45 replies to this topic

[CDLord HHGD]

I know it's taboo but PGi was once (maybe still is secretly) talking about limiting unit size. Here are my thoughts on that and adapting a specific dropship purchase wouldn't be hard to factor in....

Clicky

[Novakaine]

Meh, I've given up over 2.5 mil xp on my Stalker 5M to do what?
Yeah just meh.

[SuomiWarder]

As to CW, there were a bunch of MW4 leagues run with no budget that had economies, mech tracking for units, garrison forces and even movement restrictions for attacks. So they had plenty of places to look and even people they could have recruited to help.

As to DropShips, we will buy one when we can. We will love it, and feed it, and keep it warm and name it Bob. Or maybe Baltic Serenade. But probably Bob.

[MeiSooHaityu]

Dirk Le Daring, on 23 February 2016 - 10:41 PM, said:

So way before Kerensky left the inner sphere, PGI had mentioned units being able to purchase a dropship.

Who remembers this ?

Is this idea lost to the mists of time ?

Will we ever see such a cool idea come to fruition ?

I would like to think it could happen, and it would give units something to actually work for. Add a bit more flavour to the game, and be totally cool.

So what happened to the idea PGI ?

This should be an easy question to answer.

Who would buy a dropship ?

I would.

If it makes you feel any better, you will have your own Dropship in Battletech (Stage 3 Reward)...
https://www.kickstar...ech/description


">>> STAGE 3+ ADDITIONAL FUNDING GOALS (FUNDED!)

• $2,000,000 - Customizable Home Base: As part of the ongoing campaign, you'll acquire a home base (likely in the form of a derelict DropShip) for your mercenary outfit to call home. At this funding level we'll also allow you to adjust its appearance, repair and upgrade its functionality, and grow and evolve your base as your outfit grows and evolves." - Harebrained Schemes

Too bad it will be in a different Battletech game :/

Edited by MeiSooHaityu, 24 February 2016 - 07:53 AM.

[Sandpit]

Intrepid, on 24 February 2016 - 03:37 AM, said:

But please continue to tell us how difficult it is to re-make a 25 year old game that arguably still does better than what MWO aspires to do.

a lot harder than you seem to think it is...

I'll agree with a lot of criticisms when it comes to PGI and MWO, but game dev work is not "easy" by any means whether you're remaking or doing from scratch.

[GRiPSViGiL]

Navid A1, on 23 February 2016 - 11:12 PM, said:

Yes, I remember their presentation at the launch party.

Their vision at the time was far surpassing their capability.

Now they know what they are capable of.... so here's another pack for you to buy.



However, they are slowly progressing and learning the way.

I hate to hold them to that design but other games have done similar and current games are doing comparable and more. I would take half of what they presented that day. It hurts a little more since I was standing there nodding my head when Bryan was presenting it.

The more I read through this thread the more butthurt I get that PGI sucks at their job.

Edited by GRiPSViGiL, 24 February 2016 - 09:27 AM.

[Lyoto Machida]

Dropship MVP (Minimum Viable Product)

[Metus regem]

Dirk Le Daring, on 23 February 2016 - 10:41 PM, said:

Who would buy a dropship ?

If I could fly the Dropship, and use it like a gunship, HELL YES!

[Dahkoht]

When I read things like this it always reminds me of my dream mmo.

Basically a mix of EVE and MWO with persistent open world planets and heavy repair costs , salvage , and so on.

Aerospace pilots and cruiser pilots in space battles and protecting the dropships for planetary invasions , then elemental and vehicle pilots along with the mechs and so on. Good aerospace pilots become as valuable as any mech pilot and so on.

You don't have 12 -20 mechs , you have one that's your lifeblood to start with and struggle to level up and buy a better one , same with aerospace , vehicle pilots and so on.

Real time text alerts that someone is invading a planet your faction controls and you scramble through the office to fire up the gaming laptop..............

One can dream.

[Lostdragon]

martian, on 24 February 2016 - 12:34 AM, said:

Don't tell me that you have really expected that you will have your own Leopard, Union or Overlord.

I need a Warship to get all the mechs I own where they need to be.

[Sandpit]

Dahkoht, on 24 February 2016 - 09:48 AM, said:

When I read things like this it always reminds me of my dream mmo.

Basically a mix of EVE and MWO with persistent open world planets and heavy repair costs , salvage , and so on.

Aerospace pilots and cruiser pilots in space battles and protecting the dropships for planetary invasions , then elemental and vehicle pilots along with the mechs and so on. Good aerospace pilots become as valuable as any mech pilot and so on.

You don't have 12 -20 mechs , you have one that's your lifeblood to start with and struggle to level up and buy a better one , same with aerospace , vehicle pilots and so on.

Real time text alerts that someone is invading a planet your faction controls and you scramble through the office to fire up the gaming laptop..............

One can dream.

That's what was basically promoted and discussed years ago by PGI

It's also one of the reasons the community went into meltdown mode over Transverse. They were basically building a new game that could have instead been designed to be every part of the Btech universe that's missing from MWO such as aerotech, player characters, a live universe, etc.

[Dahkoht]

Sandpit, on 24 February 2016 - 10:12 AM, said:

That's what was basically promoted and discussed years ago by PGI

It's also one of the reasons the community went into meltdown mode over Transverse. They were basically building a new game that could have instead been designed to be every part of the Btech universe that's missing from MWO such as aerotech, player characters, a live universe, etc.

I missed the Transverse drama here , as I played in early beta (about the time they released the Highlander Hero ) , left before Clans were launched , and came back about a year ago.

Did read about the Transverse bit on other sites , I can only imagine the drama here over it , and yeah , that would have rubbed me wrong too as I would have wanted all those things put in MWO and not a separate game also.

I bet there was some fun forum drama though at the time.

[martian]

Lostdragon, on 24 February 2016 - 09:58 AM, said:

I need a Warship to get all the mechs I own where they need to be.

I am sure that if you will nag Russ often enough on Twitter, PGI will implement Potemkin-class troop cruiser specially for you. This is how the system works.

[CDLord HHGD]

Dahkoht, on 24 February 2016 - 09:48 AM, said:

When I read things like this it always reminds me of my dream mmo.

Basically a mix of EVE and MWO with persistent open world planets and heavy repair costs , salvage , and so on.

Aerospace pilots and cruiser pilots in space battles and protecting the dropships for planetary invasions , then elemental and vehicle pilots along with the mechs and so on. Good aerospace pilots become as valuable as any mech pilot and so on.

You don't have 12 -20 mechs , you have one that's your lifeblood to start with and struggle to level up and buy a better one , same with aerospace , vehicle pilots and so on.

Real time text alerts that someone is invading a planet your faction controls and you scramble through the office to fire up the gaming laptop..............

One can dream.

My dream MMO is Star Citizen in the Battletech Universe.

Imagine walking around your hanger amongst Battlemechs. Your ships would be Dropships, Jumpships, or Warships as you transport your Battlemechs or cargo. IT WOULD BE GLORIOUS!

martian, on 24 February 2016 - 10:19 AM, said:

I am sure that if you will nag Russ often enough on Twitter, PGI will implement Potemkin-class troop cruiser specially for you. This is how the system works.

I'd take a corncob cruiser...

[Sandpit]

Dahkoht, on 24 February 2016 - 10:15 AM, said:

I missed the Transverse drama here , as I played in early beta (about the time they released the Highlander Hero ) , left before Clans were launched , and came back about a year ago.

Did read about the Transverse bit on other sites , I can only imagine the drama here over it , and yeah , that would have rubbed me wrong too as I would have wanted all those things put in MWO and not a separate game also.

I bet there was some fun forum drama though at the time.

lol well it's taboo to talk about here on the forums but I'll say this. Was some of the funniest trolling and memes I've ever read, created, and partook in

Reddit would have a good history of it I'm sure. The islanders still dwell there more than here

[MoonUnitBeta]

martian, on 24 February 2016 - 10:19 AM, said:

I am sure that if you will nag Russ often enough on Twitter, PGI will implement Potemkin-class troop cruiser specially for you. This is how the system works.

Twitter is the new meta

[Tyler Valentine]

Dahkoht, on 24 February 2016 - 09:48 AM, said:

When I read things like this it always reminds me of my dream mmo.

Basically a mix of EVE and MWO with persistent open world planets and heavy repair costs , salvage , and so on.

Aerospace pilots and cruiser pilots in space battles and protecting the dropships for planetary invasions , then elemental and vehicle pilots along with the mechs and so on. Good aerospace pilots become as valuable as any mech pilot and so on.

You don't have 12 -20 mechs , you have one that's your lifeblood to start with and struggle to level up and buy a better one , same with aerospace , vehicle pilots and so on.

Real time text alerts that someone is invading a planet your faction controls and you scramble through the office to fire up the gaming laptop..............

One can dream.

EVE + MWO = TAKE MY MONEY!

We have a very similar dream MMO...

[Metus regem]

Tyler Valentine, on 24 February 2016 - 10:47 AM, said:

EVE + MWO = TAKE MY MONEY!

We have a very similar dream MMO...

Several of us have that dream, and it hurts to see such potential being wasted in the dream of becoming a true eSport....

[Sandpit]

Metus regem, on 24 February 2016 - 11:48 AM, said:

Several of us have that dream, and it hurts to see such potential being wasted in the dream of becoming a true eSport....

PGI was handed a roadmap 3 years ago of what players wanted and expected from CW.

I think what we have now and what we've seen them working towards (such as Phase 3) is PGI's limit as far as their programming abilities go. What we have is what we'll have from here on out. I don't think there's any need to go into a list of things that MWO has been missing for years now that other games seem to have implemented seamlessly.
Even on the same engine

So it's not technology limitations.
PGI is profitable to the tune of millions annually so it's not revenue issues
They have been "hiring" staff for 3 years now so it's not a dev team size issue

That leads me to believe that it's simply their limitations as devs in general. (and before anyone even tries to say it, please note not once have I said they were "bad" "incompetent" or anythign else, simply pointing out a few things I've observed over the years)

In other words, we've hit the "limit" of PGI's ability and knowledge. I really think they should do two things.
Hire a cryengine expert because it became painfully obvious they were WAY out of their league with this engine when it took them over a year to design a GUI (that got implemented and updated like twice and still has a long list of features nowhere to be seen) It continues when you look at how "complicated" it seems to be for PGI to implement what have become industry standard type features such as
collisions
dynamic drop deck tonnage
lobbies
a persistent universe that doesn't require hour long ceasefires to update a map
etc.

That's not a knock on PGI's abilities, it's simply stating that I feel they get in way over their heads with an engine they knew very little about and had zero experience with.

Then hire a PR/Marketing type staff member to manage things liek social media, dispersing information across multiple platforms to players, sending out newsletters, sending out comstar intercepts with fun fluff, etc.

Finally, Russ needs to walk into the office, look everyone square in the eye and let them know that from here on out workflow practices, dev times, deadlines, and everything else form the ground up is going to be reviewed and adjusted if need be.

If Russ is going to continue to be the "face" of PGI, then he needs to know what's going on with all the various teams or have a dedicated staff member available to answer his question before giving out information to the public. how many times have we seen the "misspoke" issue come up with Russ passing along info to players that's outdated, inaccurate, etc.?

Again, that's not a knock on Russ or PGI, simply stating that if we're going to realistically talk about how PGI could improve things, they need to do a little internal housekeeping and review some of their processes because I'm sorry, but 2 years to get to "phase 3 of BETA" is unacceptable at this point.

You're a live game taking money form customers. It's ok to have beta, it's not ok to let major portions of the game languish in beta hell for years at a time.

[Stelar 7]

On one hand, I'd love to have EVE and MWO mashed up, but on the other, I'm pretty dang burned out on EVE and I still love MWO. Why? MWO asks very little of me. I can play casually, have friends, get fights, buy toys and never, ever, ever need to have an alarm telling me to hurry up and get online. Sorry online, you have to wait until after my wife and kids are sleeping. If they are awake, I have better things to do. I'm not alone in that and people like me have money to spend, so games need to keep us in mind. EVE doesn't do that. It wants me to feed it every month, just to log in. MWO offers me cool stuff on a regular basis for a fraction of the cost. EVE is big, but the people who rule there are the kids and the famlyless who can be online at the drop of a hat, or 23/7. They have money too, but I bet there are more people like me than there are like them.

I would say, MWO need not be like EVE, it would be cool if they could be like WWII Online. Persistent map, but also regular map resets. Why? Because if you don't allow resets then you need to code in the inability to win. Do you like winning? Would it be cool to drop on Luthien, or Terra and actually take them over? Yeah it would. WWIIOnline had three main factions, and three sets of equipment. We have more factions but only 2 sets. As factions get wiped out their mercs, us, can be shifted to the remaining groups. Either signing up with the surviving factions or being allowed to play from faction spaces as expatriates.

I also would love Jumpships and dropships and being able to look at my stuff from a more interactive view. I do not want to see dropships engaging in the combat more than they do in CW. I would love to see CW modes where we attack a dropship though. Take the turrets off a Union or Overloard and then either blow the landing legs to kill, or get into it and steal something. Can you imagine brawling inside a dropship? I can.