70 replies to this topic

[Alistair Winter]

invernomuto, on 22 June 2016 - 05:17 AM, said:

What are these four pillars?

invernomuto asked this in another thread and I thought I'd make a thread about this. Maybe he was being sardonic, but I'll just assume he was asking the question sincerely. And it wouldn't be very surprising if he did. Here's a short history lesson, for all the people who joined MWO late or who forgot all about how it started.

Way back in 2011 and 2012, the Four Pillars was basically how PGI described the game to sell it to the Founders and future customers, from the very start of Closed Beta. The game wasn't ready yet, people didn't know what to expect, people didn't know what the game would be like upon release. And PGI's vision for MWO was the Four Pillars.

• Mech warfare
  
• Information warfare
  
• Role warfare
  
• Community warfare

I don't want to write an extensive history of MWO. Suffice it to say, the development of the game wasn't as smooth as the devs or the players had hoped. First of all, the actual release of the game took longer than expected and didn't really come with any significant new content. MWO upon release was very similar to Open Beta, to be honest. Community warfare (now Faction Play) was promised 90 days after release, and that was a hopelessly optimistic deadline that people have been making fun of for years.

To make a long story short (and I know a lot of white knights will disagree with this, but bear with me), PGI basically ignored Role Warfare and Information Warfare because Community Warfare (CW) became a top priority and took longer than expected. I think PGI wanted CW so badly because MWO is a niche game with a very split playerbase and the 'endless arena deathmatch' of Quick Play didn't appeal to a huge chunk of their target demographic, so they felt that CW was needed to capture the rest of the Mechwarrior fans. Better to finish CW quickly and keep everyone interested, instead of losing all those players now and trying to bring them back later.

In the end, Information Warfare (IW) was reduced to TAG and ECM (basically) and Role warfare (RW) was reduced to "Lights cap bases" In other words, a lot of players felt that MWO didn't really have IW or RW at all.

Here's why I'm starting this thread. <drumroll>

In 2016, we're finally starting to see the Four Pillars being delivered.

A lot of players are asking why some of us are so thrilled about the developments this summer.
"But the rescaling is terrible, just look at my Jenner."
"But weapon balance is crap and power draw won't fix anything!"
"But the game modes are awful, everything is basically just team deathmatch!"

Forget all that for a minute. We're now getting real information warfare. Not just ECM and TAG and "Press R to hold locks". That's not information warfare. We're getting:

• Infotech that determines how easy it is to detect your mech, how easy you detect other mechs, at what range you can detect other mechs, etc.
  
• New minimap where scouts can point out enemies, where we can see teammates asking for help, where we can identify different mech types (heavy, assault, etc) at a glance, where certain upgrades (such as command console) will increase available information (e.g. turning directionless diamonds into doritos so you can see where mechs are going)
  
• Command wheel that both facilitates communication and integrates with the minimap, so your commander can call artillery and call for UAV on specific locations, designate primary targets, etc.

And Role warfare is not longer just "send lights to cap base", we're actually hearing talks about completely revamped skill trees, integrated with the minimap and the command wheel and infotech. Today, the website has the following 4 roles: Scout, Brawler, Support and Assault. In 2012, there were 4 different roles being talked about. Command, Defense, Assault and Scouting. A lot of us were looking forward to this. We were upset that Commanders didn't have anything to do. We were upset there we no separate skills for the Scouts, as promised.

Read this and get a sense of what some of us were expecting to see in MWO:

https://mwomercs.com...-3-role-warfare

http://mwomercs.com/...rmation-warfare

This post is getting too long and too disorganized and I apologize. I wanted to keep it short, but I could probably write 30,000 words about this without breaking a sweat.

TL;DR - Some of us are very excited about the prospect of PGI finally delivering Role Warfare and Information Warfare, as described many years ago. This makes us more excited than PGI buffing PPCs or releasing a new mech pack. It makes us so excited, we're kind of overlooking the fact that rescaling had some nasty side effects (like nerfing light mechs) and that PGI rolled a critical fumble when they tried to update the minimap (especially since it's getting hotfixed this week). We're just really excited about PGI finally delivering what we considered to be the core of MWO, namely the Four Pillars. Even though it's just promises and words are wind - at least it's promises about something we care about, instead of new mech packs and light gauss rifles or whatever.

Jesus, even my TL;DR turned out too long.

[AnTi90d]

IF IW/RW means that Russ steals all of my doritos, then I don't stand behind PGI's vision.

I'd rather just toggle back to the old minimap and keep going that way. These changes make no sense. If your mech's sensors know the difference between an enemy's front and back armor, while targeted, they should therefore know which way that mech is facing. It's just an arbitrary and unjustified change because they couldn't come up with a better idea and they don't take suggestions from us, here, on this island.

[Alistair Winter]

AnTi90d, on 22 June 2016 - 06:16 AM, said:

IF IW/RW means that Russ steals all of my doritos, then I don't stand behind PGI's vision.

Some players will always view it like that. I don't understand or sympathize with that view at all. If PGI is nerfing seismic or making global nerfs to the minimap / radar, then some players see it as PGI taking something away from them. Ultimately, I have no illusion that I can convince you otherwise.

Think of it this way. There's a scale from 0 to 10, where 0 is having no information about your enemy at all, and 10 is having full information about their location, direction, armour, weapons, etc.

After PGI finished nerfing the ECM (reducing its bubble to 90 meters, removing the IFF disruptor, etc) let's say most teams were at about 7. If you had really good scouts with lots of UAVs, you could get this up to 8 or 9. But really, the advantage of having 3 Locusts with BAP and TAG and NARC feeding you extra information didn't really make up for the significant loss in firepower for investing in 3 Locusts instead of, say, 3 Stormcrows or 3 Warhammers or whatever. Even a team without scouts would be at about 6-7 anyway. If there were no tonnage restrictions, you'd probably see a lot of 12-man groups without any scouts at all. Why? TMI. Too much information.

PGI is now reducing the amount of information available. Some people have suggested that they should just keep things as before, and instead try to incentivize scouting by letting scouts provide extra information, like ammo location, XL vs STD engines, heatsink location, etc. However, this is a bad idea, because all that extra information isn't really valuable enough anyway.

The only way to incentivize scouting is to take away some of the information. So instead of bad teams having 6-7 on the information scale, and great teams having 8-9, you will now see the whole scale being used. Bad teams will now be at 1-2, having almost no information available. Mediocre teams will be at about 4-5, good teams at 6-7 and only the teams with awesome scouting will be at 8-9.

[CK16]

Same thing happens in other games like MWO...."*Insert company* STOP TOUCHING MY STUFF! YOU RUIN THE WHOLE GAME WHEN YOU TOUCH STUFF!"

But yea, I am looking forward to getting more roles. Just as long as each gives decent xp and rewards. Scouting, tagging narcing as some have pointed put gives hardly any rewards, these if they become, and hopefully they do, a vital part of team play, hopefully they reward and focus mechs to do thier jobs, aka getting lights to scout. Assualts to be the base busters ect.

Edited by CK16, 22 June 2016 - 07:09 AM.

[MrJeffers]

If you seriously listen to what was said in that video, they have delivered everything. 80% of the bittervet "promises" made BS is player interpretation of things that have been said based on their own (unrealistic) expectations. Not the actual things said. Dates have been missed, repeatedly, sure but the basics of what have been said have been delivered.
Information warfare is targeting info, thats it.
CW is battling for planets, that's it. Not some deep logistical war game.

Bittervets need to listen to exactly what was actually said, not what they think was said. PGI's biggest mistake is taking in vagueness that leave it open for all that interpretation that sets up unrealistic expectations.

Edited by MrJeffers, 22 June 2016 - 06:57 AM.

[TheArisen]

AnTi90d, on 22 June 2016 - 06:16 AM, said:

IF IW/RW means that Russ steals all of my doritos, then I don't stand behind PGI's vision.

I'd rather just toggle back to the old minimap and keep going that way. These changes make no sense. If your mech's sensors know the difference between an enemy's front and back armor, while targeted, they should therefore know which way that mech is facing. It's just an arbitrary and unjustified change because they couldn't come up with a better idea and they don't take suggestions from us, here, on this island.

It's actually a pretty good idea. Take away the information crutches & make people work to get that information. That creates a need for scouts, etc. Now having a team that's only built around firepower can be a liability.

This adds layers to the game & once ppl get acclimated I anticipate a deeper gameplay experience.

I understand it's hard to accept change & the unknown is disconcerting but this could turn out to be one of the best things PGI has done in awhile.

[Bud Crue]

Alistair Winter, on 22 June 2016 - 06:29 AM, said:

The only way to incentivize scouting is to take away some of the information. So instead of bad teams having 6-7 on the information scale, and great teams having 8-9, you will now see the whole scale being used. Bad teams will now be at 1-2, having almost no information available. Mediocre teams will be at about 4-5, good teams at 6-7 and only the teams with awesome scouting will be at 8-9.

In re minimap and role warfare [edit]:
I too agree that we need more roles, especially scouting, but I disagree that the "only way to incentivize" it is by taking away the information that all players previously enjoyed and replacing it with something that just feels...well goofy.

To my mind I would have incentivized the scouting role by perhaps giving lights a straight up buff to sensor range and target acquisition time, leave mediums the same, and nerfs to heavies and assaults. Or something like that. Then I would change the rewards structure so that everyone gets more bonuses for scouting but with certain "scout" mechs getting a bonus multiplier. Quirks would then be used for flavor (e.g. Cyclops gets light level sensor range and target acquisition, maybe the Jagger and Rifleman too so as to justify their giant wing, etc.). Stuff like that. All easily done within the current (well, before yesterday) version of the game.

I just don't think removing a feature that is not only useful but near ubiquitous to the MW experience and replacing it with something far less useful for its intended purpose (providing situational awareness), and counter intuitive to boot, should be necessary to incentivize role warfare.

Edited by Bud Crue, 22 June 2016 - 07:22 AM.

[MoonUnitBeta]

What are the pillars supporting, though? A firm cloud of imagination, or could/would/should be's?
What's supporting the pillars? Just dry, dusty hard packed dirt?

I feel like when imagining the pillars, they are all different shapes and sizes.
Mech Warfare, - that's like roman or greek styled, nice and crisp white, about 3 stories tall, pure marble...
Information Warfare, - a branchless pine tree. The trunk is strong, but tapers as you get higher. Spindly, and thin at its highest potential, we have the basics, but quickly fades into the air.
Role Warfare, - a steel i-beam. About 20 feet tall. Very simple. It's important, but there's not a lot foing for it.
Community Warfare, - a crudely shaped piece of granite, with very little form/function, about 2 feet tall...

[Alistair Winter]

Bud Crue, on 22 June 2016 - 07:01 AM, said:

I too agree that we need more roles, especially scouting, but I disagree that the "only way to incentivize" it is by taking away the information that all players previously enjoyed and replacing it with something that just feels...well goofy.
To my mind I would have incentivized the scouting role by perhaps giving lights a straight up buff to sensor range and target acquisition time, leave mediums the same, and nerfs to heavies and assaults. Or something like that. Then I would change the rewards structure so that everyone gets more bonuses for scouting but with certain "scout" mechs getting a bonus multiplier. Quirks would then be used for flavor (e.g. Cyclops gets light level sensor range and target acquisition, maybe the Jagger and Rifleman too so as to justify their giant wing, etc.). Stuff like that. All easily done within the current (well, before yesterday) version of the game.

Infotech in itself will help a lot. And what you're describing is essentially Infotech. But I don't think it's enough.

Bud Crue, on 22 June 2016 - 07:01 AM, said:

I just don't think removing a feature that is not only useful but near ubiquitous to the MW experience and replacing it with something far less useful for its intended purpose (providing situational awareness), and counter intuitive to boot, should be necessary to incentivize role warfare.

Not sure what you're talking about here, specifically.

MrJeffers, on 22 June 2016 - 06:57 AM, said:

If you seriously listen to what was said in that video, they have delivered everything. 80% of the bittervet "promises" made BS is player interpretation of things that have been said based on their own (unrealistic) expectations. Not the actual things said. Dates have been missed, repeatedly, sure but the basics of what have been said have been delivered.
Information warfare is targeting info, thats it.
CW is battling for planets, that's it. Not some deep logistical war game.
Bittervets need to listen to exactly what was actually said, not what they think was said. PGI's biggest mistake is taking in vagueness that leave it open for all that interpretation that sets up unrealistic expectations.

If you read the Dev Logs, you can see where the bittervets got their interpretation from. The idea of different skill trees didn't just come to people in a dream, for example. And when Russ said that Role Warfare was the most important pillar, and talked about how MWO would be different in that light mechs would be valuable, well... there's a reason tonnage cap and 3-3-3-3 was introduced. Without any restrictions, bigger turned out to be better after all. Without restrictions, you'd see 4 waves of 12 heavy mechs or assault mechs in CW / FP, I have no doubt.

MoonUnitBeta, on 22 June 2016 - 07:02 AM, said:

What are the pillars supporting, though? A firm cloud of imagination, or could/would/should be's?

Mech packs.

MoonUnitBeta, on 22 June 2016 - 07:02 AM, said:

What's supporting the pillars? Just dry, dusty hard packed dirt?

Turtles all the way down.

[Bud Crue]

Alistair Winter, on 22 June 2016 - 07:14 AM, said:

Not sure what you're talking about here, specifically.

Minimap changes. Thought context was clear. Edited my post.

[Alistair Winter]

Bud Crue, on 22 June 2016 - 07:24 AM, said:

Minimap changes. Thought context was clear. Edited my post.

But when you say 'removing a feature', it sounds like you're saying that they're effectively removing the minimap. So you think, even with the hotfix coming this week, the update to the minimap is essentially removing a feature? Or are you talking about the time between now and then?

[Rebas Kradd]

Alistair, I think you hit on a few good points - that role and information warfare have never been abandoned, just delayed.

But I have an honest question: What difference does mech direction make on actual combat? If I know a mech is there, I'm going to shoot it. If we're on Skirmish on Viridian Bog, I can make a wild guess where an enemy group is headed (or will be in two seconds) - straight towards me. With 12 enemy mechs in a relatively small area and all the damage output flying around, how is this information really going to change how I prioritize targets? I can't be the only one thinking this.

I have a theory. Bear with me. I think another part of the reason PGI delayed their development is because they saw that the maps and gamemodes reduce them to irrelevance.

Discovering weapon loadout, for example: in our current deathballing format, does that change the actions pilots take on the battlefield? Everyone just ends up rushed into targeting the center torso because you've only got a few seconds to take your shots before the enemy murderball melts your face. Scouting is another example. Why bother when the small maps mean that your eyes are all the information warfare you need? We can know the location and movement of the enemy just by sticking a Raven up on the hill on Alpine; we can guess their direction based on the one objective that's on the map (on most of the gamemodes, at least). There's really no real question to any of this, or any work required to figure it out. So PGI went - "why bother?" At least that's my theory.

Based on this, and on the whole Ghost Targeting debacle of last fall, I think PGI is struggling to think up meaningful IW, and so many of their efforts feel largely token. A great part of the reason for this, is that knowing the enemy's location, movement, or status has yet to really make a difference in how pilots think and act, because the deathballing and predictable gamemodes make it all either irrelevant or already known. It just becomes shoot-shoot-shoot.

And like you said, Alistair, I don't think anyone in the bittervet community really had any practical ideas on how to deploy it either. People complain that the skill tree we were promised wasn't implemented. The thought in the back of my head was always, "Will it even matter?" The current nature of the game rewards nothing but raw damage output and rushing towards the same one objective. Skill trees won't change any of that.

We as the community should really put our heads together and brainstorm for meaningful ways to bring IW into the game. But I think the nature of MWO (small maps, predictable gamemodes) is really, IMHO, what makes this game feel FPS-y. It's going to continue submerging the usefulness of most IW until it's changed. This is why I've spent the last year pounding the table on these matters. How might IW actually make a difference if the field were divided into smaller battles and if we actually made "Where is that mech going?" a question with multiple possible answers?

Edited by Rebas Kradd, 22 June 2016 - 07:33 AM.

[AnTi90d]

Alistair Winter, on 22 June 2016 - 07:27 AM, said:

But when you say 'removing a feature', it sounds like you're saying that they're effectively removing the minimap. So you think, even with the hotfix coming this week, the update to the minimap is essentially removing a feature?

Indian-giving us doritos is removing a feature.

If they even decide to add it back for Tag / UAVs / CC / Cyclopses it won't be for weeks if not months.. and it creates a lot of ill sentiment to give everyone something and let them have it for years and then take it away and give it to someone else.

[Bud Crue]

Alistair Winter, on 22 June 2016 - 07:27 AM, said:

But when you say 'removing a feature', it sounds like you're saying that they're effectively removing the minimap. So you think, even with the hotfix coming this week, the update to the minimap is essentially removing a feature? Or are you talking about the time between now and then?

I am speaking to what we have actual evidence for: The map as it exists now...the one Russ showed at the townhall and clearly indicated was to be functional in the way it currently is, and that a zoom function was being considered but not guaranteed. That new minimap is in my view removing a feature that we all knew and replacing it (edit) with something that is counter intuitive and fails in the function of providing a player with any situational awareness. It is a universal nerf to not only the games functionality but to its enjoyment. Such a gimping of the game play is not imo a good way to encourage "role warefare".

Now, what PGI may end up releasing may in fact do the things you hope. It may help development of infotech and role warfare. But I am not holding my breath. If what we actually got in the form of thecurrent minimap is in any way an indication of what they think of as an aspect of further developing the four pillars then I think those pillars are not going to hold up a whole lot of further construction.

Edited by Bud Crue, 22 June 2016 - 07:44 AM.

[Mystere]

Alistair Winter, on 22 June 2016 - 06:07 AM, said:

Here's why I'm starting this thread. <drumroll>

In 2016, we're finally starting to see the Four Pillars being delivered.

Now imagine for a moment where the game would be now with the 4 pillars if PGI had not wasted 4 years constantly going around in circles like a dog chasing it's tail with regard to balancing.

[Mystere]

TheArisen, on 22 June 2016 - 06:58 AM, said:

It's actually a pretty good idea. Take away the information crutches & make people work to get that information. That creates a need for scouts, etc. Now having a team that's only built around firepower can be a liability.

This adds layers to the game & once ppl get acclimated I anticipate a deeper gameplay experience.

I understand it's hard to accept change & the unknown is disconcerting but this could turn out to be one of the best things PGI has done in awhile.

The problem is that PGI "took away" things before first explaining their reasons why. That was their biggest mistake in this entire brouhaha.

[Weeny Machine]

MrJeffers, on 22 June 2016 - 06:57 AM, said:

Information warfare is targeting info, thats it.

If that's their "vision" of info warfare...then I am not even angry...I honestly pitty them. Info warfare could be so much more: different radar detection levels according to size. Chassis with some boni regarding this (another way to balance chassis without bloated weapon quirks etc)

Edited by Bush Hopper, 22 June 2016 - 08:06 AM.

[Rebas Kradd]

Bush Hopper, on 22 June 2016 - 08:00 AM, said:

If that's their "vision" of info warfare...then I am not even angry...I honestly pitty them

What's yours? What information do YOU think is 1) actually valuable on the battlefield and 2) can be made unobtainable by any other means?

[TLBFestus]

I applaud your optimism Alistair, but after 4-5 years of observation, I seriously doubt that we will ever see more than 2 of those "pillars" even remotely fleshed out and complete to any degree.

This is not just sour grapes for the sake of it. I'm basing that opinion on what we've seen in the past 4 years with PGI. Glacially slow development that often seems unfocused and misguided. Unless that changes, and since that originates at the top of the PGI food chain, I seriously doubt they would be able to accomplish this in any time frame that doesn't involve generations.

[Darkblood]

Alistair Winter, on 22 June 2016 - 06:29 AM, said:

Some players will always view it like that. I don't understand or sympathize with that view at all. If PGI is nerfing seismic or making global nerfs to the minimap / radar, then some players see it as PGI taking something away from them. Ultimately, I have no illusion that I can convince you otherwise.

Think of it this way. There's a scale from 0 to 10, where 0 is having no information about your enemy at all, and 10 is having full information about their location, direction, armour, weapons, etc.

After PGI finished nerfing the ECM (reducing its bubble to 90 meters, removing the IFF disruptor, etc) let's say most teams were at about 7. If you had really good scouts with lots of UAVs, you could get this up to 8 or 9. But really, the advantage of having 3 Locusts with BAP and TAG and NARC feeding you extra information didn't really make up for the significant loss in firepower for investing in 3 Locusts instead of, say, 3 Stormcrows or 3 Warhammers or whatever. Even a team without scouts would be at about 6-7 anyway. If there were no tonnage restrictions, you'd probably see a lot of 12-man groups without any scouts at all. Why? TMI. Too much information.

PGI is now reducing the amount of information available. Some people have suggested that they should just keep things as before, and instead try to incentivize scouting by letting scouts provide extra information, like ammo location, XL vs STD engines, heatsink location, etc. However, this is a bad idea, because all that extra information isn't really valuable enough anyway.

The only way to incentivize scouting is to take away some of the information. So instead of bad teams having 6-7 on the information scale, and great teams having 8-9, you will now see the whole scale being used. Bad teams will now be at 1-2, having almost no information available. Mediocre teams will be at about 4-5, good teams at 6-7 and only the teams with awesome scouting will be at 8-9.

I understand your point, agree with it mostly (still bugs me that you also lost information about your teammates, which is just ...).

But even if this is all true, the implementation was moronic. You want to withhold info, so you can sell info? FINE! But where do I buy it right now? Nowhere. This hypothetical mechs supposed to give me the info which was removed from the map are just that, hypothetical.

If PGI wanted to test out this partial implementation of the map, while still waiting for the other things necessary to make it playable, they should do it on a PTS, like most games do. You can't be reducing features of your game back to unplayable/placeholder/whatever status years after launch. Are we still in beta?

I don't understand this hurry to rush things out of the door before they are playable. Info warfare? Great! But I wouldn't touch the minimap before, AT LEAST, allowing people to change the zoom (even if only through settings screen) and allowing TAG/UAV/Console to pass directional info.

What they just did was reducing ALL players to 1-2 info on your scale.