522 replies to this topic

[El Bandito]

On CW phase three. Doesn't know what yet, but he confirmed it on Twitter. Oh, and he accused the big merc units such as -MS- and 228 for intentionally hopping over the fence together so they would not fight each other.

IMO, the amount of influence the Mercs wield is pretty detrimental to CW's development. House units really need to be made more attractive. Hope the phase three will include new faction specific rewards and meaningful penalty for changing factions.

Edited by El Bandito, 29 December 2015 - 01:16 PM.

[Tesunie]

If things go as presented, Loyalty units will vote where to attack. This will keep merc units from disturbing any faction truces... and stuff.

[El Bandito]

Maybe Russ can reduce the maximum size of merc units, compared to House units. Or make the Merc life as tough as it should be, like in MW2. Right now there is no risk of going Merc and hopping factions--on the contrary, there are only benefits, such as easy low tier rewards.

[Tesunie]

Well, at least making here a faction attacks a vote for loyalists only is a start. Would prevent incidences such as "Purple Dragon Island" from happening again, at least.

Would also prevent a rouge merc from trying to disrupt alliances, such as has currently been going on along the Marik and Liao boarders over the last few weeks.


I don't believe we should limit group sizes. I know the mega groups do seem to have a large influence on the map, but I think it would be unfair to limit them as well. They already would become limited by the attack corridors the Loyalists choose, restricting their movements at least. (If proposed concept does make it into the game.)

[Davegt27]

Quote

On CW phase three. Doesn't know what yet, but he confirmed it on Twitter. Oh, and he accused the big merc units such as -MS- and 228 for intentionally hopping over the fence together so they would not fight each other.

IMO, the amount of influence the Mercs wield is pretty detrimental to CW's development. House units really need to be made more attractive. Hope the phase three will include new faction specific rewards and meaningful penalty for changing factions.

The last town hall Russ called out the big units saying they were not fighting each other and preferred seal clubbing (not exact words but they were not fighting 12 to 12)

I disagree with the notion of always nerfing or penalizing people getting craped on for changing factions this just rubs me the wrong way

I told people in game don’t report anyone it’s not there fault that CW is screwed up (there no one teaching them not much help at all)

Anyway there has to be other ideas
For example a bonus for fighting 12 against 12 man
A training battalion all Newbs go to the mandatory training unit clan or IS
After 10 drops they get to move on



Just a few ideas

[AlphaToaster]

So where I have a problem with the faction hopping, is that there isn't a severe enough penalty.

Limiting the number of players in a unit will spawn alliances which we already see between units.

Perhaps only allow a pilot to hold rank with 1 faction at a time. Before I can join steiner on a loyalist contract, if I'm rank 10 as CJF, I can only take a short term contract with Steiner that rewards no match end faction bonus or steiner faction points until I've ground down my rank with my CJF. Regaining a rank already earned will not trigger the reward a 2nd time. So to go back to CFJ, I'd have to reach rank 11 before gaining another reward. I would not pick right off from rank 10 again.

We can have a x2 or x3 multiplier for neutralizing out the faction so it doesn't take the same amount of time but there should be that kind of time delay that requires an additional grind.

Not gaining 300k per match win while grinding down 20 levels to join a new faction just for a weekend event with plans to switch back at the end? Yeah right. Units will have to really want to switch factions, and will want to stay for a while.

[C E Dwyer]

They introduced House/clan v Merc units in the wrong order, they reduced the length on contract time because of the cry babies, at one stage the shortest was going to be a month

[Dirk Le Daring]

El Bandito, on 29 December 2015 - 01:15 PM, said:

Oh, and he accused the big merc units such as -MS- and 228 for intentionally hopping over the fence together so they would not fight each other.

This does not surprise me in the least.

El Bandito, on 29 December 2015 - 01:30 PM, said:

Maybe Russ can reduce the maximum size of merc units, compared to House units.

I doubt that merc units need to be capped. Read the thread in my sig, there is a solution there..... Eleven months old.

Edited by Dirk Le Daring, 29 December 2015 - 02:16 PM.

[Tombstoner]

Davegt27, on 29 December 2015 - 01:56 PM, said:

The last town hall Russ called out the big units saying they were not fighting each other and preferred seal clubbing (not exact words but they were not fighting 12 to 12)

The smart player attacks the weakest position and reaps the resulting rewards. This is supposed to be a simulation of the succession wars and the clan invasion. Anything goes, If some units chose to not attack strong opposition and effectively game the system maximizing their return on time invested. I call that smart game play.

PGI built the wrong kind of match making system for simulating the succession wars. players take advantage go figure...

PGI should have built Solaris... a place where sink drops cant happen. why no common pool to draw from. you fight the people above you.

Want to drop as a pre made 12 man guess what....you play against another 12 man.... population too small.... deal with it... play 8 vs 8....again too small then go 4v4. No 4 man teams want to ladder then pug it.

[Mystere]

Cathy, on 29 December 2015 - 02:07 PM, said:

They introduced House/clan v Merc units in the wrong order, they reduced the length on contract time because of the cry babies, at one stage the shortest was going to be a month

Is there any change in MWO that did not get triggered by crying?

[Mystere]

Tombstoner, on 29 December 2015 - 02:35 PM, said:

The smart player attacks the weakest position and reaps the resulting rewards. This is supposed to be a simulation of the succession wars and the clan invasion. Anything goes, If some units chose to not attack strong opposition and effectively game the system maximizing their return on time invested. I call that smart game play.

PGI built the wrong kind of match making system for simulating the succession wars. players take advantage go figure...

PGI should have built Solaris... a place where sink drops cant happen. why no common pool to draw from. you fight the people above you.

Want to drop as a pre made 12 man guess what....you play against another 12 man.... population too small.... deal with it... play 8 vs 8....again too small then go 4v4. No 4 man teams want to ladder then pug it.

Units are the equivalent of highly-trained soldiers, PUGs are the equivalent of local militia, and the former almost always crush the latter. In a quasi war simulation, that is how things should be.

Having said that, it can be mitigated by more imaginative game modes, maps, and overall game depth. But, the obsessive demand by players for nothing short of 100% symmetrical end-to-end balance works against all that.

Edited by Mystere, 29 December 2015 - 02:56 PM.

[Davegt27]

Quote

Is there any change in MWO that did not get triggered by crying?

4 v 4 is the only thing I can think of

Dirk what we have coming in phase 3 sounds like your ideas

Have to go back to June/July town hall to hear it

[Commander A9]

Influence...

You mean because...

They're "good" at the game?

Again, PGI potentially punishing player skill? Come on.

This "doing something about the mercs," is it going to be some kind of obnoxious handicap that punishes the better-skilled players? Because that wouldn't surprise me in the least.

Edited by Commander A9, 29 December 2015 - 03:02 PM.

[Zfailboat]

And as usual Russ just doesn't get it, he is blaming others for PGI's own release and event scheduling.

Now I am no big wig in 228th. but taking the last 6 weeks our contracts go like this.

F.Y.I. our last 4 faction, Kurita (before last quirk pass). Wolf, for Turkyyid, Jade Falcon, for II-C mechs, FRR - to try new IS Quirks in CW.

1. Clan for Turkyyid. (we were Kurita before this). This was simple. Event on, numbers of players per faction. we picked the smaller side to have less waiting time. If we were IS for this, everyone would have had longer wait times.

2. Changed to Jade Falcon after this. Stayed clans however as II-C mechs where being released. and we wanted to both play them, and science builds in them for CW.

3. changed to IS. We had been clans for 4 weeks, now we changed to IS. First time we are trying new quirks in IS and Russ puts out stoking stuffer event, so of course we will do CW and get grab bags.

I don't know what we will do next. However what will likely come into our thinking is.
1. where will we get most games
2. is there new mechs in next 2 weeks that players want to lvl.
3. is there a group we have not been lately, with attack lines that new members can get easy mech bays from.

Remember, we didn't make the rewards, but CW3 is going to remove LP rewards from mercs. So if we are getting free mech bays, it needs to be now before CW3.

[old man odin]

Davegt27, on 29 December 2015 - 01:56 PM, said:

The last town hall Russ called out the big units saying they were not fighting each other and preferred seal clubbing (not exact words but they were not fighting 12 to 12)

The problem is these people aren't avoiding each other on purpose, but because they move for the same reasons. I briefly was the Isengrim officer in -MS- and got the opportunity to sit in on the meetings where we discussed contracts. Other units were never brought up as a reason for or against moving. What mechs people wanted to play was the most common reason; whether it be because they'd been Clan or IS too long, new mech packs out, balance changes, whatever.

[Alteran]

The problem with CW is that there are multiple units per faction – House and Clans. Merc units, large and small, actually can work as they are since they are supposed to be independent. Unfortunately, CW is a broken game mode given that there is no resource management. It is just a bigger version of the Quick Play with a map and as such will not work ‘as intended’. PGI needs to give the Houses and Clans a reason to hold a world over time, which then brings in resource management:

Worlds with raw materials, Mech production, Mech repair/refit and Dropship/Jumpship repair/refit. Ultimately that means that there are limits to Mechs, Dropships and Jumpships; resulting in many battles with less than 48v48.

BUT to do that, CW becomes a game within the game and PGI doesn’t have the time and resources to create that. Plus, Houses and Clans will need to work together within their own factions. Merc units are about the only ones that can work independently of this mode while working for House factions and fulfilling their contracts of either offense or garrison duties.

Trying to force large units to fight one another is foolish, but with the way CW is now, it’s PGI’s only way to make CW ‘a success….’ which it is failing.

Edited by Alteran, 29 December 2015 - 04:36 PM.

[MischiefSC]

Is it uncool that coincidentally all the big units seem to always be in a place where they are playing against pugs and not each other? Sure. That's more a product of design than an evil big units conspiracy. The problem isn't big units it's that PGI designed cw to make faction membership irrelevant. Who wins or loses in cw overall doesn'tmatter, its about winning the match and getting cbills.

That everyone was Clans while Clans were OP then coincidentally switched to IS when rebalance happened doesn't engender respect either. The real problem is that by exploiting the bad CW design choices for so long as lot of the big units have burned all the community good will they might otherwise have had. At this point when/if Russ puts in some mechanic to hamstring big units, even if it's a stupid idea, the general player concensus will be "good. **** those guys".

*THAT* is a problem that can be laid completely and correctly at the feet of the units in question, by and large.

[Mystere]

Davegt27, on 29 December 2015 - 03:01 PM, said:

4 v 4 is the only thing I can think of

I seem to recall quite a number of people crying that 12x12 is too much for them.

[S T I N G S]

I actually thought about this today before this came up

PGI should put a limit on merc units, but not on loyalist units...
Loyalists don't hop factions so they shouldn't need limits, but put a population cap on the factions.

While they should make it that if you take too many merc contracts with a certain enemy of a faction example: Davion/Liao
The other faction won't offer you another contract until you kill a certain amount of that enemy's mechs then they wil slowly offer you more contracts.

They need to make it basically that mercs don't control the CW map the loyalists do, while making it that mercs can't pick where they go thag would somewhat cancel out 228 and -MS- on the same side

[ZenFool]

Let me get this straight. They gave incentives for people to jump sides, then got mad because they did?

I say this as a Steiner loyalist who finally bit the bullet two months ago to get my mechbays.

I'm not defending coordinated unit hopping or the seal clubbing that it generates at all, but it seems ridiculous that PGI would get upset. They couldn't have set it up better for unit hopping if they had tried to.