance to manage the ability to do the changing around as you say from IS to Clan but it is also better perhaps not to impose any behaviour onto MERC groups since they have this relationship with warfare that is all to do about the C-bill. This neutrality in essence would allow them to chase contracts or who would pay the best for achievable opportunities and there was/is little concern for philosphies or politics in the main with how MERCs applied their talents.

However with the MRBC and the ability to apply factional contracts presumed to be future mechanics for MWO it would still be expected that the SLDF could still hire MERC groups for their purposes, either as unit or as per any proposed factional related ideals. Assuming that players will have some influence to these matters, even if not ultimatley control them or who is involved with them.

The complications that exist in MWO are associated with MERC factions being more prepared due to more experienced and prepared units prior to the introduction of the Clans and also their relative populations are more by equivalence to factional player populations than would be expected from lore. This and perhaps then the more obvous connected issue of allowing the Clans the ability to use MERCs which would not be plausible as a relationship from a BT perspective. This then allowing for MERCs to have a greater instability to factional objectives or be used as a force multiplyer in a limited theatre. These then moving the understood precedents from BT understanding so that they don't really have the same relationships. Well other than the plausible idea of MERCs being badass due to their need to be good to get paid and be alive to enjoy that payment.

Diplomacy also will have some relevancy here as despite what people think in terms of loyalty to factions but MERC loyalty is bought and paid for with contractual terms and is nothing to do with any sentimental ideas of aligning objectives with their employer though for some MERC units this was relevant. (E.g Wolf dragoons becoming Wardens of the IS). And there were a few distinct and recognisable MERC units set up with specific aims being paid for by factional houses but this was a "bread and butter" relationship and could be considered as loyalist units for all intents and purposes for MWO and not flip-flopping between IS and Clan as per the more understood association of MERCs using variable and temporary contracts.

In short then:

• MERC neutrality needs to be better understood.
  
• MERCs need to be free from political constraints as it is the C-Bill that motivates them.
  
• SLDF as a philosophy doesn't suit the vast majority of MERC units with its aims.
  
• MRBC needs to better apply MERC/Factional relationships.

Edited by Noesis, 11 February 2015 - 03:21 AM.

[Ghogiel]

Mercs have the best thing in CW imo> Ability to change between the 2 main factions. makes it easier to farm and get planets. Though planets don't do anything right now.