204 replies to this topic

[Ghostrider270]

did anyone ever wonder why you can see from one end of the map almost all the way to the other side even when its pitch black night?!
change that please, so at least on the night modes the snipers and lrms lose some of the advantage
i know the ice or snow will reflect a lot but this much?

Edited by Ghostrider270, 29 May 2017 - 03:46 AM.

[5m0k3r]

Remove this piece of crap map that you stuck together on a weekend and fire the guy that designed it, i don´t even bother anymore when it comes up, i know its ****** of me but it just isn´t any fun.

Edited by 5m0k3r, 05 June 2017 - 01:21 AM.

[Void Angel]

So what you're saying is that you're in regular violation of the participation clause of the player code of conduct because you don't understand how the map works.

[cougurt]

Void Angel, on 05 June 2017 - 04:59 PM, said:

So what you're saying is that you're in regular violation of the participation clause of the player code of conduct because you don't understand how the map works.

what's there to understand? the map sucks. the game already heavily favors long range and high mounts, and polar highlands only reinforces that further.

[Kaptain]

cougurt, on 07 June 2017 - 02:48 PM, said:

what's there to understand? the map sucks. the game already heavily favors long range and high mounts, and polar highlands only reinforces that further.

This. I have yet to just quit out when it comes up but it is such a bad map. I dislike it more than the old Terra Therma.
I hardly ever see good close games on this map, its almost always a stomp.

[Void Angel]

cougurt, on 07 June 2017 - 02:48 PM, said:

what's there to understand? the map sucks. the game already heavily favors long range and high mounts, and polar highlands only reinforces that further.

Kaptain, on 07 June 2017 - 03:42 PM, said:

This. I have yet to just quit out when it comes up but it is such a bad map. I dislike it more than the old Terra Therma.
I hardly ever see good close games on this map, its almost always a stomp.

I rest my case.

[Void Angel]

However, if you're really interested in improving your skills and being able to understand the map, I do Have Something For You.

[Void Angel]

Now, before you mention LRMs, let me point out two things: first, AMS is a thing, and if your team isn't using it, you have no right to complain about LRMs. You're just whining, and that's a fact. Second, while the cover in Polar is too low to block LRMs (this is the only real weakness of the map,) you can still use those ubiquitous covered routes to reach the LRM jerks - which is how you deal with LRMs in the first place.

[cougurt]

Void Angel, on 07 June 2017 - 07:45 PM, said:

Now, before you mention LRMs, let me point out two things: first, AMS is a thing, and if your team isn't using it, you have no right to complain about LRMs. You're just whining, and that's a fact. Second, while the cover in Polar is too low to block LRMs (this is the only real weakness of the map,) you can still use those ubiquitous covered routes to reach the LRM jerks - which is how you deal with LRMs in the first place.

AMS should not be necessitated by a map's design, especially when there's no way of knowing which map is going to be played beforehand, or whether the enemy team will even have LRMs. i'm not going to waste precious tonnage on something that may very well be completely useless.

while the hills do provide a small degree of cover, that all goes out the window if even one person happens to spot you, or god forbid you get NARCed.

assuming you're a brawler, sticking with your team usually means that you're just going to be dead weight for at least 75% of the match. you can try to sneak around on your own, but once again, all it takes is a single person spotting you to immediately put an end to that idea. and finally, even if you are able to close the distance, you're going to have a difficult time hitting anything if your weapons are below chest height.

also, the LRM boats will almost always be hanging out with the rest of their team; closing in on them specifically is rarely an option.

Edited by cougurt, 08 June 2017 - 04:11 AM.

[Aggravated Assault Mech]

Void Angel, on 07 June 2017 - 07:45 PM, said:

Now, before you mention LRMs, let me point out two things: first, AMS is a thing, and if your team isn't using it, you have no right to complain about LRMs. You're just whining, and that's a fact. Second, while the cover in Polar is too low to block LRMs (this is the only real weakness of the map,) you can still use those ubiquitous covered routes to reach the LRM jerks - which is how you deal with LRMs in the first place.

The cover is too sparse and too easily camped. Anyone fast enough to actually get to the LRM boats isn't armored enough to punch through the suckers huddling around him. Pushing around the I8 high spot (common meeting point in Skirmish) is still 400-500m of open terrain, and frankly it confers more actual cover to the people around the LRM boats than it does to the people trying to get within 180m of them, since they can peek from cover at the junctions of these depressions, while you're just charging down them.

Posting a guide that can be concisely summed up as "just use teamwork guys!" doesn't change anything- if I wanted a non-answer I'd rather you just tell me to not get shot.

Most people in this thread seem to be aware that it's fantastically unrealistic to hinge success or failure almost 90% on team composition and the actions of one or two players in Skirmish and Assault- the only other map in the game that's like that is Alpine Peaks, and the only reason that map is so uncommon is because the ranges are too long for LRMs.

[Ragnahawk]

I don't like how the trenches are so tiny. Oh I can see your head, I guess that means you get LRMS. Actively punishes really tall mechs like the grasshopper and black knight. All the other maps, like tourmaline or grim plexus you can find decent cover, but this one has always been extremely catered and fed to strong lrm teams. The only effective strategy involved a strong coordinated push where everyone shares their armor but I think that ruins it. Why do we have to play to only one strategy?

Please PGI, if you can read this, please redesign this map. We are hurting here because we have no way to work the map. I would have never hopped into the dropship and land my mech here. Not ever.

[Fox the Apprentice]

Ragnahawk, on 09 June 2017 - 08:19 AM, said:

[...]
I would have never hopped into the dropship and land my mech here. Not ever.

Heresy! Your C.O. Commands it!

[Void Angel]

cougurt, on 07 June 2017 - 10:06 PM, said:

AMS should not be necessitated by a map's design, especially when there's no way of knowing which map is going to be played beforehand, or whether the enemy team will even have LRMs. i'm not going to waste precious tonnage on something that may very well be completely useless.

True as far as it goes - but this current resurgence of complaints comes at a time when everyone and his Clanner uncle is screaming about LRMs because of the skill tree shake-up. And since you never know where you're going to end up - or who you're going to be fighting - AMS is worth the investment in the current tactical environment.

In short, you'd be totally correct if the complaint was "this map is too good to LRM users unless my team brings a lot of AMS, which I can't control." But the typical LRM-centric complaints about this map are invariably along the lines of "LRMs are too good on this map," followed by the question "do you use AMS," with the inevitable reply of "no, AMS sucks!" That's not a reasonable complaint - that's failure to adapt, which is what I was heading off in the quote.

Edited by Void Angel, 09 June 2017 - 10:03 PM.

[Void Angel]

Speaking of failure to adapt...

Aggravated Assault Mech, on 08 June 2017 - 08:36 PM, said:

Posting a guide that can be concisely improperly summed up as "just use teamwork guys!" doesn't change anything- if I wanted a non-answer I'd rather you just tell me to not get shot. [fixed that for you]

If you wanted an answer at all, you'd have tried reading more... carefully. What you seem to want is agreement, which is wrong of you to demand. If you actually want to summarize that microguide, it would read "use the terrain to maneuver; don't just assume that the only options are 'run at them,' and 'camp in place.'"

Polar Highlands is hard to play against LRMs - if the LRM team has all its ducks in a row complete with dedicated scout Lights and NARC. AND if your team has a force mix with some combination of insignificant AMS/ECM, inadequate screening forces, or just plain slow 'mechs. It's not reasonable to assume that you will always (or even usually) have the worst-case scenario when you play the map.

In any case, the tried and true way to defeat LRMs is to get in their faces -or just flank then out-slug them with direct-fire weapons - and Polar Highlands is well-suited to letting you do that. Sure, you get teams who see LRMs in the air and refuse to accept damage in order to reach those 'mechs - but that's a tactical failure and not a problem with the map.

Ragnahawk, on 09 June 2017 - 08:19 AM, said:

I don't like how the trenches are so tiny. Oh I can see your head, I guess that means you get LRMS. Actively punishes really tall mechs like the grasshopper and black knight. All the other maps, like tourmaline or grim plexus you can find decent cover, but this one has always been extremely catered and fed to strong lrm teams. The only effective strategy involved a strong coordinated push where everyone shares their armor but I think that ruins it. Why do we have to play to only one strategy?

Please PGI, if you can read this, please redesign this map. We are hurting here because we have no way to work the map. I would have never hopped into the dropship and land my mech here. Not ever.

The map isn't really "catering" to LRM teams - it's just that the trenches do need to be deepened so that you can hide from LRMs a bit more effectively once spotted. This allows you to flank them without taking as much damage (particularly via spotter Lights) and then either get in their faces or beat them down with direct-fire weapons - nearly all of which kill more efficiently and quickly than LRMs. This is the way you kill LRMs on every map, though, so it's not really a Polar Highlands thing.

[Audacious Aubergine]

Honestly, Alpine is WAY worse for LRMs. At least on Polar the map itself is flat, so the trenches, while shallow, can actually hide a mech behind them. Once you're behind one and think you've lost the target lock, move sideways rather than following the Prometheus School of Running Away From Things^TM. Meanwhile on Alpine you can think you're hidden behind a hill but then someone standing on top of the mountain can still see and/or maintain a lock on you

[cougurt]

Void Angel, on 09 June 2017 - 09:55 PM, said:

True as far as it goes - but this current resurgence of complaints comes at a time when everyone and his Clanner uncle is screaming about LRMs because of the skill tree shake-up. And since you never know where you're going to end up - or who you're going to be fighting - AMS is worth the investment in the current tactical environment.

In short, you'd be totally correct if the complaint was "this map is too good to LRM users unless my team brings a lot of AMS, which I can't control." But the typical LRM-centric complaints about this map are invariably along the lines of "LRMs are too good on this map," followed by the question "do you use AMS," with the inevitable reply of "no, AMS sucks!" That's not a reasonable complaint - that's failure to adapt, which is what I was heading off in the quote.

i don't consider it worth the investment when i can consistently avoid LRMs through good positioning on every other map in the game. the only time i would run AMS is as a gimmick on the few mechs that can carry 3 of them. otherwise, i would much rather use the tonnage and slots on something that's guaranteed to provide some benefit regardless of map or enemy team composition.

LRMs aren't the only issue with the lack of cover either. that combined with the hilly terrain also make polar highlands extremely unfavorable for mechs with low-mounted weapons (because apparently they need to suffer as much as possible), which i'd say is reason enough on its own to consider it a poorly designed map.

another thing i'd like to bring up is how badly the game's environment LOD presents itself on this map. i've had countless occasions where what would appear to be a perfectly clean shot on an enemy would instead hit an invisible hillside. i won't harp on it too much since it's a technical problem that occurs on other maps as well, but i think it's worth mentioning due to how apparent it is on polar highlands in particular.

[Void Angel]

1.5 tons of ammo and gear (1 ton minimum) is not a significant investment for most 'mechs. If you're a Light, I can see it - even some Medium builds are just too tight to fit it in - but not anything else. LRMs are strongest on Polar Highlands, but they are used elsewhere. Or, to look at it another way, you may be able to avoid LRMs consistently on most maps, but your teammates may not have grabbed a clue - so if you slap in AMS, you're going to get your money's worth in most builds and play styles. So even if this map is the only place you need AMS, you'll still get your tonnage worth out of using it overall. There really isn't any excuse to not be bringing the system if you are so intimidated by LRMs that you effectively (or actively) refuse to play when you drop there - if you're not bringing the countermeasure, your moral authority to complain about a weapon is rather low.

And again, if you understand the map, you find that low weapon hardpoints actually matter less in Polar than some other places. You're thinking of the map as a hill-humping slugfest instead of taking advantage of the covered routes to flank all those low hills so that hardpoint height doesn't matter. In any case, complaints about hardpoint height fall into your own reasoning about LoD, though I should point out that I've not noticed significantly worse issues with that on Polar Highlands - maybe it's because I'm flanking?

[cougurt]

Void Angel, on 10 June 2017 - 06:37 AM, said:

1.5 tons of ammo and gear (1 ton minimum) is not a significant investment for most 'mechs. If you're a Light, I can see it - even some Medium builds are just too tight to fit it in - but not anything else. LRMs are strongest on Polar Highlands, but they are used elsewhere. Or, to look at it another way, you may be able to avoid LRMs consistently on most maps, but your teammates may not have grabbed a clue - so if you slap in AMS, you're going to get your money's worth in most builds and play styles. So even if this map is the only place you need AMS, you'll still get your tonnage worth out of using it overall. There really isn't any excuse to not be bringing the system if you are so intimidated by LRMs that you effectively (or actively) refuse to play when you drop there - if you're not bringing the countermeasure, your moral authority to complain about a weapon is rather low.

if my teammates don't know how to avoid LRMs then they should have brought their own AMS. 1.5 tons is still an extra engine rating (or several in some cases), jump jets, an extra heatsink, an extra laser, more armor, more ammo, etc. all things that i personally would get more use out of than an AMS in most situations. and i do give my best effort to play well when i get polar highlands, as hopeless as it is a lot of the time.

Quote

And again, if you understand the map, you find that low weapon hardpoints actually matter less in Polar than some other places. You're thinking of the map as a hill-humping slugfest instead of taking advantage of the covered routes to flank all those low hills so that hardpoint height doesn't matter. In any case, complaints about hardpoint height fall into your own reasoning about LoD, though I should point out that I've not noticed significantly worse issues with that on Polar Highlands - maybe it's because I'm flanking?

am i wrong to think of the map as a hill-humping slugfest? everything about its design would suggest that it's practically made for that playstyle.

you keep suggesting flanking as though it's that simple to just do. a flank is a risky move on any map, and considerably more so on polar highlands where a single person spotting you can often mean death. flanking also does not eliminate the problem of having low-mounted weapons, as all it takes for someone to become completely unhittable is for there to be a hill nearby that they can walk up, which is what the map happens to be entirely composed of.

the LOD issue is just a general complaint that obviously applies more to long range builds.

[Void Angel]

... "an engine rating?" For cereal? That engine increment was trivial before the mobility de-link, and it's doubly trivial now. Ditto with a single heat sink, a jump jet or three, hypothetical ammo, a Medium Laser for the hardpoint you already filled, - or armor. Particularly armor; if that AMS stops just 24 damage, it's paid for itself and the rest is gravy. Invoking personal experience doesn't make the facts subjective. In general, you can afford a ton (for the bare minimum possible) devoted to AMS on most builds. Sometimes, you actually do need that extra heat sink; most of the time, you don't.

cougurt, on 10 June 2017 - 02:52 PM, said:

am i wrong to think of the map as a hill-humping slugfest? everything about its design would suggest that it's practically made for that playstyle.

Yes, you are wrong.

You are wrong on several key points, any one of which would be fatal to your position. First, the map does not consist of ubiquitous hill-cover that is always available for your opponents to hide behind while they kill you in the open. Instead, it consists of a large network of rolling hills, with the seams between the hills providing covered routes to get practically anywhere on the map. In fact, rather than a network of hills, you should think of the map as a maze of intersecting ridgelines.

Of course, that ridgeline is too tall for Polar - the terrain there is much flatter, and the ridges less defined. But while the illustration is provided for the purposes of, uh, illustration, you can still see some things about this type of terrain... illustrated. First, while the top of the hill does block line of sight and fires (cover,) there is little cover on the slopes or in the valley between the ridgelines. This is especially true when the draws and spurs you see in the illustration are flattened out in Polar Highlands to the point where you can't really hide in them. If you can get to the end of that ridgeline, you can fire along it at the jerks who were lined up using it as a breastworks, and they're going to have a bad day. This wouldn't be that helpful if you had to run past the field of fire commanded by that ridgeline, but you don't. Polar Highlands is designed so that you don't have to - in fact, those long, low hills mean that it's far from trivial for the hill-humper you just flanked to regain a covered position. So that's your first mistake.

The second mistake is assuming that maneuvering around Polar as a group is hard; it isn't. This isn't like a flanking move in most other maps, where you're either circling around in a known pattern (Caustic Valley, etc,) or splitting off some guys and hoping you can coordinate a strike along two axes before the enemy realizes your fixing force is alone. This is picking a direction and moving through the low ground in that avenue of approach. You don't have to coordinate more than just moving together, and you can tell you're too high if you see the enemy. It's certainly possible to get turned around or lost - that's a matter of knowing the map - but in general once you pick where you want to go, the terrain channels you there. And since you're not trying to hit the enemy at a certain time (or even a certain place, really) the difficulty is not comparable to other, superficially similar, tactical scenarios.

Most players took one look at Polar and thought, "Oh, there is a lot of open space; I shall do sniping to it!" They missed the nuance of the terrain, and have not thought past their erroneous first impressions. I've been that guy with the wrong first impression; when they told me to mount up at the bridge against the Alliance in Alterac Valley (vanilla WoW,) I thought they were out of their minds - but I was wrong, and there were good reasons to do that. To this day, however, I run into people who don't understand why the Horde had to use that tactic; they were never convinced of their error - and having decided they were right, no amount of truth could dissuade them.

[Jiffy]

While I generally agree with most of your opinions on strategy and balance, Void Angel, I pretty much disagree with you down the board when it comes to Polar. Basically because these scenarios you are suggesting are highly idealized, and the match rarely every plays out the way you claim. Not only that, but it's easy to force the game to not play out in such an idealized fashion, rendering it much easier for a team of LRM boats and snipers to foil any attempt to close the distance than it is on any other map. Basically the scenarios you're putting forward hinge on the notion that the enemy team isn't just as aware of what's going on as your own team. They can do the same thing, and as long as their scouting and sniping is effective, they'll win against a team of brawlers every single time.

One of the problems is that the cover is so low, UAV's and poptarts can both get line of sight far more easily than they can on any other map in the game. And then if you get NARC'd, that's it. Period. There's no other map in the game where being hit with a NARC is effectively a guarantee of death, regardless of position. So even if the "only" problem with Polar is that the trenches aren't deep enough, that is a balance problem so severe that the map really shouldn't even be in rotation until that's changed. And even then, I see the map disproportionately favoring long range pop tarts and LRM's, much as it already does. I mean, let's be honest. Would anybody choose a brawler going into Polar on any game type other than domination, if they knew they would be playing Polar?

Also the suggestion to bring AMS is straight up silly for a number of reasons. First, when people vote for Polar they're often bringing the most LRM-spammy mechs that they have access to. One guy with quad LRM 15's isn't going to be meaningfully defeated by one guy with an AMS. You need a significant number of players with AMS to stop one missile boat from ruining a teammate's (or your own) match. But it's rarely ever just one missile boat-- if you're getting Polar it's usually a minimum of three. And they invariably bring enough ammo to exhaust your supply of AMS rounds well before they're out of missiles.

Edited by Jiffy, 11 June 2017 - 10:29 AM.