59 replies to this topic

[PharmEcis]

Personally, I'm a fan of the new group tonnage limits. It adds a lot of flexibility to the drop decks although the assault pilots don't seem to be too happy about it as they have to convince several people to drop pretty light to get their assaults. The whole point of the tonnage limits was to decrease search time to help the MM out. It absolutely accomplished it's goals. We were getting drops as a 12 man in seconds, I think the longest we had to wait was 2 minutes.

However, yesterday my unit and I intentionally wanted to try and break the group queue by dropping with insane drop decks. 10x BJ1X + 2 Cheetahs. 8x TDR 5SS + 4 Cheetahs. 10x SCR + 2 BJ's. We were hoping to break our match win time of 1:41 but alas it didn't happen. When we dropped with a bunch of Dragons we got face rolled but it was awesome to hear all the dakka dakka... lol

There is a ton of crying about the new system. I think the new system would be perfect with the addition of one simple mechanic to it. Limit the number of duplicate chassis. Make it impossible to load up a deck with the same chassis / variant. We had some discussion in our unit about this and the consensus was that there needs to be a hard coded rule for groups that you can't have more than TWO or THREE of the same chassis. This will still allow people to pick what they want but will prevent gaming the system like we did yesterday.

I think this will keep the MM and us the player base happy with search times AND it will prevent all the crying and whining from the player base about stacked drops.

To be honest, it really wouldn't have mattered what we dropped in yesterday, we still would have done well.

*edit* I do want to add that I sincerely hope that PGI NEVER limits the number of people in the group queue. That is just horrible. This is a team game. Please please please before you feel the need to do that, please try this implementation to see how it fairs. I can almost guarantee that this is the end all solution to the problems we have faced.

Edited by PharmEcis, 21 October 2015 - 07:39 AM.

[Shae Starfyre]

What would an example drop deck be from a competitive 12 man under this system look like?

[Kira Onime]

Watching you guys, BMMU, break the system on streak yesterday was quite nice.

[Solahma]

Simple... Can't think of a reason why that wouldn't work... Best solution i've read so far!

[PharmEcis]

Aphoticus, on 21 October 2015 - 06:17 AM, said:

What would an example drop deck be from a competitive 12 man under this system look like?

Whatever you feel works best for you and your teammates. At the end of the day, everyone has their own personal play styles. When I can see someone do more than 1000 points of damage in an Awesome and have the top match score, that leads me to believe that while certain mechs are better than others, in the end it is the pilot that really matters as to how good you do.

[BattleBunny]

I would personally go for a duplicate limit of 2. So only 2 crows allowed, 2 timbers, etc. Diversity on the battlefield!

[Shae Starfyre]

PharmEcis, on 21 October 2015 - 06:19 AM, said:

Whatever you feel works best for you and your teammates. At the end of the day, everyone has their own personal play styles. When I can see someone do more than 1000 points of damage in an Awesome and have the top match score, that leads me to believe that while certain mechs are better than others, in the end it is the pilot that really matters as to how good you do.

Let me rephrase, in these discussion you had, was there any talk as to drop decks that could break this concept?

12 Man's will still be competitive and min/max; I just wonder if it is just another degree of the same.

I have not played CW because I do not see the fun in it yet; and would support an idea fervently if a fun factor was introduced - being a single solo dropper (not that that is what CW should cater too; but would make it more viable for people like me).

Is that an oxymoron statement; solo dropper; more viable?

Edited by Aphoticus, 21 October 2015 - 06:32 AM.

[Kira Onime]

-ignore-

Edited by Kira Onime, 21 October 2015 - 06:26 AM.

[Solahma]

Aphoticus, on 21 October 2015 - 06:25 AM, said:

Let me rephrase, in these discussion you had, was there any talk as to drop decks that could break this concept?

12 Man's will still be competitive and min/max; I just wonder if it is just another degree of the same.

I'm looking now, and you would be able to do stuff like:
2 DWF
2 SCR
2 WVR
2 BJ
2 FS9
2 ACH
=640 tons

or

2 TBR
2 HBR
1 EBJ
2 SCR
1 WVR
2 FS9
2 ACH
=640 tons

or, following the same "zerg" mentality of the 10x SCR deck

2x SCR
2x WVR
2x GRF
2x SHD
2x ENR
2x BJ
=630 tons

Much better distribution of mechs IMO

[BattleBunny]

yeh at least that gives some diversity. variety is the spice of life!

[Lugh]

So an even more restrictive 3-3-3-3 rule?

*meh*

[Solahma]

And the UI could just indicate, in red, if there are any more than 2 of one chassis.
EZ PZ

Lugh, on 21 October 2015 - 06:52 AM, said:

So an even more restrictive 3-3-3-3 rule?

*meh*

Not at all, it still removes smaller groups from running nothing but Heavies and Assaults. It also ALLOWS groups to take a lot of mediums or more heavies instead of being FORCED to take Assault mechs. It adds a lot more variety and freedom than the 3/3/3/3 ever could and it eliminates the abuse of spamming multiples of the strongest mechs. Sure, you are restricted from running 3 TBR now, or 3 DWF, but that was one of the issues with the weight class rule. You could still maximize and take 3 of a really strong chassis. With the "no more than 2" rule, you'd only see 2 of a particular chassis, so teams can't abuse stronger mechs as greatly.

The tonnage system WITH max 2 of any chassis would be the best of both worlds!

Edited by Solahma, 21 October 2015 - 07:00 AM.

[Kira Onime]

Lugh, on 21 October 2015 - 06:52 AM, said:

So an even more restrictive 3-3-3-3 rule?

*meh*

Well if Russ' word is anything to go by, this is one of the last attempts to "balance" group queues before they start limiting who you can paly with.

[PharmEcis]

Lugh, on 21 October 2015 - 06:52 AM, said:

So an even more restrictive 3-3-3-3 rule?

*meh*

Simple comprehension is not your strong point is it? How is it more restrictive? You could take 10 mediums if you want, they just can't be all the same chassis. In a nutshell, it's a safeguard against stacking the deck against whatever is meta on that particular day.

[Solahma]

PharmEcis, on 21 October 2015 - 07:24 AM, said:

Simple comprehension is not your strong point is it? How is it more restrictive? You could take 10 mediums if you want, they just can't be all the same chassis. In a nutshell, it's a safeguard against stacking the deck against whatever is meta on that particular day.

Yup, you lose a whole possible 1 more of the same mech that you used to have in the 3/3/3/3 rule, but you gain the freedom of overall group mechs. I wouldn't consider that more restrictive in the slightest!

[Roadkill]

Sounds great for 12-man groups, but what about smaller ones?

6 x 2-man can still take 6 x (Timber Wolf, Dire Wolf) like they can now?

3 x 4-man can still take 3 x (Stormcrow, Stormcrow, Timber Wolf, Timber Wolf)?

I like the idea, but I'm not sure it accomplishes the same goal at smaller group sizes. And the solution is not as simple as "enforce the rule for the combined group as well" because that just makes matchmaking impossible for anything other than a 12-man.

[Darwins Dog]

Given that there are so many ways to do the same thing in different chasses, I don't know how much this would help. 4xACH vs. 2xACH and 2xFS9 is not much of a difference.

The only real limit that I see is on streak crows, but even then you can still run some pretty nasty SRM boats with IS mediums.

[Solahma]

Roadkill, on 21 October 2015 - 07:42 AM, said:

Sounds great for 12-man groups, but what about smaller ones?

I believe MM now tries to match tonnage instead of weight classes, so you're examples would be:

1st example = 1050 tons
2nd example = 780 tons

these are very much extremes for the MM.

The first would be very difficult to find a tonnage match, assuming they were all placed on the same team.

These are examples of very rare cases. You could say nearly the same thing could happen with the 3/3/3/3 rule, but you NEVER saw it get that bad. Sure, there were definitely some "wtf mm" games, but nothing to the extreme that you are describing.

Darwins Dog, on 21 October 2015 - 07:43 AM, said:

Given that there are so many ways to do the same thing in different chasses, I don't know how much this would help. 4xACH vs. 2xACH and 2xFS9 is not much of a difference.

The only real limit that I see is on streak crows, but even then you can still run some pretty nasty SRM boats with IS mediums.

Sure, 4x ACH vs. 2x ACH 2x FS9 isn't much different. But 8x ACH vs. 2x ACH, 2x FS9, 2x RVN, 2x PNT is much different. This is about limiting extremes of large groups. The thing that most people are concerned about.

Also, lol if you think boating streak 2s on IS mechs is anything comparable to streak crows! This isn't about limiting builds, it's about limiting chassis that have an inherent advantage. SCR isn't just good for streaks. It's great at many things, has incredible speed, and has very good hitboxes. Taking a variety of 55 tonners instead of JUST SCR adds diversity. Especially if the quirks on many of these mechs are going to be reduced dramatically. SCR reigns supreme compared to other 55 tonners in the PTS environment

Edited by Solahma, 21 October 2015 - 07:56 AM.

[Roadkill]

Solahma, on 21 October 2015 - 07:53 AM, said:

I believe MM now tries to match tonnage instead of weight classes, so you're examples would be:

1st example = 1050 tons
2nd example = 780 tons

these are very much extremes for the MM.

I believe you are right, but I don't believe it goes for an exact match. As with Elo/PSR, there's a range within which it works to find a (tonnage) match.

My point was more that a "hard limit" of 2 doesn't actually succeed when using smaller groups because each group can have the same 2.

For example, a large Merc Corp could all log on in pairs and take 2 x Stormcrow in each pair. Sure, sometimes they'd end up fighting each other, but sometimes 6 of their pairs would get sent into battle against a 12-man suffering from the "hard limit of 2" rule.

[JC Daxion]

I like the idea of limits on mech types.. And i agree, i do like the idea of this, but it still needs work, and limiting the number of varaints would be a nice first step. At least in the specific groups, it think it would make it to hard if different groups end up getting mixed together as you can't know what others have.