124 replies to this topic

[RussianWolf]

HARDKOR, on 01 April 2015 - 08:12 AM, said:

I hope it has some sort of matchmaker or ladder, or it's just going to be more of the same 1/10 ratio for good game vs stomp. 4 vs 4 will reduce the effects of teamwork but it won't fix the rest of the factors that make this game so top heavy.

This game has truly failed at end game content. In most games, when you start getting better, you move up a ladder and you fight better players, and your tactics evolve to fight those better players. In MWO, as you get better, it becomes simpler and simpler and in the end, most of your in game improvements come in leveling up your ability to farm people out quickly, not in your ability to defeat high skilled players. This blows my mind, as I have never played something so expensive. I would have thought that the high cost of this game would make it a more hardcore experience, but instead, it seems to be 90% casuals, as if it was some sort of console garbage or a browser based game people play at work.

I wonder if star citizen will be like that, too. Spend a bunch of money to get into it, get a good posse together, figure out the game mechanics, then spend the majority of the time bored.

This problem stems for the population size. Since this was approached as a team based game from the start, it became very niche. If they had added in Solaris 7 early it would have pulled in a larger crowd (people who didn't know the franchise, but liked the concept and the esports area) and you'd have enough people in it to segregate the skill levels more. With a low pop, you can't do that or you alienate the fringes.

[Mystere]

HARDKOR, on 01 April 2015 - 06:24 AM, said:

When you have people proudly exclaiming that they are never going to get on a team or that they don't run the meta, it's a toxic environment.

Ahem!

The first two highlighted items have no relation to the third. So choose your words carefully if your intent was not to use a wide brush.

[RussianWolf]

Mystere, on 01 April 2015 - 08:25 AM, said:

Then play for "fun" and not for "best practices". In the end, that is the point, right?

Oh I do, but I find the public queue much more enjoyable because the variety of mechs and builds is wider. Even if I derp in CW and take a Quickdraw, most others don't. So it stays boring. Public queue I can derp in any mech (Running a lot of Mist Lynxes at the moment) and I see plenty of others running the full gambit of mechs, some uber quirks and some next to stock. It's more entertaining for me.

[HARDKOR]

RussianWolf, on 01 April 2015 - 08:28 AM, said:

This problem stems for the population size. Since this was approached as a team based game from the start, it became very niche. If they had added in Solaris 7 early it would have pulled in a larger crowd (people who didn't know the franchise, but liked the concept and the esports area) and you'd have enough people in it to segregate the skill levels more. With a low pop, you can't do that or you alienate the fringes.

YUS. Solaris should have been the very first thing they did. Balance the game for 1 vs 1, then add players and make bigger maps as you go. Build the competitive community from the ground up by pitting them directly against eachother instead of creating a situation like we have now. 12 vs 12 shouldn't have been added until the game was complete.

Mystere, on 01 April 2015 - 08:31 AM, said:

Ahem!

The first two highlighted items have no relation to the third. So choose your words carefully if your intent was not to use a wide brush.

Hrrrm... I am trying to find a word for when something is ruined by catering to the LCD. I dunno... *goes to make coffee and dabs*

[RussianWolf]

Mystere, on 01 April 2015 - 08:00 AM, said:

As I mentioned in another thread, 4x4 will be good if and only if people don't start flooding the forums with gut-wrenching complaints that hotshot players (especially those dropping as a 2/3/4-man unit) are ruining it for them by always killing them in 5 minutes or less and start demanding that the latter be kept out of their 4x4 queues.

But I am not holding my breath.

agreed but the hot shots I think will be further between. The massed focus fire is one of the big problems I see with CW right now. Everyone packing Gauss, PPC and LL with quirks and those long straight corridors = snipe fest. Rather one dimensional for me. 4v4 will limit that focus and hopefully things will improve a bit. Time to kill is one of the problems for enjoyment, when you die 5 seconds after making contact with the enemy as can happen (I once was headshot by an AC20 as the first shot of the game, I laughed my butt off. I complimented him and he said he just got lucky and was surprised himself, but if that was happening regularly???? These 4AC5 Whales can lay down enough fire by themselves to wreck you quick without any help.) it limits that enjoyment.

As said, hopefully it will be an improvement overall. I'll try it a few matches and see. Maybe it will pull me back into CW, maybe it won't. Reward will be important to me as well because I can do quite well in the Public queue even in losses in that regard.

[SethAbercromby]

4x4 will in my opinion be the most difficult mode when it hits. Since a fight can be lost in seconds, players need to be a lot more careful. The first bad trade can have devastating results once the cards are on the table. One dead 'Mech is an instant loss of 25% of power and the results of focus fire will be much more pronounced. Of course the much lower density of 'Mech makes murderball tactics less viable and flanking Lights have much more freedom of movement and more flexibility to engage, but this tranlates back to requiring capable pilots to utilize them efficiently.

What I think though is standard queue would benefit from 8v8 matchups, lowering the 'Mech density and improving performance and CW remains at 12v12 for high density, but I'd love to see more open maps that require very different approaches to combat.

[ArchSight]

I'm not sure 4v4 will be the right answer for solo dropper's. The amount of damage a single mech can do in a alpha strike has jumped into the 4 shot to kill a 100ton assault through the center torso. 186 divided by 4 = 46.5 damage a shot. Some Mechs can carry 92 damage alpha's that two shot 100ton assaults.

Four mechs with at least 47 damage pin point alpha's will destroy any mech with a single shot from all their weapons. This means teamwork will be just as important as having all 12 mechs together if the game doesn't have a incentive for those mechs to split up.

4v4 may only be able to solve wait times for a match instead of also solving the lack of teamwork when matching solo's together.

[Jon Gotham]

Lord Jay, on 31 March 2015 - 07:12 AM, said:

There will be Pugstomping in CW as long as there are Pugs.

So if you are a solo CW player...

If you are a solo and you do not like your CW experience then do not play it. Play the aspects of the game that you do enjoy.

If you are a solo and you want to improve your CW experience please at least investigate joining a casual unit or at the very least check out your faction TS and drop with some folks.

The impression of organized teams by the general solo population seems very skewed. Most teams are very friendly. Most teams do not have playtime requirements or force people to tryout in order to join. In fact most teams want you to join!

If you join a unit and find you don't like the people, find another unit. There are so many units with different schedules and styles (Mil-Sim, Role Play, Casual, Competitive, etc).

The majority of players find dropping with others a very positive friendship building experience. If you don't like it, try another unit or return to solo dropping. No permanent harm done.

If you are unable or unwilling to join a unit or even try a public TS then your CW options will likely remain limited to mostly pug vs. unit drops. That is the unfortunate reality of the CW experience for the foreseeable future.

PGI has few viable options to change it but you can take steps to try to change your experience.

This post should be rammed down the throats of many, many people on this forum-so much sense in so few words.

RussianWolf, on 31 March 2015 - 08:34 AM, said:

I don't have an easy answer, but I know this.

If you want more people to play (without incentives like free mechs) then it need to be a fun experience for everyone.

And before someone reads into that, a win =/= the only way to have fun. I can have plenty of fun in losses.

PGI threw this event and the pop went up. (I didn't play so I'll take you guys at your word) and fun was had, but many played to get the prize and immediately left. What does that tell you? It must not have been too much fun or they would still be in CW playing.

Fun for everyone you say? Lately the focus seems to be only fun for solo players.
I think you are missing why these people do what they do. Look at the forums, what is said about this mode or that mode. Look what happened to the queue system. This game has a SOLO queue (note neither WoT nor WT has this-why?) in a MULTIPLAYER TEAM game. Think about that for a second. a mode made for people that don't want to operate in a team.
Everytime PGI tries something, the playerbase seem to throw it back in their face.Then 180 a few months later.
We don't want to join teams, or co operate with others-we just want casual games. It's unfair groups have voip and not us.
PGI makes solo queue and sends groups to the naughty corner.
Playerbase then says: hang on, there is no team work in this game. PGI give us voip so we can teamwork.
I mean...O_O much?
We want more tactical games and rolewarfare etc. Ok PGI says, here is CW.....playerbase responds by: OMG!!! peeps are using teamwork in this mode! We have to commit to stuff and try harder....we might have to join teams and talk to people....public TS servers..EHH???!!!-this is no fun. We want pug queue.
The pattern goes on and on.....
The average casual gamer just does not seem to want anything beyond log on and shoot. I've seen it in games over and over. Whenever a dev tries something that requires more than log on and shoot-it goes south. I remember the mouse debacle in WT. A control method with fly-by-wire functionality that basically removes any kind of skill input from flying, and thanks to 360 god radar view makes a LOT of flying tactics invalid. Valid and sensible questions were asked on the forums as to how this fair vs people using joysticks and flying from in the cockpit....
Result? An almighty crapstorm from the casuals defending the chosen control method, because it was easy and they didn't have to learn or commit to anything. It did not matter one iota that it was unfair. Result from that? ALL my WT partners quit the game. I also have not spent ONE PENNY more on it.
With the gaming population as it is now, PGI are stuffed if they want to do more with MWO beyond what we already have-especially if it really needs people to engage beyond log on and shoot. The market for mmo gaming has undergone a huge shift in past few years. The sooner we accept that, and PGI accepts that the longer mwo might live.
It'll live on half blind, weakened a shadow of it's potential but I dare say the "masses" won't care....

Would you want PGI's job? You'd never know just WHAT to do to make your players happy. Everytime they try to do anything new, it's wrong. People whining day after day, like it's somehow PGI's fault they won't talk to other people. As long as current gaming culture persists PGI are stuck with variations on teamsolomatch.
How would you feel sat down in their office, trying to work out what to do?

Davers, on 31 March 2015 - 09:00 AM, said:

I think the upcoming 4v4 mode will really help solo players who want to play CW.

Will it?
Based off of what I read on the forums from solo players I doubt it sadly. The increased pressure to perform well-you can't blend in with 11 others now, it's YOU pulling 25% of the weight. People seem to want casual fun-not effort.
How would you balance it? Would it end up 4 assaults vs 4 assaults?
I hope they are going to consult the solo playerbase. What would happen then if the opfor four used in game voip, and the other three on your team didn't? You'd get smoked.
How would that be fair?

Also what if it was really popular and larger group queue became a desert? That leaves people like me with nowhere to play. What would I do? Quit? Try for a refund? Stick to non cw group queue?
Now if they put a four vs four GROUP queue in as well....now that might be cool....why does it nearly always have to be solos first, groups second?

Edited by kamiko kross, 01 April 2015 - 09:41 AM.

[Davers]

I know a lot of people disagree with me about 4v4. They think it will become a place for 'elite teams only'. But I really think 4v4 will be more about individual pilot skill and less about having 12 mechs focus firing with 60 point alphas. I hope they keep the respawn mechanic for it, and upgrade the turrets to CW equivalent, even if they have to use different ones (with less range for the smaller maps).

[HARDKOR]

kamiko kross, on 01 April 2015 - 09:39 AM, said:

This post should be rammed down the throats of many, many people on this forum-so much sense in so few words.

Fun for everyone you say? Lately the focus seems to be only fun for solo players.
I think you are missing why these people do what they do. Look at the forums, what is said about this mode or that mode. Look what happened to the queue system. This game has a SOLO queue (note neither WoT nor WT has this-why?) in a MULTIPLAYER TEAM game. Think about that for a second. a mode made for people that don't want to operate in a team.
Everytime PGI tries something, the playerbase seem to throw it back in their face.Then 180 a few months later.
We don't want to join teams, or co operate with others-we just want casual games. It's unfair groups have voip and not us.
PGI makes solo queue and sends groups to the naughty corner.
Playerbase then says: hang on, there is no team work in this game. PGI give us voip so we can teamwork.
I mean...O_O much?
We want more tactical games and rolewarfare etc. Ok PGI says, here is CW.....playerbase responds by: OMG!!! peeps are using teamwork in this mode! We have to commit to stuff and try harder....we might have to join teams and talk to people....public TS servers..EHH???!!!-this is no fun. We want pug queue.
The pattern goes on and on.....
The average casual gamer just does not seem to want anything beyond log on and shoot. I've seen it in games over and over. Whenever a dev tries something that requires more than log on and shoot-it goes south. I remember the mouse debacle in WT. A control method with fly-by-wire functionality that basically removes any kind of skill input from flying, and thanks to 360 god radar view makes a LOT of flying tactics invalid. Valid and sensible questions were asked on the forums as to how this fair vs people using joysticks and flying from in the cockpit....
Result? An almighty crapstorm from the casuals defending the chosen control method, because it was easy and they didn't have to learn or commit to anything. It did not matter one iota that it was unfair. Result from that? ALL my WT partners quit the game. I also have not spent ONE PENNY more on it.
With the gaming population as it is now, PGI are stuffed if they want to do more with MWO beyond what we already have-especially if it really needs people to engage beyond log on and shoot. The market for mmo gaming has undergone a huge shift in past few years. The sooner we accept that, and PGI accepts that the longer mwo might live.
It'll live on half blind, weakened a shadow of it's potential but I dare say the "masses" won't care....

Would you want PGI's job? You'd never know just WHAT to do to make your players happy. Everytime they try to do anything new, it's wrong. People whining day after day, like it's somehow PGI's fault they won't talk to other people. As long as current gaming culture persists PGI are stuck with variations on teamsolomatch.
How would you feel sat down in their office, trying to work out what to do?


Will it?
Based off of what I read on the forums from solo players I doubt it sadly. The increased pressure to perform well-you can't blend in with 11 others now, it's YOU pulling 25% of the weight. People seem to want casual fun-not effort.
How would you balance it? Would it end up 4 assaults vs 4 assaults?
I hope they are going to consult the solo playerbase. What would happen then if the opfor four used in game voip, and the other three on your team didn't? You'd get smoked.
How would that be fair?

Also what if it was really popular and larger group queue became a desert? That leaves people like me with nowhere to play. What would I do? Quit? Try for a refund? Stick to non cw group queue?
Now if they put a four vs four GROUP queue in as well....now that might be cool....why does it nearly always have to be solos first, groups second?

QFT

If you want a dumbed down easy game, please GTFO. There is nothing casual about battletech/mechwarrior. There are plenty of stompy robot battle games with no depth that are perfectly suited to the casual gamer.

[Mystere]

HARDKOR, on 01 April 2015 - 08:12 AM, said:

This game has truly failed at end game content. In most games, when you start getting better, you move up a ladder and you fight better players, and your tactics evolve to fight those better players.

That might work for eSports, but that is not what I am here for.

I'm here for Community Warfare (and occasionally bust some egos on Solaris if and when that game mode arrives ).

Edited by Mystere, 01 April 2015 - 09:54 AM.

[Dolph Hoskins]

I think the 4v4 will become the home for people who find joy out of 1:1 number crunching.

I personally like bigger battlefields, more players, and more lasting consequences in a MW game mode. Hence why I like CW more than solo queue. I am looking forward to the LFG feature they are going to add in. That along with VOIP pretty much makes it to where many people can attach themselves to some form of organization without all of the out of game bs.

Some people just seem to over rate what playing a game competitively means to others I think. Not that big of a deal even at the highest levels...

[Screech]

RussianWolf, on 01 April 2015 - 05:20 AM, said:

less intensity in the focused fire should at least increase time to kill. That's the one upside.

Yes, and it would also should have a shorter queue as well which is a plus. But I think that the amount of lopsided matches in these 4x4 games will be extremely high. And then the toxicity from accumulates facerolls could make it very ugly place to play.

The mode is needed to accommodate the small groups but I really don't see it as a viable alternative to CW for puggers.

[Mystere]

Screech, on 01 April 2015 - 09:56 AM, said:

Yes, and it would also should have a shorter queue as well which is a plus. But I think that the amount of lopsided matches in these 4x4 games will be extremely high. And then the toxicity from accumulates facerolls could make it very ugly place to play.

That is exactly what I am predicting.

[Triordinant]

Mystere, on 01 April 2015 - 09:54 AM, said:

I'm here for Community Warfare (and occasionally bust some egos on Solaris if and when that game mode arrives ).

I really hope we get Solaris with a "Skill Only" 1 vs 1 Mode where both competitors have 100% IDENTICAL 'mechs down to the last point of armor and its location. Neither player would have a technological advantage or a team to carry them so it would be the Mode that determines once and for all who's a better Mechwarrior!

[Mystere]

Triordinant, on 01 April 2015 - 12:29 PM, said:

I really hope we get Solaris with a "Skill Only" 1 vs 1 Mode where both competitors have 100% IDENTICAL 'mechs down to the last point of armor and its location. Neither player would have a technological advantage or a team to carry them so it would be the Mode that determines once and for all who's a better Mechwarrior!

Who decides what Mech to use?
Who decides what weapons to mount?
Who decides what modules to use if any?
Who decides what engine to use, how many heat sinks and what type, ECM, CAP/BAP, etc., etc., etc.?

Meh! it will be so devoid of variety and imagination I will not want anything to do with it.

[Triordinant]

Mystere, on 01 April 2015 - 01:03 PM, said:

Who decides what Mech to use?
Who decides what weapons to mount?
Who decides what modules to use if any?
Who decides what engine to use, how many heat sinks and what type, ECM, CAP/BAP, etc., etc., etc.?

Meh! it will be so devoid of variety and imagination I will not want anything to do with it.

They'll implement the Mode using stock 'mechs first. The only thing to make sure is both pilots have the agreed-on 'mech Elited (no need for Mastery since stock 'mechs have no modules).

[HARDKOR]

Building your mech is a substantial part of the game, though. I've never entered any sort of tournament that didn't let you build your own mech.

[Jon Gotham]

HARDKOR, on 01 April 2015 - 09:54 AM, said:

QFT

If you want a dumbed down easy game, please GTFO. There is nothing casual about battletech/mechwarrior. There are plenty of stompy robot battle games with no depth that are perfectly suited to the casual gamer.

You utterly and completely missed my point. I agree with YOU numpty.
However, we have to admit the average player has changed and we are not going to win.The very fact we have a chuggin' SOLO mode in a multiplayer team game should ring alarm bells in your head.
Just read what some of the prosolos actually say, some of it defies any reasoned logic. Yet, here we are.

[Navy Sixes]

ArchSight, on 01 April 2015 - 09:31 AM, said:

I'm not sure 4v4 will be the right answer for solo dropper's.

I think it will be a good place for good solos. A good solo pilot can totally carry 3 mediocre --or even poorly skilled-- teammates against a single enemy lance. In the 12v12 PUGs, this is rarely possible.

On the other hand, players without those solo skills (I believe that in terms of both build-technique and play-style, being good in a group is sort of different from being good solo) are going to have a harder time of it. Even if they allow 4-man premades into 4v4, I still think good solos will find in 4v4 a place to shine (at least a little more brightly than in 12v12).

I'm looking forward to it, myself, and might even give up PUGing 12v12 all together when it drops.