50 replies to this topic

[Appogee]

This goes out to the guys who spawn and immediately run to the enemy base and try to cap it.

Yes, it's Assault Mode. Yes, capping the enemy base is an objective. Yes, sometimes it is a strategically good idea for a Light to get on the enemy base, and force some of the enemy to break away from the main engagement.

But not immediately after we spawn.

When you cap rush immediately after you spawn...

• You string out and split up the team. Some of our PUG team will inevitably follow you blindly across the map, in the mistaken belief that you're the nascent death-blob or at the leading edge of the battlefront.
  
• You give the enemy an immediate numerical advantage. Depending on how many of you went to cap rush, and how many of our team is trying to follow you, the enemy's death blob can have as much as a 2 to 1 firepower/armor advantage over the rest of the team who is actually fighting.
  
• You deny us your firepower. You aren't shooting at the enemy. You aren't harassing, distracting and suppressing them. The enemy can focus down our team's most potent heavy and assault Mechs more easily.
  
• You lose us the match. Those of us actually fighting the enemy soon get overwhelmed by the enemy's numerical advantage. By then, one of the enemy Lights will be stepping on their base stopping you capping, and you have an entire enemy team focusing you to death, too.
  
• No-one gets their Challenge points. During Challenges like the present one, you need 150 match score. You are unlikely to get that from a cap rush, and the rest of us certainly won't while we're being hosed down as you stand in a square at the other end of the map..

I can't count the number of matches I've seen lost because immediate cap-rushers split up the team, got half the team killed, and then couldn't complete the cap. But spawn cap-rushing it has certainly resulted in waaaaay waaaaay waaaaay more losses than wins. (And even the wins are relatively pointless from a rewards perspective.)


So, please, don't rush immediately to cap after spawning.

By all means cap in the middle of the fight if splitting up the enemy line will help us win. But please consider carefully whether the balance of the battle is better served by you shooting, distracting and harassing, rather than just running off and standing in a square.

Edited by Appogee, 20 February 2016 - 09:16 AM.

[Monkey Lover]

Just get in the murder ball and do the same thing every match? Naa sorry this is solo Q I'm going to run for the base with my brawler and get some brawling

[Saint Scarlett Johan]

I don't solo queue anymore, but if you're in group queue and it's a group of lights doing it, they're likely trying to troll.

[Deathswarrior]

I don't play lights much, but when I do I like to try to "scout" and I have noticed more and more the blob starts to follow me in a line when I am clearly to far away to be a focal point. I chalk it up to the blob mentality of the way most rounds are played anymore, the "Follow the leader" mindset.

[Bluttrunken]

Assault, as it is, is detrimental on many maps. On some small maps it's easy to circumvent the enemy and cap the base with most of your team, on big maps a sneaky cap or base rush is hard to defend.

Of course both sides could dug in at their base, right? Or whatever you might suggest.

All in all, Assault played purely on objective is a waste of time and I ask myself: why have a detrimental objective in the first place. Perfect scenario: One team rushes the base and caps it with 8-12 mechs. Takes under a minute as soon as the team is on the base. 300-400 damage traded at most. A serious waste of time.

I'm not against diversity in game modes, it's rather the opposite, but Assault as a game mode needs to be reworked or get rid off completely.

[Semper Bob]

I have mostly been in lights or fast mediums so far, in the past couple of months things have really seemed to click better as far as battlefield awareness. I mention this because driving a locust during a recent match in the canyon we found an enemy out of position and alone early on and took him out, then after we got a good engagement going with the enemy I made a solo run for their base. I only stayed on it long enough for two base being captured calls before seeing a red dorito pointing my way so I started heading towards the rear of the enemy forces to drop an airstrike. I was knocked out shortly after that but we did end up winning.

I've also seen every light run for the base and it doesn't end well most of the time.

That end run by the whole team ... saw it on Polar, we went right, they went right, never saw each other and we were too far out of position to stop them. Interesting once, not something I want to repeat so now I try to make sure both sides get scouted.

Edited by Semper Bob, 20 February 2016 - 09:40 AM.

[Appogee]

Deathswarrior, on 20 February 2016 - 09:26 AM, said:

...I have noticed more and more the blob starts to follow me in a line when I am clearly to far away to be a focal point. I chalk it up to the blob mentality of the way most rounds are played anymore, the "Follow the leader" mindset.

I share your observation.

And, knowing PUGs will do this, is one reason why I am urging immediate cap rushers not to do it.

[Screech]

Somehow this thread feels like a necro.

[Damia Savon]

Appogee, on 20 February 2016 - 09:13 AM, said:

This goes out to the guys who spawn and immediately run to the enemy base and try to cap it.

Yes, it's Assault Mode. Yes, capping the enemy base is an objective. Yes, sometimes it is a strategically good idea for a Light to get on the enemy base, and force some of the enemy to break away from the main engagement.

But not immediately after we spawn.

When you cap rush immediately after you spawn...

• You string out and split up the team. Some of our PUG team will inevitably follow you blindly across the map, in the mistaken belief that you're the nascent death-blob or at the leading edge of the battlefront.
  
• You give the enemy an immediate numerical advantage. Depending on how many of you went to cap rush, and how many of our team is trying to follow you, the enemy's death blob can have as much as a 2 to 1 firepower/armor advantage over the rest of the team who is actually fighting.
  
• You deny us your firepower. You aren't shooting at the enemy. You aren't harassing, distracting and suppressing them. The enemy can focus down our team's most potent heavy and assault Mechs more easily.
  
• You lose us the match. Those of us actually fighting the enemy soon get overwhelmed by the enemy's numerical advantage. By then, one of the enemy Lights will be stepping on their base stopping you capping, and you have an entire enemy team focusing you to death, too.
  
• No-one gets their Challenge points. During Challenges like the present one, you need 150 match score. You are unlikely to get that from a cap rush, and the rest of us certainly won't while we're being hosed down as you stand in a square at the other end of the map..

I can't count the number of matches I've seen lost because immediate cap-rushers split up the team, got half the team killed, and then couldn't complete the cap. But spawn cap-rushing it has certainly resulted in waaaaay waaaaay waaaaay more losses than wins. (And even the wins are relatively pointless from a rewards perspective.)



So, please, don't rush immediately to cap after spawning.

By all means cap in the middle of the fight if splitting up the enemy line will help us win. But please consider carefully whether the balance of the battle is better served by you shooting, distracting and harassing, rather than just running off and standing in a square.

Agreed. There is a time and place for a base cap but right at the start is not it.

[Alistair Winter]

I see your points, but pug matches are unpredictable.

Sometimes 1 mech capping is a waste of firepower. Other times, half the enemy team RTBs and the other half is left scratching their head as they get roflstomped by 11 mechs.

As it happens, this sort of thing only happens when the enemy team sends 1 mech to cap. When my team sends 1 mech to cap, we either split up in 5 directions or get outcapped ourselves. Puglife.

[Deathlike]

To be honest, when the team has an advantage when capping, you'd hope that they would stop so that others (and themselves) would benefit from more salvage rewards instead of the paltry cap win reward.

Making money is kinda Lostech for some people.

Even then, most capping teams are pretty bad at their job (mostly get overrun).

[Cyborne Elemental]

If a fast light can pull even 1 guy away from the murderball, it can have its advantages.

I see Yoki do it all the time, and then guys get engaged and HAVE TO chase that evil squirrel, and it creates some chaos in the fight.

Like last night for me, had an assault game on Crimson, I pulled 4 guys away from the fight by cap harassment, I killed one and kept the other 3 busy while I ran through the buildings and played peekaboo, amazingly I survived to the end of the match, but that was 4 guys that weren't harassing my team, and we won 12-4.

It depends alot on the map, but diversion and harassment can have value, its a gamble either way, but it does make things more interesting than nascaring in the murderblob all the time.

Edited by Mister D, 20 February 2016 - 01:14 PM.

[Triordinant]

Bring back game mode selection. Problem solved.

[Appogee]

Triordinant, on 20 February 2016 - 12:01 PM, said:

Bring back game mode selection. Problem solved.

Yeah, I ended up deselecting Assault Mode ... even though I really liked it when it was used strategically.

[sycocys]

I had the challenge points after the first 20 or so matches (Friday morning, during EU peak no less), so capping bases off and getting a couple assists/scouts in is plenty effective for me.

Plus it makes the skirmish only people rage like crazy - so there's that added bonus.

[Lykaon]

Appogee, on 20 February 2016 - 09:13 AM, said:

This goes out to the guys who spawn and immediately run to the enemy base and try to cap it.

Yes, it's Assault Mode. Yes, capping the enemy base is an objective. Yes, sometimes it is a strategically good idea for a Light to get on the enemy base, and force some of the enemy to break away from the main engagement.

But not immediately after we spawn.

When you cap rush immediately after you spawn...

• You string out and split up the team. Some of our PUG team will inevitably follow you blindly across the map, in the mistaken belief that you're the nascent death-blob or at the leading edge of the battlefront.
  
• You give the enemy an immediate numerical advantage. Depending on how many of you went to cap rush, and how many of our team is trying to follow you, the enemy's death blob can have as much as a 2 to 1 firepower/armor advantage over the rest of the team who is actually fighting.
  
• You deny us your firepower. You aren't shooting at the enemy. You aren't harassing, distracting and suppressing them. The enemy can focus down our team's most potent heavy and assault Mechs more easily.
  
• You lose us the match. Those of us actually fighting the enemy soon get overwhelmed by the enemy's numerical advantage. By then, one of the enemy Lights will be stepping on their base stopping you capping, and you have an entire enemy team focusing you to death, too.
  
• No-one gets their Challenge points. During Challenges like the present one, you need 150 match score. You are unlikely to get that from a cap rush, and the rest of us certainly won't while we're being hosed down as you stand in a square at the other end of the map..

I can't count the number of matches I've seen lost because immediate cap-rushers split up the team, got half the team killed, and then couldn't complete the cap. But spawn cap-rushing it has certainly resulted in waaaaay waaaaay waaaaay more losses than wins. (And even the wins are relatively pointless from a rewards perspective.)



So, please, don't rush immediately to cap after spawning.

By all means cap in the middle of the fight if splitting up the enemy line will help us win. But please consider carefully whether the balance of the battle is better served by you shooting, distracting and harassing, rather than just running off and standing in a square.

There is a strategy to base capping in Pug matches that eludes many.

First off if you are not piloting a mech with at least 100+ speed you have no business trying to cap early or mid match.You are not fast enough to evade a dedicated base defense and you will not have the time to finish the cap most matches.

Timing is important. Too soon and the enemy mechs are not sufficently engaged or distant.This results in a potential over reaction to your cap attempt with several of the close enemy returning to base and running you down. This doesn't keep them occupied long enough to merit the loss of your mech,it doesn't put pressure on the enemy team by significantly reducing the cap bar and it does give the enemy an easy mech kill if you fail to evade the over reaction to the base cap.

Don't be overly focused on capping early match. You mech is far more valuable spotting the enemy and distracting their attentions from your team mates.A fast mech should be supporting the team early match by locating the enemy,distracting their focus and delaying movement and possitioning of the slower mechs. Running straight for the cap is not the best use of your mech for your team.

Know when the time is right.

If your team has the enemy well engaged and the battle is in full pitch now may be a good time to attempt to draw enemy off the front. The trick to this is try to make it a lopsided trade. If your light mech only draws an enemy light off the line it's not as advantagious as drawing 2 or 3 mechs off the line. Unless of course you are sure you will take down a lone enemy light. And that leads me to my next point.

If you are a skilled one on one (or even two on one) light mech pilot then the game is a different one entirely. You are not trying to cap the base at all you are trying to get fed fresh meat that runs back to base to die at your hands. A while back I had a teammate that I would employ a strategy that was based on this pinciple. It's more difficult to do in a pug match but not impossible.

The plan is as follows. 1 Kintaro KTO18 with LRM5s and my Raven 3L with NARC. I tickle the base with the Raven and NARC and duel any responders. The entire time they are forced to dance with me the KTO is raining the LRMs on them. It's fast and it's brutal.The only mechs that don't fold quickly are the assault mechs. And if an Assault mech shows up The KTO redeploys and I bug out with the Raven leaving the enemy assault mech way off the firing line.The KTO has the range to rapidly rejoin the fight and the Raven has the speed to get back to a useful place for the team.


One of the important uses of base threatening is forcing the enemy to respond and act on your terms. It's not always about trying to cap that point as fast as possible or even as simple as distracting the enemy. It can be as complex as a well designed mech trap.

[Dawnstealer]

Yeah, it's a goal on Assault and one that, if you're going to pull it off, you BETTER start early in the match. But if you're in a hundred tonner and that's the first place you go? You're a bad person and you should feel bad.

The only times I go for the base is on big maps where the action usually happens near the middle (Tourmaline, for example) and teams get locked into a scrum and can't get out. Capping in that situation can sometimes pull vital teammates off and give your team the advantage.

But there's a few tricks to this: it doesn't take more than one or two Lights to pull this off. Any more than that, and you're probably hurting your team.

On other maps, like Canyons, it seems like you just naturally end up next to the base while NASCAR-ing, so what the hell: might as well stand on the thing and draw the enemy towards you.

But where this goes wrong is when you have 2-3 Assaults sprint across the map, ignoring the enemy, and stand on the base. Inevitably, depriving the team of that much armor and firepower means the rest of the team is at a severe disadvantage, and will get wiped. Then those two to three Assaults and Heavies will both get swarmed and have to deal with the hate pouring down from their own team.

[Deathlike]

Dawnstealer, on 20 February 2016 - 01:18 PM, said:

Yeah, it's a goal on Assault and one that, if you're going to pull it off, you BETTER start early in the match. But if you're in a hundred tonner and that's the first place you go? You're a bad person and you should feel bad.

The only times I go for the base is on big maps where the action usually happens near the middle (Tourmaline, for example) and teams get locked into a scrum and can't get out. Capping in that situation can sometimes pull vital teammates off and give your team the advantage.

But there's a few tricks to this: it doesn't take more than one or two Lights to pull this off. Any more than that, and you're probably hurting your team.

On other maps, like Canyons, it seems like you just naturally end up next to the base while NASCAR-ing, so what the hell: might as well stand on the thing and draw the enemy towards you.

But where this goes wrong is when you have 2-3 Assaults sprint across the map, ignoring the enemy, and stand on the base. Inevitably, depriving the team of that much armor and firepower means the rest of the team is at a severe disadvantage, and will get wiped. Then those two to three Assaults and Heavies will both get swarmed and have to deal with the hate pouring down from their own team.

The Atlas or Dire that goes base capping is a sad thing. The only time it works is when the main force is busy and the distance traveled isn't too significant (doing it on Alpine is a total waste of time for instance), and that only surprises the Lights that show up once in a while. It's just a bad deal to even bother attempting it as an Assault mech (assuming it is the last option).

I've probably seen too many of these, and facepalm when people do this.

[MadcatX]

I'll sometimes do a rush, but I always announce it in VoIP that I'm going on cap to see if I can split the enemy team and not to actually win by cap and most importantly to NOT FOLLOW ME.

[Ultimax]

There has to be another game where useless trolls like this can expend their energy.