169 replies to this topic

[Antares102]

DISCLAIMER: This thread is NOT about balance.

So we are getting close to a situation where all clans may be pushed back to their start planets.
What do you think will happen when we really reach this point?
Will lore guys go nuts?
Will PGI buff clans (probably only drop deck tonnage)?
Will everything stay that way it is and the large units who made it happen will laugh at PGI for not being able to control their own game?
Will some large units just switch sides and go into the other direction again?

Even though I am clan I would find it hilarious to see clans being pushed back to their start planets. After clans surrounded Terra and conquered 25% of the entire IS kinda funny.
Furthermore if this really happens it will have some obvious consequences to the CW gameplay.
If there are no more clans to attack, the IS has to (god forbid) attack each other again.

Edited by Antares102, 31 December 2015 - 05:08 AM.

[Pika]

I think PGI will look at their metrics and adjust the balance again. We shall repeat this process until balanced is achieved.

It's hard to say what is causing the imbalance, too. If it's the 'Mechs, that's fine. Better the 'Mechs be underpowered and tuned up rather than underpowered and needing nerfed, no one likes that.

Is it the IS quirks? Possible, but again, easy to adjust in the grand scheme of things. Is it inherent weapon balance? Are clan weapons just inferior in their delivery? Some of them potentially are a bit more annoying to use but not the point I could see it altering balance.

Perhaps it's the largest units? Well no, because they would simply attack past each other anyways. It could be argued this is balancing on it's own. It might not be about player skill but sheer volume of attacking players on so many targets.

The only way I see this balancing out is if underdogs get _monumentally_ larger rewards, that factions offer defence, attack and disruption contracts to units rather than them attacking and defending willy-nilly and even potentially player caps.

But eh, we'll see. It'll likely change in the next balance pass and we'll see the pendulum start to rock the other way.

[Navid A1]

Well i think its not about lore...
basically CW is nothing more than 3 large units painting a digital map. PGI simply can not stop it. Large units like pugstomping. Even if they don't, they have no choice. There is no MatchMaking in CW.

I'm more concerned about letting new players into CW right from the start... yeah, yeah... they get the warning...lol
(if you think that warning is gonna stop anyone... you need help... mentally!)

There should be a requirement of having 4 basic'd mechs for entering CW. I mean... what is the point of playing CW doing 2K damage while having 6 .. yes... SIX guys with lower than 100 damage on your team... yes, clan trial mechs are bad.. but at least you could shoot your weapons ONCE before you die, couldn't you?
That will not only drive veterans away from CW, it will cause new players to never touch CW again.



Also, balance-wise, clans have been nerfed on more than 1 front...it makes it a little harder on experienced players... now imagine the Pug hordes trying the clan trials.
Compared to super-quirked IS trials

Edited by Navid A1, 31 December 2015 - 05:19 AM.

[Antares102]

Pika, on 31 December 2015 - 05:15 AM, said:

It's hard to say what is causing the imbalance, too.

Well thats simple.. many big units on the IS side. No balance issue here.

Edited by Antares102, 31 December 2015 - 05:24 AM.

[totgeboren]

You can't really use the CW map for judging balance. When there were a lot of good units on the clan side, and many more puggers on the IS side the clanners stomped all the way to Terra in notime.

Now the clanners instead have a majority of the steam crowd, and then they get pushed back to their starting planets.

Player input matters in this game, so balance isn't just an issue of PGI changing some numbers around when we have the situation of skilled units changing side once in a while, and also the influx of new steam players and where they end up (hint, clan trials are a lot better if you are a new player).

Edited by totgeboren, 31 December 2015 - 05:33 AM.

[JohnnyWayne]

Antares102, on 31 December 2015 - 05:19 AM, said:

Well thats simple.. many big units on the IS side. No balance issue here.

Same could be said about the last season.

[Dawnstealer]

On to Strana Mechty! The Clan worlds are on there if you scroll north on the map.

WE'RE COMING FOR YOUR HOMEWORLDS*
























*at least until we lose the big merc units

[Volts]

My money is on a bunch of the IS Merc units switching to clans to get endless and quick drops from IS teams in the q.

If it happens I'll be looking forward to seeing none of them posting qq threads about IS OP.

[Alistair Winter]

This is what happens when a game with "Community Warfare" lacks the ability to balance itself, except through arbitrary changes from the devs. In other words, right now, the devs have to manually change the rewards and max drop tonnage for the various factions to provide balance. For the game to stay balanced, that stuff needs to happen automatically. In an ideal world, MWO would have a real economy with contracts in CW that ensure no faction ever gets wiped out. At some point, fighting for the least powerful factions should be 'an offer you cannot refuse', because the rewards would attract the best players. And it needs to happen dynamically, in a continuous balancing act, to prevent constant unit-hopping to manipulate numbers

As soon as any faction in CW begins to dominate, the rewards should automatically diminish. And in certain circumstances, drop decks should be influenced as well.

And there needs to be some really serious rewards when you reach the higher ranks of any factions. Handing out GXP and some C-bills isn't really that effective for veterans, because many veteran players have enough GXP and C-bills anyway. And winning pays more than losing, even with mediocre rewards. So the rewards for reaching rank 20 (or whatever) with your faction needs to be interesting for veterans. Not just big paydays, but also unique faction rewards.

But yeah. As long as we have this super-simplistic CW, PGI will be forced to manually balance it, and they'll be forced to reset the map fairly often. How many times have they reset it already? It's a joke.

[Cyborne Elemental]

Majority of the Comp level players are all playing InnerSphere right now, so its 12 man groups of expert players rolling mixed pub players on clan.

PGi will see clans getting their asses kicked, overreact and nerf or buff one side or the other, throwing balance again, missing the target.

[Kurvi]

FWIW, it might be a natural response to Tukayyid 3. Consider that a number of the top units moved to the Clan side for the faster drop times. Since they are merc units, it's not inconceivable that they simply want to alternate between IS and Clan. If this is correct, then things will balance out a bit more once they get de-synced.

[Ghogiel]

tbh I didn't even know about clan factions not gaining any ground and I have been playing some CW for grab bags all week, I literally only look at the numbers to find the best queue to join, not even looked at the map since reset lol. All that matters is there is always some amount of red and blue numbers that aren't zero on a planet for fighting to happen on.

PGI will probably do some goofy balance act based on the CW map like always though or better yet change CW so groups simply spamming mediorce to win planets doesn't work/ changing faction hopping mechanics in various ways to prevent situations like we have now.

Edited by Ghogiel, 31 December 2015 - 06:00 AM.

[El Bandito]

Antares102, on 31 December 2015 - 05:03 AM, said:

DISCLAIMER: This thread is NOT about balance.

So we are getting close to a situation where all clans may be pushed back to their start planets.
What do you think will happen when we really reach this point?
Will lore guys go nuts?
Will PGI buff clans (probably only drop deck tonnage)?
Will everything stay that way it is and the large units who made it happen will laugh at PGI for not being able to control their own game?
Will some large units just switch sides and go into the other direction again?

PGI just buffed Clan drop deck to 255 tons. Now one can bring three Timberwolves and a Cheetah.

I personally blame this on mercs switching allegiances at will. 228, -MS-, and SWOL all jumped ship.

Edited by El Bandito, 31 December 2015 - 06:08 AM.

[KillSecured CGB Magnusson ZeLaw]

As a new player i wanna say few words(im playing for 2 weeks) :

Recruiting in this game pretty hidden, no aggressive recruiting, topics are far away from my eyes
Even in tutorial we learn how to drive IS mechs
Hero mech`s - only IS
Its harder to get full stack of clan mechs for new player - Cbills cost
For example - i mastered already 2 types of mechs& 2 is coming, cause they are cheap, u can switch engines, etc.
And for the same cost i can master only 1 mech from Clan

Sry for my horrible grammar, i hope u understand what i mean

UPD: many new players cant join Clan units cause of "Tryhards" or u use words - competentive gaming

[Draq Creage]

one word "SWOL" LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Kdogg788]

This is what happens when all big CW units go IS and then of course large units have come to the obvious conclusion that all they should do is attack because:

A. They will have a much higher chance of seeing randoms on the other side, and not just randoms, randoms of multiple factions.
B: They want to tag planets to mark up the map.
C: They force the other side to send "someone" and if not, they get ghost drops with free money and free loyalty although this is admittedly a second option for them above either a gen rush or pug stomp.

-k

[Antares102]

Draq Creage, on 31 December 2015 - 06:03 AM, said:

one word "SWOL" LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

SWOL on FFR has tagged a SINGLE planet.
228 has tagged > 10 planets.
You think you are doing the work?

Edited by Antares102, 31 December 2015 - 06:22 AM.

[Tarl Cabot]

Kdogg788, on 31 December 2015 - 06:11 AM, said:

This is what happens when all big CW units go IS and then of course large units have come to the obvious conclusion that all they should do is attack because:

A. They will have a much higher chance of seeing randoms on the other side, and not just randoms, randoms of multiple factions.
B: They want to tag planets to mark up the map.
C: They force the other side to send "someone" and if not, they get ghost drops with free money and free loyalty although this is admittedly a second option for them above either a gen rush or pug stomp.

-k

Primarily this, the lack of CW population.and then there is no one actually attacking. When the big units switch again then the shoe is on the other foot.

And since there is not a large CW population and many people do not want to wait a long time, many will drop in the normal queues while checking the map to see if one side is manned up while their side is filling up for the next drop.

To put it another way, since there are multiple planets being fought/defended for instead of 2-3 max, the CW population is split all over the map.

Edited by Tarl Cabot, 31 December 2015 - 06:31 AM.

[BigBenn]

The only way PGI can stop the onslaught of any system is for them to systematically manage each planet and the battles being fought on them. Currently, all planets are the same. They take the same maps, the same process, etc. The drop decs rarely change, too. Look at how many maps are won without a drop? I don't think a unit should be able to advance the capture of a planet without a defender (or attacker).

Way back in NBT-4/NBT-Mercs, drop ships were managed and mech inventories were managed. No, I'm not suggesting that take place here since not player has access to every mech, but currently there is no restriction or management. Drop decs are the same weights. It is just show up and go. There are no cold planets, no hot planets, no urban planets, no undeveloped planets.There are maps that would allow for a lot of different scenarios already in game (Alpine would be a LOT of fun in CW), ditto for a number of other maps too.

I have high hopes for the changes to CW coming our way. Lets hope it shakes it up.

Edited by BigBenn, 31 December 2015 - 06:34 AM.

[zeves]

wonder what will happen when the system changes later on, since the largest units are mercenaries right?
would the factions have to pay based on the unit size, then who would afford them?
im looking forwards to the hilarious problems that will ensue