367 replies to this topic

[Dino Might]

zudukai, on 23 October 2015 - 09:46 AM, said:

what i have been seeing in my unit, and abound is stupid decisions when folks group up - just taking what they want to play for "fun" and having little synergy, instead of running complimenting mechs, or gearing towards a specific playstyle/tactic.

Sounds like you may be part of the problem. Heaven forbid people actually play for fun. Gotta play to WIN!
Not sure if your unit is all the elite players or just run of the mill joes like me, but really, this ultra-comp everything always on the line style of gamesmanship is just...well...sad and boring.

[Mystere]

Kira Onime, on 23 October 2015 - 10:23 AM, said:

You are correct on what you say, as this currently worked in the game without the tonnage system but the problem with this system was, and still is the ability to boat a fuckload on the same chassis/variant.

So what if someone can "boat a fuckload on the same chassis/variant", especially if someone else finds a better "fuckload of whatever", that is then beaten by somebody else's "fuckload of awesomesauce"?

Kira Onime, on 23 October 2015 - 10:23 AM, said:

Yes, A>B>C>A is correct but let me ask you this, was that a new effect from the tonnage system or was it already something you could find in the game without it.

What does the tonnage system really do that is new outside of being able to boat X or Y mech? And at what cost.

I dare say it allows for an even greater variety of formations that go beyond the restrictive 3/3/3/3. Of course, it's up to the players to choose to take advantage of that opportunity.

The fact that the MWO player base in particular, and the gaming world in general, is a cesspool of unimaginative copycats does not change the fact that the potential for variety is bigger.

Kira Onime, on 23 October 2015 - 10:23 AM, said:

That is what the tonnage system lets you do and as long as nothing else is done to limit this, there will always be a sweet spot for this "abuse".

In a related note, maybe humans should not be given better technology. They might just use it to kill each other into extinction anyway.

But on second thought ...

Edited by Mystere, 23 October 2015 - 10:36 AM.

[Kira Onime]

Mystere, on 23 October 2015 - 10:34 AM, said:

So what if someone can "boat a fuckload on the same chassis/variant", especially if someone else finds a better "fuckload of whatever", that is then beaten by somebody else's "fuckload of awesomesauce"?

Then the system offers nothing new to what we previously had and the larger the group, the more restrictive you have to be in what you take since you have little-to-no wiggle room. At least the 3x4 gave those groups something to play with.



Then again it was made pretty clear by Russ that he doesn't like anything above 4 players so this is not really suprising.

Mystere, on 23 October 2015 - 10:34 AM, said:

I dare say it allows for an even greater variety of formations that go beyond the restrictive 3/3/3/3. Of course, it's up to the players to choose to take advantage of that opportunity.

Somewhat agree to some extent.
But then you can have **** like this happen with multiple small groups.
http://imgur.com/a/dkeQi

If you find someone that enjoys facing 7+ assaults on the enemy team please let me. I'll send them to a doctors appointment.

Mystere, on 23 October 2015 - 10:34 AM, said:

The fact that the MWO player base in particular, and the gaming world in general, is a cesspool of unimaginative copycats does not change the fact that the potential for variety is bigger.

Both the 3x4 and the tonnage system have/had room for variety.
Both systems had flaws but I find the ones for the tonnage system to be far greater than the 3x4 restrictions.

Mystere, on 23 October 2015 - 10:34 AM, said:

In a related note, maybe humans should not be given better technology. They might just use it to kill each other into extinction anyway.

But on second thought ...

People are stupid.

[zudukai]

Kira Onime, on 23 October 2015 - 10:23 AM, said:

You are correct on what you say, as this currently worked in the game without the tonnage system but the problem with this system was, and still is the ability to boat a fuckload on the same chassis/variant.

That is what the tonnage system lets you do and as long as nothing else is done to limit this, there will always be a sweet spot for this "abuse".

the problem is, people are having a hard time comprehending and adapting when they see groups of the same chassis, the whole "shoot the scrow!" "what exact scrow!?" element.

it is my opinion that if you really wanted to, you could run 3/3/3/3 and you would inherently be balancing your group, thus making the 12 stacking no longer ideal to counter XX strat.

basically coming back to the players instead of the system to work WITH the system, it is still very early, and as such we see more people starting to grow and adapt, i am seeing many more streaks since the light boon (thanks reddit..) and that is an early sign that the min/max group was a strong early drop deck, also people just playing the WLF, and again early adopters grew a new deck.

it is not that difficult to make a balanced drop deck for your unit, all the common meta is laid bare, and whatever else is hot is usually posted on reddit or a forum similar.

the "abuse" as it's put is simply people stretching their legs in the new freedom we now have, things will settle and a new counters will develop.

who is familiar with CW? all your GrpQ lessons can and have been taught there already!

p.s. thankfully the tonnage system is still being refined, because it's not just a single 12 you need to worry about, what PGI is doing is trying to give the small groups the best chance against a refined deck. (and they still need to tune it farther.)

[Mystere]

Kira Onime, on 23 October 2015 - 10:45 AM, said:

If you find someone that enjoys facing 7+ assaults on the enemy team please let me. I'll send them to a doctors appointment.

You obviously did not enjoy facing Steiner companies as I did before 3/3/3/3.

And no, there is no need to set me up for a doctor's appointment. I just got my clean bill of health, mental and otherwise.

[Kira Onime]

zudukai, on 23 October 2015 - 10:51 AM, said:

the problem is, people are having a hard time comprehending and adapting when they see groups of the same chassis, the whole "shoot the scrow!" "what exact scrow!?" element.

Yeah..
...



.. no.




...well maybe if you're fairly new or inexperienced in the game.

zudukai, on 23 October 2015 - 10:51 AM, said:

basically coming back to the players instead of the system to work WITH the system, it is still very early, and as such we see more people starting to grow and adapt, i am seeing many more streaks since the light boon (thanks reddit..) and that is an early sign that the min/max group was a strong early drop deck, also people just playing the WLF, and again early adopters grew a new deck.

zudukai, on 23 October 2015 - 10:51 AM, said:

it is not that difficult to make a balanced drop deck for your unit, all the common meta is laid bare, and whatever else is hot is usually posted on reddit or a forum similar.

The larger the group, the harder it is to create a balanced and healthy drop deck as you -barely have enough average tonnage. 12 mans currently have 50 tons per player.
3 groups of 4 players have a total tonnage of 1050. This tonnage system is falsely trying to balance teams by putting a heavy handicap on the larger group.

Pretty sure you're aware of this but group queues are never balanced, no matter how large or small the group is and this system only hurts ragtag groups of little billy and his friends that just want to play in a group more than anything.,

zudukai, on 23 October 2015 - 10:51 AM, said:

the "abuse" as it's put is simply people stretching their legs in the new freedom we now have, things will settle and a new counters will develop.

False sense of freedom as the large the group is, the more restrictive it is.
Only "true" sense of freedom this system has is in the very small groups where they can pretty much take anything they want, which in turn leads to scenarios of 8 assaults on a single team.
Seen here. http://imgur.com/a/dkeQi

zudukai, on 23 October 2015 - 10:51 AM, said:

who is familiar with CW? all your GrpQ lessons can and have been taught there already!

CW sucks, end of story.

zudukai, on 23 October 2015 - 10:51 AM, said:

p.s. thankfully the tonnage system is still being refined, because it's not just a single 12 you need to worry about, what PGI is doing is trying to give the small groups the best chance against a refined deck. (and they still need to tune it farther.)

They're giving small groups near "true freedom" vs a severely gimped drop deck.
Not exactly sure I can agree and call it "balance".

Mystere, on 23 October 2015 - 10:55 AM, said:

You obviously did not enjoy facing Steiner companies as I did before 3/3/3/3.

Started in March of this year so I can only imagine.

Mystere, on 23 October 2015 - 10:55 AM, said:

And no, there is no need to set me up for a doctor's appointment. I just got my clean bill of health, mental and otherwise.

Sure you don,t want to? I know a great one just around the corner.

[Mystere]

Kira Onime, on 23 October 2015 - 11:10 AM, said:

Sure you don,t want to? I know a great one just around the corner.

I'm very sure.

Besides, I go to Montreal to enjoy the food and the rest of what the city has to offer, not get poked and prodded. Not even blizzards can stop me from enjoying the new year over there.

[Kira Onime]

Mystere, on 23 October 2015 - 11:20 AM, said:

I'm very sure.

Besides, I go to Montreal to enjoy the food and the rest of what the city has to offer, not get poked and prodded. Not even blizzards can stop me from enjoying the new year over there.

Poutine bro... poutine.

[MischiefSC]

Fire for Effect, on 23 October 2015 - 09:37 AM, said:

since THE TEAMS are being equalized it is essentially completely unimportant what you take with you... so you can try to get the best for you BV but since the wweapons are pretty universally used this evens out to a large degree...




yes these have Battle Value nice that you agree...



And this has to do with BV what exactly? Battle Value is a COMBAT POTENTIAL the ability to dish out and survive incoming damage. This potential is completely independent, does not matter if it comes from a dice roll or a guy pressing the left mouse button. your die roll has NOTHING to do with BV. Die roll is ELO or PSR nothing more nothing less. Both components are perfectly describable in numbers that can be added up and be used to balance sides. If you want to make it more accurate you can even make a defensive and an offensive BV before adding it to a single number.



BV is actually the only useful thing; weight is completely wrong since it describes exactly nothing about loadout or the ability of that paticular mech to dish out or survive damage, and even worse it is fixed you cannot change that number... You dont need magic bullets you just need mathematics.



true and has exactly nothing to do with BV....




Its an absurdity to base it on a weight in the beginning and even worse to gimp larger groups.
In my other post I stated a few facts why one side had actually lost that had absolutely nothing to do if there was a group on the other side or not...

whats rebel galaxy?

I get what you're getting at but the problem with BV is and has always been that you don't get the same thing for your BV money. It was always an issue. a Warhawk stuffed with CLPLs would absolutely and consistently destroy the same BV in just about anything else. As an example it doesn't matter what BV you give a Flamer or an LB-10X - they are so inferior that the equal value in just about anything else is a better choice.

It's the same reason that a min/maxed Timber Wolf is going to face-roll a non-min/maxed Timber Wolf. An equal BV in missiles and ballistics is going to be inferior to a laservomit one right now because the synergy between laser weapons is better than the synergy between missiles and ballistics.

I get what you're talking about and I absolutely agree with the concept. My ideal goal for the game is balancing not just on BV but the players historical performance with a given mech/chassis/loadout. So the 'BV' is not just the point value of the mech and loadout but how you do with it. For example I've played a lot of AC20s. I do really, really well with them. So when I put an AC20 on something the BV is higher than the default for AC20s. Also I do really, really well with a WubShee. In that specific loadout my relative 'BV' is higher than, say, when the Marauder II comes out and I'm trying to unlock basics on it. The point value of a Marauder II with Clan tech may be higher but I'm actually a better performer in the WubShee.

Make sense? As a system that's the flat out best option and most precise. The best way to actually and accurately seat players in matches to estimate how they will impact their teams odds of winning.

However, if weapons are not fundamentally balanced that system works but it lacks real options. LRMs are still bad, so regardless what value that they're given they will perform worse than an equal BV in lasers. You haven't really made anything else viable you've just improved the odds of the matchmaker putting bad players in bad mechs against other bad players in bad mechs. THAT however is still dependent on there being enough players around to make a balanced match so that you've got teams of bads in bad vs other bads in bad... which, again, will be skewed because the BV for lasers translates into success better than the same BV in SRMs/LRMs, but still we don't have anything like the population depth necessary to always balance matches.

We need BV. I'm all for it. In fact I'm all for it being tied to player performance with that equipment/loadout. However we still need to balance weapons or you're putting a good idea on a broken foundation.

Rebel Galaxy is a new game on steam. Think of it as a Rogue-like over-the-shoulder Serenity style space game. Worth it for the sound track alone. Go to Steam, click on Top Sellers, it's on the front page. It's like $17 right now. Been very impressed with it so far.

[zudukai]

Kira Onime, on 23 October 2015 - 11:10 AM, said:

They're giving small groups near "true freedom" vs a severely gimped drop deck.
Not exactly sure I can agree and call it "balance".

sure, but in an imperfect game what do you expect? you will find some balance... and PGI already has changed the values, i don't really agree with 7 assaults in a public drop per se, but you knew it was possible.

as the week goes on, like a CW drop, try new things, expect some BS tonnage and build some counters, then post some more feedback... tell PGI how much you loathe your new found freedom, and how you want so badly to be shackled into 2-4man groups.

[Red Legs Greaves]

I just had a pug drop with 10 lights, 1 heavy and 1 assault. The enemy had a balanced team and also had 3 or 4 streak boats. They just balled up and the streak boats went to town on any light dumb enough to get close. i'm fine with the new tonnage limits but there has to be some kind of system that decides what groups go with who because 4 groups 2 all dropping lights is not a good idea.

[Kira Onime]

zudukai, on 23 October 2015 - 01:33 PM, said:

sure, but in an imperfect game what do you expect?

With PGI/Russ in lead? I expect the kneejerk/terrible designs that we are currently seeing in the game.

Group queue by nature is imbalanced, it's a risk you take when going into it.
PGIs current method of balance is the equivalent of ripping off half of a mechs weapons to and calling it "even" against the other one.

Then again, looking at PGIs past this is nothing surprising.

[Mystere]

Red Legs Greaves, on 23 October 2015 - 02:04 PM, said:

I just had a pug drop with 10 lights, 1 heavy and 1 assault. The enemy had a balanced team and also had 3 or 4 streak boats. They just balled up and the streak boats went to town on any light dumb enough to get close. i'm fine with the new tonnage limits but there has to be some kind of system that decides what groups go with who because 4 groups 2 all dropping lights is not a good idea.

What you call "not a good idea" I call "variety". With the new tonnage system, players have more freedom of choice compared to the 3/3/3/3 system. That is a good thing in my book.

[Red Legs Greaves]

Mystere, on 23 October 2015 - 02:49 PM, said:

What you call "not a good idea" I call "variety". With the new tonnage system, players have more freedom of choice compared to the 3/3/3/3 system. That is a good thing in my book.

Freedom with big groups is fine, in fact i'm excited to see what my unit can up with as a 12 man. The problem i have is when the match maker puts 12 lights together or stacks any other weight class when it's a bunch of 4 mans or less dropping in the same group. That's not fun or balanced, it's sort like when you run into a 12 man of MS and your teams factions look like a bag of skittles.

[Mystere]

Red Legs Greaves, on 23 October 2015 - 02:56 PM, said:

Freedom with big groups is fine, in fact i'm excited to see what my unit can up with as a 12 man. The problem i have is when the match maker puts 12 lights together or stacks any other weight class when it's a bunch of 4 mans or less dropping in the same group. That's not fun or balanced, it's sort like when you run into a 12 man of MS and your teams factions look like a bag of skittles.

I really don't understand this player base. On one hand, 12 lights are feared. On the other, 12 lights are disdained. Do people really expect PGI to find the perfect algorithm to balance player skill, Mech weight, Mech class, Mech speed, and Mech equipment to match 24 people in a perfectly balanced game? We don't even have the population to support such possible permutations.

Edited by Mystere, 23 October 2015 - 04:08 PM.

[Fire for Effect]

TWIAFU, on 23 October 2015 - 10:17 AM, said:

If your only playing top tier players that only play top notch mechs with top notch quirks you would have to follow suit. Just like how top tier players played each other in top notch mechs and were only limited by 4x3 on what they could take to play other top tier players.

Now top tier players can take more meta to put against other meta or put meta up against higher tonnage.

look at the numbers it can now be 1200t vs 600t taking anything but hard meta for large groups is simply non-sense now.

[Fire for Effect]

MischiefSC, on 23 October 2015 - 11:52 AM, said:

We need BV. I'm all for it. In fact I'm all for it being tied to player performance with that equipment/loadout. However we still need to balance weapons or you're putting a good idea on a broken foundation.

Rebel Galaxy is a new game on steam. Think of it as a Rogue-like over-the-shoulder Serenity style space game. Worth it for the sound track alone. Go to Steam, click on Top Sellers, it's on the front page. It's like $17 right now. Been very impressed with it so far.

this game is on a broken foundation since closed beta so its more of a "where do we strenghthen the ground today"...

thanks for the info will look at rebel galaxy ^^

[Fire for Effect]

Davers, on 23 October 2015 - 09:09 AM, said:

While you do make some points, I do disagree with your justification for a BV system. BV doesn't replace actual mech and weapon balance. It is not ok to just say, "Hey Flamers don't really work, but it's cool cuz we lowered their BV cost", "LRMs are complete rubbish at competitive levels? With the new BV cost, working as intended".

If mechs like the Locust are not worth taking, then they should never have been made. PGI should have never wasted the time designing them, and players should be told to stop asking for mechs like them.

While AI units and stuff are all really cool, I would like to have more of a balanced game soon, rather than years from now when they finish the single player stuff. Isn't that one of the reasons flamers are so bad now, because eventually they will be anti-infantry weapons at some future date?

Based on your BV system there is never a need for anyone to use less than the 'best' mechs. At worst they will be matched against the same, at best they will face several inferior mechs on the opposing team.

you and PGI are working on the wrong layer... dont make mechs equal; make TEAMs equal.

Its completely unimportant what you take for an individual mech or what the loadout is as long as both TEAMs have roughly the same combined survivability and ability to dish out damage. Combine that with player skill and you have a robust mathematical basis.

Easy and elegant instead of clumsy random quirks and nerfs in a try to make mechs equal that can NEVER be equal.


And that is only possible using mathematics, obviously weight is NOT a descriptive number that can be used for survivability and ability to dish out damage.

And yes that might of course result in one side having more mechs. Bring only high powered mechs close to the limit, have only tier 1 players and you might provoke the MM to grab more and more average players trying to get close to the set Number.
(oh 500 points are missing... ok *grabs an additional locust* fits now)

[Lugh]

Kira Onime, on 23 October 2015 - 10:45 AM, said:

Then the system offers nothing new to what we previously had and the larger the group, the more restrictive you have to be in what you take since you have little-to-no wiggle room. At least the 3x4 gave those groups something to play with.



Then again it was made pretty clear by Russ that he doesn't like anything above 4 players so this is not really suprising.




Somewhat agree to some extent.
But then you can have **** like this happen with multiple small groups.
http://imgur.com/a/dkeQi

If you find someone that enjoys facing 7+ assaults on the enemy team please let me. I'll send them to a doctors appointment.





Both the 3x4 and the tonnage system have/had room for variety.
Both systems had flaws but I find the ones for the tonnage system to be far greater than the 3x4 restrictions.





People are stupid.

I enjoyed the facing 7 assaults games, Heck I can remember WINNING games against 8 assaults(All atlases) using Dragons, before the quirkening, and Catapults.

The superior maneuverability does make it possible.

Edited by Lugh, 27 October 2015 - 05:52 AM.

[Davers]

Fire for Effect, on 27 October 2015 - 05:46 AM, said:

And yes that might of course result in one side having more mechs.

...and here is where everything falls apart. This is a 12v12 game. We are not going to have asymmetrical team sizes.

Maybe you are willing to take inferior mechs that earn less Cbills so your teammates can carry the game for you, but not everyone wants to play that way.