78 replies to this topic

[Pat Kell]

DaFrog, on 31 July 2016 - 02:14 PM, said:

We do not need LONG TOM because it is implemented in artillery strikes and air strikes. There never was, in Btech history, a mini long tom and a Hiroshima Long Tom.

now you want to make scouting important ? Then the party that out scouted the other one gets to be able to use it's artillery strikes and air strikes. The losing party is denied being able to use them.

This was discussed as a possible replacement for long tom in the town hall meeting. When Russ asked me if I thought that it was powerful enough to get people to want to scout a planet to 90% I said no, as it stands now, arty and air strike are not powerful enough to warrant that much effort. People may do it for fun but not specifically for that benefit. That last tier in scouting needs to be powerful, just not as powerful as the current state. Maybe it can deny the enemy arty and air strikes AND get some sort of buffs to friendly arty and air strikes...who knows. I don't always know what is going to work, I just know when something isn't working and long tom isn't working

Edited by Pat Kell, 31 July 2016 - 02:31 PM.

[Baulven]

I think long Tom should become a wide artillery strike (say 500m) that does 30 damage at center and drops off at 200m (20) and 400m (10) and strikes once every 4 minutes. It's still helpful, it probably won't get more than the accidental occasional kill, and the damage amount will still provide a tangible bonus to the owners of the 90%.

If that is not an option, killing it and replacing it with another advantage (maybe more drop deck tonnage) would be best. Right now people purposefully stop scouting because it is no fun and clears queues faster than chipolte.

[Aylward]

Pat Kell, on 31 July 2016 - 02:29 PM, said:

This was discussed as a possible replacement for long tom in the town hall meeting. When Russ asked me if I thought that it was powerful enough to get people to want to scout a planet to 90% I said no, as it stands now, arty and air strike are not powerful enough to warrant that much effort. People may do it for fun but not specifically for that benefit. That last tier in scouting needs to be powerful, just not as powerful as the current state. Maybe it can deny the enemy arty and air strikes AND get some sort of buffs to friendly arty and air strikes...who knows. I don't always know what is going to work, I just know when something isn't working and long tom isn't working

[Big Tin Man]

Copied and pasted from my other thread for relevance...

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As for the long tom discussion, the community heard you Russ, you like long tom, you like the effect and you like that it gives a big incentive to push for it in scouting. Most of us don't because IT KILLS QUEUES. We have a gentleman's agreement specifically NOT to push to LT because IT KILLS QUEUES. The concept of LT is currently toxic to the community, it needs to go away for a while. You sound pretty married to seeing the effect, so how about this:

Air Superiority--A straight out BUFF to all airborne consumables, and the side that doesn't have it can still have their normal things. So this would do the following:

--Arty's become actual long toms (not mini nukes), and use LORE values (single blast, 60 points of damage at epicenter, reduces to zero as it goes outward, maybe slightly larger than current AOE for arty). Keep the effect, reduce it in size a bit, and makes the LT lore folks happy. Add a bit of time to the cooldown. #WINNING all around

--Airstrikes become a dropship strafing run. Dropship flies along the same path as an airstrike and blasts mechs with lasers. Aim for the DS to hit for 30-40 damage per mech in the path. Increase cooldown a bit as well. And the effect and sounds of a Leopard buzzing the battle blasting mechs with lasers would quite frankly be, AWESOME.

--UAV receives a significant boost to range, duration and health. Maybe make it a small drone that circles around a 100m circle making it even harder to shoot down. And the lurms shall RAIN.

Still quite a meaningful boost to reach the highest level of scouting reward, players control the damage instead of being the middle finger of god squishing mechs every 2 minutes.

[fragmented]

How about instead of 600 points, or whatever it is, to top out the scouting queue. Make the resource totals smaller (say 200), so it swings more fluidly. This way it at least give the other side a chance to swing the map in their favor without 100 scout drops, and you'll never know if the other team will have the long tom. I won't play a round that I'm against a long tom.

[Jackball]

Could the fix be something as simple as an extra 20 drop tons per player instead of Arty? This removes the fun of having you gain/loose the ability during a match while scouting is happening (which is pretty cool). But seems pretty simple and does give a significant advantage.

[DaFrog]

Pat Kell, on 31 July 2016 - 02:29 PM, said:

This was discussed as a possible replacement for long tom in the town hall meeting. When Russ asked me if I thought that it was powerful enough to get people to want to scout a planet to 90% I said no, as it stands now, arty and air strike are not powerful enough to warrant that much effort. People may do it for fun but not specifically for that benefit. That last tier in scouting needs to be powerful, just not as powerful as the current state. Maybe it can deny the enemy arty and air strikes AND get some sort of buffs to friendly arty and air strikes...who knows. I don't always know what is going to work, I just know when something isn't working and long tom isn't working

Fair enough, I admit by that time in the roundtable, I had no more attentino to spare to that as I was quite desillusioned about the whole process.

I will stick to my guns though: it is pointless to talk about buckets when we have no players. So buckets should not have been at the top of the topics, it should have been making FP popular and the most preferred mode. After that is fixed, you bucket the heck out of it.

[Pat Kell]

DaFrog, on 01 August 2016 - 04:13 PM, said:

Fair enough, I admit by that time in the roundtable, I had no more attentino to spare to that as I was quite desillusioned about the whole process.

I will stick to my guns though: it is pointless to talk about buckets when we have no players. So buckets should not have been at the top of the topics, it should have been making FP popular and the most preferred mode. After that is fixed, you bucket the heck out of it.

I agree that getting more to play is ideal, but if you are a small company with little resources to spare on paying people it's either time to take a huge gamble and see if you can retool things enough to bring players back or focus on what is working and see if there are small, easy things you can do to improve the situation some and build on that. Russ appears to have chosen the latter and I hope it works. Time will tell I suppose.

[Thorn Hallis]

If scouting is ment to be oh so important, how about making it two-way, so both sides can get the Long Tom?

[B L O O D W I T C H]

Thorn Hallis, on 01 August 2016 - 11:52 PM, said:

If scouting is ment to be oh so important, how about making it two-way, so both sides can get the Long Tom?

I don't understand, it already is two-way, either side can get the longtom as long as they maintain 90%.
Do you want both sides be able to have longtime simultaniously?


Anyhow, longtom issues:

130 damage to component
2 minute cooldown

That's it. That's what longtom drives people away from invasion matches.
Only this 2 values. Literally TWO VALUES.
I simply can not comprehend why it should be this difficult to change 2 values.
It is literally less work then pressing 10 keys. Me typing the last sentence took more effort.

My take, immediate fix for invasion and longtom:

Change 130 damage to component to 45 damage.
Change cooldown to 6 minutes.
(exclude cockpit internals from taking damage for even better gameplay results)

GG close, longtom fixed, no more b!tching, invasion with longtom playable again.

Longtom is still in the game, it would still hurt (a lot), it would still add to the game (tho, visual rather than balance) invasion games don't get completely wrecked. Scouting still has meaning.

[Sedmeister]

How about:

1) Long Tom can be disabled in FW by placing a destroyable node (like the Alpha node in the Domination game)? Kill the Long Tom generator in game and you shut it down.
2) Increase payout for scouting. At the very least, ramp up the amount of loyalty points for scouting. The economy for scouting (ie: que wait times versus paltry returns) make scouting a low priority for many players I speak with.
3) Turn Long Tom into emp damage. So the effected mechs are forcibly powered down rather than physically damaged/destroyed.

I am not a fan of it and reckon it diminishes the game but if PGI are wed to it, hopefully these suggestions might mitigate player frustration?

[MischiefSC]

So I want to get this clear -

Everyone seems to agree that scouting, apparently, sucks and is no fun as a gamemode and nobody would bother to play it if it didn't provide a significant advantage to Invasion?

[Waylander40K]

1- Have the Long Tom only active for Invasion (not-active in counter attack), and the invader side only (i.e. no long Tom bonus for the defender, give bonus c-bills instead in scouting mode for defending side)

2- Long Tom targets, enemy turrets and generators.

3- Very large smoke indicator, ~10seconds before strike (sequence of strikes marked on invader players map).

4- Only has e.g. 3 strikes in a match.


e.g. opens up at start of match. Destroys a random gate, a minute later 2nd strike removes turrets around orbital gun, 3rd strike targets furthest generator from the gate the 1st strike destroyed.

In other words the Long Tom makes it easier for the attacker, but in a predictable way so that defenders can easily avoid there own mechs taking damage.

[AnTi90d]

MischiefSC, on 02 August 2016 - 01:10 AM, said:

So I want to get this clear -

Everyone seems to agree that scouting, apparently, sucks and is no fun as a gamemode and nobody would bother to play it if it didn't provide a significant advantage to Invasion?

Personally, I don't like scouting. Running around a huge map looking for one tiny 140kph+ mecha-weasel isn't my idea of Battletech or fun. I only run scouting when there's an event that drastically increases my reward for playing a game mode that I don't want to play.

I also agree with your point that one game mode shouldn't shut down another.. especially when one side can get to 100% just by ghost dropping by abusing PGI's inability to balance faction populations. I have no idea why Russ is so in love with the idea; it's bad game design.. which is something that the CEO of a gaming company should understand.

As long as Russ sets the 3rd scouting bonus to something that does damage from out of nowhere, I won't drop against it. (Yes, I have played several matches when Thomas was against us and won. I understand it isn't a win button.. I just hate it won't reward the other side with my participation.) He can nerf it all he wants.. and the people that use it can have fun ghost dropping or chasing new players out of the mode, forever.

[Tom Sawyer]

Said it before and I shall say it again. Scouting should have never been a separate game mode. Rather I would like to see a giant map with more than just a gun and gate. Have objectives way out on the fringes that give bonuses to those willing to capture. A version of long tom that is given to the DC to use perhaps once could be one. Or the overhead sat system. Control of special turrets or AI tanks.

Makes CW a tactical game as well as a run and gun. Does the DC have his scouts do what they are meant to do? Dispatch a medium to help? Meanwhile the heavies and assaults are moving to the space base, com tower, bunker, factory to attack. Multiple targets needing taking and the team that gains the most objective points wins, or destroys the opposing side.

[Lehmund]

2 ideas that can work.

Change LT to this:
--> 300m area of effect. 10 Artillery Strike smoke plumes show up in the area of effect, random placement, followed by artillery strikes of same strength as pilot called ones. The idea here is your massive Scouting has given the satellite overhead the location of the enemy mechs, and they are shooting a barrage in that area in aerial support of the invasion team. This also means that the mini-arty strikes are totally avoidable for pilots aware enough.

Another idea that did come up at the round table but forgotten, that I like. It has been mentioned here in this thread too:
--> The team with LT gets to use their Air Strikes + Arty Strikes without team cooldown. This allows the team to do localized severe damage. The team that doesn't have LT cannot use Arty Strikes or Air Strikes while LT is against them.

Both these give significant advantages to the owner team to bring Scouting to 90% on a planet as they change the gameplay but without ensuring victory. I.e. I can totally see 12-man teams still handily defeating pug teams or less skilled 12-mans even with LT against them, but it would give the other team a fighting chance too.

Edited by Lehmund, 02 August 2016 - 04:48 AM.

[BluefireMW]

feeWAIVER, on 29 July 2016 - 02:57 PM, said:

Here's an idea!
How bout 90% gives a bonus in scouting mode that encourages people to hold the 90%?
Like double cbills or something.

no one, will scout anytime for this

[Dawnstealer]

It's a viable award for scouting on one hand, but it goes off too many times. If it happened once in a match, it would be fine - kill half of one wave? Perfect: that's a great reward for scouts doing their job.

But going off roughly once a wave kills 3/4ths of your team before they even SEE the enemy? That's not fun.

At all.

If it happens once in a match? Okay - you've got an uphill climb, but you might be able to recover. More than once? No - you might as well DC, because that game's over.

[Zimm Kotare]

An idea which would require a bit of work, more so than adjusting/modifying LT:

On reaching a certain point beyond the first two rewards, scouts gain access to a new mission (as a scout fan I'd love this), this new missions central conceit is that the scouts have achieved sufficient Intel collection to discern the location of critical infrastructure.

In this case, as an example, I would suggest the scouts are offered the opportunity to attack a defenders primary air base, with a defending team of scouts in play, alongside base defences.

This stacks the odds against attackers, making the final reward (which I will get to in a moment) all the more difficult to achieve and rewarding. Though perhaps a clever team could draw off defenders sufficiently to expose the target: perhaps a control tower to capture/destroy or a grounded flight of attack craft to destroy.

If victorious, these scouts grant their Invaders periodic aerial sweeps with large laser equipped aircraft or lore suitable direct fire craft. The direct fire is crucial because it allows the other team the chance to get their heads down, making the flights non-definitive but still something the other team could take advantage of: "flight isn't getting hits but while they're suppressed, we push".


You could even say that scouts that failed this final super-objective would grant their opponents Invaders the same bonus by failing to cripple their air support. Though this is obviously fraught with potential issues.

Just a thought, myself I'd love to see a scout drop working towards a reward of a new, cool challenge beyond the standard scout missions.

[Hotthedd]

Replace Long Tom with Air Superiority

The team that does not have Air Superiority cannot use Air Strikes, Arty Strikes, or UAVs.

Certainly a hefty advantage, but not so much as to be game breaking.