20 replies to this topic

[Sean Lang]

[TheCaptainJZ]

Is this supposed to be the official devlog they promised?

[martian]

Could somebody simply post the text version of this ... "stuff"?

Thanks.

[TheCaptainJZ]

It's 2 hours long and I'm only 20 minutes in, but Solaris as a standalone, 24/7 feature is going away and will be incorporated into the event queue, which really is a good way to do it. It won't always be Solaris but they can have actual structure to it or even have a tournament. They can do a lot of kinds of modifiers like low gravity, MGs only, stuff like that for unique events. It'll be interesting to see what they do with it.

[Nightbird]

Ummm... expect more of this then

[LordNothing]

^ that is certain no matter what you do. the game is too old to attract new players, and its even getting too long in the tooth for some of the grognards.

[SFC174]

Is the event queue going to be opt-in, or will anyone wanting to play during "event-time" be automatically placed in said queue? Sorry, I can't spare the time to listen to these guys talk for hours when the relevant info is just a few paragraphs. Thanks in advance for whoever slogged through it and posts the takeaways here.
"

[TheCaptainJZ]

SFC174, on 22 March 2022 - 12:46 PM, said:

Is the event queue going to be opt-in, or will anyone wanting to play during "event-time" be automatically placed in said queue? Sorry, I can't spare the time to listen to these guys talk for hours when the relevant info is just a few paragraphs. Thanks in advance for whoever slogged through it and posts the takeaways here.
"

It can be turned on and off as desired so not 24/7. It would be a separate button in the Mechbay.

[SFC174]

TheCaptainJZ, on 22 March 2022 - 02:20 PM, said:

It can be turned on and off as desired so not 24/7. It would be a separate button in the Mechbay.

Ok, at least they wouldn't be forcing people to play whatever wacky mode they come up with. Of course, that's gonna split the population which has its own issues...

Probably should work on matchmaking first (unicorn dreams).

[East Indy]

Obligatory plug for Solaris becoming more fighting game/class-focused, where players have a limited set of thematic and thoughtfully balanced chassis choices created and voted on by the community — maybe event rankings and separate rewards for each so all 'Mechs see playtime even if the balance doesn't work out in execution.

[PocketYoda]

Please buy our packets of salt, salt is bad for you...

8v8 was excellent. Faster load times, faster games, better builds and far less lrms.. Tonnage and groups ruined it but that looks like PGI knows this.

8v8 will not stop stomps.. i did see less stomps personally.


Just an idea
Why not use Quickplay maps for Faction play..

Edited by Nomad Tech, 25 March 2022 - 05:44 PM.

[LordNothing]

SFC174, on 22 March 2022 - 04:39 PM, said:

Ok, at least they wouldn't be forcing people to play whatever wacky mode they come up with. Of course, that's gonna split the population which has its own issues...

Probably should work on matchmaking first (unicorn dreams).

eq is going to be weird. i think the only way it works is if it is a time share with the other buckets, like solaris or fp. every mode gets a scheduled slot. but seeing as the only creatures in the known universe that can stay civil about time shares are cats, i think its going to be a bust to do it that way. not that its a bad idea, fp already has its defacto peak periods, and if you are smart about your time slicing you can hit those. solaris really isn't played nearly as heavy as fp is and it would get a proportionally smaller slice of the pie. anything left can go to the wacky mode of the week or whatever. but because everyone expects their preferred mode to be there every time the log on all the time, no serious change will occur.

making a fourth bucket is even more absurd. i figure it will just be a dumping ground for all the failed modes, escort week or scouting day and things like that. might even see beacon chase (the mode you used to get when fp failed to make a match) or counter attack come back there. if they aren't going to do anything different with it its going to be a waste of space.

Edited by LordNothing, 23 March 2022 - 03:24 AM.

[MW Waldorf Statler]

Sounds for me a Little like CoD MW...constant changing of modes and game events, and if the only mode I played Plunder didn't come for weeks, I didn't even look in to see if it was back after weeks and was interested in other games found...the changing of FP Modes and only palyable Factions destroyed by me each interest for FP (+ the long Wainting Times for Ghost drops)

Edited by MW Waldorf Statler, 23 March 2022 - 04:06 AM.

[TheCaptainJZ]

This is not a stand-in for the official devlog. Hopefully we still get that this week, that is Matt's intent (he joined the 2nd hour) but you know how something always comes up and changes their plans.

This isn't a transcript but some things talked about:
The 8v8 weekend was supposed to happen later, but they changed it somewhat at the last minute based on needing or wanting that data sooner rather than later. Sounds like they have a narrow window to get it implemented with freed up engineers now. Matt was going to change group size, but was told or got the impression it might mess up faction play. Without knowing the ramifications, he didn't. They got the feedback loud and clear about 8v8. Some people liked it and some people hated it and they mostly hated it because groups and tonnage issues ruined it. There's no plan to change QP to 8v8. I wish they'd do a better job of communicating their ideas. An informal chat like this would go a long way honestly. I understand they are busy but they've not been able to keep up with devlogs the past year. It would be nice to know what they are hearing in terms of feedback. They said they do read and see the feedback--either directly or it's compiled for them--and from various channels. Matt did admit the roadmap released this year might have been a bit of an overcorrection on their part. He and Daeron are working on more behind the scenes but nothing is certain so they don't want to start talking about something and have it fall through. They only managed to achieve about 1/3 of the roadmap last year. They've been talking to engineers about what is possible with some of the ideas they have.

They know Solaris is mostly a dead mode which is why it's getting replaced (pretty sure no one will be sad to see it go). It can remain as a limited time event queue rather than 24/7. With the event queue, they want to have a many controls available as possible. They should be able to limit the chassis and variant and have the UI tell you, ok, here's the requirements for this queue and here's a mech picker for valid mechs you own. They will want to have a trial mech available that fits the parameters so everyone can participate. They want to be able to change things like low gravity or Urbies only or Steiner Scout Lance with the scouting game mode, etc. Matt intends to release the list of variables and ask for ideas from the community. I think it's a great idea and the goal is to freshen gameplay in new and interesting ways with existing content to try and extend the life of the game for as long as they can by making it as fun and interesting as they can with the resources they have with such an old game. Matt got inspiration from other live games his kids play. I thought of Halo MCC myself which sometimes has Race or other specialized game types in a queue. They can control group size. He will be able to give different rewards also. And the Event Queue won't affect PSR.

Phil talked a lot about the matchmaker and trying to get Daeron and Matt to work on tweaking it sooner rather than later, even if in small ways to improve matches. He said it's the number one issue among players and pressed why PGI hasn't done anything with it or tweaked it. Daeron said they're always talking about it, but nothing concrete was offered by PGI on this point. It might be that Matt and Daeron are still new to the reports and controls available to them and haven't determined what changes would really improve the match maker. Matt seems more focused on getting the event queue implemented which again seems to be a window of opportunity for the resources he needs. Hopefully they say something more about this soon.

[martian]

TheCaptainJZ, on 23 March 2022 - 05:25 AM, said:

This isn't a transcript but some things talked about: ....

Thanks for the info.

[LordNothing]

yep, i kind of think i like where this is headed. i like the idea of steiner scouting or urbie death arena.

[HGAK47]

I really hope they do the event queue it sounds like it could offer some really fun experiences. I was hoping that the roadmap would have gone into it but at least we have a little more information on it now.

[Vorpal Puppy]

I listened to more than half of this --- my feedback for Matt is that event queue sounds interesting, but if you REALLY want to bring players back, an improved matchmaker should be your absolute #1 priority. Even with soup queue the way it is, as Sean said, the matchmake frequently makes very poor decisions. You often can look at the teams and see that if you just rearranged the pugs you could create more balanced matches. Win or lose, 12-0, 12-1 matches are not fun.

[feeWAIVER]

I'm more interested in a potential FP revamp than anything.

[TheCaptainJZ]

feeWAIVER, on 24 March 2022 - 10:47 AM, said:

I'm more interested in a potential FP revamp than anything.

Daeron is supposed to be working on that, they both know it's been neglected, but I don't think there's much they can do without a larger team and more resources, unfortunately.