157 replies to this topic

[dervishx5]

Mystere, on 15 July 2016 - 03:52 PM, said:

I'm not advocating for power creep. I'm advocating for an immersive Community Warfare full of depth, something way beyond this ultra-simplistic system we have now.

Pretty sure my namesake has a much higher chance of being put in the game before we get this.

[Mystere]

dervishx5, on 15 July 2016 - 03:41 PM, said:

If this game had any strategic aspect to it then you might have a point. But I seem to recall PGI saying something about marketing MWO as a tournament game.

Then scrap CW altogether, build Solaris, and be done with all of this ridiculousness, because CW is not the correct environment for such a thing.

Then the question now becomes, does PGI have the guts to openly say and do so.

[Deathlike]

Mystere, on 15 July 2016 - 03:52 PM, said:

I'm not advocating for power creep. I'm advocating for an immersive Community Warfare full of depth, something way beyond this ultra-simplistic system we have now.

Now whether or not PGI is up to the job or is even remotely inclined, that's on them.

If you want depth, PGI is not truly capable of providing it (3 phases, and mostly disappointment on the latter 2).

Quote

Once again, depth can solve the 12v10 environment. But apparently, it just takes more imagination and creativity than I give developers and players alike credit for.

And for crying out loud, it's only 12v10!

<Calling JM! Calling JM! Where are you?>

You would have to be greatest dev in the world if you could figure that out.

Reality says though that uneven team environments normally don't work out. It's way too intricate to even attempt balance on that level. Watch people whine incessantly in other FPS games where teams are uneven (in number and certainly on skill) where that extra man or 2, or 4 (whatever that number it may be) is enough to break the game.. let alone weapons/equipment that may be twice or half as durable. It's not something you can design and it'll "just work"... it's very difficult... if not outright impossible.

If you can find an actual game (not BT/TT) that is designed totally around that, maybe you might have a shot.

It just never/rarely works in an online multiplayer environment.

[Scout Derek]

Can we PLEASE all agree that the Long Tom needs some adjustment, particularly in making it less effective than it already is with the damage that's put out by it?

Mystere, armies don't consist of just tanks, they consist of infantry, support (which we have in form of UAV and cool shots), and much much more.

We only got mechs and support, and limited at that. what, 48 mechs? man. that's a skimirsh in my book during a war on the planet. To have artillery come in every two minutes is costly as well, for it to be able to take out how many mechs it does in a match.

Hell, the only thing that needs to be changed is availability and usage.

For me, that's 3 shells with +1 for each set of 12 mechs destroyed for the team that has it available. Cool down is a even 4 minutes. ( that would mean at most 7 Long Tom shells, better than the unlimited shelling)

That way, you can choose to use Long Tom to even out the match if losing with its sheer firepower or to gain a little more edge in a fight.


Otherwise it'll always be this usually for those on the end of the Long Tom:

[Lily from animove]

627, on 14 July 2016 - 02:39 AM, said:

This is the theory, yes. But if you played the last event you can see how people and bigger units do this. First they scout with everyone and their moms till they hit 95% or so - after that, scout queue gets abandoned, only a handful stay there while the main force now rush the invasion mode. And those few left in scout queue are enough to keep it over 90% for at least an hour, more than enough time to scare off everyone who dares to defend that planet.

I saw 60+ defenders trying to scout back against only 10-12. So you won't get that 90% down in time.


And for the spawn camping, at least you can shoot back and your dropship can shoot back. Try knocking down that artillery shell...

btu this then coems down to the playerbase issues of being too low

Procurator Derek, on 15 July 2016 - 03:58 PM, said:

Can we PLEASE all agree that the Long Tom needs some adjustment, particularly in making it less effective than it already is with the damage that's put out by it?

Mystere, armies don't consist of just tanks, they consist of infantry, support (which we have in form of UAV and cool shots), and much much more.

We only got mechs and support, and limited at that. what, 48 mechs? man. that's a skimirsh in my book during a war on the planet. To have artillery come in every two minutes is costly as well, for it to be able to take out how many mechs it does in a match.

Hell, the only thing that needs to be changed is availability and usage.

For me, that's 3 shells with +1 for each set of 12 mechs destroyed for the team that has it available. Cool down is a even 4 minutes. ( that would mean at most 7 Long Tom shells, better than the unlimited shelling)

That way, you can choose to use Long Tom to even out the match if losing with its sheer firepower or to gain a little more edge in a fight.


Otherwise it'll always be this usually for those on the end of the Long Tom:

its like gabe is the baby of the medic and the heavy

Edited by Lily from animove, 15 July 2016 - 04:01 PM.

[Mystere]

1453 R, on 15 July 2016 - 03:54 PM, said:

Unfortunately, Commodity Warfare isn't going to get the ground-up complete redo most players 'suggest' it needs. It'd cost too much for a company which has already sunk a disastrous amount of resources into a game mode that players wanted more for nostalgia reasons than because they actually wanted to play it.

Here's the rub. PGI does not have to scrap CW and start from scratch. They just have to add to it -- add a campaign system, add more game modes, add asymmetry, create different victory conditions and rewards, etc.

Or is that really asking for too much?

Deathlike, on 15 July 2016 - 03:43 PM, said:

When people discuss having an "balanced imbalance", it's the idea that there is a counter or at least a weakness to the design, so that players that are familiar with counter it can perform the action ...

The "counter" to the LT is to take it away from the enemy. Again, it's the "match" vs. "war" mentality at odds.

[Deathlike]

1453 R, on 15 July 2016 - 03:54 PM, said:

Unfortunately, Commodity Warfare isn't going to get the ground-up complete redo most players 'suggest' it needs. It'd cost too much for a company which has already sunk a disastrous amount of resources into a game mode that players wanted more for nostalgia reasons than because they actually wanted to play it.

Frankly, I see things like the Scouting mode as about the only way you're going to get any sort of fixes for CW. New game modes, using existing or easily-built resources, that try new spins on the game rather than trying to salvage the truly incredibly awful Invasion mode. Except...people keep trying to demand that Piranha basically create a brand new game from scratch, which we all bloody well know they're not going to do.

Thus a lot of my frustration with people kvetching so much over the Long Tom and the fact that Scouting actually has something resembling a point. We should be pushing for more stuff like Scout mode, not saying "dump all of CW and spend another two years rebuilding it from scratch AGAIN, and get it right this time!"

Experience shows that even if they did just throw away updating the rest of the game to focus exclusively on CW - AGAIN - for a while..it wouldn't really end up the way people keep demanding it end up.

That's a total error.

The purpose of CW/FW is to promote a purpose for buying all the mechs and stuff. Otherwise, this game has nothing to go on past Quick Play... which ironically has been the case since inception.

You're mistaking nostalgia for purpose.

Nostalgia is creating imaginary conflicts between factions. It's great for roleplaying, and as long as people don't take it too serious... it's good community banter. However, you don't design a game around that - people create that among themselves.

Purpose however.. is the vital reason to actually play the game. There has to be an endgame goal. That's what leagues are created generally... to provide something that the game doesn't nominally provide. However, this isn't MW4 or any of the previous incarnations. We have a dev group "actively" trying to improve the game... and this means it is in their best interest to KEEP THE PLAYERS INTERESTED in the game. This means FW/CW has to be developed to retain people as much as possible.

Otherwise, it's very easy to write off the game... since all we have is a quick-game shooter that provides nothing of substance for anyone involved past nostalgia for mechs.

[MischiefSC]

Mystere, on 15 July 2016 - 03:41 PM, said:

Some people scout because they want to gain a huge strategic advantage. Again, it's the &quot;match&quot; vs &quot;war&quot; mentality at odds.



Sigh. I'm going to repeat myself:



After all that, are you still really going to insist that I really do not want a fair or balanced game environment? &lt;smh&gt;

If factions had a unified command and everyone dropping on a front was required to be involved in a military command structure, or any strategic anything this wouldn't be a conversation.

Current system though is that winning Scouting = invasion irrelevant. Scouting queue balance is bad, even if it wasn't though winning Scouting = Invasion irrelevant is a truly terrible game design. Invasion play is irrelevant, only thing that matters is scouting. If you don't want to play sxouting then no reason to play.

Bad game design.

[Baulven]

Being unguided artillery shells are actually extremely cheap to mass produce and use. That being said at 120 damage they would blow away large sections of population centers and would be a terrible weapon on most planets. It severely needs adjusted both in frequency and overall damage. Honestly once every two satellite sweeps would be sufficient, and damage needs reduced by at least half of not more right now.

[Deathlike]

Mystere, on 15 July 2016 - 04:03 PM, said:

The "counter" to the LT is to take it away from the enemy. Again, it's the "match" vs. "war" mentality at odds.

That's not really a counter in this case.

Even while people are actively trying to.. the game mechanics promote more of a landslide design, instead of a see-saw. If one side quickly reaches that Long Tom point of 90%, well - the Invasion queue ON ITS OWN stops (it may be slow initially, but people will get the message after being bombed at least once). That's poor design. You don't want EITHER SIDE to stop queuing BECAUSE of the mechanic. The game needs to continue... but it can't - the game is over as far as everyone is concerned (both owners of the Long Tom and the opfor).

That's horribly broken, regardless of how you wish to justify it. If noone shows, why play anymore CW/FW for the night?

[Mystere]

Procurator Derek, on 15 July 2016 - 03:58 PM, said:

Can we PLEASE all agree that the Long Tom needs some adjustment, particularly in making it less effective than it already is with the damage that's put out by it?

I think that's pretty much established. The rest is just "details".

Procurator Derek, on 15 July 2016 - 03:58 PM, said:

Mystere, armies don't consist of just tanks, they consist of infantry, support (which we have in form of UAV and cool shots), and much much more.

Precisely. Or translated in another way: we need immersion and depth. And no, it can be done without infantry. But, we do need support "systems" -- like the LT as the benefit of achieving artillery superiority.

Heck, we can even have another scouting mode, but this time for air superiority.

Otherwise,

Mystere, on 15 July 2016 - 03:55 PM, said:

Then scrap CW altogether, build Solaris, and be done with all of this ridiculousness, because CW is not the correct environment for such a thing.

Then the question now becomes, does PGI have the guts to openly say and do so.

[HammerMaster]

Match mentality vs warfare mentality.



Warfare. Not single mech match. Not 4 mech each match silliness. Faction warfare should be expenditure tracking. Repair. Rearm. Long term. Real immersion.

[Mystere]

Deathlike, on 15 July 2016 - 04:03 PM, said:

Purpose however.. is the vital reason to actually play the game. There has to be an endgame goal. That's what leagues are created generally... to provide something that the game doesn't nominally provide. However, this isn't MW4 or any of the previous incarnations. We have a dev group "actively" trying to improve the game... and this means it is in their best interest to KEEP THE PLAYERS INTERESTED in the game. This means FW/CW has to be developed to retain people as much as possible.

One of PGI greatest failings is in communicating their plans and vision. Of course it assumes they actually have a plan and vision, and that they want to reveal it to their player base.

Deathlike, on 15 July 2016 - 04:08 PM, said:

That's not really a counter in this case.

Even while people are actively trying to.. the game mechanics promote more of a landslide design, instead of a see-saw. If one side quickly reaches that Long Tom point of 90%, well - the Invasion queue ON ITS OWN stops (it may be slow initially, but people will get the message after being bombed at least once). That's poor design. You don't want EITHER SIDE to stop queuing BECAUSE of the mechanic. The game needs to continue... but it can't - the game is over as far as everyone is concerned (both owners of the Long Tom and the opfor).

That's horribly broken, regardless of how you wish to justify it. If noone shows, why play anymore CW/FW for the night?

You say poor design, I say severely lacking in features and current ones needing adjustment.

HammerMaster, on 15 July 2016 - 04:18 PM, said:

Match mentality vs warfare mentality.

Precisely. It a core root of the problem ... for developers and players alike.

[1453 R]

HammerMaster, on 15 July 2016 - 04:18 PM, said:

Match mentality vs warfare mentality.



Warfare. Not single mech match. Not 4 mech each match silliness. Faction warfare should be expenditure tracking. Repair. Rearm. Long term. Real immersion.

No, it really really really really shouldn't. Repair/Rearm has no place in an online multiplayer game. You should lose your match because the other team beat you (or because your faction gave up on Scout and your team couldn't compensate for the recon advantages), not because you couldn't afford to pay for armor. Losing a game because you couldn't afford to field undamaged 'Mechs is a really damn awful way to lose.

Frankly, if I had my druthers for FP, I'd set each given planet up as a two-week attack cycle - two or more factions spend the entirety of two IRL weeks fighting for a planet, over the course of hundreds of 'wedges' or whatever. After that, whichever side wins earns a planet-specific (as much as possible, which is likely not very, but still) bonus for having won that fight - one that applies across all of the game, not just Commodity Warfare. Not dumb junk like "cheaper DRG-1Ns!" either - nobody gives a rat about 'Mech pricing after a while, and most FP players are the sort who've been here for a while.

Doesn't have to be major, but giving, say, Clan Wolf loyalists or contracted mercs (who were CW contracted mercs at some point during the fight, and have not switched their loyalties since) 5% bonus C-bill winnings for capturing a mercantile planet, or 10% increased UAV duration for capturing a planet with a lot of technology and R&D on it, or other nifty-but-not-ridiculous little bonuses like that, would go a long way towards providing some context and purpose for CW. Let the bonuses fall off after the next two-week cycle, to be replaced (or not, if you sucked) by the next set of planetary capture bonuses for the current CW cycle.

You don't need to do the Mystere "turn this game into Civilizations except as an FPS. Somehow" nonsense. Just provided some incentives worth playing for, and perhaps come up with some way for a player's choice of faction to actually mean something to them, rather than "which icon do I like the most/who has the best set of bonuses this week?"

[TELEFORCE]

This is absolutely ridiculous. They either need to nerf the Long Tom into the ground, at least to table top levels, or just rename it orbital bombardment. A naval autocannon orbital bombardment does the same type of damage as the current implementation of the Long Tom.

[-Vompo-]

When ever you have something in the game that actually makes loads of people stop playing you should consider that it might be broken.
Andi and others who think long tom is great and a gift from the gods should probably go play some cw or fw as it's now called and see the difference in queues between planest with long tom active and planets that don't.
I'd claim that most players don't even wish to attack planets with long tom on their side let alone face it.

I'm not claiming it is impossible to win against long tom but I am yet to play a fun game with long tom active.

[MischiefSC]

Something other than long tom.

Something that is interesting and useful but not decisive.

We don't need something stealing kills and farming damage from the players.

If it's decisive in scouting then invasion is irrelevant. FW is won or lost in scout queue first. So 4man queue closes 12man queue.

This is horrible game design. It's driven the bulk of players out. Trying to say that scaling it down a bit will be relevant is an irrational discussion.

If the underlying result is "win in Scouting, Invasion is easy" then we are at the exact same failure we are at now.

If you have an automated system killing players and farming damage most people won't like it. It defeats the point of the players being there. If it's doing 4 kills and 2k damage even it's better than 90% of players and, as such, a bad mechanic. See above point on scout queue closing invasion queue.

This isn't even touching on the balance issues.

[HammerMaster]

1453 R, on 15 July 2016 - 04:34 PM, said:

No, it really really really really shouldn't. Repair/Rearm has no place in an online multiplayer game. You should lose your match because the other team beat you (or because your faction gave up on Scout and your team couldn't compensate for the recon advantages), not because you couldn't afford to pay for armor. Losing a game because you couldn't afford to field undamaged 'Mechs is a really damn awful way to lose.





Frankly, if I had my druthers for FP, I'd set each given planet up as a two-week attack cycle - two or more factions spend the entirety of two IRL weeks fighting for a planet, over the course of hundreds of 'wedges' or whatever. After that, whichever side wins earns a planet-specific (as much as possible, which is likely not very, but still) bonus for having won that fight - one that applies across all of the game, not just Commodity Warfare. Not dumb junk like &quot;cheaper DRG-1Ns!&quot; either - nobody gives a rat about 'Mech pricing after a while, and most FP players are the sort who've been here for a while.

Doesn't have to be major, but giving, say, Clan Wolf loyalists or contracted mercs (who were CW contracted mercs at some point during the fight, and have not switched their loyalties since) 5% bonus C-bill winnings for capturing a mercantile planet, or 10% increased UAV duration for capturing a planet with a lot of technology and R&amp;D on it, or other nifty-but-not-ridiculous little bonuses like that, would go a long way towards providing some context and purpose for CW. Let the bonuses fall off after the next two-week cycle, to be replaced (or not, if you sucked) by the next set of planetary capture bonuses for the current CW cycle.

You don't need to do the Mystere &quot;turn this game into Civilizations except as an FPS. Somehow&quot; nonsense. Just provided some incentives worth playing for, and perhaps come up with some way for a player's choice of faction to actually mean something to them, rather than &quot;which icon do I like the most/who has the best set of bonuses this week?&quot;

So you don't want immersion?

Edited by HammerMaster, 15 July 2016 - 05:14 PM.

[Mystere]

1453 R, on 15 July 2016 - 04:34 PM, said:

You don't need to do the Mystere "turn this game into Civilizations except as an FPS. Somehow" nonsense. Just provided some incentives worth playing for, and perhaps come up with some way for a player's choice of faction to actually mean something to them, rather than "which icon do I like the most/who has the best set of bonuses this week?"

Ahem! You not wanting a campaign system for CW does not make it nonsense. Now dumbing down CW, like the mentioned faction consolidation idea, that is nonsense. <shrugs>

HammerMaster, on 15 July 2016 - 05:13 PM, said:

So you don't want immersion?

He obviously doesn't. He just wants his loot ... just like in any other multi-player game.

TELEFORCE, on 15 July 2016 - 04:44 PM, said:

This is absolutely ridiculous. They either need to nerf the Long Tom into the ground, at least to table top levels, or just rename it orbital bombardment. A naval autocannon orbital bombardment does the same type of damage as the current implementation of the Long Tom.

Just imagine the resulting rage if PGI actually did that. It will be the ultimate trolling of the player base.

Edited by Mystere, 15 July 2016 - 05:36 PM.

[Mystere]

MischiefSC, on 15 July 2016 - 04:03 PM, said:

If factions had a unified command and everyone dropping on a front was required to be involved in a military command structure, or any strategic anything this wouldn't be a conversation.

As I keep saying: lack of depth.

In the meantime, enjoy the new supply caches! It's a richly immersive system for CW.

Edited by Mystere, 15 July 2016 - 05:23 PM.